Nice to meat you

I came to a fairly sad realization today. Before I tell you what that realization is though let me learn you a little bit about myself (I know you don’t care, but trust me, it’s relevant).

Eric Fact #1

I’m lazy. Like most people, I like to do as little as humanly possible and still remain a productive member of society. I often fail at that task. And I don’t mean failing at doing as little as possible, I mean I’m often not a productive member of society.

Eric Fact #2

I don’t like to waste any time. Well, that’s not entirely true. I waste a ton of time, how can you not when the internet exists. What I should say is I’m very selective as to what time is appropriate to waste and what time is more useful. For example, time can not be wasted in the morning before work. My alarm clock is to the exact amount of time I need to get out of bed (immediately, snooze buttons are for the weak), shower, get dressed, and go straight to work on time. I don’t understand how people can relax read the newspaper and eat breakfast when they have the horror of an entire workday hanging over there heads. To me the time after work is much more productive, and at the same time more relaxing, than time after work so the sooner one gets to work the sooner they get to leave and enjoy their day.

Eric Fact #3

At times I spend money recklessly. Here’s the terrible part of that, I rarely spend recklessly on cool things. I always find myself in a situation where I think to myself, man I would love to buy this awesome sweater, or perhaps a new iPod, but I’ve spent like $700 on food this month (that includes beer also, I just wanted to mention that so it would seem less ridiculous).

Based on fact #3 I recently decided it was time to make a lifestyle change. In order to guiltlessly purchase things I need, like bedroom furniture (a Wii?) or some new clothes for work (Guitar Hero?) I’ve been eating lunch at work everyday and cooking dinner at home. It’s worked out great, I save tons of money. But here is where facts #1 and #2 come into play. I’m far too lazy, and consider it a huge waste of time, to make lunch in the morning before work. My solution is to go to the grocery store by the office and stock up on groceries that I can leave here and prepare lunch daily in the office. It’s really a great solution but it allows me to not only save a few dollars a day, but also time spent preparing food at work is time spent not working. So win-win for me.

All of this is an extremely round about way of coming to the sad realization I alluded to earlier. Here it is:

The most important decision I make all week is based around which lunch meat I’m going to buy for my sandwiches.

I know you’re thinking this sounds trivial, but I’m not sure that I can understate the importance of this decision. If I’m going to eat the same sandwich no less than 4 days out of the week it better be a damn good sandwich. Nothing can ruin a mood more than an entire weeks worth of bad lunches. Trust me; you did not want to be around for the roast beef fiasco of October 13-17. It wasn’t pretty.

Although now that I think about it, if the biggest aspect of your life is making a decision between turkey, ham, or corned beef it could be construed as sad, or it might say that you have an awesome life. I’m going to go with the later. Mostly because I have a glass half full kind of attitude today. Why am I in that chipper state of mind? Because I went with pastrami for this week and it was delicious.

The 2nd Debate...

So I'm watching the debate right now. I don't have much I want to say about what the candidates are saying because I doubt anyone reading this cares about my politics, but I will say this: Tom Brokaw, shut the fuck up. This is sort of important, let them talk for Christ's sake. There is pretty big decision coming up in a few weeks and we kind of want to hear what they have to say. Who cares if they go over a minute. Dammit.

How Did This Happen?

I don't eat very much. I'm skinny and I have a small appetite. I don't know if I'm skinny because I my lack of an appetite or the appetite develop because I'm so skinny. It's the chicken and the egg and all that crap, the point is, I don't eat very much. Sometimes I don't finish dinner because I simply get bored. All the cutting and chewing and sitting up straight is just not worth it when I could be relaxing and not moving. Occasionally I skip dinner all together because I ate a late lunch. This is why the following list is so perplexing to me:

A Complete List of the Food I've Eaten in the Last 28 Hours

2 Nature Valley Bars
2 packs of Oreo Cookies
2 Ham and Cheese sandwiches
Half a bag of Utz Kettle Cooked potato chips
Half block cheese (with crackers)
3 pieces of pizza
1 everything bagel
1 16-20 rib eye steak
Mashed potatoes
Corn

This may not sound like that much to some, but it's a veritable binge for me. I've been trying to figure why I'm so hungry lately and I can only come to one logical solution. I'm pregnant. A few months ago I wouldn't have thought it possible, me being a man and all, but then that one dude (you all know who I'm talking about, I don't feeling like finding a link to the story) got knocked up and everything changed. Expect to see me on Oprah in the very near future.

Vacaton...

I just got back from vacation late last night. A week where the entire day consisted of relaxing on the beach, then going back the house and relaxing by the pool, then relaxing in the hottub at night.

I took today off just to keep the relaxation going before going back to work next week.

So what do I wake up to at 8 in the morning?

