Time To Buy A Satellite

I re-awoke to the bzzzz of my cell phone. If the phone is on silent, this could mean anything; text, email, calendar alarm, etc. But I knew my phone wasn't on silent today, so that bzzzz had to be an email as everything else has an audible noise.
As a gluttonous slut for email, internet and technology, I couldn't fight the urge to check it. It was school, and it was important: Dear Students, don' t be late for class today as we will be...bla, bla, bla. I don't usually get through his emails. I don't much care for him as a professor or as a person, so my way of getting back at him is not finishing his emails.
Thankfully, today I had my 9:30am class canceled, so I could sleep in all I wanted. So I did. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. Waking around 10:00, I figured I'd have time for a burned three-egg omelet with old, pre-grated cheese and a couple slices of whole grain toast before my class at 12:30. So I got to cooking and before long, I was watching some show on MTV about how hard it is to find true love on the Jersey Shore. Seriously? Am I really watching this? Yes, I was. And as I put fork to mouth, toast to mouth, fork to mouth, I realized I had been enjoying it too much and might now need to hurry.
Walking into the bedroom during a much needed commercial break, I put on the same pants I'd been wearing for that week, conveniently pre-filled with chapstick, house keys and motorcycle keys in the right pocket, a void for for my cell phone in the left, a leather notebook in the left butt pocket and a ridiculously over stuffed wallet seriously lacking cash in the back right. The other blessing of this environmentally friendly approach to dressing is that the belt is still in the loops and a puff of unsavory air wooshes up as I pull them up and strap them on.
I'm ready.
Now all I have to do is pick out a shirt that I haven't worn in at least 2-3 days, find a pair of socks that don't fall down into my shoes when I walk and pick from the ugly and styless selection of shoes piled at the bottom of my cascading tie collection. Leather, plaid or athletic is the choice for today. I've been wearing my blue hemp and natural leather loafers way too much lately and the odor is ghastly. In cahoots with the smell of death permeating from my pants and I just might get sent home from work today. So loafers it definitely is not.
Now to watches. You'd think with 20 or so watches you'd have an easy time picking something good, but lately I've been relegating myself to my Soviet Union series of watches; time pieces I picked up while living in Ukraine. A morning wind up puts the hands in motion for two days easy. But if I choose one of the self winding ones, I never even have to think about it...usually.
I headed back to Jersey Shore which was playing in full technicolor in the living room. I again got absorbed in the pain of some drunk, sweaty guy, covered in what appeared to be muscles. Not sure, but he appeared to be drinking away his pain. He must have been hurt pretty bad because he was majorly sloshed.
Time check and panic.
What? How did time fly that fast? All I know is it's 12:15 and I've screwed the pooch watching the Jersey Shore Boy break his sweaty little heart.
I'm off. Motorcycle doesn't even get a chance to warm up before I blow out of the garage, down the driveway and out onto the interstate. Time is the enemy so I hunker down behind my gigantic 1981 windscreen, hoping to set Phelps-like records on my way to school.
Arriving, I shed fleece one, coat one and and scarf one. Sometimes, when it's cold, the apparel comes in two's to minimize the frost bite on my nipples, nose and ears.
The dash begins. Sweat has already formed on my back from the sheer notion of needing to hurry. The prospect of being late makes me perspire. But that's all before I even have to start incline speed walking. Not so shockingly, the speed walking really does me in and by the top of the hill, at the bottom of the short flight of stairs to the finish, I'm damp. Forehead, back and chest are marshlands. When my chest gets sweaty my chest hair feels like a wet scouring pad. Like something you might have just pulled out of the kitchen sink. Without proper ventilation, it's like throwing a giant tarpaulin over the rain forest; it gets rather humid under there. But the humidity doesn't get a chance to stay in the foliage, or dance around in the tree tops for long. No, it falls, runs and pools in the little valleys under my man boobs. There, it churns like dirty water in a clam, lingering without the pearl's reward. I shudder to think how I might be perceived in a grey, clingy t-shirt. Would people think my nipples were frowning? Or would it look as if my belly had silly little eyebrows? But like I said, I shudder to think.
But I summit the 16 step flight in 16, short, breathless bounds, skipping no step for fear of a groin injury. But I'm here and now I face only a 2 minute dash to the door of my classroom.
For joy! But as I glance at my watch, it reveals I am ten minutes late. Bollocks. I should have turned off the Jersey Shore Boy when I had the chance. Now I was done. Finished. Worse yet, as I looked more closely at my watch, IT WAS AN HOUR OFF! My trusty Soviet time piece had deceived me, indicating that it was only in fact 11:40 when I knew darmned well it was 12:40. I knew it, I just knew it. This always happens to me. I'm late. I hit every red light. I'm damp. And if that wasn't bad enough, my watch has gone and missed a whole hour of the day!
My mind raced. What excuses could I make to my professor as I glided in the classroom on a cloud of sweaty fog, tapping my watch like a perplexed tourist.
"Wouldn't you know, my watch is off," I tested aloud.
"I sincerely apologize. My watch was off by an hour and I didn't realize it's inaccuracy in time," I whispered, going for a more humble approach.
But time ran out, my chunky legs had brought me to the threshold of my classroom with a class I didn't recognize...er, what?
"I don't recognize anyone in this class. And that's not even my professor," I wondered to myself.
My hand gently backed off the door knob, thoughts of confusion replacing myriad excuses as I gingerly and naturally backed away from the windowed door.
I determined that we had decided to meet in a different room, or possibly a different building all together. I'm never really paying attention to what's being said in class. Sometimes it bites back, but usually not. This time, it looks like I'd been bitten hard.
Then the though crested the foggy out-reaches of my oxygen-starved brain that maybe I was wrong. Maybe the Bolsheviks had it right and my Tolstoy tendered time piece was ticking in exact precision. We'll, I turned it over to the gods, whipping out my cell phone and getting the trustier time of the $50 million dollar satellite that little phone called mother.
11:45 it smiled back.
I say smiled because I could see my smugly disgusted smile in the greasy reflection of my phone's screen. It was 11:45 alright. 5 minutes from when the exuses started flowing and a full 45 from when I would have needed to use them. I was defeated.
Lincoln was shot in a theatre during a performance of Our American Cousin. He was in company with the great General Grant.
I though, was alone. In an empty hallway I stood, staring at a greasy cell phone screen that had long since gone dark. General Grant was not by my side and I was in no grand theatre. Like Lincoln, I was defeated. But self defeated. Defeated by my own worst enemy: myself. My stupidity had put me somewhere 45 minutes early. My stupidity was to thank for me not finding out if Jersey Boy ever found love. My stupidity was making my nipples frown, and now my face was frowning too.
And for that, I'll never trust a watch again.

