Sunday, December 31, 2006

Are you FUCKING kidding me?!?

Dateline: December 27, 2006

Long Island - Thomas Beck (my dear brother and partner in crime) is involved in a car accident when a semi driver decides he simply has to get off the highway at the exit he had just passed, jerking the wheel to the right and slamming into my brother's car, sending it on a whirlwind tour of the grass shoulder. My brother's car came to a rest upside down back on the very highway he was attempting to leave, at which point he crawled out a broken window and made his way to the side of the road. He was immobilized by meidcal workers at the scene and taken to an area hospital. He has stitches, abraisons, contusions, aches, and a very grateful family.

Dateline: December 30, 2006

Long Island - Thomas Beck (my dear brother and partner in crime) is in my passenger seat as we prepare to leave WalMart in Riverhead. We sit, first in line at the light, waiting for it to change. As the Westbound turn lane signal goes red, a truck tries to squeeze through, at which point it is struck by an east bound car. The back of the truck gets spun around into the front of my poor, dear Gretchen. Airbags deploy, and my brother emerges from his second accident in 78 hours. This time, it is I who was immobilized by emergency responders. A few hours later, I leave the hospital with a bruised sternum, a sore back, aches, and a very grateful family.

Alright, here it is, to paraphrase Marge Simpson:

"And God, if you expect me to make those lemon squares for the church bake sale, you'd better stop killing our vehicles."

What the fuck is going on here? How is it that our family is involved in two vehicular mishaps in less than four days? What are the odds?

I'll post again when the Percocet wears off, if I don't immediately need to take another.

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Resolution Revisitation

Another year is at it's end, and it was considered, in the end totals, a bad one. My father passed away, I quit my job, my blog ate itself, I came down with some obscure dog-disease which continues to plague my flesh, and my brother was forced to engage in automotive acrobatics by some truck-driver shit-head that realized he was missing his exit (my brother is okay, thank Ashley.)

Let's review my New Year's Resolutions from last year (with the results following):

(from December 31, 2005)

I, Kenn Beck, resolve the following:

1. I will not kill anyone unless it is absolutely necessary, or if said murder has tremendous comedic potential.

Success. This was a tough one.

2. I will break my four year self-imposed social exile and actually go out on a date. With who remains to be seen.

Failure. No time, no patience, no woman in her right mind would do it.

3. I will stop bitching about the fact that my computer is woefully behind the technology curve to everyone and anyone who will listen and do something about it.

Success! New iMac with a 500 GB hard drive, courtesy of my inheritance.

4. I will allow myself to not feel responsible for the fact that my father lives alone in a Unabomber style cabin in the middle of the Catskills and drinks himself into oblivion every day because I don’t come to visit him more often.

Qualified failure. I was doing okay with this one until he passed away in October, and since then it has affected me pretty badly.

5. I will submit at least one of my short stories to a literary magazine for publication.

Failure. There ARE no more fiction magazines that accept open submissions, and the one piece I managed to finish met with critical panning by my nearest and dearest, which I asked for 100%, but none the less doused my spirit.

6. I will not digitally colorize and contemporize Casablanca.

Success. I instead re-mastered Citizen Kane with new footage, like the infamous meeting with Jabba the Hutt.

7. I will travel to a U.S. city and state that I have never been to before.

Failure. I've BEEN to every state on the eastern seaboard besides Maine, and who wants to go there? This one WILL fall in 2007, however.

8. I will not bring chloroform on the aforementioned date.

Inapplicable. PUSH.

9. I will not go out of my way to drown any ferrets in such a manner that can be traced back to me.

Success. It was not out of my way.

10. I will stop going all in with two pair unless they are face cards.

Failure. My brother bought me poker chips and cards for Christmas, and we've been playing for the past few nights, and sometimes I just can't resist.

11. I will not devour the life energy of this planet and render it a useless, barren husk.

Success. I stopped with New jersey.

12. I will paint at least one painting.

Qualified failure. I did manage to paint a chair for my friend's daughter, but no paintings.

13. I will write at least one poem.

Horrific failure. I should have been able to knock that bitch right out.

Wait, that's a haiku, isn't it? Judges? DING! Success!

14. I will sing Karaoke.

Failure, and in that failure, success for everyone else.

15. I will not testify in front of a grand jury that I have never taken steroids and then get caught testing positive.

Success. I only tested positive for horse tranquilizers.

