Randumb Thoughts: The October 1 Edition

I really just had to post this picture again.




Carol and I just forked out $40 for our Belleville Vehicle Registration stickers. Yay. They reinstated the tax back in spring after a 16 year hiatus when the City Council voted in favor of it. Let’s look at this a little more in depth though. Belleville is broke and needs money to pay its workers. The City Council members are city workers. So in a nutshell, they probably could’ve proposed a $2000 per vehicle tax and the City Council would’ve voted for it because if it got shot down, they wouldn’t get paid. They were essentially voting to get paid. If the option of getting paid or not getting paid were put to me, you bet your ass I’d vote to get paid, but it’s still crap for the residents to be forced to pay this. As a result, the city has now imposed a $20 per vehicle tax for a stupid sticker to put in your window.

Let’s look at this from another angle. How in the hell do they plan on enforcing this? Are they planning on stopping all vehicles that pass by the town square that aren’t sporting a sticker? How are they going to determine which cars are from Belleville and which aren’t? Are they going to go door to door within Belleville’s city limits and ticket people based on some spreadsheet that shows who has paid and who has not? No. The only way that they can enforce it is by ticketing people during traffic stops for other offenses. So, basically, if I’m a good driver and don’t get pulled over the city is never going to be able to tell that I didn’t buy a sticker and I can save my $20. Right? I haven’t been pulled over anywhere other than Millstadt and East St Louis in the past 5 years so I think I would be safe. Also, if I get busted for speeding or (god forbid) a DUI, are they really going to stick the fine on me? More than likely, it will be the same thing with car insurance – if you don’t have it at the time of your ticket, you simply get it before the court date and all is good and the charge gets dropped. It makes so much sense to me to say “screw it” and just not get the damn sticker until after I get pulled over, but alas, my guilt overrode my anarchistic ways and Carol finally went to the courthouse to get the stickers today.

The deadline was yesterday though, so buying them a day late still makes me a badass, right? RIGHT?

In other news…

Since the weather has cooled off a little, I find myself wanting to wear jeans a little more often. I say “wanting” to wear jeans because all of the jeans I have are from two years ago. Two years ago, they were a little big around the waist. Last year, they fit just right (I attributed that to natural wear and tear and being placed in the dryer instead of being air dried). Well, they must have been worn and torn and put in the dryer all summer long because for some reason, I’m having a difficult time breathing in the pair that I’m wearing today. Getting older is a bitch.

My LiLo has entered the Betty Ford clinic. I guess she didn’t read the blog regarding my suggestions for Dr. DJ Awesomesausce’s Female Celebrity Rehabilitation Facility. I could be helping her as we speak.

Regarding that blog, apparently someone must have searched “rehabilitation” or something and ended up coming across my blog. The poor woman must have read the entire post looking for some sort of redeeming quality but was stuck with my gross perversions (and obvious concern for my patient’s wellbeing – of course) instead. She commented on my blog and I didn’t recognize her name so I found myself checking out her blog as well. http://heal-the-healer.com/. After listening to that drivel, I’m beginning to think that my rehabilitation method might not be the worst idea in the world.

Speaking of past blogs, I have a stat counter on my blog that counts the number of visitors that I get each day and which blogs are getting read the most (for those curious, it’s this one: http://scottchronicles.blogspot.com/2010/09/nothing-left-to-say.html. Within that tool, I can also access a map to see where people are accessing my page from. I saw 4 or 5 in LA and was curious who they were because I only know two people out there and think only one of them reads my blog (thanks MAP). To my shock, I saw that the IP address was listed as E Entertainment and it showed that the blog they accessed was my Open Letter to Joel McHale. So, either Joel McHale is finally manning up and taking responsibility for his actions or he has some of his henchmen stalking me to see what I’m planning next. Either way Joel, I just wanted to let you know that I know that you now know that I know what you’re up to. The ball’s in your court buddy. Let’s play.

