Nasty Woman (Women)

Perhaps some of you opened this blog as you said audibly "Why Jacob, it's nearly 10 PM, what are you doing still awake and about?"

Well, I was almost asleep and then my monstrously loud, heavy footed, nasty woman, bad hombre neighbor decided to stomp around the kitchen and scream at her kids for a few more minutes before the 10 PM curfew struck and I call the police. I have headphones in and can still hear her stomping around. How is that even possible? It's as if I am living under someone who stars on the TLC series "My 600 lb Life" She doesn't weigh 600 lbs, but you'd never guess that by sound alone. It's like a truck is driving around up there. Anyway, I'm up because I'm trying to decide if I should send her anthrax in the mail or faux as a salesperson and kill her in person.

This will be my last neighbor complaint, but I feel like this story is genuinely too rich to not document. The other morning Mrs. Dinosaur was up crashing around at 5:45 AM. After slamming the cupboards and refrigerator open and closed a few times, I heard her call her 3 year old downstairs. When she got downstairs, she screamed in this little girls face, and I quote "DID YOU EAT MY F*CKING YOGURT?! G*D DAMN YOU SAVANNAH I AM SO G*D DAMN F*CKING SICK OF MY LIFE GOING TO F*CKING SHIT BECAUSE OF YOU F*CKING KIDS. YOU RUIN EVERY F*CKING THING. I CANNOT HAVE ANYTHING!"

This raised a few questions for me.
1) Who wakes up at 5:45?
2) Who can wake up that early and start screaming as loud as they can?
3) How good was this yogurt?
4) Even if it's true, should you ever tell your kids that they ruined your life?
5) Who taught you to swear? They did a bad job.

I don't think I have ever seen my wife more upset than she was that morning. I laughed, because anyone who can wake up at 5:45 and start a fight with a 3 year old girl over yogurt has already punched her ticket to hell, in my opinion. She could be the anti-Christ for all I know. But my wife won't stop until she's locked up. Is there a prize for a Nasty Woman award? This lady is worse than Clinton, I promise. She has yelled at her kids every day for 300 days straight. That's not an overshot either.

Anyway, this blog isn't about my neighbor. I just thought that would be fun to share.

I was just thinking about dieting and health today. Which I realize is an anomaly if you were to see me in person. I have this thing where I think about people congratulating me on losing weight a lot. I haven't lost any, it's just nice to think about what people would say if I did. I imagine people are nicer to skinny people than they are to fat ones.

Isn't it nice to think about how cool it would be if people were nice?

I was thinking about dieting today because I saw a picture of myself and wasn't sure that it was me. So that's not great. But that's what you get, I guess.

I have this weird thing with diet and weight loss. Mostly because I wrestled in high school. So I always equated losing weight to just running around with garbage sacks on and losing weight in an hour or so. One time I went to practice my senior year in all sweats, and I lost 11 pounds of water weight. That was wild as hell. I don't necessarily think that this wrestling mindset crippled me in any way, I think it actually made me realize that any weight loss goal is possible. If I can lose 11 pounds in 2 hours, people can accomplish their goals. Anyone can.

I just have been thinking about the super trendy diets recently. Not about starting them, because I'm not crazy. "All you have to do is put this patch on and only drink water and you'll lose weight!" I just think it's interesting that we're complicating such a simple equation. Stop eating so much and so much garbage + more exercise should = weight loss. At least that's how I think, and I am not a nutritionist nor a pinnacle of good health.

I just want to give a thumbs up to anyone who is on square one, or square 100 with any health goals. Or any goals at all. I think it's important for people to realize that almost everyone has body issues or things they wish they could change. But not everyone can afford to have elective surgery when they find something they want to improve. We all have to work for stuff. Which sucks, I like not doing stuff so much more. Not doing stuff is easily my most favorite hobby. Sitting down is my second favorite hobby. This really isn't conducive to helping anyone (or me) with health goals. I just think it's important for everyone to realize that exercising is stupid and hard. I realize that's cliche to knock on exercise. Fat folks everywhere love a good anti-exercise joke. (I know I do.)

In parting I want to give a few bullet points to sum this all up and tie it together and hopefully will give you all guidance for the days to come:

-Don't have neighbors.
-Don't give up on your goals, you can do it.
-Reward hard work with a lot of sitting.
-Don't take yogurt that isn't yours, you never know whose life you may have ruined.

This is your captain through the weird; Snakes. Signing off from Santaquin. God Bless. G'Night.

