creamy buttcheeks

man, freaking exhausting week. pulled several 7 am to 1 am workdays in a row, including a spectacular one last night. got home circa 2-ish in the am. a few z's and then back to the office.

as dawn and drew say, creamy buttcheeks.

the monolithic dome song is stuck in my head.

head butler

now that thanksgiving is behind us, it means shopping for the holidays. i sure as hell don't do the black friday craziness at the mall. in fact, i prefer to do as much of my shopping as possible online. it bewilders me that stores have not figured out how to make shopping more pleasant for men. i recommend:

• an identifiable "dudes area" (aka "man-landia")
• manlandia should have plenty of comfortable couches
• stocked with good magazines (not three year old issues of better home & garden) like GQ, Sports Illustrated, and Newsweek
• big screen tv with appropriate video game apparatus
• fridge with cold drinks

this isn't just catering to cranky dudes. the fact is because the store is hot, i have nowhere to sit, and i'm sick of looking at belts/shoes/purses/whatever, i get cranky. when i get cranky, mrs. wintermute is unhappy. she cuts short her shopping time. end result? we buy less stuff. if instead i had a place where i could just chill out, then mrs. w could take her sweet time. bad for our amex bill, but good for retailers' revenue. this is a no-brainer!

mrs. w and i also have to play the game of trying to figure which friends are going get us gifts. most of our gift giving traditions are pretty well set in stone, so it's not really a stress point for us.

if you're like me, shopping is still a pain in the ass. that's why i love head butler. it's a simple but very creative site for tasteful gift ideas. it's run by a single dude who simply shares the stuff that he likes in books, movies, products, etc. he simply has great (and by that, i mean it agrees with my own sensibilities) taste and is picky. he's not a snob about it at all ('harold & kumar go to white castle" is on his list), but there's a fair amount of intellectual stuff (read: star wars is not on there, but we all already know that episodes iv an v are the best movies ever made) and it's prety liberal-leaning.

so check him out here.

the luster is fading

well, for all the build-up, a pretty uneventful travel day, thankfully.

as soon as howard got in, he came over to pick up mrs. wintermute and me and we headed over to our nati tradition of the village tavern in bucolic downtown montgomery. howard and i have been doing this for the past six or seven years without fail. this is always a highlight for me and i've managed to drag mrs. wintemute along the last few years. in the back of my head, i've had this sinking feeling that the days are numbered. the excitement of running into my old soccer team mates or band mates (rock band folks, not THE band) is slipping away.

last night, i think i could see the end in sight. we got to the tavern around 11 and the line extended 40 deep. are you shitting me? we stood there for five minutes and then decided to go across the street to the (recently opened, i think, because i've never seen if before) corner pub. that's right, montgomery now has a third bar.

we did not recognize a single person. it was like being in some kind of bizarro world. did i somehow step through a stargate? mrs. wintermute pointed out that all of the people there were most likely indeed from montgomery, but a good six or eight years younger than us. we're rocking out to welcome to jungle on the jukebox, to how much axl rocked in fifth grade. mrs. w points out that some people in the bar may have been born after appetite for destruction was released. oh man, i'm about to become that guy.

one beer later, we jump into howard's car and cruise across town (and in montgomery, that means a four minute drive down montgomery road) to the olde montgomery tavern, a poor man's cousin to the village tavern. this bar encapsulates my hometown pretty well. the beer is cheap, and that's about all it has going for it. there's a fine line between a dive bar and a bar that is simply shitty, and this one is clearly the latter.

a high school friend was working the door and waved us in without paying the cover (score, four bucks back in my pocket. that's two beers). i asked what he was up to these days. he said something to the effect of, 'well, i'm kind of a fuck up. living at home. working the door here. pay's shit but i get free beer." uhh, what do you say to that? he's a smart kid, too.

five or six of the old music friends meet up with us, so it is worth being there, but it was definitely the least fun i've had in this long held tradition. at least the beer was cheap. i left wondering how many more times we'll uphold this tradition. closing in on 30, i'm dangerously close to be the guy that i used to see at the tavern. i'd smirk and say, "i'll never be that dude. doesn't he know it's bingo night down at the veterans of foreign war hall? what is he, like class of '92?"

just finished some side fixings cooking with mrs. wintermute. now mom and my bro and prepping the turkey.

penn station tomorrow. and 007, i think.

happy turkey day.

not a great start

we were all set yesterday. the bags were packed, we had all but a freaking process map drawn out for it.

at the delta kiosk. it tells us that we can't check in b/c it's too close to our flight.

but we're there an hour early.

what.

the.

fuck.

we stand in line for a real live human customer service rep (an endangered species these days).

