Wii Gettin' Outta Here
or
Euro'd-um? Nearly Killed 'Em...

From time to time, for strange reasons that make no sense to me, I get a bank statement that shows that I have money to burn. One of those times happens to be now. My statement is positive…even after making payments to The Village of Schaumburg for having expired tabs on my Town & Country minivan.

But what to buy?

My first thoughts went to the Nintendo Wii. Nothing beats the summer heat, which should be just around the corner, better than holing up in the cool comforts of my basement and blending the lines of fantasy and reality with a plastic joystick or two. At $250 it’s a steal. Plus it looks like something out of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Before acting rash, though, I decided to think through other possibilities.

Nothing surfaced until my manager told me yesterday that she was leaving for a vacation in Texas.

"Ha! Texas! Hell, I can do better than that."

So it began: Travelocity, Orbitz, and the discovery of a great Yahoo! airfare tool that searches multiple sites automatically. Nothing gives me greater pleasure at work than showing my superiors that, despite the fact that they make twice as much money as I do, I still have more freedom.

$650 Chicago to Amsterdam
$638 Chicago to London
$725 Chicago to Peru
$1100 Chicago to one week all inclusive in Jamaica
$838 Chicago to Rio de Janeiro
$947 Chicago to Prague, Czech Republic
$711 Chicago to Alaska

I was excited, and decided to tell Mezzo and Master P over drinks and Golden Tee.

"So whaddaya say, who's in?"

Mezzo, being who he is, quickly reminded me that everything I know is wrong.

"Huh…well, you know London is expensive. Really expensive. Actually everything in Europe is expensive, especially with the conversion rate. It's something like $0.50 usd to 1 eurodollar. You could do the Czech, but you're more likely to catch a V.D. than to have any fun. That goes for Amsterdam as well, and nearby Munich might be even more expensive than London. Alaska just sucks. Chances are you'll get rained out and spend all your time freezing your ass off at the hotel bar. The fishing is good, but you wouldn't be able to handle the extreme cold. You could go to South America, which is cheaper than Europe and warmer than Alaska, but you're likely to get kidnapped and murdered. Did you hear that one of every five Americans traveling to South America ends up dead? It's true, I read it in the New Yorker. I also read that Jamaica is a dirty hole and a disgrace to mankind. I guess your best bet would be Amsterdam or Peru, but you've already been to both of those places. How much vacation do you get?"

"I have two weeks right now, plus two floating holidays."

"Well, anything less than two weeks isn't even worth it. You barely have time to deplane and check in at the hotel before you have to turn around and leave. No chance you'll have time to take a train to some other location after you get there. Just flying to any of those places takes a day, plus recovery time. You don't want to waste all of your vacation now with 9 months left in the year."

He took a sip from his Miller Lite and watched as I began to cry.

"Why don't you just buy a Wii," he asked, "It's only, like, $250."

Don't Judge Me, Asshole



Last night, I had the apartment to myself, and was unburdened by my moral anchor who was in Arizona for the weekend. It was a night of pernicious excess, and a morning of regret. My Carl's Jr. two-for-one six-dollar burger coupon was about to expire, and the local grocer was running a two-for-one on Little Penguin. Two-for-one + two-for-one = an upset digestive system and a rotten hangover. Why did I uncork that second bottle? Why did I scarf down that second, obscenely large hamburger? To answer these questions, I turn to poetry.

Vegetable Oil Tears - A Haiku

Little Penguin Cabs
and two, six-dollar burgers
I’m a fucking pig

Choked Unconscious

Dear Old BJJ Instructor,

I haven't grappled with really sucky beginners in a long time. Most of the white belts I've been encountering have been white belts for a long time, are young and athletic, are distracting in their hotness, or a combination of the three. But not yesterday. The white belts I grappled with yesterday, after experiencing nominal success with exploding from any dominated position, prided themselves on flailing around, like a paraplegic cruelly dumped out of his wheelchair into a swimming pool, upon getting mounted or put in side control.

