Bob Theory

Sunday, October 14th, 2007

Well, now… I found this oldie but (questionable) goody from yon days of early high school. Do you recall those youthful days of seven hour periods (the class kind, not the flowing variety) when you and your peers started branching out from more sanctioned, conventional comedy and trying your hands at the surreal and unexpected? To some, this meant discovering Monty Python or Tom Robbins; to others, it meant trying to be funny, which often lead to not being funny at all. But, you tried, and that’s what’s important. Or, that’s what’s important in today’s post because I feel sympathy for my young self–who never foresaw the Internet, or that his attempt at humor would be seen by such a wide audience.

I don’t exactly recall what prompted The Bob Theory, but I do know that its origins are tethered to a middle school discussion where Brian Knarr and I were musing over the name “Bob”. (This was many years and numerous beers before we discovered J.R. “Bob” Dobbs.) No one, we figured out, would ever be afraid of a monster by the name “Bob”.

“Look out! Rampaging down the street, it’s… Bob?”

See? Wouldn’t work. You can’t be scared of Bob. You can be frightened by a Robert who tries to pretend to be a Bob, but we all know the truth in the end. Monsters are Roberts, not Bobs.

Brian eventually moved away, but not before the name weighed anchor in my hormone-laden adolescent mind. So, a few years later, caught up in a fit of attempted high school humor, I rushed to the Apple IIgs lab and dashed off the following masterpiece:

The Bob Theory

Rules for BOB:

1. Bob is everything.
2. 1 + 1 = Bob.
3. Bob hates all gifted people, but they equal Bob, anyway.
4. Skip created Bob, therefore Skip is the Creator.
5. Skip = Bob
6. Bob never = Skip
7. Always spell Bob backwards.
8. Bob is always right.
9. When Bob is wrong, see Rule #8.
10. Bob expects presents on his birthday, which is every day. (Caretaker of presents = Skip.)
11. Bob does not like you.
12. Bob loves you.
13. George is Bob’s second-in-command.
14. George is a phone.
15. Bob disproves the Zebra Theory; Bob is the Zebra.
16. Disciples of Bob play the plastic harmonica.
17. You are all disciples of Bob.
18. Bob claims Welsh is the language of the future. If you disagree, see Rule #8.
19. Bob can make up new rules whenever he pleases.
20. Bob syas that J.F.K. was killed by a magic bullet sent by the Wicked Witch of the West.
21. Bob proves that chemistry does not exist; instead, everything is made up of tiny particles of Bobectrons, Bobtons, and NuetrBobs.
22. Dragons and unicorns are real.
23. Bob is better looking than Axl Rose.
(See Rule #24 under #28.)
25. Bob is Jeannie’s boyfriend, therefore Bob does not exist.
26. Only Skip and Kyla can make up Bob Rules (with Skip as the final authority).
27. People against Bob are communist spies.
28. Chris Lytle is the only person who can equal Bob, but Bob cannot equal him unless Chris chooses so. Chris is a non-Bob Bobber.
24. If you have any questions, refer to Rule #1.

