Santa Claus is a Korean Man

Last year, this was the scene. Both the Buddha and the Peanut hated Charlie Claus.
This year, the Peanut loved Charlie Claus.
The Buddha wasn't so sure. I love the way the Peanut is admiring her dad in a "My dad is an awesome Santa Claus" kind of way.
Once the scary Santa went away, the Buddha and Ahpa had a good time opening some presents.


A few minutes later, I looked over and the Buddha had found her way to the cheesecake. She was sitting at the table all by her lonesome enjoying herself.


While SHR distracted the Buddha, I went in for the steal.

The Case of the Mysteriously Vanishing Newspapers

Christmas Eve: Our downstairs neighbors were having a super loud dance party. I was out. SHR did some serious pounding on the floor. This must have really pissed them off.

Every single night: Our asshole upstairs neighbor high heels it up while listening to nothing but loud bass while moving furniture. Sometimes we pound the ceiling with an umbrella or ball to fight back.

Two weeks ago:
We received the "please send me a tip" disguised as a Christmas card from our newspaper delivery guy. As previously stated, I refuse to tip the fucker this year. Not only for his obnoxious May behavior but other smaller transgressions.

12/26
Our paper and a neighbors' copy of The Wall Street Journal were kicked behind the fence. SHR deftly climbed over to get our copy.

The past three days our paper has been nowhere to be found. Other people on the block are getting theirs, but not us.

So who is responsible? The salsa dancers? The whore upstairs? The vindictive newsie?

My money is on the salsa partiers. The fact that our paper had been knocked aside on Tuesday is my main evidence. I picture the guy not being sure which was our paper but knowing that both were read by some whitey upstairs and figuring that he couldn't go wrong with knocking both over. I wonder if our neighbors have been getting their The Wall Street Journal the last three days. If not, that could be the clue that cracks the case.

I've been contemplating how to figure out who the culprit is for sure. I could go outside at 5 am and wait to see if the paper is delivered. If it is, I could sit in the park across the street and see who steals it. Or I could buy those exploding dye packs that they have over there at the bank and booby trap my paper upon delivery and wait for the fireworks.

Or I could just count down the days until I move out of this apartment. And continue to plot ways to get my revenge on my neighbors before moving out.

Catching Up

I haven't been taking many pictures recently. Just haven't felt like it. Between my winter blues and not having internet access for a bit, I haven't posted many.

But here are my three favorite pictures and one movie from over the last few weeks before Christmas.

1. Beth and SHR before heading to Floyd for the Bocce playoffs. Unfortunately, we didn't do so well.

2. When SHR and I move to Clinton Hill, I will once again be close to my beloved General Fowler.

3. Amy and Bart won the amazing Couple Tees! at this year's Pick and Climb. I've got to say - I felt quite sheepish to give these as a gift. Or should I say - to give them as a regift. But Bart and Amy seemed to be pretty excited about them.

Watch the movie where Chris Larry calls us assholes for bringing such a ridiculous gift and Jim rats us out.

Hey Waiters and Waitresses

It isn't that fucking hard to write down my order, is it? So why do an increasing amount of your brethren feel the need to memorize my order?

Do you think it means bigger tips? Are you trying to impress me with your brain power? Did your boss tell you to save the ink on his pens?

Because when you don't write down my order, you always fuck up. Sometimes it is just a little. Sometimes it is big. But you always always always fuck up the order somehow.

That is all.

Because Nothing Says Christmas Like Pee Wee Herman Wearing Fake Dreads

I am still in shock after seeing this for the first time early this morning on VH1 Classic.

Wishing You and Yours a Very Happy Handwashings Kind of Holiday Season

Thank you Mitch for sending me one of the funniest yet quite disturbing holiday cards I've ever received.

I Am Very Proud To Announce

That when you google "I have a unibrow," my blog is the first listing. I have finally arrived! Sadly, my unibrow isn't here to enjoy it. Damn you tweezers!

