Return of the Roving Machinations of the Giant Bottle of Rye

Just like most things that happen, the title of this post doesn't mean anything.
However, from time to time, something does mean something. Like yesterday, when I went to Costco. Going to Costco meant that I was one hundred and something dollars poorer and Dickety-two consumer items richer. It was quite enlightening to realize that.

So at least I've got that going for me, which is nice.

Lies All Mixed Up With Omissions

So it's not Tuesday. Sue me already.

Things People Searched For That Lead Them Here (Well, Not Here Exactly, But Rather to Somewhere in The atonofbricks.blogspot.com File Library) And The Exact Page to Which The Search Results Directed The Intrepid Searchers

1. PEOPLE KILLED IN A BIG HOUSE NOW IS HAUNTED MEXICO MONCLOVA


2. Zach 3years Genius


3. Manthong Photos


4. Mama Cass died of Ham Sandwich


5. Trombone Hemorrhoid


6. What stores carry honey i shrunk the kids on dvd


7. "Historical Global Temperatures"


8. Jiffy Pop popcorn Meijers


9. Peter Bulanow Budweiser


10. Short reviews of diary by chuck palahniuk


11. zipconnect itower

People Just Liked It Better That Way

Boy do I feel special today!

Get this: not one, but TWO of my very favoritest bloggers in wholest widest world linked to me today: Mike and Rusty. Now Mike linking to me isn't that uncommon but it's still special. Rusty on the other hand rarely links to anything but real, important kinda stuff. If you can call the Washington Times real....or important...but anyway.

Now, as all narcissistic bloggers must, I monitor my traffic from time to time. Here, in chart-a-rific fashion is what happens when either of my much more famouser friends (I did meet Rusty in person once and yes he was wearing a BoSox hat. No sweater vest though, sorry).



As you can easily see, my blog traffic is ego-crushingly low. Not that I care about that. But when I get links? Shooooooot, it practically goes through the freaking roof! Yeah!!

If only I had AdSense on this thing. I could have made, like, almost a dime.

Always Hungry For Something

Well, here we are.
Here we are where we soon shall not be.
We are now officially in our last week living and working in DC. A week from right now (assuming I'm not just waking up from a wicked, last-day-of-work-in-a-soul-crushing-office-building hangover) we'll be somewhere on the road between here and the great city of Detroit. And by "great city" I mean "abandoned hellhole," but whatever.

So I guess I thought I would take the last few days here to recollect a little about the good and the bad of living here in DC.

Today's Sappy Post!

The Good: Obviously, the best thing ever about our time here in the Nation's Crapital (get it? I changed the word to make the meaning something different! LOL) is that I met so many wonderful people that populate my link field over there ---->
I will fucking miss the shit out them. And I'm angry about that. But it's a good anger, right?


The Bad: Actually, this just happened yesterday. I found out that over the weekend my friend Charles (the homeless(?) Street Sense vendor) was jumped, beaten up, and robbed by a gang of five "young'uns." Now he doesn't have money for rent and may have to move into a shelter again. He told me that it's a good thing he doesn't have a gun because now he'd be serving life in prison. What a world.

Where'd You Get That Point of View

So, as usual I found some stupid thing in the tubes today (thanks reddit) that is claiming to be the first image ever published on the world Wide WEB!!! Supposedly Tim Berners-Lee uploaded it back at CERN or something. Anyway, here it is.



However, I happen to know for a fact that this is NOT the first image to ever appear on the web. In truth, the first image to appear on the web is one of the oldest images in the history of mankind. It has crossed cultural and millennial borders, it has reached even the most remote of societies. In fact, some sociologists believe that this image is actually a part of what makes us human, part of our very identity. The first record of this image is found in cave paintings from the neo-paleolithic era, as seen below.


Even in this very early form, the image was always accompanied with a warning against masturbation. The characters below this version can be roughly translated as "Whenever thou [indecipherable, assumed to refer to autoeroticism] SunGod kills a kitten."

