NYC is for me

Sensational

Dear readers:

I never BLOG without a purpose and tonight is no different. I can't sleep which means random things flow through my cerebellum that trigger a response that cannot be described on the screen you're reading this on. There is one big thing I want to tackle right now and that is something that I'm going to have to throw my fellow "man" under the bus for. Let me give you this scenario:

Picture yourself walking through a shopping mall. You're contemplating whether or not to get that sweater vest that has been staring you down in the JC Penny catalog for the past year, when all of a sudden you see good 'ol Pete Klinistone, who you haven't seen since high school! So, naturally, you approach him and introduce yourself to his date (who, on a side note, is way to hot to be dating "Pete meat"). You find out he got a job as an Alligator wrangler at the Washington, D.C zoo and that he and his wife recently bought the rights to the entire Jackson 5 music collection. After making up a few stories about yourself and entertaining your ego, he utters this line: "I'm so happy for you, did I mention that we're pregnant." Of course you're going to act all happy, exchange phone numbers, promise a night where you double-date and play a game of Apples to Apples and eventually be on your way.

I don't feel like we as men should say "WE are pregnant " for the simple fact that, let's be honest, we have it reeeeally easy. We aren't losing our luscious curves, gaining weight (and ultimately stretch marks), or letting a baby grow inside of our bodies. All we do is give our donation to the cause and let the ladies do the work.

I do want to add at this point that it is definitely OK to be happy that your wife/girlfriend/one night stand/girl you don't remember/ girl you thought was over 18/ girl who ended up being married to your bosses godson/ girl who you gave 83 cents to at the store because she was a little short on money and you sensed how awkward it must have been for her/ man you found out actually got a sex change and this is a medical miracle that will probably be published in a medical journal, is pregnant because it is definitely a big deal. All I'm saying is that legitimately as a man we should just take pride in what WE did to make this happen. Let the woman bask in all the glory of being a glowing baby-momma-to-be, and we can sit back and watch her breasts grow a size.

PS: Ashley is not pregnant so don't start that rumor.

Monster try

Dear readers,

I gave Monster Energy Drinks a try on my quest to get free things. Here is the email I sent to Monster Customer Service:
"I always go to my local K&K store before my 45 minute drive to work so I can pick up a Green Monster Energy Drink. Today when I bought one, I cracked it open and the drink had barely any carbonation. Being a huge monster fan, I know how it s suppose to taste. When I cracked open the other one I also bought for a coworker, it too was flat. I m not happy because they are expensive to start with and I expect a consistent drink."

I thought this was a guaranteed coupon! However, this is what they sent back:

"David Gray:

Thank you for taking the time to contact us direct regarding this unfortunate incident. We are very sorry and wish to extend our apologies.

Your comments are very important to us and they have been forwarded for further review to our Quality Control Department. We use such comments to fine tune an extensive Quality Control Program which helps assure excellence with all Monster Products. Should you still have the container please contact us direct at 866-322-4466 and ask for Umallah Hicks. I will be interested in obtaining codes that will help further investigate into this matter.

Your satisfaction is very important to us. We appreciate your continued support and understanding in this matter.

Sincerely,
Sasha Bleed"

First of all...why aren't I Mr. Gray?! Second of all, that is upsetting! The two other ones I would have been OK not getting a coupon, but Monster is one of my daily vices! I guess I'll have to try a different way of going about complaining! Let me assure everyone that with this, as well as the rest of my complaints I have not lied about it; every single complaint was truthful and worthy of a complaint! If you have any doubts, let me tell you about a woman who encountered me at the good ol Pizza Hut.

This lady, lets call her Susan Smith (because I bet she would drown her kids), approached me after her meal was completed to tell me that her bread sticks were cold, her server was unattentive, and the bathroom didn't have enough toilet paper. First off, the bread sticks were cut by myself and I know they went out to the table fresh and hot. Being Susan Smith, maybe a 440 degree oven isn't hot enough, maybe she's used to the fires of hell and anything under the melting point of the devils kidney stones is cold. As for the server being unattentive, all I have to say is the dining room was relatively busy but the 2 servers only had 5 tables each so I highly doubt it. Lastly, the bathroom has a poop-wipe dispenser that holds TWO rolls of toilet paper at a time...the one side had about 100 rips left in it and the opposite side had an untouched roll. Give me a break! But of course I gave her 25% off her bill because if I didn't I would have my name being blasted all over a 1-800 call to corporate!

