Jew on Jew crime

Let's start this thing on a positive note: It's about FUCKING TIME the Lakers ditched Kwame "I'm 7 feet tall but play like I'm 5'4'', and I can't catch the ball, and I can't shoot the ball, and I can't make free-throws, and I sometimes play defense, but mostly I get lost in rotations, and I don't know where to be in the triangle offense" Brown. Pau Gasol is a legitimate scoring threat, a good rebounder, and isn't a little bitch. He may not be the best defender, but neither was Brown, so... Hopefully this will convince KOBE that it's time to stick around LA a little longer, not bitch and moan all summer, because, surprise surprise, the Lakers are scaring people again!

Oh yeah, and I bought "Plan 9 from Outer Space" on DVD for 32 pesos!!! That's a little less than 3 dollars. If you don't know of Plan 9, it is purportedly the WORST movie of all-time. And if you know how much I randomly love terrible movies, you know what a boon this is for me.

Ok... now for another installment of "Fucked Up Shit that Happens to Me"

Greenbaum tried to kill me two nights ago. Matt and I came home from a quintet rehearsal at about 10:30pm. Walking into the apartment, we were struck by an unusual smell. It kinda smelled like Alex had made something kinda funky for dinner while we were out. Like onions and butt-sauce. But Matt and I had been steadily drinking tequila during our quintet rehearsal (we're in Mexico, after all) so we just sorta gritted our teeth and chilled.

Around 1 I think I decide to go to sleep. I looked for the root of the smell in the kitchen, assumed it to be the trash or something (we'd thrown out some beef from the fridge that afternoon, so you never know) and decided to go to bed. I think I woke up once as the stank sorta washed over me. It kinda smelled like a dead animal, but it was coming in waves... I dunno, I went back to sleep.

At about 2 in the morning, Alex returned home from the poker game we'd had to miss on account of quintet, with his buddy Wilshere (not to be confused with Wilshire) rolled into the apartment. As I'm kinda a light sleeper, and seeing as how I sleep in the living room, I stirred as they entered to a chorus of, "Wow, it smells TERRIBLE in here" and "Do you think Gurfield like crapped his pants or something?"

"No guys, I think it's something you made for dinner, Alex" I squawked. They proceeded to go chill for a while, and I think at some point Alex locked the trash outside, assuming the smell to be the same thing I did.

Every few hours through the night, as I tossed and turned, I got a whiff of dying flesh. Gross. But when I looked under the couch (the usual spot for mice and such) I found nothing.

The next morning, I got up early to eat something before orchestra rehearsal, and went in the kitchen to make some eggs. Still smelled funky. This particular gas stove has a button to light the stove (no pilot light). As I attempted to light the right front burner, the burner on the front left LEAPED into flames. HOLY SHIT! The gas for the right front burner was on very low. There was no flame, but the gas had been on all night. Alex, in his infinite wisdom, had turned off the flame somehow during his dinner prep, but had left the gas on. Yeah. Now I'm lucky enough that I didn't blow the whole apartment up (including myself) as part of Alex's elaborate plot to eliminate the extra Jew from the apartment, but what really boggles my mind is how I didn't, like, you know, die from suffocation on account of sleeping in the room full of gas.

Now in the US, I'm quite familiar with the scent of natural gas. What I was not told was that in Mexico, the scent is quite different. It smells like onions and butts. Smelly butts. But yeah, there were a couple of windows slightly open, and somehow I managed to not feel any real ill-affects. No sickness, and no discernible brain damage... other than my usual general malaise. So I guess that's a good thing, right?

I guess maybe because he was feeling guilty for the whole, "trying to kill me" thing, Alex decided to buy a 32-inch LCD flat-screen TV for our Superbowl party. The thing is, the only real place to get anything like that around here is WalMart. Now I have plenty of moralistic reservations and objections to doing anything at WalMart, but I DO like TV, so I happily went along for the ride. Plus, with their return policy, I think the plan was to bring the TV back after the game anyways. So we show up, because a cheap TV they've previously found seems like the best bet, but when we arrive, that TV is no longer available. So we opt for a slight upgrade. Of course, finding someone who works in the electronics section proves exceedingly difficult. And then they take approximately 30 minutes to go to the stock room and come back. Only to tell us that there are none of that one left either. And it takes another 30 minutes for them to go and check with the "manager" to see if we can take the floor model. And another 30 minutes after they said we could for a 5% discount (normally a floor model discount is at least 10-15%). And after asking to speak to the manager, it takes another 30 minutes for them to return and say, ok, 10% (we never saw a "manager", by the way). Then came this:


Notice ball-on-a-stick in the background....

Yeah so "floor model" in Mexico apparently means, no box, but we will SARAN WRAP it for you. If you've never wondered just how silly the thought of Saran Wrapping a TV is, neither had I, until I saw these two "dedicated" stock workers, obviously put-off by the fact that they had to DO something that evening, diligently wrapping the LCD screen in plastic wrap for protection. The funniest thing was when we were leaving the WalMart, the security guards at the door didn't seem at all perturbed by our un-boxed TV that we were carrying out. Almost as if they see this sort of thing all the time.

So to recap, no more Kwame, didn't die, and ended up with a big screen TV for the Superbowl. Overall not a bad day and a half. Oh, and the conductor of the orchestra, who kinda reminds me of a less-competent Chris Schwabe (Lincoln Middle School Band and Orchestra, and eventually SAMOHI Orchestra Director... favorite quote: "I am hap-py, major third") has taken to giving me the big "Thumbs-Up" every time I have an entrance. Not really sure why. I'd like to give him a finger too.