We also find records of this image nearly 5000 years later in frescoes produced at the height of the Roman Empire, as shown below. However, at this hedonistic point in history, the warning was reversed and read (in Latin) "Eneverwhay ooyay ontday asturbatemay, Aturnsay illskay a ittenkay."


After the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of Christian Nation-state in the 5th century CE, all art was religious in nature and paintings of non-God related material were essentially forbidden. The warning remained and in this examplar piece of medieval art read "Everye Time Thoue Masturbateste, God Killse His Son."


Eventually, as the Enlightenment gained ground, art became more focussed on the natural as opposed to the supernatural, giving God's creation the primary spot as opposed to God himself. The impressionist era was, in many respects, the culmination of this naturalistic style of painting as it boiled art down to the essential substance in the universe: light. Monet (Painter of Light TM) finally brought this iconic image back to life. It is unclear whether or not he was aware of its prevalence throughout history. Most art historians agree that he was not and consider it one of the great masterpieces of humanist-impressionism. This was the first (and only time in the historical record) that the image was not accompanied by any warnings, in fact, rumors abound that Monet painted it primarily with his own semen, so.....


And finally, as all good things must, this picture showed up on the internet. And, like all things on the internet (including this very post) it is almost irredeemably stupid. In fact, the existence of this monumentally moronic proto-image, this meta-idea in the human conscience is used by many to justify a hard nihilism. Many Christian groups believe that God put this image into our DNA to test us and that the fossil record shows this image to be no more than 65 years old at the most. Carbon dating is unreliable.

Sometimes It's Harder to Leave

So, I haven't been writing much around here lately. That's because I'm working on other things having to do with this blog, like making new logos, see?



That's way more fun anyway. But I'm not done yet either. I'm categorizing all my posts and such so there may not be much new in the next week or so. I'm just saying.

Also, if you subscribe to my RSS feed (I know there's at least 1 (or 25%) of you that do), well, HA HA HA HA HA!

Loaded Like A Freight Train

Welcome to the (not)ALL-NEW A Ton of Bricks!

The content is the same, but the look is slightly different!

You know us:

form before function.
style before substance.
looks before learning.
trends before tradition.

We Will All Be Astronauts

And by "astronauts" I mean "rich" thanks to Web 2.0

Here is my sales pitch for the all new A Ton of Bricks, complete with logo!



Welcome to the all-new A Ton of Bricks; We're about what Web 2.0 is about. We are on the brink of a new age and Web 2.0 is the new New.

It's all about community. Taggable folksonomies! On-demand news clouds with one click! Roll your own podcasts! Cry out, blogosphere! Social is the new push!

Here are some of the features that will be incorporated into the All New A Ton of Bricks - this will change everything.

• Dynamic inline updating with yellow fades!


• An AJAX-driven GUI


• disintermediate peer-to-peer communities


• post rss-capable networking


• Ruby on Rails


• enabling of embedded platforms


• incentivized user-contributed network effects


• Emergent topologies based on PERL-enabled sub-scripting


• DRM-free video sharing through Skype


• Monetizing through AdSense


• Real-time aggregation of content-sensitive Atom feeds

We shall transcend borders.

List Tuesday

Things You Might Not Know About This Blog

1. It is on indefinite hiatus

A Ton of Hot Air

Okay folks, I wasn't going to write about this, like, ever, but I have to. Did you see the Post today? No? Okay, here's the editorial cartoon...



Can we all just stop blaming things on global warming? Global warming is not an on/off thing. It doesn't directly cause any weather patterns. It influences average weather patterns over decades not days. This rain? Not caused by global warming. Hurricane Katrina? Not caused by global warming. Were the intensities affected by global warming? Possibly. But please, please stop saying "well, looks like it's global warming."

Also, while we're on the subject, no, colder weather than usual during the winter does not mean that global warming isn't true.

