Prank War

Not so long ago my Sister and I fiercely engaged in a prank war.

We did all of the classics.

Clingwrap on the Toilet Seat, 

Shaving Cream inbetween the sheets, 

Freezing toothbrushes in blocks of ice. 

you name it, we tried it. 

As always the case in a Prank War, there is a Grand Finale: a mother of all pranks that puts the recipient out of the prank buisness.

One such legendary Grand Finale involved completely stripping a prankster's room of replaceable items and floating them down the hudson river on a raft.

That was the level of Epic Prank that I was looking for. A perfect opportunity arose when my sister went to Six Flags for a whole day. While she was gone, I disassembled her bed, moved it to the neighbor's house and then reassembled it.

Muahahahahahaaa. 

My Sister didn't get home until 11:45 that night. Predictably, she quietly climbed up the steps in an attempt to not wake anyone up. 45 seconds later, she slammed my bedroom door open and yelled: 

I ignored her and pretended to be asleep. 

That worked for all of five seconds. I am, alas a terrible liar. I sat up in bed and started grinning: 

This incensed her. She flew into an incredible-psychotic-lack of sleep-sunburn induced rage.

My only response was a high pitched giggle, which didn't improve her mood at all. 

She proceeded to call all of her friends and demand the whereabouts of her bed: at 12:45 in the morning. 

Eventually, her incredible-psychotic-lack of sleep-sunburn induced rage burned out, and she gave up on the phone calls and slept on the couch. 

The next morning, Mom asked my sister to take something over to the neighbor's house. She was invited in, and then stood stock still. Her bed was set up in the neighbor's living room, waiting for her. 

I watched her move her bed back into our house, feeling like a criminal mastermind. That feeling lasted all of 12 hours, when my sister stole all of my underwear out of my dresser and froze it.

Sometimes ya just can't win. 

I'm Thankful All Right

How many of us have felt like we have the most insane, embarrassing family on earth? If you haven't EVER felt like that, then I am concerned for your sanity. 

Most extended families nowadays are nothing more than groups of people with diverse interests that share the same genetic tree. I know, you're thinking of your Great-Aunt Bonnie and wishing that your DNA had come from somewhere else.  But there's something special about tripping on each other's toes in the kitchen and eating too much turkey together.  

You don't think that my family's insane? Take a peek at our traditions.  My grandmother always called the Thanksgiving turkey Sally. For the two or three days before Thanksgiving, she kept telling me how much she was looking forward to Sally. The day of Thanksgiving, she kept telling me  “I smell Sally” I was mystified. I didn't have any relatives named Sally!

 Finally, during the Thanksgiving prayer, she expressed her thanks for Sally whom we were about to eat. Sally: the turkey. For a 7 year old, that's pretty traumatic. I didn't touch the turkey that year. 

During Thanksgiving I am thankful that I'm only partially related to my Relatives. 

Another tradition is that the men of the family sleep in the living room for at least 2 hours before dinner. Why? because they know they will ingest so much L-Tryptophan that taking a 2 week nap after dinner will not be adequate. They spend 2 hours preparing for their epic yearly battle: “Man vs. Turkey” 

My family seems to think that there's room  for all of God's creatures next to the mashed potatoes.  We've eaten interesting things like tofu, dim sum, shrimp (complete with eyeballs), deer venison, preserved duck eggs and jello salad with pretzels along side of stuffing and cranberry sauce. 

Thanksgiving is also a time to be thankful for antacids. 

Perhaps the thing I am most thankful for is that most of my relatives don't live nearby. 

I think that George Burns said it best: “Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.”

Welcome MtnDew

Anecdotal Irony is pleased to introduce it's first Guest Author: MtnDew!


MtnDew is a shadowy librarian with a strange affinity for Mountain Dew. In his first post: The Most Interesting Place in the World, he mentions that he can install things in cars and dates women under the age of 50. And no, ladies, we will not be posting his phone number online for you. He gets enough weird voicemails already.

Most Interesting place in the World!

Who says working at the library has to be dull and boring?

It's the most interesting place in the world!!!!

In here are thirteen things your librarian won’t tell you. All of these are from personal experience. Yes, people actually do these things.

1. Please don’t bring all ten members of your family then expect your five year old to interpret for all of you because he’s the only one who knows English.

2. Don’t drive your semi to the library. You won’t be able to make the turn, and you will run over our bushes, causing me to have to come out and spend 25 minutes trying to direct you out. Not cool.

3. If you have babies who like to scream, please stay away from the library. What happened to the time when the library was quiet?

4. Don’t automatically think that because I’m a lowly librarian you’re smarter than me. I can guarantee you that the problem with your computer is not a keyboard virus.

5. We can help you with more than you might think. I’ve driven to a church twenty miles away to help somebody who locked their keys in their car. I’ve also driven to the auto store, bought a fan belt, and then helped install it in the person’s car.

6. If you have computer problems, ASK FOR HELP! We would much rather help you, than have you break a pen over the keyboard because you got so frustrated.

