I’m Talking About a Little Place Called Assssspen

Once in awhile I like to post about something that I think is only going to be funny to me and maybe a few select people.

This is one of those times.

I like to blog about my vacations, not because I think other people will think they are interesting, but because it sort of preserves the memory for me in a way that a photograph can’t. Pictures are a great visual but they don’t remind of you the little things on the trip that actually made it the great holiday that it was.

Plus I like to think that someday, when I’m sixty years old and blogging away at why I think prune juice is a better natural laxative than oat bran or something like that, I can dig into the archives and remember back to that one glorious weekend back in Aspen, where the beer flowed like wine and beautiful women flocked instinctively like the salmon of Capistrano.

The first thing you should know about Aspen, Colorado, is that it is literally impossible to NOT quote Dumb & Dumber while traveling to said town. Getting to Denver was easy enough but I dare you to not comment “I thought the Rocky Mountains would be a little rockier than this” while traveling the route along I-70. It can’t be done.

FYI – Dumb & Dumber was actually filmed in Breckenridge, Colorado. Many Aspenites commented on this fact, usually in a visibly annoyed manner. I got the feeling that the Aspen locals are not entirely impressed with Harry and Lloyd quoting tourists twelve years after the debut of this classic comedy.

We spent Thursday night partying in Denver, with the intention of making an early start to Aspen on Friday morning. Unbeknownst to us, we would be halted the next day by 100 mph winds causing 0% visibility beyond the Eisenhower tunnel, two hours into our journey.

That’s what’s weird about the Rocky Mountains; one second it’s crystal clear blue skies and two seconds later you’re stuck in a Class III Kill Storm.

Undeterred, we drove down to Colorado Springs and then west again to bypass the storm since the radio reported that I-70 would be closed until Saturday morning. All in all we added an additional five hours on top of the four hour trip it would have been regularly. What’s funny about that is that I-70 eventually did open up again on Friday night, so had we waited the storm out in Denver, we effectively would have arrived in Aspen about the same time without the extra five hours sitting in a car.

We justified our decision by claiming that we conquered that little bastard I like to call uncertainty. Who knew I-70 would open up again? Onward ho!


I realize this scene looks like it was taken directly from a Kazakhstanian Disco but I assure you, the rest of the weekend wasn’t NEARLY as homoerotic.

2/25/07

Anxious to check out the local scene, we quickly unpacked our things and headed downtown. The strange thing about Aspen is that it represents a small microcosm of a major metropolitan area. What I mean by this is that instead of having a few bars and restaurants like a typical ski town, Aspen contains its own Rodeo Drive complete with a night clubs and martini bars.

Not bad for a voting population of 6,000 people.

Anyways, having no one to plug us into the social pipeline, we decided to put out the vibe at the nearest watering hole that we could find. Luckily, we befriended some…well, I guess you call them hippies, but they weren’t like Madison hippies, more like ski bummish hippies. We had a fun time partying with them and they helped us show us the ropes around town.

The next day, we hit the up the Aspen Highlands, which was one gnarly hill to board. Gnarly is a very peculiar word that sort of evolved over the course of the weekend. At first gnarly was used mockingly to make fun of the locals.

“We’ll hit that wicked pow pow, br’a, it’s gonna be gnarly.”

As the afternoon went on, we stopped mocking gnarly and eventually accepted the word into our vocabulary, realizing the adjective has a tremendous amount of range. By the end of the trip, we turned gnarly into a noun, no small feat. In fact, one of the best quotes I heard over the weekend was Pete pointing at a jump from the chairlift and commenting in deadpan delivery:

“I think on this next run I’m going to grab some gnar off that headwall.”

Nice work, Pete.

Saturday night was more of the same with the exception of starting out at the local chapter of the Elk’s Club. The only reason I mention this is that Pete number 2 was using this as a pick-up line that night, which I’m pretty sure no one cared about. It was a worth a shot though.

Sunday was a great day. After another gorgeous day of boarding at AJAX, a rocking out session of Tegan & Sara, and a fabulous meal at the Aspen McDonalds, where we had everyone within an earshot in hysterics over an intense debate on the merits of the McRib, we decided to check out a thrift store in town where we got the following artifacts from around 1983.

I think the picture explains it all.



Rollerskate, Participate, Negotiate. These are the good times.

One more story from this trip, I promise.

So we decided to go out that night wearing these jackets, hoping a great story would emerge from the ridiculousness of the situation. As soon as we got out of our Taxi Sunday, we were immediately invited to have a drink with this 30-ish to 40-ish year old woman who was one of Aspen’s elite.

