Broken Rules of Marketing

I passed a hair and nail salon the other day that clearly never bothered to put its business' name through any sort of peer review process.

I imagine that the "SoHo Salaon" was trying to evoke and idea of the South Hampton neighborhood, but someone really should have told the guy making their requisite neon window sign.

He just kind of smooshed it together so it read, "SoHoSalon," which–my mind being what it is– picked up on as "So ho," as is "So Very, Very, Ho(ish)."

As in, "Hey! Look at that ravaged, raving twatter of a slut. I bet she got her cornrows did at So Ho."

I wouldn't name my dog grooming service "Dirty Bitches." Although, actually, I might. That's the kind of edgy, New York thinking that gets a man ahead on the East Coast.

But not if he's running a hair salon.

Like Kids, the Best Pets are Somebody Else's

"Now is the winter of your discontent."

I'm not a dog person, but I love playing with pups so long as they aren't stinky pups.

Cats, same boat as long as I don't have to scoop that poop.

Kids, I mostly just like watching them like kindergarten is a zoo. No interest in touching one, or even really being noticed, just hang back with the pedophiles and angry dads restricted by the refs from getting too close to the soccer field.

I love my cats, but only when my mom was around to feed them. Dogs at my dad's house are a distant second, my cousin's kids and babies at work come in third an astronomical distance behind. Still, I get joy from these things.

Which is why I look forward to my roommate being able to bring her cat when we move into our new place. I love having a cat to pet and love and cuddle, I just hate fish smell and cleaning poop.

Let somebody else worry about sanitation and responsibility.

I'm going to be the "Fun Uncle" to animals everywhere.

Maybe to humans too, one day, but only once they're big enough to be cool.

Creepy Thought of the Day

Have you ever stared down a fish?

I don't just mean get into a contest over something stupid, I mean looked down through a fish.

You can see into it. Look down a fish's mouth, and it goes all the way back. It opens it's mouth and you just see a cavernous salmon-colored maw. At some point you know it has to hit a stomach, but you never see that, you just see what is, presumably, the back of the fish.

There's a reason I don't eat seafood. And that's that I can't stand the smell. But also fish are creepy.

Cute Puppies: Female Aphrodisiac, Male Contraceptive

A girl came into my store last week. This is not atypical, truthfully. She was also rather attractive, and clearly well over the age of consent in all 48 contiguous states, Alaska, Hawaii, and even Puerto Rico and other colonial landholdings of the United States. And I must admit, I stared quite a bit.

Everyone was pretty alright with this, as this girl happened to be holding one of the laziest, most adorable puppies I've ever seen. It never left her arm. The one arm. A second was not necessary. To be fair, I'm not sure this dog was even awake more than 30% of the time his owner was in the store. The only thing I saw him do was yawn.

Oh yes, him. I know it was male, because we kept cruising this girl so hard eventually we had to admit it was just a cute dog and we didn't suspect her of shoplifting with an incredibly realistic hand puppet. She then informed us the little guy was named Jeffrey. Adorable.

Amazingly, it stands to reason this was the only time such a pretty young lady could be certain that people were checking out her dog and not, say, her ass. While I'm sure Jeff attracts that certain breed of douchebag who see him as an "in" with his master, more often then not I'd suspect she does not bring her dog with her to casual pick-up spots for the swarthy Lothario club hopping crowd.

All the attention we lavish upon her is directed entirely at her dog. It's the same method douchebag men use to attract gorgeous women and then sway the conversation to drinks and superficial bonding activities.

Basically, this girl is either the world's greatest (worst?) female pick-up artist, or she's discovered the most effective manner of unwanted male attention deterrent since the all-girls gym membership.

Bravo, Miss.

Bwavo.

The Better Mousetrap

"You can't imagine…
the things I've seen."

My cat's become a veritable mouser. He caught one that fell out of our hallway closet a few weeks ago, but this past week he caught and killed three more in just two days. (Alright, one suffocated in the tuperwear my mom eventually trapped it in and I'm pretty sure one drowned in his one blood, but still, all dead as direct result of feline aggression. That's like two counts murder-1 and a man-2.)

We started thinking about laying out traps. They haven't evolved much, but if you pay extra you can get one of those non-lethal little cages or sticky-pads. As cliched as it is even today, the adage seems to be true, you really can't create a better mousetrap.

That seems like bullshit. Surely, someone can create something more efficient or more effective without compromising the simplicity of the tool. The guillotine and short-drop gallows were both improvements over remarkably similar devices. Why not the mousetrap?

