Hey there, blogophiliacs! I’m busy running around trying to get ready for this nerd convention that I’ll be performing at all weekend so today’s blog is an old favorite from my ol’ MySpace page! Enjoy!

The following is a rough timeline of what the public school system teaches of Christopher Columbus. This can be quite a valuable tool for the hundreds of four year olds that read my blog and want to know what to expect over the next 12 years of their scholastic career.

K-5: In 1492, Columbus Sailed the ocean blue. He was on a voyage to show the queen of Spain that the world was round. During his voyage, he discovered America and met people who lived there that called themselves “Indians”. In exchange for some horses and the gift of Christianity, these friendly natives gave Columbus exotic vegetables to bring back to his delighted queen!

6TH GRADE: Actually, Columbus didn’t discover America. That had been done already by some Vikings a couple hundred years prior. Even earlier by the natives if you really want to get into the semantics of it.

7TH GRADE: Oh, Columbus wasn’t really trying to prove the world was round. That had kind of been accepted as scientific fact since the 2nd Century B.C. He was actually just trying to find a shortcut to India to get spices and opium.

8TH GRADE: Dumbass actually thought he had landed in India. That’s why we call Native Americans “Indians”. In an effort to cover his own ass, he brought back exotic vegetables and called them spices. That’s why we call jalapenos and the like “peppers”.

9TH GRADE: Yeah… about those Indians. The few he didn’t rape and kill he took into slavery.

10TH GRADE: Stealing a time machine from Leonardo DaVinci, Columbus travelled to 1908 Vienna where met young artist Adolf Hitler outside of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. When Hitler told Columbus of his latest application rejection, Columbus scoffed and said “Those damn Jews wouldn’t know art if it slapped them in the face!”. He then went back to his own time to rape some more Indians.

11TH GRADE: Remember that puppy you had when you were little that your mother said “ran away”? Christopher Columbus strangled it to death because it’s the only way he can achieve an erection.

12TH GRADE: Don’t ask me how, just know that Christopher Columbus was somehow involved with the cancellation of “Arrested Development”.

Note: Should you choose to go on to college after graduation, I highly recommend majoring in Columbus Studies. Then you can learn even more about this intrepid explorer like his involvment in the 9/11 terror plot, the Lincoln assasination and pretty much every Adam Sandler movie after “Happy Gilmore”.

When I last did an installment of Mark Trail Text Only Non Sequitor Theater, our hero was in his cabin talking on the phone to somebody. That was four years ago so something completely different is going on now!

Friday, June 24th, 2011. Our first frame shows three men standing outside. A man with a rifle, our hero and a bearded man wearing one of those brown shirts with the tassels on it like Billy Jack wore in the movie “Billy Jack”. All three men have blank, emotionless expressions on their faces indicating that they are engaged in a possibly serious conversation. With his hand on the shoulder of the bearded man, Mark asks the rifle weilding individual “Sheriff, what’s the meaning of this?  Why do you have a rifle on John?”

The second panel zooms out until the three men are blurred figures, even more indistinguishable from each other than before.  In the foreground and taking up literally 1/4 of the entire panel is a Chickadee perched on a branch proving, to the reader’s relief, that animals do still exist in the world of Mark Trail.  In the background the men continue their conversation which has nothing to do with the bird prominently featured in today’s comic.  The sherriff says, with a look that one could only assume is stern, stoic blankness, “I think this man has been robbing stores in the community, Mark!”  Mark, surprised that such an allegation has been made against somebody that is probably his friend or something replies incredulously with “He what?”

Our third panel zooms back into the three men, leaving us to wonder of the fate of the Chickadee.  Did it fly away to search for food?  Was it snatched up by a large predator?  Is it still perched on that branch, watching these events unfold with the rest of us?  We can only wonder on the fate of the Chickadee.

