A Proper Introduction

I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn.

I may not know you, even though it says I've indicated you as a "Friend." And I cant be bothered to tell you how I found your name, or why I'd like to be connected to you. But hey, why can't you just give me access to all your professional information and contacts. I've indicated you as a Friend. Remember.

How the fuck is this professionally acceptable?

I am not your friend. I'm a crusty old bastard, who uses the social networks like everyone else, but expects a little social etiquette in return. A networking rub, if you will.

So this blog goes out to the Sxxxx Serlings, Jxxxxx Collinses, Nxxxxxx Nelsons and Cxxxxx Mendezes of the world. You seem like nice people and all. You work in fields related to mine. And it might even be mutually beneficial for us to be connected.

Just tell me why.

The Not-So Happy Meal

It's been said that Larry David is an exaggerated caricature of his true personality - his on-screen persona says all the things he wishes he could say in real life. And yet, with very little effort, I'm often accused of behaving just like him, and not by people who know what he's like in real life.

I get multiple emails a week to the tune of, "I just watched Curb and totally thought of you." But what they they're really saying is, "you're an abrasive asshole who's behavior is socially unacceptable. Hah!"

I'm bald, Jewish and perturbed. And I don't live in New York, where this type of description is not only acceptable, it's the master race.

Now for those who know the wife, they just feel sorry for her. Poor girl, as charming and lovely as she is, having to live with a social pariah like myself. But what most people don't realize, is that the wife is a closeted Larry David hereself, as evidenced by two recent visits to Laughing Planet Burritos.

As frequent customers, we are very familiar with their menu and typically order our five-year-old the "kid's bean and cheese burrito." It's a lot smaller and a little cheaper than their standard fare.

But on a recent solo visit, the wife was feeling only moderately hungry and decided to order the kid's burrito for herself. As she sat in the restaurant enjoying the diminutive wrap, the cashier publicly humiliated my dear, sweet wife, letting her know that in the future, kids burritos could only be ordered for kids.

Well, the future came yesterday. The wife went back to the same Laughing Planet and ordered a kid's burrito from the same cashier, who responded with a dubious look. The wife, always quick on her feet said, "It's for my kid. I going to pick her up now from camp and she'll need something to eat. So I'll just take it to go."

Left with no option, the cashier sold my wife the burrito. But she did it with hate.

It probably comes as no surprise, but I whole-heartedly side with the wife on this one. The burrito joint wins by charging only marginally less money for significantly less food and they should support the notion that uneaten beans and cheese won't be thrown away. They should be ashamed of themselves for even instituting such a policy.

Perhaps one day, we can all channel our inner-LD, without shame or indignation. And we'll all be kept a little more honest for it.

Nothing to Complain About

Do you know what the title of this blog post means to a guy like me?

It means, I've got nothing.

Complaining is my life blood. It's what gets me out of the bed in the morning. It's what fills my awkward moments around the water cooler. It's fueled the majority of these less and less frequent blog posts.

That's because these days, I really have nothing to complain about.

I've started a new job that I actually like (and involuntarily lost 10 lbs since I started).

The wife hasn't had any chemical meltdowns of late.

And I don't have time to hate on any coffee shops at the moment (I'm actually writing this from an old favorite and I sort of wonder why I ever left - oh yeah).

Anyway, therein lies the problem. Complaining is my Yoko. Without complaining, I'm a fucking mute. I know, I know. I sound like a real joy to be around. But this, sadly is just how it is.

And then last night, after a particularly enjoyable company outing, while driving the boss back to his hotel, I found myself complaining about something. Something minor and forgettable actually. But complaining just enough to trigger the boss' reaction: "My goal is to see if you can go three days without complaining," admitting that he'd just gotten two for setting me up in a swank hotel.

Apparently, this man, who has only known me on and off for the last three months, deftly identified my entire M.O.

Does this mean I've got it back? Or maybe it never went away. Either way, I hope this renewed sense of general displeasure has some legs. I've been a little lost without it.

Coffee Shop Saga (Cont.)

When we last left off, nearly two years ago, I had found a coffee shop that met my early morning criteria - on the way to work, $2 Americano's, decent atmosphere/music/staff. Prior to that, it was just an endless barrage of me bitching about one proprietor getting too personal about my bathroom time (pre-dating the genius Curb Your Enthusiasm episode covering the same topic below), or my disgust for another shop's music selection.



The last place had a nice long run. But the owners got complacent, went on an extended vacation and hired Portlandia cast-offs to run the joint. It was all downhill from there.

But, like the move that brought me there, I wasn't willing to completely forsake my morning ritual, until I found a viable substitute. And just when I least expected it, along came Water Avenue Coffee Company.

They roast their beans on site, and damn well, I must say. They kill it on the Americano, charging an equitable $2, though they call my version (very little water) an "Italiano" - a little contrived, but I'm not judging. And like all roastaries worth their metal, these guys serve up the array of pour-over brewing methods that bring out some crazy flavors if you're totally committed to the "experience."

Cool space (if not a touch "precious" - a descriptor to be discussed in greater length with the following post - coming soon ). Close to work. Nice staff. The music's never great, but it's certainly, no Paul Simon Graceland. More trance-y electronica. Fine for my purposes. This appeared to be a relationship that could last.

And then, without even consulting my pre-work-self - with complete disregard for the fragile balance that is my morning refuge - my work-day-self accepted a new job on the other side of town. And just like that, my new-found morning paramour, would be ripped from my loving embrace.

I sit here now, soaking in my final days with Water Ave., recounting our short, but passionate lives together. We had a real good thing going, and yet, we may never see each other again.

