Saturday, April 26, 2008

What's Wrong With A Taxi?

Tonight I found this posting on Craigslist. A friend of mine has been perusing the personals, and out of curiosity I checked out a few.

This posting was in the "Women Seeking Women" section oddly enough.

This is the verbage:

I am looking for someone who can pick up my wife and I (you must have a nice or average car) on edgewater in Clearwater at 6pm on Sunday and bring us to bon jovi, then pick us up when it is over and go out for some drinks. You must be the designated driver obviously, but you can spend some time talking with us and see where it leads. As we are looking for some new friends as well. We moved here 4 years ago and have been so busy outside of family we really don’t know anyone closely. I am willing to pay 150.00 to drive us there, pick us up and spend a couple of hours with us after the concert. I will be away from the computer from here on out and checking emails on my cell phone which has limited capability. So please leave phone # attach a pic and be serious about this.
Thanks,


Wow... I'm not even sure what to say. First of all, the pictures of this couple have the heads cut off and in one photo the man is grabbing the woman's boob.
The $150 to chauffeaur the couple to a concert doesn't sound bad on it's own, although if that's all they want - what about calling a cab?
If they expect a hot lady cab driver/sex buddy - shouldn't they at least invite her to the show, too? Excluding her seems fairly rude.
Spend a couple of hours with them after the concert??? So they can kidnap this person, torture them, and leave them left for dead off a freeway exit? This posting definitely has potential serial killing written all over it.
I'm sure this guy will definitely need to be constantly checking his cell phone for the barrage of emails he'll be getting.
In fact, I'm crafting my own response right now!

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

A Total Loss of the Weekend

For six years, I've had a bright blue Ford ZX2. It's not a particularly wonderful car. It rumbled loudly every time I drove it, had a bad window seal problem so driving at higher speeds popped my ears, and has horrible safety ratings.

But still, it was my car. Paid off and reliable. I was not looking for a new vehicle anytime soon. In fact, just the other day I was thinking that I'd be driving it for another three years or so. No mechanical problems. Last month I had the spark plugs changed and a new gasket kit put on by one of the Brighthouse mechanics who work down in our parking garage.

This past Friday, AJ came to visit me. On the street outside my complex a large bird smacked into the windshield of his Honda CR-V. It destroyed the windshield, leaving feathers stuck in the glass and shards lying all over the interior. AJ showed up with little cuts all over his arms and face - bleeding out from all of them.




We were then down to a single vehicle - mine.

So the next day, we decided to go to the beach to check out a skim boarding event that our crew was out at shooting for a story. We ate lunch with three of my coworkers, then walked a few blocks back to my car. I'd parked on a side street off the main strip. Running perpendicular to some roads are little drainage culverts, ditches, apparently they're called "Miami curves."

At the first intersection, I stopped for the sign, then proceeded to move forward. About three feet later, my little car bottomed out letting out a loud screech. The airbags deployed, hitting AJ and I. That broke my windshield. With the air pressure increase, the moon roof broke. The drivers side door broke in half and the window broke. The front axle bent, leaving one tire sticking out. All for going under 5 mph.

Several people standing on the corner saw the entire thing unfold. They asked us if we were okay, and one man said cars bottom out quite often and are damaged. He called the police.





The Pinellas County Sheriff's Office showed up, but would not issue a police report because technically, I didn't "hit" anything. Hello? I made her give me a card for information. I collected one of the witness' phone numbers and address. He lives on that corner.

The sheriff's deputy actually told me to try to drive the car back to my place, about 15 miles away. AJ and I managed to do this. With a broken windshield and deployed airbags.

For the next two days, I had no car. My insurance claim was taken, but the adjustor wasn't in until Monday. Saturday night, I'd gotten us tickets to see a comedian I like. We ended up ordering pizza ihstead.

Monday, I got a rental car while AJ waited for the Glass Doctor to come and fix his Muskogee Duck Destroyed windshield. The adjustor told me to start looking for another car, because mine is most likely totaled. A towing company was supposed to come either Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning to take my car to the insurance company's lot for inspection. It's now Wednesday and that still hasn't been done.

