It's the "You can suck it Earth Day" song.

Hey Earth Day, you can suck it. Oh Earth Day, you can chuck it. If I could think of another rhyming word, that would apply to you too, oh I would. Oh, Earth Day.

Say Earth, with your ashes and volcanos and your earthquakes, you probably think you're pretty awesome right now. With your shaking and your spewing and your killing lots of people. Oh Earth day. It's like a birth day.

Yeah. Yeah.

You probably think you deserve your day. And maybe a cake with green frosting. CAUSE green is the color of stuff that grows right out of the earth. BUUUT most of the actual earth is brown. But please don't frown. It's your special day, oh earth.

Oh shoobie doo whop, shoobie doo whop.

Oh earth day, if I had an SUV I would drive all over your exposed little Grand Canyon. Oh Earth Day! You want the freon, take the freon, freakin freon eating earth day. Oh Freon is the whipped topping on the can of whoop axis that I think someone needs to crack open on you. Shoobie doo whop. Shoobie doo whop.

I hope and hope and hope my old air conditioner takes a thousand years to decompose and you feel it like a hemroid, every time you rotate. Earth day. Tree hugger mirth day. I'd rather celebrate Colin Firth day even though he's kind of a pansy British romantic comedy guy whose name rhymes with Earth and MIIIIIIRTH.

[GUITAR SOLO]

Oh earth, you can take your day, and stick it on a sleigh and drive it all away and that's where you can stay where rich people alieviate their guilt by singing to themselves "hey, i have a whole crapload of money, why don't I just buy the 16 seer and get the tax credit AND rebate while the lazy low income slobs . . .

[Big finish, bring out the dancing girls]

PAAAY . . .

FUUUULLL . . .

PRIIIIIIIIIICE!"

(oh man, I think that note is out of my voice range. I think I pulled something . . . I mean besides all the stops.)

Bible Stories for Children

So what if God is actually a little kid. Not in a star trek kind of way (GEEK CHECK!), but what if God actually has all these powers, but is still working on responsibility, but with no parental supervision. And that whole bible thing about "Fear God" is a mistranslation. It actually means, "God Fears," or, to be precise, "God is scared!" So there is this scared little kid in charge of everything. So he decides, old people should die, that way, I can drag them into the afterlife and try to figure out what makes them tick. Which turns out to be kind of a disappointment. They show up in the afterlife, bodiless, with all this knowledge about medications, health insurance and investment advice. Not to mention the fact they keep telling the same old stories over and over.

Now if you'll excuse my sequencing issues, pretend you are a kid watching adam and eve run around naked. You really don't care about naked very much if you are a kid, as a matter of fact, it's kind of funny. Then, all the sudden, the dude and the chick figure out what's what with their nakedness and BOOM they are all over each other (I'm just skipping over the whole snake and fruit metaphor and getting to the nitty-gritty). God, the kid, sees this and its like walking in on your parents. "Nobody wants to see that. I didn't make that for this. Mr. Peepers was just put there to be funny looking and the lady didn't have one to make Mr. Peepers more funny looking."

Out they go.

At some point, God, the kid, gets this crazy idea. What if I do the whole human body thing? Then I could grow up. Be an adult. See what that's like.

So here comes this kid with these crazy ideas. He checks out parties. Finds out about the affects of wine. Hangs out with friends. He never really messes around with chicks because, well he saw that in the garden one time and it was straight up nasty. He tells people they should become like kids. He also tells grown ups to stop fighting all the time. Tries to tell old religious dudes not to be so bossy. And he tells everybody they should share everything. That pretty much did it. So God, the kid, finds out that being a grown-up totally sucks in a BIG way. In one of the most misunderstood passages in the bible, God, the kid, says "eli eli lama sabachthani", which is an old proverb meaning "Screw you guys, I'm going home!"

Little Chicken Little Chicken Little Chicken Little

Which came first? Did the sky fall or did chicken little wonk about it first?