16. I will be open and honest and admit my feelings to that certain mystery someone in my life.

Failure. She's gone, moved away.

17. I will do at least one nice thing for someone I don’t get along with. (Which could be any of you bastards…)

Success. I won't tell you who, but the year was REPLETE with forgiveness and nice deeds.

18. I will deflect an asteroid using only my vast mental powers, preventing an alien civilization from being exterminated.

Success. What? Go ahead, PROVE I didn't do it!

19. I will not travel backward through time in order to try and alter history to my benefit.

Failure. Sorry, I originally intended to just go back and prevent Millennium from being filmed, but ended up curing my horrific leprosy (which is, ironically, how I contracted the Parvo instead).

20. I will complete a 16 x 16 Sudoku puzzle, and will create a MEGA 25×25 Sudoku puzzle.

Succure. You figure it out.

21. I will write something that makes someone cry (and in a good way, even).

Success. Dry eyes were few and far between during my father's eulogy.

22. I will not commandeer any vehicles with my self-imposed authority.

Success, but only because my father SAID I could use his truck while he was in the hospital.

23. I will not hire a male prostitute and send him to my friend’s office in an attempt to cast doubt on his sexuality. (Transsexuals aren’t technically male, are they? (I’ve gotta leave myself SOME outs.))

Failure. Sorry, Bill. Girardo, your money's on the dresser...

24. I will tell the people that are important in my life just that.

Success, in abundance.

25. I will try to hit 25 Homeruns.

Success. Between two leagues, I hit it and passed it.

26. I will try one food that I have never tried before.

Success. And for the life of me, I can't think of what it was...

27. I will crush my enemies, see them driven before me, and hear the lamentation of the women!

Failure. The women failed to lament my replacing their weak, puny males!

28. I will donate to a charitable cause.

Success. I sent cards to Marines in Iraq while shopping at Best Buy, gave change to the Salvation Army, and taught my four year old nephew how to pan handle in Penn Station.

29. I will find a cure for the disease I created in my home-lab last month (that transient I have locked in the basement has his fingers crossed on that one too).

Success... but too late to help Mr. Panicky (the name I ended up giving the transient).


30. I will not have my website investigated by the CIA, FBI, or secret service for listing the words “Bomb,” “Terrorist,” “Assassinate,” “President,” or “Anthrax.” (Hmm. Self defeating prophecy?)

My lawyers have advised me to answer "success."

31. I will keep this blog going, breaking the cycle of laziness that always befalls my attempts at journaling.
Well, let’s see how that goes. I give myself until February 14th before I’ve broken at least ten of them. I have already broken four of them while I was writing this (I killed the male prostitute because it was too funny to pass up on, and traveled back in time to prevent it when I realized I could actually go to jail for it.)

Gasping, strangled, wriggling, crawling success. Despite what iBlogs did to my creative material, one year later, I am still blogging for the fate of the free-world.

18 Successes, 11 Failures, 1 Push, 1 Mixed Result.

We'll see an updated list for 2007 tomorrow.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Will It Blend? - The Movie

It's hypnotic...

Listen to the way this guy sounds when he offers the end product... he's smashed, I swear it, and why not? His job is throwing things in a blender...

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Allen Iverson To Nuggets; NBA Still Full Of Spoiled Assholes

Allen "The Answer" Iverson was traded today to the Denver Nuggets for Joe Smith, Andre Miller, and two first round draft picks. In other news, does anyone really give a shit?

I used to wait eagerly for big name deals like this to occur, and track where players moved as their clubs shuffled their payrolls to try and make a push at the playoffs. I don't know when I became so jaded at basketball, but I can narrow it down to between 2000 and 2005. I was on the edge of my seat for the Lakers' first of three recent championships, actually choosing to STAY LATE at work to listen to the game over the internet when they won. Last year, my favorite player, Shaquille O'Neal proved to the Lakers that it was a mistake to let him go, and I barely caught ANY of the playoffs.

Basketball has lost any of the artistic merit it used to have. Gone are players like Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, Oscar Robertson, John Stockton. No one makes game winning 15 foot jumpers anymore; players either feed the ball to their big man who slams his back into the man "guarding" him until he's close enough to crunch the ball home, or they throw up a three at a 26% clip. Ho Hum.

58 days until pitchers and catchers report...

Friday, December 15, 2006

OK, kids....

Leaving town for a day. I should be back by tomorrow night, but you know how bachelor parties can get :)

If you're going to have a party, clean up afer yourselves.