So to this sweet little shop, tucked under the east side industrial bridges, you'll be in my heart forever. And maybe, just maybe, our paths will cross again in this crazy, mixed-up world.

Adieu.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 7)

A Tale of Two Dressers

Yes readers, it has been a while. But not for lack of material. Only a lack of time. So much has happened with the wife's sniffer these last four months that I can only share with you the best and most recent episode now.

For the last five years, the wife has been pleading with me to buy her a dresser, as her clothes are strewn across our bedroom floor, occasionally making it to a laundry receptacle. This may come as a surprise to anyone who has been reading, but the wife is, how shall I say...a fucking slob.

Crazy, right? One would assume that with all her sensitivities to noxious odors, she would in turn also be a neat freak. Not the case.

Our house looks like an episode of Hoarders, but instead of garbage bags full of soup cans or feral cats cluttering the house, our place is wall-to-wall hairballs and dust bunnies. It's all organic, locally-grown dust, though, so it's fine.

Anyway, the wife wanted a dresser. And I was all too happy to provide. I took pictures of dressers I found in antique stores. I offered to order one from Crate & Barrel. But nothing was good enough. Either the drawers didn't open smoothly. Or The style wasn't right for our room. You know, that early-mission-I-just-don't-give-a-shit-style.

And of course, there was the smell issue. Anything new would be treated with chemicals and anything used would have someone else's smell on it.

Now, I am sympathetic to my wife's affliction, but every once in a while, I demand that logic come into play. She may not like other people's smells, and I'm with her there. But other people's smells should not cause the same reaction that say, a wood stain, might. Body odor is not chemically engineered.

My attitude was, buy someone else's dresser, give it a nice healthy scrub (with non-toxic cleansers) and deal with it until it takes on a smell of our own.

The wife went and bought an IKEA dresser. Obviously.

To be expected, the nondescript box with drawers smelled distinctly like new IKEA furniture - a mix of freshly pressed particle board and Swedish meatballs. And while the wife wouldn't dare bring the toxins into our home, she had no problem leaving it in the back of our car for the next couple days. Somehow, she's unaffected by glues and dyes when she's in motion.

So I brought the box directly into our garage and unpacked all 497 pieces. Never mind the fact that this would take up a ridiculous amount of space in our already cluttered garage. That thing had some off-gassing to do. At least two months worth.

In the meantime, with clothes piling up in every corner of our bedroom, the wife surprised me one day as I returned home from work. She's purchased a lovely, mid-century modern dresser that she found on craigslist and had it delivered to our home - already assembled. I loved it.

All I had to do was repackage the IKEA dresser, drive it back to the burbs and reclaim my $100. And with the help of our neighbor, I carried the pre-owned dresser upstairs and found a nice spot between her just laundered jeans and slightly soiled jog bras that littered the floor. Perfect.

Perfect until we opened up a drawer. Yes, it smelled. Kind of perfume-y. Kind of moth-ball-y. But according to the wife, all deal-breaker-y.

She gave each drawer a once-over with our highly ineffective non-toxic cleaners but it still smelled. And yet, as if the smells inside the drawers were hermetically sealed in this wobbly mid-century modern design, the wife closed the drawers up and went on about her business, leaving the dresser where it sat, mere inches from where we sleep at night.

That was two months ago. The used, mid-century modern dresser still sits empty in our bedroom. The new, unassembled, IKEA, off-gassing dresser still sits in pieces in our garage. And the woman's clothes still take up every square inch of usable floor space in our bedroom. She refuses to put her clothes in the used dresser. And we can't assemble the new dresser until we sell the vintage one.

So, anyone in the market?

Do It For Your Prostate - 2010

I like to grow mustaches. Plural. I just can't keep them.

The growth is rich and thick, sure. But short, bald and oddly groomed facial hair don't mix. No matter how hard I try.

So I grow them for as long as I can bear to be laughed at, and then the inevitable shave.

It drives the wife bonkers. Which is kind of my way of getting payback. Besides, it's a super cheap thrill.

So for the last two Novembers, I've used Movember, a fund raising effort that seeks an end to prostate cancer, as my excuse to 'stache out.

I don't know anyone who's ever had prostate cancer, so this is not a personal mission for me. And, as I mentioned here last November, I'm not much of a "giver," so this is not just another altrustic hobby I've jumped on.

This is about me and mustache. And without this blessed annual event, there is absolutely no reason for me to look this absurd.

Last year, I didn't raise a dime. I didn't even donate to myself. Nor did I inted to. I set up a Movember page just to keep up my shaky charade. And to be fair, I started growing the mustache about a week into November and shaved it right before Thanksgiving dinner. Fails on both counts.

But this year, I'm all in. I've had this bad boy growing since day one. And I'm taking it on the road, to spend Thanksgiving with the in-laws. The wife couldn't be more thrilled.

I've even raised some money. $160 to date. And I'm only about half way through the month. And yes, I plan to make a financial contribution myself, this year.

If you'd like to contribute to my mustache, and other people's prostates, you can make your donation here.

Or just grow your own mustaches.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 6)

The wife and I don't get out much. At least not with each other. Our lack of babysitters and the cost associated with them have conspired to keep us socially irrelevant.

But when our good friend invited us to the opening of his new bar, we made a thrice-annual night out of it. Not only did we want to support our friend, this particular bar opening was slated to be a real big deal, based on said friend's past endeavors (I'd mention the friend and the bar, but we have a very strict, no real names policy here at Look Lefty).

Parking was a challenge and we found ourselves walking, hand-in-hand through a bizarre stretch of road framed by Dennys restaurants and cheap convention center hotels.