Loving to Hate

Going to see David Sedaris perform live and then writing about the invigorating experience did more than just inspire me; it murdered all sense of confidence and creativity I had going into the event. You may have noticed a major slow down in blog posts over here at logantanner.blogspot.com. Your notice was not mistaken. I haven't been writing much. I haven't been writing much of anything in fact. I'm scared. Everytime I start to write, I hear David's shrill, childish and purely homesexual voice in my head telling me that my words just aren't good enough. He's like that older brother that your parents wish you could be more like.
"Why can't you be more like your brother?" they say.
Unfortunatly I am the older brother in my family. There really wasn't much for my siblings to live up to though. I was pretty cool and funny in high school, peaking in looks, talent and creativity. Sadly though, every peak has it's valley and every valley it's deep, bottomless cravass. I, today, am at the bottom of that deep, dark, bottomless cravass, 10,000 leagues below the peak that I used to shine from.
So don't live up to me and don't live up to David. He'll just put you down. But it's really not his fault. He can't help it that he is not only talented, but EXTREMELY gay to boot. It give's him a competitive edge over all the other writers out there. People browsing book stores, thumbing through crisp, unopened novels with smart and clever covers always pick the gay guy when it comes to entertaining dialog and witty slices of life.
I'm not gay. Sure, you might disagree and you have the right to based on some pretty gay things I have done and said over the years. But regardless of your opinion I am full of boring, slow, colorless and straight humor. I can't think of anything more boring that a white, straight Christian guy trying to write about the fun things that life throw at us. Pie, Jesus and pearly whites will only get me so far. Fritters, Satan and a little bit of smokers plaque might get me a little more credibility in this world. Unfortunately, that's not me. It just isn't.
I'll never be black-a-nese (a term related to some friends by a black, Asian), a homosexual or a Buddhist. I love the world and I love the people in this world, but gosh darn it I'm a republican, a Mormon and a college student.
Although some things may change, I may always be boring. Unfortunately though, I don't foresee David leaving his perch on my shoulder, judging me and scrutinizing the boring, straight, Christian-censored writings that I churn out. I like writing for me though, and for that reason, I hope David breaks his leg and falls off my shoulder soon. I'm not writing for him or anybody else. Anyone who reads my garbage is just along for the ride. David of all people can suck it. He can't be my inspiration and my glass ceiling. That's just not...fair. So yes, I hope David falls off my shoulder and lands on his little gay head. I hope he chips his smoker-plaqued teeth and bites his tongue because by golly and gosh darn, this white, boring, Christian has got some writing to do.

Why I Love David

This is how David signed my book after Kristen and I waited for two hours to meet him. He guessed I was a Gemini and we became soul mates for life. Yes, that is a representation of me as a turtle.


