My dad should have stayed single.

On the surface my dad's second wife is nurturing, supportive and involved. They used to work together and for a while it seemed that she worshipped the ground he walked on.

After my parents got divorced,"Samantha" and my dad worked togther 70 hours a week. It didn't take too long until they started dating and before I knew it... they had set a wedding date.

I saw Samantha as driven, pushy, nosy and overbearing but I figured as long as she was treating my dad ok, it was none of my business.

My wife and I set up a wedding reception for my dad and Samantha, and took them to Las Vegas with us as a wedding present. As soon as we arrived at the hotel Samantha immediately became too relaxed. I got to hear about their sexual positions and what kind of pornos they watched together....this was a little too much for me. Weird and scary. I didn't want those pictures in my head.

This type of behavior went on and got worse. I became her confidante every time my father pissed her off. Samantha was great at making up outlandish stories about my dad. At first I would be extremely concerned when she told me that my father had rolled his pickup and attacked 4 police officers in a drunken rage. When I would speak to him face to face dad would tell me that he slid into a fence on a wet road and a cop let him use his cell phone to call a tow truck.

Samantha would make these crazy phone calls every so often and each one would be more unbelievable than the last. I finally stopped listening when she told me that dad and three other Vietnam Vets had beat her up, barricaded themselves on his ranch with several machine guns, three cases of scotch and were in the middle of an armed stand off.

Surely this would have made the news....

These stories would continue even when my dad was sitting right in front of me. Samantha would say to my dad, "Tell your son about when you were playing Russian Roulette last night" He rolled his eyes and said "We were watching the deer hunter last night Samantha...."

I soon learned to ignore her follies, until one Christmas, we were all sitting at the dinner table when she began telling us about her best friend who had a hysterectomy gone wrong and could no longer reach climax. I didn't like where this story was going. She went on ...about her friend dating men with bigger and bigger johnsons until finally out of desperation Samantha and her friend went to the donkey farm where you pay to have sex with animals. I'm all for a good story but I tend to prefer my Christmas dinner with mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce. Instead I got to hear about some lady getting slammed by a donkey.

I thought the donkey story was going to be the climax of the afternoon. I was sadly mistaken. Samantha was loving the attention her stories were getting from her guests. So she went on, talking to my dad this time, "Remember that Chinese restaurant you used to like so much? The owners were gay and they masturbated into your food" My dad finally had enough. "Shut the fuck up!" he yelled across the table. "Nobody wants to hear your crazy babbling"

This sent her off in a new direction..."well remember that time you had sex with that transvestite?"At this point I had enough. I calmly told Samantha that I could no longer sit there at Christmas dinner and listen to her disgusting fabrications. Luckily, she stopped before things got any worse.

I've decided that she is a mentally disturbed pathological liar with paranoid delusions or some kind of brain damage in the memory part of her brain.

Out of respect for my dad I just keep my mouth shut and go check on him myself whenever there is any question to what is going on

One thing's for sure....he sure knows how to pick em.

Want to impress your spouse or significant other?

Quick frittata.

Ingredients:

5 large eggs

1/2 cup of diced onion

1 diced seeded and rinsed jalapeno

1 heaping tsp of finely chopped cilantro or parsley (if you don't care for cilantro)

1/2 cup of drained and finely chopped artichoke hearts

1 tsp of capers

1 cup of regular or herbed feta crumbled

1 tbs butter

salt and pepper

break eggs into a bowl and lightly beat them but not completely homogeneous
lightly salt and pepper add capers and cilantro to the egg mixture.

Heat a large skillet on medium and add butter, onion, jalapeno and artichoke hearts.

When onions soften and sizzle about 3 min spread the onion mixture evenly over the bottom of the pan and pour on egg mixture

Do not stir.

Let eggs cook on medium for 1 min then remove from heat.

sprinkle feta on top of eggs

Place under a broiler for about 2 or 3 min watching carefully. I usually leave oven door partially open while I watch pan. do not let eggs brown. When the feta starts to melt sightly its time to remove from oven.

Remove from oven and cover pan.

After a minute or so check and make sure the eggs are firm and thoroughly cooked

Cut into large triangle wedges and serve with cantaloupe and sourdough toast.

Bob Barker refuses to do nude scenes....

"I'll take on a movie role if the right one came along, but filmmakers, take note: "I refuse to do nude scenes. These Hollywood producers want to capitalize on my obvious sexuality, but I don't want to be just another beautiful body."

Whole article here: Link...

I let the kids design the pumpkins this year.

Some pics for Halloween

Dragula.

The Munster Coach

Marty Feldman in Young Frankenstein

Gomez Addams and Uncle Fester.

Peter Boyle as the monster in Young Frankenstein

Halloween fun

This song was a favorite when I was a kid and here someone put together a good video for it .

Click on the link: Monster mash video

A little under the weather.

Caught some kind of crud so I'm talking it easy today.

I went ahead and re-posted the "tootsie roll" story below. It got a lot of views last month so I figured somebody must have liked it.

"Tootsie Roll"

When I was a kid nobody really explained the birds and bees to me in a way a child could understand. Too technical.. so I would just nod my head and go on being bewildered about the whole process.

One day I was at my dad's automotive shop sweeping and picking up trash when I spied one dog on top of another locked in some kind of strange seizure like embrace.

I looked over to Chuck, (one of my dad's employees) and asked him "what the heck is wrong with those dogs?" Laughing, Chuck told me that one dog was sick and the other one was pushing him to the dog hospital. Like a dumb ass, I asked "well shouldn't we help them" He just started laughing hysterically as I stood there dumbfounded. Being a kid I just put the event behind me and forgot all about it.

At the same shop we had two doberman guard dogs, fritz and Freda. One day I heard a tremendous squealing and squawking outside, I rushed out to their pen just in time to see the dogs stuck together back to back both trying to run in opposite directions. Both dogs were screaming and yelping like they were being scalded.

