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Logan’s 38 / What you pay for being alright

Logan LoJust check’n if all my hair’s still there.

Joe: Did they hurt you in there, Mitchel?
Mitchel: Not so you’d notice.
Joe: They hurt me in there, Mitchel.
Mitchel: I know they did, Joe. It’s all right now. Here. (gives him money)
Joe: You don’t have to do that.
Mitchel: Yes, I do. It’s a tax you pay for being alright.

London Boulevard (film)

You know you’re old when you fondly remeber being 30.

Started this blog five years ago because of my breakup. Then it somehow morphed into my admittedly peculiar dating life punctuated with some really cool highs and some awful, awful lows. Now I’m just a boring married guy.

But at some point in the future, there’ll be more really cool highs and some more awful lows. It’s all about waiting for the next high, I suppose.

I’ll take the awful lows, though – as best one can. And I’ll try to do my own little bit to contribute something to world. It’s all parta the same thing anyway.

Think the above quote’s spot on, paying back to the aether’s the tax you pay for being alright. Isn’t that what a tax is? It’s what you pay to be alright.

I’m alright right now, and feel the need to pay a little more this year. Duuno what that is but I’m looking.

Having said that, you know the drill. Wish me a happy birthday and say something, all of you bastards that read me but never say anything.

Location: home, listening to the rain outside
Mood: hopeful
Music: One girl, one boy, Some grief, some joy
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15 Things Every Man Should Know

Things a guy needs to know to be a man

Me: Do we have any crazy glue?
Her: I think so, why?
Me: Sliced open my finger.
Her: Do you need stitches?!
Me: That’s what the crazy glue’s for.

My boss recently commented that, cause I don’t watch or play any sports, I’m missing something in the manhood realm. Thought that was pretty funny. Cause I got my own lista of what a man should know/be able to do and sports’s nowhere in it. Suppose we all do.

Here’s mine in no particular order – a man has to be able to:

  1. Cook something.
    • At least one thing very well without consulting a recipe. For me it’s chili – it can be any type of food but you gotta know it well.
  2. Tell a story well
    • Can pretty much assure you, it’s the difference between a good night or a great night. Basic rule: if it adds nuthin to the story, leave it out. Eg, if you mention that he’s wearing a white paisley belt, it’d better be crucial to the story. You have to be funny and engaging enough so that a girlie touches you on your shoulder or arm three times in a row. BTW, if that happens, you must kiss her. Unless you’re married or otherwise involved, at which point you smile and politely leave.
  3. Throw a punch and take a punch
    • I like the good old fashioned cross, but that’s just me. You gotta know how to throw it, pull it back, and throw it again. As for taking it, try not to do it often. Ducking’s a good secondary skill to possess. As a corollary, if you’re defending your pride and have a mortgage, a wife, or a kid, walk away. If you’re defending the cause of your mortgage, your wife, or your kid, keep moving forward.
  4. Do 50 push-ups
    • If you can’t, you’re an old man. The thing is, most fellas don’t have to be old men for a while.
  5. Know that what people think of him is none of his business
  6. Be loyal
  7. Know how to keep a secret
    • This is important. If you’re known as a guy that can be discreet, you will make more money and have more respect than the guy that can’t. Plain and simple.
  8. Use the right tools for the job
    • Traditional: Hammer, screwdriver, wrench (monkey, adjustable, and combo), etc.
    • Modern: Google operators, Ping, POP/IMAP, etc.
  9. Quote something that actually means something to him
  10. Have some female friends and not try to bang them.
  11. Know that his parents did they best they could
    • Or didn’t, whatever, you’re a man, let it go. They were probably kids when they had you and had no idea what they were doing.
    • Extra credit if you realize you were no prize either.
  12. Know when to use F__ and when not to use it
    • It’s like salt, a little goes a long way and too mucha it ruins a lotta hard work.
  13. Give and take a compliment
    • For the former: The occasional and honest Nice XXX with a quick nod works wonders.
    • For the latter: Yeah? Thanks, is appropriate for just about everything.
  14. Control the fear
    • It’s always there. If you’re not afraid, you’re nuts, stupid, or grossly underestimating the gravity of a given situation. Unclench your fists, breathe in deeply through your nose, out through the mouth – imagine you’re filling up your lungs from the bottom up, like a glass of water. Then think. Quickly.
  15. Stop bleeding
    • Minor wounds – pressure, hydrogen peroxide, crazy glue or bandages with lotsa changes.
    • Major wounds – pressure, call a professional, more pressure
    • Also, studies have shown, saying positive things to a gravely injured person increases their chance of survival. No, don’t have a quote, wish I did.

