I was surprised to learn yesterday that the Democratic National Convention was in town. I thought I remembered writing a piece a month or two ago about being glad that the elections were over, but I guess I had my facts all jumbled.

A quick scan of Google News this morning suggests that the official election does not even happen until some time in the fall, so all the stuff that has happened so far doesn’t even matter.  Admittedly I’ve had my head buried in the sand at work, and I’ve been building my internet empire on the weekends, so I haven’t had a chance to “tune in” to the ever-exciting election coverage. 

Still, the Democratic National Convention is in my home town of Denver, so you’d think I would have at least known about it, and possibly received a visit from one of the candidates –surely at least one of the seventeen people running could have made it down to the burbs.  I would have loved to have dinner with that one guy and his hot wife.  (I would have looked up their names before they came over.) Sadly, I didn’t even know they were in town.

Of course, I don’t live in the city of Denver, nor do I work in Denver, so the chances of me bumping into any of the candidates were slim – even one of the random candidates like that Obama guy. I’m sure if Obama is still in the race, he’s probably struggling. I think he only makes like $700,000 a year – not enough to run a campaign.  Of course, the whole point of our political system is that regular guys like me and Obama who only make $700,000 a year can still become President, because the system does not favor wealthy people, but he does have an uphill battle because Obama is hard to spell, and people don’t really remember the name.  Plus, I’m not sure the country is ready to elect a man with young children. Most of the Presidents that I have known have had older children, so this must be what people want.

I wish I would have known about the Democratic National Convention though, because I could have offered some advice to the candidates. If I were running for President, and were visiting Denver, I would probably travel out to the suburbs and spend an afternoon at Park Meadows mall putting bumper stickers on all the cars. People like it when you put the bumper stickers on for them, so that they do not have to do it themselves.  (I learned this “viral marketing” strategy in the parking lot of Disney World in 1985.)

Of course, I don’t think it matters how many people are running, or how many trees get cut down to make bumper stickers because I’m pretty sure Hillary has the election locked up.  Her acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention was apparently amazing, and people really like her because she is very electable and people really like her, so people like her because she is electable because people like her. Also she knows a ton of stuff about politics and stuff.

Other people were in town too – including every reporter in the world. I suppose this is the largest news story to happen in Denver since Columbine. Oddly enough, it was because of the under-handed, over-sensationalized, absolutely-inaccurate reporting of Columbine that I forever swore off news coverage, which is how I missed the whole Democratic National Convention thing. I’m guessing there have been sweeping changes in journalism since then though, so more than likely today’s television journalists only report on things about which they have information and do not just spout sensational speculation for the sake of ratings.

I am sad though because I read that Anne Hathaway was in town for the convention, and I would have liked to meet her for several days, possibly over a weekend. Her outstanding attributes make her a natural spokesperson for any campaign. She has a brilliant political mind, as evidenced by her stint on the university lecture circuit, and her grasp of economics is amazing. (Her paper on Hazlitt was brilliant.) But, apart from her treasure trove of political tomes (you must read her book on the political history of the US during the cold war) she just has a certain something – I can’t quite figure out what it is, probably her effervescent personality - that makes people, especially male people, want to be around her.

From what I was able to read this morning, there was only one riot in Denver this week. From the picture, it looks like some hippies – probably fans of the rock and roll band Rage Against the Machine – got into a scuffle with the Denver Police. It doesn’t look like any of the police were injured though, so all is well.  In related news, the Denver band Flobots played a concert, which kicked off with their song “Handlebars,” followed by seventeen Steve Miller Band covers, and finished up with the long version of “Handlebars,” by which time most of the concert goers had moved on to listen to Hillary’s acceptance speech.   

More than anything, missing the Democratic National Convention brings to light the fact that I need to pay more attention to the world. There is still time for me to study all of the candidates and make an informed decision before the elections some time in the fall, but what if there had been something big – like the Olympics or something – and I totally missed them? I would feel pretty stupid and uninformed. I don’t think the Olympics are until next year though, or maybe this winter, so I still have some time to get ready for that.

UPDATE:  I went downtown at lunch to see if I could catch a glimpse of Ellen (I heard she was in town) and I got this short clip…

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When we start our fresh new blogs, we are excited and imagine ourselves posting every day (possibly several times a day) until, inevitably, we become so busy with the book deals that we just can’t keep up.  After months of regular posts, and with the noticeable lack of emails from publishers that proclaim “MY GOD – YOU ARE BRILLIANT,” it is natural for bloggers to begin to shift their energies to other projects (Project Runway, for example.) Also natural is the guilt that comes when you realize you have not even looked at your blog in three weeks. This guilt spurs the come-back post.