7. Don’t automatically assume that I’m a total video game nerd when I happen to mention that I like CoD. I really don’t want to waste the next thirty minutes of my life listening to you describe your latest achievement in Halo. I don’t care.

8. Don’t’ try to steal the books. We have RFID tags in all of them that tell us whether they’ve been checked out or not. The alarm will go off and you’ll be embarrassed because you just unsuccessfully tried to steal a book from the library. They’re free anyway.

9. Do not let your children anywhere near the DVD’s without parental supervision. They get pushed behind the shelves, and then we get to spend the next half hour picking them all up and putting them back in order.

10. I can tolerate flirty girls, but please, if you’re over 50, refrain.

11. I’m talking to you teenagers. Just because you have a laptop doesn’t mean you’re the coolest kid in the world. I’ve got one too, and I’m pretty darn sure it’s better than yours.

12. Please don’t come to the desk demanding to know why the document you tried to print didn’t print when there’s a big red sign on the printer that says “Out of Order.” Learn how to read.

13. We have two glass doors that are cleaned every day. Don’t get so absorbed with your phone that you run into the doors. It puts smudges on them and you might get a little hurt and embarrassed.

Remember to drink MtnDew, drive crazily, and take chances!

Telephone!

Have you ever been self-conscious about talking on the phone in front of people?

I am! 

If at all possible, I will find a secluded corner somewhere and talk so quietly into my phone that the person on the other end of the line can barely hear me. 

On some occasions, this is impossible. 

Of course, it's when you have something really awkward to say. Or something to say that sounds REALLY awkward out of context.

 For example:

"Mr. Ed says we need to change the angle of attack to 30 degrees." 

What people think of: 

Mr. Ed: the horse

Change the angle of attack to 30 degrees: Attack from above with awesome ninja moves!

In actuality, Mr. Ed is an Aeronautical Engineer who is helping my and a nerdy cohort build a rubber-band powered helicopter. The angle of attack is in reference to the steepness of the blades on the propeller.

 But if  you say "Mr. Ed wants us to change the angle of attack to 30 degrees " as your entire math class is filing by you while you stand in the hallway talking on your cell phone, you'll get some pretty weird looks. 

My Math class probably thinks that I am a secret ninja working for a talking horse now.. How awesome is that?

Statistics

I just noticed that I posted 8 posts in September and 8 posts in October. I intend to outdo myself and post 10 posts during the month of November!!

Let's take a look at the statistics!

November has 30 days in it. Today is the 8th of November, and I have finished 1 post.
I have 22 days to write 9 posts. That's an average of 1 post every 2.45 days.

This doesn't take into account Thanksgiving! 1 day of making food, 1 day of stuffing your face, and 1 day to recover/kill yourself more with obsessive Christmas shopping.

So really, I only have 19 days to write 9 posts. That's a new average of 1 post every 2.11 days, or 1 every 50.66 hours.

I think that sleeping in the month of November is important. If I don't sleep, the posts will probably end up being about exploding ferrets...

Averaging between 6 and 8 hours of sleep a night, gives between 152 and 114 hours of sleep in November. (Thanksgiving holiday not included in this calculation)

304 hours remain in November that I will be awake.
 Now, I obviously can't write a blog post while I'm at work.

I work an 8 hour shift every Monday, and there are 3 Mondays remaining. There go another 24 hours of my time.

(If you're getting confused with all of this superfluous mathematics, we now have 280 hours remaining in November).

9 more posts in 280 hours doesn't SOUND bad, right? That ends up being 1 post every 1.29 days!

Don't even get me started on the time that I will have to spend in class, doing homework, and driving everywhere.

On the other hand, if I just wrote 9 posts this month, I would have 1.5 days to write a single post....

 I'm thinking that I should have made this a 2 post article!

Update: By Popular demand: A picture. 

Phone Number

Once upon a time, I went grocery shopping with my mom.

While we were shopping I played with my mp3 player in my coat pocket. When we got to the checkout line I realized that it was no longer in my pocket.

 I walked around the ENTIRE store while my Mom got her groceries checked out.

Alas,  I did not have the moment of pure joy that I had anticipated upon the event of finding my mp3 player. I was one sad duckling. The prospect of having to live in music-less world was enough to make me despair!

I shuffled back to my Mom, who had finished paying for her groceries and was waiting at the front of the store with the bag boy. She informed me to go to the manager, give him a description of my mp3 player and my phone number and ask him to call me if he found anything. 

I walked away, just in time to hear the bag boy mutter to my mom: 

"Do you think that she'd give ME her number? " 

My Mom just laughed, but I was careful to stand far away from the bag boy as he carried the groceries out to our car. 

Halfway home, I noticed a weird lump in my coat. 

My MP3 player!!!!! 

It had fallen into the lining of my coat from a tiny hole in my pocket that I hadn't noticed. 

I was rescued from a future of music-less gloom!!!

And then I realized...

My Phone number was still in a drawer at the grocery store where the bag-boy had access to it. But hey, I was still safe from a future of music-less gloom!!!