It’s my birthday today. Woo, go me.

I was thinking about the Beatles song, Birthday. The lyrics go a little something like this:

You say it’s your birthday
It’s my birthday too–yeah

How hard would that suck? You’re all happy because it’s your birthday and people are probably going to be nice to you and give you stuff and it’s basically “your day” for the day — and fucking Paul McCartney comes bopping in saying “It’s my birthday too — yeah!” Great. So now you get to share “your day” with one of the most famous and beloved men in music. Great. Guess whose day it’s really gonna be now? That’s right: the Walrus’s. Goo goo g�joob.

And then Paul goes on to sing:

I would like you to dance–Birthday
Take a cha-cha-cha-chance-Birthday
I would like you to dance–Birthday

Great. So not only are you going to be overshadowed by McCartney, who all the women are going to be screaming over while you sit lonely and ignored in the corner, but now he also wants you to be his monkey too. Dance, monkeyboy, dance! Dance for my pleasure! Some birthday.

McCartney hasn’t shown up yet here, though, so mine’s been going pretty well so far. The day started at Zoe’s school with their annual Halloween parade, where the Fates finally granted my wish and brought me face to face with her. And of course I was wearing that stupid Elvis mask for the introduction, which must explain why she didn’t immediately tackle me to the ground and begin having her way with me. But that’s okay, we have a whole school year ahead of us. Stalking Love takes time.

Then I went to the movies solo, which I love to do, and saw Saw. Ha, I just like saying that:

I saw Saw.
What did you see?
Saw.
Okay, what did you saw?
Nothing, I went to the movies. I saw Saw.

Ha. Anyway: Saw. Not bad. Genuinely creepy at a few points, good tension, but then it got kind of silly in the 3rd act, especially with Cary Elwes gnawing every little bit of scenery he could find. And don’t get me started on the yeah, right bad guy. But over-all: eh, not bad.

Then home again to meet up with Mom, who gave the gift that always fits: cash, then Beth and Zoe showed up with a hooded vest for diving. My wetsuit has no hood, which means my big bald noggin is hanging out there in the water scaring all the fish, and on my last dive the water temp was 62, which was pretty fuggin’ cold and which served as notice to me that it was probably my last dive of the season without a hood. When you get a spike-in-the-head headache from how cold the water is around you, it’s time to cover up. Which now I’ll be able to do, warmly.

And finally, on tap for dinner this evening is sushi at our favorite restaurant. Woo.

Not a bad way to celebrate a birthday. It’s almost enough to make you forget you’re turning 4-friggin’-2.

Ouch.

Is twelve days long enough to enter Major Asshole territory, or are you still trekking through the hinterlands of Rude Jerk at that point? Perhaps right on the border? Well, where ever it is, that’s where I am because it’s been that long since I met some of the people I link to from here for dinner and I never said a word here about it. Oopsie.

The parties in question were my lovely wife Beth, El Steve and his no-question-about-it better half Viv, and the new-to-me Carol. I had a nice time seeing/meeting/having dinner with these people, and I know they checked in here expecting me to talk about it and were disappointed, so apologies are in order for not doing so. To some of them.

Now, I can get away without acknowledging Beth for obvious reasons: she didn’t write about it either, and thus is even more shameful than me. And I can get away without giving his Steveness his due because, well, he ain’t got none. But I can’t let myself off the hook for failing to mention seeing Viv again, or meeting Carol for the first time. I should have said something sooner because, well, it was worth mentioning.

Viv goes without saying. (Um, pun not intended.) She has been a longtime stealth reader of these pages, she’s very cool, betrays (outwardly, at least) absolutely no regrets at having married far beneath her station, and I hardly ever get to see her, so let me just say — belatedly, too late, and even after the fact — that I’m glad we got together and I wish we’d do it sooner.

