Sometimes Playoff Beards Work.

Being a fan of a team is largely disappointing and frequently soul crushing. Your team rarely rewards your fanatical devotion with championships. And then sometimes, inexplicably, your team wins. And you feel good. So very, very, good. Congratulations to the 2013 Red Sox. WooHoo!

I'm sure it was my beard that pushed them over the top. 

How To NOT Commit Adultery

I have been married for eighteen years, which is a long time, even by the impossibly high standards set by today's reality TV stars. My wife and I have been successful because we love each other and are committed to making it work every day. Well, most days. More days than not, we really work on it. And communication, that's really important, we totally do that. Talking about stuff is important-ish. But at least a part of my success as a husband has to do with my non-adultery contingency plan.
   My plan was first created early in our marriage, when a friend who had been married for a long time pulled me aside and told me that I needed to come up with a plan on how to NOT stray from my marriage vows. Now to me a plan seemed a little unnecessary, by staying faithful, I was by default, not committing adultery. But he told me that you needed to have a plan, because unless you were careful, at some point in the marriage you were going to be in a situation that would be so tempting, that if didn't already know what you would do when some wanton hussy threw herself at you, you would falter.
   He told me parts of his plan to help me formulate mine. His first thing was, if a woman wanted to make the sexy with him, he would get up and run away if necessary. In addition, he said that he made it a habit to never be alone with a woman that wasn't his wife. Or his mother probably. He didn't mention that, but I imagine he was safe with her as well. He stayed away from places that might incite him to passion with another woman, porn shops, strip clubs, the internet, Las Vegas as a whole, pools, beaches, summertime, concerts, movies, HBO, especially-especially Skin-e-max, the mall, and basically anyplace that isn't under Sharia Law. He absolutely never flirts with women; he once used pepper-spray on a Denny's waitress that called him Sugar. He actually had quite a long list, apparently women routinely threw themselves at my friend. (I guess I understand, he was voted as the accountant with the most visible chest hair poking out of the top of his undershirt, three years running down in the corporate tax department. Rowr.)
   After much consideration to what my friend had suggested I sat down and formulated my own plan. I'm sure all you married fellows, will come up with your own plans later this evening. Yours might include not befriending and then cyber-stalking old girlfriends on social media, or not having sex with people you aren't married to. Excellent plans all. But for me, my list is really short. A one, two punch of a good solid plan that is sure to keep me monogamous for life.

My plan is this:
1) I decided I would be socially awkward to the point that people of the opposite sex felt so uncomfortable around me they couldn't even carry on a conversation.
2) I decided that I would be (and this is the most important one, I think) fantastically, utterly, completely, amazingly unattractive. Really, really not good looking.

Well, not decided so much as, that's just how things are. Which shouldn't detract from the fact that my plan has been a smashing success.
 

You're lucky. I usually do my selfies with a duck-face.

I Don't Always Drink Beer...

Which is why we're on a break, beer and I. 

Don't Drive Drunk. Or Stupid. Especially Stupid.

SIR! SIR! Roll down your window please. NO! Not the passenger window, the driver's side. Oh holy crap! SIR! Not the rear driver's window. SIR! Roll down YOUR window, sir.

Uh, sorry.

Thank you, sir. I see you had a little problem with the window, sir. Do you know why I pulled you over, sir?

Alien mind control?

Excuse me, sir?
Aliens from Beetle Juice came down and sucked out your brain, and commanded you to pull over innocent law abiding citizens and harass them until they bowed down to the evil alien overlord, which is why I wear a tinfoil thong, because Beatle Juice-ian's brains are in their crotches, which explains the human phrase, he is thinking with his LITTLE brain...
NO, SIR! That is the stupidest thing I ever heard sir. Aliens don't exist, sir. You were driving erratically, sir. You were drifting all over the road, your speed was inconsistent, you used your blinker after you turned, the gas nozzle is hanging from your gas tank, and you are currently parked in someones koi pond. I'm suspicious that you've been drinking sir.