Panic stricken, I called my dad on the phone and explained to him what was going on. He told me to spray them with the hose until they broke free.

I hung up, grabbed the hose and started spraying the hell out of the conjoined canines. The water made things worse, now panicked by their predicament and frightened by the spray of cold water, fritz was running around dragging his partner in crime behind him.

Only then did I see what they were stuck together with. Shocked and disgusted by the whole disturbing ordeal I turned off the hose and left the dogs to their own devices, now a little bit wiser. Several weeks later I witnessed Freda give birth to 12 puppies. This completed my education on the birds and the bees. I thought to myself, "if that's how babies were made I wanted no freaking part of that nonsense".

Fast forward a couple of years. I'm sitting in 6th grade health class when the school nurse comes into our classroom and announces that we are going to be shown a very serious film about our growing bodies and how to care for them. The nurse warned us that if we did not take the film seriously or if we cut up in any way we would be sent to the Principal's office and given 3 days detention.

Sobered by this dire warning I noticed the boys and girls were being sent to different rooms.I was relieved that I wasn't going to have to endure this film in front of a bunch of girls.

As we approached the portable building where the boys film was being shown I noticed three boys sitting on the front steps next to the football coach. The boys were all red faced with tears steaming out of their eyes. Now I was really worried. As I got closer, one of the boys croaked in a hoarse whisper "tootsie roll".

By now I was almost in a full fledged panic attack. Sitting at the desk I was sweating profusely wondering what horrors lay in store for us.

Before the coach turned on the film projector he warned us a second time that anyone caught laughing would be sent to run laps then on to detention.

The projector started its chatter and the Walt Disney Logo appeared on the overhead screen. I thought to myself " what the hell is this?" All of the sudden these little green cartoon bugs wearing berets were being given a motivational speech by a larger bug dressed like Patton.

"Alright men we are germs and we are going to march up this man's the penis and give him gonorrhea!" Then the germs started singing a Disney song about travelling up the urethra chanting herpes! Gonorrhea! Syphilis! over and over as they goose stepped up this guys dick hole.

With every fiber of my being I fought the urge to guffaw. I felt like I was going to explode,my face flushed and tears were streaming out of my eyes. I put my head down on the desk and began to convulse silently biting my lower lip till it bled. I thought, how could anyone at any age not roll on the ground laughing their asses off at Disney gonorrhea voiced by Mel Blanc.

The next film was about testicular cancer and how to test for it. They showed this man in the shower bathing himself. The guys hands were below camera level. Slowly the camera starts to pan downward towards his nether regions. It was like an unavoidable slow motion car wreck. My inner child screamed in agony as the film displayed this man massaging his balls in the shower. I let out an involuntary gasp as the word "tootsie roll" flashed into my brain.

This man had a dick the size of one of those tiny chocolate candies they give out at the bank.

I didn't have the urge to laugh but instead a feeling of confusion came over me. Horrible questions raced through my mind...why are they showing this man's tiny genitalia? I wondered what would possess someone with such a minuscule Johnson to be filmed and ridiculed by millions of school children. The film goes on, the guy finds a lump, goes to the doctor, gets a biopsy and wakes up with no testicles....and the guy is like: "whew, doc thanks I'm sure glad you caught the cancer in time".

The nutless tootsie roll man is shown holding hands with his wife as the film mercifully ends.

Someday, when my son comes home from school with the health class permission slip, I think I'll let him skip school that day and have the doberman talk with him.

Kids do the damnedest things.

I'm constantly getting calls from my son's teacher about crazy shit he does at school. Not bad calls mind you. I got a message on my machine this afternoon telling me my son is infatuated with the class ant farm and wants to be reincarnated as an ant. I have no idea where he comes up with this shit.

The other day the teacher was passing around different herbs like basil, rosemary and thyme so the kids could smell them and see what they looked like. When the herbs didn't make it back up to the teacher she inquired on where they went. Apparently my son had put them in a girls armpit because he wanted to "cheer her up".

I'm going to have to have a long talk with that boy...

When he was two years old I would be pushing him in the grocery cart and whenever I paused to take something off the shelf and there happened to be a woman near by with a nice looking butt, he would grab a handful of it.

Needless to say, this often led to some embarassing situations. I had to be quick on my feet. Sometimes they thought it was cute, others thought I was a pervert placing blame on my kid. Ever try to reason with a 2 year old and try to prevent them from impulsively grabbing things?

Then at three years old sonny boy decided he liked boobs. We were at a steak restaurant one night and when the waitress bent down to pick up a plate kiddo reached in her blouse and grabbed a bare tit.

I was about to crawl under the table out of embarassment. Luckily he's a cute kid and she didn't raise a fuss, needless to say she got a hefty tip that night.

Now with all the election shit going on I've got people knocking on the door telling me to vote for some asshole or another. I was visiting the throne and dropping the brown kids off at the pool when the door bell rang.

Against all of my teachings and admonishments my son opened the door, I was trying to cut myself short and get out there to make sure he was safe when I heard him loudly exclaim "WE'RE REPUBLICANS!!!" and then a loud "slam".

When I got out to the living room there he was all pleased with himself dusting his hands off muttering something about friggin democrats.

I asked him where he learned "frigging democrats" and how he knew he was a Republican. He told me his class had mock elections and everyone including the teacher was pushing Democrats. He told me that he felt sorry for the Republicans because nobody liked them.

How can you argue with that logic?

Since my last name is of Hispanic origin I am frequently targeted as a liberal Democrat. I get Spanish language flyers on my door telling me to stop the moral bankruptcy of the current administration...

I offered my son a dollar for every time he slammed the door on someone canvassing for the democrats.

I haven't yet got around to explaining to him that I'm a Libertarian.

My favorite restaurant.

I used to live in an old well worn neighborhood that had not yet gone through any urban renewal. My side of the road consisted of fairly well kept older homes and the other side looked like crack alley. I don't know what causes a dichotomy like that.