So I mounted this fellow, and he bucked and snorted and used a lot of energy, none of it directed at my knees, hips, or ankles. I got one hand deep inside his collar for a choke while posting a foot out, waited until he expended a tremendous amount of effort trying to fight my very solid post, and then put my thumb in his other collar. I sunk the choke and started to put my head to the mat for better leverage and stability. I was confused because he wasn't defending - confused not because he wasn't intelligently defending, but because he wasn't defending at all. I looked over at his hand which sort of flopped against my torso. It wasn't a tap, really, but I had nothing more to prove.

I asked him if he was tapping and it was then that I realized he was unconscious. I got off of him and he came to almost immediately.

"I think I just went to sleep," he said.

"Yeah, I think so," I responded, "you sure don't tap easy! Nice job!"

He nodded with a mixture of pride and disorientation. There was only one thing left to do, so I made a "V sign" on both hands and did a victory lap around the mat*. Thank you for introducing me to this wonderful sport!

-Mezz0

*FYI - The victory lap took place in my hand, rather than in the actual, physical world.

Also, I create this BJJ Wiki to track techniques

FUCK THE IRS




Youngest,

I too, in the spirit of youthful exuberance and contempt for the government, ignored my state taxes in 2000 only to have the US Phallus shoved so far up my ass it was red, white, and blue for weeks. I too was contacted years later and extorted for fines, and interest on fines.

"How do you get such wonderful interest rates?” I wrote on a post it note along with my check to the IRS. I didn’t receive a response, which was more insulting than the 20% APR they charged me.

I thought I learned my lesson, but this year’s tax burden was a total donkey punch. I have yet to meet my accountant face to face, but he strikes me as the kind of guy I would love to have a beer with, assuming I was dying and for some reason beer was the antidote.

“There’s gonna be some additional liabilities,” he told me today, in a voice mail. This made my lower stomach contract. I thought I was playing it safe. Rather than accurately calculating my quarterly taxes, I just made a ballpark estimate, and then raised the amount by 15% so I would get a healthy refund. I immediately returned his call.

“You didn’t pay estimated state taxes, did you?” he asked.

“Fuck,” was all I could say. This would be taking me one giant leap away from the dream of a private island and monkey butler. My lower lip quivered. The little girl inside of me threatened to take over. This just wasn’t FAIR!

His tone reminded me of my dentist, upon not seeing a dentist in more than five years. This is right fucking mess, he seemed to suggest, but it can be fixed. Sure it could be fixed, but at what cost? My head was swimming. I hadn’t paid state taxes. I miscalculated Federal taxes. Fines, etc. Thousands upon thousands of dollars.

"Can I write off the lube?” I asked, “Will that make a difference?”

“What?” he responded.

“For this ass fucking – can I write off the lube?”

“Ummm – heh heh – I don’t think so.”

I hung up, went to the grocery store, and bought a plastic, economy-sized bottle of dirt-cheap vodka. It was time to batten down the hatches, downgrade the Netflix subscription, swear of sushi, reuse tin foil, and double stuff the washing machine. I started working on my resume. I diluted the shampoo with water. I attempted to channel my energies into something productive while waiting for the final tally, ignoring my ass, which tingled in horrible anticipation.

Uncle Sam Thinks Income Tax is Bullshit















I have no time for wit on this evil night. I wanted to go pick up my free tax-day burrito from Chipotle, but dammit...I was filling out a tax form after work today and for some damn reason I needed to stop filling out that form and fill out 3 other forms to get the right answer to finish that first form, but not without following line by line instructions so I know what the fuck they are asking me and none of it is saving me money and suddenly three fucking hours pass in the blink of an eye.

Not only did I miss my free burrito, I missed what was sure to be another thrilling night of Jack Bauer's 24.

But I learned my lesson once before. The Man put the smack down on me for a very well rationalized attempt at civil disobedience. I decided not to pay my Minnesota state taxes for a year.

I had overpaid my taxes by about $200, but Turbo Tax didn't want to let me E-file since I was new to the state.

"Fuck it," I reasoned, "I'd rather get stoned and watch Laugh In, than deal with postage and fill this shit out by hand."

Then I turned in the direction of the nearest lake and called out to the state, "Minnesota! I give you my tax refund for your benefit! We both know that you are committing a crime against our constitution and never should have taken my hard-earned money in the first place. You owe me one!"

