The Toadless Boy

I’m necklaceless.

I would like to parody those who make the blanket statement that Saturday Night Live is not like it used to be but I’ll leave that up to The Onion, since they dabble in that forum.

But to quote Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler (they’re both on SNL), “Really??” Saturday Night Live is no longer funny? “Really??” Don’t you miss the multi-faceted comedic stylings of Molly Shannon? Or David Spade? I really wish they would bring Colin Quinn back to do “Weekend Update”. Every person has some opinion on what era of Saturday Night Live was funny. Mark Wahlberg likes the Joe Piscopo era.

I’ve been wanting to bring this up for a while but haven’t been cranky enough. Recently Saturday Night Live got more attention with the election coverage and SNL has always had a history of doing a lot of election related stuff. That’s great because it probably keeps SNL in the ratings enough to keep going.

Unfortunately, this was mostly because of a spot on impression of Palin by Tina Fey. I imagine most of the people who followed it, a demographic that included my parents, don’t even realize Tina Fey is not in the cast. Mark Wahlberg couldn’t name anybody on the show and a few weeks later he was on the show. Now I’m not saying it’s your civic duty to watch and appreciate SNL. I guess I’m just airing out the fact that it’s still a very funny and relevant show. It has it’s moments but it definitely has a more solid cast and writers than any of the ones I grew up with. So don’t act appalled when I mention watching SNL this weekend or I ask you if you saw it.

I thought the Palin impressions and political coverage were cute but pretty predictable and standard. Some of the funnier, more poignant moments came when Tina Fey read back word for word what Sarah Palin actually said in an interview. That’s funny and gets the point across but definitely doesn’t show the abilities of the warped minds of the cast. Even something as timely as a rip on MacGyver or the Match Game ends up turning into a Twilight Zone-meets-comedy maze but with the ability to stop after 5 minutes, if they’re going nowhere. There are few if any weak links on the cast now and even Kenan is funny now, “Bokay?”

As Ransom says, “the things I laugh at anymore are either fart jokes or ones that make me say, ‘O ho ho ho, that was quite a marvelous turn that took.’” I’m glad SNL is able to combine both for me without turning in to an impression-riddled TV version of Scary Movie 5 or Date Movie 2 where they rehash word for word something that wasn’t funny the first time around. But really, I’m an elitist that is just glad to see that some shows still exist that aren’t racing for the bottom. Two and a Half Men is one of the highest rated shows on TV.

A while back, I decided I was going to stop “blogging the politics” because we don’t really need any more celebrities speaking their mind about things, especially when they are going to be more correct than the general public like I suspect I would be. That’s not going to stop me from letting my mom get her two cents in.

Backstory: My mother:

• is slowly becoming more and more liberal, especially in the face of idiots like Bush.
• gets spitting mad (in the cutest way) when Bush, O’Reilly, McCain, Cindy McCain, Laura Bush, Sarah Palin, Todd Palin, that local weatherman who doesn’t ever get around to telling you the weather come on the TV.
• is the only family member of her parents and siblings (fortunately not her husband and children) who supports Barack Obama and other democratic candidates.
• gets enjoyment out of this fact. She has hosted a fundraiser for Dave “David” Loebsack and has asked on numerous occasions to have Harkin and his buddy Obama over to her farm for a campaign stop. I can’t figure out if this is more for her politics or so she can email her dad a picture of her with Obama.

Mom sent me an email on Monday entitled McCain/Palin. They are coming to the Eastern Iowa Airport and she wanted me to get her a ticket. Why?

“I am dying to go ‘laugh’ at them.  Actually, I would like to go so I can say I have seen both sides when I have to argue with dumb people.”

She had clearly thought this out because she had plans in place in case they noticed that both she and Jayne and I have donated to Obama and are registered Democrats. I knew they would just be happy to have one more person there to inflate their turnout numbers.

In registering for the ticket that I would have to pickup for her at the Republican Headquarters in Coralville (Jayne will have to blog about this one), I pointed out that it was hilarious that they were calling it a “Victory Party” two months ahead of time. Mom’s perfect response:

“I thought the same thing………victory for what?  Being the biggest assholes!”

If it were socially accepted, I would wear rollerblades at all times.

I wore them a good chunk of my freshman and sophomore years at college, including in class.

After top stories of Utah’s four day work week, the booming Bollywood (is this a headline every year?) and “the business of the Olympics”, you may have heard about the conflict in Georgia. You may also remember that I mentioned my brother is in Georgia. My mom’s talked to him twice today and he is near a lot of the action in Gori but he is safe and evacuated. So long as he’s safe, I hope he’s having a good experience.

Psst. Dude. Dude in my training class. I remember that shirt. Not only do I remember it from when my mom bought it for me at Old Navy in 1997, but I also remember it from when you wore it the other days of training this week. You’ve been in the same classroom with 15 people for three days. You ain’t fooling us into thinking you didn’t wear that yesterday. Just a Head’s Up.