A jackhammer. Right outside of my window.

I hate you Baltimore. I hate you so much.

Thoughts...

- I saw a homeless man reading the newspaper this morning. I thought it was nice that he was keeping up on current events, but I was really curious as to what he might be reading so I decided to ease in for a closer look (I'm like a ninja). He was reading the stock market report. I've said this before, I'm not really sure what irony is, but I think a homeless man check stock prices qualifies as ironic.

Although, maybe he wasn't a homeless man. Maybe he was just a really dirty broker. I shouldn't presuppose that someone is homeless simply because they're filthy and sitting on the sidewalk. They could just be a hippy.


- We have a new neighbor. My roommate met her first and this was his description: a hot, blond, australian girl who just graduated college. I know, sounds pretty awesome right? Well, I met her on Saturday night.

She's from Florida. That totally ruins it.

Moral of the story: My roommate can't tell the difference between a southern accent and an Australian accent. And he's an idiot.


- Yesterday I played Guitar Hero for the first time. I'm terrible at it. I feel like this makes me more and less cool at the same time.

This is the headline for today's featured story on Yahoo!:

Even Paris Hilton has fallen prey?! Holy shit, we're all screwed! Oh wait, she's an idiot. We're fine.

A brief foray into politics...

I don't really get into to politics very much. Well, I don't talk about it on my blog anyway. I doubt many people care about my opinion on most matters, mainly because I'm generally ill informed. But I would like to just throw something out there. Sarah Palin's children are named Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper, and Trig. I could be wrong about this, but I believe her husband is eskimo, and maybe these names have something to do with that. I'll claim ignorance on that. But if that's not the case I don't think I could ever vote for someone who gives their children such terrible names. I'm just saying.

Trig? Really?

Who knows maybe she's just a former sprinter who loves ESPN (or NASCAR), Val Kilmer movies costarring midgets, the pan flute, and triangles.

I have a group of friends who love to read my blog. They ask me about it all the time. When they bring it up it's always in a semi mocking tone as if they think it's super lame. But secretly I know they love it because they check it every day. I'm on to you guys, just so you know.

Anyway, since I how much they enjoy my awesome musings on life, and pretty much everything about my blog in general, I know they'll be super pumped about this. I would like to congratulate Brent on being the 25,000 visitor to I'll Think of Something. You're sort of famous now so enjoy it.

A List...

A Partial List of Dead Animals That I Have Been Close Enough To In the Last Week to Catch a Horrible Disease

1. Squirrel (s)
2. Bat
3. Deer*
4. Large Bird**
5. Bat
6. Groundhog***
7. Small Bird****
8. Cat
9. Human? *****
10. Orange mystery animal ******


* It was only a deer leg. I don't want to know what happened to the rest of it.

** I think it was an eagle. My coworker disagrees. Probably because he hates America.

*** Or woodchuck if you prefer.

**** Baby eagle?

***** It was just a bone, but it looked eerily like an arm bone.

****** It was long and skinny. Sort of ferrittish, but to big. It could have been one of these. Which would have been sad, because they're cute. And not native to Pennsylvania.

Day 2...

As I was driving further north into Pennsylvania I got to thinking more about creepy guys eye flirting thing, and then I figure it all out. I think this son of a bitch is trying to kidnap me and take me on a romantic weekend getaway in the Poconos. Luckily I'm on to him so I'm going to have some sort of shank ready at all times to repel his advances.

Right now we're just outside of Scranton, PA. I'm pretty big into agrotourism so I'm going to try and book the irrigation room at the Schrute Farms B&B.

And that is the last "The Office" joke I'll make. I've been so excited just to be near Scranton that I've been making them all day and it's annoying people.

All right, gotta go. I'm meeting Jim and Pam at Poor Richard's to see Scrantonicity. Peace.

Day 1...

Well, I learned what I was doing up here and it's even more boring than I could have imagined. I'm here to inspect all of the retaining walls on the northeast connector of the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I know it sounds awesome, but trust me, it's not.

I learned something else also. The Days Inn in Horsham, PA is a terrible, terrible place. You know your hotel stay is off to a bad start you go into your room and neither of the beds are made and all the towels are used. You might think that would make you feel at home. It doesn't. It's gross. Their continental breakfast better be amazing to make up for this.

The creepy guy isn't even doing anything interesting. He just chain smokes. And tells the same stories over and over again everytime he meets someone new. Even though the people he just told the story to are still standing there. And his eyes flutter when he talks. It's weird. I think he's trying to seduce me. Only his method of seduction is the one Bugs Bunny used on Elmer Fudd when he would cross dress in Loony Tunes cartoons.

So if you happen to be driving between Philadelphia and Scranton any time over the next two weeks and you see a two guys staring at a wall, one of whom appears to be hating his life, stop and say hello. Or run me over with your car. Your choice.