Apparently, though, I owed Minnesota two. They took $400 from my tax return three years later...for interest that I owed on money that I never owed them. How's that for Minnesota nice?

So did I fix it? Set The Man straight? Fill out some forms and get back that old refund that I deserved?

Like I said before, small print, calculators and paperwork don't even compare to getting stoned and watching Laugh In.

But I did get my taxes in on time this year, and I will get paid back this time. So in a way...yeah. I feel like I'm growing as a person.

(Oh, yeah, that's pure Goldie Hawn Laugh In Hotness!)

RIP Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007)


So it goes.

I happened to be at the library early this morning when the news came across the wire. Word spread fast amongst the librarians.

I was looking for a special issue of Consumer Reports when a strange noise distracted me. I could hear what sounded like a chorus of starving cats begging for food far off in the distance. I walked closer to investigate and soon recognized the sound. I found them in the back room, behind the check-out desk. It was the librarians. Each appeared to be middle aged, red faced, and weeping loudly. They took no notice of my entrance.

"What has happened?" I demanded of the group, fearing another terrorist attack. A younger woman, having heard that a man was in the room, stood quickly and ran into my arms.

"What is it!?" I demanded again.

"He's dead ....it's Kurt....the fall last week proved fatal!! (inaudible, muffled noises) Why, Mr. Vonnegut, why God!?"

My mood quickly snapped from fear to anger. I grabbed the girl by her shoulders and pushed her back away from me.

"Damn it woman, get a hold of yourself! " I yelled, shaking her violently, "The man smoked unfiltered Pall Malls for nearly seven decades. He'd have shot himself in the head by now if he had the balls! Now get off your asses and stop whining!"

I threw her to the ground and stormed out of library. Outside I paced back and forth in front of the door, huffing down two quick Camels...waiting for the idea to come.


I ran back inside and grabbed a bag at the check-out counter. The librarians were making their way out of the back room now, crawling on top of each other, wailing loudly at God and stretching their arms up to the sky.

"God?" I said to myself, shaking my head in disgust, "Fucking Vonnegut didn't believe in any fucking God."

I made my way to fiction, Te - Z, and found his collection. I swept my arm behind his books and scooped them all into the library bag. The security alarm beeped as a threw open the first door at the exit, but I knew that there would be no interest, Kurt Vonnegut is dead.

Kurt Vonnegut is dead...and those dirty librarians are going to have a hell of a time explaining why Kurt Vonnegut's entire catalog of work shows up on the screen, but not on the shelf.

Why would I steal the collective works of a man who has helped shape my life? Why would I deprive so many aching minds of the same experience? Why am I presenting librarians in such a sexist and offensive light?

Fuck you.

We all mourn in our own ways.






(Did you know? One of Vonnegut's sons was a big Phish fan. Phish's Drummer, Jon Fishman (a Jew), was a big Vonnegut fan. The two met. The son convinced the old man to design an album cover for a Phish album. The album name was changed and a different artist used, but the art still exists. 5 points to the first person who can spot the asshole, the penis, and the vagina in the drawing...or is that a fishing lure, line, sinker, and pond?)

Hillary Clinton is a Sexy Bitch


I'm still not sure why Slick Willie went all screwy on us and stuck a cigar up some cross-dresser's asshole...I don't follow the news that closely. What I do know is that Bill is gonna come crawling back once he sees some of these hot campaign shots. She's so sexy and dirty, I wrote her two haiku's.

Oh sweet Hillary
swallow me within your lips
let me lick your teeth

President Hardcore
veto my heart with your fist
your power, like God's

Be An Ultimate Fighter

Prior to switching schools, I met a really nice guy named Antoni Hardonk – a giant of a man from Holland. Hardonk was a professional kick boxer with insane leg kicks. He was in the United States to learn some grappling prior to fighting in the UFC. He won his first match without ever going to the ground, and then last week fought again on UFC’s fight night on Spike TV.

I laughed when, in his corner, I saw that asshole black belt instructor I talked about last week – a guy so full of himself that he refused to demonstrate a move for me after class. I laughed again when the announcer claimed that Antoni was a Rickson Gracie blue belt.