Also, while we're on the subject, I've heard that last year was the hottest in 2,000 years. Are you telling me that we are freaking out and blaming death, destruction and flooding on weather that isn't even yet out of the normal distribution of historical global temperatures? You are? Well I'll be! I thought global warming was a never before seen wave of highest ever temperatures. Huh.*

[Redacted due to policy violation]


*For those of you who don't normally read this blog, or for those of you that do, but never understand when I am joking, this is one of those times. I actually think global warming is real and a big deal. It's a big deal because our industrial society was built during a period of historically low global temperatures and is vulnerable to any major shift in weather patterns, even if it takes decades. And stop feeling smug about it. It'll affect you, too.

I Give Up

Well, the death of this blog might be on the horizon. I couldn't be cynical today, and without that, my blog persona's got nothing. Nothing.

I wanted to say something cynical and funny about this house concert that I went to last night, but I can't. It was too good.

Dang it, Ryan and Holly!

Everyone else: I highly recommend The Cobalt Season's But I Tell You.

L i s t T u e s d a y

A Bunch of Things I'll Probably Never Do, so what.

1. Play professional basketball


2. Eat a million pounds of steamed crab


3. Stop writing this stupid blog at the end of the month


4. Juggle more than 8 apples


5. Throw a baseball more than 1,000 feet on the fly. I've yet to top 800


6. Star in a Broadway Show about the life and times of Edgar Rice Burroughs


7. Care who Edgar Rice Burroughs is


8. Fight fire with fire


9. Lose more than one SmarTrip card at a time


10. Call someone who cares


11. Cry over spilt milk


12. Spill milk


13. Cough up a lungfish


14. Be buried alive


15. Climb every mountain


16. Ford every stream


17. Hold on loosely


18. Walk 35 miles through the desert to find some old sage just to get the chance to ask him one question: "What in the world are you doing out here?"


19. Shoot flames out of my ears


20. Think that Bono isn't a tard


21. Play chutes and ladders. It's Snakes and Ladders or nothing for this guy.


22. Fly to Nebraska


23. Drink a whole bottle of vodka in one sitting


24. Work in this town again


25. Join forces with evil

List Tuesday: Advertisers' Fun Page Edition

Well, I made it back from Japan and have no interest in going back anytime soon. It feels good to be back in the "screw you" capital of the world. It's nice to know that when people crowd past you or in front of you on the road or in the subway, it's because they think they are better than you and are doing the cutting off out of individual, selfish aggresiveness. I much prefer that to the same thing happening in Tokyo where it happens because there is absolutely no concept of personal space in Japan. Of course, there can't really be such a concept in a country the size of Florida with 130 million people.

Anyway, last night, the brickwife and I were talking about the idea of personal space and individuality, the hallmarks of American culture. She asked me if it bothered me that I'm actually not very individual or different than a lot of other people. My answer? No, I don't really care. Advertisers and other social anthropoligists know me. They've never met me, but I fit perfectly into one of their little market fragments. They know what I like, they know how to get me to buy something and they know what gets on my nerves.

So here's today's challenge for any advertisers out there that read A Ton of Bricks (none that I know of): I will list 4 things about me and you have to tell me four other things about me based solely on the information I revealed. If all four things you tell me are accurate, you win!

Things About Me That Are Probably Very Revealing To Advertisers

1. I drive a Volkswagen


2. I use Apple computers at home


3. My favorite current, scripted TV show is NBC's The Office


4. I have and maintain a "blog"

So what else do I own/do/want?

List Tuesday: 0% Published Edition

Did any of you notice that Blogger was down for like 12 hours yesterday? What's that? You did? Oh, me too.

At first I was going to get all complainy that I couldn't post anything and that all my faithful readers wouldn't be able to read my nuggets of wisdom dipped in delicious northern style honey mustard sauce. Then I realized that I don't pay any money to Blogger for this service and that it would be disingenuous for me to complain about something that is free. What's the old saying? Don't kick a gift horse in the face, or something like that? So, you won't be hearing any whining from me about how those idiots over at blogger couldn't get the site back up for like twelve hours I mean that is what they are paid to do why can't they just do it.