I started to write this long story about how I went and saw David Sedaris at Abravanel Hall in Salt Lake City and how he told this humorously disturbing tale of a mother who falls down the stairs and breaks her neck, allowing her newborn child to slip under the water of the bathtub and drown, when I realized it was all wrong. The punch line didn't fit with the story and no matter how many times I tried to re-tell it, the story just didn't sound right.
David Sedaris doesn't let you take pictures of him. David Sedaris won't perform without the lights in the theatre being off. Both make him nervous and he doesn't like it. I believe, along with this quarky fear of light and photographic technology, David Sedaris has implemented some sort of device, system or spectre that rips the ability to re-tell your experiences after you've left the theatre. I'm serious. I can't for the life of me form one coherent sentance that has anything to do with the awesome stories he told. I can tell you he read stories, recited entries from his diary and made the stupid lady behind me laugh rediculously hard everytime he opened his mouth; buy beyond that, I can tell you nothing. It was fun. It was awesome, and David is just faaabulous.
If you're looking for a great homosexual author to fill a void in your life, look David up. He'll make you laugh and he'll make you feel uncomfortable. Isn't that really what life is all about?



p.s. He isn't really as cool as this picture makes him out to be.

Why Men Are Lucky

Men are luckier than women. I was thinking about it today and obviously there are pros and cons to being either sex, but I came across a pro that made me proud to be different; proud to be a man.
Now, without going in to too much detail, lets just consider for a moment how differently men and women use the bathroom. Did you think about it? Ok good. Now I'll explain where this is going...
If you asked 100 women what company made the flushing systems for toilets in public bathrooms, how many do you think would be able to even begin to guess at a company or brand? Would they be able to spit out even one?
Now men, are you with me here? Could you guess at least one company name? How many times have you stood at a urinal and found no non-awkward place to look but down at the urinal itself? The plated steel valve system and piping with a brand stamp engraved in it...what does it say? If you said Sloan, your probably a man, or a woman working in the urinal business. At least I hope you know because you work in the urinal business. I don't know why else you....doesn't matter. What matters is that this one thing separates us as men and woman. It's a small thing. It's not obvious, but it's interesting. The details are always interesting. It's not necessarily our sex that makes us different, it's the things we learn and don't learn because of our sex that make us who were are.
So in a round about way you might be wondering, "does this make men better than women?" Of course it does you sexist pig. But this knowledge is completely irrelevant and most likely means you drink too much or have a bladder infection. So, next time your find yourself in a moment of relief, look down (or behind you) and see what you might not have noticed before: the brand of the toilet you are using.

Use Baby Wipes

I highly recommend you use baby wipes as an adult. And don't make me explain my meaning for "use." You know exactly what I mean. Use them. Try it. You'll be shocked at how much better it is than just toilet paper. Now you might complain and rebut that you wouldn't like that damp feeling left over when you were done. Well of course you wouldn't and neither do I. That's why you do a follow up with regular dry paper.
I'm sorry to bring this up but it just has to be said. Public bathroom toilet paper is the basest of all when it comes to the hierarchy of toilet paper; and for someone who is used to a significantly higher level of satisfaction, it just won't do. So please, everyone, try what I am proposing here. Try it, be converted and eventually, maybe that cheap, see-through paper they put in public stalls will be done away with, relieving thousands in its wake.

High Fashion Asian Girls

Why do I love high fashion Asian girls? Is it harajuku? Is it high fashion? Is it weird or is it hip? What ever it is, I love it. I love seeing them huddled around together in their awkwardly cool attire, jibbering and jabbering with imaginary kanji symbols spurting out of their excited little mouths, flashing brightly like Tokyo neon signs. I love how they congrigate. They huddle and hunch, smiling and gasping in their high fashion thrill. I love how they don't care that they don't fit in. I love their massive stillettos and soggy layering. I love the patterns mixed with solids and the earth tones mixed with pastel. A rain jacket on a sunny day? What the heck. These girls got it goin' on.
But there is one thing I love better than high fashion Asian girls: the not high fashion, not Asian girls who glare at them. Is it the language? Do they want to be included? Is this the same verbal jealousy that manifests itself when you have to interrupt a yammering group of Hispanics to get them to take your order? You don't know what they are talking about, you just want your food. Do these girls want their food too? Are these Asian fashionistas getting in the way of the light that they want to let so shine? More likely though, they are just ugly and the splendor and confidence radiated by these awkwardly awesome Asian ladies is cramping their style.
That single take where you see them start at one end and scan their way in the opposite direction. I've seen shoes up and I've seen hair down, but either way it sure looks dirty. Not dirty in the way a guy would look you up and down, but dirty in the fact that you're half expecting this white chick to gouge the other girls eyes out. It's awesome. I love being able to judge people for judging others right at the moment of initial judgment.
Asian high fashion girls bring my world full circle. We don't have many of them here on our campus, but that just makes them all the more rare; like a pink diamond or a piece of the moon. I love it and I love you high fashion Asian girls. Keep it up so I can watch the tawdry and bland stomachs of the boring white girls turn.