"oh yeah, we canceled your original flight and put you on an earlier flight. hmm, seems that flight has already left."

were you planning on tell us?

"we called and didn't get anyone."

so you didn't leave a message?

"we don't leave messages."

no email? no text message? no carrier pigeon, for fuck's sake?

"we called."

how on earth could i have known to show up for a flight that left an hour EARLIER?

ok, wintermute, keep it together. last month i blogged here about how i pride myself on my zen state in dealing with customer service folks, especially at the airport. yelling just pisses them off. besides, everyone deserves to be dealt with in a dignified manner. even if they are a complete fucktard. i usually am very good at getting what i want. i know how to game the system and unlike 90% of pissed off people in airports, i don't lose my shit and take it out on the very people who can help me.

because we're flying from a small market airport, there is physically no way to get us on another flight that day to the nati. we settled for a 1:00 flight the next day (not so bad, in fact, i'm blogging in the departure gate right now).

but is really freaking terrible. my bro re-arranged his whole schedule to fly 2000 miles so we he could arrive at the same time as me. he took an extra day off from work. as did mrs. wintermute. as did my dad. this does not by any means ruin thanksgiving. it could be a lot worse. but it sucks.

then i have a laughable moment. i ask for the ticket agent's manager. she comes right out. go through the same exercise. i ask for her manager. she says, "i am the manager. i'm as high as it gets here. if you need more help, you can call customer service."

well, shit.

a 45 minute call later, while presenting my most charismatic self and pulling out all of my insider knowledge as a road warrior, all i can get is a freaking $200 voucher, and a suggestion to write a letter. and so i shall.

happy thanksgiving.

turkey day coming up

back from chicago and the cold weather followed us home. 40 degrees in south florida?

gotta love the two day work week.

headed to the nati tonight with mrs. wintermute. my bro flies in around the same time.

am committed to not doing any work, but am already thinking of the stuff i'd like to get get done, especially for the business plan i want to enter in this year's big h b-plan contest (alumni are allowed to attend as long as they have at least one active student on the team). when i was in boston earlier the month, i pitched the idea to two of my profs (including one who does all of his research in the type of business i want to launch) and they both really liked it and said they would be willing to sponsor me. dr. e said, "i think you have a live one."

this year, i have tons of stuff for which to be thankful. but going into the holiday, i'm especially grateful that family time is not stress time. for both katie's home and mine, everyone gets along, we're very laid back, and i know it will be a relaxing holiday. i know not everyone has that luxury.

next stop: penn station, skyline chili, larosa's pizza, and of course, the village tavern in downtown montgomery.

that guy on ponce

cockmaster. donkey man. the package. that guy on ponce.

he is a legend. an institution. now, finally, he gets to tell his story. if you live in atlanta (and by that, i mean actually in the city of atlanta. marietta doesn't count. that's why it's called marietta and not atlanta), you've seen him. you've started in amazement. you've wondered who the hell he is, and why is always standing on ponce and briarcliff. generations of emory students have known him.

this may be one of the most important films made in a long time.

enough said. here it is.

deep dish

greetings from chicago. good week. got here yesterday.

last night, hung w/ the big bro's chick for dinner. she and the big bro are moving here. turns out she doesn't know chicago quite as well as i thought she did.

tonight, seeing friends from high school (yeah, i had friends in high school, and yeah, a few of them still talk to me) the soccer team. we go way way back to like fifth grade.

tomorrow night, mrs. wintermute gets here--the whole reason i'm in chicago. she's presenting some research at a psych conference. we're staying through the weekend (since the conference lasts that long). good chance to see the town and get a milder taste for what minnesota could be like next year.

friday night, hanging with the fraternity bros and their ladies.

saturday will see some sights and take in a good meal. sunday, back to soflo. and thanksgiving next week.

i embarrassed to tell the lovely people of chicago that i detest deep dish pizza. thin slice ny style is where it's at. roma's on 89th and 3rd is my place.

blue

back in the ussr.

bloodninja's hair did not turn out quite as electric blue as i had hoped.

next stop: nassau

on the plane. hopefully no snakes.

got a first class upgrade. nice pay-off for week after week of traveling for the last few months.

saw teen woolfe this morning. he's on his way to st. simon's now. can't believe he's doing a direct flight to tokyo next week.

we have got some good plans for bloodninja.

don't feel bad for bloodninja

after 8 months of planning, bloodninja's bachelor party is finally here. catching the direct flight to nassau tomorrow and then taking a puddle jumper over to paradise island. bg has done an awesome job of putting it together. everyone i talk to is impressed by how large we are living. one of my co-workers said, "shit, i've been to some crazy bachelor parties...vegas, new orleans...but never off-shore. that is freaking awesome." 4 days in the bahamas.