The least of Monster's worries is me complaining about a little carbonation, but I'm a loyal customer who only drinks their energy drinks. I should have gotten a $2 off coupon at the least! What do you all think?

Happy Birthday, America!

Dear readers,

I have great news! General Mills has sent me not just one, but TWO coupons! One is for a free box of Golden Grahams, and the second is for any General Mills product! I'm pumped, or as the Canadians say: "I'm totally stoked!" Also, Slim Jim has sent me two coupons as well! I'm actually surprised at how fast these came and how generous the coupons were! Now I'm on a quest to find something a little more substantial to write in about!

As you know, today is Independence day! Along with being America's birthday (although I'd like to interject and say that the Declaration of Independence was actually written on July 2nd...), it is also my girlfriend, Ashley's, younger brother's and younger cousin's birthday! I was curious and did some research to see how many others were born on this holiday. I uncovered that Barack Obama's daughter Malia, Advice twins Ann Landers and her sister Abigail Van Buren (better known as Dear Abby), New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, and President Calvin Coolidge were all born on July 4th! Strangely, I also uncovered that Presidents John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and James Monroe all died on July 4th! Very strange.

For today's festivities, I wasn't sure what to do. In the past I have taken a ride to Lyntucky to see everything they have to offer in their 20 sq.ft. of township, but this year I wanted to do something different. So my girlfriend and I did what any other American would do: go see a movie! Let me interject really quick to let you know that when Ashley and I were thinking of ideas on what to do today, she actually said, "Hey!!! Let's go to Canada for the day!!!!!" Yeah, I would be a fantastic American if I went to Canada on my nation's freakin' birthday!

Anyways, after the movie and dinner, we decided to see if the mall was open. As we drove up, I noticed this car stopped at a stop sign and the man standing outside with his door open. Odd, right? Reality struck hard when I realized that his penis was out and there was urine making its evacuation onto the pavement. Where else can you see a beefy dark man holding his purple-helmeted warrior of love in his hand on the side of the road as innocent passerby's are helplessly forced to gaze? I say this: Only in America!

Goodnight, and Happy Birthday my beautiful country!

New URL!!!

Dear readers,

Exciting news has come to the Gray matter. We now have easier access to my blog because I decided to buy a shortened URL! www.dgraymatter.com will be the permanent home for my blog. I think I might be a little more excited than you, but this is going to make life much, much, much easier. In the works next is a twitter page to update short things about my escapades, including the future adventures of getting free products!

In other news long time pal, Casey Flynn, approached me about her problem with Slim Jim. Seeing as I'm still waiting on my "prize" from my first trial, I thought hey, why not give this one a try! She bought a 24 pack which was enclosed in a tin. This tin was perfectly fine until she opened it only to find 21 packages sealed and 3 sealed packages with NO SLIM JIM in it! This is the letter I wrote to them:

"I recently bought a can of Slim Jim's that "contained" 24 individually wrapped pieces in it. I opened it up only to find that 3 of the wrappers were sealed but DID NOT contain any Slim Jim's! I don't know how your quality control works but they are not doing their job correctly. In this day and age, you can't afford to put out a product like that. Please respond, I'm not happy."

They responded in a very quick amount of time. It was only 6 hours until I got a response that read:
Dear Mr. Gray,

Thank you for contacting us with your concern about our Slim Jim® Jerky Canister. We are sorry to learn about your experience.

Comments from consumers of our products are always helpful. It is only by meeting your needs that we can continue to be successful. Your feedback will be shared with others in our company.

We will also be sending you a response via regular mail, with an attached coupon that is valid for nine months. Please allow 1-2 weeks for receipt.

Please accept our sincere apologies for your experience. We value our consumers and hope you will give us another try.

Sincerely,
Krissy
Consumer Affairs

We shall see how this one turns out! I'm obviously sure it'll be a coupon but will it be for a buy one, get one free, or will it be a free voucher?! I will keep you posted as well as let you know when I receive my free Golden Grahams.

Goodnight readers, and Rest in Peace Michael.

Adventure: Part 1

Dear readers,

I started strong with my quest to get compensation! I searched my house for something I was not pleased with and came to a box of Golden Grahams. This box had contents described as: "Honey Graham ridged cereal" on the box. When I ate one of these ridged cereal peaces, I was displeased with the amount of honey on it. I decided to start my quest with a letter to General Mills! It read as follows:

" I was not at all pleased with the product. I have eaten this cereal as well as pretty much every GMills cereal there is for years! The problem is the lack of honey taste on the grahams. I have noticed this entire box is full of practically honey-less grahams. This, as you can imagine, is unacceptable and I hope you can do something about this because I am extremely displeased."