Carol was someone I’d been looking forward to meeting, but I have to admit that I was disappointed. I’m half-deaf, you see, and the restaurant was noisy and she sat at the far end of the table from me, and Steve would not shut up, and so I didn’t get to really talk with her very much. Which was not great, because I wanted to get to know her better. But she had excellent table manners and was witty in the few moments we spoke to each other, so I have high hopes for the next time we meet. And in the meantime, I get to keep reading her blog, which I think you should all go read right now (and here’s another link to it to make things easy on you) before I say something else mean about Steve.

And then there’s Steve. Yeah. Once you trek into the desert with a complete stranger to hand up a pay phone, there’s really no going back. You’re linked to each other for life, sort of like that old American Indian thing about when someone saves your life you’re bound to them for good, only it’s not nearly that noble. But that’s sort of what Steve and I have, tempered by the anti-emotion ribbing that guys do when they like each other but pretend they don’t. So it’s always good to see him, especially since the gaps seem to be getting longer and longer.

So having dinner with them all was a nice time and I should have said so sooner. But better late than never and all that, so get off my back about it already.

And next time let’s not do Don Cuco’s. Sure, the food’s good, but it’s not that good, and I’d like to be able to friggin’ hear everybody. Instead, let’s go to Waffle House.

Lablogs asks:

1) What sort of earthquake preparations do most people have?

It varies by level of paranoia, ranging from “nothing” to “I’m moving to Kansas tomorrow.” Little known fact, though: Kansas has earthquakes too. Oopsie.

2) Have you ever lived though a big quake?

Yes. And I think phrasing it as “lived through” reveals an element of fear on the part of the questioner.

3) Which ones?

The Northridge Earthquake in 1994. Our house was about four miles from the epicenter. It was quite a ride — I remember being bounced out of bed in complete darkness and stumbling across the heaving floor like a drunk, over to the bedroom doorway where I had to brace myself to keep from being thrown down, and yelling at Beth to get out of bed and come get in the doorway with me where it was safe. She rode it out where she was — nothing gets Beth out of bed, not even a big-ass earthquake.

4) Does anybody really have earthquake insurance?

Yes. That’s why you’ve heard of it.

5) Do you?

Yes, and it was a good thing we did in 1994. We had to make major repairs that we couldn’t have afforded without it.

6) How bad would things have to get for my apartment to come crashing into
the ground?

It depends on the apartment building, but click on the Northridge Earthquake link above for an example. If you’ll recall, an apartment building did come crashing down, killing 16 residents. Maybe you should move to Kansas. Or… maybe not.

7) If I don’t anchor the bookcases to the wall, are they really going to
fall over and kill me in my sleep?

Only if you A) sleep under them and B) store anvils on them.

8) Are you fearful, anticipating, or indifferent to coming quakes?

Indifferent, edging toward anticipating. They’re kind of fun when nobody gets hurt and there’s no significant damage. Dirt surfing, woo hoo!

God, I love the internet.

The heater on our central air is out (again! — it seems like it goes out every other year), so I had a repairman come out today. You know how these guys are (or maybe you don’t): they’re crooks, always looking to shoot an angle on you. He poked around for a few minutes, then came inside and announced: “It needs a new circuit board. That’s a $500 part.”

Yeah, $500. For a circuit board. I don’t think so.

So I thanked him for coming out, told him there was no way in hell we were spending $500 on a unit we put in just a few years ago, and sent him on his way. Then I came inside, sat down at my computer, and plugged the part number into Google. $98. So I’ll buy it online, pick up a six-pack at the local 7-11, and one of Beth’s engineers from work will come out and install it for me.

$500 part my ass. I’ve got a $500 computer in here with a high speed connection that’ll bitchslap you out of business every time.

So what does a wannabe writer do when he finds himself unemployed? I mean after he plays online poker for a few days and watches Oprah with the blinds drawn and eats 6 pieces of peanut butter rye toast for lunch? That’s right, he fucks around on the interweb for a few days. After that, well, then he starts thinking about getting back to writing again.