Peace

Kenn

Thursday, December 14, 2006

zzzzzzz huh?

Hey, guys, when I said let me sleep, I didn't mean for a week!

Anywho, nothing much to report thus far. No new hysterical comedy musings, no amazing advancements, no earth shattering news.

My Illness is still kicking my ass, and my neurologist says there is nothing wrong with me (in a neurological sense) so the mystery of the dying banker is still a mystery. Zoinks, Scoob!

Tomorrow is my buddy Charlie's bachelor party, for which we are all trucking out to Atlantic City. Here's hoping ym lack of concentration doesn't affect my Blackjacking skills...

I've been out of work since Monday, because a tired and unfocused banker is a mistake making banker. My cocktail of vitamins, sleeping pills and Aleve continues to bear limited fruit.

Christmas is coming! Stay tuned for my Christmas list!

Friday, December 08, 2006

Spent...



Shh!

Let him sleep...

Thursday, December 07, 2006

In The Name Of All That's Holy....

Because we're lazy, forgetful bastards, my brother and I forgot to get dog biscuits from the store today. As we were nearly home, and I needed to stop for gas, we went into the Hess in Center Moriches, where my brother picked something up for the dig. They had no biscuits, so instead we went to the Beef Jerky isle and picked something that looked like the dog might like it.

Pickled Sausage? Pickled Sausage? Who the fuck eats this crap? My brother opened it up and immediately quoted a line from Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy... "It smells like Big Foot's Dick!"

The stink was so bad that I cupped my gasoline soaked hand over my face to get away from it (which reminds me of my next lesson; don't try to pump 11 gallons of gas into a 10 gallon tank.)

I feel bad for the dog, who will doubtless be outside at 1 a.m. yelping as his ass is seared by the remains of this devil snack.

Poor, poor dog.

Tuesday, December 05, 2006

Special Insight.....

Which of these fun factoids are false?

1. I make myself sneeze once a day by snorting water.

2. I have an imaginary friend who speaks a magical language that only I can understand.

3. I once killed a man by reciting poetry to him.

4. I have never had my wisdom teeth removed.

5. I once smoked a cigarette in one and a half minutes.

6. I drink my birth weight in peanut oil every morning.

7. I own five automobiles.

8. I own five percent of Microsoft.

9. I once ate an entire order of McDonalds Hotcakes in one bite.

10. I was ejected from my one and only spelling bee in the first round, having misspelled a five letter word.

11. My sense of taste is so acute that I can tell how many grains of salt are on a pretzel nugget.

12. I once slept for 24 hours straight.

13. I once stayed awake for 56 hours straight.

14. I have been on television twice.

15. I wrote Whitney Houston's "I'm Every Woman."

16. I was born in the year of the Muskrat.

17. I once drank an entire travel bottle of Scope with no ill effects.

18. I have been to Orlando eight times, but have never been to Disney World.

19. All of my relationships happened within a three and a half year span.

20. I am missing a piece of my right eyelid.

ANSWERS:

1. True. Best way to nose douche the coffee stink out of my head.

2. False. He speaks a form of Esperanto, and I have no idea what he's saying.

3. False. Not yet, anyway...

4. True. I have had one broken tooth in all four quadrants of my mouth, which creates enough space for the wisdom teeth to exist pain free.

5. True. As a cigar smoker, when I was once forced to resort to cigarettes, I smoked it like a cigar, with deep drags and no inhale. It went up like flash paper.

6. False. Strictly corn oil for me.

7. True. Two of them work.

8. False. ANYONE who knows me knows I want nothing to do with anything that isn't Macintosh.

9. False. But I would be willing to wager a week's pay that I could.

10. True. Abate. A-B-A-I-T. BZZZZZT!

11. False. I can't tell the difference between a beefsteak tomato and actual beefsteak.

12. True. After a 33 hour stint at Dan's Papers.

13. True. Painting at college for my senior show.

14. False. One of my appearances, as announcer for the Southampton College Basketball team, never aired, because they lost the playoff game. Dicks.

15. False. REALLY. I SWEAR.

16. False. It was the year of the Ox.

17. True. Frost Valley, 1988. I won 50¢ on that bitch, too.

18. True. I always get stuck driving the group that wants to go to the beach...

19. True. Sad, but true. My first girlfriend and I started dating in September of 1995, and my last girlfriend dumped me in April of 1999.

20. False. I am missing a piece of my LEFT eyelid, due to a childhood chicken pox scab falling off.

Rumble...



