Before my wife, the only time I lit candles was when I was sitting closest to the cake at a birthday party. She exposed me to a world of scented lotions, methods for doing laundry that did not include sorting clothing into two piles; "whites" and "everything else" and of course, candles. Now I have candles everywhere. I never knew one needed scented candles for bathrooms, offices, living rooms, family rooms, spare bedrooms and laundry rooms. Every odor issue in our house is solved by lighting a candle. "God you stink, Matty. We should light a candle!" Maybe I could take a shower? My wife has corrupted me. I now find myself debating the aromatic pleasures in the Yankee Candle area at Bed, Bath & Beyond. Do I want Pumpkin Pie or Clean Cotton? Cucumber Melon or Beach Walk? Finally, there is a candle company that appeals to my male sensibilities; Hot Wicks. They carry scents that smell of urinal cakes, campfires and strippers. Hot Wicks describes the stripper scent as, "the perfume counter at your local department store times a thousand ... then add some glitter." I think a more accurate description is "bitter desperation mixed with the hint of ass sweat, stale bourbon and broken dreams."

Labels: l-i-v-i-n, pop culture, strippers, the greens, wife

Friday. The wife and I attend the 2008 Punk Rocks show at Red Rocks. The band lineup includes NOFX, Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Bouncing Souls, Street Dogs and young Denver skate punks Frontside Five (the Circle Jerks are a no-show). I soon recognize how old I am when I breeze through beer lines in mere minutes. I soon learn that new punk kids like smoking weed way more than old punk kids. NOFX, Mighty Mighty Bosstones and Bouncing Souls are still awesome. The Street Dogs are the opposites of awesome due to an hour and a half set and a fifteen minute dissertation on who the Ramones are and why they are so important to punk music. The only way to make their set less cliche would have be for the lead singer to not remove his shirt before his Ramones tribute song only to reveal a strategically planned Ramones shirt underneath. I conclude that six hour concerts and $7 beers are not nearly as fun in my thirties as they were in my twenties.

Saturday. Enter the annual neighborhood pool luau. We represent a respectable drinking crew and my next door neighbor's classic rock cover band melts faces. Our HOA is awesome because they allow (tolerate) my next door neighbor to wheel an ice-cold keg over to the pool to serve free beer. I soon realize that inflatable monkeys cannot sustain the belly-flop weight of a grown man from a diving board. Post-luau we torch a fire in the backyard pit and the wife provides ingredients for 'smores. Three people fall asleep in their chairs. I conclude that staying up late and drinking until intoxication two nights in a row is not nearly as fun in my thirties as it was in my twenties.

Sunday. My annual fantasy football draft goes down in the living room. Being as this is the fifteenth year of my league's existence and the same team owners have been in said league for the past six years, I expect the draft to take no more than two hours. Four hours and eight cases of beer later, the draft concludes after much humor, animosity and stupidity (this sums up my fantasy football league perfectly: upon the draft's conclusion one team owner loudly proclaimed, "I have to get going. I am late for marriage counseling.") Steak, potatoes and a gigantic apple pie from Costco are then decimated in less than twenty minutes. I conclude that sports gambling and NFL football viewing are not nearly as fun in my thirties as they were in my twenties.

Labels: chili dog, denver, drinking, drugs, glory days, kaye, l-i-v-i-n, music, sg crew, sports, the greens, weekend that was, wife

Kaye: Where are you working from today?
Me: A coffee shop in Boulder. I am meeting with a vendor this morning and he chose this joint.
Kaye: Nice.
Me: I cannot wait to be an old man at a coffee shop. These codgers are sitting next to me
and have been talking about the weather for the past hour.
Kaye: With their newspapers and their sweater vests?
Me: Well it is Boulder, so gray beards, flannel shirts...
Kaye: ...and some LL Bean khaki pants?
Me: Right. And instead of a regular newspaper they are reading an alternative paper. Something that bashes Republicans and the "establishment."
Kaye: God. Old Boulder dudes.
Me: They are not even cool old dudes wearing a Fedora, walking all slow and talking about losing their buddies during the WW-deuce.
Kaye: Ha! They are just old Hippies. The worst kind of Hippy.
Me: Yes. Because they are old enough to know that their peace-loving, cheeba-smoking rhetoric does not work anymore.
Kaye: Totally. You know what looks good on a Hippy?
Me: Blood?
Kaye: No. Fire.
Me: Even better.

Labels: boulder, career, coffee, colorado, im convos, kaye

I have been consumed with Olympics viewing all week and thereby disturbing my normal sleep and freelance design routines to watch riveting "sports" such as synchronized diving. The thing I did know about synchronized diving is that synchronized showering and synchronized hot-tubbing are a major part of the "sport." The first week of the 2008 Beijing Olympics has shown the world that at least one female Chinese gymnast is underage, sportsmanship is not necessarily alive and well in Olympiad and Michael Phelps is kind of good. Maybe Michael Phelps can teach Carmelo Anthony work ethic before the next summer games so Melo shows up ready to compete on the world stage instead of spending his entire first game on the bench after going 0 for 3 from the field.

Labels: america, denver, pop culture, sports

I love me some Olympics. I love the history, the majesty, the competition, the pseudo-sport "athletes" doing lesbian modeling shoots, the underage Chinese gymnasts and the ridiculously shredded Dara Torres looking like she could punch through the ass of a thoroughbred race horse. I long for this Friday's opening ceremony in Beijing where anti-rain rockets will be fired into the atmosphere, crippling pollution will destroy the lungs of the most well-conditioned athletes and the Chinese government will slaughter kittens in the streets. I look forward to the 29th Games of Olympiad to watch the best of the world compete on a grand stage and ogle hot female Olympians. I am especially anticipating rooting for my wife's childhood friend and one of Arvada, Colorado's native sons Casey Malone, who will be representing the United States in discus for his second appearance in Olympic competition (and just in case he forgot, I wish to echo what I told him at his send-off picnic: "If you do not come home with a medal, Malone, do not come home" which loosely translates in Brozovich to, "You show them, Malone. You show the world.") Let the Women's Beach Volleyball, and the games, begin.

Labels: a-town, chicks, history, lesbians, sports, wife