The Gift That Keeps on Giving

My friend's wife--and her sister!--gave me spotted dick in the can!.

I hear, however, that penisillin will clear it right up.

*chortle*

My friend, B, and I have been joking about the spotted dick for about three or four months. I won't really get into the specifics of the joke, but suffice it to say that I still laugh at adolescent jokes--as if that's a revelation to you. So, I apologize to my friends from the UK. But, you have to admit, it's a funny name.

Anyway, B apparently likes to go home and--get this!--converse with his wife about what happened during the day! He's a regular Ward Cleaver, that one. Anyway, when we first started joking about the spotted dick (*chortle*), he went home and told his lovely wife about it. So, when they were at a grocery store over the holidays, she spotted a can of the spotted dick and said, "Don't you need to buy some of that for your friends?"

Because he's a man of action, B grabbed it and said "No, I just need to get one."

He presented it to me on Monday.

So, for those of us who don't know what spotted dick is, let me fill you in. *chortle* It's a dessert made of a dough-like suet mixture and some sort of dried fruit. Apparently, according to this article, the fruit is typically currants, but my spotted dick has syphilis raisins. Typically, it's served with custard--which is, as you know, a thick, whitish cream--and is a favorite of Ron Weasley's. Who knew? Gingers like the spotted dick! Red, I'm looking at you...but this isn't any different than any other day. So, carry on normally!

You know what's even better? My spotted dick was made in England, so it's authentic. Yessir, it was made in Middlesex! *chortle*

The absolute best part of the can, though, is how polite the wording is when it comes to discussing quality control. I quote:

"If you are not delighted with this product, simply contact us quoting the quality code on the can end and we will refund your money in full. Your statutory rights are not affected."

What a wonderfully polite people, the English.

I would be remiss if I didn't add this little bit at the end. The spotted dick is microwaveable, but you can also warm it in the can by setting it in a pan of boiling water for 30-40 minutes.

So, yes...it's best to have hot spotted dick.

*chortle*

German Gifts

I had kind of a rough day yesterday. And by "rough", I mean by my standards.

First, I didn't really get a lunch. At one point during the afternoon, I slammed down a somewhat overripe banana and some celery and washed it down with some water. Oh, healthy.

When I came in in the morning (oh! Double preposition!), I was filled with optimism that I'd be able to better the world, one sp3-hybridized orbital at a time (unless I'm actually fiddling with the sp2-orbital on the aromatic ring with my bromine on it...how does lithium-halogen exchange work anyway...I know it's a single-electron transfer mechanism, but does it dump into one of the pi-system antibonding orbitals or does it...oh, I'm sorry, what? Did I slip into chemistry speak again? Well, let's fix this ship right the fuck now!).

Anyway, I had high hopes for what I could accomplish during the day. So, I mixed up some solvents, prepared a few samples, slammed down some coffee, and signed up for a decent amount of time on the High Pressure Liquid Chromatography machine (henceforth referred to as the HPLC-inator). I trundled off with my carboy of solvent, my samples in hand, and extra gloves. Science was about to be done.

I prepped the machine appropriately, and I was all fired up. I had this thing. I didn't need to go find my friend, Joe (which would have involved a trip to some sub-tropical, pirate-infested waters, anyway, so it was better that I had everything under control). I could handle this. I started the machine, and this loud buzzing, like a million angry bees were coming for me, started up along with the machine.

Things didn't seem quite right (at least in my adolescent-level mind) but I figured I'd let the first run go, see how things shaped up. Except, I did something stupid: I leaned forward, resting my forearms on the bench, thus pushing the keyboard back into the UV-Vis detector, and shutting it off. Keen. I'll just turn it back on.

Except. It didn't come back on. Not fully. It wouldn't calibrate. I tried shutting it off for longer and letting it come back up. Still no calibration. Crapfuck. I had to go get help.