This happens quite a bit, and I have noticed some common mistakes that returning bloggers make. If you are considering a post after a long hiatus, here are some things you’ll want to avoid.

I know there were probably rumors that I was dead

In your return post, it is best to avoid talking about why you have not posted in a while, or even mentioning that you have been absent. No one wants to hear “OMG, LOL, I haven’t posted in, like, forever, LOL!!!1!”  Frankly, unless the reason that you have not posted in a week, a month, or seven years, is that you are currently deceased, readers assume the reason to be burn out or lack of interest. In fact, unless the reader is your mom, it is unlikely that they have even noticed your absence, so the reader is uninterested in your reasoning and it is best to not mention it.

And then, last month, at my niece’s birthday party…

Another big pothole you’ll want to steer around is thinking that because you have not posted in ages, you need to catch people up on your life. Unless your name regularly appears in People magazine, your life is probably void of things that are of interest to people beyond your immediate family or close circle of friends. People who have interesting lives do not blog. I know that comes as a shock to most bloggers, who may be asking “if our lives are so boring then why on earth would we blog about them?” That is a great question, and probably one you should spend some time thinking about. In the interim, keep your come-back post current, fresh, and hip by avoiding any mention of the incredibly exciting craft fairs and dentist appointments that you attended during your hiatus.

I swear on the graves of my ancestors, I will blog again

The last mistake that most returning bloggers make is what I call “the contract.”  In our glorious return post, we say something like “I know I have been lax about posting, but I promise that I’ll be posting every day again.”  Bad move.   First, never promise anything. Second, why would you assume that your second-wind will last longer than your first wind? The truth is, the only way to produce quality blog posts day after day for years without incentives like money, fame or free tickets to a Journey concert is to completely ignore the rest of your life and become a blogging machine.  The rest of your life here means friends, family, work, and all the other little things that sometimes pop up and get in the way of you creating brilliance.

I would be the first guy out of the gate in a race to tell you that you should be blogging because if you love it as much as I do, then you probably feel a million times better when you are blogging. But, if it comes at the expense of your family, it’s probably not worth it.

Hello, tech support, I’ve forgotten the name of my blog…

I see my time is up. I do encourage you, if you have not visited your own blog in a few weeks, to take some time now and think about maybe posting something. I feel certain that if you follow my advice and avoid the common mistakes made by previously-MIA bloggers, then you’ll more than likely have a hit, and you will most certainly feel better about yourself. I know I do.

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Humor Columnist is a word that I enjoy associating with myself. Also it is fun to say, if you do it with sort of an English accent. (Oh, but that would be humour columnist, not humor columnist.)  One of the most important thing you can do to convince people that you are actually a humor columnist is to write columns with humor in them.

Lately, that has been quite difficult.

I am going to blame the television, because it is right there, and it can’t defend itself.  Yes, sometimes the television can be a source of inspiration. But, that is only if you are open to the inspiration, and also if you are not half asleep and watching crappy  television that is about as inspiring as a bar of blue soap. (For reference, green soap is the most inspiring.) For a very long time I eschewed television because I thought it was evil, and also it took away from my time doing other things. But,  lately, “other things” are not really fun things, so  thats actually OK.

I also blame the internet. For a long time I was on the internet, but never went anywhere on the internet, other than the one or two places that I went.  Lately I have been going to two to three new sites every day. My horizons have been totally expanded, and I have laughed and cried and changed my political affiliation and my views on wind power, but it has taken time away from what my purpose is supposed to be - writing stuff.

Not that it is a “purpose,” but it is a good constructive hobby that I like to encourage in myself.

I also blame the summer. I have never been a good summer writer. I love writing in the Fall - so if  we get there, and are still sort of where we are now, at least we know that things will take a turn for the better then.

That’s all I wanted to mention - been taking sort of a break, but forgot to mention it, or plan it, and I wasn’t aware of it until just now.  But, realizing you have a problem is the first step, right. (Or, maybe admitting. OK, I admit it, I haven’t written much in a while.)

But, like I said, turning things back around, on my way back to once again being a humor columnist.

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For the last 45 days I have been undercover, posing as an affiliate marketer on the Internet, in an attempt to learn all that I could about this illicit ring of hack sites and expose the pseudo-industry for what it is – a big fat hairy lie.