She eventually called up her entourage, who’s combined net worth is a figure so high that my financial calculator does not recognize it, where we ended up at the Caribou Club, Aspen’s most expensive private club in town. Apparently, Tommy Lee was there the night before. That was the closest I got to a celebrity sighting. But it was still pretty cool. Cody and I started sweating about the bar tab but thankfully the rich broads picked it up. So free drinks, too! The only thing I paid for was a round of coat checks, which set me back 15 bones. Not bad for a night hob-knobbing with Aspen’s elite.

I won’t get into the details about the remainder of the night, but let’s just say one of us, and I’m not going to name names, made a $350 major blunder. You know who you are, Magic Moves. We’re teammates!

So that was our trip. It was sweet. Or should I say, it was gnar. Very gnar.

Oh No, not VD!

They said it couldn’t be done.

To all the cynics out there, most notably my perpetual arch nemesis, Professor Dic, I’d like to give you all give a big…um… what’s that thing called that the Rock used to do…you know, when he put his arms out and then a made a big sweeping “V” motion which ended up with him focusing your attention to his crotchular area. I forget.

Anyways, you are all a bunch of Gibroni’s because I was not alone on Valentine’s Day. Better yet, I was not alone…with a GIRL.

Many of you may have remembered my Valentines Day blog post massacre last year. Although I still feel the day is a corporate sham, at least I can now post my thoughts on the subject without using expletives, a major feat for me. I must be getting mature or something. Scary.

Even though I had a date, I wasn’t going to let VD get the best of me, so I didn’t freak out and spend five hours in the mall trying to read the angle of every single possible gift idea out there in the hopes of sending the appropriate message to my little dirndl-clad fraulein.

But I did want to acknowledge that VD was festering about and that I didn’t forget so I narrowed the gift down to three options, each equally awesome and meaningful in my mind:

1. To do a really nice blog post about her
2. To NOT to do a blog post about her
3. My dick in a box

I quickly ruled out number 2 because ALL people long to be blogged about, even if they won’t admit it and say it would be super embarrassing. And I think I’m going to save number 3 for Christmas so that leaves number 1; the gift of blog.

Then I realized that if I don’t want to be alone for the next outbreak of VD, then I better just make her a nice homemade greeting card and take her out for a whole meal of food. I also planned to not annoy her very much too, which is the closest I get to being romantic. Also notice I said “homemade” and not “store-bought waste of heavy paper stock”.

It’s your move, Hallmark. Let’s see what you got.


Fellas, your lady may tell you time and time again that she wants diamonds or shoes for the holidays, but you know as well as I do what they really want...

Brain Litter Re-Cap

When I start a blog or a string of blog posts, it usually stems from a picture with a funny caption I had in mind and then just kind of spirals off from there.

For instance, I knew I wanted to do something to commemorate the return of Brett Favre so of course I had to rehash the story of us building a tree fort together. But in reality, my goal was to establish Peyton Manning my new arch nemesis right up there with pennies and bachelorette parties by using this photo I got from Google Images:


Here is a great pic of Brett Favre about to head butt Peyton Manning. Er…actually it looks like he might be about to give him a kiss, too. It’s really hard to tell from this vantage point. Better to assume the former.


Unfortunately, I was swamped at work and at home so I got lazy. Expect to see various jabs at that hack of a quarterback in the foreseeable future.

FYI – You can use “swamped at home” interchangeably with “crippling addiction to Guitar Hero.” Same Difference.

While I’m wrapping things up, I have gotten various feedback from people wondering what the false Joe Daniels tale was since they were all so mind-blowingly real. I suppose that was kind of a dick move to leave you hanging high and dry so… the false story is…

Story Number 2, the one about us getting kicked out of the bar on News Years for dropping wicked bombs. Everything about that story was true except exchange “Joe” with “me” and “kicked out” to “almost kicked out.”

Conceptually, I find the idea of getting bounced from a bar for breaking wind absolutely hilarious. It would be worth trying out some night as some kind of weird social experiment. I think it would be tough though. You would have to drop ass with malicious intent, like inserting yourself in the middle of a pack of chicks and then laughingly hysterically once they all go scrambling for fresh air.

If anyone is inspired to try this out, for the love of God, please do us a favor and tape it so you can put it on You Tube or something. That’s all I ask.

Third, I’m going to finish that Great Games I Have Known, because there is some great material I can use there, but I got Valentines Day coming up and a trip to Aspen happening this weekend so it will have to wait.

He's BACK!!!!!!!!!!!

Brett Favre has decided to return for his 16th season as the starting quarterback for the Green Bay Packers, once again, in no small part from some influencing from yours truly.

This time around it was a little more difficult.

My tale begins a few weeks ago in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. Me and Brett Favre we’re building a fort in the woods near his home. We were looking for our own private place to play Legos because Brett Favre's seven year-old daughter, Breleigh Favre, was always stealing our missile pieces and as every Lego buff knows, those missile pieces are no commodity when building an interstellar fighter plane.

