I’ll admit it. When I was a lad, I fancied myself something of a handyman. After all, once you’ve helped your dad re-shingle the house, re-wire a few lamps and replace plumbing fixtures, you feel like you can do anything.
Guess how long it takes living in your own home before you realize that you don’t know squat? Yeah, about the time it took you to read that sentence. Fortunately though, Al Gore invented the internet, and once you shove past all the porn, there’s actually quite a bit of useful information out there.
The point of all this? I and my fiancée are getting married in a few weeks, and there’s a lot of work that goes into making that happen. And by “a lot” I mean a ridiculous amount. Actually “ridiculous amount” doesn’t begin to describe it. But you aren’t paying to hear me bitch about wedding plans. On with the show.
I’ll make the painful part of this little expose short: A few years ago I was really into the show “The Gilmore Girls.” No, seriously. I was. And it was a good show, for a little while. It was! Oh forget it, fine. I’m a loser. The reason I bring it up is because on the show, one of the characters made a chuppah for the main character’s wedding, and I remember thinking “That would be cool, to make something like that for a wedding.”
Fast forward a few years to me not watching that show anymore, but I still wanted to make a chuppah, so imagine my delight when I got the chance to marry a beautiful Jewish woman! After Googling “DIY chuppah”, this is the design I cobbled together.
Materials:
STAGE ONE
4 large planters
2 bags QuikCrete fast-dry cement
4 2-foot lengths 2” diameter PVC pipe
4 1 ½ inches x 8 foot pine dowels
1 can wood stain
So let’s get started with stage one, shall we?
Sand those dowels, get all the splinters and rough patches out. I learned through some doing that you should spend some time on this one with a medium-grain sandpaper. Brush the sawdust off the poles with a soft rag.
Take one of the PVC pipes and stand it up in one of the pots. Drop one of the poles into the sheath. Measure where the top of the pipe is on the pole with a pencil mark. Do this for all four poles. This is the length below which you don’t need to worry about applying stain.
Now stain those poles. Use two wooden sawhorses and a Styrofoam pad applicator, and work that stain into the pine.
This will take you a while. It will sort of suck, because the stain will want to bead up in places – if this dries, it will look like someone drooled on the pole. You really have to go over and over the wood with your applicator, but you’ll get there. I advise having some music playing, and perhaps an organ grinder and monkey nearby to entertain you while you carry out this task.
OK, find a safe spot for your poles to dry out.
Now it’s time to focus on the pots. Get your first pot and PVC pipe, and the first bag of cement. This stuff is pretty forgiving, up to a point. You don’t have to worry too much about precision with your measurements, but don’t take too long doing anything, or you’re going to have a chunk of rock on your hands before you’re ready: the stuff dries in about 20 minutes.
Pour about half the bag into the planter. When you’ve finished choking on the dust, take a quart bottle full of water (again, this does not have to be precise: see the measurement device I used)
Pour that water on top of the dry cement, and using a hand trowel, mix vigorously. I mean work it. Dig the stuff up, find all the dry powder that hasn’t gotten hit with the water. It’s like a nightmarish version of instant oatmeal. You’ll probably want to go back for another two cups or so of water – just make sure you get all the powder. Don’t go too nuts – you don’t want runny mud, but you don’t want clay either. Right in between. Once you’ve got it all mixed, shove that PVC pipe right in the middle. Make sure it’s straight – use a level if you want. But get your hands in the mud and make sure that pipe is going to dry straight up and down.
Do this all four times, then go clean up. Watch an episode of “No Reservations” or “Dexter”. Have a drink. Relax.
When you go back, put your four stained poles into your PVC sheaths, and stand back. Nice job, you’ve finished Stage One!
Next weekend: Stage Two. Start thinking flowers, ivy and cloth. You heard me!
As many of you don’t care about, I grew up some years ago, and have at least a few clear memories of the 1970s. My sister is a few years younger than me, and I’ll warrant she has at least a few herself. Both of us, however, have long treasured the memory of listening, on 13″ vinyl, of course, to the story of Oblio and his faithful dog, Arrow, on Harry Nilsson’s seminal album, The Point. Now, our parents specifically chose this album to play for us, both because of its cool ’70s music interwoven with a storylike narrative, and for its positive message of anti-discrimination.
The album affected both of so deeply that when, in our adult years, we recovered a copy of it, we both instantly fell back in love with it. I keep it on my Mp3 player, and pull it out on rainy days, long car trips, republican presidencies, pretty much any time I feel gloomy or down. Just the first few bars of “Everything’s Got ‘Em (This Is The Town And These Are The People)” can instantly buoy my mood.