So I know the sky didn't fall. yet. But if it's up there, surely it has to come down here.

Let me explain. Here is the long version. Ready?

Gram's pool is a mess. A mess. I have been trying to get it right for 3 years. Years, as you may know, are the sum of months, which are the sum of weeks, which are the sum of days. A long 3 years.

When you swim in it, it's sorta like liquid mountain climbing. Webbed footed creatures would be able to break new records with the particulate level in this pool. Every flap of the foot would be like a track and field starting gate.

This stuff would take forever in an hourglass. It would slow down time. As a matter of fact, it is probably my grandmother's pool water, in some sort of multi-dimensional hourglass, the outside of which is constructed of a turtle shell, that has been tracking the time I have spent working on the freakin pool.

Oh yeah, that idea you're thinking right now, I tried that. And that.

Now, after 3 long years of fighting the good fight AGAINST filling it in (which, by the way is like hiding chocolate under dog poop), and, instead, just cleaning it up, we were close.

Chemicals upgraded - check.

Sand changed - check.

Hose repairs (2 backflush, 6 vacuum) - check

Pool drained - yeah, that, well . . .

Joel: I can do that.

Joel's Mom: No. No you probably shouldn't do that. The plaster cracks. The pool rises out of the ground.

Joel: No really. You just need to rent a pump.

Mom: where does the water go?

Joel: I'll find out.

Joel find's out: the sewer access pipe in front of the house. No problem. Let me just go locate that real quick. Hmm. Somewhere around here. Hmm. No. There? No. Hmm. I think someone is moving it. Every other house in the neighborhood has one. Hmm. I guess I could dig.

Joel's Mom: No. You probably shouldn't do that.

Joel: Why not? How hard could that be?

Mom: Well you could hit a gas line. Or an electrical line. Or a water pipe.

Joel thinks to himself, sewer pipes are way bigger than all those other things. Surely, if I am going to hit something, it would be the bigger thing, not to mention the added advantage of actually looking for it.

Mom: We should probably just have a plummer come out.

Joel tries anyway. Digs. Gramma. Mom. Wife. All watching. Wife even starts helping. Nope. Hmm. No. New hole. Nope. Hmm. Most of the rocks in the yard moved. Hmm. Deeper hole. Oh look, late mesozoic fossils. Score 1 for evolution and zero for God for not helping me find the missing sewer pipe.

Mom: We should call a plummer.

Joel: We could totally empty the water down another sewer line. Maybe where the washing machine drains?

Mom: And flood the house?

Joel: No. The washer drains just fine there.

Mom: Yeah now.

Joel: But . . .

Mom: We should call a plummer. What if we need to know where the sewer is for something else.

Joel: Okay. Call a plummer.

several days, weeks and months pass. No plummer is called.

89 year old gramother recruits neighbor with plumbing sign on his truck. Neighbor plummer, also apparently part mole that is unable to see in the daylight, puts a stick in the ground, right where I had been digging.

Gramma: It only took him a few minutes.

Gramma's meaning: Joel, you kinda suck.

Joel: So I guess now we just need to rent a pump and some hose.

Mom: Um. The pump could break. There may be more to it than you think. Plus the plaster cracking and the pool lifting out of the ground. Why don't we just hire someone? Is there anyone that will do that?

Joel: I could just . . .

Mom: No. Let's just hire someone.

Several days and weeks pass. The hourglass of particulated pool water is inching viscously down the glass. Drrrrriiiiiiippppppp.

Joel: Got anybody yet.

Mom: Not yet.

Joel does research. Finds several places that will do pool maintenance and will more than likely drain the pool.

Joel: Here's the number.

Mom: Where did you find these guys.

Joel: The internet. highly rated, too.

Mom (suspiciously): The internet?

Joel: Oh yeah. Highly reviewed. Here's another number. Highly reviewed too.

Mom: Where . . .

Joel: The internet, Mom.

Mom (suspiciously): Oh. Hmm.

Phone numbers sit on kitchen table for days and weeks.