About a block away, my wife quickly veered off the sidewalk and through some bushes into a random parking lot, pulling me with her. "What's going on?" I asked, only with a super annoyed tone. Disgusted, she replied, "smokers!"

I hadn't even noticed, but sure enough, right in our path was a plume of hot, steamy carcinogens. I acquiesced and joined her through the bushes.

I think it's important to note here, that this woman who claims to experience such volatile reactions to all things chemical, was actually a smoker herself when we first met. And the really weird part - while many people claim to be social smokers, only opting for the fashionable little cancer wands when out with friends, my dear sweet wife, was a closeted smoker. She would only puff in the privacy of her own home (where she all but chain-smoked), extinguishing any sign of them when people (including myself) came around. Nowadays, she can't lick a stamp without getting chest pains.

Now back to the bar.

As we rounded the corner, we ran into two more smokers standing right outside the door. There was no getting inside without walking right past them. And the best part was, one of the two smokers was a partner in the bar. The wife had never met him, but I had on several occasions, so an introduction was not only in order, it would have been terribly rude to enter his bar without doing so.

The wife extended a tentative hand like a little mouse about to get batted around by feral cat. The friend took her hand and smiled graciously, not knowing anything of my wife's afflictions, all while his cigarette continued to burn just inches away.

I reveled in the moment, watching my wife squirm before finally entering the bar. Not nice, but that was my only entertainment for the evening.

As expected, the place was incredible and packed to the gills. The food looked amazing and the space was styled out beautifully. Surely, a place I will frequent.

And like any new establishment, the air was thick with the lingering aroma of fresh paint and toxic adhesives.

We said hello to our friend, congratulated him on the opening and promptly left.

All in all, a night to remember.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 5)

I have officially found my muse.

Cassavettes had his Rowlands.

Woody had his Farrow. And his Keaton. And his Soon Yi.
(I don't know about you, but I still don't like looking at his stepdaughter's cleavage, even though she did just turn 40).

My muse, and I love her for it, is my wife's central nervous system.

I worried that such a niche subject simply couldn't sustain itself. I mean, how many disruptions to her environment could I expect to write about in a given year? And make a good story out of it? One? Maybe two?

I am here to tell you, that my dear, sweet, afflicted wife is providing an endless cannon of material. A bottomless treasure trove of absurdity. If the Chilean miners dug into this one, they might never make it out.

Last week I was tempted to write a post, applauding the hyper-sensitive receptors built into this woman, rather than ridiculing them. While strolling through our otherwise sleepy little neighborhood, she sniffed out not one, but two gas leaks coming from separate houses. The gas company was called on both occasions. Leaks were found and repaired. And everyone lived happily ever after.

Incredible. Imagine what might have been without that uncanny sense of smell. Explosions. Lifeless bodies on kitchen floors. To think, my wife - a modern day Toxic hero.

I just couldn't find a good hook.

But like any proper muse, that good wife of mine came back with all new material. This week's episode: Don't Turn On The New Furnace.

Most people will only succumb to purchasing a new furnace after the old one completely shits the bed, and even then, only after the temperatures drop below 55F.

Not us.

Our furnace was operating pretty much just fine, save for an irregular filter space. Which meant we were never getting 100% filter coverage. And that meant, the basement smells wafting up through our vents were a chronic issue for my wife. When the furnace experienced an operational hiccup last April, repaired with only a q-tip and some olive oil, a decision was forced - the Cadillac of furnaces with the uber-hepa-filter system, to be installed during summer's warmest months.

The installation itself posed a bit of a threat. What with all the industrial tape and epoxies required. In fact, my wife worried so much that she made plans to sleep at a friends house for that entire week. As it turns out, she stayed home and was only mildly affected with a bit of an itchy throat. Huge progress.*

Inching our way through the gauntlet of this home improvement project, we were feeling pretty good. All that was left was to turn that baby on. Crank it up. Find out exactly what Melba Toast was packing down there.

But the smells! Yes, we were told, there would be some initial smells. Internal coatings or what have you would need to burn off within the first couple of hours of use. Which meant, we'd wait.

The wife wanted to wait until she left town for the Thanksgiving holidays. Through all of October and most of November. No heat.

Until then, the plan was to just double sock it and throw on an extra afghan. Think of the money we'd save not using the $4000 dollar furnace we just bought.

Were it not for our neighbor - one of the two gas leak victims discovered - coming over to watch our kid this week, we'd still be living in a meat locker. She looked so sad and cold when we came home, bundled up under every blanket we own and maybe even a few bath towels. Empathy took over and my wife decided it was only right to apply the heat and suffer the consequences.

There was a smell. It was chemical-born for sure. And yet, here we all are, on the other side, warm, breathing easily and blogging about it.

Thanks honey. Keep up the good fodder. We'll all just wait for whatever comes next.

*Addendum: After reading the post above, the wife reminded me that she did in fact spend one night sleeping out of the house. Still, not an entire week. And by my measure, still a great stride forward.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 4)

It's my wife's birthday today, September 17. For those unfamiliar with the back story on this wonderfully complex creature, please see Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.

So anyways, I was coming up blank on what to buy the woman who wants nothing, and fears everything that off-gases. There were some suggestions bandied about the office including a gas-mask, a HEPA-one-piece, and a hyperbolic chamber. All good ideas.

If you recall my last post, I am happy to report that the case of the off-gassing phone has been resolved and the wife no longer speaks to people through a BPA-free plastic bag. She is braving it, placing that little plastic cancer vessel directly up against her face. And barely complaining.