I had long decided that if I ever had kids, I was going to play this for them too. After stumbling upon this gem from Schmilsson himself, I definitely am.
“I was on acid and I looked at the trees and I realized that they all came to points, and the little branches came to points, and the houses came to point. I thought, ‘Oh! Everything has a point, and if it doesn’t, then there’s a point to it.” (Harry Nilsson, on the inspiration behind “The Point)
If you haven’t ever heard the album, go download it now from your chosen portal. I don’t need to post a link to it, because you’re all grownups who choose their own music portals. Find a nice quiet spot to spend about 45 minutes, and just listen, beginning to end. I guarantee you’ll be entertained.
Best album of our childhood…totally based on fat trips. Awesome.
Possibly the first instance of those words being combined this way and printed, yet in my case it’s true. I sandbagged my four-year old Dell and replaced it with a new one (I paid about 300 bucks for the last one, new, so I feel as though I got my money’s worth) but was unable to do anything about them installing Vista as the OS. Once I got over the initial repulsion toward the Mac-like “launch bar” and the fact that Outlook Express will no longer hook up to my pop-3 mail, I’m kind of OK with it. Hopefully that lasts for a while. Probably it won’t. Ah well, I can’t bring myself to care because…
I got to be on NPR.
This was some pretty cool shit right here. I emailed NPR’s “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” about three months ago, and told them that I wanted to be on, so I could give Carl Kasel’s voice to my fiancee as a wedding present. Apparently, humans actually read these emails, because I got a call last Wednesday from a charming woman named Emily, who asked me if I still wanted to be on. I told her I did, and after we chatted for a few minutes, she said “OK, well you’re on. We tape tomorrow night.” I was like “whaaaaashit…okay.” I hadn’t been paying attention to the news that week! Would I crash and burn? So I pulled about three hours of “study every news website and the npr.org weekly archive” and when the time came, I did okay. And holy shit was my fiancee surprised. I wish I coulda downloaded the look on her face and burned it to the CD with the show. (And yeah, you can still download it in case you care to…till the new episode comes out this Saturday.) And yeah, that weekend on the Cape was a blast, even though…
Spending all day drinking on a Sunday puts you in the shitsack till Tuesday, at least.
Seriously. We had one of those epic Sundays, the ones that started with getting up and watching cartoons with coffee, then wandering around the Cape looking for someplace to eat, finding one, eating lunch, having beers, remembering the Sox game was on at 1, then drinking through the Sox, then drinking outside because the sun came out finally. Epic. Bowling later? Of course! With some beers. Then, at home, a last screwdriver while I checked my email from over the weekend. And at last, bed.
And when I woke up, it felt like a raccoon took a shit in my brain. For two days. Surprised? Well, screw you. I was. But you know what DOESN’T surprise me?
Well, folks, I’ve got a new place. We’ll be moving to Waltham next month, leaving scenic, historic Revere Beach behind. We’d been talking about finding a new place to live, but really hadn’t looked seriously. It’s hard to leave such a cheap apartment with everything included, but the family next door provided us with the motivation to get the hell out of there.
See, we live next door to the worst human beings on the planet. Just horrible, horrible people. I could spend all day describing their savage ways, but instead I’ll just give you the highlights:
7:30 am Basketball camp- We share a driveway with these knuckle-dragging mouth breathers, and they decided it was a good idea to put a basketball hoop there. They also thought it would be nice to invite all their childrens’ friends to come over and play basketball at 7:30 in the morning. If you’ve ever been around children, you probably know that they tend to be noisy. They tend to scream. And one of them tends to both scream and cry when he’s not given the ball enough.
Wall-shaking, picture-breaking madness- As a byproduct of the Under 10 Year-Old Revere Beach Morning Basketball Camp, there’s the constant slamming of basketballs against our wall. It’s now gotten to the point where they do it so hard that they knock pictures off our wall. Now, let me be clear: it’s not just the children, it’s also the father. He goes out with the children to teach them how to play, but he’s really teaching them how to live life in a way that completely ignores the fact that other people are around. He’s teaching them a healthy disrespect for anyone, and he’s doing a great job at it. Though I’ve asked both the children and the father “Can you please stop bouncing the ball against my wall?” multiple times, they just continue doing it. Usually they either apologize first or say “it wasn’t on purpose”. They then just keep on doing it.