Fortunately, I went and found someone who wasn't on a cruise in pirate-infested waters, and they tried the same things I did. Nothing. So, they went to consult someone else. Finally, we called it a bust and I hopped on another machine. Not literally, as that might have crushed it. However, hopping on it probably would have netted the same result.

Apparently, over the break, the computer that runs the HPLC-inator had a fight with the pump on the HPLC-inator, and they weren't speaking. I dunno, they started bitching about little things and then the computer called the pump a whore and...well, things got ugly. After a little bit of fiddling, that problem was rectified...except the computer, in an uppity fit of bitchitude, decided it wasn't going to read my information for me, so it wouldn't run the program.

The obvious fix was what anyone does when dealing with an uppity computer: turn it off, turn it back on. Things finally seemed to work, so I reloaded all of my data into the sequence programs and got things running. This was an hour and forty-five minutes after I wanted to start, and I had a meeting looming over me at 2:00.

Yeah. Six hours into the new year and we're having a meeting. Right, sir, I'll send a memo.

So, after the meeting, it was 3:00, and I went down to check on my HPLC-inator runs, and I found that it had shut off. This was not unexpected. The initial run was to get a feel for the method I was running and to see if it would, in fact, purify my compounds for me. Finally, around 3:30, after having to reload all the data for the sequences into the computer and restarting the run, I was able to go sit down for a bit and cram some food into my piehole.

I worked on my notebook to make myself look busy for a little while and then wandered back out to my bench to see what was happening there (the answer better have been nothing, since I hadn't been able to set anything up, thanks to the bitchy nature of the computer and the spat it had with the pump).

Instead of nothing, I found a big-ass, flat, cardboard box. "What the bloody hell is this?"

"It's a box," said my labmate, Jennifer.

Because it's always a good idea just to go tearing into mysterious, unlabeled packages in a chemistry company, I dove right in. What I pulled out was...a calendar.

Apparently, I bought a chemical from this vendor in Germany, and they wanted to thank me for my purchase with a calendar. It's a nice calendar, pictures of flowers, all that good stuff. The days are even in the right order, and all the months are there. Top of the line stuff.

I found a letter enclosed with the calendar. It was in German.

"Can you read German?" I asked my labmate, Jennifer.

"Nyet," she responded. I cocked an eyebrow at her.

"You're very funny; you know that, right?"

She grinned.

Fortunately, if you flip the letter over, there's English on the other side. That's how I knew this was a "thank you" calendar. Also, I found a packing slip. It was, perhaps, my favorite thing in the box. It read: "Contents: 1 calendar".

Also, there was a letter verifying that the calendar did not contain any infectious agents. Nice. So, it's not an anthrax calendar or anything. Which is good, because "death by calendar" is probably a very ignoble way to go.

So, thanks, German vendor of chemicals. I'll hang that calendar up in my office...whenever I find a way to do it. All I need is a hook or a nail or someone with rock-hard nipples one of those magnet things.

Shadows of the Past

One of the unfortunate drawbacks to having picked up so many new readers and followers over the course of the past year is that many of you were unable to bask in the glorious triumph that I celebrated at this time last year. And let me just say, that t-shirt is one of my absolute favorites. I mean, it does taste gloriously of victory and free, which are two of my favorite things in the world (right after boobs and bacon logs), so maybe the t-shirt has an unfair advantage.

Fortunately for me, my knowledge of college basketball is almost as vast as my desire to get free shit. Again this year, the concierge service ran the same contest. Again this year, I won. I am, in fact, just that fucking awesome.

I hope like hell that I won for knowing that the most points you can score on a single play is 3. That's so much better than knowing that you only get five fouls.

Last year, I chose an Indiana shirt (they are my favorite NCAA basketball team, after all). This year, I went for the alma mater, proving that someone from Notre Dame can fucking win something (hear that, football, basketball and hockey teams? I'm rubbing it in your face! Try stop being a bunch of cockfaces and put forth an effort already! And maybe suck a little less while you're at it!).

The other thing that I've proved is that, unlike Notre Dame, winning a free t-shirt is never overrated.

