Sooner than later

I'll be tossing another update on here soon enough, incase anyone is worried about whether or not I will continue posting stuff. I ahve this thing, as you can probably tell, where I seem to enjoy letting a WHOLE hockey-sock worth of stuff build up before posting an epic blog entry, which takes an hour or so to write, which i've been thinking may not be the best way to do things...I figure a lot of people probably begin to just "skim" around the middle parts, where they most likely miss a lot of gold (comedy gold!).

I am kicking around the idea of doing smaller posts, dealing with single subjects, versus my usual rambly things. This, of course, does not cover things like stories about monkeys, where the entire thing NEEDS to be posted as a narrative, in order to be the best it can be.

Maybe start diving stuff into parts, to keep people coming back? Who knows?

Anyways, I am going to start posting the epic "Dyko's Working Life" series this week at some point. I warn you in advance, that this will be a good one. Multi-part good.

That is all.

P.S. I decided that this post would be entirely contained within a quote. It's called thinking outside the box, people. Jesus.

By popular* demand...

Dyko vs The 20-Centimeter Monkey

Let me paint a picture. It is the summer of '97, and our hero is but a scant 162 months old. Everyone is listening to the powerhouse that is Big Shiny Tunes 2, and our hero is no different. Armed with his CD player, Dyko embarks with his family on the second of many camping trips to Kingston, Ontario. This particular year would stand out in his mind forever, though. This year, he would encounter his greatest foe to-date. This year, he would face, the 20-Centimeter Monkey.

It should be mentioned at this point that Kingston is a very different place, than, say, suburban Toronto. Being up north, the city seems to brim with friendlyness that is all but foreign to those of us living in the T-Dot (a term that will never be used in this or any blog henceforth). Looking back, this writer has difficulty actually remembering *what* Kingston looks like, as it has combined with Orillia, Midland, North Bay, and Moosonee into a sort of northern-Ontario-small-town imalgum, but suffice it to say that it is likely a pleasant place, that probably has an entraining main street filled with interesting stores, and most likely a harbour down by the waterfront. One might find a chip-wagon, or ice cream truck by the docks, and can probably get reasonably-priced, homestyle breakfasts from a diner that may-or-may-not be on one of the street corners. Dyko most likely enjoyed eating at these places, as they are likely to be nice, if they do, in fact, exist.

Enough of that, on with the story.

Being a lad of science, Dyko often enjoyed trips to zoos, as it gave him a chance to be outdorrs, walk around, and see all kinds of crazy critters. While travelling with his kinsfolk through the town of Smith's Falls, a signpost was spotted along the side of the road, which boasted "Zoo". To not visit this place would be near-criminal, so the Dyko clan decided it was best to visit this place.

Without going into too much detail, this zoo was a terrible, terrible place. The cages were tiny, the animals, sickly, and over-all, other than being spread around some very nice property, there was little that this zoo had to offer. Young master Dyko thought this, until he saw something that would change his life forever. It was a cage, maybe 3 feet long, 2 feet wide, and another 3 feet tall. Around the top, made of painted wood, was a...thing...giving the cage a sort of circus-like appearance.

This pleased Dyko.

Stepping closer to this cage, which was already shaping up to be the most entertaining thing at the zoo, Dyko spotted a delightful scamp of a creature housed inside. It was a monkey! Not just any monkey, but a wee 20-centimeter-tall monkey! Oh, how adorable he was, thought Dyko. He stared out from behind the bars, his small, black, sad eyes saying more than monkey noises ever could. Dyko knew what he had to do. Coming right up to the cage (this zoo did not have it in their budget to actually put any sort of fences or barriers around the cages. The monkey cage was, in fact, just kind of standing in the middle of a grassy area), Dyko presented a banana (the account of where the banana came from has been lost over time and alchohol).

This pleased our monkey.

Breaking off a bit of banana, Dyko held it out, presenting it to his simple friend. In a moment not unlike a scene depicted on the ceilling of the Sistine Chapel, Dyko and monkey exchanged gifts. To monkey, Dyko gave the gift of banana, and to Dyko, monkey presented the gift of joy.

All was well in the world.

A second piece of banana was offered, and, again, the two shared a moment.

It is at this time that Fortuna's wheel took a drastic turn downward, as things went terribly wrong.