Let the neighbors clean up the dog shit- Not long ago, this family of apes bought a dog. It’s a puggle that barks constantly. Rather than trying to train the dog, the family of the year instead took the path of least resistance. That involves chaining the dog to their balcony and just letting it bark for hours while they go off to do whatever it is they do. When the dog is not on their balcony, they bring it to our front yard, chain it up there and leave him to shit everywhere. It’s always a pleasant experience when I go out to get our mail.
The final straw- Last week the subhumans finally did it. We saw it coming, and there was nothing we could do about it. After Randi got her car back from the shop (someone mysteriously broke her tail light), she heard the doorbell ring. It was the mother and three children. She said “the boys have something they have to tell you.” Then one of them somehow mustered the cognitive ability to say “we were playing ball and we broke your window”.
Yep, that was their story.
Later on, the father came to the door and changed the story to say that they were instead throwing rocks in the air and hitting them with a baseball bat. Mind you, this is in our driveway. He then informed Randi that it wasn’t his kid that did it. It was one of their friends, and he doesn’t know which one. When the insurance company called them to find out what happened, the story became “Our kids were outside and saw some of their friends hitting rocks with a bat, and her window got smashed.”
Here’s what the window looked like:
This all took place last week. Just two days ago I went out to my car and guess what? Their children were back outside playing baseball, aiming directly at the row of cars behind our building.
If I believed I could actually convince the father that his parenting style was sub-par, and that his children were making life absolutely miserable for us….well, I’d talk to him. But I just don’t think there’s any way that would work. I honestly believe that if you moved his dinner plate an inch in any direction, he would starve to death.
So, goodbye, Revere. We had some good times, now didn’t we? Off to historic Waltham where I’ll have a less than 5 minute commute and some semblance of sanity.
But I have managed to raise it to an art form. I’ve been working at the same nonsense now for about twelve years (thought not all at the same company) and no, I’m not going to tell you what it is, since I’m shitting all over them. Ah, who am I kidding, they’re probably reading it right now. Anyway, I’ve discovered that I’ve raised “hating my job” to a new level. The level of intellectual and creative rape to which you are required to submit in order to “properly carry out your job” here is staggering. Imagine someone hands you a bucket of sand and tells you “You must account for and index the properties of every grain of sand in this bucket. And you must be able to answer questions about each grain and its properties on command.” And behind that bucket you see five hundred more and the person says “when you’re done with that bucket, start on the next.”
That’s my job. Depressing, no? It does pay reasonably well, though, and somehow I’ve managed to become good at it. But last night I realized that I have completely sublimated the hatred for my job, pressed it down to the point that it actually manifests itself externally, in things like “alcohol abuse” and whatnot. Seriously, if I take an emotional inventory at any given moment, “I hate my job” is not actually on the active roster. It’s been forced onto some unseen level, repressed by my practical and survival-oriented forebrain, which realizes that if I were allowed to continuously experience the full horror of how much I actually loathe what I do for 8-12 hours a day, five days a week (sometimes six and seven) I would almost immediately succumb to some wasting illness and die. A wasting illness other than cirrhosis of the liver, that is.
Ah, free stuff. The cornerstone of any good economy.
Last night, I marshalled my shit at the end of a long day of work and dragged a blanket and a thermos full of screwdrivers down to the Prudential’s South Lawn for an obnoxiously-sponsored, but ultimately free and enjoyable outdoor screening of “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”.
Granted, the “entertainment” which preceded the movie was a nauseating MC who conducted a “trivia” contest (sample questions include “What animal makes this sound?” <<mooooo>>>) but with a good loud mp3 player and a magazine, you can ignore almost anything. Especially with a thermos full of screwdrivers.
Once the sun went down, I enjoyed a burrito, delivered to my lazy ass on my blanket, and a big-ass screen showing one of my favorite 80s movies of all time.
Of course, right now I’m making this a win for the obnoxious radio station by giving them free press, as well as having delivered some coin into the coffer of Qdoba, but hey - you have to eat, and in one man’s opinion, you have to go see Ferris Bueller when it’s being shown for free on a lawn.
Next week: The Wedding Singer. See you there, Fredders.
Hey folks. JH back in the house. Sorry for my long, unexcused absence, loyal reader, but I did have a couple of reasons for laying off…the broken ankle which developed blood clots which became pulmonary emboli chief among them. But I’m back, and I have a few things on my mind these days.
Some of the most interesting things I’ve seen on TV (and with recent events I have been watching a lot of TV) have come from commercials. Think of it: there are whole companies full of people who craft 30 to 60 second morality plays, designed to get us to buy stuff. And some of them…well, some of them just don’t make a lot of sense. Let’s look at a few, shall we?