moe, the chief, bloodninja and i have done a few of these together. each of them was a room mate of mine--it's a tight crew. now, the funny thing is that the bar keeps getting set higher. i won't shit you, this weekend is going to be crazy. it could make mine look like a tea party. i have only two hopes:

1. no one in jail
2. no alcohol poisoning

everything else is on the table. i'd be nervous if i were bloodninja. but don't feel bad for him. the person you should really feel sorry for is moe. the chief and i are both safely married and our bachelor parties are behind us. this weekend is going to be so sick, but by the time we get to moe's bachelor party (who knows when it will be, but that's another matter), we're going to ramming up his anus with a rusty cattle prod. not only will moe's be the fourth in a long line of debauchery, but it will be the last one. so in some ways, this weekend is just a warm-up...but a hell of a warm-up. we're going to be toweling off by 9 am.

everybody say "yatta!"

15 seats

we needed 15 seats to take the house. woke up this am to find that we had won 28. a nice ass-kicking.

would love to have been there to see w's face this morning.

goodbye, rick santorum. and good riddance.

a dem in the ohio's governor's mansion?!?!? i can't believe it.

on the runway in soflo. headed to atlanta. LOVE my new sprint card for the laptop. i have my own virtual wifi where ever i go. if i can get a cell phone signal, i have broadband. atlanta for the next few days. teen wolf is flying in from being deployed overseas for the air force. he'll be hanging with me for a day or so before driving to st. simon's to see his fam.

snowcrash readers will know that i'm precipitously close to become a gargoyle.

deval patrick

woke up this morning feeling pretty nervous. felt worried that we had let the red staters sneak up on us.

but things seem to be going well.

first of all, props to prizblog for picking deval patrick way back at the beginning of the race, who was just called the winner for the mass governorship, retaking it for the dems.

webb is running neck and neck in virginia against macaca.

menedes looks like he's going to pull of nj.

lieberman will keep his seat.

ellsworth beats the incumbent in indiana.

fantasy fest pics (the rest)

mrs. wintermute attracted some new friends. apparently there are a lot of hermione fans at fantasy fest

these are almost two weeks old. but i've got bloodninja's bachelor party coming up and will have plenty of stories to share. no pictures. i think it worried bloodninja's fiancee when i told her that there are no cameras allowed.

ok, back to fantasy fest. first, click here to see the whole set of pics.

some favorites:

lion+dorothy+tin man

the tin man turned out to be a bit of an exhibitionist

that oh shit feeling in your stomach

last night i realized that i couldn't remember when my passport expires. and that i left in atlanta. and that i'm in soflo this week. and that i'm leaving the country for bloodninja's bachelor party this friday (that's right, we're going big time for this one).

shit shit shit.

i can't believe i let this slip.

i can't remember the last time i renewed it. between 1994 and 2003 i had at least one trip abroad ever year. mrs. wintermute and i seem to remember that on the last one (canadachick's wedding) that mine was close to expiring.

i call the beav since i left a copy of my key with her. she's in italy. mothershitter.

i can't believe i forgot about this one. i hate procrastinating. even worse, i hate admitting to myself that i did. even worse, i'm going to have to admit to other people that i did because i can't get out of this one myself.

call moe this morning. thankfully, i catch him before he leaves for the airport for a business trip.

in the meantime, i've made an expedited renewal appointment for tomorrow. moe will grab my passport, overnight it to soflo, and then i'll renew it after dropping off mrs. wintermute at work tomorrow. i'm a lucky mofo that that one of the 10 regional renewal offices is in miami. it's going to cost me more than $100 all in, but it's my only way to a trip that i cannot, will not miss.

moe runs over to my place. another reason i'm a lucky mofo is that i know where every scrap of paper is in my atlanta apt. nothing is left to chance. it weirds some people out, but today it pays off big-time.

moe gets the passport.

it's good until 2009.

big, big sigh of relief.

the art and disgrace of airports

a couple of fridays ago i headed to hartsfield after a pretty long week. run from alphacrappa back to inman park, grab my stuff, park the green monster in the garage and jump in a cab. flights are delayed a couple hours already because of weather (and by weather i'm mean that it's anything besides sunny and 75, so hartsfield cannot cope), so i'm already nervous about getting to soflo tonight.

i get to the gate and stand in line to confirm my upgrade. the gate agent looks at my boarding pass.

"that's the wrong boarding pass."

what?