So I thought, perhaps, what this woman needs is a head set (wired of course), that would keep her head a nice safe distance from her radio frequencies. Only problem, this nearly new phone of hers only accepts a head set through one of those mini-usb ports - not the traditional ear phone jacks everyone else in the world has. And because no one else in the world uses such a ridiculous item, they are not sold in any physical retail space.

Hence, my recent purchase on Amazon.

The wife is absolutely thrilled and the whole thing (S&H included) only cost me $15.

All birthdays should be this sweet.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 3)

I should probably just rename the blog, focusing on this theme as it is by far my most compelling. In any event, we've got a real doozy.

As was briefly noted in my last post, the wife, subject of both T.C.M.J.K.Y-A.L.S (Parts 1 & 2), was none too happy with my recent purchase of the iCancer. In fact, I've already received a litany of emails from her detailing the SAR levels, or Specific Absortion Rates in all phones. While she may be right (I looked it up, and subsequently, I turn the wifi off and the Airplane mode on, anytime I put the phone in my pocket), the wife is certifiably insane.

exhibit a:
No, my wife isn't so insane as to believe that the radiation will be stopped by a flimsy little ziplock. That would be far to simple a problem.

After extensive research on the SAR levels of every make and model of phone, my wife settled on this hot little number, a LG CF360, knowing that I would be switching us from Sprint to AT&T with my far more fantastic, tumor phone.

As rudimentary and absurd as the phone she wanted may be, it was light years ahead of her former free phone (and way less cancer-causing), so she seemed excited about that.

But as soon as the small mass of plastic and silicone emerged from the box, a wave of noxious chemicals hit my dear sweet wife in the kisser with all the force of a Nazi gas chamber.

The tongue and throat started to swell. The chest palpitated. And the brain throbbed.

That evil little communication device would have to go to the garage, where it would be left to off-gas. This lasted about a week. That's how long my wife went without a cell phone. A week. Because the chemicals were off-gassing.

Finally, she gave it another go, with similar results. But she needs a phone. So, like any rational person might do, my wife put the off-gassing plastic phone, inside an off-gassing plastic bag. And while it doesn't seem to be quite as offensive to her highly sensitive nervous system, she has ultimately decided to trade this one in for another, plastic, off-gassing phone.

This is currently how she takes her calls, so if it sounds like she's wrapped in plastic the next time you speak to her, rest assured. It's just her phone.

Procuring the iPhone

After three years of working in an industry that labels you a professional pariah if you can't "bump" phones or shoot grainy, faded looking photos with your hipstamatic, I finally gave in. But man, it wasn't easy.

My wife didn't make it easy. Besides not wanting to spend the money, she claimed that the games on this new device would stunt our child's brain development and that we'd all be exposed to Silkwood amounts of radiation.

Apple didn't make it easy. Despite making $200 off of me, plus all the kickbacks they get from the app purchases, three separate stores in my state were completely sold out of the iPhone4, one full month after the product's release date. I could either order the device and wait 7-14 days, or I could check back daily, as they receive sporadic deliveries and sell whatever shows up on a first come basis. How is that a business plan?


AT&T didn't make it easy. Even though they're gonna take me for $114 per month over the next two years, every one of their locations in the greater Portland area also "claimed" to be sold out. The last store I tried gave me the same story, until I disclosed the part about me switching over from Sprint. Once I uttered those magic words, the clerk looked both ways to make sure no one saw him, and pulled the holy grail of modern communication out from under his register. He said it was his only one. That motherfucker!

And yet, here I go, diving into an abyss of chemotherapy, poor customer service and apps that help me geo-track my TV remote. Ah, iPhone. How did I get by without you?

Living With The Gout

(And how the American medical system failed me)

4 am. July 5th. I sat alone, tired, and in excruciating pain under the bright emergency room lights at Providence Medical Center.

I don't mean alone like, no one came with me. I mean I was the only human in the waiting area of the emergency room. Weird, given that these were the wee hours following a long night of young children playing with illegal explosives and residential neighborhoods sounding like the streets of Kabul.

If there had been just one severed extremity or any searing flesh in line before me, I might just have hobbled back outside, pointed a roman candle straight into my own eye, and prayed for a distraction from the pain in my foot.

I was ankle-deep in throes of a gout attack.

If you don't know what the gout is, or you think it's the same thing as gangrene or hand, foot and mouth disease, then let me quickly clarify.

Gout is an acute form of arthritis that typically affects the big toe, though it can show up in any joint. I get it in the ankles, too. It feels like getting your foot caught in a bear trap. If it was on fire. And you had to give birth, while getting kicked in the nuts. And shot. In the face.

When people talk about this horrid affliction, it's never just "gout." It's always, "the gout." Like "The Hague." Or "The Fonz." Why the superfluous "the?" Because pain of this magnitude just demands that kind of respect.

It's also known as the "rich man's disease," which is either because of the rich foods rich people eat, or because it only affect 1% of the population (mostly male).

Ironically, I spent much of my childhood fearing that I would suffer through the unimaginable pain of a kidney stone - a close cousin of the gout in that they both result from high uric acid levels. Those dreaded little calcium deposits were things of lore in my family, passed down from (and through) my father and grandfather before me. The mere thought of having to pee stones out my...well, my legs are tightly crossed as I sit here typing.

But I digress. Back to that big, lonely emergency room. This was my saving grace. Maybe this would be quick. Get in, shoot me up with some pain meds, and get out.