Space fighter plane craft happen to be our Lego specialties even though Brett Favre’s designs tend to be on the boxy side and lack symmetry. Then again, he can throw a football as straight as a laser beam so maybe he knows a little bit more about aerodynamics than I do.

Anyways, we were installing a secret trap door at the base of the fort when I started up with my usual retirement banter:

“So I read in Variety yesterday that Dan Marino and the Farrelly Brothers are thinking about filming some kind cross country road trip movie together. Kinda sounds like it’s going to be like There’s Something About Mary only funnier and better…”

“Oh, good for him,” he replied as he nailed one of the hinges to the floorboard. “I would have loved to work on that project but I already told Marty Scorsese that I would work with him on his next mafia movie. We’ve been looking to collaborate on a project for several years now.”

“Damn”, I thought. That Dan Marino crap usually gets his blood boiling. It was time to switch tactics.

“You know on Sportscenter today, they said Peyton Manning would make the running list of all-time greatest quarterbacks if he won the Super Bowl this year.”

Brett Favre missed a nail and hit his hand with the hammer as I said this. “Goddammit Goddammit”, he said as he resumed nailing the second hinge to the door, virtually unaffected by the smashing of his hand with a hammer moments earlier.

“If only there was some way to shut those pundits up,” I said, as I handed Brett Favre another board to reinforce the door.

2/6/07

Brett Favre didn’t respond to that last statement but I could tell the wheels were in motion.

I didn’t want to push the subject much further. If there is one thing I know about Brett Favre, it’s that he hates being manipulated into dominating the NFL. The best way to keep Brett Favre quarterbacking is to let him think that it was his idea to keep playing all along. Luckily the silence was interrupted by some rustling in the trees.

It was Deanna Favre. She was bringing us milk and cookies. We quickly got rid of the dips in our mouth and covered up the secret trap door with some tree branches.

“I thought you boys might be hungry so I brought you some treats”, she said. I rolled my eyes and begrudgingly accepted a cookie. Deanna was always bringing us snacks but deep down I knew she was just spying on us.

When Deanna left us alone again, we put the finishing touches on the secret trap door and climbed inside.

“What do you think the secret password should be,” asked Brett Favre as we sat huddled in our miniature fortress of solitude. “I was thinking maybe Hail Mary would be a good one. Or Lambeau Leap, I like that one, too.”

“Those are pretty good passwords, but I was thinking Indianapolis Colts in honor of my new favorite team,” I replied.

We never did come up with a secret password that day but I knew Brett Favre was seriously contemplating my words.

Normally, we just talk about girls we kind of like while we play Legos but that afternoon, he asked me for tips on all how to throw the long ball, so already I knew in his head that he was a staging the ultimate comeback for Green Bay in 2007.

That’s why it wasn’t a complete shock for me when he made his announcement last Friday even though I am excited all the same. It is going to be another glorious year for the residents of Green Bay. I can feel it in my bones.



Here is a photo of Brett Favre at a press conference, announcing to the world that me and him are totally BFF. It was one of my better days to say the least.



2.8.07

Apparently this last Sunday, there was some kind of exhibition game to determine the second best team in the NFL after the Green Bay Packers.

In a contest that I would best describe as a battle of mediocrity, The Indianapolis Colts were handed the Vince Lombardi Trophy on a silver platter by none other than Rex Grossman himself.

I’m sure ol’ Sexy Rexy is going to be the treated with a nice warm reception by the City of Chicago when he returns home from Miami. After all, they don’t take football very seriously there in the Windy City and I’m sure they are just happy that Rex tried his best out there. Ditka would be proud.

Initially I was upset with the Bears losing the Super Bowl, primarily because I didn’t want Peyton Manning to ever earn a Super Bowl Ring. Having the ring automatically puts Manning in the upper echelons of all-time greatest Quarterbacks and the last thing I wanted was some punk from Indy upstaging the great Brett Favre when he makes his triumphant return next season. Talking to a lot of fans in the past few weeks, I know I am not the only one with these sentiments.

One major difference between Peyton Manning and Brett Favre is that Manning is a whiny little bitch whenever a play does not go his way. Manning can throw up some impressive numbers in a season, but if you ever watch the guy play, he’s real tough to get behind when he’s down. No one wants to root for cry baby, I don’t care how good your team is otherwise.

Brett Favre, on the other hand, never let’s a play get out of his control so he’s always cool and jovial. When he throws an interception or gets sacked, it is because he CHOOSES to throw an interception or get sacked. The NFL knows that Brett Favre is essentially invincible, so he is contractually obligated to screw up every once in awhile to make the games interesting and maximize advertising revenue.



Where's your pacifier, Peyton?