THE JO-TEL ... popular culture no longer applies to us

Posted by Hip E.  2006-01-24  15:53:34 

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Here's A Phrase I've Probably Never Knowingly Pronounced Correctly:

"If worse comes to worst."

Posted by Hip E.  2006-01-23  13:42:09  

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Wednesday Nights are taken care of ... by LOST!

8-9, bitches!  I missed the episode this week because I took the bus on Wednesday night from Civic Center down to the UPS station at 16th Street and San Bruno Ave. in the industrial area between SoMa, the Mission, and Portrero Hill, I think, to pick up my new headphones that I got on Amazon.com.  They're the big ones.  I got fed up when the iPod headphones got stepped on to the point where the little wire mesh came a little loose and there was a tiny piece of wire going into my ear like those electrodes they use to control your mind in MK-Ultra.  Then I went to this place down there on 16th and Utah called Il Pirata, it's an Italian resaurant/ pizza shack and sports bar.  I highly recommend it.  My order was taken by a little old Italian woman with the real deal accent from the movies and it was pepperoni calzone.  No pizza by the slice but the calzone was extremely good for $6.50 and big.  Some realistic blue-collar dice games being yelled at the end of the bar and a drunk 33 year-old couple chilling out talking about how she's going to the Superbowl.  So then I took a cab home and forgot that LOST was on Wednesday nights, which might help to explain this outbreak of American Idol distractionism.  I realized what had happened on Thursday and immediately went home to download the episode off iTunes for $1.99.  But I found out the hard way that iTunes or ABC or somebody has really fucked a guy in the ass and not had the goddamn common courtesy to give him a reach-around.  You can no longer buy individual episodes of LOST, as you could as recently as Season Two, Episode 6.  Now you can only buy the entire season 2 for $22 bones.  This is despite the fact that I've already bought five of the episodes for $2 each and I would be forced to buy them again.  I was pissed.  So I searched the internet and eventually set my computer to download a version off of Bearshare in .avi format that was a mere 350Mb and took all of Thursday night to finish.  I'm really looking forward to it.  Other than that, maybe I'll post soon about the backpacking trip Shark and I took last weekend.  Yes, yes, Pliska - I wish I knew how to quit him.  The funny thing is that I'm uninsured and Shark and I both got the "deep ticking" on the second day of hiking, and we both have the red target-shaped formations around our tick bites that generally are the best indication of Lyme Disease. 

 Posted by Hip E.  2006-01-21  11:13:28

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Wednesday Nights are taken care of.

American Idol from 8-9pm, followed by Beauty And The Geek from 9-10pm. It's on.

As much as it hurts me inside that Ashton Kutcher is the executive producer of BatG, I must give credit where appropriate, and here it is definitely appripriate. The first season will be hard to top, what with Richard being the best reality show character ever and all, but the geeks this season are pretty cool too. I can't decide whether I'm rooting for Tyson, the Rubik's Cube world record holder for speed solving blindfolded, or Ankor (pronounced like encore), the guy who refuses to shave his unibrow... on principle. Then there's the guy who suffers from panic attacks and opts to sleep in the closet rather than in the same room as his partner, Basically this show is awesome. Lucky for us, there is another all new episode on tonight!

Host [to Beauty]: What type of screwdriver is this? [shows picture of Phillips head screwdriver]

Beauty: There are types of screwdrivers? [pause for laughter] Um... I'm going to say... hand-held? 

This whole Wednesday night block is of course going to fall apart when American Idol moves to Tuesday only, but at that point they stop showing the auditions where all the terrible people sing, and who wants to watch good people only? I watch American Idol to see terrible people get yelled at. Once that stops, there's nothing left for me.

We were also discussing how Hip E. should totally lie his way onto the show. "Hello ladies. I'm Matthew. I graduated from University of California, Berkeley with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and I currently work as a professional engineer testing the tensile strength of pipe joints... or something. In my free time I enjoy arguing with my roommate Shark about dumb shit, and making fun of religion. I'm pretty good at crossword puzzles..." Johnny D would also be a good choice, but he dresses too nicely.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-19  12:13:55

Steve Smith: Asshole

Well... having had a few days to recover , I feel I should apologize to the city of Chicago for that horrible Bears loss this weekend. A lot of my friends want to blame Lovie Smith for not putting the ball on the ground more, or maybe our corners for their piss poor performance, or maybe our D line for not really being able to break through an offensive line which during our last meeting gave up 8 sacks. Actually it was my fault. I can explain.