I'm pretty sure it was aliens.
No, sir. You were driving dangerously, sir. And aliens, notwithstanding the illegal kind, don't exist. Sir, have you in fact been drinking? 
Du'h, you would totally die if you never drank anything.
Have you been drinking alcohol, sir? Or are you just stupid? 
Uh... Sorry officer. You caught me. I'm a degenerate alcoholism. I've had a five-pack of beers, at that boob club, where the women show their chestal region. Yup, I'm totally drunk. 
The what? Show what? Sir. How much have you had to drink?
I said a fiver. No, wait, a seven pack. Ninety beers.
Sir. Beers, come in six packs. Or twelves, or eighteens, or cases. Have you in fact been drinking? 
Oh yes, I was having a debauchery at the bar with the females and I ordered five... ten... forty-two or the black and whites...
Sir? Do you mean Black and Tans?
That's so PC.
Sir. You haven't been drinking have you, sir? You're just stupid.
I resonate that remark. Resemble. Regret.
Resent?
I never even sent it the first time. 
Resent, it means to be angry or upset.
Oh. Sorry, I've drunk so much I forgot the dictionary. And I forgot I was drinking Moonglow and not beers.
Moonglow? Do you mean Moonshine?!
And, I had some Irish Car-Jackings.
Irish Car-Bombs?
A fourth of Jeff Daniels.
A fifth of the star of Something Wild? And Dumb And Dumber? You meant Jack. Sir, it is apparent you haven't been drinking. I'm going to have to write you up for being an idiot.
No! My work will fire me if they find out I'm stupid.
I'm sure they already suspect, sir. You are rather amazingly stupid.
I'm not stupid, I tell you. I'm drunk, I've been drinking vodka sauce. 
Vodka sauce goes on pasta, it's not for drinking. Let's do some field tests and see how stupid you really are.
Like saying the alphabet backwards?
I suspect you would just face the other way and say the alphabet.
Are you psychic?
Sir, what is the area of a square which has sides that are 4" long?
Let's see... A squared, plus B squared, equals ABBA, who was a really famous Swedish band. I'm going with ABBA.

That might be the stupidest thing ever said aloud, sir. The area of a square with 4" sides is not ABBA, it is 16 square inches. You are stupid, sir.
I'm not. Give me another chance.
OK, when did man first land on the moon?
Never. You can't land on the moon. They staged it.
I kinda knew you were gonna say that. That's a stupid person benchmark. Without a doubt you haven't been drinking, you just have the IQ of a zucchini.
That's not so bad, I hear wild zucchinis are pretty clever. 
No sir, they're not. Let's go, get out of the car. You're under arrest for being spectacularly dumb.
I'm not a idiot! Give me one more chance.
OK. One last chance to prove you're drunk and not stupid. A man has a cat. He puts the cat in a box. The box has poison in it that may or may not have have opened and killed the cat. You can't lift the lid of the box to check; is the cat alive or not? 
That's just wrong. You can't just go around killing or not killing cats. Why isn't PETA all over this guy?
It's hypothetical sir. Sir, answer the question; is the cat alive or dead?
Uhhm. Yes?
Yes?
He is alive and dead.
Correct, sir. I guess you aren't a complete moron.
That's great! What do I win?
A DWI. You have the right to remain silent...

I Will Sigh No More Forever, or I Have Met the Enemy And He Is Me... And Totally Pathetic.

You go through life and you think, "I'm a pretty nice guy, I generally care about the people around me. I try my best to be good. I know I have a few shortcomings, but they're not that bad. It's not like I'm felonious, I just have a few foibles." And then you meet someone who exhibits your foibles, and you realize what an annoying demon from the very pits of hell you are.

   If you are a topper, nothing will get your blood boiling like some guy that knows somebody that did some thing way cooler than what you just talked about. Or people that have to be brutally honest and point out the faults of every person they've ever met, REALLY don't appreciate having their own faults highlighted. My lone fault, (I'm practically a saint) is that instead of complaining, when life is hectic and I am overwhelmed, I bravely, stoically... sigh. In the manliest way possible of course. My own semi-silent protest against the crushing minutia of life. Practically nothing, really.
   And then yesterday I had a customer who started sighing the moment I walked into her house. She was upset about a multitude of small offenses. The electrician was late, sigh, she had to get to her office, sigh, she didn't bring her air scrubber, sigh, underneath the fridge was filthy, sigh, walking to the front door, sigh,  standing up, sigh, sitting down, sigh, sighing, sigh, sigh, sigh, sigh. ARGH!

   Each sigh was a pin prick. And then a paper cut. And then she was stabbing me in the throat. Holy crap! It wasn't a victimless crime, it was akin to genocide. My minor foible transformed into a slathering vicious monster right in front of me. I totally would have punched her in the throat to get her to stop, but I couldn't bear the resulting sigh.
   So beware. If you meet anybody that shares your faults, you should just run. Or kill them. Unless there are witnesses.