I’ve been reading “I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell” by Tucker Max and I am appalled. For those of you not aware, Tucker Max is a drunken womanizing douchebag who lives his life with no little to no consequences and then writes about his experiences. And I’ve gotta say – it‘s pretty awesome. I can’t imagine ever doing what he does to people but I sure have a good time laughing at it. The thing that appalls me about it is that if I had a little less decency towards people (including myself) and the ability to forget that eventually my mother would read it, I could have written some similar stories myself. I will, however, always try to keep my blogs as clean as possible and not include any stories about the adventures of my genitals.

You’re welcome

Carol and I are currently attempting to stop smoking. I went to the ballgame on Wednesday and got a little tipsy, so of course I failed miserably. Carol, on the other hand, is holding up like a champ and is, in turn, making it easier for me. While she is making it easier on me though, my actions (which are barely tolerable to most people while they are not going through nicotine withdrawal) are becoming increasingly annoying to her and I think she is about ready to punch me in the face. Part of me just wants us to start smoking again so that I don’t have to be fearful every time I turn a corner and see her standing there with her “Oh, you’re still breathing?” look.

I love you Carol. You’re doing great. We’ll get there together (unless you decide to terminate my existence in the meantime).

I don’t think the 3 or 4 chicken enchiladas that I just ate for lunch are helping me with my jeans situation at all.

Tonight is the Chili Cook Off in Belleville. I don’t think I’m going, but I felt left out because every single person in the Belleville area has mentioned this as their Facebook status for the day.

Our patio is finally complete. Well, it will be complete this spring when I buy flowers to go in the flower beds, but the bricks are laid, the arbor is built, the retaining wall is up, and I unloaded a truck full of dirt and another full of mulch to get it where it’s at. I think it looks awesome. If anything, it sure beats the mud pit that was there for the past year. I do want to thank everyone who helped though, so thanks cousin Ryan, Carol, and me. We’re awesome!

Does anyone else listen to the Arch? (I gave up on 103.3 after they placed a restraining order on me due to my frequent calls to see if I they had just called my name to be the $500 winner. In fact, just mentioning them may be in violation of that order, but I’m not too sure. Between Brittney, LiLo, Pam Anderson, Cloris Leachman, 103.3, etc, I get confused as to which restraining order rules apply to which.) Anyway, is anyone else creeped out by the Mormon commercials? I’m aware that they’re “just like other people,” but I wasn’t aware that enough people thought that they weren’t that it would require an advertising campaign to claim that they are, in fact, “just like us.” In truth, all it makes me think of is “We’re Mormon, and we’re among you” in the creepiest possible way that it can sound.

BTW, I’m still waiting for the Reds to come back down to earth because there’s no way that they’ll beat out the Cardinals for this division. The TLR Cardinals are just too good! (If I read this in the future and don’t get my joke here, it’s that the Cardinals were supposed to run away with the division but Cincinnati played really well and had a much better team all year but the Cardinal fans couldn’t cope with the fact that any team could be better than one with Pujols, Carpenter, Wainwright, Holliday, Molina, Rasmus, TLR as the manager and the great Dave Duncan as the almighty pitching God. There are now 3 days left in the season and the Cardinals choked their way out of it in mid August. Not poking fun here, it’s just for my own reference).

This is my 79th blog entry and I anticipate that I’ll hit 100 right around Christmas. I’m still trying to think of something big to do for the 100th blog, but can’t think of anything special. Maybe a Q and A session? Maybe an update on every blog story that I’ve written? Maybe a top 100 reasons why I am awesome list? I’m not sure, but am definitely up for suggestion. It doesn’t matter to me that I only have an average of about 35 readers per blog. What matters is that 35 people take time out of their day to read the ridiculous crap that I put on here. If I haven’t said it enough in the past, thank you all for your support. It’s nice to hear people talk about this little blog (good or bad) when I see them out. I’ll keep writing this thing as long as I have stories to tell or as long as there are still idiots in this world to make fun of (myself being the main one).

Or maybe I’ll use my 100th blog for the top 100 moments in the adventures of my genitals…

100? I’m not sure I could even do a top 10.

Or even 5.

Maybe 5.

So sad.

Thanks for reading.