Before I dive into my report, I’d like to provide some background for this case. For years I held out hope that the world was fair and that my blogging effort from mid 2002 to late 2007 was akin to the efforts of other writers who submitted their work in the more tradition manner involving stamps and SASEs and (shudder) cover letters. In what was perhaps a moment of true clarity, in November of last year I came to the realization that my blogging efforts to date were weak and half-hearted, which greatly contributed to their being wholly unrewarded. It was at this time that I decided to “take my blogging seriously.” So, I began in earnest to research what it took to become a successful blogger. I learned a great deal about the things that I had been doing wrong, but the main thrust of almost every site I visited was that I needed to blog about something – be it “photography” or “Mining in Utah” or “Paris Hilton.” I needed focused content.

The problem, as I saw it, was that my pen and paper travels had always taken me to unique and diverse ports of call. I am a man of many interests because it is not the thing I am interested in, so much as the way it plays upon the human psyche. For instance, I am not overly passionate about the raising of children, but I do enjoy writing about some of the more outlandish stuff that is associated with children and with parenting. I could not see limiting myself to one topic, so in true Jay fashion, I started a blog called Unfocused Content. This was my way of telling the world that I would not conform to the rules of the Internet. I am a renaissance man, and it was my hope that I could transcend the pre-formed cubby structure of the blogosphere and have at least marginal, if not overwhelming success.

That didn’t work. I blame myself mostly, because at the same time I was gearing up a new career, and I was not able to produce consistent, quality content. At this moment I still believe that I could, with the right level of effort, make Unfocused Content work as a concept. But, it would take more time than I have available in the day, so I have resigned myself to the fact that this is simply a place for me to record my musings for my wife, mother and the occasional passerby to read.

Two months ago I was at a crossroads, both personally and professionally. We had some scares at work that forced me to stand up and evaluate my mid-term and long-term goals. I came back around to an idea that I’ve held for several years – I don’t really want to work the rest of my life in a cube. This is in no way revolutionary, but it was something that I’d forgotten to think about, so when it was pulled forth from the farthest reaches of my brain, it brought with it a sense of longing, but also a sense of adventure. I knew there were people making money on the Internet, and I gleaned from here and there that they were not doing so by writing semi-humorous 800-1000 word articles, or even by writing daily posts about the stars of High School Musical. So, I took it upon myself to investigate this world of Internet money, to see if it was right for me.

The world I’m talking about is affiliate marketing. It is often mislabeled “blogging for money” because many affiliate marketers chose the blog format for their sales pitches, but it is in no way related to the blogging that you and I know so well, wherein we discuss something, usually our lives, for our own edification.

The idea behind affiliate marketing is that people like you and me purchase goods and services on the Internet In order to find those goods and services, we use search engines. It is human nature to type in what you are seeking, then chose one of the first few results on the first page, all while thinking to yourself “hey, I typed in what I am seeking, and the search engine returned something, so these results must be related.” If, however, the affiliate marketer has done his job correctly, when you type in “free anuall credit report” (misspellings intentional) the first result on the first page of the search engine results page (SERP) will be his site that is optimized for your misspellings. The site may or may not contain actual information about Credit Reports, but it will certainly contain the keyword “free anuall credit report” about a hundred times, it will certainly display advertisements related to credit reports, and quite possibly it will provide a link where you can sign up for a credit report service. If you click and ad, or sign up for the service, the affiliate marketer makes some cash.

“Well, that’s not so bad,” you say, “at least I found some information on credit reports.” Did you? Let me ask you this – if there were no affiliate marketers, when you typed in “free anuall credit report,” what do you think you would see? Probably a suggestion from the search engine for the correct spelling, which might then lead you to an actual page of an actual company that provides an actual service related to credit reports. In the end, you are at the same place, which means the affiliate marketer did not “help” in any way. So, why does he exist? Good question.

It is not just misspellings that affiliate marketers target. They have an animal called “long-tail keywords” that they optimize for as well. If you were looking for a Wii Fit, you might just type “Wii Fit.” According to Wordtracker’s Gtrends, there are 6,347 searches for Wii Fit a day, and 13.5 million sites out there that contain the phrase “Wii Fit.” As an affiliate marketer, it would be awesome to get all 6,347 people to your site, but with 13.5 million people competing for that keyword, you would be lucky to get one visit a week. But, 12 people a day search for “wii fit with wii balance board,” a long-tail keyword, and there are only 17,000 sites competing for that traffic. So if you were the top site on the SERP, you could expect most of those folks to come to your site. In the affiliate marketing game, it is not about making $200 a day on a single site, it is about making $1.00 a day on 200 sites.