This was sent on the morning of the 23rd of June. I received the following just today at around 5pm:
"Dear Mr. Gray:
Thank you for contacting us regarding your disappointment with Golden Grahams cereal. As a responsible manufacturer, we strive to produce high quality products and are sorry your experience did not meet the standards we expect from our products.

We will be sending an adjustment for your purchase to your mailing address. You should receive it within 7 to 10 business days. We appreciate that you have shared your concerns and hope you continue to use and enjoy our products.

Sincerely,

Rhonda Short

Consumer Services"

First off...thanks for the Mr.Gray. I would have preferred to be called, "Mr. Yarg" because that would be my last name backwards....I don't know but I think it would be impressive if they did that. Secondly, what the heck is an adjustment for my purchase? After doing some investigating in my noggin, I think it may be a check in the amount of a single box of cereal? I'm not going to lie, that would suck. Let's hope they give me a check with an amount big enough to buy six or seven boxes. I'll keep you all updated!

PS: South Carolina governor sleeping with an Argentinian woman....good job. It's getting tougher and tougher to defend why I stick up for the republican party so much.

Have a good one!

Adventure

Dear readers,

I have been thinking for weeks about something to do this summer. I took up fishing and I work 30+ hours, but something is missing! My summer quest finally came to me at my sister's wedding reception. There is no rhyme or reason for why I came up with it there, but the thought that triggered it was looking at the "Miller light" label of my beer can (or should I say a beer can of someone over 21...). I thought to myself, "wouldn't it be great if we could get this stuff free?!"

So far you should be scratching your head, or other extremities, and be asking yourself what the heck I am talking about. Well, my friend, I am talking about companies and exploiting their flaws. That is right...I am going to find something wrong with a product or company and try to get something free because of how displeased I am!

I will avoid doing jail time by not lying. I promise not to call/write to complain if there is not a just cause. I will find something wrong with AT LEAST one product a week and try to get something more than just a letter of apology! There are many avenues of approach I will try such as:
1) Bad customer service
2) Bad food safety practice witnessed
3) Bad quality of product
4) Mislabeling of product (happens more than you think...)
And much, much more...

I will have to ponder which product I want to go with first. I think I may start small and work my way up. Perhaps a restaurant, or cereal company? Hmmm...we shall see. Feel free to give me ideas. Pictures and reports will, of course, by put on my BLOG for you to enjoy with me!

Good day faithful readers,

The urinal experience

Dear readers,

As most of you know, there are unspoken rules that a person must abide by when using public restrooms. Some simple ones are to make sure you shut the stall door, to wait your turn, and to not mind the little boy who feels it is necessary to pull hit pants and underwear all the way to the floor when using the urinal.

Ladies, excuse me in advance for this but you won't understand much of what I am about to say but I think you will enjoy it, none-the-less.

With these unspoken general rules, comes the more intricate and very necessary ones that every responsible man lives by. Recently, on a trip to my local wal*mart, I walked in noticed that there where 5 urinal's to choose from, so I decided to take the very last one so that there would be room for 3 guys to use them if they come in (obviously keeping one urinal free in between each man urinating, because that is one of the unspoken rules). All of the sudden this husky bald fella walks in and takes the urinal RIGHT NEXT TO ME. Ladies you're saying to yourself (or maybe outloud), "wow Dave, not a big deal." Well, I'm here to tell you, Miss. Mary Jane Rotten Crotch, that it is a big deal. How can I concentrate on relieving my bladder when there is a man doing the same just inches from me? If all the urinal's were taken it would be a different story; however they were not, so the whole time I was peeing, or as our British friends say "spending a penny", I was thinking about the possible reasons why this bald man chose such a spot.

On the drive home, I thought of a few possible scenarios that could have been why Mr. Clean made the decision to piddle so close to my excretion of fluids. Here are a few:
1) He wanted to see what I had going on "down there."
2) He wanted to peak at my urine to make sure it was the correct color. If it were too yellow, he may have mentioned that I need to drink more water.
3) When he walked in he thought he saw me wearing Sponge bob boxers so he wanted to get a closer look.
4) He's OCD and can only urinate in that urinal when he comes to Wallyworld
5) He only goes in the urinal that has the biggest urinal cake, because we all know when you pee directly on the cake it releases a smell of angelic proportions.
6) He was hoping I would offer to shake it for him.
7) He was hoping I would ask him to shake it for me.