The “manager” of that school gave me a hard time over not having an official Rickson Gracie blue belt after I had been training there for five months after training Brazilian Ju Jitsu for four years, after receiving my blue belt from a black belt under Rickson, and yet they handed one of their prestigious blue belts to this kickboxer from Holland after a few months of training to get themselves a few seconds of publicity. Whores! Fucking whores!

This time, the guy fighting Antoni had a style suited to neutralize the kickboxer. Antoni got taken down easily, and had obviously learned nothing about take down defense, and while Antoni had opportunity after opportunity to win the fight with Ju Jitsu 101, his lack of ground experience prevented him from coming close to submitting his opponent. When Joe Rogan, the color commentator, suggested Antoni get a new training camp, I schadenfreuded all over my pants.

Poor bastard! Nice guy, hell of an athlete, thought he was training with some of the best ground fighters in the United States only to find out the hard way that the sport of grappling has changed a lot in the past ten years, and Rickson’s school, while very good at sport ju Jitsu, is no place to be an Ultimate Figher, despite what their google ads say.

(Rickson showed up once in the five months I was there. He sat in during warm ups and criticized the way we were doing forward rolls, then left - Thanks, man!)

I See Your Incest, And Raise You Bestiality

Had a pile of dreams last night, including the old reoccurring plane crash dream – this time I’m on a Jet Blue flight, lounging fully reclined in business class, when I discover the pilot has locked himself out of the cockpit. He sits down next to me and we both stare dumbly out the window as the plane goes down, down, down.

But my favorite was a particularly vivid dream that I was “going out” with a wolf. She talked to me as a human would, but only when nobody else was around. At one point she was curled up in my lap, and we discussed my uneasiness about the fact that she might, at any point, be overtaken by her natural instincts to devour me.

“Oh – I imagine you would know,” she said.

“You mean, you would give me a warning?”

“Well, I would start growling and snarling like this.” She growled and snarled, but it was obviously not the real thing.

“Ahhh,” I said, thinking we had an understanding, “if you started growling like that I would just set you down gently and slowly walk away.”

"Yes, but I would still tear you to pieces before you reached the door," she blithely, if not lovingly, responded.

Welcome to my Poker Heaven (Fuck Yes!)

Is there a sweeter sight in the world than a player under the gun going all in when you have him covered by 3,000 chips, you're in 2nd place, you just dedicated yourself to playing smart poker, and you hold in your hand the best two cards in the deck?

Well, the Grand Canyon viewed from a plane was nice...winter time in Minnesota was quaint, those 80 degree days a couple weeks ago were swell, but this is fucking pure bliss.

2nd place in a $5, 45 person tourney.

Oh, yes...

(click image to make bigger)

E = MC Idol, Incest

Go to cnn.com, click the tab that says "analysis" and watch as you are magically transported to Time magazine articles within CNN's website. I have no fucking idea why this happens, but it does. The same thing would probably happen if you go to http://www.time.com, But there's just something unsettling about typing that into a browser.

Usually I just like browsing the news of the day, primarily focusing on politics, but they always have the "Top Five" which occasionally has something interesting to read.


















They hit two home runs recently:

A fascinating article about Albert Einstein and his views on faith and God, which reminds me of a sort of Tom Robbins style of faith...and just so happens to be the only brand of faith that I could say I ever actually felt and believed to be real. (so what if I was on mushrooms)


The best article that I have ever read about a television show. Dead-on analysis of what makes American Idol so ridiculously successful and why it's so appealing to such a large demographic. It's so fucking good, he doesn't even rip on Paula Abdul (who deserves it, that whorish cunt should have disappeared after her "Cold Hearted Snake" video)


And, since the trio here at The Fucking Triumvirate like things in threes, and happen to be related...Time obliged with another story today, topping off this joyous little menage a trois of news with a story about legalizing incest...yeah, I know, third sign of the apocalypse. The second being the legalization of marijuana, the first being Jeb Bush's presidential bid in 2012. This is the only sign of the apocalypse that relates to sex toys, though. Well, without accompanied giggling and cotton mouth, anyway.