But, to create 200 sites, you would have to know a little something about 200 different things. That is when it struck me – what I’d been doing wrong on Unfocused Content (besides not posting enough, and being sort of boring most of the time) was throwing all of my ideas on to a single site. I should start a blog about trips to the zoo, and another blog about trips to the amusement park, and a third blog about trips to the Virgin Islands. (Wait, maybe I just need a blog about trips – FamilyAdventures-321.us. Hmmm.)

So, here is where the confession part begins. Even though I think it is unscrupulous to mislead honest folks to coming to my sites just to view and click on my ads, and even though I think it is despicable to make money doing this, I tried it. Following the advice of some professional affiliate marketers, I set up several blogs that were optimized for long-tail keywords. I published a few posts on these blogs with my keywords sprinkled liberally throughout the text. Then, I published these blog posts at free article sites, making sure to include a link to my site in the text of the article. I added some extremely attractive “widgets” to my page, all advertising items related to my keyword and all linked to my account so that, if clicked, I would get paid. Lastly, I submitted my sites and site maps to the search engines, and waited for them to get “indexed.” (Indexed means that they will appear in search results. Until the search engines index your site, it is just out there in space and no one can find it unless they know it is there.)

And, it worked. If you type in “used Wii games,” my site comes up on the first page of the search results. This took about a week, which is apparently really fast, so I must have done it correctly. And, I have had a small amount of traffic. I have not made my first dollar yet, but I am sure it is coming. I’ve pulled together nine sites so far and I was going to make a tenth this morning when I realized that to get to 200 sites at my current rate of production, I would be building for another year and a half. Of course, affiliate marketers have an answer for this too – automation software.

I could buy software that would build the sites, build the links and even write the articles for me. All I would have to do was sit back and watch the machine crank out money.

“Really, you ask?”

“Well, I’m not sure,” I reply, “I didn’t try it because it sounds sort of blackhat.”

“What is blackhat,” you ask.

There are three types of Search Engine Optimization (SEO.) Whitehat SEO is playing by the rules and doing everything that the search engines (mostly Google) tell you is ok. Blackhat is SEO that is definitely against the search engine rules. For instance, creating a site for a good cause, getting links to that site from some reputable sites, then redirecting your good cause site to a sales pitch site, which pops way up in the SERPs and makes you a ton on money. That is illegal, and bad. Grayhat SEO falls somewhere in between the two, and is harder to define, but the tactics described in this article probably fall into the Grayhat category..

“So, what kept you from buying the automation software,” you ask, “besides morals?” It came down to how I felt after my relations with the affiliate marketing pros. There are tons of categories that affiliate marketers focus on – but two that come to mind are related to people looking for help with their lives – weight loss, and get-rich-quick schemes. Guess which one “affiliate marketing” falls into. I began to realize that the guys who were telling me how to do this stuff, the gents who were lovingly guiding me toward my big money future, were also mentioning here and there that I needed this tool or that program so that I could bang out the volume of sites I would need, or generate the links required to make real money. It turns out, I was just another one of their “customers,” and they were selling to me just like they were selling to the credit report guy. One guy actually said “you need product X. If you can’t afford to spend $27 to make thousands, then you’re in the wrong (expletive) business and you should just go get a (expletive) job at McDonalds.” I thought to myself, “where have I heard that sort of no-nonsense language before?” “Oh, right, the used car salesmen I used to work with.”

The last straw came this morning when I signed up for a “free” service that was guaranteed to increase my sales volume. (Not that I am selling anything.) As soon as I signed up, I was greeted with a one-time-only offer to by over $6,000 dollars of worthlessness for only $67. (Everything in the affiliate marketing world has a price that ends in “7.” Apparently research indicates that people will buy stuff if it costs something-7 dollars.) I said no to that offer, then I was greeted with another page that wanted me to create a page just like the one I had said no too, and put it on one of my sites where I sell this “free” service, so that each time one of you suckers signed up for the free $67 offer, I would make 75%. To me, that sounds a lot like MLM – if you don’t want to buy, it, maybe you want to sell it? It was then that I said “this is all a bunch of malarkey, and I am done, done, done.”