Tell Me Something I Don't Know.

I have high blood pressure.

Some of you read that and thought "Surprise." as you rolled your eyes and continued. Others maybe thought "I'm glad you're finally seeking out medical help/advice."

I guess finally realizing that being passionate, maybe borderline too passionate, has finally settled in that it's affecting my physical health. Years of pizza and garbage eating with little to no exercise has nothing to do with it, I assure you. I blame all my ailments on years of defending sports, artists, genre's and whatever else I wanted to be brassy and belligerent about.

I used to be so passionate and up tight that I failed to recognize that other people have an opinion on the matter, and perhaps even a valiant opinion. Instead I would walk into an argument with my eyes closed and swing my opinion around like hell, hoping that the sword of opinion cut as sharp and deep as the sword of fact. (We often grab the wrong sword to fight with.)

In retrospect I realized that I really didn't do any good by getting red in the face and arguing. That person isn't going to like 'screamo' any more because I threw a bunch of facts I hadn't really checked at them. (Maybe I should run for president?) I'm confident they didn't walk away and think "Wow. he had some really good points. Maybe I should reevaluate my musical taste and preference." In reality that person probably walked away and thought: "Wow. That guy is an asshole."

To anyone in high school who told me that 'screamo' sucked, and we got into an argument over it: Screw you. You're still wrong.

I have come to realize that maybe not having something to be upset about isn't necessarily a bad thing. I had thought for the last 6 months that maybe I was depressed; because I didn't care enough about things anymore. I wouldn't argue with strangers on the Internet about sports, I didn't have this feeling that the world was ending and that I was a 'fake fan' If I didn't watch every single baseball and football game, I just didn't have the desire to rub my fandom in the face of everyone anymore. For a while I thought that this was a bad thing, I have come to realize that it's really not. It mostly just means that I'm an adult now.

I was realizing this last night as I was watching the baseball game. For the last few years I have been very loud and had no problem telling people that my favorite teams had won world championships. And while I am still excited by those historic moments, I have come to realize one simple thing:



I referenced this in a blog earlier, but they don't hand out trophies or 5 million dollar championship rings to whomever is the best lifelong fan. So there is really no reason to be cramming it down people's throats.

On a similar note, they also don't hand out gifts to people who expressively hate other organizations. I will be the first to say that for the past 5 years my absolute disgust and disdain for the Los Angeles Dodgers organization FAR outweighed my love for the San Francisco Giants. I woke up and realized one day how backwards that was (And how it also might have been affecting my health *gulp*) and decided to let sleeping dogs lie. While I will still tell anyone who asks that I hate the Dodgers, Nationals, Panthers, Raiders, Packers, Yankees and so on, I have stopped letting my hatred for those dictate my sports fanatics.

The biggest realization I got here is this: Being a dick to an opposing team fan and/or berating them is not going to change their mind or their loyalty. It's not going to make them like the rivaling franchise any more. They won't stop and think "Wow. he had some great points. The Dodgers/Giants/whatever DO suck!" they're only gonna think:"Wow. That guy is an asshole."

Going around being a dick to people only makes you out to be the dick.

To fans of those organizations that I have argued, belittled or otherwise quarreled with: Screw you. I still hate every organization I always have. I just don't have the stamina to send you all a personal email insulting you.

To wrap this all up I want to put in a political plug. I think everyone should stop putting all their energy towards the candidate they hate, and rationalizing their own personal choice of candidate's actions. Both are terrible as hell. Put your energy into something you believe in and stop degrading others. While I understand that that is a tall order, I just think it's important for everyone to stay positive.

It might raise your blood pressure if you don't.

Lucky #8

I had a dream the other night, well, it was more like an evening nap kind of dream. I had fallen asleep while watching TV briefly. But in my dream I had this Magic 8 Ball and God was inside of it. If you ever needed an answer to a question, you would just ask God in the Magic 8 Ball and he would reply in various yes and no answers. You could ask him if your crushes liked you back, if the Giants were going to pull it together and make the playoffs, if there is oil wells in various parts of the land, anything! And he would never answer "Answer Unlcear, Try Again Later" it was always yes or no. 

I guess I just fantasize about how nice it would be to have the master of the Universe being toted around in myJansport backpack to be pulled out whenever you need an answer. I would never go wrong again and my life would be a dream. I would win a lot of money gambling, I'm sure.