This could suck...

For the next two weeks I'll will be inspecting various structures throughout Pennsylvania. I don't know where, wish is disconcerting, but I do know that I'll be doing it with the single creepiest guy in my company. Since I'll be spending most of the time in a hotel room alone trying not to interact with this guy I might as well chronicle my days. It could be hilarious. It could be the most boring series of blogs posts in history. Stay tuned to find out.

The Olympics are awesome

I’ve watched approximately 9,000 hours of the Olympics since they started last weekend. I have a few random thoughts I’d like to share.

- I don’t get synchronized diving. I don’t really have a joke here, I just don’t get it. Synchronized swimming makes sense to me, it’s not a sport, but I understand the need for synchronization. Without it it’s just someone flailing around in a pool, which could give the appearance of drowning. But diving is already a sport, a difficult one, and it doesn’t seem as if any extra skill is needed for synchronized diving. You’re just doing the same dive you would have done by yourself with someone right next to you.

- Alicia Sacramone has inordinately large boobs for a gymnast.

- I want to play team handball. It’s awesome. Not only do I think I’d be good at it, but America does not have a representative in this Olympics because there aren’t enough athletes to field a quality team. Hello London 2012.

- I cannot reveal my sources, but I have access to Michael Phelps’ cell phone number. I think I might send him a couple of text messages. Not so much to congratulate him, everyone’s doing that, but more to make fun of his ears. And mouth. I don’t want him to get a big head after all the gold medals. Or maybe I should send congratulations in hopes that I could get Natalie Coughlin’s number from him.

On the Prowl

This is a Washington Post headline this morning:

Cougar Reportedly Seen on U-Md. Campus

The story is not at all what I hoped it would be about.

The Genius of Lou Brown

I'm a little off my game today. Kind of tired. It's probably because last night, while flipping through the channels falling asleep, I caught Major League just as it started. Everyone has a stable of movies that they always watch. It doesn't really matter where the movie is when you turn it on, you're always going to watch it until the end.*

*This theory explains why I can recite nearly every line of Braveheart. I seen it approximately 400 times, never in it's entirety though. And since I know you were wondering, my favorite line in the movie is when Longshanks is discussing instituting the right of prima nocta and he says, "the trouble with Scotland is that it's full of Scots." That gets me every time. Not because the jokes is funny, but because all of his cronies laugh like he just said the greatest thing ever. Cracks me up. Also I plan on having several kids and naming the oldest one Argyle so that when they have kids they'll call him Uncle Argyle. That's a badass name. Hopefully my future grandchildren will have Scottish accents.

Anyway, Major League is one of those movies. I love it. Easily one of the top three baseball movies of all time (the three obviously being Bull Durham, Field of Dreams and that. I was trying to decide the order and as luck would have it Bull Durham was on this weekend and I'm ready to say that it is definitely number 3, and Field of Dreams is number 1. Because it makes me cry.), so I almost always watch it until the end. Well this time I got to think about something that had never occured to me before, and it sort of bothered me. Not enough to make me stop loving the movie, but bothered me none the less.

Do you really mean to tell me, that in spring training when the Cleveland Indians were putting the team together and teaching everyone the signals that they actually had a signal for: Call your shot so that the pitcher will throw up and in and knock you down with a fastball, then on the second pitch after the sign the runner on second will steal, you lay down a bunt surprising the infielder who is playing deep, when the infielder charges, the runner (who was attempting to steal third) will never stop running, and hopefully score because of the throw to first. Call me crazy, but it seems a little ambitious to presume that all of that would happen as planned often enough to actually have a sign for that play.

This is starting to get out of control

On my way to work this morning I saw a girl sending a text message. While jogging. What could possibly be so important that it couldn't wait until after your workout, but not important enough that you would actually STOP RUNNING long enough to type out a message?

I was rooting pretty hard for her to trip on some uneven pavement. It didn't happen, but I'm happy with the knowledge that it eventually will.

Happy Bastille Day!

Hey check that out. That's almost a politcial statement. I'm so controversial.

This is how I would write if I had talent...

I thought this post was awesome.

Bromance

I know I haven't posted anything in over a month, and I doubt many people even still look at this. Also I know it's weak to do a come back post that is just a link to a "news" story, but, baby steps you know. There are some things that just make me weep for our society. This is one of them. I kind of want to just dig a hole and stay in it until all this mess blows over.

I'm Having A Shitty Day...

...no seriously, a bird shit on me on my way to lunch today. I had to walk 10 minutes with a huge pigeon turd on my arm before I could wash it off. You're piling it on these days aren't you God, frankly it's just getting mean.

When did I turn into Charlie Brown? ARGH.