So, here we are. I closed that page, and I started this entry. I don’t think I will spend the next year and a half making worthless sites and trying to insert myself in the sales process just to make a few bucks. I am not adding value, and I am not really providing anything that folks could not get from an actual product site, so why am I there? Sure, the money would be fantastic, but it reminds me too much of a Tupac song.

“I made a G today.”

“But you made it in a sleazy way. Selling crack to the kids.”

“I gotta get paid.”

“Well hey, that’s the way it is.”

Plus, it’s not like this is new. Guys just like me have been doing this exact thing for several years. It is no secret that every domain name out there is registered by someone for something. (Even everydomainnameistaken.com is taken.) And, think of anything you might want to purchase on the Internet, and type it into a search engine. I guarantee most of the top sites in the SERPs are affiliate marketing sites. It is just sad, and there is no room for a semi-scrupulous guy like me.

As for my future, I have no idea what I am going to do. I actually enjoyed building the sites, writing the articles and optimizing for search engines. Maybe I’ll try to find some freelance work building sites for affiliate marketers. I hear that is a booming little industry.

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I’ve always been a little freaked out by gorillas. Not that I’ve seen them often enough to form any real opinions of them, but on the few occasions that I have observed them in their faux-natural habitat, when they are not eating their own vomit; they seem to enjoy staring at me. It is the stare that disturbs me because it is all too human – I would not be surprised if they began speaking. This may be directly related to the number of times I have watched the 1983 movie Trading Places.

I only mention gorillas because for a while, if you search on Google for gorilla, this site would come up. (It does not today – Google has discovered that my site has nothing to do with gorillas, apparently.) I wrote a post a while back about the gorillas at the Denver Zoo, and it had a nice image of a gorilla. (I can not remember if I took this picture, or if I happened upon it on the internet – it was a long time ago.) This image seemed popular with folks searching for gorilla, so it moved up and up on Google Images until, tada, first page.

That’s right, little ol’ Unfocused Content got on the front page of Google for a keyword. Though, as I have mentioned, this site isn’t so much about gorillas as, say, the Wikipedia article about gorillas. Still, front page, ya know. So, I started thinking maybe I should capitalize on this rare and possibly one-time occurrence. Now, I couldn’t really begin to write about gorillas because (a) that would be boring and (b) I know literally nothing about gorillas, (and by literally, I mean I know very little) but I could maybe find something related to gorillas that would dovetail with a humor blog. (semi-humor blog.) So, I did some research.

You probably don’t know this, but people don’t really care that much about gorillas. I mean, as a species, we’re all pretty sure that it would be bad if they were all gone, and we’re hoping someone somewhere is trying to save them and stuff, but we don’t really think about gorillas much beyond that. The best I could come up with was to throw some ads for gorilla glue in to the sidebar. Not as an affiliate, but just because I liked the company and thought that people should use it. Except, and I hesitate to share this, as my affiliate status with gorilla glue is still pending (I sent them an email and asked if maybe they would start a program), but as I wrote last Halloween, I used the product, and I didn’t have much success.

So, the whole idea was a total bust, and now I’m not even on the first page, so the opportunity has been missed by me. (I don’t think that sentence could have been written any more passively by me – which proves that the missed opportunity was not my fault.)

Of course, in my other ventures, I am still chasing other keywords. Most of them are pretty good, (better than gorilla, for sure) and I don’t think anyone else has even thought of them. Stuff like “mortgage” and “web hosting.” I may even start a site called best-web-seogorilla-free123.info and write about all the money-making opportunities available on the internet. I should be a millionaire by October, I’m thinking.

PS - don’t you hate when emails have odd stuff in them like this - Why is that?

This is women’s tag watches is and wii fit reviews and also guitar hero wii and not to mention Croc Review how could I forget bluehost without did the Crocs and also (a long time ago mind you) the penguin webkins.  also not mentioning used wii games there was also guitar hero wii and not to mention Croc Review how  other stuff and when we did the Crocs and also (a long time ago mind you) the penguin webkins. That was really fun.

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It became evident to me while on our trip to St John that other parts of the world do not adhere as strictly as we do to some basic safety rules. For instance, in St John they drive on the wrong side of the road, and most transportation is done in open-air trucks – meaning most tourists are riding in the back of a truck on the wrong side of twisty mountain roads with no sort of means of anchoring said people into said truck. In the event of a vehicle collision, everyone would be dead, but they no one there seemed to mind.

