That Time I Invented The Internet Meme

My wife started a blog earlier this year and she is very good at it.  If you are wondering if I am jealous of the Flipping Unbelievable blog, the answer is Not Applicable.

We have very different blogs with very different target audiences.  She traffics in offering useful information and I do not.  If she gets into the useless information game and becomes irreverent like Brain Litter, I will consider it an act of war but until then our blogs can co-exist in peaceful harmony. 

But I think she fired off a warning shot with this funny meme that she invented.

If you don’t recall, I invented the internet meme back in October 2006.  Don’t believe me?  Check it.

Happy Brett Favre Day!

OK OK, so I called them e-cards instead of memes and they are quite primitive compared to your modern-day internet meme but they are effectively the same thing.  Meme technology didn’t exist back then to transpose hilarious sentences directly on to photographs.  I had to create those beauties in PowerPoint, dink around with clunky text boxes, and save them as crushingly high-memory jpeg files.  I bet that original post took 5 seconds to load up back in the day, which is light years in internet time. 

Long story short, we live in a day and age where if you say something and believe it is true, then it is true regardless of facts.  I invented the internet meme!  What a time to be alive!

Babes, if you are going to use my technology against me, I will have to retaliate with an equally funny original meme of my own.  Behold!

Topical!  I’m also thinking this would make a great t-shirt conceptually.  Surely some hipster would gladly pay 10 bucks for this shirt after drinking one too many IPAs over there at Hinterland.

Michelle, maybe you could help me out with this?  You did a great job helping me with those Occupy Tipler hoodies I made for my deer camp way back when.  Maybe it would be funnier with some sort of Arabic font?  We’ll talk about it later.

This feels like a real solid business opportunity but I have been known to overestimate the demand for novelty t-shirts that only I think is funny.  I have a dusty old box full of shirts in the farthest nether regions of our basement to prove it.  

The shirts simply say “43,560” across the front, which is how many square feet are in an acre of land.  It is a real estate joke that I tried to profit from at a big real estate conference about ten years ago.  I made 100 of them and sold about 10.  It was a colossal mistake.

I would throw them away but the Dan and Kathy in me makes it physically impossible for me to throw away perfectly functional items no matter how outdated they are. Those t-shirts will remain in basement storage until the end of time or until I sell them.

Screw it.  I’m digging them out and putting them for sale again FOR A LIMITED TIME ONLY. Sizes come in medium and large.  They are navy blue and made of 100% cotton.  $10 each or 50 for $15.

GET THEM NOW WHILE THEY LAST! 

The Happy Man And His Dump Truck

Remember when I said I wasn’t going to be writing about kid stuff?

I lied! Here is a blog about kid stuff!

Jackson posted up to our bed the other day with a new book in his hand. I had never seen it before but that is not unusual.  We have a cabinet full of books and I have no idea where they come from.  They multiply in there like rabbits when we are not around.

I know this because there are hundreds of books in there and I’ve only bought two children’s book in my entire life.  The first is a Frozen book which I bought to replace a library book that the kids destroyed. 

HOT PARENT TIP:  You can’t show up at the library with a destroyed book and a replacement book from Amazon.  You have to go through their channels proper.  Also, don’t try to Catch Me If You Can the bar code stickers off the destroyed book to paste it on the new book from Amazon.  The library is privy to some sort of super glue of unknown origin that makes this task impossible.  Don’t even bother.

The second book is Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes, which is great.

Spoiler Alert LOL those shoes LMAO those shoes don’t stay white for very long.

Anyways, the book in question is called the The Happy Man and His Dump Truck and it is a re-printed Golden Book originally published in 1950. 

Upon first reading, I thought it was a cute little yarn.  This guy goes around town picking up various farm animals in his truck and then they go joyriding through the countryside.  A great time was had by all.  The End.

When the story was done, Jackson beeled off to God knows where and I went about my business but something didn’t sit right with me.  I paged through the book again and gave it a real close look and then I realized what was so deeply unsettling.  

Look at some of these illustrations.

My takeaway is that the moral of the story is:  If a strange guy offers you a ride in his rusty old truck, then hop right in because you are going to have a great time.

This guy.  

 This. Freakin. Guy.

This guy looks like he is ready to go hang out with Gags and Pennywise back home at the railyard. Is he half clown half hobo?  What’s with the Mom jeans?  Nobody knows. 

Did I mention he tortures the animals?  Look at this shit.  

He opens the tailgate while going top speed down a slippery country road.  This isn’t a yarn, it is a psychological thriller.  Look at that poor dog!

Now I get that this was written back when America Was Great.  Back then you could probably hang out at a railyard for hours, maybe even all day, without getting rape killed.  It was a different time. 

