Due to various birthday-related activities, I was not able to write anything worthwhile for Monday’s post. I should be back in the swing of things on Tuesday. In the meantime, read Sunday’s post (if you haven’t already). Or check out this guy’s God Damn Diary. There’s always something great to read there. Just wish the bastard wouldn’t set the bar so goddamn high. Motherfucker.

By the time you read this blog entry, my 36th year of existence will be over. Yes, today I am 37. Don’t believe me? Take a look at my bio over there on the left. The bio doesn’t lie. The bio never lies. Okay, sometimes the bio might tell a fib or two. But when it comes to my age, the bio never lies.

Anyhow, I can’t say I’ve been looking forward to this birthday. Not that I’m frightened of getting any older. It’s just that once your mother stops arranging parties for you, the b-day celebrations kind of lose their charm.

No more pointy little hats with elastic chin straps digging into your flesh. No more Pin The Tail On The Donkey or Musical Chairs. No more ratcheting noisemakers to whirl around over your head. Or those snake-tongue buzzers to blow into your friends’ faces.

Why not?

I want a clown-face cake with number-shaped candles. And party favors for all my friends: superballs and Hot Wheelsâ„¢cars. And I want a lousy magician performing store-bought tricks. And I want hot dogs for lunch with yellow mustard, not dijon. And orange soda to wash it down.

And after that, it’ll be time to serve that clown cake, thick with Crisco frosting. You’re welcome to have a piece. Just remember, I get the part with the nose on it. And don’t give me that bullshit about who called it first. I’m the goddamn birthday boy and it’s my fuckin’ special day! Now where the hell are my presents? You better have brought me a present.

Did that get your attention? Of course it did. That’s a what a good fuck will do to ya. You could be reciting a speech on particle physics to a group of sleep-deprived mongoloids, but drop the word fuck in there and they’ll sit up in their seats and raise their unibrows.

I’m not sure why fuck is such a powerful word. For some, it’s just the shock factor: “Oh my god, did he just say fuck?” For others, it’s the memories that the word fuck brings up: sweaty bodies, lustful moans, that look in your lover’s eye right after she’s had her tenth orgasm in a row, that kind of stuff.

Fuck is the king of all profanity. Think about it: Throughout the day, you might throw a dozen or so shits out there, but you reserve the fucks for special occasions: pounding a nail through your thumb, getting stuck in traffic, drinking expired milk, getting kneed in the balls, having a DVD skip at the best part, misplacing your winning lottery ticket, catching a fly ball with your nose. . . and not having enough time to come up with a fucking ending to your blog entry. FUCK!

I’m usually pretty good at solving basic math problems. But there’s one type of equation that constantly gets me confused: age math. I mean, how hard could it be to subtract 1976 from 2004? Apparently, a little harder than I thought.

Last weekend, I was talking to my sister on the phone when she brought up the topic of my upcoming birthday. She wanted to know if I had any plans to celebrate. “Not really,” I said. “It’s not a big deal. Just 36.” My sister quickly corrected me. I would not be turning 36, but 37. Damn it, she was right. How the fuck could I forget my age? Could I really be so subconsciously concerned about getting older that I forget basic math? Nah. . .

Holy shit, I just thought of something: In just four more years, I’ll be hitting the big 4-0. Now that’s scary.

About five years ago, when I was vacationing in Africa, I spent a week with the Muhalabee tribe. They were a primitive people, fashioning most of their weapons from the dung of water buffalos. Since water buffalos did not exist in Africa and were pretty much extinct, the Muhalabees took very good care of the weapons they had. I found this to be rather strange, but I did not question their ways. After all, I was a guest of the tribe and I had to respect their traditions.

One tradition they insisted I take part in was the drinking of the tribal chief’s urine. Now, I know that may sound disgusting, but it really wasn’t that bad. It’s not like he just pisses into a cup. They serve it chilled in a glass pitcher, with just a hint of lime. I asked them where they found such a lovely pitcher, and they replied “crateandbarrel.com,” after which I questioned how they kept the urine so cold, and they replied, “Just shut the fuck up and drink the fucking pee.” Well, that’s about as best as I could translate it for you.