So, I suppose when folks from other parts of the world, where safety is number seven or eight on the list of stuff to worry about, visit our country, they probably think we’re being sort of girly with all these rules and stuff. Take, for instance, a couple that my wife and I observed yesterday at a local amusement park. As you may have guessed from the photo, these folks took their infant on to a ride with them, and just sort of held the infant, one-armed style, while they enjoyed the ride. Now, in the photo I depicted this couple on a roller coaster, because that was funnier, but in reality they were on the Tea Cups. But, while the Tea Cups seem innocuous enough, stuff could still happen that might but the baby at risk.

I guess what I am asking is, who is right? Are we too concerned with safety in this country, or are other cultures maybe a little lax in their analysis of the dangers of certain situations?

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On this day in 1867, Canada sort of almost became an independent country. According to the Wikipedia article about Canada Day, the British Parliament had limited political control until 1982, when George Michael wrote the song “Constitution Act” that finally freed the Canucks from the tyrannical rule of those otherwise lovely Brits. Also, at some point they were French, but the article didn’t talk about that. I have long been a fan of Canadians, specifically ones that are also female, so I thought I would celebrate my love by dedicating today’s post to all the friendly Canadians out there.

You can’t think of Canada without thinking of beer or hockey or the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever, but the “land of a thousand hot chicks” has much more to offer than you would imagine– like, hot chicks. I know we are supposed to be keeping the Canadians out - protect the borders and our jobs and all - but I can’t help but think that the cold air up in the Great White North must be really good for creativity - as they have been churning out some great music and comedy for a very long time now. (Also it is good for the skin, and bone structure, apparently.) The following is a list of my favorite Canadians.

Kids in the Hall
SNL’s cousin to the North ran in the US from ’89 to ’95 and featured Dave Foley, Kevin McDonald, Bruce McCulloch, Mark McKinney and Scott Thompson – all very funny guys who wore more dresses than would normally be acceptable outside of a sketch-comedy show. Dave Foley went on to shows like News Radio, What’s up Peter Fuddy and Celebrity Poker Showdown, where he played an inebriated version of himself.

Kids in the Hall is important in that my family still quotes it today any time we are around an eight to ten year old child, thanks to one of McCulloch’s characters.

“One time…there was this kid…in my class…and he lived at home… with no mum or dad….and he was eight.”

The Bare Naked Ladies
My all-time favorite band, The Barenaked Ladies blends fantastic music with just enough comedy to entertain. Plus, I can play several of their songs on the guitar. Every time I read their bio I realize that not everyone in the world loves them as much as I do. That makes me cry a little bit. When I am rich, they will play at my birthday, and the world will be right. (I’m thinking 75th birthday. I hope they are still alive.)

“You think I only think about you
When were both in the same room
You think I’m only here to witness
The remains of love exhumed
You think were here to play
A game of who loves more than whom”

Ellen Page
Oy. She is a recent addition to my list of favorites, due in large part to her portrayal of Juno, the sassy pregnant but responsible teen in the movie of the same name. She was also the cute girl in X-Men: The Last Stand. (Which, by the way, can’t be the “last” stand, because they sort of left us hanging.) She was born when I was in High School, so I can’t really say much more about her – other than she is a very good actress, and her appearance on SNL was nothing short of brilliant.

“I’ve taken like three pregnancy tests, and I’m forshizz up the spout.”
“How did you even generate enough pee for three pregnancy tests? That’s amazing…”
“I don’t know, I drank like, ten tons of Sunny D… Anyway dude, I’m telling you I’m pregnant and you’re acting shockingly cavalier.”
“Is this for real? Like, for real for real?”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
“Oh my GOD. Oh shit! Phuket, Thailand!”
“There we go. That was kind of the emotion that I was searching for on the first take.”

Evangeline Lily
Double Oy. Yes, she is Kate, the lovable bad girl from LOST, but did you know she was in the Lizzy McGuire movie? As the “Police Officer,” though I am guessing her character was actually “Super Hot Police Officer.”

She was dating the hobbit boy for a while, but thankfully, that is over.

During filming she lives in Hawaii with two roommates – both of whom are her stand-ins on the show. Does that mean that she has two twins? No, I know it doesn’t, but for now I am going to pretend that it does…

All Dressed Chips
Dude, did you know that they have different flavoured potato chips in Canada? The “odd” flavours include “Ketchup,” and “All Dressed,” which is the Canadian way to say “take every flavour you make, eh, and mix them all together?”

That sounds nasty, but they are fantastic. We smuggled some home the last time we were there, but they are gone now, and I miss them.