Last weekend (as in the 7th and 8th of January) Hip E, Shark and I decided that we would try and go backpacking this weekend (as in the 14th - 16th). Things were looking good until Hip E found out that he wouldn't be getting Monday off, so if we went we'd have had to come back on Sunday. Then, on Thursday, things went from bad to worse when Montine decided to schedule a going away party for me at work on Friday at 5, putting my ability to wake up at 6am Saturday to leave in serious jeopardy. Selfishly, I went to the party and had a great time. Afterwards Montine took me to Absinthe and bought me a hamburger with a fried egg on it. As an aside, if you've never had a hamburger with a fried egg on it I highly suggest obtaining one at your earliest convenience. I arrived back at the Jo-Tel at around 1:00am and proceeded to pack my bag. I was still planning on going because I knew if I didn't go, there would be consequences not just for me, but for the entire city of Chicago.

You see, when I first agreed to go, I failed to take into account that if I did so, I would miss the Bears/Panthers game. Later that evening when I realized my error, it was too late. I couldn't back out of the trip for the sole purpose of watching the game. Obviously that would all but ensure a loss. Unless the entire trip was cancelled, I was stuck. I had to go.

So there I was on Friday night. It was nearing 3am and I still hadn't gone to bed. Packing had taken longer than I thought. I was tired, and I had had a ton to drink. I was faced with a tough choice. Stay, claiming a hangover, and watch the Bears lose or go, miss all 4 playoff games and be miserably tired and not into it.

I chose the former, and the Bears responded in kind to my jinx by totally, completely sucking ass. Yeah they scored 21 points, but how many first downs did they get from Carolina penalties? Exactly.

So, City of Chicago, I am sorry for being so selfish. At least we still have the White Sox... unless you're a Cubs fans and then you're just a complete and total loser.

Oh... I almost forgot. Despite my own culpability, Steve Smith can still kiss my ass. What a bastard.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-17  23:47:55

From The Garden to The Jungle.

As some of you probably know by now, I moved downstairs last September from the inarguably nicer third floor to the first, mostly to save money for my eventual unemployment and likely move to L.A. Aside from saving me $220 a month, living downstairs does have other advantages... but it also has some very real disadvantages, aside from being smaller and uglier. As is the general proclivity of the Joteliers, I have itemized some of these in a convenient, easily printable list format. Enjoy.

5 things I like about living downstairs. 

1. A full compliment of hot sauce options - Whether it be Tapatio for pizza, that Asian stuff with the rooster on it for... uh, Asian food, or tabasco sauce for everything, The Jungle has it all. We even have many types of peppers, groud, flaked, and fresh for our edification. In the garden no meal goes unhottened. Compare that to upstairs where a small bottle of tabasco, purchased at Walgreen's, will be emptied within days, causing the purchaser to vow to never buy hot sauce again. I'm pretty sure now everyone has made that vow. sometimes twice. This may seem like a trivial advantage, but for a man who enjoys his hot sauce as much as I, the spicing options are much appreciated.

2. 80% less exposure to salt - both in that Shark now lives two floors away and that The Jungle, to my knowledge, doesn't have any granulated salt, let alone a shaker. We do have two pepper grinders but at the time of this dispatch they are both empty. Real Foods is trying to charge me like, 5 dollars for some more peppercorns and excuse me if I say fuck that. But lowering my sodium intake should be beneficial because salt retains water in your muscles and prevents you from looking really ripped. I learned that from TV.

3. The pantry - It's nice to have a place to store food that you buy. When I lived upstairs I had to hide my canned soups under the sink behind the 409 Orange Power. If you don't want Shark, Reid, or Hip E. to find your food, hide it near the cleaning products. Speaking of...

4. Cleanliness - Despite the fact that five people live downstairs and one of them is Johnny D, the jungle is actually an OCD sufferer's paradise compared to the garden. To be fair, downstairs there's a lot less communal space, which means less for me to clean. No living room, no foyer-like area, no second toilet. If we had all that shit downstairs who knows? But we do keep our over-taxed bathroom clean enough for the less scrupulous girlfriends to lodge nary a complaint. And so far there has not been a "poo outside of the toilet incident" as was all too common in The Garden. It's a little known fact that they call the third floor the garden because you can grow tomato plants in the carpet.

5. Fewer stairs - 55 stairs is a lot when you're walking back from Polker's and have to poo. Downstairs I'm a full 20 seconds and 3-5 kCal closer to the bathroom. However, if that bathroom is occupied, you are screwed in the worst way. It's at those times when you wish you were more like Shark, and had no scruples about defecating in the bath tub.