I swear, all I did was type the word "winner" into a Google image search!

I Need Someone, Not Just Anyone

Okay, I need some help from you happy folk. I don't care if you're not happy, I still need some help. This is dire and, without your assistance, I might not be able to have sex this weekend. Somewhere, a towel just shed a single tear.

Anyway, let me give you the story here.

My wife works for a bookstore that has an ampersand in the middle of the name (and no S on the end, dipshit). People leave shit there all the time, like harmonicas and lipstick tubes and half drunk lattes and little cars and children. All of these things get chucked into a box (except the children; they get sold to witches in the Black Forest of Germany) cleverly called "Lost and Found". Once a month, or so, they go through the box and shitcan things that have been in there for a while--usually something like three months. If it's something grand and glorious (like, say, a quarter), the employees lay claim to it and if, after the three-month grace period is up, no one claims it, the employee with first dibs on it gets to keep the grand and glorious loot.

Well, a few months ago, some nimrod left his iPod at the store. His 30-gig iPod. I think you can see where I'm going with this, but the public schools have left us all drooling, simpering idiots, so I better spell it out for you, just in case.

The Buxom and Comely and Easily Terrified Boudicca is all woman, trust me. I've inspected. Several times. Thoroughly. However, when she saw this sweet 30-gig iPod in the box, she popped a boner. Right there, in the middle of her shift, in the store. Very awkward, as you can imagine, but that's a story for another day. My wife put her name on the 30-gig iPod that Nimrod had left behind while jetting off for some general douchebag activity, I'm sure. Right after Christmas, the three-month period was up, and my wife came home, happy as a clam at high tide, sporting her treasure. I haven't seen her so happy since the doctor told me I shouldn't have sex for about two weeks after my gall bladder surgery.

I can tell that Nimrod was a douchebag because of his musical selections. Plus, the 30-gig iPod had video capability and photo storage, and yet not one hint of pornography could be found. Not that I checked. Several times. Or anything. Anyway, the point here is that Nimrod's musical tastes are pretty...fucking lousy. Who the hell puts Alan Jackson and Snoop on the same iPod? This poor electronic device needed to be purged of the shit that had been thrust upon it.

The Buxom and Comely and Easily Terrified Boudicca had bought adapters and cords to be able to begin the purging of said iPod. We downloaded the iTunes bullshit. We couldn't clean the thing off. I went and bought a different program that was "guaranteed" to fix everything on my iPod. It doesn't work, either.

I spent a good hour and a half last night trying to clean the iPod off and load all of her CDs and some of my CDs that she likes onto her iPod as a Valentine's Day gift. You know like, "Look, I took the time to do something sweet and romantic and kind for you. Doesn't that moisten you right up?" Or something to that effect. The problem was, despite having charged the iPod and connecting it via the cords she bought, the computer would not recognize the device. I kept getting an error message saying that no iPod could be found, despite using every single trick I knew in order to get the computer to talk with the little bastard machine.

Pay attention; this is where you come in. I beseech you, good folks (see, it sounds more dire with the big, fancy word): Is there a trick that I'm missing here? Or could it be that Nimrod left this thing in the store on purpose because it was fucked up? Also, I've heard that you can exchange an iPod if it breaks or malfunctions or joins al-Qaeda or something; I've heard that they'll even exchange it if it's been soaked in a base bath. Is this true? Can anyone confirm this malicious rumor for me?

And, finally, does anyone have any other advice for how to work this device? Or am I doomed to listen to "Summertime Blues" and "Who Am I?" for the remainder of my days?

I realize that this pretty much ruins the surprise I had in mind, so any thoughts of autolubrication that I had fantasized about once I presented her with an iPod loaded with Barenaked Ladies, Harry Connick, Jr., and Ben Folds is pretty much out the window. Still, any help would be appreciated.

The well-being of my towels are at stake here, people. Help a brother out.

