The Worst Restaurant EVER

I like trying new things

...with food anyway.

 Probably because last Christmas was my first experience with Sushi and I love it. I need to include that fact since what I'm about to tell you would be negative no matter how good the food was if I distrusted unfamiliar foods. I don't. So what I'm going to tell you is doubly disgusting if you do.

And now the story of how I found the worst restaurant I've ever been to in my life.

My cousin told me about this little Sushi place downtown with half off Tuesdays and Thursdays. Most people don't trust half price sushi in a landlocked state 700 miles from the beach, but Sharlene and I were feeling adventurous so we went looking for it.

We found a window along the street with a few flags I didn't recognize and somewhere must've been the words “sushi” or “Asian” or something like that so we parked the car and went in. The withered hostess seemed to be from somewhere else since her answer to, “Do you have sushi?” was to lead us back past the buffet and Mongolian barbeque to a table with some little teal plates wrapped in cellophane..

Lest you picture this wrong let me describe. The entire place from the carpet to the upholstery was a seafoam greenish blue so it felt like climbing into the behind-the-seat area of an old station wagon. And the place was completely empty except for the hostess and a fat man wedged behind a table gulping down noodles. The Mongolian barbeque wasn't on. And, I'm not sure why, but at that moment the raw meat sitting out buffet-style in front of it didn't make me worry. “It's a restaurant.” I thought. “Surely the food is safe.”

It was $8.99 for “allyoucaneebuffet” so like an idiot I said, “Sure.”

The hostess motioned to the back wall smiling and nodding her head. We looked. It was an old stand up freezer filled with dented old chunk encrusted freezer-burned ice cream.

“Oh. Ice cream.” I smiled.

She nodded profusely and went to get our Sprites.

They came free with the buffet. Meanwhile Sharlene and I grabbed plates and started our search for anything sort-of-fresh looking. Our first plates were the most exotic with selections of pork and I think chicken and some fried green bean things. Sharlene took advantage of the sushi table taking three or four little plates. It looked like salmon on mine. As I passed the Mongolian barbeque I chanced a closer look at the meats sitting out in the open.

They didn't look healthy.

Imagine opening a fresh frozen Styrofoam bottomed package of boneless chicken. You unwrap it, turn it upside down, and dump it on your kitchen floor, turn up your heat, and go on vacation. What you see when you get back is what was laying there. It needed buried.

As I got back to the table Sharlene had already pushed aside most of what she had on her plate and was cautiously unwrapping one of her sushis.

She didn't eat it.

I tried some of mine- makes me gag now.

I still remember the smell when I unwrapped it. It was like opening the fridge after a fishing trip and your trout are laying there on a plate with a little bit of trout blood surrounding them, and they're all staring wide-eyed at you like they still can't believe you did this to them.

It was that.

Not like real sushi. Not with tasty spices or whatever it is they roll in there that makes it taste good. This was half an ounce of white rice with my dead goldfish laying on it.

I didn't eat the other piece. The hostess came back out to check on us. Like an idiot, I nodded and smiled, not wanting to hurt her feelings.

I think there's something wrong with me.

Sharlene snuck her unopened sushi back to the buffet while the hostess wasn't looking. I figured as long as it was all-you-can-eat I should get my money's worth. So I searched the buffet again for anything I could safely eat. As I found some shrimp on ice I thought, “Hey! Something refrigerated!” Then I noticed someone hacking out a lung in the kitchen. How appetizing. But maybe whoever it was wasn't working when they made the food yesterday or the day before so I took the shrimp. 

But it smelled like a dumpster.

Sharlene sat across from me with that look.

“What?”

“You shouldn't pay.”

“But we took food... And Sprite!”

“I just don't think you should pay.” She sipped at her sprite.

I looked down at my two unfinished plates. “We could try the ice cream.”

She didn't smile.

“If we hadn't eaten yet, it'd be different, but-”

“We haven't.” She gestured to the unfinished plates.

“So just tell her... I'm not paying?”

I sat uncomfortably for another five minutes fighting my conscience over how to put it tactfully. The hostess finally came out to see if we wanted anything else.

“No. We're done.”

Have you ever realized mid-story that you should have done something differently, but you can't now because you already did what you did?

Well I looked at the lady and then at the food and said, “I'm sorry, but this isn't edible. We thought you served food here... but this is garbage. Have you obtained the proper licensing to serve food publicly? Because this is unacceptable.”

I stood up and took Sharlene by the hand. She beamed back at me with all the love and admiration a woman can beam with. The old lady started apologizing and offering gift certificates for free dinners. We passed them to a starving homeless man sitting just outside on the sidewalk. He grinned toothlessly and lept to his feet to hug me. A reporter for the nightly news was out doing an interview with the mayor but stopped when she saw us helping the poor stranger. The entire camera crew rushed across four lanes of heavy traffic as the music swelled-

I signed the dang receipt vowing never to try miscellaneous “Asian” buffets ever again.

The door swung open and four smiling men came in sniffing the air hungrily. Apparently they'd been here before because the host remembered what each of them wanted to drink. One of them hoped loudly that they still had that sweet and sour pork he loved so much.