This Week's Notable Comments

Super Cute Girl Who Sometimes Dresses as a Butterfly For Ballet Performances and Today Was Wearing a Santa Hat said to me, "Mr. Listmaker, I had a present picked out for you that I really really wanted to get for you. But my mom told me that the teachers had decided that they didn't want presents anymore so I couldn't get it for you." Um, the teachers didn't quite decide that. Dagger in my heart.

Super Obsessed Kid told me at the end of the day today that he wasn't going to be friends with his best and pretty much only friend in class, Kid Who Never Does Anything Until I Tell Him To Do It At Least Twice, until February because he likes one multiplayer internet game and his friend likes another. Talk about obsessed!

Kid Who Never Does Anything Until I Tell Him To Do It At Least Twice said that this was okay because he has other friends to play with. Which begs the question - why February? I mean, shit, if you are really pissed off with someone's choice of games, why not hold a yearlong grudge?

Who do you vote for?

Super Obsessed Kid
Or

Kid Who Never Does Anything Until I Tell Him To Do It At Least Twice

The Second Part of a Three Part Plan to Become Fully Domesticated

When we woke up on Sunday morning, SHR and I were feeling down about the whole buying an apartment thing.

But then our broker called us and wanted to know if we wanted to go any open houses. Sure, why not? So we checked out four apartments in Clinton Hill.

And one of them was really great. So we put a bid on it.

Last night it was accepted!

What's next? Um, I don't know. Something about lawyers and contracts and writing a check much much larger than I've ever written before in my life.

The view from the living room.

As I type this, SHR is playing Mappy (part of our Pick and Climb bounty, more on that later) while singing her own song that goes something like this, "Hamachi! Welcome to Brooklyn, Hamachi!"

I've Decided

From now on, I will never greet someone by their first name. Just a "Hello" or a "How are you?" Or perhaps both.

I can not remember anyone's name. Ever. It is bad. So by my logic, if I never greet anyone by their name, then I'll never be seen as the kind of guy that doesn't remember names. So the next time I run into you, whether I know your name or not, I will not put your name into my greeting.

Not that anyone would have ever noticed this new strategy except for me. But, I'm just simply stating this for the record.

Thank you.

Mid December Blahs

What's up with me you ask?

I drank way too much at the faculty party the other night. At least I didn't piss off any librarians this year at the party, as far as I know.

I am without cable or internet at home right now and it is killing me. I am quite dependent. Well, we do have wireless the past few days that we are picking up from a neighbor. But that ain't the same for me.

I hate writing report cards.

Buying an apartment is retarded.

Working isn't as much fun as not working.

Bocce championships this week.

Not much else to say but here's some more searches that led to me.

adam brody's hair
Huey Lewis and the News Story behind Bobo Tempo
I Hate Baseball
Does Michelle Rodriguez Have a Girlfriend
Reconstituted Meat
curse of armando benitez
"how's the ring" mike mussina
"They really think this is good?" music
listmaker easy to use
Is it make you upset when other people do not stand for the National pledge?
hayden christensen + circumcised
stomping clomping upstairs neighbors
Bobby Higginson's Limo Company

File Under Grain

I have a unibrow. Always have.

When I was in the 7th grade, it bothered me. So I did what any self-respecting kid would do. I shaved that shit.

Yes, yes I know. Stupid, right? Why shave it? It will grow right back and thicker than the first time, right? The 12-year-old Listmaker was more concerned about getting a date to the Winter Ball than worrying too much about post 1985 matters.

A few weeks ago, I brought in my grandfather's war scrapbook. Every year, I tell my class his story hoping to inspire them to wish a Happy Veteran's Day to any veteran they might know.

One child, Girl Who Always Is Trying to Get Away With Something, said "Your grandfather was so good looking. Much better looking than you. You've got a unibrow!"

When I relayed this story to SHR, she thought it was hilarious. She's been after me for years to let her pluck my unibrow. Every now and again, I let her pluck a hair here and there but never the whole thing. That shit hurts.

