The Mutton Munchers

I try to play basketball almost anywhere that I can find a court, a hoop, and nine other guys who want to run with me. Whenever I hear the distant echo of a ball bouncing on hard wood, I flock to it and try and get on for the next game. There are so many places to play all over St. George, and I adore this town for that. Churches, old gyms, backyards, pretty much anywhere that I can find, just so I can get that rush of basketball that I have L-worded for so long.

Golds Gym is certainly one of the most interesting places to go to. I say interesting because the cluster-curseword of testosteronian steroid creatures that flock around the venue flaunting their feathers are hilarious to just sit back and watch as the night goes on.

For full effect, download “Teenage Dirtbag” by Wheatus and play at full volume throughout the duration of this post.

They are the creatures of the night. Disgusting show-offs. Pathetic attempts at what someone would mistake for "men". I don’t know what keeps some of them ticking on a daily basis, but there are sure some odd ones doing some heavy lifting day in and day out.

You can pick these guys out from the second that they step through the doors. Their cocky attitude is smeared across their faces, and they immediately start loading up a bench press or a squat rack in hopes that a female of their same douchebag stereotype will find them appealing in any way shape or form.

It’s all for the girls. No question about that. Their entire workout technique and schedule is solely based on impressing some shallow fruitcake with the massive amount of reps that they do on their last set. They also use an odd grunting and groaning in many quirky ways that would almost be some type of mating call for the girls that surround them. Almost hoping that the peculiar noises will in some way attract the females, and that their weightlifting chemical smell, plus their massive good-looking physicality would be the closer in finding a mate that afternoon when they step into Gold’s.

It’s a mammoth meat market with head games and abnormal behaviors being flaunted from the moment these steroid-users walk in the door to the last rep that they do on the weights, and the pride stride they perform on their way out to their whopping sized trucks out in the parking lot. That’s another thing that has always confused me, as to why these weight-lifting creatures almost always have some type of gigantic truck decked out to its fullest waiting for them. It’s like a standard in some ways. The smaller, or shorter the meat head is, the bigger the truck he then has, that he almost dangles in front of a girls eyes in hopes that it will attract her even more than he already has.

It’s probably that way because the undersized squats are trying to compensate for some other miniscule appendage that is dangling.

We are Lazy

I feel like a stay at home, two-face mother of four children for not posting on this blog for the past few weeks. I have no excuses, I really don't. I shouldn't be the one who blames my kids' illness, or my term papers as the reason for my lack in posting. Hopefully, my sarcastic and belittling words can win back your fandom though.

For full effect download "The Lazy Song" by Bruno Mars and play at maximum volume throughout the duration of this post.

We all love that song don't we? Of course we do. Everyone enjoys waking up on a Saturday afternoon and not vacating the three-foot circumference that surrounds our beds. I will admit it is days like those that I relish for once in a blue moon. Do you know why we L-word days like those?

Because we are lazy pieces of cow dung.

Cue awkward moment of silence as I rip my own generation to shreds. Follow with a midnight run to Smith's in your flannel pajamas to purchase a king size bar of Symphony chocolate that you can slobber over while you remember why you don't read my blog because of how I am ten pounds of crap stuffed in a five pound bag.

Yes, I am a compartment filled with douche.

Honestly, our culture and society is one that is heaping with a lack of self-motivation and determination to accomplish the tasks placed before us. Procrastination seems to be our middle names as we stumble through a nine to five escapade while holding a rosary sending up Hail Mary’s in hopes that Friday will roll around quicker than expected.

Cue awkward opening scene from “Hangin’ With Mr. Cooper” or any other waste of a show that aired every T.G.I.F.

Why are we like this? I have no idea. It is mind-boggling to live in a world filled with goal-setters and aspirant go-getters, but have no fortitude or patience to stick with the task that they are given. This is a world where we look for the quickest and easiest solution to anything that can be classified as a slight bump in the road. Our world is one where we rely on creations such as Siri, and the Internet to solve any difficulty placed before us. Yes kids, that’s right, we are getting packed away into oblivion by html coding and app innovators.

I was on Reddit this morning, (kind of a hypocritical pastime for this blogpost, I know) when one of the posts was asking Redditors to post three things in their lives that they want to accomplish before they die. And oh boy was it outlandish to see some of the things that our world wants, or hopes rather to achieve.

“I want to write a book” was a classic response. “I want to finish up my degree” was another common statement. Then there was the cliché “I want to move in/settle down with/marry my gf/bf/future spouse”. That was a given on nearly every single one of the responses. There were also the far-fetched, outlandish, WTF-are-they-thinking goals as well. “I want to work on the moon for NASA”, “I want to build a ’67 Shelby Mustang from Scratch”, “I want to be a successful politician”, “I want to move to Hollywood and win an Oscar”. These are all great hopes and ambitions, but will any of them actually happen?

Absolutely not.

And do you know why? Because we live in a world that sets mediocre goals and then lets them fly by the wind. We live in a world where people hallucinate over potential lifestyle changes that will never happen because they’re too focused on catching the latest episode of “How I Met Your Mother” tonight. Our world is stockpiled with cattle who have delusional trances transposed in their conscious thought, but then don’t have the actual balls to act upon those urges when the Jiminy Cricket inside their heads tells them to get off their lethargic hindquarters and do something.