Nope. I waited two hours, writhing in pain every minute of it. When the doctor finally did show up, he hurried me through a diagnosis (sore ankle) and a suggested treatment (anti-inflammatory), and handed me a prescription. Oh, and he gave me two Percoset to get me through the current attack.

Before I could limp out of the hospital, the front desk stopped me for my copay on the visit - $125.00. ONE FUCKING HUNDRED AND TWENTY FUCKING FIVE FUCKING DOLLARS. My copay! Presumably, the insurance company would owe the hospital more on top of that.

Two-hours and $125.00 later, and all I got was a band-aid to a problem the doctor didn't even suggest fixing. Yes folks. This is your American medical system (if you have insurance).

I've been plagued by the gout for about eight years now, the first three of which went improperly diagnosed.

The first time I had an attack, I woke up feeling like I'd sprained my ankle. My primary care physician told me I had a blood clot.

The next time it came up, an orthopedic surgeon thought I might have misshapen bones in my feet, but he wanted to inject me with dye to find out for sure. Dye! The opposite of "live."

What the fuck is wrong with these people?

Finally, my wife convinced me during an attack on my big toe to see a Chinese acupuncturist who spoke no English - Dr. Chan. Limping through the sketchiest part of Seattle's Chinatown, I wasn't sure if I was gonna get rolled, or offered a hit off the communal crack pipe. Instead, I left the oddly sterile offices still in pain, but with a used, brown, paper bag full of roots to boil and soak my foot into. Needless to say, I was not super convinced.

Yet, despite all that skepticism, this was my first "gout" diagnosis (Dr. Chan had a translator).

It was like the veil had been lifted. The great wizard, with the fancy prefix on his name that only doctors get, is really just one of your father's drunk fraternity brothers with a nice car.

Still, I wasn't ready to give up on western medicine. Not after all the wonderful vaccines and inflated insurance premiums they've given me all these years. Not because one wise, old medicine man proposed an ailment that sounded a lot like what I might have.

I went back to the "traditional" doctors to get some second and third opinions. And what do you know? I had the gout. Well, at least as far as they could tell. The only true diagnosis for gout, according to Quincy, was to take a fluid sample from my affected joints during the height of an attack. Translation: They have to stick a needle in my toe and pull stuff out when the pain is at its most unbearable.

Here's the crazy part. Every one these traditional doctors wants me to take a pill everyday for the rest of my life to prevent any more attacks from coming. The rheumatologists, the orthopods, the podiatrist, the family doctor - all of them. The boilerplate line has been, "if you don't want to take the pills, don't complain about the pain."

The pills in question, are called Allopurinol. And it's true. The pills do help reduce the production of uric acid in your system (my grandfather also suffered from gout and was on Allopurinol most of his life - he also died of a heart attack after beating Hotchkins Lymphoma).

Now I'm no doctor, but the notion that a 38-year-old, otherwise healthy man needs to take a chemically engineered substance for the next 50 or so years was kind of preposterous to me. I might rid myself of the gout but at what cost? A golf ball sized tumor on my liver?

So, despite the pain, which was coming more frequently and with greater force, I began searching for an alternative cure.

As wise as old Dr. Chan was, he admitted that acupuncture doesn't always help the gout. And in my case, he was right. What I did learn from him though is that gout is highly affected by diet. No organ meats, shellfish or heavy creams. Done. Oh, and no alcohol.

Now I'm not a big drinker anyway, but they can't mean "no," right? Less, maybe. But "no?"

Actually, "no" really does mean "no." A few sips of beer, and I feel it. That goes for wine and whisky, too. The only social lubricant I've found gout will allow is small amount of the clear stuff - gin and vodka. So that's fun.

Then I started looking into the natural treatments. Black cherry extract is probably the most well-known, though the traditional doctors claim to know nothing about it. Unfortunately, it's an incredibly expensive habit to keep up, and I seemed to grow immune to the sweet little capsules.

I made it through the last winter with a mild amount of pain and was pleased with that. But as the weather warmed, I noticed the inflammation building again like a hemorrhoid on the backside of Mount Vesuvius.

Then I discovered "the Mother." Part of the miracle treatment known as Bragg Organic Apple Cider Vinnegar. I found it online as a natural prevention for the gout, among other things. But it has to have "the Mother."

The more I asked people what they knew about Bragg, the more I found out that it was being touted as the natural cure-all (much like the Dr. Bronner's, complete with quasi-religious text on the label).

It's cheap. Easy to find. And while a little unpleasant to the taste, it has no harmful side effects, other than possibly removing the enamel from your teeth. Fuck it. I was in.

I took two, one-tablespoon doses daily, cut with a little distilled water, and after one week, I was already feeling the effects. Not only was I not having any attacks, all the tenderness in my big toes had vanished completely. This was the best my feet had felt in five years.

And just to be sure this wasn't some weird placebo effect, I held off on buying another bottle after I drained the first one. Within three days, my toes started hurting again. I was back suckling at the restorative teet of the Mother.

So you may be wondering (if you've made it this far), if this stuff works so well, what was I doing in the hospital early Monday morning?

Well, it was fourth of July weekend. And while I've never been capable of a true bender, I did let the beer flow a bit more freely than usual. I had gotten drunk on my feet's new freedom and I paid the price.

What then is the point of this absurdly long post? I've really proved nothing. I hate the western medical community and yet, I found myself begging them for mercy just a couple days ago. I love the Mother and all of it's healing benefits, but I still can't knock back a couple of cold ones without a reaction. What's a guy with the gout supposed to do?

My plan: Make all my cocktails with two parts apple cider vinegar and let Dr. Chan handle everything from the rectal exams up.