I guess I just had this dream because it relates to my faith on a stupidly personal level. In regards to my own personal faith in religion, I really have had periods in my life where I viewed it as a Magic 8 Ball. I would have a concern or question and I would say a quick prayer that I would have the answer, in essence shaking the Magic 8 Ball. As I think about this I realize that I was probably asking the devil inside the Magic 8 Ball for guidance. There have been a fair amount of things I thought were good and right and they turned out to not be either of those things. In retrospect, billiards seems more like the devils game anyway. 

In the current climate of the world, I think it's become easier than ever to look away from our faith and rely on ourselves. I don't even want to lend specifically to faith in religion. I have seen people lose faith in everything. Which is really what makes the world livable. If you have faith that if you pay it forward it'll benefit someone, faith that karma will play her part, faith that circumstances can change and that PEOPLE can change. There are so many things to be hopeful about, and yet it's become so easy to be a skeptic. Which is a huge bummer.

My goal with saying all of this is that if you're struggling with faith in religion or just hope that things will get better, hang in there. There is always something on the horizon that you least expect. What you need will find you if you are willing to work for it. I'm not good at inspiration, but I wanted to take a break from my constant complaining and hopefully offer a little hope. Cause I've been there. I've been down roads that I thought would surely lead me to my all-deserving hell. Don't let Donald Trump win and ruin your outlook on life. Things will get better. 

If nothing else, keep shaking that 8 ball. Maybe God will shine through. Don't shake it too hard though, you'll create bubbles and wont see your answer. 

A Genie In A Bottle Babay

I often think about what it would be like to be rich.
I think that's what separates "Us" from "Them" because you know that they don't sit around and think about what it would be like to be poor. (Original thought on that was from Louis CK) But, honestly. In any aspect of life why would you think about how life would be if you were poorer.
This all lead me to think about what I would do with my wishes if I found a genie, and genies actually existed.
Here's me rapid firing whatever wish first pops into my head, if I had unlimited wishes for 2 minutes:

-That my wife never had to work again and that our house had a pool that the water temp was always 95 degrees.

-That the Dodgers make it to the first round of the playoffs every year and lose, from now until the end of forever.

-That I would find $500 cash on the ground every day for the rest of my life.

-That Donald Trump would die in a grease fire at the Trump Tower in Las Vegas.

-That I had a house without any neighbors and that my current neighbors got banished to the northern-most part of Canada forever.

-That I had my own meal service at my house every day and never had to cook again cause they can cook every delicacy.

-That I reestablished the Montreal Expos and owned them, and that I would have endless poutine in the owners box. Also that we had the Dodgers sized payroll to buy players.

-That eating pizza, fries and red meat made me lose weight.

-That being a dickhead to cashiers or waiters is punishable by a life sentence in federal prison.

-That driving while impaired, distracted or otherwise idiotically would result in a permanent rebuke of your license and driving privileges.

-That I owned an airline.

-That I owned Walmart.

-That all my relatives were stupidly successful in anything they pursued.

That should be two minutes worth. I could even rapid fire more when put on the spot. But, I feel like that gives a fair assessment of my priorities when it comes to wishes.

When I think about stumbling on a genie, I don't have very big plans to save the world. The last thing on my mind would be that Jews and Islamic people would get on a little better. I also wouldn't say: I don't need any wishes, I'm grateful for what I have and I have all that I need. Would anybody say that, really? I guess I fight with what I want and need, and the feeling that I should be grateful for what I have.

All these thoughts led me to this thought: What if it doesn't get any better than today? Honestly. What if for the rest of your life you looked back on today and thought: that was the best day of my life.

I think honestly for a good 99% of those who read this blog, that day wouldn't be that bad. I imagine you ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner today. Or at least you will. You probably have or will sleep in your own, comfortable bed. You probably have a place to call home, and if you don't there's a good chance your parents would put you up.

I mean honestly, if you never got to move to Hawaii, and you never got to build a time machine and go back in time and see shit, if you never got to stake your place in Mount Everest, You never opened your bank account and didn't cringe a little, if you never got a wardrobe the size of a house, and never got that record player that is made of gold, how sad would you really be? I log online and all I can see is "Like if you want to travel." Or "All I want in life is a Dog and 900000000000000G per year, is that too much to ask?" To which I say: "Kinda." If you're spending all that time thinking about what you don't have and what you want, are you even happy? Are you enjoying your life? Seriously, I mean that. If all you're doing is driving around and looking at cars and clothes and houses and diamonds and all you can think and say is: "I want that." how can you even stand to be alive? Honestly. How do you function? I don't mean that to say, don't have goals. What I mean is; can you not be grateful for what the hell you have? Cause I'm fairly sure that it's more than most have.

