Lunch Time

I'm about to go to lunch and I felt like saying something. Go Lakers. Actually, funny thing happened to me last week that I wanted to share. First, some back story.

As you may know the Phoenix Suns exercised demons in the Semi-final found of the playoffs this year by sweeping the San Antonio Spurs. The media in phoenix was foaming at the mouth during this series for a couple reasons. 1) the spurs are hated rivals. 2) They are notoriously dirty players (Nash broken nose, Horry hockey-style checking of Nash into the scorers table and Bowen stepping on people's feet as they go for jump shots, etc). 3) the spurs looked highly beatable and old with guys like Duncan, Parker and Gionobli. So the sweep occurred, there was redemption in the city of phoenix and all this while there is an immigration act that was being (and still is) hotly discussed. I'm not going to talk about the bill in this blog so no head shaking or anything like that, OK? good. So at this point, if you are a Suns fan, you are worked into a frenzy because sports immortality only occurs so often in phoenix and your Phoenix suns are in the Western Conference Finals. So who better to go through than the defending world champion Los Angeles Lakers. The Cross hair has been set, the enemy is now Kobe Bryant and the Lakers.

Ok back to me. So there I was, 7:04am going South bound on the I-17. Nearest car in front of me was about 200 yards away and about the same distance was the nearest car behind me. Perhaps I suffer from early morning partial blindness or maybe I am just completely unaware of whats going on around me but a car came out of nowhere and cut me off while getting into the fast lane, which is where I was driving. So right then I was thinking a couple things. "wtf?, there is NO ONE around me. How can you cut someone off so bad when there is tons of room". So as any young man in his mid-twenties would do, I honk at him. Not a "you-cut-me-off-you-Ahole" honk, but a "hey-Im-here-just-letting-you-know-that-we-dont-do-that-to-people-when- you-have-400-yards-to-change-lanes" honk (pretty standard, really).

Part 1.a of the story is that the evening before I had put a good sized Lakers sticker on the back window of my truck the night before. It wasn't as big or as obnoxious as some of the suns stickers I have seen out here but it wasn't small by any means. Like 8 inches long and 2 inches tall. My thought process is that If people can roll around here supporting their favorite teams, no reason I shouldn't be able too. Not to mention I lived in Sacramento for a year as a laker fan and survived so this would be a piece of cake.

So, after honking at the man who cut me off he decided to change lanes into the carpool lane (that's to the left of the fast lane) and started slowing down and after a couple seconds he was even with me on the freeway. I'm going to Pause the story here because there are a couple things that could happen..

Situation 1) He flips me off, I laugh and he drives off.

Situation 2) I give him the "wtf" look, he yells something That I obviously cant hear, menacing glances are exchanged then one of us speeds up or slows down just to get away from the other.

Situation 3) He pulls a gun out, shoots out my tires and I Mission Impossible style leap from my slowing, crippled car on top of his and we have a fight to control his vehicle careening down the interstate (I wont lie, was kind of hoping this one happened)

I went for the option 2, I gave him the "wtf" face. I would have never guessed in a million years what he said next. I watched and read his lips has he mouthed...

"Eff you Laker fan."

So Full but So Empty

Hello friends.
I am in the midst of something revolutionary happening in me. I have come to the realization that my life, everything I have ever loved or wanted, and all the things around me have led me to one certain and nearly unattainable destiny. I have never felt a burning passionate love for anyone in my life. I have never loved enough to die for someone or to care really all that much at all as a matter of fact, save for 2 people. I am sorry for most of you as you most likely are hurt by this, but save that because I hardly believe that you can say the opposite in regards to my well being. Looking back at all the people that have ever said they loved me while being at church, consider yourself among the liars of this world. Something said at church just to make yourself feel better for being a selfish, self minded person will only get you so far before you realize that you are no different. You are a sheep and you are a meal ticket for a pastor who doesn't know your name to eat and feed his kids. There has only ever been 2 people I actually believe meant it. To the rest, it was a lie.

I can say that what I do love, I love deeply and whole heartily. I love to the point in which it hurts me sometimes. As such, my love for music is no different. I can say that, with all of me, that music will always be my one and only love. Nothing in me stirs more emotion, more conviction or more joy than that which music has given me. Perhaps I am the only person I know that feels this way. Music has never broken my heart, it has never stabbed me in the back, it has never been friends with my Ex's on facebook.

After 25 years of living and breathing and dying a little each day, I have come to see who and what I am. I don't know if I'm cut out to have a family. I don't know if I'm cut out to have kids or a wife or any of that bullshit everyone on this planet seeks. Maybe I am the only one who knows what it is like to unconditionally love, then fall to the bottom of the ocean when it turns out that they just pushed you away. I wont deny that I desire the one true love manifested in a woman. However I cannot help but feel... empty. So full but so empty.