There are quite a few family owned Mexican restaurants in the area and all are pretty decent.It's really hard to get bad food in a place where someones 90 year old Mexican grandma is back in the kitchen chained up to the stove.

Someone told me about a place called Las Brazas that was just a few blocks from my house. I had probably driven by it hundreds of times and never noticed it. One day a friend and I stopped in after a trip to the range.

I immediately knew why I had not noticed this place. It was a squat, squalid little building with badly tinted windows. The place was really run down. A closer look revealed that this was eatery was an old shack with a mobile home attached to the back then covered in cheap siding to make it look fancy.

I stepped inside and there were exactly six tables. One of them was 2 long folding tables like those in a school cafeteria with similar seating.

The chairs were badly stained with grease and food and the place was decorated like Sanford and Son meets Hiroshima.

We were hungry and I had a reliable source telling me this place was good. So I just went ahead and decided to suspend my fear of food poisoning for the time being.

The waitress had a gigantic rear end that barely fit between the already cramped tables. I was hoping it was because the place had good food.

I was hungry so I ordered the Guacamole Chalupas and the Cheese Enchiladas. The food came out quickly and at first I thought they had messed up my order.

They gave me a plate heaping at least six inches high mounded with lettuce, tomatoes, grated cheddar, about 2 pounds of fresh guacamole, home made green salsa, refried beans and melted cheese all on a crisp corn tortilla . Actually, 2 of these came in an order.

I can honestly say it was the freshest tastiest Mexican food I had had in my life up to that point.

I devoured every bite. the Enchiladas were more traditional but the sauce they used was out of this world.

My friend was served a giant bowl of Caldo, loaded with green chiles, two whole ears of corn, huge chunks of potato and about half a chicken. It was the soup you had to eat with a knife and fork.

Stuffed to the gills we waddled up to the cash register, My food came to just over $5.

I couldn't believe how good this place was. The best part was, it was the only place for miles open 24 hours. Later I noticed when the bars closed at 2AM people lined up around the building to get some of this food in their drunken faces.

I could never remember the name of the place so I just dubbed it "hole in the wall" everybody in the neighborhood new what I was talking about anyway.

I ended up eating at this place every day for months I finally had to slow down when my pants wouldn't button anymore.

Now when I have out of town guests, this is the first place I take them. They usually think I've lost my mind.

When people come to visit they usually want to go eat down town or on the River Walk.

Screw that. Why would I go pay big bucks for shitty tasteless tourist food when I could take my friends to the hole in the wall...

Quickie

Senator Hillary Clinton was invited to address a major gathering of The American Indian nation two weeks ago in upper New York State ...She spoke for almost an hour on her future plans for increasing every Native American's present standard of living, should she one day become the first female President. She referred to her career as a New York Senator, how she had signed "YES" for every Indian issue that came to her desk for approval. Although the Senator was vague on the details of her plan, she seemed most enthusiastic about her future ideas for helping her "red sisters and brothers".

At the conclusion of her speech, the Tribes presented the Senator with a plaque inscribed with her new Indian name - Walking Eagle.

The proud Senator then departed in her motorcade, waving to the crowds. A news reporter later inquired of the group of chiefs of how they had come to select the new name given to the Senator.

They explained that Walking Eagle is the name given to a bird so full of shit it can no longer fly.

Sometimes a coat hook is just a coat hook

My mom was always trying out new fads. She loved those crazy fad diets, psycho babble excuses for things wrong with our lives, and of course "self help" books. She had a new scheme every couple of weeks. When she decided that she was going to do the Dr. Shenanigans no food diet, or when Professor Gustaf E Looneypants said to pour Clorox bleach on your food before you eat it, the whole family suffered.

Whenever I would ask, "hey mom , why are we on a bird seed diet instead of the nothing white shall enter our bodies diet?" she would say "oh that last one didn't work but I swear this new one will purify us for sure" I'll probably never know what she was trying to cleanse us from.

Thank god grandma sent me some money each week. I kept a loaf of "forbidden" bread and a jar of "poison" peanut butter hidden in my sock drawer for emergencies.

Then mom decided all of our problems could be solved by psycho-therapy. The only mental issue I ever noticed was her always trying to solve our imaginary problems.

She had started going to a therapist and "Brent" became her new fad, "Brent this and Brent that" I soon began to think her new therapist must have a sugar coated prick or something.

Don't get me wrong, I was all for my mom getting mental help, lord knows she needed it. However, I soon found out that mom's new therapist was the type that blamed ones problems on outside forces. Brent decided to send mom to his wife Connie who was also a therapist. They had a small practice in an old house across town.

Since Connie was around my moms age, they soon became friends. This psychology business was so great that mom decided we were all crazy too and they whole family should go get therapy.

I was very hesitant and apprehensive about talking to someone about my problems, which were pretty much non-existent in my opinion. But since my dad had agreed to go, I didn't want to rock the boat and upset the delicate balance in our household.

On the way to my first session I was nervous as hell. I could just imagine the crazy shit I was going to have to put up with.

Connie was a late 30's hippy type lady, she was pleasant enough and we soon began to talk."Tell me about your parents?" Ha! no fucking way. I already knew better than that. They were her patients too. I became very evasive and just said, they're fine. An hour session would come and go and Connie would just end up talking about herself the whole time.

This suited me just fine. I didn't trust Connie for some reason and I soon felt that these sessions were all part of a conspiracy or some sort of evil plot.

My fears were soon confirmed when one day my mother took me aside and told me, "Connie says your father is crazy and should be hospitalized" The only time my mom spoke to me "buddy buddy" and in confidence was when she was trying to manipulate me.

I already knew my dad was perfectly fine and his only problem was his taste in women.

I knew for a fact that Connie was not supposed to talk about their patients, and especially not to their spouses. This made me clam up completely during my weekly session

I was really surprised when Connie all of the sudden started telling me about my parent's problems. This chick was as nutty as a fruitcake. How could she expect me to spill my guts to her when she blabbed everybodys business like a walking talking supermarket tabloid.

