The company I work for is doing a, well not really a contest, but let’s just say a thing to help people stay in shape that involves walking. The so called contest started on May 12 and goes until June 30. They give us some choices to decide how many steps we will walk in that time and the more you agree to walk, the better your prize is at the end. Of course, I love to walk so I went for the highest total they give which was 200,000 steps. The first week I walked something like 68,000 steps from Thursday May 12 to Thursday May 19. I started off well the second week managing to walk over 20,000 in one day on May 19. A couple of days later I lost my damn pedometer in a drunken haze while at a bar in Milwaukee. So I missed out on a couple of days of steps before I was able to get my new pedometer. I used the new one for day and it wound up breaking on me. But, I still managed to finish the second week with over 70,000 steps, well on my way to 200,000.

So a lot of people at work signed up for walking contest. Many of the people who signed up for it are overweight. And I don’t mean just a little overweight, but I mean a lot overweight. Hell, it’s a call center and call centers are notorious for hiring people who are overweight. What drives me nuts is that they will always ask me how many steps I’m up to and when I tell them the number they almost get jealous and make excuses as to why I have so many steps and why they don’t have many at all. It’s the same way when they talk about my weight or how thin I am. They say I’m so lucky because I’m so thin, but I kind of get offended at it because I work my ass off to stay thin; both by exercising and generally eating healthy.

Still I have to wonder why those overweight people are not walking a lot of steps. Is it because they feel hopeless because of how overweight they are? Is it because they are lazy? I don’t know. All I know is that when I set a goal like this, I look for any chance I can to meet it. I’ve always  been the type to take the stairs anywhere instead of an escalator or elevator. I also would rather walk over to somebody instead of calling them or emailing. And of course, I have been walking a lot on my lunch. So not a lot of big things, but just little things that add up.

Now I should mention what type of effect this had on me. Well, I started off about 130 or 131 pounds. I also found out recently that I’ve got slightly high cholesterol so I’ve been eating oatmeal for lunch. Because I was walking a lot, still doing my normal exercise routine of riding the exercise bike and walking a lot, my weight got down to a hair under 125 which, let’s face it, is probably too little. My metabolism was really high though as I was hungry all the time. So I kinda scaled back on the bike and ate more, especially since I was in Milwaukee a couple of weekends ago and then we had the holiday weekend this past weekend. When I weighed myself on Friday May 20, I was just about 125. When I weighed myself yesterday, just 10 days later, I was up to 134! Whoa, nine pounds in 10 days, that’s not good. And I’m going to Key West in two weeks. So it’s back on the diet for now.

Ahhh, ya gotta love holiday weekends. Tomorrow of course is the first day of the work week but already Tuesday. So Friday I got off work at 6:15 and couldn’t be in any  better of a mood what with a full weekend of stuff to do, starting with hanging out with some friends. Well, as it turned out, nobody was able to do anything for various reasons. That was okay though, because I still had a full Saturday, Sunday, and Monday planned.

Saturday the plan was to go to a 40th birthday party of a good friend of mine before going to a bar in the city with some other friends. I was on my way to the birthday party when I got word from my other friend that she was not going to be going to the bar that evening. The birthday party was fine though, however there were a few people who were supposed to make it who did not.

Sunday was a day I have been looking forward to for many years. The plan was to go to Arlington Racetrack and bet on some horses. I have not gone to the track in about eight years. Unfortunately though, Mother Nature never got the fucking email and decided to not only rain on our parade but fully fucking deluge on our parade complete with tornado warnings and storm warnings for a good part of the day. So, instead we improvised and hung out at a friend’s house for most of the day.

In the evening the plan was to go see the Hangover 2 at Hollywood Blvd theater which is one of those places that serves meals during the movie. We got there and while we were in line the movie sold out. Keep in mind this was a full hour and a half before the movie was to start. So we wound up going to the Tilted Kilt before going to a later showing at another theater. As for the movie itself, if you saw the first Hangover than you pretty much saw the second one. It was okay, but that is how I felt about the first Hangover: not nearly as funny as everybody makes it out to be.

Today actually went pretty much just as planned. We played baseball in the 90 degree heat before coming back to my house for a bbq and hanging out. We also played some basketball as well and managed to sweat more in the 20 minutes we played basketball than the two hours we played baseball.

Still, overall it was a great weekend. Geez, I can’t believe summer is here already.

All I can say is fuck the damn Miami fucking Heat. The Bulls got eliminated tonight in heartbreaking fashion. Game just ended. Like the rest of Chicago I’m stunned. All along I expected them to lose this series. I even thought they would lose this game. I just didn’t think it would be like this. And to this team, the hated Miami Heat. I think I might hate the Heat more than any other team in professional sports. They are just so fucking arrogant and have this sense of entitlement to them. I hope the Dallas Mavericks give them the beatdown of a lifetime, however I know that won’t happen as the Heat are going to win the whole thing. Fuck.