The Huffington Enquirer

According to the Huffington Post, back on June 5 "Mom finds (my) missing kid after 15 years using Facebook." I say "my" kid, because it was my kid, pictured alongside this headline.

Mind you, my kid is only four years old. And other than that one time back in Nam, she's never really gone missing.

Now despite that little subtlety, a photograph - not a screen-grab, a photograph - of my Facebook page was featured with this story about a woman who's kids were taken by her husband 15 years ago and she just found them through Facebook. On the front page! Mid-way down, but on the front-friggin page of the Huffington Post. (This screen grab is my only proof, as the picture has since been removed from the story).

I read "HuffPo," as the loyalists call it, from time to time. I've always considered it a reputable news source, if not just a little too entertain-y to be considered "real news."

So why this photo? Well, if you've stuck with this sorry excuse for a blog for any length of time (and I can't imagine why you would), you might remember a little story that was published by the Associated Press, also a fairly well-repsected news source. It featured yours truly and largely referenced an earlier post from this very blog. The original story can still be found at various respectable online news outlets, like msnbc.

I authorized the AP photo. I even posed like a self-satisfied grinning schmuck next to a glowing monitor featuring my little princess. But never did I imagine such a brazen act of journalistic vandalism would result.

I contacted the AP and learned that this was an isolated incident (the story about the missing kids appeared all over the Net, but only the Huffington Post used my Facebook page as an accompanying photo). So I sent the Huffington Post a letter expressing my displeasure with the situation.

After five days, they removed the photo. No apology. No response at all, actually. But hey, now they're practicing real, legitimate journalism.

I kind of wanted to get a little more out of the deal. Like a half-million dollar settlement or something. What's my case? Well, who's to say, the next headline to accompany my Facebook page won't read "Child impersonator uses Facebook to find best birthday clowns?"

Scary stuff, people.

Don't you LOL me.

This morning I received an email from one of my oldest friends, who will remain nameless as he is no doubt reading this to keep up with his blogosphere. Yes, he is one of those. You know the type. Always tweeting and tagging friends while he virtually "Checks In" to his off-line destinations. I understand that it's critical in his career that he stay current. But the trend has now led us into knowing way more about these people's lives than you'd ever need to. And it's just annoying as hell.

It should also be noted that he didn't simply send this email to one of my three primary addresses. He emailed my facebook page.

We chatted back and forth a bit before I asked for his take on the latest internet sensation, Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. Just in case you haven't heard the Das Racist buzz, here it is. And it's wonderful.



Somehow, this darling of SXSW had escaped his RSS feed. He replied, "I actually don't know the Das Racist meme - but sounds right up my alley."

Meme. Come on. Don't talk to me like one of your chat room buddies. I'm a human being and that thing I asked him about is a song - not a meme.

Yes. I know what a meme is. For those of you who do not, it is defined on wikipedia as "a postulated unit of cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena."

That's not the point.

I've known this guy since 1987. I went to high school and college with him. He was at my wedding (I was not at his, because he got married in Puerto Rico and I wasn't on any cruise ships that week). But I've known this guy long before there were online memes or tweets. Or emails for that matter. He can't just casually throw meme into a conversation with me and not expect me to devote an entire blog post to it (don't think the blogger who calls the kettle black is lost on me).

Which all brings me to a larger discussion. As a rule, emoticons and online acronyms are the work of barely literate teenagers, too jacked up on Monster energy drinks and chatroulette masturbators to actually write their own thoughts, because it might tip their character count. Don't try and charm me with a tongue-out, winking smily face. It ain't happening.

Just to illustrate how bad the problem has gotten, I was watching a television show the other night where one character said out loud to another, "TTYL." They were standing face to face. Is this what we've come to, people? If we go out to dinner, in a real restaurant, and you tell me a good story, am I simply to check a box that reads, "Lefty likes this"?

And just for the record, I have never so much as typed the letters LOL (until now). I don't believe anyone who says they are LMAO. These terms barely have relevance in the online world. But please, if you must communicate like this, keep it online and directed at someone other than me.

B.O. vs. Cancer

So, I smelled. Pretty fucking bad.

In the last year or so, I developed an odor so profound, some kind of weird, old man overactive pheromone stink so distinct, that I almost have trouble going to bed with myself. I can only imagine how tough it is for my wife.

It all started when I decided it was time to forsake the aluminum-filled Old Spice for something a little less Alzheimers-y.

Mmmm, Old Spice. Before the new ad campaign featuring LL Cool J and showering Centaurs, aiming squarely at the Axe Body Spray market, this was a scent you could only inherit from a father. In fact, I did inherit from my father.



I loved that smell. It was strong. You could smell an Old Spice man, whistling a mile away. Back in the 90s, one of my work colleagues quietly advised me to "ease up on the cologne," refusing to believe that such a mellifluous scent could come from a single off-yellow stick, applied generously to my underarms.

I started rubbing all that muskiness on my tender 13-year old pits well before I even had an odor. All 79 pounds of me, with a thick pair of glasses and an unruly Jew-Fro, trying to smell like a grizzled old sailor, as he returns home from sea.

Now, with 24 years of Johnson and Johnson lab work seeping deep into my pores, I'm probably already mutating cells like a 3-mile island resident. So I started seeking an alternative. Problem is, the natural stuff doesn't work. I was going through deodorants like other people go through breath mints. I had long talks with the natural grocers about my desire to smell ok and not get weird diseases from my hygiene. One of them steered me toward a Tea Tree Oil based stick from JASON natural body care products.

