Romantic Vacation Cancelled: Instead, IHOP

My girlfriend had been talking about taking a mini vacation. The plan was to walk across the George Washington Bride to spend a nice weekend at the Fort Lee Hilton (now Doubletree). They have good restaurants, a fitness center, heated indoor pool, a nice lounge, excellent mattresses, etc. Oh, and a bar. Very important.

While discussing our vacation, the vacation in which the destination is less than a mile from my apartment, an IHOP commercial came on TV. This excited my girlfriend to no end. She asked me to search the intertubes to find the nearest IHOP to the hotel, so we could go there for breakfast on our vacation in New Jersey. My girlfriend loves IHOP. Also, continental breakfast sucks.

I went to the IHOP online locater and plugged in my zip code. As I mentioned, the hotel is less than a mile from my house, even though it’s in another state, so my zip code is sufficient for finding said IHOP.

I looked at the first couple of listings. I blinked a couple times. I looked closer.

“Hey, babe? This intertube says that there is an IHOP in Manhattan. Even better, it’s at 135th & Broadway!”

“Don’t play with me. You know how I feel about IHOP.”

“No, seriously. The phone number is right here. I’ll call and confirm.”

I call. (ring, ring)

I confirm. (fist pump)

Girlfriend: “Well, fuck the Hilton! Let’s just go to IHOP Saturday morning!”

Me: “I love you.”

Class Distinction

Sunday afternoon, I went to the deli to grab some Gatorade. I was in a wicked bad mood after having just received a phone call informing me that I had been fired from my job because of this blog. There was a guy behind me in line at the deli who was dressed in all white and carrying a white boom-box on his shoulder. Said boom-box was emitting the sort of sonic catastrophe reminiscent of one of your old friends that thinks they’re a DJ and sends you a weekly e-mail about where they’ll be “performing”. This guy was buying a quart of milk. That’s it. I’m not shitting you. Picture it.

Being that he was directly behind me in line at the deli, he checked out a couple seconds after me and followed closely behind me as I left the store, his quart of milk in tow, no bag. Upon following me out of the store he cranked up the volume on his boom-box to the redline, ensuring that I could enjoy his music just as much as he did.

The usual Washington Heights hubbubin`s were in full swing. People hanging out on the stoops, hanging out on the corner, hanging from the fire escapes with one arm while gripping a bottle of Corinita in the other, congregating in completely illogical places as to disrupt the flow of foot traffic as much possible, seemingly on purpose.

The fruity guy with the stupid white clothes, quart of milk, crappy music and desperate need for attention was still following, basically breathing down my neck.

I’d had it.

I was wearing dark sunglasses so I did the “fake-look-over-my-shoulder-into-the-distance-when-I’m-actually-looking- you-square-in-the-face-to-get-a-read-on-you-because-you’re-following-so- close-that-you’re-kinda-freaking-me-out-and-pissing-me-off-at-the-same- time” thing. You know what I’m talkin’ ‘bout.

That’s when I saw that he had those stupid white contact lenses on his eyeballs. I almost threw up in sheer disgust of his gimmickry.

“I have a pair of earphones that I’m not using, do you want them?” I asked.

“WHAT?” he screamed over his music.

Everything fell deafly quiet as I took the liberty of hitting the ‘pause’ button on his boom-box and shouted as loud as I could,

“I HAVE A PAIR OF EARPHONES THAT I’M NOT USING, DO YOU WANT THEM!?”

He stood with me face-to-face and stared at me, shocked, for about four seconds. That’s four seconds in real time, people.

One-one-thousand.

Two-one-thousand.

Three-one-thousand.

Four-one-thousand.

He flipped me off and walked away. Simple as that.

I think it made us both feel better.

Movin’ On Up

Like Gershwin, things are looking up.

There is an old-time gambling legend that lives in Texas, a man named Amarillo Slim. Amarillo Slim used to brag that he was so famous that you could send a letter from anywhere in the country addressed only to “Amarillo Slim in Texas” and the letter would find him. Tall tale? Maybe not.

In my never ending quest for global domination, I have taken a huge step. According to Google, I am the most relevant and/or important person named “Ryan” in all of Washington Heights, NYC.

Don’t believe me?

Google search: ryan in washington heights

Yeah, that’s right. You found me.

Numero uno, bitches!

Also just as exciting, I am now the top result for Google search: pissed and petty. I know you’re thinking that that should have happened a long time ago, but Tom Petty wasn’t giving up the top spot easily.