This Incestuous


That'll do for now.

Please leave.

Welcome to my Poker Hell (Shit! Fuck! Goddammit!)




















Games Played vs Return on Investment

Well, I don't know how else to put it...I lack discipline....I done fucked up...I was riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave, kicked back and cruising...contented, for once, at the state of my poker game. I smiled sadly at my competition from time to time, wondering what I've been doing wrong for the last two years.

"Fuck it," I thought to myself, "now is the time to turn pro. Now is the time to develop a bankroll and make some serious money....now....pro" That's about the time you see the first significant dip on the chart.

3/9/2007 - I deposited $50 at PokerStars

55 games later I had about $700 in my account.

4/9/2007 - With 2o1 games under my belt and 30 days passed, I am down to $0.64

The plan I had was simple: Support my bankroll playing multi table tournies, and when I get ahead by enough, I play in a satellite to the WSOP....$80 single table sit n go here....$30 + rebuy tourney there....sooner or later $50 turns me pro.

"Enough" worked for the first 70 games and led directly to a horrific and shameful form of tilt that I haven't experienced for over a year. I lost a few 3 hour tournaments on the bubble by "bad beats". It didn't sit well...so I started playing three tournies at a time. That way I can focus on poker exclusively, and won't be bothered by the television.

It was terrible, I zoned into this attitude where I knew that I was better than all these fucking morons I was up against and yet I played worse than them every game....all of them....the whole fucking lot of them.

So I did the only logical thing you do when you know that it's your competition, not your game, holding you back. I started playing even more expensive games....more expensive buy in equals more skilled opponents. More skilled opponents plus a tilting, half retarded jackass pissing his winnings all over the table equals the second largest drop in the above graph.

Pffffffffffffffffffffffft

Like a fucking geyser, pissing everywhere, on everyone, in every room on the site...it was sick and gross and disturbing and people fucking loved me for it, games filled instantly after I registered. "Hey Frank, that donkey's at tournament 1432532!"

It was terrible, my bankroll was so severely depleted that it lacked any value whatsoever to me. So I played an $80 satellite with $120 in the bank and a quarter bottle of whiskey in my tummy.

Why not?

Finished third and was outchipped by 300 when I went all in. I won't tell what my opponent caught on the river, but I will tell you that the player who finished ahead of me and received his buyin back was sitting out all game and had only enough chips to cover about two orbits of the blinds. I received nothing but anger and blind rage in exchange for 1.5 hours and $80.

So I found two $10 tables let some steam out.

Then I had $20 in the bank.

Then $5

Then I ended up far from where I began...for one full week...Omaha Hi-Lo $1.75 buy in, 18 people. I mounted a comeback. I could place fairly regularly.

Back up to $27!

then I got drunk last night and must have entered an expensive MTT after playing several games of Omaha...my massive wave finally crashed. But I have learned some things after the most recent 200 games played...the same fucking things that I already knew:

Don't be a fucking idiot
Don't play while extremely drunk
Don't think that you're better than anyone at the table
Don't overbet
Don't give people odds
Don't get fancy
Play within your bankroll
Make the money

It's a simple fucking game and a winnable fucking game if you play smart.

$50 deposit after work tomorrow.

Let the grinding begin....

Will report after next 50 games...unless I turn pro first.

Here's the only thing that brought a smile to my face during that massive tilt. Two tournaments, two pocket aces dealt to me at the same time.

Damned Yankees Are Everywhere



The thought occurred to me when I wasn’t able to sleep last night (due to intense abdominal pain brought on by an insane amount of sit-ups) that you find the New York Yankees all over the place. I would characterize a Yankee organization as having the following characteristics:

· Very good at what they do, if not the best
· Arrogant
· Lacking in sense of humor
· Powerful
· Sometimes Wealthy/Costly
· Sometimes Monolithic

Accenture consulting are the Yankees of business. They are uniformly intelligent, driven, arrogant, and almost inhuman in their lacking of a sense of humor. They are one of the biggest, most powerful consulting organizations in the world, and they are obscenely expensive, billing out their recent college grads at $80/hour.