We staggered out. I felt a little green. Tossing and turning that night, I was sure I'd be waking up around 3am with that awful churning stagnant garbage-in-your-stomach feeling of food poisonings gone by. But I didn't. I was fine.

Amazing.

So there you go. That's how I found the worst restaurant I've ever been to in my life... and PAID for it.

It even topped the Dollar Wok In next to my first summer job at a jet ski rental shop.

That's pretty bad because that was in Tillicum. 

But that's a story for another day.

Here's my impression of the sushi there. If you want to make things like this from pictures you find with google images like these: 
Then get photoshop.

Bed Wetting

It's interesting that as a child you think you're the loan freak when in fact the truth is that most of the kids at school only knew what it was because they did it.


You're really only one step up from diapers. I'm pretty sure a few kids in my kindergarten class still wore them.
Imagine you didn't know what it was.
Imagine the shock of first finding out that it even happened; that people actually went to the bathroom while still laying in bed... all over themselves.


Imagine that reaction.
Then compare it with how they all acted when somebody actually got accused of doing it.


Not even close.
They knew very well that feeling of relief; the growing warmth; the unstoppable dread as you realized that you weren't in a bathroom at all! It was a dream! This was a bed! Your bed! You tried to stop but it was impossible. So then you'd have to lay there covered in a gallon of your own urine at 1:13 in the morning wondering what to do next.


They were guilty; every last one of them.


Accusing the ugly kid made everybody feel better though.

Rise and Rise Again, till Lambs Become Lions

I find my tolerance for older single men waining.

Granted,

I used to be one.

Still am in fact

... sort of.

But remember Robin Hood.

Even though he lived in the forest with a bunch of guys doing cool things like swimming and hunting and shooting bad guys, he still had Maid Marian off in a castle pining away for him.

Even if you appear single, you should always have a Maid Marian. Its really nice.

I know this because I've found mine. But she's about two-thousand miles away right now so I have time to do this.

No, the real problem lies with young men who lack nothing, but the gumption to rise up and be men. That's an old phrase so I imagine it's an old problem. I just happen to be of the right age and circumstance to have finally noticed it myself.

I have nothing against the socially inept,

of which we are all members in varying degrees.

But there are some among us, too many I feel, that would rather go back to being fourteen than face the reality that time advances on almost a yearly basis.

I'm 28 years old. When am I going to grow up? I find a wonderful remedy is to look at one's life and recognize what is different now that you are 28... or whatever ripe old number you choose.

You can vote.

You can buy firearms without a parent.

You can open and close bank accounts, get a real job, drive your own car, and not live at home.

If I want to eat, I have to go to the store and buy groceries. The magical self clearing table and self emptying sink is gone from my life.

If I want clean dishes and to avoid botchulism, I have to clean them with dish soap.

I have to buy it.

At a store.

That means a certain amount of my income has to be spent on things I don't drool over in catalogs.

The magic of the bedroom and bathroom floor also disappeared when I moved out of my parent's home. My clothes have forgotten how to clean themselves and appear in my drawer hours after hitting the floor.

The startling thing to me is the number of men my age who still think these things just magically take care of themselves; that if you leave things out, they will somehow organize themselves and be found, clean, folded, sparkling, and or sorted neatly in some appointed place without any effort on your own part.

Its maddening.

And that's leaving out all the other strikingly annoying perceptions and habits of single guys my age- one of which is dating.

I get that rejection stinks.

And I get that sometimes it seems like nobody is interested.

And I further get that "it used to be easier."

And when it stopped being easy was probably about the time you got dumped or dissed or jilted or something horrible which no one else could possibly understand because it was the first time in the history of the world that someone felt lied to and got broken-hearted.

Guess WHAT! Everybody faces rejection!

IT IS A REALITY.

Perhaps we should thank rejection for just a moment for allowing us the chance to move beyond our first crush which we forgot all about because it was kindergarten.

If it weren't for rejection, you would be stuck with that girl from junior high. The one that liked you because she didn't know you yet and that you didn't like back.

Yeah.

That one.

Without rejection, you'd be married to her. So thank rejection.

Please.

It bugs me.

Why can't a guy that is this old learn that when a girl rejects you, you should stop pursuing?

Should he not have learned this years ago? Learn to read body language. There are books on it. Read one. When you've met someone and they seem really nice at first but then turn cold and are hard to get a hold of, stop trying. Just leave her alone. You're wasting your time, making her uncomfortable, and making yourself a nuisance.

Go away.

Also can guys stop singing the inverted Snow White song of, "Someday my princess will come."?

This is not how it works!

She doesn't come to you.

I know too many who think the idea of arranged marriage is a good one.

You have no taste.

Get some.

Your obligation and duty as an adult male is to go out into the world and find HER.

This involves dating.

You have to try out different people and relationships and get to know how to behave generally so that by the time you get to be my age, you're already married because no girl could resist the man you've become.

You've got to learn that its not fun being alone forever.

And if its not, then how much is it worth to not be.