F.A.Q.s

  • Who was George?
  • George was a phone. (Duh.) George, was the first phone I ever truly owned; it was given to me along with my first private phone line. One fateful day my step-father, angry for some reason long since forgotten, grabbed George and threw him down two stories and onto our marble entryway. George, alas, didn’t survive. Thereafter, he was known as “Drop Dead Fred”.
  • What was the Zebra Theory?
  • Aww, geez. I don’t know, exactly. At least, I don’t have the details in memory. I do recall, however, that the Zebra Theory was a competing theory created because mine wasn’t entirely funny. Was it funnier? Probably. I hope whomever created the Zebra Theory burns in hell.
  • Plastic harmonica?
  • Dude, I owned one. Probably got it out of a Happy Meal, and it was the first thing I thought of when I was trying to persuade Bob to play an instrument. I own numerous harmonicas now, by the way, and some of them are even real.
  • Welsh?
  • Yeah, Welsh. I never did get beyond some basic phrases: Mae fy hofrenfad yn llawn o lyswennod. (“My hovercraft is full of eels.” It’s very useful if you’re ever running about Wales in a hovercraft and get attacked by a roving band of eels. Study up on your foreign languages, kids.)
  • Axl Rose? What’s an Axl Rose?
  • People have been asking that question for years. He couldn’t sing, couldn’t dance, and couldn’t help but be swamped by hordes of gorgeous young women who wanted to give him booty and booty. At any rate, some young female acquaintance of mine must have made a positive comment concerning Axl’s heroin-chic looks and thus cemented his place in the theory.
  • Rule #24.
  • Rule #24 must have been where the theory originally ended, but I believe I was cajoled into adding more rules. Rule #24 remained the last rule, though, no matter the number of edits.
  • Did Jeannie ever find a boyfriend?
  • Of course. Bob exists.
  • Who’s this Kyla chick?
  • Best friend of one of my girlfriends.  So, when she told me to add her as an authority, why, I did such a thing. What can I say? I’ve always been weak.

I’m leaving Chris Lytle’s full name in this entry. Maybe, one day, bored at work, he’ll whip up a quick Google vanity search and run across this page. In that case, “Hi, Chris!”

My Gott, we were such goobers back then.

Hot Fuzz

Friday, October 5th, 2007

I love the Internet. After you get home, there’s so much you can do to relieve yourself from the doldrums the work day relentlessly breeds. (The mundane, I swear, it multiplies like it’s a coupla Catholic bunnies.) From the many hours of my life sacrificed at the altar of our newest god, YouTube; to the burgeoning days of HotOrNot.com where I spent, oh, an every now and then looking for old girlfriends so I could rate them “hot” (I’ve got a reputation to protect, don’t ya’ know); to the social networking sites of Facebook.com and MySpace.com where I get to point and laugh at a number of people I randomly happen across… and who’re probably laughing just as loudly as they look upon my antics; the Internet certainly cheers me up throughout the day.

My favorite site for this day, however, is not a comic, nor a movie trailer site, nor even an opportunity to kill some zombies (hint: go for the knees).

Today’s fun site is Cops Writing Cops.

I admit it, I’m a sucker for some of the drama out there in Internet Land. Even if the drama is entirely manufactured and magically pulled from the rabbit’s furry butt, it amuses me. In this case, it amuses me a bunch. Here we seem to have a site dedicated to police officers complaining about other officers because they, the writers, received traffic tickets from their blue-shirted bruthas. They detail badge numbers, departments, where they got busted, and when available, first and last names of the ticket-writing coppers.

Oh, John Law. You funny.

The rest of us civilians complain often and loudly when we get tickets. Whether we’re guilty as hell, or the ticket was given in error (me, I’ve always been guilty of speeding, but I make allowances for you angels out there), we reserve our right to gripe, whine, moan and grumble. Schadenfreude in cases like ours can be dull and as tasteless as brussels sprouts because, hey, tickets happen to most everyone and even Turkish Delight becomes commonplace after too many helpings.

In the case of Cops Writing Cops, however, it’s a delicious feast.

Mind you, not because of any special dislike of the police. No, it’s because the level of entitlement in these stories is turned up to 11. Perhaps the one comment that sums the whole site up for me is:

“Please someone explain this mentality to me. No matter how much I try I just don’t understand why a brother officer feels so compelled to write another officer a ticket. I can’t see any other explanation other than the fact that he is simply a DICK.”

Really? Not even if you tried really, really hard? Not even then would you think about how breaking the law is sometimes tailed by actual consequences? Not even when you consider that a blanket allowance of letting other officers out of tickets is a shining example of corruption?

Still, that’s not even the worst (just the majority of complaints); the extra, super-special unbelieveable complaints are the ones where the writers talk about how their spouses and kids aren’t being given a pass—even if they go the extra mile and offer to let the ticketing officer to talk to their Keystone relative on a cell phone.

Heh.