The final straw came when my mom called me in once more and revealed to me that Connie had discovered the source of all her problems. Apparently, my mom had a dream about a box of odds, end and various junk. Connie thought this was important and had mom search the house for this "mystery dream box." Mom told me she had found it.

She pulled out an old paper sack and carefully removed an object like it was the holy grail and laid it on the table. "What do you see?" she asked. I looked at the object not really knowing what to expect.

It was a bronze coat hook, the type you bolt to the back of a door. Probably $2 at the hardware store. "Well?...." she prodded. "It's a coat hook" I replied, This was not the correct answer of course. I took it to Connie and she says it's a penis. I knew better than to laugh at the absurdity of that last statement. The hook part of the object vaguely resembled a dick, but I think that was for the purposes of functionality as a coat hook, not a phallus.

With a straight face my mother said, "Connie says I was molested as a child and have repressed memories. This coat hook represents the penis I was molested with"

Riiigght.

My mom immediately called my grandmother and started screaming hysterically about how she could allow her own daughter to be molested. I was listening to this conversation on my short wave radio that was uniquely suited to listening to cordless phone calls.

My grandmother denied it of course and this sent my mom into another mouth frothing tirade. Of course mom didn't ever remember the molestation, or who did it. This was all based on a coat hook and a nutcase therapist.

Mom hasn't spoken to her family in almost twenty years now and she tried to force me away from them as well. Luckily by this time, I was old enough to make my own decisions.

Punch me in the face kemo sabe

Reading about Steven Novak's 15 min of fame made me think back to a strange event from my youth.


I was 10 years old living in Albuquerque New Mexico. One Friday night My mother came in the door and told me "We are going to Santa Fe on Sunday and you are going to audition for the new Lone Ranger movie. I said, "hmm, no thanks mom, I'm really not interested in being in any movie" My mom continued, "It will be fun, there will be lots of kids there all trying out for the part in the movie won't that be exciting?" "No thanks mom, can I go play now?" She suddenly screamed,"You are being a selfish little jerk can't you see this is what I want??!!!" Her face was twisted into this grotesque mask of rage.

This is one of the times I wish my dad would have stepped in, but he just said, "just do it for your mom." I was almost used to my mothers tantrums and by now and I knew it was a done deal. Short of me severely injuring myself or running away there was nothing I could do about going to this fucking audition.

I wracked my brain for a way out of it. Suddenly, I had an idea. I went up the street to my best friend Joey's and asked him for a favor. I told him what was going on with my crazy bitch mother. Joey seemed to sympathize with my plight and thought it was unfair that I had no choice in the matter. Banking on this, I asked him if he would please punch me in the face repeatedly as hard as he could and do as much damage as possible.

In my infinite ten year old wisdom I figured if I looked like shit with a broken nose, spit lip or bruises, I would at best not have to go to the stupid casting call or as a consolation prize not get picked once I got there.

Joey was apprehensive about punching me, he was my best friend after all. We went out to side of his house, I finally had him convinced.

His pudgy fist glanced off my cheek. It didn't feel good but it didn't hurt all that much either.I told him to hit me harder in the nose this time and quit being a fucking pussy about it. By this time Joey's dad came out of the garage and asked us what the hell we were doing. Joey ratted me out. My friends dad shook his head in disbelief and sent me home.

My avenues of escape were exhausted.

Sunday came too soon. We got in the car and drove the sixty miles or so to Santa Fe. Dad drove and my mom was as giddy as a school girl...fucking bitch. At that point I would have given anything not to see that arrogant smirk on her face .

We got to the center where the casting was being held. It was fairly large convention room with a stage set up near the back. A lady came by and handed out big white stickers numbered in black marker.

I still remember my number...95. There were around nine hundred kids in the room some of them dressed in garish cowboy garb, some of them with plastic toy pistols, and all of them were accompanied by wild eyed mothers itching to ride on the child star gravy train.

I knew for a fact that's what my mother wanted too. She was not shy about exploiting her resources.

Four serious looking guys in suits were up near the stage. They began calling groups of numbers. Kids began filing across the stage not unlike some dog show or the state fair cattle judging. They called my number, I walked up and across the stage with the most depressed sullen look I could muster.

I went back to where my parents were waiting. We had to wait until all the kids crossed the stage before they made their pick and I could go home.

Once everyone had walked past the suits, they called four numbers to go back up. Everyone else could go home.

I was turning around to reach for the door when I heard "95". Fuck! I turned around and walked back up, I didn't dare look at my mothers face because I know for a fact I would have killed her with my mind bullets.

I stood up the stage with three other boys. They looked at us for a minute and asked our ages. Two of us were ten and Two were twelve. They said, sorry, ten year olds were too slow mentally and wouldn't be able to handle the memorization or the discipline of being an actor.

I realized that I had been holding my breath for a long time. I let it out in a giant sigh of relief. On the drive back my dad told me he thought it was cool I made it to the final picks.

My mother just said, "well he wouldn't have been any good as an actor anyway....."

A strange courtship

Early 1991, I was a junior in college. I was working 60 hours a week, living on my own and putting myself through school. It was stressful and exhausting. I wanted to start dating and get a regular girlfriend because the mind games, nutbags and party girls were all too annoying and stressful to deal with.

I was on and off with a girl at work but she had taken up with an ex-con, I.V. druggie rapist, armed robber that was in our company "parolee to work program." That was enough of a hint for me to stop seeing her.

I kept my eye open for girls at the university but I was never one of those slick chick picker uppers. At that time, frat boys who wore acid washed overalls with one clip undone, and sucked pacifiers were all the rage. (What the hell is up with the pacifiers?)

If attracting women requires dressing like a trained chimp and acting like a blithering fool I'll head to the nearest monestary thank you.