Happy Canada day everybody. Have a Molson and watch X-Men. Apparently everyone in that movie is Canadian.

Honorable Mentions from the North

• Pamela Anderson (Many of you don’t remember, but she was attractive once, before the procedures.)
• Elisha Cuthbert
• Dan Aykroyd
• Sarah Chalke
• Neve Campbell
• Tommy Chong (Holy Crap! I had no idea he was Canadian.)
• Brendan Fraser
• Jill Hennessy (She has a twin!!!)
• Norm Macdonald
• Sarah McLachlan (She should have made the top list, but I don’t want you to think I am stuck in the ’90s)
• Alanis Morissette
• Carrie-Anne Moss
• Mike Myers
• Anna Paquin
• Missy Peregrym (Probably never hear of her again, but “Stick It” was a darn fine movie.)
• Seth Rogen (The funniest guy in the world, I think.)

Crocs for Sale
Wii Games
Humor Books
Blue Host
Croc Reviews

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Based on the overwhelming response to yesterday’s post, I have decided to open a gift shop in Ronald Reagan airport selling books of mad libs with nothing but camp letters in them.  Please visit soon.

I mentioned that while Carrie and I spent most of our week lying in the gutter and urinating on each other ourselves, we did find time to rescue a doggie. (I decided that “urinating on each other” sounded more intentional than what I was going for, so I took it out.) We saw the doggie, I call him Champ, running the sidewalks without the aid of a human, which in itself might have been OK because he wasn’t in the street and seemed to know to use the crosswalk, but he was a small dog and we felt his caution might not be sufficient to save his tail should a teenager come speeding down the road in a supped up older American car, so we opened our car door, Southie hopped in, and we took the little guy home. I was calling him Champ, but then I started calling him Southie, or sometimes Frenchie. I thought he might have been a Boxer (Champ) because I don’t know what Boxers look like. Using the Internet, we discovered that he was a Boston Terrier, so Southie seemed to fit better. Also he sort of looked like a French Bulldog.

He didn’t have a collar – he probably took it off before his evening shower and forgot to put it back on before his run (honestly, who showers before a run?)– Which made finding his owners extremely difficult because he was the kind of dog (Boxer or Boston Terrier or French Bulldog) that did not speak English. When we found him, he was travelling east, so we drove him around the neighborhood to the west, thinking he was running away from home instead of returning home from a softball game. But, we did not find anyone out looking for a dog.  This left us only one alternative – we had to take him to the lost and found.

This is where the story gets mildly amusing, so you’ll want to keep going.

When we arrived at the animal shelter, there was another couple there with a dog that they had found running the streets. (Full moon, maybe.)  I went inside to check out the lost and found and saw four spots for found animals. (Or lost animals – they don’t specify if two are for lost and two are for found, so we assumed you could put either type of animal in any of the spots.)  Two of the spots were already occupied, which meant that we’d have room for the other dog, and for Frenchie, but it also meant that I had a new blog post.

You see, the bottom left spot was occupied by a large cat named Frederico  (I’m guessing about the name) and that was extremely uninteresting,  but the top left spot was occupied by a real live actual chicken.

When we were in St John, there were chickens everywhere - and lizards too, but mostly I am mentioning the chickens to show the dichotomy.  Back on the mainland, when I see chickens, they are usually already priced at $4.99/lb.  This guy, who I called Cockie, was very much alive and well.  But, if you are like me, you have to wonder, who finds a chicken?  Who finds a chicken and says, “Dude, this chicken does not have a collar, so I can not contact the owner. Maybe I should take him to the animal shelter.”??? Who finds a chicken and doesn’t think “hey, free lunch.”  (Most folks, probably – I wouldn’t know how to make “chicken” out of a chicken. Plus, I’m not even sure if you can eat male chickens.

We checked the shelter page the next day and Champ was on for a while, but they took down his picture about 2:00, which hopefully means his owners found him and he’s now safe at home taking a milk bath and relating his adventures to his long-time companion Ruthie, the German Sheppard.

But, the chicken never showed up on the Lost and Found page. Maybe there is a separate page for lost cows and donkeys and stuff that you can only find if you live in a small town.

That’s all I had. We got another letter from the kiddo, but I won’t bore you with that.  Back to work.

Have a fantastic day.