Drrrrriiiiiiippppppp.

Sister: We should fill it.

Mom: We should fill it.

God: Just fill it already.

Joel: God, why are there fossils where my grandmother's sewer pipe should be?

God: Ha ha. You said your grandmother's sewer pipe. Fill the pool.

Joel: But the fossil.

God: Um. I really have to take this call. Pat Robert's opened his mouth again. Messy. Messy.

DRRRRIIIIPPP.

Joel finds:

DA DA DA DA "CALSAWAY POOLS". On the internet. :(

Mom: The internet?

Joel: Let me just call them.

Ken (Nice Calsaway pool guy): We can UBER-FILTER your pool. No need to drain it. So clean you could drink it afterwards.

Joel: That's sounds easy. But I don't think you know this pool.

Ken: We are pool guys. We got this.

Joel: Awesome.

Ken: One thing.

Joel: Uh oh.

Ken: The pool needs to be pretty clear.

Joel: How clear?

Joel: Mom . . .

Mom: The internet?

Joel: I just told them to come check it out.

DRRRRIIIIIIPPPP!

Ken: No problem.

Several days and weeks pass.

Ken: Wow.

Several more days and weeks.

Ken: Wow.

Several more days.

Mom: Do these guys have any idea what they are doing?

Joel: I found them on the internet.

Several days.

Ken: I think. . . . Maybe . . . just . . . No? Wow.

Several more days. 1 Week. Drrrrriiiiiiippppppp.

The big day is scheduled. They are going to do this.

Ken (on the big day, calls joel, exhasperated, on the cell phone): Joel?

Joel: Yeah, Ken.

Ken: We have been digging all over. We can't find the stupid sewer drain?

Joel: Huh?

Ken: Sewer drain.

Joel: But?

Ken: Yeah, some of the water does have to be flushed. Like 6000 gallons.

Mom (though she is not present, her voice can be heard): The internet. hmph.

Joel: The stick?

Ken: Yeah, no.

Joel: There was a plummer. With a stick.

Ken: Nope.

Joel: Bummer.

Please note (Joel is on the phone, not present. He is at his job, where he should be working).

Joel: What about where the washing machine empties?

Ken: Great idea, Joel. you're Mom must be so proud of you.

Joel: Yeah, no.

Ken: Let's do it.

Gramma: Let's do it.

Joel: Let's do it.

Ken: Couple things.

Joel: Um.

Ken: Garage door will be propped open slightly. Door to the washroom too.

Joel: My mom . . .

Ken: Be a man.

Joel: Yes sir.

Drrrrriiiiiiippppppp.

Later that night, mom calls.

Mom: They couldn't find the sewer. (internet)

Joel: No.

Mom: There's a stick. (internet)

Joel: I know.

Mom: We should have called a real plummer. I also noticed the hose is running into the washer. Do these guys know what they are doing? (internet)

Joel: Hope so.

Mom: I just went out and looked. There's all these pipes. It makes no sense.

Joel: It's kinda neat.

Mom: I just hope the water doesn't back up and flood the house.

The next day. Ken calls. Too early.

Ken: So. I had this dream.

Joel: Were there fossils?

Ken: Dude? No. I had a nightmare. Woke me up. 3 am. Dreamed your grandmother's house was flooded. FLOODED. Isn't that funny?

Joel: Funny. :|

Ken: You haven't heard anything?

Joel: No.

Ken: Maybe everything is good.

Joel: Maybe.

Joel calls gramma:

Joel: Gram . . .

Gram: Everything is fine.

Joel: You didn't have to swim to the phone?

Gram: I don't like swimming. Your grandfather wanted the damn pool. Everything is fine.

In just a few hours from now, the pool should be all sparkly blue. . .

Random and uninvited.

Hello
Uninvited, random thought.
Did I leave the window open?
The door?

Yellow?
You would be.
You cannot stay.
You burred and barbed,
Hooked and crooked,
Twisted and tempting
Distraction.