In my 22 years watching the Bulls, I’ve had far more to cheer about than be upset about. So I guess I can take solace in that fact.

Fuck though, this is a tough one.

As some of you might know, recently Joakim Noah of the Chicago Bulls called a fan a faggot during the Bulls game three loss in Miami. Being gay and a huge Bulls fan, I have been quite bothered and disappointed by this situation. I’ve realized over the past few years that when you take the time to contact a company or politician or somebody else famous, a lot of times they take the time to respond. So I decided to email the Chicago Bulls and tell them how I feel. I don’t expect there to be any change but wanted to let them know that they do have gay fans and see if they care enough to actually respond. Below is a copy of that email:

There has been so much bad stories in the news lately so here is something that should make you feel much better, especially if you live in Chicago. It turns out the Chicago River is one of the nations most threatened waterways. How so you might ask? Well, I can summarize it for you, but I would not do as good of a job as the article right here:

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-05-17/news/ct-met-chicago-river-endangeredlist-20110517_1_chicago-river-waterways-water-quality

Things are so bad that attempting to clean it would be a waste of money, no pun intended. So what is it that makes the river so bad off? Well, for starters Chicago is the only major U.S. city that fails to disinfect its sewage. Want to be even more disgusted? 1.2 billion gallons of partially treated human and industrial waste dumped into the river every day; hell do we even have a number high enough to estimate how much that is over the course of a decade? Fuck. And people made a big stink when the Dave Matthews Band emptied their bus toilets into the river. Of course, they emptied it directly onto people on a boat below so I guess they had a reason to be upset.

As disgusting as all of this is, it is amazing to me that the river doesn’t have an unbearable stench emanating from it. Yet, I’ve driven over,or walked over and next to the Chicago River hundreds of times and have never noticed a smell. Of course, that doesn’t make it any less disgusting or sad, just surprising is all.

Okay, so I didn’t want to stuff my entire trip to Milwaukee into one long post. So, here are more of the highlights of the trip that I might have missed but all of a sudden remembered just minutes after submitting the previous post:

• We spent a good portion of the trip betting on stupid things like who can throw a baseball the fastest or what my friend Brett Favre would eat at the game.
• Saturday morning I saw a young guy sitting on the corner waiting for a bus. The rest of the weekend and even for much of today I had the Violent Femmes “Waiting For The Bus” stuck in my head. In fact, I had to play it right now as I’m writing this. I think this song will always remind me of the great time we had in Milwaukee. 
• Milwaukee kicks L.A.’s ass! Oh sure, the weather might be better in Los Angeles and the people hotter, but we had no problems getting into any bar we went to and the bars were open just as late as the ones in L.A.
• There is a Bronze Fonz that we never quite found. It is exactly what you think it is: a statue of the Fonz made out of bronze.
• Outside of hotels, there are pretty much no sit down restaurants to eat at for breakfast in downtown Milwaukee. This kind of sucked, but fortunately the food at the hotel cafe was good and reasonably priced.
• Those of you who are from the midwest know about the legendary Mars Cheese Castle. Turns out they built a larger, more kick ass castle right across the parking lot from the old one. Fuck I love cheese.

So that is all I can remember right now, I’m sure I will remember more shit one I click save. Perhaps if I do, I will just add to this post instead of doing a whole new one.

As I mentioned in my last post that nobody read, some of my friends and I took a trip to Milwaukee for the weekend. So now its time for me to tell you all about the weekend, complete with made up names for my friends and my amazing drawings of the trip.

The plan was to leave on Friday night and pick up our one friend up at the airport on the way. For the most part, the plan when off without a hitch and yadda, yadda, yadda, we were in Milwaukee on a Friday night.Three of us wanted to go to the casino while the other three did not want to go. Now in honor of Milwaukee, all of the made up names will be names associate with Milwaukee or Wisconsin. So, myself, Brett Favre and Mrs. Cunningham went to the casino while Red Foreman and Laverne and Shirley didn’t. This was the first time I had ever been to the Potawatomi casino. This was a place my mom used to go play bingo at every New Year’s Eve for years. So we decided to play bingo.

There was just a couple of catches. First of all, we had not played in a really long time, probably like 10 years. Also, I was drunk. And the bingo caller seemed to call really fast. Or maybe because it was drunk time it just seemed fast as time always moves faster when one is drunk. We wound up sitting next to a really nice girl who was a bartender from Kenosha. She was by herself and was kind enough to help us out throughout the night. She even played Mrs. Cunningham’s cards when he got up to go to the bathroom and wasn’t back in time before the next game started. Hell, somebody had to play them as Brett Favre and I had a hard enough time maintaining our own cards.