What I am trying to say is that I was put on this earth to make music. To Love my true love everyday. And I will be Damned that I don't see it through. I have so much more to say but cant even begin to explain. So many people have meant so many things to me and they have all come to the same conclusion in my life, they have left. What kind of life is it to lead when you cannot count on the very people that brought you into it.

So full and yet so hopelessly empty.

Shameful Behavior

This is going to be somewhat a two-parter of a blog entry, and I wont lie, this could get messy. Well, enough with the blue balling, I'll get right to it.

Situation 1: Hypothetical (which means a real situation with names removed)

In some crazy cosmic coincidence, you (imagine yourself as a love drunk 25 year old male) end up painting your girlfriends toenails. I know, as disgusting as that might sound, it happened. You know it, she knows it, and now every one of her friends on facebook knows it because she posted a picture of you doing it. Now all her friends are commenting on it and, if you will allow me, I will share some of those comments. As always, names are removed to protect the author of the comment. Instead, I will replace their names with an attempt at a comical stereotype that will most likely be offensive.

Blonde twenty-something female posted; "OMG that is sooooo cute!"

Blonde pre-twenty-something female posted; "Wow, (generic boyfriend name) never paints MY toe nails, your BF is the best!"

Person who is disgusted by this blatant lack of manhood and feels a sociological obligation to put and end to the madness posted; ".... "

If you couldn't tell who the last poster was, it was me. Yes, shocking as it may seem. Silence seems to be my least used weapon when fighting the battle for men everywhere (another shocker, I know) but this time I felt my silent indignation towards this blasphemy to all men would be justified and people (read: women) will know that this shameful behaviour is simply not acceptable in Mandom. The madness did not end there...

Blonde female getting her toes painted in the picture posted; "Oh Josh, just wait till you are painting your girlfriend's toenails ;-)"

Annoying short blonde High school student posted; "haha if he ever gets one! Lol jusss playin!"

I'm going to be the bigger man here (and try not to critisize the lack of grammar for one thing) and let a couple of things that I have to say about these last two posts slide. Too bad that forgive/ignore sentiment only lasted for about 3 seconds. So those things I'm letting slide are being replaced with a couple gems I have come up with.

You will never EVER see me doing anything like painting my girlfriends toe nails. First of all, that disgusting, those are her feet. All you females out there might say something about being in love and doing anything for the love of your life blah blah blah but you know what? I have been in love. Yes, the cold, callus, rock hard heart I now possess was once less cold, callus and less rock hard. Think of it in terms of rock layers in the earth. It used to be like the topsoil, now its more like the granite that's a couple layers down, but enough of that poorly executed analogy. I'm simply not going to do it because there is something major that I have to consider. Its called the Man-card. That's right, the coveted Man-card. The man card is the proverbial membership that every man is a part of from the moment you are born. Its an understood, seldomly spoken of collaboration of all men world wide. One of self governace, honor and pride. Once you lose your man-card, you are never looked at the same way. Here as an example.

You are walking through the mall and you see some guy walking around, holding hands with his girlfriend. She is carrying nothing while he is carrying her purse. So you, being a fellow man, think "Well ok, maybe she needed to tie her shoe and he is just holding it for her". A perfectly reasonable explanation for the situation. Then you realize, wait a minute, they are just strolling along window shopping and going into the pottery barn and the like home decor businesses. Looking at rugs and nodding their heads like they are some experts on the Eastern-Mediterranean styling of this throw rug that they are about to purchase from a store somewhere in mid-suburbia USA.

Then it hits you. The purse is his! It was a Gift from her! The only thing you can utter from your trembling lips is "...m-m.. m-MANCARD!" You would be absolutely correct in your declaration or this mans' newly missing piece of man-proving critera. Purse guy has had his man-card taken from the lady that purchased him that purse. Oh sure, they will call it something else, "shoulder bag" or my favorite, "European-whatever-bag". OK like I have never seen a picture of cities in Europe/been to Europe and you want me to believe that all the guys over there have purses. Reality check - they don't, ok? I'm not an idiot. Make no mistake though, he could have preserved his man card. He could have not worn the purse and kept a wallet like every other guy out there but no, she took his man card the moment he donned that shiny black leather purse with the gold buckle on the front.

There isn't much lost in translation if you apply that to painting toe nails that happen to be your girlfriends. I would like to take a moment to ponder this in writing. If he (said toe nail painter) were, oh I don't know, painting his own toe nails, he would just be really weird but wouldn't lose his man card over it. The fact that is in the picture, he was on all fours, hunched over with a little bottle of purple polish, and the little brush, painting a toe nail while she was sitting on a chair above him destroys any pride he should have left as a man. Not only are you completely devoid of any dignity you might have had left, but this action now shreds your man card into tiny man-card pieces.

Well i hope we can all learn a valuable lesson from this. Man-cards are irreplaceable (unless you can pull off something freaking huge, like wrestling a bull and winning or catching a bullet in your bare hands or something) and if you are going to do something that you know you will lose your man-card over, at least make sure no one is taking pictures of it.