I try to write that tediously, because I think it's a double edged sword. I think too often people say "You're an American, you shouldn't want anything!" but at the same time we shout back "I can if I want to!" I don't mean it to come across that you should never want anything. I mean it to come across as maybe you should have a little more tact and grace. You should look around and be thankful for what you have once in a while.

I guess what I'm truly getting at is that things really aren't that bad. Sure, you think of things that you want, things you need, and things you would get if you stumbled on a fair amount of money. I have those too. I really break them up into a couple groups; Needs, achievable wants, and pipe dreams. And to be totally honest my pipe dream list is the longest one. The house I have drawn up in my head in the event I strike oil makes very little sense, it's essentially Smart House from the Disney Channel Original Movie 'Smart House' (Before she goes nuts and takes human form) mashed up with the kids house on Blank Check. If you don't understand these references I encourage you to look into them, you will be enlightened and your goals will expand greatly.

I guess if things never got better from here (And judging by our Presidential candidates, there is a good chance that they will not.) I really wouldn't be all that sad. I mean, absolutely there are ways I am going to make things better in my life. But when I take a step back and really evaluate my life and where I am at; there is a ton more to be grateful than to be longing for. That's something I, and seemingly everyone, needs to do is realize that life is alright where you're at. Go get whatever you want. But don't let your goals turn into greed and consume you. You can make a lot of things happen and do a lot of good where you are.

Be ambitious, but don't be an asshole.

Oh, and if you stumble on a genie, will you do me a favor? Ask that he grant me three wishes as one of your wishes (I'll return the favor)

Kids Suck

I haven't slept in a couple of nights now, and I am really beginning to wonder why. I've been having strange and troubling dreams, which I think is why I'm not sleeping. You know those dreams where you wake up heaving for air? Those kinds of dreams. Or ones where I wake up and I'm mad at my wife or family member for being a dick in my dreams. They really ought to apologize when they're mean to me in my dreams as soon as I wake up to avoid the hard feelings I carry for the first 3-6 hours of my day. Anyway. I don't think that's why I'm not sleeping tonight. Tonight I keep thinking about the demons from The Conjuring 2 that I went and saw in theaters on Saturday night. There is a portion of my room where the light from the window doesn't touch. Its a tiny hallway to the door, and it's always completely dark. I've spent the last 2 hours staring at that black void waiting for something to open it's eyes, or otherwise jump out. I also am fairly angry and bothered tonight. More than usual. Which is why I got out of bed and faced the void/possible future horror story and decided to blog.

"You let it out honey, write
it in the book."

I should change this blog to Jake's Burn Book. Or maybe that can be the working title to a book if I ever write one.

I guess I have just been thinking a lot about how much I hate kids. Not like, little kids. Just pre-teens, teens, and pro/after-teens. I was at the pool today and there was this kid that was probably 12 and he had a little group of cronies following him around. His whole purpose, in my opinion, was to make everyone's day as miserable as his life is. He was going around the pool and was splashing everyone in the face. Other kids, adults, lifeguards, moms, you name it. That little sonofabitch would've splashed his own grandmother in the face if he had gotten a chance. So my wife and I had just gotten into the pool, acclimated ourselves to the water and were just talking. Then the little prick came swimming behind us in the lazy river and splashed my wife right in the face. I had a lot of choice words for him, but he went underwater and swam away before I could tell him what big words I was thinking. I sat and watched him do the same thing to an older lady just right across the pool from us. Now, some of you may be thinking, "But Jacob. He is just a boy!" True. But that doesn't make him less disrespectful. It's not about the fact that it's just water. It's about the fact that we're there trying to enjoy ourselves, and if my wife or myself would like to get our heads/faces/anything wet, it should be on our own terms. Not because kids have no respect for anyone. I guess my biggest problem was that if I used my big swear words, I may have gotten thrown out of the pool. But I wish the lifeguards would have done something about it. If it were up to me, or my wife (she was a lifeguard for a very long time.) He would've been kicked out long before then.