But in 2017, I don’t want my kids thinking it’s cool to jump into trucks with psycho clown hobos. This book belongs in the garbage. 

Unless Jackson wants to read it again.  He can read all the psycho clown hobo stories he wants if it buys me another five minutes of peace and quiet. I better keep it just in case. Entertaining kids is hard. 

One Space Two Space Rehashed

Last week, I posted in my Facebook status about two spaces versus one space when typing sentences in a document and let me tell you, it really got me thinking about blogging again.  That post got a LOT of traction, it came scarily close to surpassing the announcement of the birth of my twins. 

It is clear that people are very passionate about this topic.  I’m pro two-space and I’m not ashamed to admit it.  I don’t want to rehash this subject and reopen old wounds but suffice to say, I think I nailed it on the head when I commented that two spaces are luxurious space cushions to give your eyes a rest between next sentences.  Mic drop.  Discussion over.

I ran into Vang and Kyle Anderson last Friday at Golomski’s induction ceremony and they told me the one space two space debate would have made a good post for Brain Droppings.  I laughed so hard because Vang called it Brain Droppings. 

In his defense, that name is WAY better than Brain Litter.

But they are not incorrect.  I had a good premise and a great one-liner.  There would have been a paragraph about two space usage being the demarcation line between Millennial and Non-Millennial.   Throw some filler sentences in there and you got yourself a kickass blog post for the week.  It was a missed opportunity.

For whatever reason, I’m very proud of the space cushions line.  It could be a top 10 and that’s ultimately what Brain Litter was all about, to have a top 10 etched on my tombstone someday to record these jokes for posterity.  My other favorites are:

1.      “These Peter Jackson cigarettes taste like Frodo’s asshole” (Inside joke, you had to be there)

2.     “Don’t worry, it’s just a matter of time before the McRib comes back around to, once again, rear its ugly head” (Again, you had to be there)

3.     The space cushions thing above

I don’t know about the next seven.  Maybe etch that map I made of where all the cool kids sat in middle school?  That was a pretty great bit.  I don’t know.  Fine, we’ll call that number four.

The reason I stopped writing in 2014 is because I thought I was getting repetitive and I didn’t want to turn into a Dave Barry dad-joke machine about kids and being married.  If there is one thing I know, it is that people don’t want blog posts about families and stuff.  They want dick and fart jokes, observational humor, and stories about being single and the sexual misfires that go along with being single (see Brain Litter 2005 - 2009).

I can deliver on the first two premises but sadly, I can no longer deliver on the third.  I am firing away on all cylinders.  I’m dangerous! 

Anyways, I am going to keep hacking away at Brain Litter again until I get a true Top 10.  I‘ll try not to get into too much Dad humor but no promises. 

Thanks for reading!

Baby Watch 2014

The end is near!  Jess is at her last day of work until the end of the summer.  Then we play the waiting game until baby time.  It could be weeks, it could be days, it could be this afternoon.   

I figured this would be a good time to talk about pregnancy.  Not so much about Jess’s pregnancy but about this bird that lives in our yard.

So this mom bird sets up shop in this rock pile by one of our trees in the yard.  I wish I could tell you what kind of bird it is.  It’s not a robin or a crow or a cardinal or a blue jay, which is the extent of my bird identification knowledge.  I’m going to call it a wren because that sounds about right.  Doesn’t matter.   I’m infactuated with this bird because I feel we’re going through the same stuff and our fates are intertwined.

I took notice of the bird when I mowed the lawn last Saturday.  She started squawking at me when I got close to her nest.  Relax, bird, I get it.  Jess is the same way when strangers try to touch her belly at the grocery store.   We have more in common than you think. 

I mowed a demarcation circle around this nest, about a 5 yard radius.  I’m hoping the longer grass provides some cover for her.  The bad patch of grass also serves as a reminder for me to not sling a tennis ball in that general direction so Cheese doesn’t go barreling in her nesting zone, which already happened 3 times anyways.  The bird hates Cheese but she remains undeterred.

Let’s talk about the miracle of eggs.  What Jess is going through is amazing.  But I can wrap my head around the fertility process.  There’s a bunch of guts and tubes and liquids festering around internally and 9 months later a human or two comes out.  It’s a beautiful thing and public schooling has served me well.   

But eggs, man!  You get three together, scramble ‘em up, add some cheese and tobasco sauce when your wife isn’t looking and you got an omelet there, my friend.  However, if you sit on them for two weeks BAM more birds.  Options.  You don’t even have to sit on them constantly, just most of the time.  Don’t think I haven’t noticed mom cruising around the neighborhood while those eggs went unprotected a few times over the week.   