I will take no action.
And you can grow,
If you like.
And make more yellow.
Take over sky blue.

I will take no action.

I can sleep and drift,
But you will swell,
Lift the skin. Infect.

You are the canary.
You are the signal.
You are peripheral,
Shifting to center.
Bore into the burrow of my brain.
Take up the chair.
Take up the bed.
Take up the room.
I will roll over and close my eyes.

Take up my eyelids.

I can exhale you.
I can busy myself.
I will crowd you out.
And you will drop to the bottom of your cage,
Gasping.

I will take no action.

Not closing the window.
Doors ajarred. Unbarred.
Breadcrumbs.
But I never invited you.

You're being embarrassing and awkward again. Lol.

When to use lol? I'd say pretty much never. Unless you mean it literally. Otherwise it sounds foolish. It's original purpose, to reward people who couldn't hear you laugh (a terrible surrogate anyway), has long since passed into folklore.

Maybe I'm wrong. I mean, maybe it's not used enough. Maybe everyone should use lol. All the time. JUST IN CASE people don't know you're kidding. Or so people will think you are kidding, when you're not.

Check this out:

Declarative:

"This is a sentence. lol."

Self congratulatory:

"This is a funny sentence. lmao."

Softening the blow:

"Honey, I have syphilis. lol."

I know I shouldn't have, but I couldn't help myself:

"I just drowned a puppy. lol."

Fishing:

"Let's totally have sex then. lol."

Bridging the gap:

"Yeah, I know you're a republican. All republicans are a-holes. lol."

(please insert the appropriate political party and notice it works both ways)

Hiccups (aka, drunk):

"Yeah.lol. I know. lol. that's totally true. lol. I am totally an lol-er. lol."

Right now, I am saying something that I know is true, that I want you to know is true but I don't want you to have any evidence against me:

"You are an irritating person. lol. I have always hated you. lol. If I could, I would take all your money and never see you again. lol."

Subtlety fail:

I hope you die. lol.

Lol has sure come a long way.

Here is a cute little story about the time I learned what lol stands for (this should also be helpful for those that have no idea what it means, however, this is no excuse to take up using it).

So I am in a chat room maybe ten years ago (I know, it's where ugly people go to make friends without good looking people throwing rocks at them and yelling "go back inside, freak."), and I say something incredibly witty (like I always do. lol), and someone types back "lol" and someone else types "lol" and maybe even a third person. I was like, what the heck, I was so witty that I gave all these people some sort of fit where they are unable to type correctly anymore. Then they all start up with the chatting again. So I got a little curious and I typed "what is this lol?" and someone typed "laugh out loud" and I thought, oh it's funny because I don't get your little lingo, eh. So I go on "chatting". And inevitably, I say something else clever and witty. And again with the lols. I am still confused. I ask again, "what's with this lol? I don't get it." Two responses from two different chatters "laugh out loud" and "Laugh Out Loud". I still don't get it and I had an ever so brief moment where my self esteem was low (lol) and I type back: "when you get done laughing at me, can you tell me what lol means?"

Finally somebody has the ability to see just how thick headed I am. "Dude (which is hilarious considering my chat name was sexylady99), LOL means Laugh Out Loud."

I type: "oh. I get it." I laughed out loud. A little, so I typed it. "lol" and then everyone else thought that was really funny, so there were a whole slew of "lol's typed that day.

I am pretty sure that is when the firmament burst and the flood gates opened and people have been drowning in it ever since. It's my fault.

If you still want to keep using lol, don't worry. I'll still totally love you. lol.

(pic stolen from Jonathan - thanks!)

Gregor Mendel - Player?

Thanks to my biology book, I now am well versed in the findings of Greogor Mendel, the scientist and monk who postulated that heredity derives from particles rather than a blending of parents. He experimented with pea plant flowers and seeds. One night, after an excruciatingly tedious day of crossing some stamen and carpel of some F1 generation purple flowers, and with some encouragement from some of the other monks, Mendel agreed to go to the local karaoke bar. Now the local karaoke bar, being near the monastery, was pretty much a Gregorian chant revival bar where they had a scroll wrapped backwards on a crank for a teleprompter and with the occasional, though at that time experimental, lute accompaniment.