There are many more rules to bathroom etiquette that I will not get into JUST yet. Trust me, once someone violates one as severely as Mr. Clean did, I will be sure to express my dissatisfaction with all 12,000 (give or take 12,000) of you who read my blog.

Goodnight my faithful readers,

542542

Dear readers,

I have embarked on a new adventure called The Knowledge Generation Bureau (kgb_). Go to www.kgb.com if you want to learn more about it, but basically it is a community of people like me (called special agents) who work shifts answering questions sent to the number "542542". It costs the sender $.99 to get an answer and for every answer I give, I receive $.10.

The training was a pain in the rear to get through because they make you learn how THEY want you to answer questions, but it was interesting and I learned a lot. Since Tuesday, June 2nd, I have been working shifts, answering some of the most bazaar questions possible...For your enjoyment, I saved a few of my favorites (I can't tell you how I answered them, though, because that would be a violation of a rule set by kgb_!)

-What is the meaning of life?
-will ben kiss me at da dance 2nite?
-why cant the bills do anything right?
- How old is Clint Eastwood?
- When will Hilary Duff come to my house and make out withme?
...and just tonight I got this one:
-"was up wit gay peep..they b babey killerz?"

As you can see, there are the fair share of serious ones. For example, I get a lot asking about restaurants in areas, and even how much flights are. BUT, you can also see that people do not mind spending a buck to ask a real person a real question.

My advice to you, my lovely reader, is to text kgb_ if you have a question that is killing you because there are some great special agents who know their stuff and can help you out. Also, if you are looking for a good laugh, send them an off-the-wall question! We like those, too!

Until next time,

Drive in, drive out

Dear readers,

Driving to my job, Pizza Hut executive chef, in Batavia, has it's advantages and disadvantages. For one, I have to get ready for work about an hour before hand, and leave about 40 minutes before my shift. That is a problem because that means instead of a 4-11:30 shift, it turns into a 3-12:30 shift with the drive.

The Upside to the drive is the opportunity to have some one-on-one time with myself. Go ahead and insert dirty joke, but I'm serious; sometimes the best thinking is done on my way to and from work. You could even say it is therapudic in some way because you start to think about everything that is bugging you in life, and even everthing that is going great in life.

To put it bluntly, I have been in a sort-of "funk" lately. I don't know how to explain it, or how to even describe it, but for some reason I feel sad lately. It might be because of the number of peope who have passed away in the last month, and if you know me you know that I don't deal well with death or the prospect of it. Death to me is something I keep far away from my mind and it's been that way since Mom had her stroke and cancer. When mom had cancer, I saw how awkward it was for people to act normal around me. It always seemed like someone thought I would bust into tears at random points in the day, and that was far from the truth. I guess what I'm trying to say is, I have a tough time seeing other people in the shoes I was once in, or even worse in the shoes I am fortunate I wasn't in. I know how they feel, yet I can't talk to them... My mind and heart get in a fearce battle with one another. My heart wants to reach out and send my love to the person, while my head makes me feel uncomfortable and really upset with seeing someone going through such a hard time.

I'm babbling and I just realized it. I'll get out of this funk. I don't even know what funk I'm in to be completely honest with you.

Goodnight readers,

Back to it.

Dear readers,

I am officially back to blogging. Thanks to Abstract's motivation to start writing again, I will be updating a TON more lately.

I'll just get it out of the way now...I am officially a brother of Pi Kappa Phi. When it comes to the fraternity, I am HΛ 348, Brother McGyver! I couldn't be happier. I love being a part of something a ton bigger than myself. We raise a ton of money for children with disabilities and we are stand up guys that have an amazing name on campus. I absolutely love it.

