Insect Strength

“With great power comes great responsibility…”

Someday, I can envision a lecture with my son beginning with those words.

Like the dad from TeenWolf, I will one day be forced to council my teenage son on how to manage his superpowers. I’ll tell him that it’s ok to use these powers to excel at sports, provided he doesn’t become a ball-hog. I will say that it’s ok for him to maybe get even with a bully, as long as he doesn’t cripple the guy or something. And it’s ok to impress a girl with your powers, but just make sure she loves the real you. Finally, I will tell him to maintain his dignity, and to not be seen “surfing” or doing handstands on top of a buddy’s minivan around town. Hopefully he’ll get the message.

These are the things I’ve been thinking about since I discovered my one-year old son possesses superhuman strength.

The other day, he grabbed onto a heavy chair in our kitchen. He pulled it away from the counter, and pushed it across the floor with ease. This chair happens to be twice as tall as he is, and easily weighs twice his body weight. And then it dawned on me. There is no way I could perform a comparable feat, pushing around an object over twelve feet tall and weighing close to 400 pounds.

This is just one example. He routinely pushes, lifts, pulls and topples items around the house that are gigantic relative to his size. And being a baby, he doesn’t know that he shouldn’t be able to manhandle these items. He quite literally doesn’t know his own strength.

And I hypothesize that, as he gets older, he’ll only get stronger. Whereas now he can manipulate items twice his body weight, in a few years it will be five or six or even ten times his body weight. He’ll have full-on insect strength.

Now, as far as superpowers are concerned, insect strength is a good one to have, as it lends itself well to superhero pseudonyms. While comic book characters have already claimed the best names, there are still lots of options out there. For instance, he could craft an appropriate costume and go by the name “Locust-Man” and bring forth the ultimate famine… on crime.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves, as crime fighting is years in the future. My biggest concern will be his formative years. While I initially looked at his gifts with great excitement, figuring that I will no longer have to watch “World’s Strongest Man” competitions on ESPN to witness feats of strength, I now realize the difficulties I will encounter in raising this boy.

At only one year of age, he is already physically stronger than my wife, and routinely overpowers her during bath time or diaper changes. I used to laugh at these spectacles at first, but now I have sobered up to the fact that my days as an authority figure are numbered.

If I attempt to take a toy away from him, will he instead rip my arm out of the socket? The first time I tell him to clean his room, will he hoist the family car over his head and heave it at me?

Despite these fears, I am committed to raising my son in a house of discipline. Ideally, with the right counseling, I can teach Charlie to use his gifts for the betterment of mankind, and not the pursuit of evil. I just need to find some type of Cryptonite to help maintain discipline, as I don’t think he’ll respond well to being grounded.

Confessions of a Netflix Freak

Summer is here and we all know what that means. It’s that special season where all Netflix addicts hang extra thick curtains in the windows to block out the natural light. Thankfully, I didn’t take my window treatments down last summer so all I had to do was update them a bit for the new year. (Rubberstamp Madness magazine has some great tips on how to spice up last year’s window treatments, if you haven’t seen the latest issue yet!)

One of the best parts about being a Netflix member is how fast the service is evolving. I feel like I am a part of movie distribution history. I’m no Rosa Parks but by adding my voice to the chorus of other Netflix members’ voices, I feel like movies will continue to arrive to me in unique and varying ways. This is empowering. It might just be the biggest social movement I’m ever apart of. Today it is through the mail, tomorrow it will be downloaded. In five years, I’m pretty sure I will be Netflixing Woody Allen’s DNA and just creating the movies for myself in my centrifuge.

But the absolute best part of being a Netflix member is the goal we all share, the one thing that brings all of us members together; our insufferable desire to scam, scrimp, rob, cheat, copy, burn, and screw over Netflix. By god, we really make them earn that $20 a month, don’t we! I’ll be damned if I ever have to put a movie on my queue twice. No, I would rather buy a hundred hard-drives, a thousand blank dvds, and laboriously spend hours following the hacking career of Jon Lech Johansen than reorder my fucking queue! All to squeeze every last movie I can out of the service!

OK, I am not joking anymore. I will tell you some of the things I have done in the past to prove my point.

1. Bought a DVD burner, blank DVD discs, and got the software for my mac from an illegal file-sharing network in order to burn a copy of every Netflix that arrived. Total cost: $150 and possibly my freedom. I was going to build a personal library that would rival Netflix’s own collection. This lasted about 2 months. None of the burned DVDs play now. Apparently, human breath scratches a blank DVD. Eventually, I realized Netflix is the library. I am just paying for my library card. And with all the new movies that they offer, I rarely want to rewatch a movie I’ve already Netflix’d.