So I guzzled down the urine and they all cheered, and then they quickly poured me another glass, and then another. And that’s when I noticed that nobody else in the tribe was drinking the piss. They were devouring odd looking fruits and gnawing on the roasted meat of a poo-slain zebra.

I asked the chief why the other members of the tribe were not drinking the urine, and he told me that it was an honor given only to a privileged few. So I guzzled down another glass and they cheered again.

Well, I guess I got caught up in the moment. Because before I knew it, I had consumed the entire pitcher of liquid waste. Only this time the tribe didn’t cheer. They laughed. And I mean they really laughed. They just pointed at me and laughed. I asked the chief what the fuck was going on and he finally let me in on joke:

Turns out, the Muhalabees are notorious practical jokers. The liquid I drank was not the tribal chief’s urine at all. It was the urine of a baby elephant: a true delicacy. Those crazy guys. They sure had me going. Anyway, after I vomited violently for close to two hours, we laughed and danced into the night. Those Muhalabees. They’ve got a pretty fucked up sense of humor, but they sure know how to party.

This lighthearted blog has been interrupted so that I can do a little venting before my fucking heart explodes. Excuse the big block of text. It’s kind of how I’m feeling right now. Thanks for your patience.

Okay, so I’m driving home today in the fucking rain and I’m taking this new shortcut. I’m making good time, too, not hitting too much traffic, and I think to myself, I might even get home early. Then all of the sudden, WHAM! A fucking sea of cars appears in front of me. Where the fuck did they come from? And what the hell are they doing using my goddamn shortcut? I mean, I’ve never seen it that bad before. There was this incredibly long wait just to get through the intersection. And all of these cars were gridlocked, making it difficult to get by them. It was SO GODDAMN FRUSTRATING! I kept making turns, trying to get around the traffic, only to find myself running right into yet another ocean of sheet metal. To make an already-too-fucking-long story short, it took me an hour and half to get home today. An hour and a goddamn half. What the fuck? I was trying call everyone I knew just so I could vent, but my stupid LG phone was malfunctioning and when it finally did start working, nobody was answering their fucking phone! To make matters worse, my friend called me back five minutes after I got home to say that she couldn’t really talk because she wanted to concentrate on her driving. I was still pretty wound up from my drive through the Hollywood parking lot that I guess I said some things that didn’t quite come out right. Even though I was totally sincere when I said “I understand. Have a safe drive home.” It came out sounding rather sarcastic and mean. Not a good thing. Fuck, I hate Hollywood. I’m in desperate need of a hug or a bullet to the head.

Have a nice day.

Love,

Smivey

I used to have this great girlfriend. She was always there for me. She’d laugh at all my jokes. And the sex was, well, amazing. But then things started to go sour.

We’d get into these horrible shouting matches over the dumbest things. She’d tell me that my family was conspiring against me and that there were cameras hidden in the walls. And I’d tell her she was full of shit and that the only person conspiring against me was the man in the plaid suit, and maybe the transsexual cashier at the Rite Aid.

Still, I loved her, and we decided that no matter what, we were going to make the relationship work. And we did. Until my doctor prescribed these special orange pills for me. My girlfriend, Imogene, didn’t want me to take them. But I didn’t have a choice. It was either take the pills or spend a few months in the hospital.

So I took the medication. And wouldn’t you know it, the next morning, Imogene was gone. I mean, everything of hers was gone, aside from a bottle of perfume I bought for her and some very tiny soaps in the shower.

I still think about Imogene sometimes. But whenever I mention her to my family or friends, they just give me this funny look. I mean, sure she was difficult at times, but she was an important part of my life. And I don’t care what anyone else says about her, I’ve never met a sweeter, gentler, or more down-to-earth, one-inch-high woman in my life. Imogene, I miss you.