Ode to Joy, the Symphony of Love and other bad titles

Not too cold and not too warm. There is a perfect temperature balance that must be achieved when consuming a Symphony bar.
I started off too melty, simply consuming right after purchase. I'd nab a bar and stuff it in my shirt pocket, snuggled warmly against my sweating breast. It seemed a logical place. Lately, with age, I stick lots of things in my shirt pocket. MP3 players go there now, a pen, sometimes a cell phone and more often than I'd like to admit, food crumbs. But what I've discovered is that sweaty male mammaries are no place for a decadent candy bar to reside; not if you plan on enjoying it.
So as I see it, you really have 2 options if you want it to be the right temperature. First, you can pop it in the fridge for about 2-4 minutes, checking periodically with a ginger touch of the back of the hand. DON'T PICK IT UP or you'll heat up the part you touch, throwing the temperature balance off wack. Your second option would be to place it near an air conditioning vent or in between some cold pops; can, cup or bottle will work fine. I find this method to be the best as you can't over do it. In the fridge you have a delicate duo of convection and conduction heat transfer going on. Without careful attention, you could over cool your bar, forcing you to leave it out to "warm" or "thaw" before you can actually eat it. This is bad news because an over cooled bar is highly susceptible to crumblies and melty spots. Crumblies are when the bar gets too cold and starts to flake or chip. The danger here is that you end up with choco stains on you shirt/blouse/blazer or mangled up in your chest hair without your knowledge. That can be an embarrassment. Just last week I got a generous shmear of melted crumbly on my shirt and I'll be darned if that shirt isn't in the wash as we speak.
So, when you decide to buy a Symphony bar, by jove pay attention to how you prepare it. This isn't an apple or a baggie of peeled and sliced baby carrots, this is a Symphony bar we are talking about and your attention is paramount. I had two today and I still have the chocolatl-y, almond-y, toffee...-y goodness coursing through my veins. Look at the time stamp on this post for the sake of Pete and Pete! It's 3am! I watched the top ten blunders on Clean House, a fully awkward and humorous hour of Dog the Bounty Hunter and the painfully automated and boring process of how pool ques are made. I then cuddled with my sleeping wife for a little while until the crotch of my knees and dimples of my ankles started sweating. At that point I couldn't think of anything better to do than hit the keys. I was trying to think of some advertisements that would knock the awkwardly hip Sketchers off my professors feet but the only thing that would come to my mind was chocolate, almonds and toffee; Symphony. Hershey, you make crap hole chocolate, but by golly the Symphony bar was your final opus. And yes, that is my final musical metaphor. THE END.

Symphony of Shame

I have eaten 12 Symphony bars since I last posted on the topic. My max was three in one day. The irony is that I still have a slim fast shake for breakfast and a low calorie lunch during the day. I'm like a junky sneaking off for a secret snort during a long stint in rehab. It's really quite pathetic this show I put on. I just can't help it. I'm an emotional eater; and from the looks of things, I've been feeling rather moody!

Now For Something Completely Different

Yeah, I've got nothin'. I've been trying to figure out what I wanted to blog about for days. Nothing. I cannot think of anything to write about so I figured I'd write about how I have nothing to write about. Although, I did want to mention that I am having strange pregnancy cravings for Symphony chocolate bars. I've been on a diet (what, you haven't noticed?) so candy is a definite no-no. But for some weird reason, I replaced my recent Peanut M&M binge-fest with the decadent delight of a Symphony bar; the one with toffee and nuts. And those nuts would be almonds which just happen to be an important part of my balanced diet! Its kinda of a lose-win situation. Sugar, carbs, calories in exchange for deliciousness with a hint of healthy almonds. What a delight!
In other news David Sedaris is coming to SLC next week! I'm giddy as a school girl. He is, by far and away, my favorite homosexual writer. I mean bar-none. If you haven't read his books, do it. If you are a fervant reader of my blog (sorry if you are) then you'll remember I got his newest book, When You Are Engulfed in Flames for Christmas (or maybe it was for my birthday). Well, I dawdled and drug my feet, opting for my monthly car magazine everytime I used the bathroom instead of David's latest work. Well, all those car magazines and feet dragging have paid off. I've now arranged to get CREDIT for reading that book in my creative writing class. Hazah! That was a relief, especially since my automotive magazine subscription is about to run out.