Gregor's father had named him such on account of his own love for the old chants, but Gregor, a shy and meticulous fellow, was largely tone deaf due to a childhood accident in a bell tower. But if you put enough of the grog in Gregor, he could be known to bark a few quatres.

So here is Gregor, squinting at the scroll, mumbling his way through "Alma Redemptoris Mater"(which was the Justin Bieber hit of its time) and sporting pollen all over his tunic. He is almost all the way through when he catches the eye of a lady in the back corner of the establishment. He finishes and, encouraged by the eye contact and the potency of the grog, makes his way over to her, desperately brushing to get the pollen off his chest. He has a mission. He knows that he is conducting all kinds of precise heredity experiments back at the monastery, but with the grog, being locked up all day long with a bunch of dudes and seeing flowers and pea pods get all the action, he wants to make memory out of this night by performing a little heredity experiment of his own.

"Hey baby, I saw you scoping me out while I was chanting. I had to come over because you are looking fine beyond all this age."

"What?"

"You know, the age of reason."

"Oh."

"I know you probably have a name, and that your mother and father gave it to you, but it's nothing compared to what they gave you that you've got going on all up in here."

"Thank you. My name's Lilly."

"It would have to be. I'm . . . my name is Stamen. Stamen Mendel."

"And what do you do, Stamen?"

"I make flowers do it while I watch."

"Wow. I just clean houses. I'm kind of a neat freak. You have a little pollen on your shirt."

"Why don't we get out of here and I show you what I can do."

And that worked. Mendel was a lot smoother than he looked. Most people don't know this, but the great great grandfather of Howie Mendel was created that night. You go, Gregor.

The Fantastic ForeFathers!

A little known fact about Ben Franklin, when Ben performed that well known experiment, tying a key to a kite string, a bolt of tremendous energy surged through the apparatus and electrocuted him, but not killing him. Rather, it endowed him with the super power to control electric currents. He swore to keep this secret and to only use his power to defend the American way of life and her precious Constitution’s ideals. With his power, Ben invented a time machine and travels through time to correct America whenever she steers away from her ideal beginnings. He has seen our current state and is not pleased. Forming a band with some famous, some infamous American characters, all having their own super powers, Benjamin Franklin has come now, conjured by the invocation of John Stossel, to clean up America and restore her to a pure, constitutionally sound republic. They are the Fantastic Forefathers. “This time, it’s Constitutional!”

George Washington: wields his Ax of Truth to cleft in twain the powers of deception in politics.
Thomas Jefferson: better known by his chosen superhero name, TJ Max, a shape shifter who has infiltrated American society on any number of occasions. His weapon, a radioactive quill known as the Hancock, is mightier than any sword.
Patrick Henry: with an indestructible exoskeleton, he is always willing to make a seemingly ultimate sacrifice . . . and then get right back up and “finish the job for liberty.”
Fredrick Douglas: the alien symbiote that takes the form of his beard is the source of his power, the Filibuster. The Filibuster is a shockwave, created by Douglas’ voice and enhanced by the alien symbiote beard.
Bionic Betsy Ross: upon one visit to modern times, when George Washington was trying to knock Al Franken and Rush Limbaugh’s heads together to “make a funny coconut sound”, Betsy was standing too close, she received multiple mortal injuries. Using the invention genius of Franklin and his electrical powers, Betsy was reconstructed to be stronger, faster and more just than ever. And she can shoot sewing needles out of her eyes.

Together, with their wisdom, insight and super powers, they will save America and return her to her precious Constitutional purity: a time when health care did not exist, slavery was legal and women couldn’t vote, except of course now we have health care, slavery is illegal and women can vote, but pretty much everything else will be just like it was.