One thing I had previously overlooked were older women. They had already tried the monkey boys, ex-cons and coke heads. Older women for the most part were done with the majority of their stupid partying and might possibly be looking for a nice normal guy.

There was one girl in two of my classes that I had my eye on. One day I got up the nerve and struck up a conversation. Before I knew it we had a date set up. She was 7 years older than I was but I didn't let her know that. I didn't want to scare her off.

I went back to my apartment, told my buddies to get the fuck up and out because I had a girl coming over. They were offended and pissed because they had become accustomed to hanging out at my pad, drinking my beer and passing out on my couch.

Things were going well, I had finally met a nice decent girl and we were on the same mental maturity level . After our 2nd date she wanted to introduce me to her friends. No big deal I thought. As we were in the car she said "did I mention that they are all flamboyant gay men?".

I tried to keep my composure, I smiled and nodded "thats fine I have no problem with that" Hell, I thought, I already had a gay room mate once how bad could it be...

We entered the apartment and she introduced me to "Jaime and Lawrence" They "lived together" Roberto was my wifes co-worker and best friend, He looked like a cross between Edward James Olmos and John Leguizamo. Roberto was insanely jealous and pissed off at me for muscling in and dating his friend. Jaime and Lawrence were oogling me and making comments that made me feel like I needed to go super glue my butthole shut.

Even though these people were strange and scary, I put my best foot forward and did my damndest to not act grossed out. I knew they were testing my tolerance to homosexual behavior and were going out of their way to show off.

I ended up passing the test. My new girlfriend and her posse of butt pirates were all convinced that I was cool and open minded. Hot damn! Send me to Hollywood I pulled off the acting job of the century.

We ended up having dinner parties and playing cards with Jaime and Lawrence on weekends. Lucklily, there were other straight couples that hung out there too. The only problem with being a straight man around these gay men is the fact that when they started drinking, the stories they would tell were ...lets just say disturbing. I got to hear about the bath houses, oddly shaped vegetables and play by play of the latest gay porn videos.

I really liked this girl and didn't want to mess up so I just gritted my teeth and tried to make the best of an uncomfortable situation.

One thing about these gay men, they dressed well, had impeccable taste in furnishings and fine dining. They were actually nice people but they wore their sexuality like a badge. I couldn't imagine straight people at a dinner party talking about what they put in their orifices or going to sex clubs and what not. It still doesn't make sense to me.

Not too long after we started hanging with Jaime and Lawernce they had somehow lured away one of our straight male friends away from his wife and into their lifestyle. Too weird for me. How do you approach that person after they go to the dark side? "Hi there Fred so I hear you play the pink piccolo now... Try the new astro-glide yet?"

Lucky for me, as my girlfriend and I spent more time together and began sharing an apartment she grew tired of her flamboyant gay friends. There was too much drama and now looking back, I think she didn't want to take the chance of me being drafted into the "queen berets"

My girlfriend and I ended up getting married after seven months of dating.

We just celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary.We have a good life and great kids. I'm really glad I stuck it out and didn't let my adverse feelings for her friends get in the way of our relationship.

New friends, New links,

Thanks to all of you who have linked to When your only tool is a hammer... or have linked to individual posts.

I appreciate everyone who has taken the time to stop by. Your comments are always entertaining, interesting and very much welcomed.

I've added most all of you to my links list. If I've missed anyone it wasn't intentional.

Drop me a line at bohab@hotmail.com As long as your blog doesn't have anything to do with Beanie Babies, Namblah or Re-Electing Teddy Kennedy, I won't mind linking to you.

Sincerely,

Hammer

Trip to the coast..just the guys

I had just quit one of my terrible disgusting jobs and was in bad shape, physically and emotionally drained. A good friend of mine "Gary" was recently laid off too. Another set of friends Kurt and Sheridan had come in from Arizona, they were worthless bums, always jobless.

We four decided to make use of our temporary vacation and do something fun. Gary had a Volkswagen Van with a pop up top and I had some money so we decided to go camping.

We picked Garner state park as our destination. It had a river, nice views and was pretty quiet in May. We didn't pack much stuff, expecting to buy what we needed once we got there.

When we entered the park the ranger told us It would be $38 per night for us to park the van and have access to the facilities which consisted of a parking space, hibachi and a picnic bench.

Screw that noise. We had come this far, so we decided to buy some sandwich stuff , beer and hang out for the day. When we got up to the convenience store we soon found that we were in a dry county. No Beer for sixty miles in any direction.

Well hell. We went swimming, climbed some rocks and tried to decide what we were going to do with ourselves.

The gulf coast was only 2 hours away and I knew for a fact camping on the beach was only $7 for a years pass. We packed up and hit the grocery store, bought some Jugs of water, beans, tortillas, jalepenos and 3 cases of Lone Star beer. When a case of beer runs $5.99 you know it's the good stuff.

We hit the road, Gary at the wheel (nobody got to drive his VW van) Kurt,Sheridan and I were sitting on the back couch listening to music. We decided to open up the cooler, have a couple of beers to help pass the time and take the edge off. Gary wasn't drinking of course. We hadn't eaten yet that day and one beer turned into three or four and soon we were laughing and singing at the top of out lungs, cutting up and making asses out of ourselves. All in good fun of course.

Gary was getting really annoyed at our noisy obnoxious selves, partially because he couldn't drink with us and partially because he was a grumpy dickhead most of the time.

One thing that happens when you drink beer, you've got to pee....a lot. I turned down the stereo and hollered up for Gary to pull over at the next facility so we could take a whiz. We waited and waited. Finally, we saw a truck stop. Gary wasn't slowing down or exiting. We yelled for him to stop but He pretended not to hear us. "Oops sorry, no bathroom for 50 miles... isn't that toooo baaad" was his only comment as we passed the last possible salvation. Asshole....