There are more things one should know how to do but aren’t specific to men, maybe people in general. That’s for some other time.

A Great Online Dating ProfileIf you liked this entry, I recently wrote an April 2014 book on how to write  A Great Online Dating Profile with 30 tips to get noticed and get more responses – it’s just $0.99 at Amazon, BN.com, and the Apple Store, as well as most other online retailers:

I also wrote a book about first dates with information I just haven’t seen in other books that I learned from three solid years of dating in NYC.

A Great First Date, early 2014It’s just $2.99 at at Amazon, BN.com, and the Apple Store.

Location: surrounded by papers (they’re going to kill me)
Mood: good, except I need to fix my car, I’m DIY so The Car Starter is for me.
Music: sweet woman and my two grown up sons
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Paying off debts

Someone always has to pay the debt

Her: That is the bomb.
Me: Do people still say that?
Her: No, just me.
Me: I’m totally putting this in the blog.
Her: Don’t you dare. I don’t want anyone to know how dorky I am.
Me: OK.

In unrelated news, gotta leave the country for a while.

Potentially got some work in Europe. Italy’s interesting to me cause I’m such a fan of The Godfather and there’s this whole sequence there.

There’s this scene in The Godfather book that’s not in the film – dunno why the director kept cutting out these important scenes.

Michael kills his brother-in-law, Carlo, and his wife Kay secretly leaves him. Mike’s brother tries to stop her but she says she can’t stay because she can’t be with a man that can’t forgive.

Mike’s brother says something like, even if Michael truly, truly forgave Carlo, Carlo still “had to be killed. Because treachery can’t be forgiven. Michael could have forgiven it, but people never forgive themselves and so they would always be dangerous….[Michael] loves his sister. But he would be shirking his duty to you and his children, to his whole family, to me and my family, if he let…Carlo go free. They would have been a danger to us all, all our lives.”

Said once that that a debt is created every time something shady happens. Always.

As for France, this interesting article came out about them the other day. In it, the writer says that the French are a lot nicer to Americans these days.

The general hypothesis’s that the recession’s making everyone nicer but this writer disagrees. He says it’s because all of the older French’re dying off; the ones that were alive when the Nazis came over. It was the older French that were ashamed of the fact that they (a) collaborated with the Nazis, killing a buncha their own citizens, and (b) needed the Americans to come and rescue them.

There was debt to pay and you can’t pay back a debt like that, not even if you have IVA advice from a debt manager. So came about the dirty American. The younger French feel no such burden and can afford to be kind.

That’s the argument, anyway.

I believe it. Cause it’s the debt and the deuce. Someone’s always gotta pay the debt, man.

So, France or Italy – or maybe England. I kinda speak the language in England.

Location: Crooklyn
Mood: patient
Music: e rido e piango e mi fondo con il cielo e con il fango
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Comedy, by Gilbert Gottfried

Following the 2011 Earthquake / Tsunami / Nuclear disaster, the following were jokes made by former AFLAC spokesman, Gilbert Gottfried; all jokes copyright of Gilbert Gottfried as author.

Photo (c)Kamoshida/Bloomberg
What does every Japanese person have in their apartment? Flood lights.

Photo (c)Kamoshida/Bloomberg
Japan called me. They said “maybe those jokes are a hit in the US, but over here, they’re all sinking.”

Photo: REUTERS/U.S. Navy/Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Dylan McCord
I was talking to my Japanese real estate agent. I said “is there a school in this area?” She said “not now, but just wait.”

Photo (c) Reuters
I just split up with my girlfriend, but like the Japanese say, “They’ll be another one floating by any minute now.”

Mood: appalled
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The people that point and the people that run in.

Her: (glancing at clock) It’s 11:11 – make a wish.
Me: (thinking) I hope those people’ll be ok.
Her: That’s a good wish.
Me: (as clock changes to 11:12) Made it just in time. Maybe it’ll come true.

There’re people in life that you’ll meet that’ll always say a contrary position. If you say it’s black, they’ll say it’s grey. Daytime, it’s early evening.

These people aren’t necessarily bad, but they are needy. They need to feel superior, to be listened to, to matter.

A variation, however, is the pointer. The ones that feel they know some truth hidden from the rest of us. The ones that spring up at every tragedy and say, “God is punishing (insert childhood issue here)” or “Well, they really brought it upon themselves.”

In all of human history, there’s no tragedy so great where some cruel person won’t stand to the side and point, not at the calamity, but the victims.

Some, like Gilbert Gottfried, point and laugh. Some like Glen Beck, point and blame. The reason’s the same, that neediness. Coupled with an inability to do anything but point.