And if its worth a lot like we're talking up there with breathing, then you'd better learn that when you see a girl you have interest in, and you haven't met her, and you still don't have a date, there had better be Hellishly good reasons why not, like that your face is on fire and your hands are chained to an enraged grizzly bear on PCP.

If you look around and none of those things are happening, you better get over there and meet her because if she's good enough to notice, she's good enough to date.

Your excuses will kill you.

Stop thinking before you do something good.

Treat this like the latest dumb thing you did. Did any consequence cross your mind before you did whatever it was you did?

NO.

SO WHY NOW???

Stop it immediately. Stand up and be men.

And can we stop with the high school girl thinking puzzles?

I get that girl's mature faster than boys, but is this really where you are?

When you've met someone interesting, but things seem to be kind of impossible and you aren't sure if this could work out or not- STOP.

Stop your stupid internal dialogue. You've only been on one date anyway.

There's only one question you need to ask yourself,

"Am I still interested?"

If the answer is yes, then you go out again and you find out how you feel from the actual reality of being with her, not at home or on long drives.

If you have something to say, say it to her.

Stop telling your friends what you're wondering.

Build some freaking intimacy between you and her and ask her directly what she thinks about things. You'll get a lot farther, and your friends will respect you more because you don't sound like a sixteen year old girl anymore.

And if you're not interested anymore, stop calling her.

Can we also stop feeling inadequate, unattractive and altogether lost in life?

I am tired of hearing people say how lost they feel.

This is life. Its supposed to be a surprise!

If you plan on getting married someday, having a career, and even a family, then do something about it.

Can everybody just stop worrying about the future for a moment and evaluate what you've learned about the world at this point,

what goals you've set for your future,

what accomplishments no matter how small you've made,

and then start to feel good about it?

Can you please just stop complaining and appreciate for one small moment the infinitesimally small contribution you've made in the world?

Can you for one moment look forward to the future with a little bit of confidence and say to yourself,

"That's where I'm going to be. And this is what I'm going to do to get there."

You find whatever you can do to advance.

You figure out some way to work on it every week and you write it down.

And then you do it.

This practice will give you confidence and direction. You'll find yourself more confident in your future because you're doing something about it today, and you know it. And when you do find someone you're interested in, you'll have developed a direction for your life.

If you plan on growing up someday and getting married, chances are the girl you marry will love you.

Quite a lot actually.

So can you start living like you mean it?

If someone is going to love and adore you, then maybe you ought to start figuring out why.

Then maybe you can walk with a little confidence that you actually do possess some good qualities.

In a world where childhood seems to be extending farther and farther into adulthood, can some of us stand up and shine a little.

Manhood, adulthood, and Robin Hood are what we should be growing up to be. Especially Robin Hood because he could shoot arrows and Maid Marian couldn't live without him.

So go find her.

7th of July Celebrations Continue Weeks Afterward!

Everybody knows the joy of wearing a Kool-aide smile and blowing stuff up. Here's my brother Aaron blowing up stuff with his home made canon. It doesn't get any better than this, and yes, those are rabbits in the background.

I think we can all learn a valuable lesson here.

1. that you should always have reliable combustables around.

If matches won't do, try piles of gasoline soaked rags.

A hair dryer can usually be employed to get a flame out of something like that... Or simply fill the tub with water, slosh some gasoline over the top, plug in the hair dryer, toaster, or clock radio and toss it into the tub.

Make sure the home electonic has been turned on before doing this as experience has shown that doing so after can result in hand and arm damage including loss of life.

Then you can simlply roll up a newspaper or towel and transport the flame via homemade torch to the backyard where your fire cracker awaits.

and 2. Never eat flamingos. They taste like pink chickens.

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Caution: do not ingest. May cause blindness if inserted in eye socket.

For Whom the Ball Tolls

-or, Waking up is Hard to Do

Aren't balls just the most wonderful things ever? Without a ball they hang around aimlessly. Add a ball and suddenly, life is a game! The worries and problems of life disappear as the mind is taken by this new diversion. Think of all the possibilities! You can throw it, kick it, bounce it, step on it, catch it! The possibilities are endless! Suddenly you can be your favorite sports star because you have the same ball he has! Isn't this fun! Lets shout at each other and bounce the ball back and forth! Oh how it continues to move! It is amazing! We will chase it and bounce it forever and ever! Oh what fun and excitement! A ball! It is bouncing this way! Let us bounce it and shout hooray!

This will be good for hours of entertainment.

Have you ever woken up to noises you didn't want to hear? I have.

I really love when people get the urge to do car repairs right outside my window in the morning. Can you drop that wrench some more? Oh good! Oh and you can hammer with it! Good for you! Do you have any idea what you're doing or are you just trying to beat the bad spirits out?! And then you give up and leave when I'm finally awake...

Marvelous.

Good thing I got to beat the snot out of some idiot for trying to sue me for not giving him my car. Weird, but a worthy cause. He tried to run and hide in the bathroom but I slammed the door open on his face. The only problem with it was the stupid underwater physics. So I'm slapping him in anesthetized rage while he does nothing to defend himself but scream like a little girl...