5 Things I miss about living upstairs

1. The big screen TV - I moved before Reid's boss gave us our sweet 50-something inch TV, great for sporting events and HALO 2

2. The living room - The recliner, the fire place, the occasional game of Mario Golf, the empty beer cans, the favorable lighting, the Rear Window esque rear window. The living room was pretty cool.

3. In-house laundry - I hate Laundromats second only to public buses and Von Dutch hats.

4. Water pressure - the pressure downstairs is dangerously low and patently unsatisfying, It's all the more frustrating considering that my hair is longer now that at any point since my sophomore year of high school. The dribble of water out of what can only in the most technical sense be described as a shower head is powerless to penetrate the oily canopy of my matted, hat-compressed hair to the scalp floor beneath. Man it sucks. It should be noted that the upstairs shower in the boy's bathroom is itself no deluge, but compared to it's counterpart two floors down it seems as a veritable tsunami capable of causing Petra Nemcova to seek shelter atop a coconut palm and wait for two days for the water to recede before she can be rescued and treated for a broken pelvis.

5. The Non-Sub-zero toilet seat - Downstairs is colder in general, which I'm fine with. I have no compunction against tossing on a few extra base layers to be comfortable, but that's not really an option when it comes to sitting down upon the toilet. Every time I go to the bathroom I feel like that one kid in A Christmas Story who touches his tongue to a freezing pole. It's like the salad I just ate is triple dog daring me. Hey, speaking of A Christmas Story, did you know that Peter Billingsley, the kid who plays Ralphie, is now a porn star? I found that out a while back (also from TV) and was going to do a Christmas post about it but I forgot. It's a shame because I had some great "You'll shoot your eye out" jokes. The whole "touch your tongue to that pole" episode is also poised for ridicule. Wash your mouth out with soap? What? Okay I'll stop. Maybe next Christmas. Anyhow, so yeah basically I'm convinced that someone is periodically breaking into out house and dipping the toilet seat in liquid nitrogen. It's insane. I'm seriously considering changing into my ski pants (they have a half-moon zip in the back for back country emergencies) before I brave the sub-arctic micro climate present in our bathroom. That or I'm going to buy one of those carpeted seat covers like grandmas have. Those are pretty sweet.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-16  15:28:29

Remember Hawaii?

I know the statute of limitations has well run out on my trip to Hawaii, but since it's so FUCKING cold in my room right now, I am reminded of the sweet, sweet warmth of beautiful Maui. Here is a nice sunset that I caught on my last day there.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-16  14:03:03

A Conversation, or Reid's inability to poke fun at someone without being insulting vs. Thrill's being overly sensitive to Reid poking fun at him. Let's join the action in medias res

Reid: I like that photo you have of yourself in your room, Will. It's real nice.

Thrill: What photo?

Reid: The one above your desk where you're posing with your hand behind your head.

Thrill: So what? You don't have pictures of yourself in your room?

Reid: Well yeah but I don't have pictures of JUST myself posing for the camera.

Thrill: It was for an art project.

Reid: An art project where all you did was take a picture of yourself?

Thrill: No! My friend Alex took the picture. It was his art project.

Reid: Oh. Well that doesn't mean you have to have the picture up at your desk... in a frame.

Thrill [visibly agitated]: It was gift from Alex. If your friend gives you a gift what are you going to do with it? NOT put it up?

Reid: Okay. Whatever. It's pretty gay though.

-fin- 

See Reid, in the future if you want to make fun of someone, I recommend going about more like this:

Posted by PETE 2006-01-16 13:28:38

Awwwwwww SKEET SKEET SKEET SKEET SKEET SKEET Awwww SKEET SKEET

Skeet Ulrich

Posted by PETE 2006-01-16  12:57:17

Top 11 Movies That Begin With The Word "American"

11. American Splendor - Haven't seen it but I assume it's probably a better film than either American Pie, despite the absence of Shannon Elizabeth and SCTV alums in supporting roles. But I figure if I saw this it might move up as high as 3, so I just threw it on in the 11 spot. I like Paul Giamatti and Hope Davis, who was very memorable as the sympathetic, yet impotent Parisian ticket agent in Home Alone. And the synopsis seems pretty good. Maybe I can convince Johnny D to buy it because it includes drawing.


10. American Psycho - The reason I had to make this list 11 is that I just couldn't leave this movie off in good conscience. Just the business card scene alone is worth the price of admission. Great cast, great dialogue, giant cell phones, what's not to like? Oh yeah... the fucking ending.