I wish I were an officer; I’d submit my own story:

I was traveling westbound on I-66 on Sunday going 5 in a 55. In a seat beside me were a bloodied butcher’s knife and a puppy I like to kick; in the backseat were a bomb (conveniently labeled “Bomb!”), a preserve jar filled with ominous feeling, Satan, Thomas Beckett, that loving feeling someone lost, and the 1999 version of Napster, back when it was an evil, evil file sharing program.

And, wouldn’t you believe it? A state patrol cruiser flashed its lights for me to pull over! I was tempted to push my Ford Pinto (orange and white) up to 10 and make a break for it, but I figured, nah, I’m an officer of the law; I’ll be thrilled to chat with my fellow copper, receive a chastisement, pretend to learn my lesson, and go on my merry way.

After we safely settled in the grassy median (I can park there when being pulled over; I have a badge, and it’s shiny), the officer got out of his car, mosied on over, and knocked on my window. “License and registration, please,” he said.

“Sure. Here you go officer. Also, here’s my department badge, Fraternal Order of Police certificate, ‘I’m a cop! Truly!’ bumper sticker, and my penis. It’s detachable.”

The trooper peered inside my car. “Is that Satan?” he asked, and glanced at The Evil One.

“Yes. A few beers, a midnight ritual, blood of my neighbor’s cat, this is what happens.”

“And have you been kicking that puppy?”

“Every hour on the hour!”

“Hold on. I’ll be right back.”

Awesome, I thought. He’ll probably come back with a beer for me. Or, maybe even a pretty girl in fishnet stockings who’s been very, very naughty. I like being a cop.

But, no! The bastard came back with a ticket. A ticket! For driving too slow. A ticket! The fucker! “Wait one second!” I yelled at him. “I’m an officer of the goddamn law! Where’s the courtesy, the respect, the fraternal—and completely platonic—love for another dude of the blue?”

He shrugged. “Look, I ignored 1999 Napster. That should be enough. Have a nice day.”

Yeah, yeah, right. Nice day my ass, Officer O’Malley O’Brian, badge #3422556Bc1$. You just wait until I get home to blog about this. You’ll rue, my friend, you’ll rue this muthafuggin’ day!

Hmm… perhaps I should post it over there, anyway. It certainly couldn’t be any less jaw-droppingly astounding than some of the other stories. Plus, who knows, maybe I’ll impress enough people that someone will offer to send me a junior policeman badge.

That’d rock.

Rushing Headlong

Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007

Based solely on the latest set of sonograms given to us at our last doctor’s appointment, Wiggy has transformed from a vague brine-looking sea monkey, and into an actual vague person-looking thingy:

Wiggy's Head!

See that nose? Adorable, isn’t it? Wiggy gets it from her ma, the Insta-Princess.

Now, I’m not saying my own schnoz is lacking in the looks department, but on the whole, if I had to compare the two, my vote goes toward the Insta-Princess’s nose as being the cutest. Mine’s a more rugged look, closer in description to aquiline than button. (The phrase “cute as a button” always reminds me of Button-Bright, the curly-headed wanderer from The Road to Oz. His real name, by the way, is Saladin Paracelsus de Lambertine Evagne von Smith. And, yes, I did suggest that as a final name for Wiggy, but my suggestion was turned down. Although, not so much turned down, mind you, as laughed out of the room… taking me along with it.)

Wiggy, sensing an audience, yawned while we were taking a black-and-white peek. Cutest damn thing, evah. We’re pretty sure it was a yawn; it looked like a yawn, and the doctor didn’t disabuse us of that notion, so we’re going to stick with it being a yawn. For all we know it could have been a fart, rerouted through Wiggy’s esophagus due to the lack of a fully-formed butt.

So, yeah, a yawn.

Gee, that’s all. I thought I had a lot more to say, but breaking into a bottle of wine and stealing all of its goods last night didn’t quite put the spring into my step this morning. It was made worse, even, because I had to go it alone thanks to Wiggy’s upcoming arrival.

But I updated The Blog, and by golly, that’s important.