Also, readers, you may want to run a google search for: Pat Kachura

Yep, number one again(and two)! Poor Pat. Poor, poor Pat. It can’t feel good knowing that if anyone ever runs a search on you, my rantings are the first things they’re going to see. Ouch!

I have now thoroughly owned Ice-T, Washington Heights, Tom Petty, and Pat Katchura just to name a few.

Ahhhh, being bad feels goooood.

Happy Holidays

“Twas the week before Christmas when all through the house,
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”

… because I smashed that bitch with my shoe right on the counter top and put it straight through the garbage disposal just to send a message to all his other mouse buddies who might have the gall to sit right in front of my face and eat out of the grease trap of my George Foreman Grill while there’s a salmon steak cooking on it and I’m trying to finely chop garlic two inches away on that same counter top.

“Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night.”

No, assholes. NOW it’s personal!

Another tale from Washington Heights, NYC (the land of no-speak-y-english):

My neighborhood in NYC is populated about 99% by varying degrees of immigrants from The Dominican Republic. I love my neighborhood, but I would be lying if I said that the folks in my neighborhood didn’t occasionally make me want to pull my hair out.

As I jumped in the shower this morning I realized I was running dangerously low on soap, shampoo, conditioner, and whatnot. I made due with what little I had left. Meaning, I popped the tops off of all the bottles and filled them part way with water as to dilute each substance to get a little extra mileage, you know the drill.

After my shower, I decided to head over to Rite-Aid and restock on shower supplies. I like going to Rite-Aid in my neighborhood because they are a national chain and therefore usually manage to hire employees who are not complete retards. (I know this sounds counterintuitive but trust me, in my neighborhood, when compared to their privately owned contemporaries, Rite-Aid employees come off like NASA engineers).

I ran around the store for about half an hour collecting all my items in my little basket. As I was laying everything on the checkout counter I noticed an Adidas box-set way up high behind the counter. It had body wash, deodorant, aftershave, and a little bottle of Adidas cologne. I had just collected nearly all Adidas products one-by-one around the store. I figured I could just get the box-set and save a little money. I ask the woman at the check-out counter, “How much is that Adidas Sports Package?”

The woman turns her back and looks up at the display case. I don’t think I ever saw her look directly at the product I wanted, but regardless, she turns around and says, “nine-nine-nine”.

Not, “nine-ninety-nine”, mind you. No. Just, “nine-nine-nine”.

I figure she means “$9.99” because all the products separately would come to around “$16.00” and that would be a reasonable savings.

“Cool! I’m going to go put all this stuff back and just get that box-set instead. I’ll be right back.”

I ran around the store and put all the items back on the shelves exactly where I got them. I got in the back of the line and waited to check-out again. I figured someone would have taken the time while I was putting everything back to get my Adidas Sports Package down from the top shelf behind the check-out counter, and it would be waiting there for me. Of course not. That would have been far too logical.

Instead, when I got back to the register the cashier looked at me like she’d never seen me before. This is particularly ridiculous because aside from the fact that I shop there all the time, there isn’t another long-haired-white-dude besides myself within fucking miles of this place. Anyway, I decided to hold back my rage because I was certain that someone would give me better reason to unload, shortly.

The cashier continued to stand there with this confused “Can I help you?” look on her face.

A special note to readers: I hate when people have confused looks on their faces when they should be crystal clear as to what is going on. Seriously, it makes me want to start throwing things just so they’ll change their expression from confused to terrified, at least. Call me petty.

I looked back at her with a look of utter disbelief and said,

“Uh, yeah. Didn’t we just go over this two minutes ago?”
>
She still looked confused. I hate that.

I then gestured wildly up to the top shelf behind the check-out counter and said uber-curtly, “Can you get than down for me so I can buy it, please?!” The woman then looked over to her male co-worker who then walked over and asked me what he could help me with.

I grit my teeth and tell the man what I want. He nods knowingly and quickly runs to the back of the store. I assume he’s retrieving a ladder or something.

So I wait, and wait.

Finally he comes back with a step ladder and asks, “Ok, what do you need again, boss?”

Please tell me he didn’t just ask me again.

Oh. My. God.

Through my blinding rage, instead of smashing him, I somehow managed to make a joke that went directly over his head, of course.

“No man, not BOSS, ADIDAS!!!”

He gets up on his ladder and takes down an Axe Body Spray box-set and hands it down to the cashier, and she rings it up. I am now in complete and utter fucking disbelief. Fuse now burning dangerously short.

“No man! ADIDAS! ADIDAS! It’s right there! That big ass box that has “ADIDAS” written all the fuck over it! ADIDAS! Jesus!”

