Author: GeekMan

No G-News Is Good G-News

• by GeekMan • In Childhood Memories •   20

Ah, the memories of youth.

“Get on board, step inside,
Soaring for a magic ride,
Roaring toward the other side,
Where only rainbows hide…”

When I was a young Geek, I remember sitting in front of the TV every morning before school and singing along to the greatest children’s show of all time. I had friends on that show, friends who would teach me things that Mr. Rogers and Big Bird couldn’t, or wouldn’t, teach me at all. Things like, how to properly insult a friend without them actually getting angry with you. Or teaching me what makes a practical joke both practical and funny. Or helping me understand that so called ‘real’ news programs should be a lot more cynical if they wanted to be funny.

Of course, I’m talking about The Great Space Coaster.

Gary Gnu, Goriddle Gorilla, Edison Elephant, Baxter, Speed Reader, Roy, Fran, Dan, and the evil M.T. Promises made each day a joy. My favorite parts of the show were the Gary Gnu G-News show and whenever Goriddle would play a practical joke on Edison. Damn, I really didn’t like Edison, with his hand-held trunk, satellite dish ears and obsessive-compulsive dusting. I always thought the other cast members should have just killed him and had space elephant steaks for the rest of the year.

Mmmmm… Space elephant steak. [drool]

Well, I’ve been doing a little research on the show lately to find out if there are any toys or other paraphernalia that I could purchase and thus revisit, however pathetically it might be, my long-lost youth. I haven’t found any items to buy yet, but I have found out some startling facts about the people on the show that I thought I’d take a moment to share with all of you.

No, no. Don’t thank me now. That look of stoic, martyred tolerance in your eyes is more than enough.

Remember ‘Fran’? You know, the almost cute but not quite good looking girl from the show? Yeah, she was my first TV crush, too. And I’ve always thought she was dead, you know, like how everyone thinks Mickey Rooney is dead until he shows up at the Academy Awards? Well guess what? I found out that Fran’s not dead and is in fact alive and well and doing an off-off-Broadway show! Not only that, but if you’ve ever heard the commercial for Sleepy’s mattresses then you’ve heard her singing!

That’s right; she sings the Sleepy’s song.

“Trust Sleepy’s, for the rest of your life.”

I also found out that her real name isn’t Fran, it’s Emily Bindiger. But you know what? She’ll always be Fran to me. Fran of the sky blue colored shirts and bright yellow suspender pants. Fran of the wild, untamed hair held back with banana clips and scrunchies. Fran, who I always believed was sharing a secret smile with Edison Elephant and his long, thick trunk.

Oh, how my adolescent loins yearned for Fran and her wicked, evil ways.

I also found out, much to my chagrin, that the voice actor of Goriddle Gorilla is none other than my archenemy, Kevin Clash. For those of you who don’t know, Kevin is also the voice of Elmo of Sesame Creep Street fame. I really hate Elmo, but now that I know Kevin was also the voice of Goriddle maybe I should be a bit more lenient towards him and his new alter ego.

Nah, Elmo’s still a frickin annoying piece of crap.

Well, I’m still looking for merchandise from the show, or even something made recently that is based on the show, like those new Muppet Show figures I’m seeing everywhere. Haven’t found anything worth my money yet, though. Woe is me.

“On the Great Space Coaster, whoa-oh-oh,
On the Great Space Coaster, off we go…”

Oh man, I really miss that show.

Dropping The Bomb

• by GeekMan • In Geek Life •   3

Let me speak hypothetically for a moment.

Has anyone else out there ever noticed that the moment you think you’re alone in a public place you will almost always attempt to do some relatively disgusting bodily function? And you’ll almost always be completely embarrassed by a stranger the very next moment? For example, if you’ve spent the last hour clenching your butt cheeks in an effort to hold in what you honestly believe will be the world’s most devastatingly powerful expulsion of anal gas ever recorded in human history; you might think it’s a good idea to relax your constant vigilance the moment you stepped into an empty elevator.

You would be wrong.