In other news, finals are quickly approaching and I can't begin to tell you how glad I am for this semester to be over. Here is a list of what needs to be accomplished before next Friday:
1) GRC Paper (5 pages)
2) C.T. Paper (5 pages)
3) Group presentation
4) C.T Final exam
5) History Final

Not too bad but it will be a ton to juggle. This brings me to another thing I need to do before Friday...I also need to spend a ton of time with Julian Piraino because he's not coming back next year. This is something that I've been putting in the back of my head because I didn't want it to happen. For those of you back home (or maybe in the port) who don't know him, he has quickly became one of my best friends. He's one of the first people I met in Brockport and we literally get along better than some of my life long friends (I'm not throwing my other best friends under the bus here). I've had some really good times with good 'ol Julezzz and I hope that we stay friends no matter what he does because my college life wouldn't have been the same if he wasn't my battle buddy in ROTC, and my sidekick on the weekends! I'll probably be writing more about this later but for now I think this works.

Goodnight readers.

HOME

Dear readers,

I have not been updating on a regular basis and for that I am sorry. I must confide with you: I am an associate member (AKA: Pledge) of a Fraternity. I can't devuldge much more, but I will tell you that it is a time consuming process that (honestly, I'm serious) has NO HAZING. Pi Kappa Phi is the name of the fraternity. Google it, twitter it, do what you may with it but that is why I have not been updating. The formentioned updated will be more frequent in about 4 weeks I PROMISE!!!

As for right now, I am home on "spring break." It has been a good break so far but it'll be "cut short" (pun) because tomorrow I will be getting my...wait for it.... WISDOM TEETH REMOVED (now you get the pun). Removed is too nice of a way to put it, though. My wisdom teeth are going to be pried out as if my teeth were nothing more than a bullet being removed from a lifeless deer carcass; only to be held as a souvenir to the hunter who gunned him down (just for the record, I am a prized 15 point Buck).

My next week will consist of chicken broth, my WD, and most likely, wait, most definitely The God Father Trilogy. Wish me luck, and as always I will be looking forward to some texts to cheer me up, I mean come on I'll be chopped up into venisin within HOURS(get it? I went back to the deer metaphore) of getting my teeth yanked.

Goodnight faithful readers

The walk

Dear readers,

With the freak warm weather comes the inevitable sight of people shedding the layers. One thing I have noticed through my years of clothing myself is that when taking a stroll, it is very nice just to walk around with your hands in your hoodie pocket; it's a nice warm place to put your hands, and more importantly, it makes certain that your arms aren't swinging in an awkward fashion.

With this warm weather, and the aforementioned shedding of layers, I had the delight of seeing how far people go to make their arms not swing awkwardly. I took today to take notice to the little things people do to make themselves not look funny, yet in the process they fail epically. Lets look at a few examples I noticed today:

1) The Pocket research rocket:When a person places only one hand in the pocket with the attention of drawing ones attention away to his/her annoying other arm that is swinging aimlessly in the wind. See fig. 1(irght)



2) The Backback Rocket Attack: When a person (usually the most awesome person in sight) wears his backpack on one shoulder. This person is almost always walking with confidence like no other; his chin is up and his opposite is flapping back and forth like he was waving to every person who thinks he's awesome. See fig. 2(left)


3) The Straight arm smoke alarm: We have all experienced this one...A man/woman is walking with his/her arms pointed straight to the ground trying not to direct ANY attention to his insecurities. I don't have an image for this one, but Fig.3 is a guy who I'm 99.1% sure demonstrates this on an everyday basis.

To me, all of these are easily avoidable. Listen readers, the best way to walk is to do so next to a person who demonstrates at least one of these qualities. Just act cooler than him/her and watch as everyone walking past is focusing on how "Julian" is walking, and then looks at you and thinks you are the coolest person ever. It is fool proof. If you happen to be the "Julian" in this story, just think about what you are doing wrong and change. If, for some reason, this BLOG isn't enough for you, just wait until you see me walking across campus; My strut is enough to not only get people talking, but to set standards high enough for you to join in. Please do society a favor and stop being so damn awkward. That's my lesson for the week.

New Nips

Hello readers,

For those of you who just met me this year, I'll give you a quick breakdown about my mom. She's basically been through hell and back the last 4 years. She had a stroke, and then had some crappy breast cancer. She made a full recovery from both after a long time, but she had to have a bunch of reconstructive surgeries to repair the damage done to her breasts and so on.

Today is the last phase of the surgeries. Nipple reconstruction. Yep, I said it. Nipple reconstruction. She's got the new boobs and all that jazz, but they needed to get this last phase completed. It is kind of weird how they are making her nipple too...I guess for fun I'll try to explain it to the best of my ability. They are going to take a slab of meat from her thigh and make them look like nipples.