We got back to the hotel shortly after three. I should clarify that the six of us got two conjoining rooms at the hotel. It was me, Brett Favre, and Mrs. C in one room and Red Foreman, and Laverne and Shirley in the other room. Even though I wasn’t really tired, we went to bed about five in the A.M. Shortly after the guys in the other room went to bed, Brett Favre went in there room and ordered a wake up call for 6 A.M. just to be funny. He even did it the next night as well and they called our room too and woke me up!

Saturday we went to the Miller Brewery and the Milwaukee Brewers game. Since I was too stupid to remember to bring an actual fucking camera, instead you get to see the trip through the wonder and amazement that is my drawings.

  Okay so this isn’t a drawing. Its not even from the trip. But it is me in my fireman’s hat. I command respect!

That’s me doing a keg stand at the brewery. Notice the blood rushing to my head. I was dizzy for like 20 minutes after that.

That’s an exact replica of where they make Miller beer.

Here is a picture of the ballpark from our seats. Pretty good, eh?

After the game we decided to hit the fucking town. The plan was to go to a piano bar but it wound up being so packed that it was over capacity. So, we found ourselves on Water Street, which is the college bar part of town. The streets and bars were packed with hot, young, college kids. Of course, we were totally out of place, but who gives a fuck. We wound up going to Coyote Ugly which totally kicked ass, even for a gay guy. For those of you that don’t know, Coyote Ugly is a bar in which chicks dance on the bar. I wound up paying $20 for a couple of the ladies to get on top of each other while I do a body shot off of them. If only they knew…………..anywho, here is the pic

After a while, Brett Favre, Mrs. Cunningham and I left there to go bar hopping among several other bars. We found ourselves in a country bar which I didn’t like. Mrs. Cunningham bought me a beer in spite of the fact that I said that I was not going to be drinking for a little bit for fear of throwing up. So I gave the beer to Brett Favre. I soon realized that I don’t like country bars on the account that I hate country music. So I went back to the piano bar by myself. By this time, it was 12:45 and they were no longer over capacity.

So that is just a brief summary of the trip. I will fill in some more of the gaps in a later post. But, rest assured, a great time was had by all.

My friends and I are spending this upcoming weekend in Milwaukee for some reason. Whenever I’m in Milwaukee the theme song from Laverne and Shirley goes through my head and this time is no different. In fact I spent most of the day with the song flowing through my head, repeating the lyrics over and over. It finally hit me: those two bitches are a couple of fucking anarchists! Just look at these lyrics along with my interpretation in parenthesis:

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. (counting to get the attention of their fellow anarchists)
Sclemeel, schlemazel, hasenfeffer incorporated. (Sclmeel? Schlemazel? Hasenfeffer? Clearly this is a secret message to other anarchists)
We’re gonna do it! (Its like a Goddamn rally cry!)

Give us any chance, we’ll take it. (That basically means, we will do anything legal)
Give us any rule, we’ll break it. (and if its not legal, fuck you, we are doin’ it anyway!)
We’re gonna make our dreams come true. (We can do whatever the fuck we want asshole!)
Doin’ it our way. (Fuck you, it’s our way and a punch in the fucking face for you)

Nothin’s gonna turn us back now, (Fuck the police yo!)
Straight ahead and on the track now. (fuck the government, this is our fucking country!)
We’re gonna make our dreams come true, (ANYTHING, fucker! Anything we want)
Doin’ it our way. (Wait, maybe this should be my fucking way, after all, we are anarchists)

There is nothing we won’t try, (Think I won’t kill a man? Just fucking watch, bitch!)
Never heard the word impossible. (Ain’t no fucking jail gonna hold us!)
This time there’s no stopping us. (Trying to stop us is pointless! ANARCHY!!)
We’re gonna do it. (I SAID ANARCHY! DOWN WITH THE GOVERNMENT AND RULES! EVERYBODY FOR THEMSELVES)

On your mark, get set, and go now, (Start running asshole, this shit is gonna blow!)
Got a dream and we just know now, (We all know how this ends: freedom from tyranny!)
We’re gonna make our dream come true. (DOWN WITH TYRANNY!)
And we’ll do it our way, yes our way. (Fuck you, fuck you!!!)
Make all our dreams come true, (I am an anti-Christ, I am an anarchist, don’t know what I want, but I know how to get it)
And do it our way, yes our way, (Anarchy for the UK, it’s coming sometime and maybe)
Make all our dreams come true (ANARCHY FOR ALL!! DOWN WITH THE GOVERNMENT!)
For me and you. (We are lesbians!! Fuck this anarchy, let’s do it!)

See what I’m saying, it’s all right there in black and white. That Laverne De Fazio and Shirley Feeney are bad fucking news. Just look at them. They worked in a brewery for crying out loud; hello, nothing represents anarchy and out of control more than gettin’ drunk. And they lived together and we all know lesbians are a total fuck you to the heterosexual establishment. See people, it’s all there.