I was just pondering over this experience and how much I really don't understand today's youth. Furthermore, how much I really don't want to understand today's youth. If I were 12 and had splashed an older woman in the face, I'm confident my mother would have made me apologize to the woman after she waterboarded me. (It'll be legal here soon, won't it?) I don't really want to be one of those people that are constantly saying "When I was a kid..." because those people suck so much. I have people come into the hardware store I work at all day long and tell me how much cheaper things used to be. And it makes me want to set them on fire. "They used to pay US to come and get soda and .22 bullets!" I guess I don't really mean to be nostalgic on the ideas that things used to be cheaper and better. I just mean to be nostalgic on the fact that there used to be morals and respect in the world. People can't even look at their kid in an angry way without CPS rolling up on their front porch. I don't mean to be insensitive, because I know for sure that CPS have helped a lot of kids out of bad situations. Just seems like a double edged sword.

We live in an age where it's constant gratification. The only reason people want to go to baseball games, or go to the Grand Canyon, or to see the Golden Gate Bridge, or to a concert is so they can take pictures and videos, post them on the internet, and get the gratification that people "like" what they post. And they get even further gratification out of the fact that there are people that ARE NOT there and are Jealous!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I guess my whole question is, who gives a shit? Why don't you go to a concert to enjoy the music? I used to take pictures and videos too, but it's because I want to remember the experience. Not try and make that one girl who is kinda rude sometimes to you that is like always posting on facebook about stuff that you don't really like and thats super annoying and I know that she likes this band and is gonna be SUPER jealous that I'm here and she is not she is at home with her lame boyfriend ha ha ha ha ha habitch ha ha.

I have had a couple of experiences recently where I have been at events and I look around and everyone is staring at their phones. Middle aged people totally included. Everyone was doing something on their phone. And I am totally not immune to this. But if you put me in a quiet room for a half an hour with only my phone, I would get bored super quick. Once I go through my twitter and instagram I am pretty much over it. I will read baseball reports if they come up, or if I really have to dig I will go to magazine twitter handles and read interviews with band members. But truly, after about a half hour, I usually will end up looking at old pictures on my phone or facebook. I do not understand how people can stare at their phones for hours on end. Is it games? are they doing work? I just don't understand. And to each their own, maybe it's that I have a poor attention span. But it's something that I've noticed.

The world has turned into a great melting pot of preformers and audience. "All the world's a stage" has never been a truer statement. You can be anywhere in the world and you can still post and gather attention, and get the validation we all so desperately need. To be honest, it's pretty scary. We can turn a tragedy like what happened in Orlando to push left or right wing agendas. Instead of getting out there and doing something helpful, like donating blood, we just retweet something that says "Retweet to show support of the victims of the Orlando shootings." I'm sure those who have passed on admire your courage for reposting something so everyone knows you are sensitive and care about them. They're probably brimming from the great beyond because you're so helpful. And maybe that's all you can do. But did you repost it because you truly believe it, or because you want people to think that you believe it? See, that is where I find the true danger in what the world has come to. It's no longer about morals and beliefs, its more about what you want people to think you believe in. And isn't that so messed up? It's more about how we look than who we are. It's taking what we used to call "shallow" and making it a thousand times worse. It's no longer about looks, its about followers and likes and this and that. Does anybody know what they stand for anymore?

I guess I wanna push that you don't need internet validation to be bad ass. You can do stuff and be cool and never post about it and not a soul would know, but you would. And that's all that really matters. Your friends and social media contacts are great, and their approval is probably nice (I wouldn't know, the internet hates me.) but at the end of the day, are your internet friends gonna be there when you're not cool? When it's just you, who is gonna think you are cool? your kids never will, that's for sure. I guess what I want to say is that instead of watering other peoples plants, you should water your own. That's a metaphor, for the simpletons. Don't wait to get approval from the internet to know you're doing something cool or becoming something great. Do it for yourself, and because you want to. Learn to enjoy your company and realize that the world is truly at your fingertips.

Once you understand that nobody really cares, it makes life a lot easier. People may like your posts, but they don't really care. It's all a cesspool of jealousy and hatred, that's what the internet is. They don't really care about you and what you're doing. Everyone alive is looking out for #1, you can believe that. If it doesn't affect them, they don't gain from it, or it doesn't fit their personal agenda, they don't care. Empathy doesn't exist online, you can only find that in real life; particularly your home. Stop posting about it and tell your parents and grandparents when you do something of note, if you're really looking for validation. Those people will always love you and support you.

That was a lot more serious than I intended. I'm also gonna post this without proof reading it; the time is now 12:11 AM and morale is low. I will fix typos tomorrow, probably, so tell the grammar police they're off duty tonight. God bless.