Cialis:
Now, at first glance, when we’re not really thinking about it – and let’s face it, when are we ever really thinking about a Cialis commercial – what the hell is going on here? They’re pitching boner pills, and we’re supposed to buy the fact that two senior citizens, who presumably have some private stretch of beach, have the foresight to purchase two semi-antique ceramic bathtubs, and the spinal fortitude to haul the things down there, okay fine. Let’s suspend disbelief. Are they filling them up with salt water? I mean, what’s the point? I could see one big hot tub, but two separate individual bathtubs? How are you going to get it on? Whatever. Nice job, commercial inventors.
Chips Ahoy:
I do not want to think about the ramifications of eating an anthropomorphic cookie that has self-motivation, hopes, fears and dreams. Certainly not one who is in a Wizard of Oz cosplay fantasy.
The Minivan Commercial Where the Kids End Up Watching TV in the Driveway Inside the Minivan:
Your family is sundered, and your children would rather sit in the car than endure the smell of their great uncle’s cigar, which, for your information, smells like a goddamn burning shoe. Oh, and the great-aunt who wears her underwear on the outside and smells like baby powder and urine – the dollar that she gives them every thanksgiving is clearly not enough to offset the horrible torment of them having to deal with the smell. Yep, you’re just going to have to buy a Ford Escape and hope you die before your kids’ therapy bills come due.
Tanqueray:
Don’t you just want to punch that overdressed, semi-ambiguously gay club fop in the sack? I know I do. I would love to see that guy walk into J.J. Foley’s on East Berkeley on a Saturday night and try to peddle his crappy British accent. The bartender would vault out from behind the bar with his sawed-off baseball bat and throw him bodily into the alley. Green silk vest and all. Man, I would pay to see someone fuck up that guy.
Priceline:
Is there anything that Shatner won’t sell? If money is a dick, then Shatner will give it a rub and a tug, slobber all over it, and let it blow all over him till the camera fades out. I’ve met Shatner, and he’s an asshole. He cheats at paintball and he won’t sit up to shake the hand of someone who gives him a kind word. Every time I see him pitching low prices on undersold hotel rooms, I want to shoot him in the dangle-bobs with my Tippmann.
Women’s underwear:
Well…okay. I honestly have nothing in particular against these commercials. Although, honestly, when one shows up on ABC, are you really ready for it? Maybe you’re sitting there on the couch with your wife, the two of you watching Jeopardy, all of a sudden Playtex throws a “plus-size” bra ad in there, it’s like what the fuck, I wasn’t ready for this, I don’t have my game face on! I mean, you’re watching Spike TV and your wife is in the room, at least you know enough to start a conversation about florists, or salad, or poor Michael J. Fox’s Parkinson’s charity when the phone sex ads come on. But you’re not expecting double Ds to be flopping into your living room in prime time, are you? Come on, Playtex – have a heart!
The Olive Garden:
Nobody believes that mom and dad take their collegiate daughter and her roommates here for dinner. Unless mom works for the MBTA, dad is a disabled factory worker and “college” is Mass Bay. Their food is fucking disgusting, and you’re not at the Olive Garden unless:
- you’re a 17 year old high school guy and this is what you can afford for date night (free refills)
- you’re a fat chick whose angry boyfriend is at least willing to accompany you to dinner with the two ill-behaved kids you had by two other guys
- you’re 40+ female office worker sitting in the bar looking to pick up a college kid
- you’re a college kid looking to get head in the parking lot in a ‘96 Taurus from someone’s mom
Bob’s (for local Massholes only)
Point of interest: That man with the beard? That is notBob. That is a man that Bob paid to act in his commercials. The real Bob is apparently so unphotogenic that this cob-crusher is an upgrade. Go figure.
The Home Depot:
“You can do it. We can help.” Except we won’t. Because we don’t give a shit. Go find it yourself.
Wow. This is almost as good as the 9/11 Commemorative junk. I saw this on TV and thought I must have been dreaming. The DND Global Marketing Company saw an opportunity and damn it, they jumped on it. I think the reasoning went somethng like this:
1. People seem to like Barack Obama
2. When people like something, they tend to buy products associated with their likes
3. People wear shoes
______________________
The answer: Obama Shoes
Now that is pretty solid logic, my friends. Here’s the commercial:
I really enjoy the web site set up to facilitate a purchase. From the FAQ:
Q. Why does the shoes look like Nike Air Force Ones (AF1) and the Jordan Brand?
A. These design is been proven to be commonly preferred by most Adults & Children (black or white)
Huh?