We can’t let these two get away with this shit. We need to have Congress and the President act immediately to ban Laverne and Shirley before they start a revolt and take down the government. Now that Bin Laden is out of the picture, we all know there is going to have to be somebody to replace him; well, these two pose the biggest threat in a post Bin Laden world. That is why I’m encouraging you to write your senator, write your rep, write the president, tell them that Laverne De Fazio and Shirley Feeney must be stopped at any cost. I’ve already written both my senators, the president, my rep, and the head of People for the Advancement of Crazy Jewish Phrases to encourage them to do everything in their power to stop them. Now it’s your turn.

My favorite team, the Chicago Bulls, is taking on the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference Finals. This could be bad news for several reasons. First, I don’t think the Bulls are going to beat them in spite of the 21 point humiliation handed out by the Bulls in game one. Don’t get me wrong, nothing would make me happier than to see the Bulls beat Miami. In fact, if LeBron James somehow never won a championship in the seven years he is signed to play for Miami, I would be so happy that I would have an erection lasting longer then four hours. So you could imagine how thrilled I was yesterday when Bulls won.

One of the things that makes the series so damn difficult though is having to see Heat forward Chris Bosh for a potential seven games. When I say difficult, I mean really fucking difficult. The man is fucking unsightly. I mean he is so ugly he is offensive looking. So ugly that they should give us a warning first that they are going to show him so we can get the kids out of the room and avert our gaze. He is so ugly that he would make you lose yesterday’s lunch. Need proof? Just look at these pics:

See, just look at that; he is painful to look at. I think I’m going to work on a new invention: Chris Bosh Viewing Glasses. The whole concept would work along the same lines of the viewing glasses that let you safely view an eclipse only in this case they would let you safely view Chris Bosh without throwing up or turning to stone.

Here is to hoping the Bulls can do the whole world a favor and sweep Miami right the fuck out of the playoffs like they so richly deserve and make the television airwaves a more beautiful place.

Yesterday afternoon I went to a friend’s birthday party. On the way home I hit a ton of traffic on one of the roads I take to get home. As I got closer, I found out that there was a gas leak at the corner of the road I live on and another road. I should clarify that my house is a couple of miles down this road, but I needed to turn at that intersection in order to get to my house. This of course caused for some major traffic and forced me to take an alternate route to my house. Fortunately, there were no deaths or injuries from this leak, but even today part of the road remains closed. It is a reminder of a big problem that is facing America: our crumbling infrastructure.

I was first made aware of this problem a few years ago when that bridge collapsed over the Mississippi River in Minnesota. Then last year, there was a gas line explosion near San Francisco that destroyed a good portion of a town. Also, I watched a program on the History Channel about America’s infrastructure and how, basically, much of it can go at any time. It is a scary though and while I’m quite certain it is not as bad as they made it out to be, it is still a concern that I think we need to take seriously.

When Obama took office in 2009, Republicans all of a sudden remembered that we have a debt problem; something they only seem to notice when a Democrat is in the White House. Now I do fully recognize that financially this country is a mess, but at the same time, we do have this major and urgent need that nobody is talking about regarding our infrastructure. Or at least they are burying their heads in the sand. Obama did propose spending some $55 billion dollars on infrastructure about a year ago and Republicans all got up in arms over the spending and bashed it as just typical tax and spend policies of the Democrats. Of course, again, when a Republican president wants to spend TRILLIONS of dollars on national defense and wars than they look the other way and hide behind the desperate need for national defense. But, in a way, isn’t our infrastructure about national defense along with many other things?  Doesn’t crumbling bridges and tunnels, exploding gas lines and water pipes leave us vulnerable, weak and unsafe? And can’t all of those things contribute to turning us into a third world country?

The answer to all of those questions of course, is yes. And why more people can’t see that I don’t know. Repairing these issues before they cause problems, kill or hurt people or destroy towns is not only smart but also a good way to create jobs in a slowly recovering economy. People might say I’m just another liberal who is all about spending money and that less government is just what we need, but honestly, this isn’t a liberal or conservative issue. It is a common sense issue. Republicans have long said that the biggest job of the government is to keep the country and the people safe, well, this is just as much of a vital duty as the military keeping us safe. If we can’t agree that at the very least, the government is responsible for infrastructure than there is nothing we can agree on. See, government is not all bad but it is certainly bad when it ignores simple problems until they become major disasters.

Now I should clarify that as of right now, we don’t know what caused the leak in my neighborhood. For all I know, it could have been something that was the result of incompetence instead of the age of the gas line; after all, most of those businesses in that intersection are only about 12 or 13 years old so I’m thinking the gas line probably is not much older than that so it should have lasted for at least a couple of more decades. But, the same can not be said of some of the other problems our country has had with crumbling infrastructure.