I wonder how many people checked to see if “the Internet is a series of tubes” was one of the 7 false statements counts against Ted Stevens. I know I did.

I’ll take my politicians corrupt, crazy or too powerful but I won’t take all three.

Man the tubes are going to have a heyday with this one.

Have you ever seen a Pixar movie you didn’t like?

As a Man thinking about his Future, I sometimes think about my Past. There are some things that were an everyday part of your life when you were a kid that no longer cross your mind except when writing about it on your magic computer website.

The first and most indisputable (unless you have a subscription to National Geographic or are a paleontologist) is dinosaurs. Remember how important the location of a stegosaurus’ brain(s) were and the hierarchy of coolness for dinosaurs were? Now, I’ve gone days without thinking about a dinosaur. Days.

Other ones that I propose are:

• Baby teeth
• Being good for Santa
• Any form of practice (baseball, soccer, piano)
• Jumping beans (Man, I assumed I would see these everyday in my adult life. Woody Woodpecker did.)

What say you? What consumed your child mind but no longer is a blip on the radar? The most fascinating ones are the ones you thought would never leave the radar.

I’ve already prepared a post to follow this to cleanse the palate due to the ranting and bitching that will occur in this post. But, it needs to be said.

Get up off my shit, people. I say this for more than just me but I speak from personal experience.

I live a life and part of that life is lived online. This ain’t no Second Life escape but it is a hobby that I enjoy and enjoy sharing with others. I am aware that I am doing just that but I also expect a few things in return.

The Internet is an amazing thing. I can create website(s) that can interact with friends and notify people when I’ve newly posted. I have full editorial control over what I want to say. I think this helps keep my sites from being boring. Or at least it pleases me to just say what I want. This offers someone else a (very small) glimpse of what I’m like. I bet you feel so special that I let you in to my wonderful private life and get to know the Toadless Boy a little.

That ’s next: my anonymity. You may have noticed there are a few monikers on this site and to be honest I can’t even keep them straight. I have titled the site the Toadless Boy and I’ve used the URL of Mark Fore (my default online persona). Neither of these really describe me and I know my full real name has been associated with this site before, although I try to avoid that as much as possible. This is primarily in case I run for president and not because I am embarrassed by anything I present. But because I crudely attempt to keep my identity at least unsearchable, please play along. If I haven’t advertised my blog to you, don’t advertise/identify it to others. Let them find it on their own.

If I don’t want anybody to read it, then why do I put it openly online instead of in some old school emailed newsletter to friends? Multiple reasons. First, I want it to be open. If someone wants to refinish their old floors, I have some information out there on that. If someone found me because of my interest in making monthly mixes and they like my impeccable taste in music, they can follow my posts. These people don’t need to know who I am to be part of my target audience. Second, I don’t like to force my writing on anyone. I enjoy it when my close friends read what I write and sometimes it opens up new discussions at a tailgate or allows a friend to learn that I love talking about the misuse of statistics, but if they find my drivel on music they’ve never heard of lame, they can just ignore my writing altogether. I also enjoy the technology. I’ve learned more about PHP and CSS by keeping up my own blog. I’ve increased my vocabulary and focused on editorial things such as page layout and images.

I’m pretty comfortable with what I present to people in meatspace and cyberspace. It’s a fair representation of me but it’s no substitute for actually knowing me. I am not concerned with employers (future or current) finding this space and judging me negatively based on it. First of all, I will cite the usual mantra of “Do I really want to work for someone who judges me based on an occasionally updated blog?” Secondly, I hope that someone viewing this sees that I am a generally positive and interesting person or at the very least I am capable of writing complete sentences with above average spelling.

Advice for those that know the writer but a blog was not intended for them: If you enjoy getting these little golden eggs of insight in to a coworker’s, a relative’s, a teacher’s, an authority figure’s, an acquaintance’s life, keep it to yourself. By unfairly judging, you are only killing the goose. You are taking something from them that they enjoy and have ruined it for everyone. If you feel they are doing something wrong, confront them about it. That’s what comments are for. To open up a discussion about the topics. I’m not super nuts on the whole Web 2.0 thing, but commenting on a low-traffic blog is pretty effective.

If the writer is fulfilling his or her personal duty of keeping things (especially relating to someone else) mostly anonymous, then fulfill your duty of not giving a shit. If you feel the writer is hurting you or others in some way (which they most likely are not), let them know. I’m sure you can figure something out.

Most people are able to figure out sarcasm. Most employers would understand that just because I wrote “get up off my shit” on my semi-anonymous blog that I would not write that in a business correspondence with our biggest customer in Korea. Most people will not care that I once called my dad an “asshole” in response to an inflammatory discussion of human rights. Most people will understand, despite what a once-in-a-while post might make them think, that I love my family, my wife, my friends, my job and my life.