All I'm saying is stay away from me today. That's all.

Monday, December 04, 2006

Update



Mood: Tired

Book: Empire Insurance Physician Locator

Flash Rogue: Captain Cold

Ice Cream: Fudge Tracks

Song: Van Halen's 316

Force of Nature: Gravity

Aching Joint: Middle Knuckle, Left Ring Finger

Calendar: Mayan

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Kneel Before Me, My Evil Minions!



This is your orientation video. I am your new employer, The Evil Headcheese!

Welcome to the Cadre Of Dastardly Evildoers! You've taken the first step in becoming a Master of Destiny by joining my legion of evil! Among the benefits of being a foot soldier in my war on righteousness is the delight of watching the pathetic denizens of this wretched planet scream for mercy, the sheer rush of power from commanding the forces of nature to rebel against them, and full dental coverage.

If you'll look under your seat you'll find your information packet. In it, you'll find your henchman rulebook, a copy of the organization mission statement, a 1099 Tax form, Death Ray registration card and wallet sized permit, a non-disclosure agreement, and an application for direct deposit. If you are unsure of what information to put on the tax form, just leave it blank and you can fill it in sometime next week.

Within this information packet is also a dossier on our sworn arch-enemy, Whiz-Guy. Be sure to study this dossier, as it lists suspected aliases, known weaknesses, and attack patterns, and should we get a surprise visit from Whiz-Guy, each evil minion is expected to know how to disable him. We also get audited bi-monthly by corporate, and if just one of you fails to provide the correct information, we could fail our audit, and you don't want to be around me should THAT happen!

Upon completion of your paperwork, please return your pen and report to outfitting. You will provide your sizes to the clerk and receive your henchman jumpsuit, name badge, security card, gloves, boots, and goggles. There will be a $70 staff dress charge, but this can be drawn directly from your first paycheck. A second jumpsuit can be purchased for a one-time discount of $30, and we offer free laundry service to any on-duty personnel.

Next you will report to the armory, where you will receive your Death Ray and flight belt. Take special care of these items, as you are responsible for their operation and maintenance. We offer in house repair service, but many henchmen learn to repair their own weapons and utility devices to save on the $250 repair fee.

As a minion of unspeakable evil, you are entitled to health benefits after 120 days of employment or two super hero raids, whichever comes first. Vacation days are accrued at the rate of one a month after six months of continual employment, and can be rolled over into the next calendar year, but vacation requests must be submitted in writing no later than 30 days prior to the first day of vacation period. You receive one sick/personal day every 30 days, and these cannot be carried over into the next calendar year. Some dastardly plans may create "blackout" dates during which employees cannot schedule vacation, but these times are usually announced well in advance in the daily briefing. It is your responsibility to read these daily briefs. For every eight hours on the clock, you are eligible for one hour of break time. Cigarette breaks are prohibited, and smoking within the base itself is likewise prohibited, except in the properly designated areas, such as the volcanic catwalk.

Your first week will consist of basic henchman training, learning the basics of the Tectonic Upheaval Device, how to secure manacles, and laser training. Once you're reached the six month service milestone, you'll be eligible for advanced henchman training, including piloting of undersea submersibles, terror tanks, and hovercrafts. Aircraft training will be offered to qualified employees at supervisor's discretion.

There is room for advancement within the Cadre as well! New positions are always opening in the middle management tiers, and qualified applicants will be considered on a first come first served basis. Also, new for this year is our referral system. For every evil henchman you recruit into the Cadre, you will receive a $100 bonus in pay (pending a successful background and genetic screening).

I would like to close by welcoming you once again into the Cadre Of Dastardly Evildoers, and encourage you to be on your worst behavior! Together we will make the rivers run red with the blood of the righteous! (Which is our fourth quarter goal, coincidentally.)

Saturday, December 02, 2006



PLAYER ONE... BEGIN!

Friday, December 01, 2006

The BIG GUY!



Heh heh heh... I'm winning the race to go completely bald! Eat my follically challenged dust, brother of mine!

Watching my sister's wedding video tonight, I realized that even five years ago hurricane no hair had a pretty good eye goin' on, while my brother still had a lush head of hair. As his starts to thin slightly, my ozone hole is as gaping as ever, and it has been since I was about 12. What kind of life is that for me? I never stood a chance.

Well, it's either shave my head or shave my wrists, so it's time to see how Edge Gel feels on my pulse spot...