We all had to go really really bad. We were hopping around like jack rabbits trying desperately to figure out what we were going to do to keep from pissing ourselves. Sheridan had an idea. He grabbed one of the gallon water jugs and emptied it out the side window. He placed it behind the front seat which offered the only privacy, and began to pee in the jug. I really didn't want to do it, having never peed in a plastic jug before.

After I saw the enormous relief on Kurt and Sheridan's faces I bit the bullet and proceeded to empty my bladder into the jug. Whats this? I look down and notice that the jug is almost full and I'm still going full stream. I was able to cut the flow just in the nick of time. I put the cap back on the jug. We slowed down on our beer consumption from that point on.

We got to the beach, ran out into the water swam in the waves, made a bon fire and decided to catch some of the numerous crabs that were running all over the place. I found a broom stick and an old bucket and we tried desperately to catch these little buggers for dinner. Four drunken assholes running all over the beach trying to catch crabs...it didn't work. Evolution was on their side. As soon as we got near a crab he could bury himself deep in the sand in half a second.

We headed back to the van and decided to eat the grub I had brought with us. I put refried beans and jalapenos on tortillas and handed them out to everybody. It was bare sustenance but at this point we were hungry and tired. The jalapenos were hot as hell and due to the fact that Gary was eating too fast, he started to get a severe case of the hiccups. I handed him a cold beer.but he waved me off and instead grabbed a water jug and tipped it up to his mouth... glug glug glug,

I looked up and noticed he had grabbed the wrong one.

Sheridan , Kurt and I all yelled at the same time "STOP... IT'S... PISSSS..!!!!!"

Gary dropped the jug and violently expectorated the contents of his mouth all over us.

We were covered in beer piss, mixed with the remnants of Gary's bean and jalapeno taco.

Not another word was said. We washed off in the ocean and went to sleep.

Gary didn't talk to us for the rest of the trip or the drive home the next day.

I guess our trip to the coast left him with a bad taste in his mouth.

My best friend's wedding

I knew Juan Pablo (not his real name) since 7th grade. We were both loners with an odd sense of humor and we soon become friends. He had a mother almost as strange as mine and we could commiserate our trials and tribulations on a daily basis.

We ended up going to different High Schools but still hung out on weekends. We would alternate who's house we went to depending on what kind of crazy shit we felt like dealing with that week.

Juan Pablo was a very intelligent imaginative person but rather impulsive and high strung. I tried my best to keep him out of trouble but that was a task easier said than done.

When we both started working and going to college. He was severely itching to get some regular female relations going and I was afraid he was going to go do something really stupid. My fears were well founded.

My friend was one of the few legal employees of a fast food mexican joint. He would often tell me stories about how stupid and ignorant his co-workers were.

He soon found one stupid ignorant co-worker who had her eye on him. I'll call her "Rosita" She wasn't bad looking. She was 28 and he was 18. She barely spoke English and he was an intellectual with a gift for writing. Opposites attract? I guess when you are only referring to their plumbing...

Hormones won over and soon they were dating. She was very resistant to his sexual advances due to some bad experience she had in the past. This was extremely frustrating to Juan Pablo and I would hear no end to his whining and complaining. This girl was mentally unarmed, violent, jealous, manipulative and very unreasonable. She was also totally illiterate despite graduating from a prestigious high school.

Whenever I tried to convince Juan Pablo to dump her crazy ass. he would go into some hormonal rage and profess his love for her.

One day he called me up and excitedly told me he had finally done the deed and dipped into the dew. I congratulated him on his first piece of pain in the ass.

He showed up at my work a few weeks later with a seriously pained look on his face. I knew then what had happened. He didn't even have to say a word. She was pregnant. Yup. I felt like punching him in the face for being such a dumbass. He told me that they were using the rhythm method of birth control. I reminded him that he was having sex with a fertile turtle and he was a shithead for not using proper protection

He reminded me that Rosita was Catholic and birth control was a sin against god.

Fuck me. Talk about letting your dick get you in trouble.

Juan Pablo asked me what his options were. I told him adoption, paying child support, helping her raise the kid etc... He pressured me for more options. I said, "what do you want me to suggest? Abortion? She is Catholic for Christ sake." He thanked me excitedly and ran off.

A few days later he calls me up and tells me "Rosita is really mad at you"....

Huh? Why? What the hell did I do?

He said, I told Rosita that you said for her to get an abortion.

"What the fuck" I angrily replied ? "I said no such thing." I could hear Rosita in the back round calling me a fucking baby killer. Oh Jesus, I told Juan Pablo he was a giant fucking asshole for using my name to try to convince her to get an abortion.

Despite my pleadings, he decided to marry the crazy bitch. He got a shitty job at a 7-11 and a small apartment.

I went with him to the court house as a witness to the marriage. He was still my best friend after all.

Things started to get crazy. Rosita decided she liked sex after all. Juan Pablo told me he was screwing his pregnant wife 4 times a day. This was more information than I ever needed.

They also fought like cats and dogs. It was a living hell even as a bystander. She was Catholic and he was an Atheist, She came from a close knit Hispanic family, he came from a distant dysfunctional Anglo backround, He was intelligent and she was a window licker. The only thing they had in common was that they were both irrational and hormonal.

One day Juan Pablo calls me up and for some reason is acting angry and confrontational. He blurted out, "Are you having sex with my wife?". I told him he was fucking insane "Why in the hell would I want to screw an idiotic 8 month pregnant nutcase." (I never made any attempt to hide my dislike for Rosita)

He sighed in relief. Turns out Rosita was invoking my name during sex to get him angry. She liked rough angry sex. She was going all out, telling him that "Hammer had a bigger hammer" Just so she could punish him emotionally and get better sex at the same time.

I wanted to remove myself from this situation, but I didn't want to abandon a long time friend in need. I was getting really tired of hearing his sob stories and it did no good to say "I told you so"

I hired Juan Pablo to come work with me so he could make more money and have health insurance for his infant son. By this time, he had gained 80 pounds and was a miserable son of a bitch. I really wanted nothing to do with him at this point. He was an asshole and he took his shit out on me.