Here (courtesy of: Mayo Foundation) is a picture of how it will transform:

Wooooooah weeeeeirrrrd. I'm thankful for my all natural chocolate chip nips.

As I was typing this, I was texting my dad to get updates on how everything was going. This was his exact response word-for word:
"They put on Pigs nipples and had a hard time catching the pig. They caught it so it wont be long now. We got scared because the doctor was going to use a cows nipple if they couldnt catch it...those wouldve been some big nipples"

In all seriousness, the surgery went well. Mom will be home by 6pm with her new and improved Nips. Thanks for bearing through this one.

Oh you live here? $.50 please.

:NOTE: This is a re-post from my former BLOG...It is a good one so I thought I should put it in this. The original air date was sometime last April :END NOTE:

Hello readers! I want to tell you a story. Over the gorgeous weekend, me and this lucky gal ;-) went over to Canada just for kicks. I parked my car on the American side because I didn't want to get my car deported, denied, or searched. We walked across the Rainbow Bridge, pausing for a second to jump back and forth between the boundary line (tradition my friends), and stepped into the customs room. While walking across the bridge, Ashley let me know that she had her prescription pain medication on her; she forgot to leave it in the car. So we were running the risk of Canada thinking we were drug traffickers(something I avoided by leaving my car in America...waaadduppp). So we walked into the building, I handed the man my passport, he looked at the picture and glanced at me. "Where are you going today," he said. "Just staying here in Ontario, sight seeing," I said with boasting confidence. After that 25 seconds, he let me pass and onto Canada we were. I need to take this time to tell you my tradition. I've been doing it since I could remember. Every time I enter Canada, I sing the Canadian National Anthem even if there are a million people around me. Don't ask me why, I just always do it. (I guess it would be a little funnier if I sang the American National Anthem in Canada...hmm something to ponder over some Ice Hockey and a slice of PizzaPizza, all washed down with a shot of Maple syrup)

After about 2 hours of wandering aimlessly throughout Clifton Hill, and me actually seriously pondering getting a tattoo :-O, we decided we should go back and walk around in our native country. I mean if we were to stay any longer, we might have ingested a lethal dose of SARS, so it was probably best if we left. On our way back we crossed over the bridge, I danced a few more times on the border line, and we walked into the American Customs building. We walked up to the ridiculously grumpy officer and handed him our passports. He scanned them, looked at us, and let us go without any question. All seemed to be fine; we had a fun day, we passed both Customs inspections and we were in America again.

But readers, I warn you, my day took a sick and twisted emotional 180. After passing through Customs, we walked into this tunnel-like room, and there sitting in the way of our homeland were 3 turnstiles. That is when it hit me like a piece of debris falling from the burning Twin Towers (ehhh...sorry...too soon?): It costs 50 cents to get back into the country I was born in! What the hell is wrong with that picture?! Mind you...America showed a bit of compassion. Even though the American quarter is worth sooooo much more than the Canadian quarter, the turnstiles gave you the option of using either currency for "Our convenience". But never the less, we were forced to put in $.50 per person to get back into our country. Only in America, right Mr. Benedetti?

All of this begs one question....What if you had no quarters on you? Ahh, America thinks of everything; The machine next to the turnstiles provided the opportunity to put in a $1, or $5 bill for quarters, but it wouldn't allow for anything more than $5. So what if I only had a $20 bill on me with no change at all in my pocket? Would I not be allowed back into the country? Would I have to sit in that 6x12 room until someone was kind enough to pay my way in?(yeah, never mind, America doesn't think of everything). I checked, and the door you walked through to get into that jail cell of a room locks right behind you. Although, if it didn't, I'm sure one of those really nice, outgoing, and generous customs officers would be more than happy to loan you $.50 of their "hard earned" money.

Good day my faithful readers
.

Obsessions

Dear readers,

I have found that I have an unusually high addiction to pretzels. This might seem "not so odd" to you but let me first tell you the very specific pretzels that I eat:

• They MUST be Mini pretzels
• They MUST be in the shape of their over sized cousin
• They MUST have a good crunch to them
• They MUST have the perfect ratio of salt to them

I haven't found the PERFECT pretzel yet. Right now, I found a brand made by Shultz. Its a no name brand, and really cheap but they taste almost perfect. Rold Gold are obviously very good but sometimes they have a bad bag where the salt is ALL on the bottom, and as you recall, they must have the perfect ratio of salt to them.