The Best Restaurants in Moses Lake, Washington

1. The Golden Corral: Also affectionately known as "Spoonful of Meat."


2. The Porterhouse: ML's only combination steakhouse, card room, and hooker pick-up spot!


3. Tacos Mexicanos: This one is actually good.


4. Inca's: Like Tacos Mexicanos but covered in cheese, overpriced and clean.


5. Papa's Grill: ML's only combination bar, bad restaurant, casino, and bowling alley.


6. Arctic Circle: They make a mean white sauce.


7. KFC/A&W: Chicken+chili dogs+and draft root beer = crazy delicious (has this joke been overused yet? Yes? Oh, then never mind.)


8. The Sexist Dairy Queen: They make a mean Blizzard and only hire teenage girls. [Insert your own dirty joke about the owner here.]


9. Denny's: Culinary genius taken out back, beat with a ladle and wrapped in bacon and covered in syrup. Still, $3.99 for a full breakfast means an extra hour away from work. If you go back at lunch, it means two hours away from work. And accelerated cardiovascular disease.


10. Da Vinci's: It's where to go if you want to experience what backwater hicks think of as a fancy restaurant. I would recommend the steak, with a side of lasagna. What they lack in quality, make up in quantity. It may cost more, but at least it will taste better coming back up than Golden Corral food would after you have done a hal-dozen keg stands and pounded down 15 Stones at a backyard barbecue later that evening. Note to readers not acquainted with Moses Lake: This kind of activity is typical for a weekday evening in the Big Hole. On weekends, things would be kicked up a notch to Killian's instead of Keystones.

The Greatest Day in the History of the Blogosphere (We Kid You Not)

We would like to present some laughably bad poetry to maybe help cheer you up. Blogs may not have done anything good in the world, but they keep us entertained, so please don’t stop.




Sonnet #1
by A Ton of Bricks

At times when in this world we find ourselves
Attached to things we know not how to use
I imagine that they were built by elves
Who even now are mending all my shoes
I look on them and then, bestill my heart
I cannot comprehend their work ethic
Because although I wish to do my part
I cannot bring myself to sew or prick
Or hammer into soles those tiny nails
And delicately then undo the knots
That seal my feet and keep them from the trails
Prevent my socks from getting damp in spots
I want to think that all these things are real
But lying to myself is wrong, I feel.


Sonnet #2
by Us

A book in hand is worth two on the shelf
Its words leap off the page like tiny sprites
And gambol in my ears and on my self
And in them all my heart of heart's delights
I hope that I shall never see the day
When things turn sour for the literati
And books are tossed on piles of fiery hay
And ashes rise as far as eyes can see
The end is near my friends I would beweep
And now ‘tis much too late for us to act
To alter the trajectory we keep
And save ourselves and our beloved tracts
We’ll lose them all to be replaced by blogs
The best minds of our generation’s dogs.

Those are some pretty atrocious sonnets. Thank God I’m not Shakespeare. But speaking of Shakespeare, and trying to get the bad poetry out of our heads, let’s look at one more poem. This one is not written by me, so I’m afraid I’m going to have to run the regular “Poetry Thursday” banner again. You know, just in case this dude ever Googles his own name and is directed to A Ton of Bricks, I want him to know that I think this is good poetry, not bad.




An Infinite Number Of Monkeys
By Ronald Koertge

After all the Shakespeare, the book
of poems they type is the saddest
in history.

But before they can finish it,
they have to wait for that Someone
who is always

looking to look away. Only then
can they strike the million
keys that spell

humiliation and grief, which are
the great subjects of Monkey
Literature

and not, as some people still
believe, the banana
and the tire.

Man, would I love to get my hands on some monkey literature. I am very interested in their lives of quiet desperation. Or in the case of those dang howler monkeys their lives of obnoxiously loud desperation.

List Tuesday, Yet Again

Are y'all getting as tired as I am of this tired old routine of writing lists every Tuesday. It's a tired old blog cliche isn't it? But, luckily for you, I'm a tired old blogger who doesn't have the heart nor the desire to do anything original. So here we go again.