Helpful Tips for the Coming Year

It's 2009, and a lot of you probably made some sort of resolutions. Mine? Give up abstinence and sobriety. Also, come out of the bushes a little more often.

I'm sure some of you pledged to be more "green" in the new year. Hopefully that doesn't mean you're going to swell up like The Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man Al Gore. Seriously. Wow. Did he become a eunuch or something?

Anyway, I compiled a list of ways to be more green this year to help you, the reader.

1) Recycle. Especially paper. Plastic just gets remade into office chairs, but recycled paper can--almost--be made into usable paper once again. Or it gets made into cardboard which my kids can then transform into forts and other things to hamper my successful navigation of the living room. Also, something like 70% of the trash in our landfills is paper.

2) Install energy-saving bulbs. This will cut down on the amount of power you use, which means that's less coal and dead goats that we have to burn, thus reducing the release of the most nefarious gas of all: carbon dioxide. Also, cutting down on the amount of power you use will help you save some green--like in your wallet green. Fucking aye! Saving the planet and some cash, all in one neatly little coiled tube? I've got a heart of gold to be sharing this information with you. Be careful, though, with those bulbs when they finally do burn out because they're filled with mercury, which can damage fish, unborn children, and be seen low in the western sky right after sunset.

3) Eat more meat. Did you know that methane is a greenhouse gas? It's true. I'd get into the whole thing about IR-active stretches of the 4 C-H bonds in methane, but I can't really turn it into a sexual pun like I do most other science-based explanations that I offer up here. Think about this: All those farts you're cutting all day that you think no one can smell? Well, people can smell them, but since they don't stink like your feet, we mostly ignore them. Also, do you know what produces a shit-ton (literally) of methane every day? Cows. Eat more of them. They're fucking tasty. I hear pigs fart, too. Eat bacon; save a tree.

4) Turn the lights off. When you leave the room, flick 'em off. I promise, the boogeyman isn't going to jump out at you as you leave the room. Michael Myers, maybe, but the boogeyman, no. I mean, he's just there to dance. Or, you could be more like my wife and turn the lights off when she enters the room where I'm currently lounging. She's all about the saving of the planet.

5) Gamma rays. Irradiate yourself with some high-powered member of the electromagnetic spectrum. Go apeshit. Smash stuff. Wear a lot of purple pants. Forget how to conjugate verbs.

There you have it. Five ways that you can fulfill your goal of being more green this year. You can thank me in December.

Charity: Crappy Gifts for Sick People

My good friend Scope gave me something. No, it's not the Clap. And besides, a little penicillin cleared that right up. No, he gave me one of those chain things that I usually pretend like I didn't see, but since this one was originated by the Internet Sensation that is Dr. Zibbs, I figured I should pass it along. One thing I've learned in my time on the interwebs: nothing boosts blog visitors like suckling at the teat of Zibbs.

So, the story is simple: You pick out a craptacular gift for the ill, pick five other bloggers who would also be altruistic enough to go along with the game, and then praise the Internet Sensation that is Dr. Zibbs by linking back to the original post. Simple, right?

I figure if these people are sick and dying, what better thing to brighten their day than a stuffed representation of what has invited the Grim Reaper to knock upon their door. Or better yet, caused him to saunter slowly up the front sidewalk while you watch from the front windows. Merry Christmas, here's a strange, yellow discharge. Oh, by the way, something's eating your brain. Want some eggnog?

I've opted for Hepatitis C and Sleeping Sickness (caused by the Hepatitis C Virus (HCV) and Trypanosoma brucei, respectively). Oh sure, there are treatments for both, but both will kill you if you don't treat them (and, in the case of T. brucei, the medicine can kill you if the sickness doesn't do it quick enough!), so I thought they were appropriate selections for this game.
These can be found at GIANTmicrobes.com; order yours today!

And now, for the five people I'll meet in Hell pass this along to:

Southern Belle
Susan
Frank
Jidai
Lydia

What are you waiting for, Grinchy? That heart ain't going to swell three sizes today without you doing something about it!