He takes out all the old index cards for one of his pet screenplay ideas and dusts them off, starts brainstorming to fill out the story, starts making notes, starts trying to restart the old writing engine. And just when the engine turns over and starts idling again — roughly, but idling nonetheless — just then he casually Googles the title for this unique idea … and finds out that it’s currently in production for release next year. And fucking SNL’s Lorne Michaels is behind it. Which means, of course, that it’ll be a total steaming pile of crap that makes a gazillion dollars and if I continue with my script it will look like I copied the crap.

Crap. It’s all about timing — or as Steve Martin called it in an old bit, “Tie Ming” — and mine sucks. I know I have marketable ideas because other people keep making them. What I don’t have is the butt-glue necessary to beat them to it. This is the third screenplay idea of mine that someone else went ahead and made while I was twiddling my thumbs, and I can’t count how many sitcom story ideas of mine magically appeared on TV while I was index carding them. But, hey, you know what? Those other writers did it while all I did was dream. They’re the big winnas, I’m the big wanna. It’s on me.

So this week’s project: butt-glue. In copious amounts.

(But my Blade concept was good, dammit. And that’s all I’ll say about that.)

I think I love these guys. I especially liked the Amazing Stuntmen bit.

Here’s an excerpt from an email my 75-year old mom sent me last night:

I had a callback on a Staples commercial which, I’m sorry to report, I did not get. Boo Hoo. But I’m just happy to be getting sent out at all considering my commercial agent just died and I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. [Emphasis mine – Chuck]

Yes, Mom’s a sweet old girl — for someone who’s in the business.

Today is my first day among the unemployed. I’ll admit, I’ve been a little nervous about what I’ll do next, but then I found a God-sent email in my inbox when I got up this morning.

It seems there’s a company with something like $65,000,000 tied up in Nigeria in a failed business deal after the principal of the company and his entire family died in a tragic car accident. I’m not clear on all the particulars or why they chose me, but I was contacted by the brother of the neighbor of the nephew of the company’s window-washer’s 3rd cousin to help them get the money out of Nigeria. And they made an offer I can’t refuse! If I help get the money out by acting as an agent for the company and letting them move the money through my bank account, they’ll give me 25% of it for helping and another 5% for expenses!

That’s $19,500,000! Just for being a nice guy!

Boy, this email couldn’t have come at a better time. Whew.

Caller ID is a wonderful thing. It can help you to answer calls from your wife with “What?” and screen calls to avoid the thousand-and-one sales calls that come in at dinner time. And our kitchen speaker-phone makes it entertaining, too, by completely mispronouncing the name of whoever it is that’s calling. Like our Privacy Manager feature, which the kitchen phone announces is Pree-vah-see Mah-nah-gerrrr.

Tonight, we dodged several calls from Tel-ee-fund Eye En Seeee, which I recognized from dozens of other dodged calls as Telefund, Inc. I had no idea who Telefund, Inc. was, but since none of my friends or family are named that, it automatically became a call I didn’t answer.

Until they called four fucking times tonight.

I answered the last one at 9:20 p.m. It was someone from the Democratic National Committee who was calling for–

“At 9:20,” I interrupted. “At night.”

She instantly copped attitude with me. “Sir, by law we’re allowed to call up until 9:30.”

And she then proceeded to launch into her schpiel about… Well, I don’t know what the fuck it was about, I was just waiting for the inevitable plea for a donation. And of course it came: If I could just give $25, John Kerry and John Edwards can… Blah blah blah.

I am her target audience. I’m a Kerry/Edwards supporter. I should have been a sympathetic household. But I wasn’t. At all.

“So you’re going to call me late at night and piss me off, then tell me you’re allowed by law to piss me off, and then ask me for money?” I asked her. “I don’t think so. Don’t call here again.” And I hung up on her.

I hope that’s not the tactic they’re using to get votes, too, otherwise Nader will win by a landslide.

…for my very special visitors: Hi! Hi!