Thoughts That Might Race Through Your Head While You Are Plunging 3000 Feet Down Into A Deep Chasm*

1. Huh? This parachute is a knapsack! Ha ha ha ha ha, I never get tired of that joke!


2. Are we there yet? No, and if you ask again I'm pulling this car over and then we'll never get there, do you want me to do that? No? Then shut up!


3. Are we there yet?


4. Should I go feet first, or head first?


5. Not again.


6. Dah dum da dum dum. Dum dum. Dah dum da dum dum. Dum dum. Green Acres is the place to be, farm livin' is the life for me!


7. Next time when I'm walking along an insanely dangerous precipice, I'll be way more careful. Hindsight is 20/20 I guess.


8. I hope I reach terminal velocity soon.


9. I wonder what my terminal velocity will be?


10. Will it be higher if I do this? *tucks arms in and goes into a dive*


11. So this is the punishment for being stupid!


12. If I was made out of hydrogen, I would just keep floating up. Weird!


13. Oh man, this one time, I saw a squirrel fall out of a tree! Did you understand that? I saw a SQUIRREL FALL OUT OF A TREE! That squirrel must have been stupid. Wait, before you say it, I am not evolved to scale dangerous heights, so me falling into a deep chasm isn't ironic. It's just dumb. Really, really, unbelievably dumb.


14. I wish I had an umbrella I could use as a parachute.


15. I should probably go head first, just in case there is water down there. But what if the water is only a few feet deep? I don't want to break my neck, so I'll go feet first.


16. Oh, God, I hope I don't end up doing a belly flop, because that is going to sting like a mother!


17. I cannot believe that Mike Jensen fouled that dude in the act of shooting with 11 seconds left when they were up by four! I just cannot believe that.


18. Look Ma! No hands!


19. Do you think a fire hose puts out enough pressure to stop me from hitting the ground? I mean, if I pointed it straight down, could I just sort of float on top of the water?


20. I am going to get at least an AIS 4 injury from this. Crap.


21. If only I knew what "a stitch in time saves nine" means! I have a feeling I wouldn't be in this mess if I knew what it meant.


22. At least I'll never have to hear about Tom Cruise again. Unless I go to hell, because he is going there for sure. Hell without celebrity gossip would be like heaven!


23. I'm about to hit the ground like a ton of bricks. Shoot! My blog! What will my readers do without me? Hm, if I survive this, maybe I could make a post about it!


24. Whew, it was just a dream! I really felt like I was falling!

And on that note, Comic Book Guy says "Worst ending to a list. Ever."

I'd especially like to take this opportunity now to point out the metaness of that previous sentence. I thought I cleverly referred to my own post from within my own post, making that meta-connection self-relexive shtick stand out. Now, I've referred to my own referral to my own post. That's like, double meta! Wait, now I've referred to my own referral to my referral to my own post! Four layers of shear meta-goodness. This could keep going all day! Now I just need somebody to refer to my four levels of meta in the comments and then another person could write about the first person's comment and so on. It could be the most stupidest meta thing in the history of whenever! Look at me, I'm even pre-emptively meta-ing.

*In actuality, it is very unlikely that one would think all these thoughts in a single 3,000 foot plunge. The human body, in normal falling posture, has a terminal velocity of about 110 mph (about 161 ft/sec). Acceleration due to gravity is about 16 ft/sec*sec, so one would reach terminal velocity after falling for about 10 seconds and falling about 800 feet. That leaves 2200 more feet to fall, or about 13 more seconds, for a total of 23 seconds. I don't think that any one could think 24 distinct thoughts in that amount of time. Especially while plunging to your doom. It's just not gonna happen.

Viva Administration! And Bad Poetry Thursday

Okay, we'll get to the bad poetry in a sec. First I've got some administrative things to write about.