One day I had enough. I cornered him the parts room and told him that he needed to get a divorce, there was nothing redeeming about his relationship, and he had turned into a miserable fat piece of shit. I informed him that paying child support for 18 years was worth it if he could go back to being a semi-normal person.

A light bulb went on over his head. He went home that night and told Rosita "Hammer told me to divorce you"

Oh lord here we go again...

My mom's new "room mate"

My mother hated my father. She belittled him, chastised him. and did everything she could to undermine anything he believed in and stood for.It was confusing for me, because outside of the home dad was an alpha male, war hero, successful businessman and a great father.

For some strange reason, when my mother treated him like dog shit and cut off his nuts (figuratively) he didn't respond the way I thought he should.For some reason he loved her despite her constant abuse. He never said one bad thing about her to me and he was constantly reminding me to respect her no matter what.

As soon I as I moved out of their house and got married my mom dumped his ass. I thought it was the best thing that ever happened. I was able to have a decent normal relationship with my dad without having to put up with seeing him being emotionally abused.

Once my dad was out of the picture, my mother informed me that she had taken a room mate to help cover expenses. No big deal I thought.

Just a month or so later I got very ill and went to the emergency room.I was diagnosed with an appendicitis and was sitting in a wheel chair when I saw my moms room mate for the first time. She was 6ft 4, angular, athletic and wearing a polka dotted mini-skirt.

I was in a shitload of pain and waiting for surgery so I didn't have time to ponder this strange new addition to the family. Hmm... why was my moms room mate at the hospital?

These strange thoughts followed me to the operating room and into unconsciousness.

I woke up in the recovery room and my wife and her sister were standing over me.As I was coming out of the anesthesia, my first words were "My mom is a rug muncher!" They thought I was still delirious from the drugs.

I will preface the next part by saying that my mother is not really a homosexual, She wanted to make babies with Elvis and later she used to sit in front of the TV and drool over Tom Seleck. I was warned that she would dump my dad if either of those guys came calling.

I left the hospital and soon recovered enough for my wife and I to go back to the old homestead for a visit with mom.

She had told me that "Bridgette" had taken over my old room. When I walked by I noticed that there was junk all over the bed, no sheets and obviously no occupants for quite some time.

I glanced over to my mom's bed and it was obvious that there was definitely a two person setup going on in there. I didn't say anything. To me it was just another chapter in a long novel of my mothers weirdness.

My mother acted strange and nervous when I was around her and her room mate, Bridgette was nice, outgoing and friendly. Soon they bought a house together. I went for a visit and noticed that my mom and Bridgette were wearing Birkenstocks, masculine type clothes and they both had the exact same ornate wedding band on.

Well if that didn't beat all. I wasn't even invited to my mothers first gay wedding.

It took her a year or so of beating around the bush for my mom to finally ask if I knew what was going on and if approved of her relationship.

I told her that I had known about it for over two years and was just waiting for her to get the guts to bring it up. I told her that as long as she was happy I didn't care what she did.

My mom took the gay lifestyle to the hilt "so to speak" She marched in gay marches, ate in gay restaurants and only had gay friends. I soon felt like I was an embarrassment to her being the only non gay thing in her life. She even questioned me one time hoping that I was in the closet so she could have a gay son. Sorry to disappoint you mom.

It was a little weird because her partner was only 2 years older than I was. I liked Bridgette and was glad mom at had least picked a nice person.

I soon remembered that I hadn't told my dad about what was going on. I felt like it was my duty to let him off the hook and let him know that all the years of bullshit he put up with was not his fault.

He took it fairly well. We got drunk and tried to laugh about it the best we could.

Oh won't you be my Neighbor?

When I moved into my new house six years ago it was quite a change from the 50 year old established neighborhood I came from. The old neighborhood had kids, old folks and for the most part friendly helpful people.

My old house was like living in the 1950's. No dishwasher, old two prong outlets, one small bathroom and tiny bedrooms. It was great for a first house but it was time for something bigger and newer.

We found a nice looking neighborhood with large new two story houses. We soon found ourselves in a house with 3 bathrooms, 4 bedrooms, two car garage and all the amenities.

I'm a person that sticks to myself, doesn't cause problems, but will wave, chat or help out a neighbor if they need it.

The first thing I noticed that I was the only person on my street with children. The silence was eerie and hard to get used to.

Then I noticed all the dirty looks I was getting from my new neighbors. I still smiled and waved but not one would meet my gaze.

A week or so after moving in I noticed a yellow paper on my door. It was a citation from the home owners association informing me that my yard was not maintained properly.

I looked around and noticed nothing wrong, I had a landscaper that kept everything mowed and trimmed each week.

That's when I saw the next door neighbor lady glaring at me. I showed her the paper and asked her if she knew what they were talking about regarding my yard not being kept up.

With sneering hatred reminiscent of a Disney villain she told me that the drainage ditch next to my house had weeds in it.

I told her I wasn't aware that I was supposed to maintain a drainage ditch and I wondered out loud who would report me to the home owners association instead of having the courtesy to knock on my door and inform me of the issue.

"I reported you" she huffed and stormed off.

The dirty looks continued and I soon found out that the house I now owned used to belong to the neighborhood darlings who also ran the homeowners association and apparently had their noses up everyone ass.

There was a group of people on my street that were in cahoots and trying to make us feel as unwelcome as possible. A few days later there was another note on my door citing me for incessant dog barking. There are quite a few possums that roam the greenbelt behind the subdivision and when they get on the fence all the dogs on the street go apeshit.

Then I saw the small print stating that if I got one more citation the homeowners association can take legal action against me and get me thrown out of my home, causing the bank to call in the note and basically send my life into the shitter.

I started keeping the dogs indoors with gates in the kitchen. I pulled weeds in the ditch and tried to act friendly with the neighbors outside of the association gestapo.