2. Entered into a movie sharing pact with two friends who were also Netflix members to “pool our queues” if you will. That way, we wouldn’t have to all get the big blockbusters that we all wanted to see, just one of us would get it and then share it around. Total cost: $0. Total number of days this lasted: 3. My friend sat on the movie I gave her and didn’t watch it or return it, therefore effectively logjamming my precious queue for almost a week in Netflix time*. (*Netflix time is defined as regular time + the amount of time it takes to receive the next movie in your queue after you put the old movie in the mailbox.)

3. I’ve tried it all concerning the Netflix envelope. I’ve shoved three movies in one, one movie in three, and everything in between. I drop them in boxes all over Brooklyn, fold them, tear them, and write on them. I’ve soaked them in water, burnt off their edges, and every once in awhile I even find one that is two years old and I’ll stuff a disc in there and send it back. At this point, I am just fucking with the people at Netflix. I want to get in their heads. I am not a number baby!

Yet time after time, my new DVD arrives in the mail just the same. I’m convinced that without junk mail and Netflix, the postal service would have been abolished just minutes after email was invented. Before Netflix, I would only get one piece of mail a year and that is the birthday check from Grandma (that $25 is always appreciated, Gigi!) so I probably wouldn’t even have been the wiser had it been shuttered. But now I sit and wait for the mailman like he is delivering my college admissions acceptance letter, all in the name of quick turnaround.

Despite all this praise, I have found one person who can’t join the Netflix revolution. I bring it up now because, invariably, I know Netflix is listening and is poised to solve my friend’s dilemma. You see, he is a touring musician without a stable address. He can’t reliably have movies mailed to him. But I think I have come up with a solution. Think of an airplane flying a time sensitive mission over a very long distance. Classic scenario for a little aerial refueling also called air-to-air refueling. In the same spirit, I want to see a fleet of Netflix vehicles that roam the highways and byways performing vehicle-to-vehicle Netflix transfers.

“Sir, I see on your myspace page that you’ll be playing in Vermont tonight. I’ll be pulling up along side you shortly as you make your way to the venue and I was wondering if you had any last minute changes to your top three choices on your rental queue this evening?”

Knowing Netflix, the fleet is already being gassed up as I type this. We are making movie distribution history after all.

Teaching A Baby To Talk

My son is a year old and he has already learned a handful of words. Clearly, his favorite word is “Dada”, as he uses it to interchangeably express ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’ and ‘happy new year’ and about 25 other things. For my son, “Dada” basically functions like the word “Aloha” for native Hawaiians.

Anyway, while the words “Dada” and “Mama” certainly make his parents proud, I worry about how far these words will actually take him in life. For instance, I certainly doubt the word “Dada” will impress anyone in a job interview. So, I’ve decided to start teaching him some of my favorite words that will assist him in all facets of life…

Words to use in a job interview:
Spearhead
Catalyst
Pinnacle
Veritable
Impetus

Words to use in an office meeting:
Exhaustive
Spreadsheet (use it as a verb, as in “Let me spreadsheet the proposal and get back to you.”)
Due-diligence
Sidestep
Conduit

Words to use when making a deal:
Collateral
Non-negotiable
Accountable
Dealbreaker
Timeline

Words to express dissatisfaction (I have many of these):
Outrage
Perfect (once he has mastered the use of sarcasm)
Finally (once he has mastered the use of sarcasm)
Hassle
Standard
Typical
Headache
UN-believable
UN-acceptable (Please note, I know that “unbelievable” and “unacceptable” are not spelled with multiple capital letters or hyphens. I’m trying to illustrate how they should be pronounced.)

Words to describe someone untrustworthy:
Gypsy
Charlatan
Rapscallion
Shifty-eyed
UN-reliable

Words to use to charm a lady:
Fortuitous
Indeed
Impetuous
Inquire

And there are dozens of other words that I’ll be introducing shortly. I’ve told Charlie many times that having these words as part of his vocabulary will be the catalyst to spearheading a veritable conduit to the pinnacle of success in life. Charlie agrees fully, as he always responds with an enthusiastic “Dada!” at the end of my sermon…. which, I’m pretty sure is his word for expressing approval.

Some Needed Improvements To My Cubicle

Foot traffic has been down lately, there’s no mistake about that. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time somebody stopped by and inquired about my bobbleheads. I’m actually considering putting dust covers on the two guest chairs in my cubicle. Sadly, I’m beginning to accept the fact that hanging out in my cubicle doesn’t have the same allure that it once did.

However, I intend to do something about it. Here are my ideas for making my cubicle an office destination once more…

A Nerf Mini Basketball Hoop: Technically, I already have such an item in my cubicle. But, if I had a second hoop, then I could get a full-court game going.