It is not known what went through monkey's head; did Dyko wrong him in some way? Was there some sort of monkey faux-pas commited by the Dyko? This may never be known. What is known, though, is the account of what happened during the third banana presentation, which shall be described in its entirety presently:

The banana was presented as the previous two had been, but with a single difference. You see, with each fruit exchange, young Dyko's courage grew, and he stepped closer towards the cage. At this point, Dyko was less than an arm's length away from the cage. He led the foodstuffs out for monkey to retrieve, when suddenly, flames burst in monkey's once sad eyes. Monkey let out a screech, smacked the banana from Dyko's hand, and grabbed, with his tiny little monkey hand, Dyko's young index finger! If this had just been a simple banana smack and finger grab, things would ahve been fine, and this story would never exist. The fact of the matter is that monkey was not content in just grabbing Dyko's finger, and so, with all of the strength in his tiny little body, Monkey pulled Dyko in towards the cage, where his tiny deceitful mouth lay waiting, with row-upon-row of razor-sharp teeth ready to feast on man-flesh!

Though he was still but a lad, our hero, Dyko, sensing what was going through trecherous monkey's tiny little mind, decided that this course of events would not stand.

Dyko quickly pulled back, releasing himself from monkey's death-grip with relative ease. Luckily for our hero, monkey weighed, at most 7 pounds (soaking wet), so though his rage knew no bounds, monkeywas still limited by the physical attributes given to him my his monkey god.

After freeing himself from his tiny captor, Dyko threw the remainder of the banana into the cage, and hurried hence from the cage, feeling what he assumed was monkey's fury-filled eyes staring at him from inside his enclosure. It's never been discovered what exactly happened between Dyko and monkey that would cause such a falling out, but suffice it to say, the friendship ended then and there.

And so ends the tale of Dyko vs The 20-Centimeter Monkey. This writer hopes that if nothing else, this story helped to educate those of you who might be taken in by the excitement and glamour that a monkey friend might promise, because in the end, as this story shows, such things are simply not meant to be.

End.

*In order to register as "Popular Demand", 1/3 of the readership must agree. Since I have 3 readers, James demanding it counts as majority.

BOLG!

Dear N'Dugu,

I know it's been a while since my last update. Things have been "crazy" around here, what with my fake job and all. I've been working long hours, and between that, and hitting the gym after work, I've been feeling pretty dejected lately, bordering on crestfallen.

It turns out someone at work talked to the Big Bossman (the boss, not the wrestler from the early 90s), and there are plans to actually bring me in for a couple of months to work. For money! And we're talking actual money, not like Documentary Dollars that can be used to pay for things at work. For the first time in just about 12 months, Dyko will have an income!

I can't remember what I wrote in my last update, and I think that the 4 of us (I'm pretty sure that's roughly how many people read this trash) can agree that there's no way I'm gonna move the mouse all the way to the top of the page and click "view blog", then spend time reading the entire thing. Frankly, I'm not that big a fan of blogs. Because of this, please excuse any overlap betwwen updates. In fact, any overlap is actually not me messing up, but EMPHASIS! That's right, people, we're talking emphasis through re-iteration of points. Read a book, people.

Speaking of books, last week, I started reading the book Don Quixote, because it is something that I have always wanted to do. The language is a little tough, because it was written some time in the 1500s (I haven't actually looked into when...), but it is seriously some funny stuff. Like actual funny, not Shakespeare-style funny, where a servant gets mistaken for his master because he wears similarly-coloured stockings. The stuff in here is actual comedy, like the kind that would work in a movie today. I'm pretty impressed with that.

There have been more auditions this week at "work". I got to work with this girl Emily for the first time (she volunteered to come help with the auditions), and she was really fun. Eventually, this other guy showed up to help, but he didn't say much at all.

Ever.

That was a little strange.

Me and Emily had fun, though, and flew right through the day. The highlight was definately getting to cut pieces of paper with numbers on them in half. There was only one pair of scissors, so I had to supervise, but, damnit, we did one HELL of a job! I also got to meet Josie Dye from Edge102, which was fun. i had met her before, but as we both learned from talking for a while, we were both much to drunk to remember the meeting. I think that is how all first meetings should go.