But often, there’s no tragedy so great where there won’t be someone else that runs past them to stand in front of complete strangers and say “Stand behind me, I’ll protect you.” It’s people at their very best.

As of this writing, 50 people keep walking back into a nuclear reactor to try to get it under control. Can’t even wrap my head around that.

Said once that troubles strip away the fat of your lives to who we really are. Sometimes, under the fat, you find a Gilbert Gottfried there, sometimes you find a hero.

Both make you shake your head in disbelief but for totally different reasons.

Location: watching this all unfold
Mood: pissed off
Music: we could be heroes, just for one day
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If you don’t wanna play the part, don’t audtion.

Haven’t been able to work out cause I injured my neck falling down all of time when I got food poisoning. Still, net-net, look about the same cause the sickness meant eating only BRATY for a while.

Caught a bita that TV show Who Do You Think You Are? This one was the one where Kim Cattrall finds out what happened to her grandfather who ditched his wife and three daughters, onea whom was Kim’s mom.

It’s always struck me as a strange thing that a fella’d do something like that. For better or worse, we all got roles we’re supposed to play. Got no respect for someone that auditioned for his role, got it, and then bolted before the act’s over.

Know nuthin about sports, don’t curse much, and I like my nice threads.

But I know what a man’s supposed to do and that’s not it.

———-

This fella named Sydney Smith once said that It is the greatest of all mistakes to do nothing because you can only do a little.

You and I got a deal; I spill about my admittedly boring and nonsensical life and, occasionally, you do something for me. This is onea those times.

So, just like with Haiti, I ask that you text REDCROSS to 90999, which’ll donate $10 to relief efforts in Japan. It’ll take a sec, you’ll have something to post on Facebook, and you can feel better about yourself have paid back the aether a little for your dumb luck, yeah?

Location: running to meetings
Mood: busy
Music: Now kid I know I haven’t been a perfect man
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Anxiety is the fear of the hypothetical; Urgency is the fuel to ambition

Him: So how’s married life?
Me: Oh, about the same except I have to raise my hand before I speak.
Him (puzzled)
Me: I’m kidding! (pause) She doesn’t let me speak.
Him: Funny boy. (laughs) It’s amazing she married you.
Me: I know, right?

My buddy Cain once said that when he got married, cause he was living with his wife at the time, it felt only like 5% different. That’s true. And 5%’s both a lot and a little at the same time.

I asked this once years ago – how many days do you think you live for?

Me? I’ve lived for about 13,700 days, give or take. That means that I’ve used up more than 50% of my allotted time. It’s parta what keeps me up at night: what on earth have I done with myself?

Onea my fave quotes is from this fella named Lou Gerstner who, when asked if he was worried, said, I don’t have a sense of crisis, I have a sense of urgency that never changes, whether we’re doing well or we’re doing poorly.

When I was younger, I was pretty anxious – grades, social standing, money, etc. Think the thing that’s changed the most with age for me is that it’s gone from anxiety to urgency. And if anxiety is the fear of the hypothetical, urgency is the fuel to ambition.

There’s a sense that I’m running outta time. Time to do all the things I’ve wanted to do, learn all I can. Now that sense has increased by 5%.

Got a wife now; if I’m lucky, maybe I’ll get some kids some day. That sensea urgency’s only getting stronger.

Only got 12,653 days left; figure only halfa that – 6,326 days – to really get something done.

Location: getting ready to get to Brooklyn
Mood: ambitious
Music: Ticking away the moments That make up a dull day
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When Harry Met Sally was a movie, not real life

Drinks in NYC

The news coverage on this assassin seems to paint a portrait of someone that just could not talk to a woman. He was definitely broken insteada bendy.

For me, the surest sign of some sort of mental illness is when a person cannot relate to someone of the opposite sex. One person, a female, immediately springs to mind as she absolutely hates men but despite being relatively attractive and in her 20s, she’s had almost no experience with men whatsoever.

It seems it’s pervasive on both sides and our early indoctrination in grade school with boys versus girls seems partly to blame. It makes about as much sense as saying, “OK, today is blacks versus whites.”

Hollywood reinforces this with stereotypes that have an air of truth but no real truth to them, such as the old saw: Men and women can’t be friends because sex always gets in the way.

Sheyeah, if you’re a lonely Hollywood writer, that’s probably true.

But in the real world, if you’ve got equal parts male and female friends and you had sex or wanted to have sex with everyone of the opposite sex, you’d be exhausted.

Pretty sure that a good percentage of the  crazy can be resolved by (a) finding your people and (b) finding your person.

We literally and figuratively go crazy by our lonesome. It’s a sad thing.