9. American Buffalo - David Mamet plus Dustin Hoffman and Dennis Franz is more than adequate to secure the 9 spot. I wish he had named Glengarry Glenn Ross AMERICAN Glengarry Glen Ross though. Man that is a sweet movie.

8. American Pimp - Immensely entertaining documentary by the Hughes Brothers that just confirms what you always suspected: gators are the most hideous shoes ever. Far superior to the HBO doc Pimps Up, Hos Down, which is more of a "Look how ridiculous these motherfuckers are" type movie, American Pimp is all about depicting the true, multi-faceted pimp ethos. One of my favorite movies to recommend to people because it makes me look cool. I would love to lend it out IF CIMI AHLUWALIA WOULD PLEASE RETURN MY VHS COPY THAT SHE'S HAD FOR TWO YEARS along with my copy of CB4.

7. American Graffiti - Richard Dreyfuss, how far you've fallen.

6. American Gigolo - Deuce Bigalow is a fish tank cleaner until he gets a temporary job watching over a gigolo's house. But when Deuce accidentally wrecks the house, he is forced to compensate by becoming a gigolo himself! Eddie Griffin shines in his role as T.J. Hicks, the man pimp. The sequel, European Gigolo, is worse than Saw.

5. American Me - The second greatest Latino prison gang movie of all time, behind Blood In, Blood Out.

4. American Beauty - It's fashionable right now to say that you never really thought this movie was good. I think it's awesome. Just because Mena Suvari turned out to be a psycho in real life doesn't give you free liscence to hate on AB. Spacey: Great Benning: Incredible. Birch: Naked. Chris Cooper: best closet homosexual since Carl Weathers in Predator. It passes the Shawshank Test with flying colors.*

3. American History X - Could this movie have even been made without Faruza Balk? Also good in this is that fat guy from Mallrats (and BLOW) who can't see the Magic Eye pictures. He made a great nazi.

2. American Ninja - Considering I could've made a list called Top Eleven Movies That Begin With The Words "American Ninja", it's fitting that American Ninja number one is number two. Michael Dudikoff has it all, the moves of Jean-Claude Van Damme, the looks of J.D. Roth, and the comic timing of a young Breckin Meyer. No movie will ever make you want to kick and punch imaginary bad guys in your living room worse than American Ninja. It is THE quintessential cheesy action movie of the 80s. If you need any more incentive to Netflix it, it's produced by the same guys who gave us the Iron Eagle series.

1. American Movie - Funniest documentary ever made. I quote this movie like Thrill quotes Zoolander, and the best part is since nobody has seen it, most people think it's ME who's funny. Now you know my secret. You know what? You know what? Weak.


One thing I noticed while making this list is that -  in general - movies that begin with the word "American" are good. American Pie and American Yakuza could both have easily made the list, and I didn't even have to cheat by including movies that begin with "An American" like "An Americal Tail", starring Feivel the mouse, and "An American Werewolf In Paris" starring Rita Crosby. I think this just proves the point that America is the best, and our God is the one true God.

Stay tuned next week for my Top 1 movies starting with the word "Canadian"...

*The Shawkshank Test refers to the repeated rewatching of a movie until you start to notice glaring flaws that make the movie unenjoyable. If you can watch it more than 10 times with a negligible reduction in pleasure, it passes.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-13 14:58:14

Richard Pryor

Watched the DVD last night at Linda's.  Still the King of the "white people go like this ....  but a black guy be goin' like this ...." format of comedy.  Also does incredible animal impressions.

Posted by Hip E.  2006-01-11  08:36:19

ROSE Bowl

The last game of the year was the best game of the year... how often does that happen? I was rooting for Texas because I don't like either team but Texas was the underdog and I always root for the underdog. I guess according to Hip E. and Shark I was supposed to be rooting for USC because a win by them would "help the Pac-10" gain respectability.  But you know what? The Pac-10 had a plenty respectable showing, coming short of winning by literally a matter of inches, but they still lost so really for me it was the best of both worlds. Yes I remember Texas last year and how Mack Brown's whining and (more than likely) back door dealings with other Big 12 coaches unfairly kept Cal out of the BCS. But I ALSO remember going down to USC for the Cal-USC game and how the USC fan were the absolute biggest assholes I've ever encountered. According to the screaming, everyone from Berkeley was either a hippie, and faggot, or some combination thereof.