Call me negative, degrading, pessimistic, miserable, gloomy, or whatever other word you want to look up on Word’s thesaurus and copy and paste into the previous sentence. Yes, I may be, but I’m more of a realist who is tired of living in a social order of wannabes and never will bes who are banking on potential dreams that will never come true. And hopefully this blogpost frustrates you enough that you’ll sever the ties with my downbeat remarks and go do something productive with your own life, rather than set lofty targets in the sky that you know that you’ll never hit.

Cue enraged hurling of chocolate and induced 5K run on your local gym’s treadmill.

There. Now don’t you feel better?

You Can Suck It

First of all, I would like to give a shout out to Liz, Ramen, Ryan, and President Syme for their assisted inflation of my potential online ego. Those positive comments from your side are what fuels my desire to keep posting. As well as increases the amount of time that I stare vainly in front of a mirror and regurgitate the lyrics to a Carly Simon one-hit wonder.

And yes, I probably do think that this song is about me.

For full effect, download “Cold As Ice” by Foreigner, and play at maximum volume throughout the duration of this post.

Currently I’m somewhere in between Logan and St. George (I’m keeping this as generic as possible just for liability purposes). Today while on my travels I began talking to a young man or woman about what his or her future looks like, when out of nowhere they began venting their life story all over the plastic table we were seated at.

Generic Young Man or Woman: “I just want to get away from here.”

Swamp Thing: “Get away? Why? Don’t you like living here?”

Generic Young Man or Woman: “No, I don’t. I kind of don’t like living with my parents, they hit me a lot, and I gotta get away.”

Cue awkward silence.

Generic Young Man or Woman: “Yeah, the other day I came to work and I had to hide all of the bruises on my arms from where my Mom was hitting me.”

Cue extended awkward silence.

Generic Young Man or Woman: “Anyway, I gotta go.” And with that he or she left. Moments after their departure, a smirking elderly woman with an eye patch holding a mop in her hands came up and offered some advice for what had just happened.

Mop-Donning Stranger: “Don’t listen to them.” (Referencing the young man or woman I just spoke with.) “They’re not going anywhere in their life.”

Swamp Thing: “Umm…I’m sorry? What was that?”

Mop-Donning Stranger: “They’ve got nothing going for them, they just fail at everything they try. They will never be successful.”

Lady, you’re an over-the-hill janitor Cyclops who cleans up vomit and urine for a living, and you’re telling me that this young person is going to be a failure? What gives you the right to belittle someone who still has a fighting chance? Yes they may be embellishing a story about abusive parents, but how do you know that they are going to fail in life? You don’t! I should urinate all over this floor just for your insensitivity, and then make you clean it up!

…Is what I should have said.

But I didn’t. The One-Eyed, One-Broomed, Plump and Ugly People Eater was out of my sight even before I had a chance to unleash my fury upon her. And good riddance, I thought to myself. The world needs ignorant critics such as the mopping Cyclops just to fuel the desire for everyone else to work harder and become better people. You can go ahead and bring your janitorial lack of depth perception to the fight and we’ll shove it right back in your face.

I am Jack’s motivated clenched fists.

Valentines Day is a Crock!

So what if I'm regurgitating my old columns and turning them into blogposts. At least I'm being consistent with my writings and not updating my online family photo album every six months like every other single Mormon mother will be doing in June.

Suck on that, Half-Empty Buffalo, HA!

For full effect, download Ridin' Solo by Jason Derulo and play at maximum volume throughout the duration of this post.

I think that tomorrow will be one of the most depressing days in the history of the world. I'm referring to the day we will all experience, Valentine’s Day, also known by the much more appropriate name, Singles’ Awareness Day.

See the problem with SAD, ironic that the acronym is sad, is that if you don't have someone to love on this day overly bombarded by Necco conversation hearts and red and pink cardboard cutouts of Cupid, you feel like the No. 1 biggest loser ever created. You walk around seeing all the delivered flowers and romantic couples, and you can't help but feel like either vomiting or eating a boatload of ice cream to compensate for not having someone to say corny names like “boo-boo kitty face” to.

It's as if the whole world is pointing a finger at you saying, “HA! You don't have a significant other to surprise you with flowers, kisses and stuffed bears made out of chocolate. So I'm going to stand here all day making fun of you, you worthless, non-committal stay-at-home-on-a-Saturday-night-and-eat-Doritos-until-you-puke pathetic excuse of a wannabe Valentine lover!” Can you see how painful this must be to some people?

Why is there a holiday dedicated to being in love? This goes against everything moral and right that exists in the free world. Why can't there be a holiday focused on being single? Like National No Relationship Pride Day, that sounds like a pretty good holiday to me. We need a day where everyone just sits around and relishes in the fact that we all don't have to be involved with someone else and can just contently savor our singleness. Our non-commitment can be our gratification. Who's on my side for this idea? Probably everyone who won't be enjoying tomorrow's overly emphasized waste of a holiday.