Microsoft, of course, are the Yankees of software. The only thing differentiating Microsoft from Apple or Google is the fact that the latter two have a sense of humor, and do not come across nearly as arrogant.

Is there something Archetypical or mythic about these qualities? Could you have an organization of bad guys in a book or movie that didn’t have these characteristics? You have the Death Star, the Matrix, the Borg collective, the Firm, and Big Brother, the biggest Yankee of ‘em all.

Who are your Yankees?

-M

Er... while we're on the subject, I also don't like it that it says, "WE ARE BETTER THAN YOU"

p.s. who the hell is Carl?

p.p.s. I like "triumvirate," but "stagnant?" I mean, I get the whole reference to ourselves as people who have not really developed beyond the children that we are in spite of having had several decades to progress, but -- I just don't think I can stand to be associated with something that has the word "stagnant" in the title. how about some other adjective...? (now I'm really asking for it, I can already feel a word being hurled at me.)

p.p.s.s. I know, I mean, I ask you to create a blog for us, and then I bitch about the name. Some noive, huh?

p.p.p.s.s. Erm, nobody else is reading this, right? Because I'm pretty sure I've already embarrassed myself. (are my ellipses annoying you yet...? I am so very fond of them, I almost can't get myself to stop using them...)

hey, is this thing on?
(only one way to find out)

okay, so U wants to buy a house, and his standards are starting to come down. which is good, because for a while he would consider nothing less than a 5-bedroom, 3-bath house in the middle of San Diego. with a jacuzzi. and a big backyard. and a studio. -- did I mention the pool? so now we're thinking 2-bed, 1-bath, in a southern suburb. we'll see about a pool...

ok, so the most interesting thing I've done in the past week is to try Danza Azteca -- fun, trancey, a little delirium-inducing with lots of drumming and incense. I recommend it!

Thursday, I'm taking my first hula class...

what's new with you-all..? (personally, I can't be witty all the time without coming across as a bit of an ass... oh. mm, but anyways, just trying to give you some material.)

He ain't Heavy, he's....a frightened, cock-tongued, pussy?

After our first post, specifically pointing out that we were not children, my fucking brother wrote this. It speaks for itself.

So.....

1) Is naughty language allowed? I wrote an email to C___ that contained the word "asshole." C___ was out of town and Mom read the email. This made Mom upset. I'd like to post her response, for example, as well as using words like: bukake, motherfucker, dirty sanchez, rat bastard, royal fucking asshole, fist-fuck, cunt, etc. Is this going to be a PG-13 blog, with the occasional bad language substituted with asterisks?

2) I'm assuming that we will be protecting our real identities, and that our real names and identifying characteristics will be off limits (This is regardless of the answer to number 1.) In fact, I was thinking this would be the only thing off limits, unless of course, we go PG-13.

3) What topics are in play, here.

Welcome to the Stagnant Triumvirate

Welcome!

You have arrived at The Stagnant Triumvirate. Here you will find fascinating insights from three siblings hellbent on gaining our parents' approval. There's The Oldest, The Middle, and me, The Youngest. Feel free to start making false assumptions and unfair comparisons.

(we are not children)

I know what you're thinking now, and I say, "Fuck you!" This will not be some sort of feel good bullshittery.

(we are not children)

We will not be patting each other on the back and sharing iced tea. In fact, if all goes as planned, we will soon be at each others throats, clawing at each others' eyes...clawing at them with words.

But that is all for the future.

For the present, I thought I'd bring you all a brief list of some of our past material to pique your interest. You may be surprised at the diversity produced from such genetically similar humans:

"Severe Teaching Strategies for the Clingy Student (ages 4-8)"
"Single Malt Scotch - Is the Highland High on Your List?"
"Wedding Planning - What the Hell?"
"3 Steps to Living a Healthier, Happier Life"
"Is Iraq the Next India? - Haliburton, Customer Service, and the Shi'ites"
"Breaking Down Barriers"
"Online Poker Part 1 - Building a Bankroll"
"Online Poker Part 2 - Pissing it all Away"

That's it for now.

Please leave.

-The Youngest