FUCK YOU YOU STUPID HIPPIES! YOU FUCKING STINK! TOO BAD ALL YOUR GIRLS AT BERKELEY ARE SO FUCKING UGLY YOU WISH YOU WENT TO USC BECAUSE WE"RE ALL HOT! BUT EVEN IF YOU DID GO HERE YOU COULDN'T GET LAID BECAUSE YOU FUCKING SMELL AND YOU VOTED FOR GORE SO WHY DON'T YOU JUST GO BACK TO SAN FRANCISCO AND POUND SOME DUDES IN THE ASS!! YOU FAG! YOU FUCKING FAGS!

And that was just the girls. The dudes would throw bottles at us. It was ridiculous. It still pisses me off thinking about it. So as much as I hate Texas I have Vince Young to thank for my good night's sleep last night, secure in the knowledge that all those dicks were ruining the leather in their Lexuses with sweet, sweet tears.

Icing on the cake: for a school that lashes out with so many homophobic bromides, it's nice to know that they just got fucked in the ass by these guys:

Posted by PETE 2006-01-05  23:43:28

Cimi's Love Jams for Lovers.

Cimi, my friend from work who is way too cool to for school of any type took over her friend's radio show Tuesday night and busted out two hours of the hottest love jams ever. Conspicuously missing was Between The Sheets by the Isley Brothers, and I'm pretty sure there was no Al Green or Teddy P. or Luther but there was When A Woman's Fed Up by R. Kelly and some Jodeci. Plus according to her she's supposed to get her own show so I suppose there'll be time to account for her glaring oversights. I mean, you can only cram some many jams into 120 minutes. If you're bored at work and want to give it a listen the link is here . I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by her last song too.

As long as I'm on the subject, SF Jo-Tel fans should check out www.westaddradio.com . There's lots of good listening on there. 93.7 on your FM dial. Holla.

Posted by PETE 2006-01-05  23:11:16

PETE's Personal Ad.

When discussing interest in members of the opposite sex, both men and women like to talk about "their type". I only date brunettes. I only date guys over 6 feet. I like big butts and I cannot lie...

Personally I think the whole concept of types is misguided and self-defeating. It's hard enough for most people to find quality relationships without preemptively cutting out large portions of the dating pool from even being considered. It just doesn't make any sense to base someone's worth as a partner on overt physical traits.

That's why I always try to keep an open mind when it comes to dating. Yup. I don't let myself become bogged down by any superficial "types". What I look for in a woman really cuts right to the core of the question: can I spend the rest of my life, or at least the next few weeks with this person: Good water pressure in the shower at their apartment.

You see, I just recently moved and generally the first thing I check when looking for a new place is the water pressure in the shower, but in this case I couldn't pass up the deal so I had to make some sacrifices, water pressure being one of them. But I wasn't really prepared for the giant hole in my life that would result.

Can you fill that hole? Does your shower blast the fuck out of you? Would taking a shower at you place be considered an aerobic workout? Do you have to stand in front of it at all times because if you move out of the way it will hit the opposite wall with so much force that water will spray all over your bathroom, soaking your towels and rug? If so then I think we could really have something special between us. In fact, as you read this I can tell you - and this is from the heart - that my feelings are very strong for you.

What's that? Multiple shower heads you say? A removable massage handle? A cascade feature for rinsing one's hair? Pinpoint temperature control? You vixen! You temptress! Why do you toy with my emotions in such a cruel fashion? You must let me take you out to dinner! I can't stand to be apart from you  much longer.

Afterwards maybe we can go back to your place and I can use your bathroom.

Doesn't that sound romantic?

Posted by PETE 2006-01-05  22:12:11

Happy New Year!

Me, PETE, Linda, Shark, Patsy, Gabe, Becky, Rachel and Andrea had a nice dinner including two kinds of bread, two salads, my patented spaghetti sauce (patent pending), spaghetti, pre-made warm-it-yourself lasagna, and stuff.  Then we got loaded and then there was a power outage at about 12:30, which was awesome.  Later we went to the bar where Raph works and had some beers, but there were a bunch of douchebags there so we came back.  On the way we found a christmas tree on the sidewalk so Shark and I carried it over our heads back to the Jo-tel singing the first verse of "O Christmas Tree" over and over, along with other traditional wassails.  Then much later, these dudes came over and apparently ate all our fucking leftovers that I was extremely excited to eat today.  Also they were lame.  But other than that it was a pretty awesome New Years Eve.  I start work on Tuesday.

P:  "We paid twelve dollars for this sheet of lasagna, and we're going to eat it!"

H:  "You paid twelve dollars for this sheet?!?!?"

Posted by Hip E.  2006-01-0119:37:46