And where is the father!?  Talk about hot gossip.  Probably writing a hilarious blog somewhere.  Anyways, good luck and godspeed, you goofy bird.   I hope you have names picked out.   We don’t.   That’s a topic for another day….

Let’s Take a Timeout and Talk about Nutella

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It is a lot more expensive for me to blog these days.  When I was a salaryman, I could  blog at work during lunchtime or breaks or Fridays because I got paid all the same.   But as an appraiser i.e. an independent contractor, time means money.  Pining over Brett Favre or complaining about the dismal state of hoverboard technology wasn’t as worthwhile as it used to be.

But I have to talk about Nutella.

I just discovered it last week and it is an amazing product.  Basically it’s chocolate fudge frosting that you can eat with anything not typically associated with chocolate.  Like bread or crackers.

Here’s the real beauty of it though.  They pack it with sugar and fat and give it a European vibe and all of a sudden you can eat it as a meal.  CHOCOLATE FROSTING FOR BREAKFAST, PEOPLE. 

You buy it in the peanut butter and jelly section of the grocery store so people think its relatively healthy but I assure you, it is utterly devoid of nutrients.  The packaging says it has hazelnuts but I call shenanigans.  Maybe they sprinkle a little Hazelnut dust into the vat to get away with technicalities but that shit is chocolate fudge frosting, mark my words. 

I just read an article on MSN that people steal this stuff all over the world.  It looks like Danny Ocean had a finger-licking good time after this heist of the century. 

http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2013/apr/09/germanys-nutella-heist-gastronomic-robbery

I one hundred percent believe this story and the black market demand for Nutella.  If it was not readily available, I would buy it from a sketchy dude from the back of a truck in a heartbeat.    

 Its healthy because there is a glass of milk and bread and some leaves on the jar PSYCH! it's not healthy for you at all.

TWINNING!

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Yes, the rumors are true, I knocked Jess up and she is carrying twins.  The news came about a month ago when we went into our first ultrasound.  When I saw those two goofballs on the screen, I immediately turned to Jess and asked if we could name them Tango and Cash.  She said no.  I said let’s think about it.

Hearing you are going to be bringing two kids into the world at once is kind of scary.  When the doctor asked if we had questions, a million of them came pouring out all at once.  Do we get a discount on our medical bill from economies of scale?  But you’re already standing there, how much more expensive could it be to deliver the second one?  What if I watch you the deliver kid number one, and then I get in there and deliver kid number two, that could save a few bucks, right?  What do you think of the names Tango and Cash? 

The doctor was not very helpful.  Totally unwilling to negotiate.   Unbelievable.

Jess says she was not surprised when she heard the news because twins run in her family.  Her aunt and uncle are fraternal twins.  I told her I wasn’t surprised either because I am ridiculously fertile.  I’d watch out ladies, it’s not a superpower I can control either.  Best to avoid me all together lest we accidently make eye contact walking down the street and you end up with spontaneous triplets or something.  It could happen, I feel I am getting more potent by the day.

Jess claims she is doing all the heavy lifting but let’s not kid ourselves.  She had to produce TWO things to make this all happen, I had to produce ONE HUNDRED MILLION precisely fired things to make this all happen.  100,000,000 > 2.  It takes a lot of energy to make a million of anything let alone one hundred million.   It’s a big ass number.  Sorry, Babes.

To get into the spirit of things I’m going to watch that comedy from the 80’s with Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito over Christmas break.  I forget the name of it.  I’m pretty sure it was called The Comically Different Brothers From A Physicality Standpoint Who Go On A Caper.  That sounds right.     

Actually any comedy will do right now.  Horror and suspense movies just haven’t been doing it for me lately.  I figure if I feel the need to be scared, I’ll just review my calculations on how much college will cost in 2032.  And then double it. The Conjuring ain’t got nothin’ on that.

But seriously, we are very very excited about this news and can’t wait for June of next year.  Merry Christmas everyone!!!

Ladies: We’d like our Dick Pic software back, please

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One day, a brain trust in Silicon Valley decided to tackle an age-old dilemma.  I love dropping trou and showing off my dong but I hate getting in trouble for it.  Help me!

And thus the Snap Chat app was born.  For those in the dark, Snap Chat is an app that allows you to take a Dick Pic via their proprietary software and then send it to your target in the form of a picture text message.  The beauty of it is that within 5 seconds of viewing the Dick Pic, it disappears from both phones forever and it disables both phones so you can’t take screen shots even if the target wanted to keep it and stare at it for hours which is presumably what 99% of people are apt to do.