Yesterday I spent two hours at a Toyota dealership and found a car that I like. I put a deposit on it to hold the car, but it's completely refundable. Quite a bit needs to happen in order to get this whole process moving. The insurance company is slow as molasses.

I called the city of Indian Rocks beach to put in a complaint against those dips in the roads. There are no signs, it TOTALED my car, and other cars have been damaged. The guy I spoke with basically told me to screw off. This weekend I'm going to draft an official letter.

So now I wait. I really hate waiting.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

Live Trucks Burnin' Rubber

This incident happened in the city I used to live in, between two rival TV stations other than the one I was employed at. Probably not a great idea to race a $500,000 piece of technology.


Sunday, March 2, 2008

Millionaire Matchmaker

Don't miss the season finale of this amazing reality show!

Saturday, March 1, 2008

Things I Don't Understand About The World

Sometimes I just have to scratch my head...

1) Why John Tesh has a radio show where he gives advice on topics such as parenting and career hunting

2) Lipstick Jungle - frankly the show sucks. I caught an episode last night and it's so, so, so, so bad. Seriously, who cares about the tired storyline and what Brooke Shields is up to now. And the sex on the washing machine scene is so Varsity Blues.

3) Rehashed ideas on television and in films. For instance, American Gangster. Decent movie, but it stole tons of material from movies like Catch Me If You Can and Blow. Saw Definitely, Maybe and I hated how a cute kid was thrown into the mix to make the movie more likeable. It's kind of sickening.

4) A La this week's Celebrity Apprentice - why would anyone truly want yogurt in their moisturizer???

5) Why so many couples go to the mall for Valentine's Day?

Monday, February 25, 2008

Renaissance Faire-Game



This past weekend my guy took me to a Renaissance Fair in South Florida. For an entrance fee of $20 a pop, we were in. Into what, you may ask? A world filled with wenches, knights, and realistic-looking weaponry.

Being in Florida, it was exceptionally hot. I felt like I was wilting in the sun, and although there was brew aplenty, I stuck to Gatorade. My hair stuck to my head, and I was grateful for my choice of shorts and a tank top.

I had no idea what to expect from this thing. The college I went to had an organization called the Order of St. George which was sort of a medieval thing. Fellow students would dress up in period costumes and have a literal feast.

People at this shindig were dressed quite similarly. According to wikipedia, the European renaissance era is considered to be from the 14th to 17th centuries. Well, the costumes worn around the festival seemed somewhat interesting. There were quite a wench lady outfits on the women. And for the dudes? There were lots of Robin Hood and Sir. William Wallace types trolling around.

It was like a mix of being transported back in time, or on a movie set. Then there were the pirates. Now, I do realize that pirates existed during that time -- but it seemed a little out of place for a Renaissance festival. The type of costumes I'd expect to see with a pirate would be something out of Pirates of the Caribbean (obviously). It seemed a little Gasparilla-ish to me.

Then there were the people dressed as fairies. That gave the event sort of a Lord of the Rings feel.

I think a lot of people are confused as to how they can dress "Renaissance-y". So they take creative liberties with the costumes.

So on to the merriment and entertainment! There was a tiny elf of a girl hanging by ribbons, who I swear is the most flexible female alive. Then the wishing well wenches, who actually licked audience participants.

And the R-rated seemingly drunk guy in his underbritches singing songs like "Beer is better than women" and another one that was about a medieval orgy. What blew me away was how many parents didn't mind their children listening to some fairly graphic lyrics. At one point in his song, a family stopped by and started listening. The town singer then said, "And for the family who just got here and has no idea what's going on - you might want to move on. This is an R-rated show!"

And lastly some fun jugglers named Pyro and Gyro, who picked out my guy AJ as a potential participant. They asked him to beat his chest, pretend to be The Thinker, and quote lines of Shakespeare. I was actually shocked that AJ did not know any. Instead, the beefcake guy wearing a gold chain belted out the Shakespeare like he was reciting the Lord's Prayer. What a strange world we live in.

One thing I did forget to do. That's eat one of those turkey legs. But perhaps I'm better off, since they probably cost $20 also.

Guide to Picking Up Asian Women

Jen's best advice for men looking for their 'oriental flower'