It seemed to work so I stuck with it, despite the fact that my wife told me she has bad reactions to Tea Tree Oil and a new work colleague told me that Tea Tree has high levels of estrogen that will soon cause me to grow breasts. Fuck it. It smells ok and it probably won't give me cancer. My wife and my man breasts would have to suffer.

But then I made a fatal flaw. I went and messed with my then harmonious pH balance.

Up until this point, I had been very happy with my natural bath soap - the bar version of Dr. Bronners soap. Yes, the same Dr. Bronner's soap you hippies use while touring with Phish and cleaning your dishes in a nearby stream - if you clean your dishes. But the bar version doesn't come with all that baggage. Because it's a bar and it lives in your shower, it's indistinguishable from the chemical laden Coast or Ivory I had lived without for years. In fact, I didn't even realize that I had been using that Dr. Bronners.

Then one night, my wife told me she rented a documentary called "Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap Box." A movie about soap.



It was fascinating. Truly. I recommend it highly. Seriously.

I decided to switch from Dr. Bronner's bar soaps, to his liquid bottles, just like the one hippie campers use. It would be like taking a little camping trip in my shower every morning. It smelled way mint-ier and it makes your balls tingle. No joke. I have discussed this phenomenon with other users and they agree, the Dr. Bronner ball tingle is great way to start your day.

And then it started. The stink. It was huge. Powerful. And it literally started the moment I got out of the shower - even before I could apply my new natural tea tree oil deodorant. It made no sense. How something so sweet and minty, could make me smell so foul? And it was unlike any body odor I had ever encountered. I could smell it in meetings at work. I could smell it while eating meals. You can only imagine what a smell like that evolved into by day's end.

So I went off the Dr. Bronner's liquid. Back on the Dr. Bronner's bar soap. I think I'm smelling better everyday and I'm keeping it natural.

But this whole thing really made me wonder; could hippies earn more respect if they just used Bronner's bar soap over that stink-filled liquid?

Do It For Your Prostate

I don't pretend to be someone who gets behind causes. I hate anything-a-thons. And I hate asking people for money. Sort of rules me out of most fund-raising endeavors.

But it's November. And that means it's Movember. What's Movember, you ask.

Basically, men all over the world get to indulge their weird displays of virility all in the name of prostate and testicular cancer. Here here!

Truth told, raising money for prostate cancer was never my intention. I was just sick and I didn't shave for a week. And I just happened to carve out this slick little number on November 1.

Not just a mustache, but a mustache with the flavor saver (a term I had never heard before and which everyone tells me has perverse connotations - if I've offended, I apologize but I just thought it was a good expression for all the flavors that go in your mouth and get caught in that thing on the way in). The whole reason for the flavor saver in the first place was to distinguish me, a poseur hipster, from the guy without the flavor saver who rapes young boys.

The wife hasn't been very impressed with my sweet new look. She says she's not sure if she's attracted to me with this thing. I'm not sure she was all that attracted to me without it, so I figure, no loss there. I probably would have shaved it by now, but it is Movember, and if I hold out til Thanksgiving, I can fuck up some serious family photos. So I'm keeping it.

I am by no means asking you to donate money. I'm not even sure I'm going to. But I might. And if you felt like you might want to support these nastly little pubes growing all over my upper lip, or just the fate of balls everywhere, please do. You can make a contribution on my mustache's behalf here:

http://us.movember.com/mospace/468637/

Weekend Downtown Users borrowed my cell phone

I don’t spend a lot of time in downtown on weekends. It’s a very different place than it is on weekdays.

Weekday downtown users (WDDUs) stream in to the parking garages and tall glass buildings five mornings a week, only to return to their quiet little neighborhoods in the late afternoons and on weekends. It’s organized, rhythmic for the most part, well-kempt.

On weekends, my pleasant little city becomes Attack of the Bodysnatchers, but the only bodies being snatched are covered in scabs and tattoos. The place is fucking gross. I was mostly amazed that they keep this alternate slice of Portlandia so well hidden from us WDDUs.

Where do all these Weekend Downtown Users (WEDU) go? I should have never asked that question – they’re obviously looting the WDDUs neighborhoods on weekdays. Or maybe once downtown fills up with all us WDDUs, the WEDUs just blend in. Yeah, ok. We’ll go with that.

So I rode into downtown today (Sunday) to meet a friend and check out a movie. The WEDUs were in full junkie-fucking effect. I nearly ran over a few on my bike.

As we walked out of the theater after the show, my friend and I talking about the flick, we were asked by a tweaked out twenty-something couple (mind you, the worst looking twenties you’ve ever seen) if they could borrow a cell phone. They added some sob story about trying to get a ride back to Texas.

I had about a split second for the following thought - Don’t be “The Man.” Lend em the phone. Aww, man, I don’t want them touching my phone. That shit is personal. I understand if you’re a young lost kid, or an elderly person, or someone in real trouble that they didn’t create themselves. But not this bullshit... Don’t be “The Man.”

So I handed over the phone. One of their scabby claws grabbed it. The guy’s actually. He dialed a number with his back to me, hung up and dialed another.

I tried to continue a natural conversation with my friend about the movie we just saw, but it was useless. I was way too busy stressing over the Hep D he was leaving on my phone, which I will now never use again.

I know I shouldn't be surprised by all of this. It happens in major metropolitan areas all across the country - the seedy side exposed once the worker bees evacuate (a phenomenon, by the way, worthy of a documentary). I just thought my town was different.

So if you’re reading this, and you ooze something infected anywhere on your body that’s visible, let’s just play our respective roles. You be the disgusting junkie messing up my nice little city. And I’ll be “The Man.”