Location: waiting for a package
Mood: contemplative
Music: now you put me in the magic position
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Why I don’t curse casually

Car buried under snow in NYC with a subway sign

Continuing with my last post, you can probably tell now after four years that I don’t generally curse.

Don’t think I’ve ever told you why so now’s about as good a time as any:

Up in Cornell, there’s a small gym in this res hall called Dickson. Used to go there with my buddy Eric all of time. One night, about twenty (20!) years ago, these two pretty girls were working out there and I started chatting them up – eh, it’s a hobby.

After about ten minutes, they got up and quickly left the gym and I turned to Eric and said, “What’s their #$@#$ problem?”

Eric, disgusted, put down his weights and said, “You’re kidding me right? You talk like you’re from the gutter, every word was ‘f___,’ or, ‘s___’ or, ‘m___f___’ – and you’re a English major? What’s your problem?” He stood up and left too and I sat there, mortified. Never heard myself speak before; my voice.

Sounded like what’d you expect from a fella born to penniless immigrant parents outside an industrial park in Queens, New York.

Said once that someone else’s opinion of you’s nonea your business. However, your own opinion of yourself is your business.

My opiniona myself at that moment was less than stellar.

Stopped cursing casually that day twenty years ago. Don’t hold others to the same standard; just a personal choice I make for myself.

Look, sometimes something happens where the only adequate response is WTF? But most times, another of the 880,000 words in the English language’re probably better.

Then again, this is just my opinion. And what’s my opinion, really?

———-

  • Admin note 1: Gonna start publishing at 11-12EST on Mondays and Wednesdays from now on; just the work schedule.
  • Admin note 2: If you’re reading me on loganlo.com and feedburner, I’ve got a few tech entries I’ll be posting from time to time that’s sort of separate from the regular blog. Feel free to ignore.

Location: bundling up to go shovel again
Mood: contemplative
Music: the only thing I did good was scrapping Until the end of time
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If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck

Shot of a train in NYC with a subway sign

Been reading a lot about the whackjob that tried to off the Congresswoman here in the US. Apparently, the authorities are pouring through everything this kid posted online to get a picture of who and what he was all about.

Going through this kid’s internet life – based upon his writings and videos – they’re concluding that’s he’s a full-on whackadoo.

This fella named Riley wrote that when “I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.”

In Stalker, I wrote that the only thing to believe is the words that come out of someone’s mouth. Don’t ever assume, “I’m not interested” means “please try harder.”

Bring this all up, not just because of what happened in Arizona but also cause this acquaintance of mine took it upon himself to write “bitches” and “p****y” on my FB page.

And when I called him out on it, instead of an apology, he says I’m being insulting by saying he sounds like a thug. It’s just locker room banter, he says.

He misses the point. The phrase locker room banter implies a partitioned and segregated group – men in a locker room separate from women, work, the other team, etc.

Look, my co-workers are on this social site, my old boss, my kid cousins, my fiancee’s family, etc. Got no problems with cursing, got a problem with a fella that pops on, leaves an expletive, and disappears.

Thing is, he’s not a bad fella, not at all. He just doesn’t seem to grasp, as a 40-year old, that on the interwebs, everyone can see anything you write and it never goes away. It is, in fact, the polar opposite of a locker room. When you talk like a thug, is it any surprise then when someone in the world says, “You talk like a thug.”

You are what you put out into the aether. Every word is a pixel in your digital portrait. If you write it, own it.

Said it a million times: your friends mirror you. His argument’s that all of his friend talk like this and this is how they talk to each other. Which makes sense, his friends mirror him. But don’t mirror me.

For example, also I’ve got nothing against football. Just don’t watch it. And none of my close friends are crazy into it either. Just not what we’re about – no value judgment, just not our thing.

Similarly, I don’t toss out “bitches” and “p****y” like they’re papercuts; they’re not to me. They’re at least a bullet if not more.

If a thug doesn’t use words like that, who does? Show me someone that uses those words with someone they barely talk to and I’ll show you someone that talks like a thug.

Which brings me to another saying I like: Don’t piss on me and tell me it’s rain.

———-

Write this blog with the assumption that an employer, fiancee, family member might stumble across it. And if they read it, I’m sure I’ll come across as a very nerdy, clumsy, rum-loving, former skirt-chasing, insomniac. That’s ok, cause it’s true.

Wish I was terribly smooth, rich, and lucky; wish I were taller, wish I were a baller.

But I’m ok with whatever assumption you draw from this blog, cause the words’re all mine.

OK, except for walks like a duck, don’t piss  on me, and wish I were taller, those I stole. But the rest…

 

Location: off to the garage
Mood: irritated
Music: when it comes to playing basketball I’m always last to be picked
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