You see, as you let loose with a monumental tribute to one-note brass tubas everywhere, that’s when the gremlins of fate would show up to cause you emotional pain and suffering unseen since you were in kindergarten and spilled your apple juice on the front of your jeans and were taunted with the name ‘BedWetter Peepeeface’ for the next two weeks.

Damn you Amy C., damn you to hell.

Anywaste, let’s get back to our story. As your malodorous biological attack on sinuses everywhere escaped from its not-quite hermetically sealed container, you might even have bent slightly at the waist and thrust your butt outwards to force as much air from your body as possible. You might have made the “Ahhhhh…” sound in ecstasy as the poo in gaseous form left your body. You may even have smiled.

And that’s just what those pesky gremlins were waiting for.

Because, just as you realize that the smell of your own fart is so strong that even you are forced to hold your breath, that’s when the elevator doors will open to a lobby FULL of people waiting to get on. And as they all enter the elevator, and as you see them blanch in disgust or quickly swallow as they vomit slightly in their mouths, the only thought running through your head is, “Thank god nobody on this elevator knows who I am.”

And right then someone from the back says, “Hey, GeekMan! Is that you?”

I really, REALLY hate those frickin gremlins.

So This Is War

• by GeekMan • In Serious •   3

Funny, I don’t feel ‘war-ish’.

I’m not sure, but in order for an altercation to be considered a fight, don’t both sides need to be able to at least have the possibility of hurting each other? I mean, even though there are bombs and missiles exploding over Baghdad there isn’t anything happening over here aside from some rain.

I’m not complaining, I’m just saying. Y’know?

I don’t like to talk politics or religion here, it’s just not my bag, baby. But I am going to say a quick little something today. I used to have another website two years ago and on that website I once made a prediction. I predicted that Dubya would get this country involved in a war sometime during his presidency and lo and behold, I was right.

Go me.

But that prediction isn’t really the important thing, at least it isn’t anymore. What is important is that whether I was for or against this particular war before it began, and I’ve never mentioned on this website which way my thoughts lay, doesn’t really matter now that we’ve started bombing Baghdad. Whether I was for or against is now moot since it is my fellow Americans out there doing whatever it takes to get the job they were told to do done.

And so, I no longer consider myself pro or con.

Whether you were an anti-war, pro-peace, tree-hugging hippy, or an anti-diplomacy, pro-war, kill-em-all warmonger, I don’t think it matters anymore. Right now, you should be giving the armed forces all the support you can.

But afterwards you can bet there’ll be some reckoning.

Once this war is over those of you who were all for more diplomacy can bring Dubya to task for his actions and decisions that have no doubt made America an even more feared and/or loathed country in the eyes of the world. Those of you who applauded the president’s decision can raise him on your shoulders and carry him down every Main Street in America shouting praise at him for having the balls to finally do what needed to be done.

Me? I think I’ll just stay home and write something funny.

Right now, I am wholeheartedly hoping with all my being that this will end quickly and decisively, so that the men and women who are out there laying their lives on the line for us can come home. Safe, sound and to a nation that respects them for their willingness to lay down their own lives for us.

Good fortune, soldiers. Come home soon.

We’re Going To Pump You Up

• by GeekMan • In Geek Life •   2

“Hey Bub, what’s up?”

There is no answer from the sweat covered, heavily breathing, and human shaped lump on the floor. Raising his one and only eyebrow in curiosity, Bread saunters closer to what may have once been a proud human Geek, but was now only a defeated and pathetic schlump.

“Hey. Loser. Something wrong?”
[panting noises]
“Bub, you’re beginning to scare me. What the hell’s wrong with you?”
“Wheeze. Gasp.”
“Can you talk, Bub?”
[coughing fit]
“Ewwwww. What is that, a lung?”
[more wheezing]
“OK, moron. I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s wrong so either talk to me or I’m going to go play Halo and get ready for this weekends’ Ex-Boxx party.”

Slowly, ever so slowly, GeekMan’s sweat drenched face turns towards Bread. It is then that Bread notices that even though GeekMan seems to be in immense physical pain his eyes are fever bright with accomplishment. The last time Bread saw him look this way was when GeekMan had managed to open that stuck jar of peanut butter without crying for HoBiscuit to do it for him. Everyone had to live with, “Who’s the Man? That’s right, I’M the man!” for the following two weeks.