The three men look at each other with the same grim, determined, serious expressions that the wore on the first panel.  The Sheriff has now stepped between Mark and the suspected burglar and in a keen display of detective work worthy of his title, says “On the last robbery the thief was wearing Moccasins, and your friend is wearing Moccasins!”

What will happen to our hero and his friend?  Tune in approximately four years from now for the next episode of….

MARK TRAIL TEXT ONLY NON SEQUITOR THEATER!

CONvergence, Minnesota’s biggest yearly sci-fi convention is starting up this Thursday and I’ll be there all weekend long slinging jokes every night in the Stand Up! Records Party Room (128) and Saturday in the HarmCON room show (I think it’s across from the bar on the 1st floor).  This isn’t my first year performing at this convention and while there’s plenty of vendors, art, panel discussions and room parties to check out, the best fun is to be had watching 3,000 grown ups run around in costumes.  In honor of these and for the sake of fun, I’ve created the first ever (to my knowledge)

CONVERGENCE COSPLAY BINGO BOARD

Have fun!

The State of Minnesota will be closed for business on July 1st if the governor and legislature can’t come to an agreement on the budget. While this may seem a bit extreme to some people, it makes perfect sense to me. In fact, the last time my wife and I had an argument about the family budget I put myself into a medically induced coma until she let me buy more comic books. Sure, it cost thousands of dollars to care for me during the coma and caused irreparable brain damage but I got what I wanted.

Now this doesn’t mean that Anarchy will rule the streets and riots will break out (for the first couple of weeks) but this does mean that any state gov’t service deemed “unnesential” will be closed and all employees of said services will be laid off until an agreement is made.  Amongst those services is the Minnesota Racing Commission, meaning Canterbury Downs will shut down, laying off it’s 1,300+ employees and leaving dozens of Jockeys looking for work

Local Chapter of the Lollypop Guild

The American Cancer Society recently conducted a 14 year study on the health of over 123,000 people. The study found that people who sat more than 6 hours a day were more likely to die during the study (20% more likely for men, 40% for women), were at bigger risks for cardiovascular disease, obesity, type 2 diabetis, depression and a specific type of butt cancer.

While reading the article I thought “well no shit not exercising and sitting on my fat ass all day is bad for me” the study specifically showed that “sitting for extended periods of time does significant damage to human health that cannot be undone by exercising. Sitting for several hours each day is bad for you, like smoking is bad for you, regardless of whether you do healthful activities, too.” Having worked at a call center, this study doesn’t surprise me at all.

My last job was working at a call center for a cable company that everybody hates and will remain unnamed for the duration of this story. I have worn a lot of different no-college-degree-required office job hats in my adult life but this was the first time in a few years I had been in a call center. Twice during my training was I reprimanded for moving around. The first time I was yelled at by a lead for standing up and pacing a bit during a phone call. Her rationalization was that by standing up my voice would project over the cube walls and disrupt other employee’s work. Nothing makes you feel like you’re in a shitty job like being told you don’t get to stand up. I still hate her to this very day.

The second time I was reprimanded for scooting around in my office chair. This one really hurt because office chairs are meant to be scooted around. The only reason those chairs have wheels is because office work is soul crushing and scooting around in them provides the tiniest bit of pleasure and a scant illusion of freedom in a corporate drone’s soul. When I protested that “chair travelling”(their term) was my god given right and protected by the constitution, they explained that this was outlawed in the entire building. The reason this law went into effect is because last year alone, 4 people in the building injured themselves falling out of office chairs.

They didn’t dive head first into the chairs. They didn’t stand on a chair and attempt to backflip off the chair. They were just sitting on the chair, a mere 1.5 feet off the ground. They fell, a whopping one and a half feet to the hard, unforgiving office carpet and suffered injuries that required them to go to the hospital.