"that's for a florida to atlanta flight."

mothershitter. my travel agent booked me going the wrong way. i was on my third flight of the week and had printed off the pass at work and then ran without reallying looking at it. shit. the standby list for this flight is 62 people deep because delta has already canceled the earlier flight. double shit.

now here's the disgrace of airports. specifically, airport security: i passed through two different security checkpoints before it was caught. technically, i had no business being in hartsfield, much less in the departure terminal that evening, b/c my boarding pass didn't even have atlanta on it. the TSA agent at start of the security and the TSA agent at the x-ray machine both missed it. granted, it was a hectic night (rain delays on a friday evening at one of the largest airports in the world). but everyone who gets into the terminal ought to be a legit passenger.

now here's the art. i call delta (my travel agent has gone home for the day and we're not a big enough company to warrant after-hours support). they can't do anything for me on the phone. so i get into the customer service line.

now this line is roughly akin to the entrance to dante's inferno. babies crying. ladies fainting. cranky old men yelling. delta agents tasering passengers with cattle prods.

and the standby list is 62 people deep. on a flight that's already pretty close to full.

i have got to pull it together. i have to get myself in a zen state. smile. stand straight. breathe. deeply. look like there's no place i'd rather be.

the woman in front of me goes ballistic. she's yelling at the agent b/c someone in baltimore lost her luggage. demeaning the person who you want to help you is not a good strategy. but now she's fucking with my chances. i'm tempted to pour her a tall glass of Shut The Fuck Up.

the bitch runs out of oxygen and leaves. i wait to be called before approaching the desk. the agent calls next. i smile. i stand up straight. deep breath. i've to make her want to help me.

"boy, tough night, huh?"

she nods wearily. the phone rings. "i'm sorry, sir, hang on."

"no problem, take your time. my plane isn't going anywhere."

i wait for her to take care of the phone call. i look happy to be there. project serenity.

"ok, how can i help you?"

i explain the situation and request her expertise in helping me. i say that i know it's a crazy night and the flight is super full, but that i've been traveling all week and i just really want to be home with my wife. finally, i tell her that i know it's going to be tough and i'll be happy that she's doing the best she can. i promise that i won't throw a fit if things don't work.

in 10 seconds she gets me on the flight, prints out a boarding pass with a seat assignment.

one of my grad school profs said that negotiation is the art of letting other people have your way.

and that's the art.

ok, boarding door about to close. gotta go. next stop: soflo.

in boston

being back in boston leaves me feeling a bit schizophrenic. I miss it and am at the same time glad to not being living here. this afternoon was great. after the conference ended, walked across the charles river to get pizza (corner slices, of course) at Pinocchio's. then came back to watch men's soccer team beat up on columbia while the big drums were beating across the street in the football statdium. nerd league sports are great. used an alumni pass to work out at the gym and am now cranking in spangler. the leaves have changed, it's crisp autumn, and i love this place.

last night, hit tanjore in the square with mpg, ms. mpg, some of their friends, plus mpg's parents. afterwards, we were too late to catch the opening of borat at the harvard square theater, so we hit charlie's kitchen for some frosty beverages. however, it was ass-puckeringly cold. i was freaking miserable. i don't miss it at all.

meeting up w/ nobf and dr. nobf in a few hours. possibility to eat indian food again (there are so many good choices, unlike soflo). then back to soflo on an early flight tomorrow.

the hot chicks (fantasy fest pics, pt 3)

it's funny, but most of the under - 30 chicks were wearing naughty but normal costumes.

the women my mom's age were wear nothing but body paint.

perky



the falling off bikini strap is a nice artistic touch



errr, what?



disappearus topus

costume inspiration (fantasy fest pics, pt. 2)

i now know what i'm going to wear for halloween next year.

pretty much sums up key west

a long day

1:00. just got to my hotel in boston to find that all they have left at twin beds. who the shit wants a twin bed? this place claims to be built for business travelers (i'm at the doubletree on western ave). show me a fucking business traveler who wants a twin bed!

long fucking day. got up at 4:30 this AM to get a cab to the airport. flew from soflo on the 6 am flight to atl. all day meetings with an acquisition target. ended at 7:30 pm. drove home. got in another cab back to hartsfield. flew to boston. four freaking cabs in one day.

well, it's good to be back.

big h healthcare conference the next three days.

and will see mpg and ms. mpg friday night. hanging w/ nobf and her dude saturday. alas, slim shady will be out of town.

atilla begged out of the trip at the last minute, so no repeat of harvard square debauchery.

will have to somehow squeeze in pinocchio's, charlie's kitchen, darwin's, and indian food. not sure if i'll make it to the kong.

should be a good rest of the week.