He looks back up at the display case still standing on his ladder and grabbed a really girly-like bath oil package. They oils were in a straw basket filled with hay or some shit.I gave him the benefit of the doubt and thought maybe he was moving the girly-like package so he could reach my package… although this didn’t really make sense because it wasn’t in the way.

But no. He handed the cashier the girly-like package and she rang it up.

I totally lost it.

“DUDE, JUST LOOK AT YOUR FUCKING SHOES, MAN!”

The idiot on the ladder looks down at his shoes, reads the emblem embroidered on the tongue and says,

“Oh! Adidas!”

I wanted to kick that ladder right out from under him.

Come the fuck on, people.

*After “OK”, “Coke” and “Marlboro”, surely “Adidas” is pretty high up on the list of most internationally recongnized words. Fuckin’ seriously, man. Damn.

The Ties That Bind

For some reason I woke up wicked early this morning and couldn’t go back to sleep.

It’s Saturday and I woke up bright eyed at 7:30am.

Unacceptable.

I went into the kitchen to retrieve my lighter that I had left on the stove the night before so I could smoke my good morning cigarette.

I heard the TV on in the living room and realized my roommate(whom I have had a couple problems with) was already awake too.

I poked my head in and the following conversation commenced.

Me: “Hey man, what are you doing up this early?”

Roommate: “I don’t know. I just woke up and I couldn’t go back to sleep.”

Me: “Weird, me too. Hey, I’m going downstairs to grab a sixer. You want anything?”

Roommate:(laughing) “So, you’re just going to drink yourself back to sleep?”

Me: “Exactly. Why, is that weird?”

Roommate: “I’ll take Corona.”

I Always Miss the Good Stuff

How does this happen? I don’t get it.

I spent the first 19 years of my life in a part of the Midwest called Tornado Alley. Tornadoes are a dime a fucking dozen down there. I never actually saw one though. Several tornadoes a year for nearly twenty years and I never ever got to see one, as they never came within fifty miles of my house, which I guess is a good thing, but still… When I left that region of the country to come to NY, I also left my hopes of ever seeing a tornado in person.

I turned on the news today and saw that there was a fucking waterspout (tornado over water) in the Hudson River! I basically live on the bank of the Hudson River, and I didn’t see it. Are you telling me that I could have just walked outside and seen a fucking tornado on the Hudson River? You have to be fucking kidding me. How do I always miss this shit?

When the big head-butt of the World Cup final game went down, I was in the bathroom.

Immigration problem? Gee, I haven’t noticed.

My air mattress sprung a big ass leak last night.

I live in a primarily Dominican neighborhood in NYC and I am, on many levels, your average American white guy who speaks very little Spanish.

That being said:

I walked into a hardware store in my neighborhood today and was greeted by a pleasent and eager fellow.

Fellow: Que pasa, boss?

Me: I need an adhesive patch.

Fellow: Que?

Me: I’m looking for an adhesive patch. I have an air mattress and it has a hole in it. I need to fix it. Like, something you’d fix a bike tire with. Do you have something like that?

Fellow: Si, si, no problemo, amigo!

The gentleman disappeared into the back of the store, came out a few seconds later and met me at the cash register.

He handed me a plastic bag containing an electical powerstrip, smiled and asked,

“Es eso?” (Will that be all?)

I gave him a look that probably read something like…

–I mean you can’t be serious, dude. What part of “adhesive patch” sounds like “three-prong/eight-outlet AC adapter”? I’m a fairly tolerant individual, but this is fucking ridiculous.–

After my eyes burned a hole through this poor sap’s soul, he called for an English speaking manager.

The manager comes over, greets me and asks,

Manager: “What can I do for you?”

Me: “Hello, I need an adhesive patch to fix my air mattress.”

The manager turns to the fellow I originally spoke with and says,

Manager to fellow: “Tenemos un patcho?” (Do we have a patch?)

Fellow: “Oh! UN PATCHO!”

Yes, you idiot. Try to get your brain to think outside of that tiny box. Take off the “o” and we’re talking about the same thing, genius.

I mean, what the hell is going on here? Let’s just suppose that for some reason I took a job in a hardware store in The Dominican Republic, okay? Let’s also suppose that I speak relatively no Spanish.

If a native approached me in the store and asked for “un patcho”, I would know that the customer wanted “a patch” of some sort. How would I know this? Because I’m not retarded.

I can almost understand being served the chicken soup instead of the chicken sandwich which I actually ordered, but c’mon.
(sigh)