First, in one of the strangest things ever to happen to me, I have at least one reader from Provo, Utah. I don't even know where Provo is, let alone know any um, Provozoans?. I think it might be near SLC, but I'm too lazy to open up Google Earth and check. At first I thought it was someone who knows my sister-in-law, but it's not. It's some random girl I've never met named Becky Karlsven. She seems like a nice enough person. Anyway, it appears to be a long story, but there are five links on her blog: Google News, BYU (hey, she's from Utah), sudoku, her brother (I assume), and me. Why me??? Not that I mind. I actually feel kind of special that some random person I don't know would link to me as though I was someone important! It appears that she first found my blog (I don't know how) in August when she left a comment on this post and she has been a reader ever since! Thanks, Ms. Karlsven. I appreciate it.

Also, I still have regular readers in Seoul, Sunnyvale, CA, and recently, the UK. But none of them link to me, so I don't like you as much, okay?

Second, when searching for that post from last August, I came across another post that now has 22 comments, almost all spam, and almost all new! Awesome!

Third, today and tomorrow will be post-heavy in the morning and not so much in the afternoon. I have a lot of work to do. And by work, I mean constant refreshing of ESPN's NCAA tournament scoreboard.

Fourth, I just wanted to let you know that They Might Be Giants are playing the 9:30 Club in April, if you want to go. I already have tickets (they went on sale over one hours ago!) and if you want to go, let me know. Also, I feel kind of stupid for being excited about this show. I am out of the age range where liking TMBG is really appropriate. It starts at about 13 (there's just something about their cleverness that nerdy teenagers love) and goes to about 22 (or 25 if you're still in college. Undergraduate, that is). I guess it now includes babies and parents of babies so, hey, maybe I do still qualify! Yeah, I'll rationalize it like that. Does that mean I have to take Levi?

Okay on to.....


Waiting By The Side Of The Road As If You Think Something Is About To Happen
by "Skizz"

When you look in the windows of the passing cars
you can see the look in the eyes of the of drivers of the passing cars
and you think "what would they do
if I threw
a full cup of orange soda through
the open windows of the passing cars"

Or remember the time
that you forgot the time
and went late to the movie about
the guy who lived in a small house on the side of the road
and threw orange soda through the windows of the passing cars
like you did just now

What a strange world you think
what a funny place to raise a child in
or on or around or about face
you cannot find a trace
of your child in the world you live in
since your children are in fact a part
of nothing at all
and don't even exist in your mind's eye
that is looking through the windows of the passing cars

Birds and bees flutter in and around your head
and my head
and the sounds of the passing cars fill and follow our ears
and a single dangling piece of pie
hanging from a delirious lamp post
across the street is tempting
you to cross the street and eat it
but perhaps you will miss the bus
and find that the pie was only dust
or come in contact with the passing cars
that have star in thars
You are sure to lose that battle


On the street, people come and go
talking of Michelangelo

Or more likely why must the traffic be so bad
or guess how much my house is worth
or can you believe what that guy just said
or I heard that Howard's cat is dead
or I didn't want to leave my bed
or please stop these voices in my head
or oh god my blood is spilling, red
or I wish I had some more street cred

But nothing
happens because a watched pot while only occaisionally boil
and now is not one of those occaisional times
when a pot will boil
and the passing cars knocked the pot on its side
and spilled the water down the gutter on the street
where the passing cars have orange soda flying from
their tailpipes and their drivers eyes.

The Bad Poetry Train Rolls On.....

201 posts, can you believe it?

Fire in the Hole
by Schuyler

Black lines on a blue sticky note
tell the whole story
a story of life, love, hate, death
and music
melting chocolate and creamy nougat
A fingerprint and a streak
of brilliant black blood
mean that it's over now
And a crude representation of a sound wave
bounces from one side to the other
frozen
at that one moment in time
And a swoop of hair like lines
vanishes into the oblivion of no paper
Life's trajectory is traced out
squiggles disappearing into nothing
flaming out or fading out
it all ends the same way
when the pen
is lifted from the page
All that's left is an echo
a hole reflecting nothing
except smiles and stories.