Idiot.

“Ok, you’ve managed to turn your head. That’s a good sign, I think. So tell me, what’s wrong with you?”
“Pant. Wheeze.”
“I saw your mouth move, come on, you can do it. Talk.”
“… Ahhhhh… pant… ahhhyyy… gasp…”
“Eye? There’s something wrong with your eyes?”
“… Aaaayyy… pantpantpant… duh… duh… did”
“Ok, I get it. You did something, right? Did you fall down, go boom? Did somebody have a wittle accident?”
“I… wheeze… did… pantpant… three… huffhuffhuff… puh… puh… pushups!”
“Holy Crumb! In a row?! You know your body can’t handle the shock of exercise!”

Bread jumps to the phone and begins dialing 911.

Right before the soothing darkness of unconsciousness claims him, GeekMan smiles at Bread and says, “And tomorrow, after I get out of the hospital, I’m going to do four.”

And then the darkness claims him.

Fat Bastard

• by GeekMan • In Geek Life, HoBiscuit, Rants •   6

Last night my self image up and died.

I’ve always been skinny, almost anorexic actually, and I’ve never needed to exercise to maintain my Schwarzenegger inspired model-esque physique. But last night it was explained to me, in no uncertain terms, that I was no longer the rail thin, super-skinny, sex god of my youth.

Don’t misunderstand; I’m still a sex god. Just not such a thin and fit one, is all.

In fact, over the last year or so, I think I’ve developed a ‘Gamers Pooch’. You know, the slightly distended belly of someone who spends as much time as possible in front of a computer or television instead of doing anything that might be mistaken as exercise? It’s gotten so bad, and my body is so out of shape, that attempting to do even a single pushup might send me into immediate cardiac arrest. Eating a salad, or lord forbid a granola bar, could very well cause my colon to explode as if I were a suicide bomber on a bus in Israel.

And so, I refused to exercise so the world would not lose its one true Geek.

All that changed last night. As I was getting into bed I turned around to pick something up off the floor. As I did so, I heard HoBiscuit give a quick gasp and then burst out in a fit of giggles. Not understanding what was so funny, I turned around to face the bed and saw her lying there and pointing at me, laughing so hard she was crying.

“What’s so funny, HoBiscuit?”
[giggling and pointing]
“You shouldn’t be pointing at my crotch and laughing, honey. I told you it shrinks when it’s cold out. Or when it’s frightened.”
[giggling becomes hysterical]
“Come on, honey. I’m too tired for this. What’s so frickin funny?”
“Your ass.”
[More laughing]
“Sigh. My ass. And what about my ass is so funny?”
“I can see it!”

Oh. Crap.

I had a hole in my pajamas. A really, REALLY big hole. Now, granted these pajamas are about 7 years old and I wear them almost every night, but still, one would think I’d notice a new hole in them large enough to accommodate another leg. But I hadn’t, and now HoBiscuit would, as was her right, make fun of me for the next several weeks.

[singsong voice]
“Fat ass! Fat ass! GeekMan’s got a fat ass!”
[/singsong voice]

So, now I need to start exercising again so I can banish not only my Gamers Pooch, but also my very own big, fat ass. Does anyone know if channel surfing can be considered as part of a daily workout schedule?

No? Stupid, stupid slowing metabolism.

Pet Peeve

• by GeekMan • In Rants •   7

I wish I had a pet.

If I had a pet, I bet it would do something funny or charming every day that I could then turn into a funny story, or witty parable for my readers’ enjoyment. Having a pet would help me get through the days that I just can’t seem to think of something to write about. Having a pet would be cool, but having a cool pet would be better.

If I had a pet, it would be a shark.

My pet shark would live in a giant tank in my bedroom. In a 30,000 gallon tank with one of those cute scuba-diving bubble making thingies in it. His name would be Max, or Sharky.

Yeah, Sharky sounds cool.