See, the problem with Valentine’s Day is that no one wants to look bad in front of his or her peers, not having a lover to rely on during this stressful 24-hour period. In fact, according to BrainCandy.net, 15 percent of single women send themselves flowers just to appease their own loneliness and not look bad in front of their friends and family. How pathetic is that? That's like buying a boatload of candy on Halloween and sitting at home all night in a costume, eating yourself silly out of an old pillowcase. Why on earth would someone do such a thing? Because the Valentine gods mockingly scorn the fact that you are one pathetic loser. (LTT)

And what's even worse, the survey continued on to mention that about 3 percent of pet owners will buy something for their pets on Valentine’s Day. Do you see what this is doing to people? This holiday is damaging so many people's self-esteem that they try to compensate for lack of love by giving flowers, candy or a singing telegram to their pets. Are we that desperate? We must be to cater a candlelight dinner for our chihuahua.

Valentine's is a waste of money as well. You'll never know what you're going to get in return for the gifts that you give your significant other. I remember last year I pissed a couple hundred bucks down the drain buying a Pandora bracelet with all sorts of charms and medallions on it. And what did I get in return? A book that detailed the history of farting.

True story.

As my old roommate Matt so adequately once put it, Valentine’s Day is a holiday created by Hallmark to monopolize the fraudulent fondness that so many imitation couples create for themselves in order to not feel humiliated by the man-made monstrosity we know as Valentine's Day. According to Hallmark, around 1 billion Valentine’s Day cards will be exchanged this year. Talk about a waste of money. But hey, at least your loved one/pet/self will know that you care right?

I guess there are a few advantages to not having a girlfriend this year. As the rest of the lovey-dovey couples fawn all over each other and waste hundreds of dollars on flowers, expensive dinners and the like, I will be content to saving that money for a far greater purpose. Like buying the gallon of rocky road ice cream I'll be eating all night while the world mocks my singularity.

Either that or I'll go buy the second volume of the history of farting.

Resolutions Flop Fast

It's February, have you given up yet?

“This year I resolve to lose 25 pounds and get back into shape so when I look into a mirror I don’t want to cry myself to sleep after eating a tub of Cherry Garcia ice cream.” 


How many times have you heard that following a Jan. 1 all-nighter? My New Year’s resolution is to get a 4.0 this semester... This year I’m going to find a steady girlfriend... My resolution is to learn a new language… yada yada yada whatever. The classic idea of a New Year’s resolution is the biggest load of garbage I’ve ever heard of since the Hanson song "MMMBop."



For full effect, do not download MMMBop by Hanson, that will in fact damage you in ways much worse than Insane Clown Posse ever would.

The reason that resolutions are such a joke is simple: Nobody follows through with them. Ever. Whether it be a new diet, an attempt at a new language, or going jogging with your dog at 5 a.m. every morning it doesn’t matter. Nobody ever actually completes his or her New Year’s resolution. It is said that to form a habit it takes 21 consecutive days of continually repeated actions of that routine for it to become ingrained in you. Well, that doesn’t matter one bit because the habit is up and forgotten by Jan. 3 anyway. 



Last year I tried to break the mold and actually complete the whole New Year’s resolution idea. I made a goal to become fluent in Spanish. Yep, and I was determined, I was set, I was going to be the best non-native Spanish speaker this campus had ever seen. And so it began: I was checking out Spanish books, reading online courses, I even had a buddy of mine only talk to me in Spanish just so I could get a feel for what the language was like. Oh, I was on a roll. I was going to be fluent in no time. 



But that all changed around Jan. 4 or so. Homework began piling up, my friends wanted to hang out, I realized that I actually had a full-time job, my actual life returned, things got in the way, and my attempt at becoming a Spaniard was left back in the dust. I tried to resurrect it a few weeks later, but it was to no avail. My Spanish lessons were over, and I was back to the same mono-linguistic individual I started as. 



Now why is that? It is a mystery that is beyond me, but it is one of the most expected and typical behaviors that we all as individuals don’t do. Let’s just admit it. We all as human beings are one of the laziest, relinquishing, non-New-Year’s-resolution-finishing creatures ever. 



One thing that has always puzzled me is why we wait until Jan. 1 to start the goal. I understand that it is the beginning of a New Year and there is a feeling of freshness in the air that makes us all want to start over, but why wait until Jan. 1 to make the goal? For instance, why would I come up with the resolution to lose weight in mid-November and then pile on the pounds created by bad dieting and not working out for the next month and a half, only to make the resolution more compound and difficult to accomplish? Who knows? 



Am I wrong for thinking that the idea of a New Year’s resolution is an absolute and complete total waste of time? Do people actually accomplish things by starting a diet on New Year’s Day after gorging down an entire previous month full of holiday treats and candy-coated gingerbread houses? I don’t know. In my book, New Year’s resolutions make about as much sense as a group of guys watching “The Notebook” for Guys Night Out. There’s nothing I can do about it though, I guess. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to hit the streets for a couple of miles of jogging. It’s part of this New Year’s resolution that I made…

Life

Deep down, we all want this...