My Inner-Hippie

Back in my college days, I did the whole hippie thing. Not very original, I know. Especially going to college in Madison, Wisconsin. That’s like saying, I went to Vassar and did the lesbian thing. Or I went to Florida State and did the date rape thing. Totally cliché.

Perhaps even more embarrassing, there was no altruistic motive behind my peace, love and happiness. I wasn't saving baby seals or feeding the world. It was just me, a pair of Birkenstocks, and an unruly Jew-fro experimenting with recreational drugs, while driving an old VW all over the country to see jam bands like the Grateful Dead and Phish.



The natural progression for this post-college wannabe was to head west. Portland Oregon to be exact. But what happened next was completely unexpected. No sooner had I unpacked my Guatemalan backpack, than I shed the whole youthful facade, starting with my hair, shaved down to a quarter of an inch. And with my new cop-like buzz cut, I quickly adopted an uptight behavioral pattern, which completely belied my previous "don't harsh on my mellow" vibe.

At the time, I was neither proud, nor ashamed of my former identity. I saw the humor in my fickle transformation, but at the same time, I had no real interest in returning to that free-spirit lifestyle. That was the old me and the new me had a new rep to establish.

Years passed and I pretty much settled into the persona I formed in those early Portland days. I moved around a bit for my career, met a nice girl, got married and had a baby. We moved back to Portland, bought a nice house, in a nice neighborhood and own a nice car. I went from “hippie” to “yuppie," carrying on the great American cliché.

But this summer marked 17 years since my last brush with the patchouli crowd, and I was finally ready to relive a little slice of my dirty past. Phish announced they were playing the Gorge Amphitheater, just a scant 4.5 hour road trip away, and it seemed I had found my venue. With a couple of hall-passes from the wives, an old friend and I set out on our own 24-hour summer tour.

We arrived at the campground about four hours before show time and all the old memories came wafting in through the car windows. Kind veggie burritos. Errant Frisbees. And yes, an obscene amount of freshly burned cannabis. The nostalgia felt warm and refreshing but through the dense fog of dried up desert dust, cigarette smoke and body odor, I could see that this place was filthy. Garbage strewn about. Aimless slobs casually invading your space. And a line-up of gas-guzzling, luxury RVs as far as the eye could see.

These weren’t the merry pranksters or the Abbie Hoffmans I aspired to all those years ago. These weren’t the young and the free. These people looked old and rough. They needed more than a shower. They needed a blood transfusion.

My traveling companion reminded me that back in the day there were plenty of cracked out punks, who would rip off their own bro’ for another nitrous balloon. The shows never were about hippies, he said. Just a bunch of bums who want to dress up in funny outfits and take drugs. He was absolutely right. I was disillusioned.

The music started and I was able to relax a bit, actually enjoying what I had come all this way to see in the first place. And then it occurred to me, as my head involuntarily bobbed up and down to newer songs I never heard before - I had inadvertently become the hippie I mistook myself for all those years prior. Only with less hair, a button down shirt and a bad attitude. Here's how I figure it:

1. I ride my bike to work everyday, part of our whole one-car family plan to keep the fuel consumption low.
2. We are a staunchly organic household (mostly due to the wife and her chemical objections).
3. Our summer veggies come straight out of the backyard compost garden.
4. My kid starts summer camp today at a farm called Mother Earth, where she’ll be stomping barefoot on locally grown berries to make jelly.

I’m not complaining. I just thought I was going through a phase.

(P.S. Sorry to leave you with the maggot post all this time - I really had nothing of consequence to say).

Internet-1, My Garbage Can-0

I had never seen a maggot in real life. Until two nights ago, when I opened the outside garbage can only to find hundreds of the little buggers crawling all over my shit. Truly, the creepiest, non-threatening things put on this earth.

My father always used the expression, "that (something he had just scarfed down) could gag a maggot," the sound of which always caused me to gag slightly, myself, but made me think a lot about what a maggot eats.

And there was that scene in Poltergeist, where the dude reaches for the piece of steak and maggots scurry out, which scared the crap out of me. So I went searching for the clip online. I didn't find it. Instead, I found something far more horrible. In fact, what I saw in my trash can, were just adorable, little, organic, prepubescent flies, by comparison.

I urge you not to watch this.

The Chemicals May Just Kill You - A Love Story (Part 2)

Now that the character of my wife has been firmly established, we'll just pick up where we left off, only to say again, the woman has some intense sensitivities to the world in which we live.

One sensitivity that's been rearing it ugly rear lately, is her aversion to the WIFI waves that are passing around us, specifically when we use or get close to the laptop. Here's the first article that comes up in google on the matter.

This rules out all sharing of funny youtube videos, or picking out new house furnishings online. There will be no quick looking up of movie times. And if you want to stream in some music, you best be doing that on the desktop computer upstairs - the same desktop that gives off the signal my laptop receives. Shhh, don't tell her.

Last night we were discussing ways to save money and the topic of cancelling cable came up. I was all for it. We could get Apple TV (can anyone recommend?), kaibosh cable and netflix, and only buy the shows and movies we want to watch.
This would force us to choose our television viewing wisely, not just grow numb to the nightly channel surf, hoping tonight we land on something, anything other than House Hunters International and the 11 pm Chelsea Lately or Jon Stewart debate. We might even start reading and listening to music more. We were giddy with the possibilities. So much so, that my wife leaned over my shoulder to read about Apple TV on the evil laptop.

And then she saw it. Big, bold lettering. "Wireless to the Extreme."

The waves! The waves would be all around us everytime we watched tv.

Bye, bye Apple TV. The moment was fleeting but the love was real.