Whenever my friends came over I would feed Sharky some poor hapless feral cat I caught lurking in the neighborhood the day before. Or, if one of my friends beat me in Halo, I’d laugh as I threw him into the tank and watched him try to out swim Sharky.

Haha. Stupid human, you can’t out swim Sharky. He’s a shark.

Yeah, if I had a pet shark I would be really cool. I bet if I had a pet shark then all those girls at the mall who whisper about me being ‘creepy’ would want to meet me. Maybe they’d even stop running away whenever they saw me in my flip-flops and trench coat ‘Peek-A-Boo’ outfit.

I bet they’d even start returning my phone calls.

And you know what would be really cool? If I had a motorcycle. That’s because if I had a motorcycle, I could wear a leather jacket and become famous for jumping my motorcycle over Sharky’s tank. Then all the girls would swoon and let me touch them in their secret places.

Just thinking about it makes me feel all funny inside.

And, after I jumped Sharky’s tank on my motorcycle, whenever some pathetic schmuck wrote me an email telling me that my site sucked because I didn’t make him/her laugh anymore, I could just smile and nod my head. Because, you understand, I had jumped the shark so some anonymous idiot telling me that my site had done so wouldn’t make any difference to me. I would smile knowingly, nod my head and blithely go about my business.

But I can’t do that now, you see.

I can’t do it because I don’t have a motorcycle, or a leather jacket. And I certainly don’t have a pet shark named Sharky. All I have is myself and my silly sense of humor and a driving need to write stupid things for faceless people all over the world. So, as it is that I don’t believe that I’ve jumped the shark, and I don’t believe I’ll ever have the opportunity to do so, I feel there is only one thing I can say to this faceless, nameless, anonymous person. If you don’t like what I write, then don’t read it.

Or, in other words, “Frick you, you frickin frick.”

Men Really Are Stupid

• by GeekMan • In Geek Life •   8

Pop quiz, hotshot.

It’s a delightful Wednesday evening in the big city and everything seems right in the world. You’re sitting at a restaurant with your fiancée and three other beautiful women when your tranquil and pleasant life is suddenly and unexpectedly threatened. Having been ignoring the yip-yapping of the female conversation to give your full attention to the delicious meal in front of you, it takes a moment before you realize that the entire restaurant has gone quiet.

Too quiet.

Turning your head slowly towards the women, a thin string of hot-as-lava cheese stretching from your mouth to the piece of pizza in your hand, you realize that they are all staring at you with very angry, evil and merciless looks in their eyes. You can only imagine that this is what a wildebeest must see right before the lions rip out its throat. Quickly looking over your shoulder, you swear you can see a hooded figure with a scythe standing there.

And it’s pulling a bony finger across its skeletal throat.

Quickly swallowing the burning bite of pizza that now is as tasteful as a mouthful of ash, you ask, “What’s up, ladies?”

“Oh, nothing really.” One of them replies, smooth as silk and deadly as a knife in the gut. “We were just discussing men and their preoccupation with stupid and disgusting things.”

Swallowing hard, your eyes scan the area for an escape route as your mouth spews out a phrase you memorized as a child when your dad loaned you his copy of “How To Delay A Dangerous And Angry Female Until You Can Make Your Escape From A Most Assuredly Deadly Encounter: For Dummies”.

“Are those new shoes?”

“No. And stop trying to avoid the situation.”

Stupid, stupid book.

“As the only man here, we’d like to know your thoughts on the subject of our discussion. And you can stop scanning the place for exits, there’s only one door out and you have to get past all of us to get to it.”

Thinking fast, you come up with a plan that has never failed you yet.

“Well ladies, I’d love to give you my thoughts but right now I fear I need to use the bathroom…”

A guy at the next table turns around and whispers, “No go, buddy. The bathroom’s in the back and there’s no exit. I already tried.”

He looks miserable and his date looks smug as she continues explaining to him, in exacting detail, everything that had transpired at her office that day. Including the horrible cramps she silently and stoically suffered through during her two hour meeting.

Stupid, stupid restaurant.

Turning back to your tablemates, you sigh in defeat and resign yourself to a fate worse than death.