I watched "About Schmidt" earlier in the week. I liked he movie a lot. It starts Jack Nicholson, and he is just fantastic in it. The ending got me a bit down (quiet, Giselle!!!), but it was a great movie none-the-less. I also saw The Shawshank Redemption for the first time, which was a GREAT movie. It made me feel really smart, because I identified a metaphor that I assume they were pretty clearly going for near the end. I won't go into it because as much as I want to say I want you to catch it on your own, the truth is, i don't remember exactly how it went, so I wouldn't do it justice. Good times, though. I don't hate Tim Robbins, the man anymore like I did after Arlington Road.

This week, I "acquired" a copy of a movie called "The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra", which was kind of a spoof on all the old 50s and 60s sci-fi/horror movies. It wasn't a SPOOF spoof, like nothing along the lines of a Scary Movie or Naked Gun, but instead just really a funny movie because it was made exactly how bad movies at that time were made, which worked really well. One of my favourite lines, which will probably sound stupid without context here (but, hey, everything I write probably sounds stupid, so it would all work out, really), but I am going to toss it in here anyways.

"This sure is scary...it's a good thing I don't beleive in things."

Shut up. This is my damn blog, and if I want to quote random lines from movies you will never see, that is my perogative! Get off my back already. Jason Crisp, people.

I think that's about it for now. I am really tired, and need to get up at like 5 tommorow, which is seriously bad. As always, of course, as soon as I start working on a conclusion, I thought of something else that will keep this update going for a while still, so hang onto your monocles!

It turns out that my cats took last week to play a hilarious joke which i like to call "take a number of shits under my parents' bed". It turns out that eventually, if you don't keep a cat's litter in only the most pristine condition, it is totally in their jurasdiction to declare the entire house fair-game. That's fine with me. I'll just keep that in mind next time I can't find my cat-shaped kicking rock in the yard, and need to start kicking.

While typing that last paragraph, I saw some commercial on TV for Mustard, or buns, or some crap (my TV is on mute). I don't know what it was for, but the important thing is it gave me an idea! This idea involves being hungry, and entering a hotdog eating contest, only to have a single hotdog, then leave. See, it's funny, because you are taking advantage of the proud tradition of the ____ eating contest (this plan could also work for donut eating contests, but THAT IS IT). I bet all the wierd carnie-like people who run the contest would try and kill you afterwards, too. I figure you should probably have a defending shovel nearby incase any of them try and be heroes.

One of these days, maybe close to the CNE (OMG I AM GONNA BE TOPICAL!), I will recount some carnie stories that I amassed while working at said CNE for a number of years in various capacities. Without ruining it, let's just say that what your noses have told you about them carnival folk is plenty right.

You know what? (I am actually waiting for an answer)

Alright, fine, be that way. What I was going to say is that one of these days, I will compile an update re-telling ALL of my wonderful work stories from the 4 places that I have worked! That is seriously going to be amazing, because between the 3 days at Conklin's Waffles, the 4 years at Eastlea Security, and the summer at The WSIB downtown, I have got some SOLID stories. I experience pain or discomfort in almost all of them, too, which always makes for a few good laughs! Maybe I can make it a 4-parter, just so you don't burn out reading the entire thing as one massive post, and instead, can read about each workplace individually. Sounds good to me.

I've also got a story about a near-fatal monkey attack I experienced a few years back that is downright glorious. I'll post that soon to.

Alright, I am actually going to end this, because apearantly, I can go on forever.

I will leave you with this:

DYKO'S SHOE SCHEME

Alright, here's the plan. Let's say you are like me, and working for free 20+ hours a week, so money's a little tight for steak. You're only human, right? And Humans need new shoes, right? So here's the scheme: I walk into a mall, and find some shoes I like. They cost $90. I walk around, and find a random girl, and offer her $20 to come and just sit next to me at the shoe store, and pretend to know me. Now, to the common idiot shoe salesperson, it looks like I am with girl, so when I ask to try walking around on the tile floor outside the store in the new shoes to try them out, then run off, leaving girl behind, they assume that I would be back for girl, right? Well, this is why they say that whole thing about making an "ass" of "u" and "me", but the only difference is that I am an ass with new shoes! And all it cost me was $20, girl's criminal record, and the ability to ever visit a mall again!

Frankly, I don't recommend ever even thinking about trying this, because, to be honest, it isn't a very good scheme at all. There are a number of things wrong with it, and it really is full of holes. In actuallity, I am really tired from being awake for the better part of 15 hours, so right now, to me, that scheme seems like some brilliant writing. It isn't, though.

I need sleep right after I get something to drink.

Out.

Dyko