A Magic 8-Ball: How hilarious would this be? I could pretend to consult this item whenever a coworker asks me a ‘yes or no’ question. I know, in the real world, this shtick wouldn’t be funny at all. However, in the bland and sanitized world of office comedy, this would kill.

Velvet ropes: I want my cubicle to have an air of exclusivity. In conjunction with this, I’m going to designate the area by my filing cabinet as the VIP corner.

An Ashtray: I don’t smoke, but I consider this item to have great potential as a conversation piece. When people stop by and ask why I have an ashtray on my desk, I can respond thusly: “In the ’50’s it was commonplace for people in an office to sit and smoke at their desks all day long. In the event that fad ever makes a comeback, I’m ready.”

A Shrunken Head: The novelty items above are nice, but I think it would be fun to take it a step further and transform my cubicle into a curiosity shop/freak show. Perhaps, I could supplement my income by charging admission. And while they don’t have full beards, there are numerous old ladies in the office with some degree of facial hair. I’m sure if posted an ad on the company message board I could find lots of other freaks to round out the show.

A Giant Playland with a Ball Crawl: Admittedly, I’m stealing this idea from McDonalds. If any coworkers wander through my area with their small children, the ensuing tantrum will force them to stop by and hang out for a while.

A Bread Maker: I’m going on the record here, the bread maker is my favorite kitchen appliance. It does the full damn job. Start to finish. It mixes, kneads, cooks… My involvement is minimal. Just put the ingredients in and eat the output six hours later. When people stop by, we could share a slice of bread and I could impart wisdom about how great it would be our other coworkers were as thorough and diligent as the bread maker. Or, conversely, I could say our office functions like a bread maker in that it is very costly and produces unreliable results. I like appliances that lend themselves to multiple office metaphors.

Obviously, procuring these items will be difficult. If anyone has something from the list, I’m willing to offer a trade. My tape dispenser is of absolutely no use to me. I don’t even know why I have one. Seriously, who needs tape? Not once have I ever had an office situation that required taping two things together. It’s not like we’re doing arts and crafts in the afternoons. I’m not gift-wrapping any financial reports. Let me know if you’re interested.

In the meantime, I need to get to the mail room. With his shirt off, there’s a guy that works there that could pass for an ape-man.

Potential XBox Outrage

Gather ’round boys and girls, I wish to tell you about a great injustice that befell me years ago… (cue harp music and waving-fade camera effect to signify a flashback is beginning…)

It was the summer of 1999. It was a simpler time then. Our days were spent stocking our fallout shelters for the inevitable Y2K disaster. Nobody thought Arnold Schwarzengger would ever take the oath of office (click for audio). And everyone was convinced that in five years nobody would go to the store for anything. Hence, pouring your life savings into an Internet company that sold cat food online was considered a shrewd investment.

Also, cell phones were not yet mainstream, meaning people had to deal with the hassles of long distance plans with numerous hidden fees and restrictions.

The phone company MCI had just sent me a huge bill for some long distance calls. Naturally, since this predated sending anthrax through the mail, I decided to call and complain. After being on hold for about nine hours, I finally got to begin explaining the problems with my bill. Unable to adjust the billing herself, the operator attempted to rectify the situation…

Operator: “Sir, you can mail a letter to our customer service complaint department to further assist you… I’ll give you their address…”
Me (stunned): “Write a letter? Don’t they have a 1-800 number?”
Operator: “No, I’m sorry, they can’t be reached by phone. You need to write them a letter.”
Me (outraged): “What? This is MCI! You guys are a (expletive) phone company! What do you mean they don’t have a phone number? That’s your whole (expletive) business!”

Needless to say, the lines of communication deteriorated rapidly after that exchange. MCI banked (wisely) on laziness impeding any action on my part. It was a risky gamble, but one that seems to unwaveringly pay off when the American public is concerned. So, like everyone else, with clenched teeth I paid my bill in full, shook my fist in the air, and vowed revenge. Had the company not gone bankrupt four years ago, that revenge would have come today in the form of this angry manifesto. Seems kind of petty now, so I’ll just talk about my XBox 360.

Which brings me to my current problem: (cue wavy camera effects, signifying a return to the present day…)

Last night, my 360 froze up. I’m not feeling good about the situation one bit. My experience has taught me that companies that base their business in advanced technology usually don’t possess the most basic technology to actually deal with customer complaints. I have a feeling that when it comes time to helping a customer, all of a sudden, Microsoft has never heard of email.

So, I can’t wait to call Microsoft’s XBox support hotline tomorrow and have the “customer service” representative tell me she doesn’t have Internet or a computer and the only way to submit a complaint is via passenger pigeon. Wish me luck, I feel a potential outrage developing…