“Ok, ladies. You got me. Do you want to slit my throat and watch me bleed to death, or would you rather I poke myself in the eye with this straw so you can take turns sucking the life out of me?”

“Stop being so melodramatic. All we want is for you to answer a question for us. Honestly and truthfully.”

Oh. Crap.

“We were just talking about my ex-boyfriend and how he swore he never looked at pr0n. Even after I found a Playboy hidden under his bathroom sink. He swore he’d never seen it before and that it must have been his ex-roommate’s.”

Is that all? Whew!

“Well ladies,” You say in relief. “Obviously, he was lying. Men love pr0n. And even if it was once his roommate’s, it was his now and you can be sure he knows each of the women on those pages. Intimately.”

“So you’re saying that even though we were dating, even though he had me to be with, he still liked to look at pr0n?”

“Ladies, men like pr0n. It’s hardwired into our DNA. All men look at pr0n, they need to. And even if a man hasn’t looked at or purchased pr0n in a long time, every man will one day succumb to the base need to rent Assmaster 14: In Through The Out Door at least once in their life.”

As the women all look at each other and smile, your stomach does a swan dive into your lower intestines. Something is wrong.

“So you’re saying that all men look at pr0n? Even men, who are shall we say, engaged?”

Too late you realize your mistake. It was a trap all along.

Looking across the table at your fiancée, you can see that she now has a feral look in her eyes and is giving you a lazy smile as if to say, “I wonder how much I can pawn this ring for?”

What do you do, jackhole? What do you do?

Where’d Everybody Go?

• by GeekMan • In Experiments •   6

This is a Geek TV newsbreak.

We, the producers of the drivel collectively known as Geek TV, have discovered something that, although culturally, emotionally, intelligently and economically insignificant to the people of the world, we still feel needs to be sensationalized beyond all rational proportions until it becomes the next product of mass hysteria. It’s not that we feel left out of the whole Duct Tape Fiasco of 2003; it’s just that that train has already left the station and we can’t afford to miss the next trend or our already skittish sponsors will leave us and move over to reruns of Punky Brewster.

Or, worse yet, Dr. Phil.
[shudder]

It has come to the attention of this station that there is a crisis brewing on the internet. A crisis of almost biblical proportions. It’s not an immanent cyber-attack on the internets DNS servers or even the outbreak of a new and more destructive computer virus. What we’re bringing to your attention today is something worse, much worse.

Blogageddon is upon us.

That’s right citizens, Blogs all over the web are disappearing, falling silent, changing their main focus or being taken over by evil, power-mad psychopaths bent on using other people’s websites for their own egomaniacal plans of world domination.

One poor victims name is Dave.

Dave, of Acerbia.com, is a Bloggerville citizen who believed he needed to ‘take a break’ from the rigors of Blogging for a while. Somehow, he was convinced to hand over his site to a gaggle of different Bloggers from around the net and they began using Dave’s own site to further their nefarious plans. They claimed that their own sites had been destroyed due to something called a ’server crash’, but after an exhaustive 15 minute search involving one email and a couple of online chats with an anonymous source, we at Geek TV have found no proof of such an outage.

We now believe that Dave was being mind controlled.

When contacted by Geek TV, Dave would neither confirm nor deny that he was under the control of his new ‘guests’. He merely said, “I was promised boobies. They promised me boobies. Even Miguel promised me boobies.” over and over again.

Geek TV believes that ‘boobies’ is a new type of drug.

Another victim of this latest terrorist threat is poor Stacy of Blogatelle. When asked when her very popular web log would return, Stacy is quoted as saying, “My frickin server crashed you frickin morons! I’ll be back when I frickin feel like it. Now get that frickin camera out of my frickin face before I shove it up your frickin ass! Sideways!”

[chuckling]
Oh that Stacy, always the kidder.
[/chuckling]

Miss Michele of A Small Victory isn’t one who’s lost her site or been the subject of a takeover, but her story is tragic nevertheless. In the last year Michele has gone from writing witty, funny, introspective and sometimes vitriolic personal stories to writing witty, funny, introspective and sometimes vitriolic political stories. And as this story was being written, she has suddenly begun to question her writing and is thinking of going back to writing witty, funny, introspective and sometimes vitriolic personal stories yet again!