I would tell anyone who would listen about the citations I was receiving and if they noticed any problem with my families behavior and the way we kept our home.

Pretty soon, word got around and the harassment subsided.

One day, I was in the front yard teaching my son how to ride his bike, when I notice the wicked witch is out front glaring at me again. She started making shitty comments about, what I do for a living, why I don't let my son play by himself in the front yard and basically just going off on me. I told her I was glad that she was finally speaking to me and if there was anything she ever needed to not hesitate to ask.

When I didn't get bent out of shape at her behavior, Her face turned beet red and she stormed off.

I then noticed that there was a father pulling his son up the street in a wagon. My son ran up and started talking to the first kid he had seen in months.

I immediately noticed that the father was very apprehensive about speaking to me but his kid was having such a good time playing with my son he stopped and hesitantly began to chat.

I happened to glance over and see the wicked witch was staring open mouthed through her living room window.

The boys father and I had a nice conversation when his son ran up to him and asked if he could have a bike like my son had.

He told him he would have to wait because he was too small and it was no where near his birthday or Christmas.

I went into my garage and pulled out a small child's bike that I had stored away. I dusted it off and gave it to the father and asked it it was ok for his son to have it.

The man had a shocked and bewildered look on his face and asked how much I wanted for it. I told him I didn't want any money.His son immediately got on the bike and stared riding with my son.

I noticed my bitchy neighbor's face was pressed up against her window and I could almost see steam shooting out of her ears. The look on her face could peel paint and frighten small animals. I seriously had no idea what her problem was.

All of the sudden the boys father shook my hand and apologized for not introducing himself and that he was "Chris" the president of the homeowners association. He told me he was sorry he didn't meet me earlier.

The next night I was working my night job when my wife called me frantic and upset.
She told me that bitch neighbor had come over at midnight beat on the door, drunk as a skunk and went on a tirade that went: fuck you fuck this fuck fuck fuckity fuck. This was one high class lady.

I was pissed off to say the least. I got home after my night shift and banged on the neighbors door until she answered. I told her I didn't appreciate her harassing my wife and using her foul language. This wicked bitch had the audacity to deny ever doing it. I told her that being drunk was no excuse. Then she made a lame excuse about my dogs barking inside my house had woken her up. I told her I would call the cops if she pulled any shit like that again.

The next weekend the bitch had a barbecue with all of her snooty friends. Since her backyard is higher than mine they can see directly over my privacy fence. I went outside to the deck with the scariest looking assault rifle I owned and proceeded to drink beer and thoroughly clean my guns throughout the evening.

I was gratified when I saw a for sale sign in her yard a week later. It didn't take long, for it to sell. As the moving truck pulled out of her driveway, the street was lined with other people she had harassed and abused. My Korean neighbors were laughing and loudly chanting "Good bye dragon lady!"

I was happy to see I wasn't the only one with a problem with this crazy bitch.

Primary or Secondary?

I was in the pet store the other day buying a new bed pad for my dog. I was scanning the shelves for a suitable color, when I slipped in a puddle of dog piss about the size of a kids wading pool. The still warm pee soaked into my shoe and it took me a couple of frantic goose steps to get out of the yellow lagoon.

What sort of lame brained dog owner lets his incontinent great dane piss the contents of lake superior in the middle of the Petco without informing anyone?

I squished my way up to the front counter. Everyone is staring because my shoes are making this wet sucking noise everytime I take a step. The smell isn't so great either.

I get the attention of a bored, matronly cashier and inform her that there is a big mess on isle 7 and someone is going to fall if they don't clean it up.

She looked at me and with an aloof sneer asked, " primary or secondary?"

I gave her a blank stare for a second trying to figure out what language this woman was speaking. Maybe she didn't understand me. I told her again "big mess on 7 you need to call someone". She replied once more, this time louder: "PRIMARY OR SECONDARY?"

I told her, "I don't know what the fuck you are talking about. I'm just trying to save your ass from getting sued when someone falls into the gigantic river of piss on isle 7"

Exasperated, Ms Snotty Pants Petco cashier snidely, informs me that it's called "Primary"

I did not know I was supposed to use special "sensitive" pee speak at the pet store. With my amazing powers of deduction I soon ascertained that secondary is shit.

How about dog puke?

What should I call that Mrs secondary head cashier lady?

Grandpa.. the crazy years.

I never had much interaction with my grandfather. He suffered from various mental problems and the VA marked him 100% disabled by 1960. He seemed normal at one day and mean and curmudgeonly the next. I was in the same house with him every summer but he stuck to himself, drank coffee and smoked cigarettes all day without saying a word.

The rest of my family were very disrespectful towards grandpa. I was about 9 years old before I realized his name wasn't "that damned old man". My dad told me grandpa suffered from shell shock and possibly schizophrenia. I knew grandpa could be rough to live with but I never once thought about being disrespectful to him. He was on huge doses of Thorazine and lithium which probably explained his lack of motivation.

Once in a blue moon grandpa would awaken from his stupor, stop taking his medication and disappear off into the city. My grandmother would try to get him committed to the mental ward of the VA but they said there was nothing they could do unless he hurt somebody.

During these times the family would be in a panic. Grandpa would call the house and tell us how exciting it was to be able to communicate with the pope through telepathy, his job at the peep show and all the fine pieces of ass he was getting.

Grandpa wouldn't come home for a weeks at a time. When he did finally arrive home my grandmother would go off on a tirade that could curdle milk and make a hooker blush.

It took grandpa a little while to settle down completely. We would be sitting at the dinner table and he would take out a penthouse magazine, open it up and start a commentary about the aesthetic quality of modern pubic hair styles. I was half entertained and half afraid that a bowl of potato salad was going to fly across the room.

My uncle who lived next door, like me was sympathetic towards his father in law. However, he told me he was worried because grandpa was offering fifty bucks each to anyone willing to watch him masturbate...

Luckily, summer was nearly over and I would miss this pay per view event.