I’m no scientist and I can’t tell you if call center work creates the morbidly obese, tweety bird sweater wearing middle age lumps of middle age lethargy that fill it’s cubicles or merely attracts them but with this study one thing is certain. They’re an endangered species. If we’re not careful the North American Call Center Rep will go extinct and be completely replaced by the leaner, more agressive Indian Call Center rep with it’s keen survival instincts and ability to do yoga while programming a universal remote over the phone.

Jared lost a tooth yesterday (baby tooth.  He’s 10 and not a methhead).  Since Jen was sick she texted me while I was at an open mic that she was going to sleep and I was to play the role of the Tooth Fairy when I got home.  Now, the kid’s 10.  He knows there’s no Tooth Fairy.  He hasn’t said anything, most likely, out of fear that his only source of income will cease.  I’d love to tell him the truth and just say “Listen.  There’s no Tooth Fairy.  I’ll still give you a dollar for every tooth you lose because adults liquefy them and inject the liquid into our hearts to slow the aging process.” but he needs to initiate that conversation.

Unless, of course, he catches the Tooth Fairy scam in the act.

I’m not going to lie, this was my first Tooth Fairy gig.  I did my best to make this a covert operation but I may have been a little overconfident.  I’ve stated in the past that we live in an old house and that means creaky floors.  That’s okay, I just took it slow.  Once I found myself within arm’s reach of the pillow I pulled the dollar out and held it in my left hand and reached under the pillow with my right.

Looking back, I have no clue as to why I thought having the dollar at the ready was a good idea.  Was I going to pull some Indiana Jones switcheroo so he wouldn’t notice?

I searched around under the pillow but no tooth was found.  Did it get shuffled somewhere else on the bed?  Was it under the part of the pillow his head was on?  I slowly made my way to the end of the pillow when Jared snapped awake as if a fucking gun went off in the room.  His head swung left until his eyes met mine, a look of shock and horror on his face.

With my right hand under his pillow and my left hand holding up a dollar bill I looked him in the eyes and said “…I guess you’re old enough to learn there’s no such thing as the Tooth Fairy”.

He didn’t move.  His expression didn’t change.

“I mean… this is all a dream!  You’re sleeping!  Sleeeepiiiing.” I shoved the dollar under his pillow and ran out of the room.

All in all, I think I got this step parenting thing down.

My dad turns fifty…something today (pretty sure it’s 56) and he’s the best dad any kid could ask for.  Not only did he work hard to provide for his family and try to teach his kids the value of hard work and doing what was right (a little bit of that stuck, I’m sure), he was fun.  He went to great lengths to make sure that stuff like birthdays and holidays were special and memorable.   While he genuinely enjoyed doing all this for my siblings and I, he loved one thing above all else.

Pranking the ever loving shit out of us.

My favorite example goes back to 1990.  Nelson Mandela was just released from jail, the tabloids were all a buzz with the new romance between Paula Abdul and MC Skat Kat and Stephen King’s “It” was adapted as a miniseries on ABC.  My parents urged me to go upstairs.  It was too scary.  I wouldn’t like it.  I told them “goddamnit, I’m not fucking five anymore.  I’m eight motherfucking years old and I think I can handle a little network television horror”.  It was a long time ago but I’m pretty sure that’s what I said.

It was the scariest god damn thing I’ve ever seen in my life.  I screamed, cried and covered my eyes on all the gory parts.  I even left the room at some parts but like an idiot kid, kept poking my head back in because I had to see what was going to happen next.  I had nightmares for a week and didn’t walk near a sewer grate for two years.

I rented “It” from blockbuster as a teenager (came on a whopping three VHS tapes!) to confront my childhood fears and I couldn’t believe what a pussy I was.  The thing that haunted my nightmares was Tim Curry?

The only people this guy should scare are right wing closet cases.

Nevertheless, I had a hard time getting to sleep after the first night of watching “It”.  I did eventually fall asleep, though and when I woke up the first thing I saw was a clown.  It was the Happy’s Potato Chip mascot* cut out of the cardboard box and hanging from the ceiling from a piece of string right above my face.  Taped to it was a word balloon that said “They all float down here, Billy and so will you!”  I shrieked and immediately heard an all to familiar maniacal laughter come from the kitchen.