This can only be the work of evil incarnate, Osama Bin Laden.

When asked to comment for this story Michele said, “What the hell do you mean, ‘if I stop writing about political crap the terrorists will win’? I’m tired of writing about it and if I want to stop then I bloody well will stop and there’s nothing you can do about it. Now leave me alone you frickin jackhole before I call Stacy over here and watch her shove that frickin camera up your ass!”

[chuckling]
Ah Michele, she’s a class act all the way.
[/chuckling]

We at Geek TV believe these three, Dave, Stacy and Michele are only the tip of the iceberg. We are positive that there are many others out there who are suffering the same fate as these three hapless individuals, but they just don’t know it. We want the world to know about all the sites out there that have suddenly and ominously disappeared, changed their focus or been taken over.

Tell us of your pain, citizens. We are here for you.

No one else has given a thought to the consequences of these tragic events; they’re too busy thinking of themselves. Someone needs to speak up for the hapless people who have been forgotten by the rest of the world. Are we all so selfish? Are we too busy thinking of only ourselves to speak up on behalf of others? Well, we here at Geek TV are always ready and willing to open our mouths without thinking on someone else’s behalf.

Someone like GeekMan.

GeekMan, of The Pathetic Mighty Geek, disappeared from the web almost three months ago. He claims it was due to an overwhelming workload, but we now believe he may have been under the influence of ‘boobies’ or possibly even some other, more powerful, drug called ‘Moolah’. A close, personal friend of GeekMan who goes by the name ‘Bread’ explained why GeekMan had suddenly returned to Blogging;

“He frickin craves attention. He’s like some big, stupid circus clown. Y’know? The annoying kind? Yeah, with the nose that squeaks and the lapel flower that squirts water. If he isn’t the center of attention he gets all sulky and whiney and he becomes unbearable. You do realize that he’s only writing this whole frickin story in the hopes that the popular Blogs will link to him and drive up some traffic, right? He’s such a pathetic link-whore. It’s sad, really. Tragic.”

GeekMan could not be reached for comment.

Starting Over

• by GeekMan • In Geek Life, Traveling •   5

I’ve been away for quite a while, haven’t I?

Since I’ve been gone a whole lot has happened to me that I would love to be able to write about, but unfortunately all of it is work-centric and I won’t be able to say anything about it. No, no don’t cry. I’m sure that I’ll come up with something to say.

Ah, urmmm…

[twiddling thumbs]

Uhhhhhh…

[whistling]

Come on brain, think.

[nervous sweating]

Oh wait, I know! How about something only I’ll think is funny? Hot DAY-um! That sounds like a great idea. I think I’ll make up some sort of list that will pathetically and non-humorously summarize the last three months of my life without mentioning any particulars about what I’ve been doing. Impossible, you say? Ha! I’ll take that as a personal challenge, llama-lips! So, let’s get it on!

In no particular order, here are The Top Ten Signs You Might Be An Overworked Freelancer.

You wake up in the morning thinking, “Where am I, and am I late for where I’m supposed to be?”

Benefits, bonus, direct deposit, weekend, 9-5 and paid vacation are terms that are foreign to your vocabulary.

You know the fastest route to baggage claim in every major airport in the U.S.

Your accountant doesn’t blink an eye when you claim your Spongebob Squarepants DVDs as a business expense.

The words ‘Per Diem’ make your nipples hard.

Flight attendants on all the major carriers know you by your first name. On sight.

You don’t understand why it’s wrong to call your friends and family at 2:30 in the morning on a Sunday. Aren’t they working too?

You have no sympathy for people who claim that working from 9am to 7pm is a ‘long, hard day’. To you that’s a standard 10 hour day, so what’s the big deal?

You believe time zones and jet lag are for tourists.

You can commute to your office in your underwear and the only one who’ll see you is the family pet. And no one can hear it laugh at you.

And a bonus 11th Sign You Might Be An Overworked Freelancer…

You think this list is funny because it’s true.