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I feel a little like Inigo Montoya in that, I’ve been doing the parent thing for so long that when I am not parenting, I don’t know what to do with myself. We dropped our kids off at camp on Sunday afternoon, and have had no communication with them since then. Camps, in general, feel that it builds character to cut off kids’ communications with their parents – like prison, or the army. While it may be good for the kids’ character, I must admit that I am struggling with it, a little bit.

Of course, I lied - we have had one communique from the inside. Yesterday we received a letter in the mail that went something like this.

“Dear Mother and/or Father,

Pursuant to Article 4, Section 9 of the Universal Camp Code, I am writing to inform you that I am having a great* time at camp. My counselors are wonderful (and fully licensed in the State of Colorado to administer aid should a life or limb-threatening situation arise.) Tomorrow we are probably going horseback riding,** or engaging in some other pre-approved activity such as swimming*** or hiking,**** at the discretion of the aforementioned counselor and with the full support of the Camp and its staff.

I hope you are well.

Signed,

Child’s Name

*Great, here, means that all the child’s basic needs are being met and does not constitute a guarantee of fun.

**Horse supplies may be limited. Not available in all states.

*** Child must first pass a basic “swim” test before being admitted to any body of water. Children who do not swim will come home stinky, as this is how we bathe.

**** By hiking, we mean walking, basically, but with a water bottle. Also there will be nature in some areas, so children allergic to nature will be re-directed to another activity.

I must admit that while it was nice to hear from the kiddo, the letter left me feeling a little like she’d been kidnapped by The Gobblers and was maybe being forced to write things she didn’t really feel. When I was at camp, we didn’t write home because we were too busy setting fire to things and overturning our canoes to see if we could survive. (It was Boy Scout camp. I maybe should have mentioned that first.) But, we did have “parent night” where, as you probably guessed, the parents came. That was a good way, I think, to stave off the home-sickness, and I can’t help wishing that my kids’ camp had something similar.

But, they don’t, so unless the older daughter writes a letter - which is doubtful, since I don’t think she packed stationary like the little one – that’s all we get until Friday night. Sigh.

You are probably wondering what we are doing with our free time. You shant need wonder any longer. Mostly, we are drinking heavy, not watching the Disney channel and rescuing random animals that we find wandering the streets. But, I feel as though I should save that for tomorrow’s blog.

Have a great day.

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A co-worker mentioned that she was considering purchasing a sleep-number bed. Instead of just saying “that’s a bad idea,” I put together a small presentation complete with visual aids. This being the single-most inspired thing I’ve done all week, I decided it was, if not blog-worthy, at least blogable.

The wife and I had a sleep number bed, only back then they were just called “beds you could air up.” She liked to blow up her side all the way and pretend she was a giant sleeping on a hillside next to the village she just devoured. (At least, that’s the only reasonable explanation I can conceive that would explain her preference.) I favored a little bit of concavity in my side so I could curl up and feel all snuggled. With two such disparate preferences, we obviously need two beds and should still be sleeping on ours. But, there was a dark side.

Because the two sleep silos are, in fact, two separate beds, they are not one bed and therefore have an area in between that allows for distinction. (The only two things without space in between are conjoined twins, and the teenage couple I saw at the fair last weekend.) On our bed this space was actually a canyon, complete with burros, cacti and an old dolomite mine. In the picture I have labeled this space “no-man’s land.”

When we were sleeping, this was actually sort of nice. On most other beds, including our current bed, “we” have trouble finding the middle, and sometimes “we” end up sleeping on the three inches closest to the edge, with feet in our back. But, on this bed, the sides were clearly defined. Of course, as you might guess, sometimes my wife and I get into bed even when we have no intention of sleeping. It was during these times that we found that chasm in the middle sort of a problem. If we tried her side, one of us would have to stabilize himself with one foot on the ground or risk injury from rolling off the bed and landing “face” down on the floor. If we tried my side, one of us would be at the wrong angle and also would feel a bit stifled and have to break for air. So, we naturally gravitated toward the middle, but the middle was really just a space in between two beds, so there was no “bed” there. This meant that one of us was actually pinned between two air mattresses and lying on a hard piece of plastic. Not so romantic.

So, I explained this to my co-worker. For sleeping, sleep number beds are great. But, for other bed-related activities, they are not so great. That is when I came up with the idea for bedroom modifications that might alleviate the emphasis put on the bed for activities other than sleeping. If you added a sofa (or couch), a nice soft rug, a grand piano and a ping-pong table, these would provide alternative places to participate in these other activities, and allow you to keep the sleep number bed for sleeping.

But really, I just wanted to show you the picture. Have a great day.

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