It’s still nothing compared to the time he scared my sister’s friends so bad at the Halloween party they wouldn’t stop crying for five minutes (I helped with that one).

So happy birthday, dad!  I love you and I swear that one day I will have my revenge.

[*note:  I searched the internet up and down for an image of the Happy’s Potato Chip Clown and could not find a single picture.  I even read blog posts where people were looking for the image and called the company up (they’re still alive and kicking in NE Minneapolis) and the company wouldn’t even talk about it.  The only rational conclusion is that the Happy Potato Chip Clown was evil and banished from this realm, never to return.]

Note: Sick as hell today so I’m reposting an old myspace blog story about how Justin Caesar and I almost saved Aerosmith.

Saturday night. Los Angeles.

The New Order Nation had made it’s move. The oppressive dictatorship had taken over the country and were quickly enforcing their policies on the people. On top of the list: No rocking.

Justin and I rushed down to club X with our machine guns after hearing that Aerosmith was playing a gig. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out NON would want them out of the picture. We get to the club and are swarmed by hundreds of identical NON agents in yellow jumpsuits and rollerblades. With inexplicably limitless ammunition and hundreds of CDs at our disposal, we fight our way into the club.

Aerosmith is on stage, rocking hard in spite of the fact that the club has literally turned into a warzone. We take out all the NON agents, fueled by the knowledge that Aerosmith is the key to winning this war for some reason but it’s too late. Aerosmith has been kidnapped.

With the information from a cleverly hidden tape in Steven Tyler’s dressing room, we travel the world from the jungles of Africa to the Middle East and finally, NON headquarters. This is where the fight really begins. There’s only one problem. Justin’s running low on CDs.

I lay down cover fire as Justin picks up CDs found in broken light fixtures, Orwellian posters featuring NON leader Mistress Helga displaying phrases like “SUBMIT” and “SHUT UP”, trash cans and conveniently placed crates. After killing literally thousands of identical foot soldiers we make our way up to the boardroom. A lone figure that fucking looks exactly like every single goddamn character we’ve come across so far sits behind a desk, waiting. If only by reflex we shoot him down and his desk converts into a giant robot with machine guns and rocket launchers for arms. I fall after about 10 rockets to the face. Like Obi-Wan Kenobi, the disembodied voice of Steven Tyler shrieks “Don’t give up!”.

Knowing that Justin isn’t far behind. I race to the change dispenser and deposit my only 10 dollar bill. Quarters in hand, I run back to the game but it’s too late. The screen only reads “Enter Your Initials”. It’s over. They’ve won. Kiss loud music, video games, Coca-Cola and everything associated with youthful fun goodbye.

My wife and I live in an older house (built around 1910 or something). Living in an older house has it’s ups and downs. One of the downs, we’ve learned over the last several months, is that older houses have lots of tiny holes for little critters to slip through with ease. We first discovered a mouse, which led to sealing up all of the bigger holes with a mix of caulking compound and steel wool. Not a big deal and haven’t seen a mouse since. Then there were ants. Which led to a thorough scrubbing of floors and a can of raid. There’s been a couple of ants since then but nothing major. The latest unwelcome guest, however…

centipede!

I fucking hate centipedes.  They look evil, they’re fast and poisonous. They eat earthworms. They molest kids. I don’t have any evidence to support that last one but I’m pretty sure it’s true.

Why couldn’t we be infested with caterpillars? Caterpillars only care about two things. Eating leaves and turning into butterflies.

Now I shouldn’t say we’re infested with them. My wife just found one last night and sprayed it with enough Raid to kill a horse. Before that we saw one a few weeks ago. I think it was smoking crack and posting messages on tea party forums.

Centipedes are racist and drink milk right out of the carton.

I fucking hate centipedes.