I eat pretzels probably 4-8 times a day. Once opened I immediately place them in my "Sure Fresh resealable container" that makes sure they stay perfectly crunchy.

I realize this might be a pointless BLOG, but I deem it necessary to point out my obsessions once I recognize them. Here is a list of my other obsessions I have found out about over the years:

1. M&Ms
2. Reality TV...
   
3. Coffee...no cream no sugar, just like a true American
4. Q-tipping my ears every morning
5. Popping a Tylenol PM every night before PT to ensure I get to sleep
6. Keeping MY stuff on MY side of the room, and keeping my ROOM MATEs stuff on HIS side of the room. There should be no interchanging of the floor space.
7. Having a fan on when I sleep regardless of the temperature

Most of these are just personal ticks about me, but they are obsessions nonetheless.

CNN listens

Dear readers,

I always go on CNN.com while I'm at school simply because it is the best place on the web to get the news (Unlike CNN, I have a bias). Today I came across a headline on the front page that said "Did army set hundreds adrift at sea?" This heading made me cringe! I thought to myself, "The same Army that preaches safety and the humane treatment of others" while training me, is now setting hundreds adrift at sea with no chance of survival?! I was outraged! For a good 25 seconds (before I opened the link) I even thought about not doing the Army if this is how they treat people.

I wanted to read more about this story so I clicked the link, only to find the headline "Probe questions fate of refugees in Thailand"staring me at the face. Two totally different meanings to the same story.

Now I know what your thinking... "Wow, Dave. You are kind-of a dumb ass for assuming so much before you read the whole article." If you are thinking that, I can't help but agree with you. Partially it was my fault that I had a mini panic attack before I opened it up; however, I bet it happens frequently. I'm sure there are those people who just saw it and assumed (like I) that it was the U.S., and proceeded to think badly of our strong, humane Army.

Readers, I know there are far bigger things that CNN needs to be worried about, but for the sake of this blog I thought I'd do an experiment. I emailed CNN.com and told them a more brief version of what was said on here. No more than 2 hours later, the headline was changed to "Did Thai Army set hundreds adrift at sea?" I was more than impressed.

That is right, The Gray Matter made the Army maintain their "squeaky clean" appearance. I think I'll try something on a much bigger scale next time. Stay tuned.

Canal of a Root

Dear readers,

I had a root canal a few days ago. It seemed like it would be a straight forward procedure--grind the tooth, clean the tooth, and get the hell out. Turns out it was not that easy for me. See, my friends, I am allergic to Novocaine, which means they had to use Carbacaine. I did some research on Carbacaine for you and this is what I discovered about my less-numbing friend:

"Substituted aminoalkyl esters of carbazol-N-carboxylic acid have high local anesthetic activity, and in general, low toxicity. The presence of a urethane linkage appears to reduce the stimulant effect on the central nervous system that most local anesthetics possess, and to contribute a primary depressant effect. "

To put into plain english: Carbacaine does not numb at all in comparison to its cousin, Novacaine.

I'm going to tell you right now that it was quite possibly the worst pain I have ever felt in my life. To make matters worse, the Doctor insisted on showing me everything he fished out of the rotten tooth. Long story short, do not get a root canal unless you can get gassed, or you have a tolerance for Novacaine.

Good day

New room mate

Well it's the new semester and I get to start it with a brand new room mate. My old room mate decided to leave since he got cut from the hockey team. So far he seems like a nice guy...kinda quiet and seems smart as hell.

In other news I got a container to hold my hand lotion. It's wonderful and convenient.

Intro

Dear readers,
I had a blog for a while, got a good fan base and even moved it to an independent site. Problem being, I got lazy and didn't keep it up. I enjoy blogging...seems like I enjoy it too much.

My old blog can be viewed through my profile, and its called Dave's thoughts exactly. It was fun, but like I said, I want a fresh start with this one.

I'll start this one off by listing a few things about myself:

1. I am a history major at SUNY Brockport
2. I am an avid drummer and teach the drumline at Medina High School
3. I am a U.S. Army Cadet and I'm fully contracted (pays for a good chunk of my school)
4. I am a registered republican, but as you will read, I have a lot of views that go way beyond party lines
5. I don't take life too seriously. A good sense of humor needs to be practiced in order to completely understand life for how it is.

There is much about me I hope you learn as you read. I plan on typing as much as possible so please sit back, grab a handful of oyster crackers and read away.