However, there’s always that crazy 1% that submit their Dick Pics to the police and various news outlets and cause all kinds of trouble. 

“Where was this technology five years ago?!?!” exclaimed Brett Favre and Anthony Weiner at the same time.

Five years too late, sorry fellas.  We feel for ya.   History is full of lovable characters that loved to show off their package.   Jim Morrison was famously arrested in Florida for giving the audience a full showing of the goods.  Don’t get me started on Tommy Lee.  Some men just have to share their most prized possession with the world and nothing will stop them.

Fun Fact:  Lyndon B. Johnson famously whipped out his unit all the time in front of his congressional staff.   Probably because it was hilarious but mostly just ‘cuz.  He never got in trouble for it though.  Historians were more hung up on that Vietnam thing.  

I’m reading a 5-part book series on LBJ.  I’m on book 3 and this is my biggest takeaway so far.  How’s that for a humblebrag?  I have many leather-bound books.

Anyways, just when things were going great for Dick Pic-ers everywhere, the girls had to ruin everything by hijacking our software and using it for dubious purposes.  Selfies, meals, cats…these are all flagrant violations of Snap Chat’s original mission.

So stop it, ladies, just stop it.  We want our software back. 

Unless it’s for the boobs or butt game.  That game is legit.  

The only downside to Snap Chat?  No more hilarious Halloween costumes.

Hotel Hell, We Hardly Knew Ye

When I first heard the news today that Hotel Hell was demolished, I was livid.  What are they going to demolish next?  Hidden Valley Park?  That spot behind the airport where the planes fly in?  Krolls?  Kids have to smoke doobies somewhere, ya know.

But then Jess cleared up the misinformation campaign against Hotel Hell.  Apparently the storm last night knocked over some trees, which in turn caved in the structure .  That makes a lot more sense given the cursed nature of the property and because there was a huge ass storm last night.  I bet that place is even scarier now.  That actually makes me happier.

I remember the first time going out to Hotel Hell.  It was the middle of winter in the middle of night.  We were standing in a circle outside the hotel chain smoking cigarettes.

You go in first.   No, you go in first.   I’m not going in there.  Just do it, you pussy.   You’re a pussy.  Fine, let’s go in together.  But you got to lead and go in first. You go in first. 

This went on for like 30 minutes.  Then all of a sudden Dingeldein pokes his head up and waves to us from the 2^nd floor with a big shit-eating grin.  Hey guys!  Classic Dingeldein.  Classic brave dumb Dingeldein.

Of course we all had to go in after that and that truly was spooky and not smart.  There were loose boards all over the place.  No one wanted to fall in the basement where everyone knows they used to host satanic rituals.  There could be no other explanation as to why the hotel burned down.  None.

I miss high school when that shit used to be so fun.  Driving out to some dumb place just to hang out all night used to be so adventurous.  Now if someone asked me to drive out to Manitowoc to look at a haunted house, I’d say no thanks, I got better things to do.  The Brewers are down 0-7 in the third but I’m going to stay on the couch and see how this plays out. 

Maybe I’ll go out there and check out the damage of for old times sake.  I’ll reattempt to find that pack of Marlboros that Kyle dropped in the woods that one time when the cops busted us.  We drove back there the next day to fetch them but we had no luck.  Gas was $.94 a gallon.

 

 Here is the before picture, still creepy as ever.

 And what remains of this once hallowed high school institution.

Someone make High School Football Fantasy Camp a thing, please.

My dad’s credit union recently made a donation to Ashwaubenon High School to replace the football field grass to artificial turf that will allow a lot more use out of the facility.   This is a real missed opportunity.  Not because there are more worthy charity endeavors than replacing grass for a football field.  I’m talking about implementing my plan for high school football fantasy camp.

The idea is simple.   All season long,  offer 20 rotating spots on the practice squad for one week for like a thousand dollars a pop.  I would do this in a heartbeat. 

That turf could have been paid for 10 times over by Homecoming.  And the cash flow would be constant with dudes coming in at various points in their life cycles every five years or so.

I especially regret that that there was no high school football fantasy camp when I was 26 or 27 when I blossomed as a man.   I had a hard time not laughing out loud writing that last sentence even though it’s true.   I was in peak physical condition and a lot more coordinated than I was in high school, I could have cracked some cocky teenager skulls and it would have been glorious. 

The next prime stage would be like right about now, in my early 30’s.  I got into an argument at Cropseys just last weekend about this.  I think I could still hang with those high school kids but Mallien assured me that I would get killed at this point in my football career.   I honestly don’t know what would happen but I would think there would be a lot of wagering amongst friends and it would be interesting.