I have a unibrow. Always have. Or at least I did, until yesterday.

Yesterday, she began to pester me again. My face is a broad canvass to her. She always wants to pluck something from it. As I was minding my own business reading the sports page, she appeared out of nowhere ready to pluck. "Come on Listmaker, just a couple."

Sometimes it is better to just let her do it, rather than fight it. But within a few quick moments, a couple hairs had turned into ten. I implored her to leave me alone. But she wouldn't. She was a woman possessed. Possessed by the urge to destroy my unibrow.

The agony went on and on. Snip, snip, just a couple more, snip.

Why can't a man have a unibrow if he chooses to have one?

Finally, SHR told me she would quit if I wanted her to. I did want her to. But when I inspected her handiwork in the mirror, I realized how an incomplete job made it even worse. She had won! I headed back and told her to finish the job. What must have been 30 painful plucks later, my unibrow was finally gone.

Granted, it isn't perfect. I'd need a lot more time under the surgeon's tools for it to be truly sculpted. But for the first time, possibly ever, I have two eyebrows.

And I feel naked.

Ripped From Today's Headlines

1. File Under I Know What I Want for Christmas This Year:

For those who want to keep their iPods close at all times, there is the Atech Flash iCarta stereo dock on a toilet-paper holder that mounts on the wall. Compatible with most recent iPod models (and presumably all brands of toilet paper), the iCarta comes with four integrated speakers to bounce sound off the bathroom walls. With its electrical adapter, the iCarta charges the iPod while it is parked in the dock. The system sells for around $100 and is available at many online electronics stores.

2. File Under Borat Isn't as Funny As These Guys:

Iran Invites Scholars to Assess Holocaust as History or Fiction

Iran says that it can be the perfect impartial judge on this topic because they "are not accused and responsible for the Holocaust".

Mr. Mohammadi dismissed the notion that the seminar could promote anti-Semitism, saying anti-Semitism was a Western phenomenon. The proof for that, he said, was Iran’s community of 25,000 Jews.

Well, I'm glad that's settled - there are no anti-Semites in the Middle East. Got it.

3. File Under New Forms of Terror

An American Airlines flight was forced to make an emergency landing on Monday morning after a passenger lighted a match to disguise the scent of flatulence, the authorities said.

Random Thoughts as I Get Ready to Watch The Wire

1. I dig that the last few episodes of Friday Night Lights featured songs by Camera Obscura, The Stooges, and Beulah. That show has settled into a nice little groove.

2. Loved, loved, loved the last episode of Heroes. And thanks to the marathon on Sci-Fi Channel, I've finally seen the first episode.

3. SHR and I have three more episodes of Battlestar Galactica, Season 2.5. We were so into it but Disc 2 was a little lackluster. It felt like the writers were just biding time to what they wanted to have at the end of the season. A lot of things being introduced that seemed disconnected to other events or major plot points that were just thrown at us. Overall kind of lazy.

Still, Slice said the end of the season is amazing. So as soon as that third disc arrives from Netflix, SHR and I excitedly watch it. I can't believe we've caught up so quickly. Does Sci-Fi Channel replay the current season or do they bury it until the DVD's?

And for the record, the major event that Beth said happened at the beginning of the first season still hasn't happened and we're nearing the end of the 20 episodes of Season 2 + 2.5. Beth, Beth, Beth.

4. I'm something like 0-12 vs. Mooney in squash. But once I scored 7 points against him. Progress.

5. We found a great house today that we want to buy. I doubt it will work out though for various reasons. Reason number one being we're not rich. Darn.

6. While we might not be rich enough to buy a house, we are rich enough to buy new stereo equipment. After years of wanting one, I finally broke down and bought a Bose Soundwave. It sounds damn good but I don't remember the bass being so damn high on it. It doesn't seem like you can fiddle with the settings. As Mitch once so eloquently said about the 5th Ave brunch venue that pre-syrups its french toast - how arrogant.

7. I can live with Barry Zito. Go get 'em Omar.