I mean, sure, it’s easy to pick on the language (these design is been), but what I can’t figure out is the black or white comment. Are they saying that the design is preferred by adults and children regardless of their race? Or are they talking about the color of the shoes? I thought they were talking about the shoe color, but that can’t be it because they’re available in pink and blue as well.
Ouch. Last night hurt. All three Boston sports teams lost, and for one of them it was the end of their season. But why do I care?
See, fredders, I’m not from Boston. In fact, I’m not even from Massachusetts. I’m from New York. Now before you start pelting me with lids from steel garbage cans, let me tell you something: upstate New York is not the New York you loathe. It’s New York in name only.
Growing up I was a Mets fan (still am), a Buffalo Bills fan (not anymore), and a Red Wings and Toronto Maple Leafs fan. I never cared about basketball. But since moving to the Bay State in 1997, my loyalties have changed. While I still am a Mets fan, I find myself watching the Sox and even listening to them on the radio. I am a Patriots fanatic. I would now consider myself a Bruins fan, as I found myself arguing in a comment thread on Boston.com with Carolina fans over whether Walker is a cheap shot artist. By the way, he is. And almost inconceivably I find myself paying attention to the Celtics. I never saw that one coming.
So now I’m wondering why. As someone that derives massive enjoyment from bringing up 1986 to any Sox fan previously, I’m now finding myself checking the score on my phone, making sure to get a table next to a TV at a restaurant, and knowing the pitching matchup for the next game. When 2/3 of THF.com went camping two weekends ago, I almost was lynched for checking the score of the Celtics game. [Listening to the Kentucky Derby on the radio was a different story entirely] All of these bizarre Boston homer behaviors I’m exhibiting beg the question: what happened to me, and why do I care about these teams?
Hypothesis One: The Radio
I believe this to be the weaker of the two potential explanations, but we’ll go with it anyway. Since taking the new job in the Watch City, I find myself in the car a lot (at least 2 and a half hours each day). In the morning I listen to the Toucher and Rich show on WBCN, and they talk about sports a bit. They have drunken Red Sox recaps, drunken Celtics recaps, and they talk to Aaron Ward from the Bruins each week during the season. On my way home, I listen to WEEI, the local sports talk radio station. So each day I’m getting a lot of information about Boston sports teams, thus increasing my affinity for them. Because I know when each game is taking place, who the callers hate on the other teams, etc., it makes me want to pay attention.
Hypothesis Two: The Culture
After writig that last paragraph, I’m calling myself out as a bullshit artist. I think it’s the people. Yep, Boston is a sports town. The people here aren’t like most people in the country who have a passing interest in their teams. Ask 10 people who won the game last night (regardless of which sport), and I’m pretty sure 8 of them would know immediately and would also know the score, and they’d give you an opinion about it. Ask someone today in Boston who won the Sox game, and I’d bet they’ll say “The fahkin’ Sox lost in extra innings because Big Papi can’t fahkin’ hit no more. Left like a dozen stranded.”
Anyway, with all that babble aside, let me finally get to my question: Do I qualify as a Boston sports fan? What’s the statute of limitations? How many years do you have to live in a new city before you can consider yourself a true fan? I realize that because I still like the Mets, I’ll never really be considered a Sox fan. That’s fine. But what about the other teams?
Well?
Final Plug: Come to the Cask ‘N Flagon tonight to support Hoffa’s band, Red Square in the Battle of the Cover Bands. Find me there and I’ll buy you a beer.
All right, all right. I know. We haven’t written much in a while. For that we apologize. Here at THF headquarters we’ve taken a break from posting, but we’re back. I’ve been sitting on a couple of posts, but won’t post them until this weekend. And with that out of the way……
We strongly encourage everyone to come out to scream their lungs out to make red square the winner. The winner is selected based on how many people come in support of each band, so make sure you tell them you’re there to see Red Square.
Trust me, you won’t be disappointed.
And if anyone sees this post and comes to the show because of it, come find me, Barry Freed, and I’ll buy you a beer.
Ouch. Last night hurt. All three Boston sports teams lost, and for one of them it was the end of their season. But why do I care?
All right, all right. I know. We haven’t written much in a while. For that we apologize. Here at THF headquarters we’ve taken a break from posting, but we’re back. I’ve been sitting on a couple of posts, but won’t post them until this weekend. And with that out of the way……