The next phase would be long and it would basically just be a bunch of pathetic old guys joining for the camaraderie and to ogle the girls on the Pom Pom squad without setting off an amber alert.  Do those girls still practice routines outside in their sports bras?  I don’t know.  But I’ll find out when I’m 45.   Can’t wait.

Phase 4 is where it gets interesting again.   This is when dads are joining high school football fantasy camp in order to find a legitimate means to stomp their sons.  I can’t wait to run the gauntlet with my future son, who I love very much, but God he thinks he knows everything but he really doesn’t know shit.  Worst-case scenario, you end up making a complete ass of yourself in which case your kid is still humiliated in front of his friends, which is cool.

After your kids are graduated it’s back to the Pom Pom ogling for another decade or so but then you would have one last shot at greatness as you eventually develop OLD MAN STRENGTH which everyone knows make you invincible.   You can stomp everyone, even the 26 year olds.  There’s no point in them trying to stop you, their youth and stamina only make you angrier.   Then you ride off into the sunset in a grizzled blaze of glory before being put into a nursing home.   It’s a perfect plan.

And that pussy baby grass would be paid for, which we didn’t have as a kid.  Damn kids are spoiled these days.   Someone make this happen. I would but I’m busy.

The Legend of Brazilian Short Shorts

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Many of you are aware of our recent travels to Brazil a couple of weeks ago.  My family and a couple of other random families flew to Rio for three nights and Curitiba for seven nights to attend the wedding of Maite and Felipe.  Maite was a foreign exchange student that my parents informally adopted when my bro and I were in college and they kept touch all these years.   It was a wonderful trip and a good time was had by all.

 HOT PANTS!

 

So naturally, going to Rio, we wanted to assimilate with the culture.  Sweater Man (Joey Wollin) and I thought this entailed wearing hot pants and Speedos.   All the travel books said we would look like assholes if we didn’t wear these things on Copacabana Beach.   Yes, there were lots of hot pants and Speedos there but Frommers was wrong.  Boring-ass long conservative American board shorts are perfectly acceptable there.

 

But that didn’t stop us from throwing out the vibe and throw out the vibe we did. You’re pretty much in a constant state of throwing out vibe when wearing those bad boys.  Chicks love a good high thigh farmer tan.  I was really self-conscious about wearing them at first, but all it took was a couple Caprihanas and I was doing jumping jacks all over the place.

 

I thought these were the sexiest photographs ever but then I remembered that THIS is still on the Internet.

Caprihanas are the national cocktail of Brazil.  They are delicious and they have lots of alcohol in them.  Beer and Caprihanas are really cheap in Brazil.  Like close to Cropsey’s cheap.  Thanks, Exchange Rate!

The rest of the week was a blur.  We did all the tourist stuff in Rio, surfed Ipanema beach, flew to Curitiba, went Anthony Bourdain style on some smaller Brazil towns including this crazy little new city for rich people that I forgot the name of but I’m calling it New Miami, went clubbing, and finally had it capped it off by the most epic wedding ever. 

 

I thought open bar was the best you could do at a wedding.  I was wrong.  Private waiter at every table that fills up your drink with wine or whiskey or champagne or beer after taking a sip is now the best you can do at a wedding.  And have this service available until 5:00 am.  Brazilians really know how to party.  I would kill to see the bar tab from this thing.  I would kill to see the flower bill to tell you the truth.  Like I said, it was crazy balls and I appreciate weddings now.

I was a hot mess by the time the week was over.  Hungover as hell, at the airport on the way home, I was eating an ice cream drumstick thing with a wrapper and I was sort of leaning over my chair in the waiting area eating it.   I had the wrapper on the ground next to my feet.  I was totally going to throw it away when I was done.  But then this Brazilian cleaning lady came by and picked up the wrapper right by my feet and gave me the stink eye.  I don’t speak Portuguese but I know stink eye when I see it and it is universal. 

I deserved it.  That lady thought I was a jerk American who thinks he can litter wherever he pleases because USA is number one.   Since I was already guilty of the crime, I was ridiculously close to snubbing out my ice cream cone on the floor with my foot and then signaling the lady to come over to clean it up.  I started thinking about this and then I started laughing hysterically to myself for about five minutes straight.   Jess just stared at me and then moved over a couple of seats.

Next time I travel abroad, I’m totally going to litter everywhere and be the littering American that doesn’t give a shit because he’s the tops.  That will make one hell of a blog post.

Also, by “surfing Ipanema” I mean my brother rented a surfboard and we took turns laying on our bellies in the ocean while gawking at the locals because we couldn’t stand up on the surfboard to save our lives.  But yeah, we surfed Ipanema.