Mild Amusement

A little while back, my siblings and I wanted to get my mom some jewelry for Mother's Day. We figured she'd appreciate it, and it was one of those gifts that seems more appropriate for a "we appreciate you" type occasion. However, we're all geographically spread out, so it's not like we could arrange a group outing to find something. And despite our best efforts, nothing we saw online quite seemed to match the style we were looking for. So, one of us had to make a run to a store and see what we could find. That someone would be me. If you're a regular follower of this blog, this should sound vaguely familiar. I've had some adventures purse shopping for my mom before, and even going into stores geared towards women has some interesting consequences . So, you might expect more of the same this time around. I'd walk in, feel a little awkward, and there would be some laughs at my expense. Not this time around. This was like the manliest version of...

I have some adventures when it comes to driving and parking . Hell, I even have some fun with the car radio . It's still a little surprising to me how many stories I end up having as a result of these two activities, but the blog posts don't lie. There are amusing stories to be had as a result of my car. Well, as it turns out, there's one more to add to the list. In order for this to make sense, though, I'm going to have give you some background information. First of all, I work in a office complex that houses several companies. So there are lots of people walking around, but I don't work with all of them. For the most part, this isn't a big deal. Everyone is civilized to each other, and it's not like there are company-affiliated gang battles raging across the parking lot. We just nod and say hello. Secondly, I have always intentionally parked fairly far from the office. I figure it doesn't hurt to get a little bit of extra exercise, and I don't...

Recently, a few college buddies and I decided to get together to hang out, and we settled on a back yard barbecue. I expected a good time and some banter, but even so, folks managed to surprise me. It was more than just a tad amusing. First off, since we were all going to contribute, we sent a bunch of emails back and forth about foods to bring. I suggested anticuchos at one point, and everyone was on board with this plan. So, I planned on picking up some cow heart (that's what anticucho is made from) from a butcher the day before. However, my old college roommate happened to have a butcher friend, so he beat me to it. The problem, however, was that he was in Berkeley and the heart was in San Francisco. Well, between cars, public transportation, and plain old coordination, we figured we'd have this problem licked. This was not to be. First off, someone had to pick up the heart on a Thursday, so I was at work during the day. I asked if we could pick it up the next day, but ...

For the most part, I'm a t-shirt and jeans kind of guy. I can certainly clean up when I have to, and I have my occasional forays outside of that comfort zone . Still, though, you wouldn't realistically describe me as being trendy or highly fashionable. Hell, there are little kids who consistently put me to shame . Keep that in mind. It will make the rest of this post that much more entertaining. Recently, a bunch of us went out for happy hour after work. It was promoted more as a team building thing, so I made a point of joining in on the fun. Either way, it was the first time I'd hung out with some of these folks outside the confines of a cubicle. That made for some interesting revelations and exchanges, mostly centered around what I refer to as "girly girl" things. Allow me to explain. We were talking when one of my coworkers commented that she really liked nice purses and jewelry. We're talking luxury brands, the kind of stuff that costs you at least th...

In a way, this blog post almost feels like cheating. I covered the basic outline of the story over on the CrossFit blog I maintain , so I know roughly what I'm going to write. However, there's a bunch more background and lead-up to the story there, plus a highly amusing epilogue. So, I figured there was enough "bonus" material to warrant its own blog post here. First, let's start with the setting. I go to a CrossFit class at work, and I have for a while. In fact, I've written about it once or twice here, because it leads to a good number of laughs. Well, because I've known these folks for a while, two things have happened. First, I've become friends with a bunch of the people, from the coach and his wife to a bunch of the people in the class. Secondly, because I've been going for so long, I'm something like one of the senpais . In short, I'm something like one of the "senior" students who can help mentor or fill in under the ...

A very long time ago, I wrote about some adventures on a basketball court . Well, I randomly decided to go that same basketball court recently, and ... here I am, writing another blog post. First of all, those older gentlemen were still there . And they were still heaving half court shots with wild abandon. I wrote that blog post roughly 4 years ago, and they were still there when I stepped foot on that court recently. Based on how comfortable they were running around there, I'm assuming they've been doing this pretty consistently since I wrote that first blog post. Think about that: they have been heaving half court shots just for grins for 4 years straight. That, my friends, is what winning at life looks like. I immediately noticed them when I got there, so I chuckled to myself a little bit. However, this time, I noticed a few extra details. For example, one of the guys was wearing white gloves. We're not talking Michael Jackson sequined gloves or anything, but they w...

As it turns out, people occasionally come up with some pretty interesting theories about me. So far, I've had people darn near accuse me of being in the military  and ask me if I secretly teach math for a living . For the most part, this usually happens because people don't know me very well. In those two examples, the people asking me these things were either people I didn't know, or those whom I had just met. So, I just laughed it off. Recently, though, I've had people I work with fairly consistently come up with a few entries to this list. Remember, some of these people have interacted with me on a daily basis for years. And even if I haven't talked to them directly every single one of those days, we work in an open environment where other people can overhear conversations. Even snippets of conversations give you a pretty good idea of what someone's about if you hear enough of them. The first one is actually an oldie but a goodie. A couple of folks I see ...