List Tuesday

Things to do during the day to kill time

1. Draw weird pictures


2. Read conspiracy theories on the internet.


3. Call somebody


4. Draw even weirder pictures


5. Daydream about bears and ice skates


6. Stare out the window and contemplate the rapidly approaching end of innocence


7. Fill up your water bottle, drink all the water, then fill it up again


8. Repeat


9. Write a post. Or two.


10. Go home early

Yakimemories

Well, you know how the old saying goes; vicious mockery is the sincerest form of flattery. And if that's true, then my home town of Yakima, Washington is about to get sincerely flattered.

I was born at Memorial Hospital on Tieton Drive the morning of November 23rd, 1979. It was a Friday, the day after Thanksgiving. And while I would like to say that I was born into a region of fantastic culture and amazing opportunity, I can't. Well, that's not really fair. There are some good things about Yakima, but it's way more fun to ignore them and pretend the whole place sucks. It will always be uber-cool (ha! I used the word uber, which hasn't been a cool thing to do since 2003, and paired it with the word cool! Oh my, how my self-consciousness and self-deprecating desire to be cool is not at all obvious. Umm, now I don't know how to end this parenthetical comment....sooooo.....ummmmmm.....) to be from a small town, live in the big-city and pretend that everything there was retarded and everyone from your hometown is some kind of liberal-hating, truck-driving, homophobic, fundamentalist lunatic. But all y'all know that a part of you kind of, maybe just a little bit, wants to go back there someday. Maybe your family is still there. Maybe you still have friends there. Maybe there's a certain time of year where something in you just longs for the air of your hometown. Whoa. This is getting sappy. Let's just cut to the mockery.

Let's start with the low hanging fruit: There is a sign on the freeway as you approach "downtown" that reads, "Yakima, the Palm Springs of Washington." Based on the fact that if you Google that phrase, in quotation marks mind you, you get 732 results, I am definitely not the first to point out that the sign is kind of stupid. Let's just say that Yakima has an average high temperature of below 60 F and an average low of below freezing for 5 months out of the year. Palm Springs' average high never dips below 70.

In other news, Yakima recently landed an Applebee's! This was front-page news in the Yak. That should give you an idea of what it's like there.

When I was a kid, you had to drive to the Tri-cities (Richland, Pasco and Kennewick) to do any good shopping. And by good I just mean "not sucky."

And don't even get me started on all the fruit that they grow around there. Oh, wait. The apples are actually really good. You can even buy them back here on the east coast, though believe me, they are way better when they haven't been shipped all the way across the country.

In high school, the best thing to do on the weekends is drive around. That's it. Just drive around. You can usually find groups of hooligan kids all up and down Nob Hill Ave at car washes, empty lots, and even the Burger King parking lot. At least that's the way it was circa 1997.

Yakima has the highest ratio of very poor to very rich in the whole state of Washington. Way to go fruit growers. Keep those migrant Mexican workers in poverty with your low wages, and if they speak up, call INS and ship their asses back to Mexico (Note: this actually happens. Growers actually do call INS on their own illegal employees).

I still don't understand how a town as small as Yakima has a gang problem. What turf is there to fight over? Yo, vato, we totally claim all land South of the 5th Ave Safeway and North of Front Street between Yakima Ave and Lincoln as property of the Surrenos!

Stupid Yakima Brewing Company went out of business. The company that opened the first post-prohibition brew pub in the country ran itself into the ground. Probably because they're from Yakima and everyone that didn't leave after high school at least for college is an idiot.

The white people that live there (about half the population) thinks that the North and East sides of town are "the ghetto." You want the ghetto? I can show you the ghetto. Go drive down M-53 through Detroit. Go hang out in Anacostia. That, my friends, is the ghetto.

Well, there's so much more to complain about, and I don't have the time, so I'll stop here. But as a final piece of advice, if you ever find yourself in Yakima, make sure you check out as many random taco busses as you can. You may not always know what the meat is, but those are some good burritos.