Probably because I keep a cat. It's self-cleaning, can literally sniff out mice wherever in the house they may be, hunts them, adapts to the situation–truly, a thinking tool–and is near 100% effective. Hell, if you don't clean out this trap fast enough, it even disposes of the carcass itself half the time.

Still, I don't have to feed those little wooden spring traps. Or clean their poo.

DVR Cat

What are you doing up there, cat? You are not a DVR, you don't even have an HDMI port. Get down from there.


Damn warm, though.

Blame That Smell On the Cat

I've been seeing cats recently. Honestly, if I haven't been seeing way more raccoons, I'd swear they were my spirit animal following me around, trying to warn me of impending life lessons.

Few while driving, one clearly an outdoors-pet, two or three today I named "Dumpster Cat" at a horrible, low-income, ghetto-style apartment complex, which had a propensity for tricycles strewn about the property.

And this:

Yup.

That's a litter box training kit for your cat. If you live in a city, it's inconvenient to have to keep a small box in your tiny apartment. Obviously, the solution is to turn your toilet into a litter box for a few weeks, which you will likely poop in by mistake at least once in the middle of the night, then make it a little dessert oasis with a hole in the middle, such that the cat poop falls into the bowl beneath and you have to clean less, and then finally just have your cat pooping in the toilet like a normal person.

Except it's a cat.

My mom used to have a friend whose cat learned to do this on his own, but didn't figure out how to flush. This friend was terribly distraught at the notion of some weird person sneaking into her home every day, only to poop in the toilet and not flush it. Then she caught her cat doing it and that was that.

But yes, I'm sure it's much more convenient to only have to flush the toilet a dozen more times a day than cleaning a stinky box once.

Plus, it forever ends arguments about who left the seat up.

May The Force Bark With You!

 

 

If we can dress out snub-nosed dogs like Ewoks, Darth Vader or Yoda, I want to know why I can't find a tiny Imperial navy uniform for a dog.

I would name him Admiral Shnozzle.

On Stupid Pet Tricks

In honor of the snow day we had here in the Northeast, and the ensuing weekend festivities of playoff season, I'm bequeathing you, today, a mini-blog showcasing what we have to do to entertain the cat so actual work can get down around the house while he's tuckered out.



I believe I captured the dumb kitty talk voice pretty well. Also, I can't believe I sound like that when I talk to my cat. I need a broader social life.

Causes of Head Wounds Which Have Drawn Blood

I hit my head today. It hurt a lot, but mostly pride until I verified that I was bleeding. So my brain's working about 20% efficiency. Enjoy a thematically related list.

Causes of Head Wounds Which Have Drawn Blood:

• Glass shelf (little blood)
  
• Cat bite (surprising amount of blood compared to size of puncture)
  
• Mid-air collision with another Jew (profuse bleeding)

It occurs to me Jews might be our own antimatter. It'd explain why we complain so much in close proximity to each other: we sense impending annihilation. Also why we're historically combustible.

On Cats

I was perusing some news sites today, sitting with a cat in my lap when I hear a rattling sound come from the other room.

Now this didn't seem at all odd, since the other cat was somewhere out there, very likely getting into the boxes and boxes of Christmas decorations we just recently pulled out of the attic for his little kitty amusement.

Although, after about twenty minute of only the same periodic sound, I became worried. Like the sudden silence of children out of sight, a cat only making one mischievous noise for any extended period of time can only spell certain doom for you or your possessions.

Yeah.

Turns out he managed to clime a series of open plastic storage bins to the bookshelf, where I assume he crossed the treadmill front display like a bridge to the cardboard box stored on top of two medium sized plastic tubs.

The empty cardboard box. That's three feet high. With an open top.

Yeaaaaaahh … I ended up having to approach the wiggling box and verify that there was no cat on either side of it, that it was still tiny paws scratching the sides of this box that made the noise I was hearing and, ultimately, that the box weighed about seven pounds more than an empty box should.

And son of a bitch, when I took the box down and tipped it over and opened the top … nothing. Damned cat didn't even feel like coming out after all that. Had to claw him out myself. God, I love those little bastards.

On Dogs

Shh, shh, just go to sleep. It'll all be over soon.
You won't be able to hurt anyone else ever again.
Sleep now, forever, demon spawn.

When people came to the New World they brought their pets. When they moved Out West, they did the same. Homesteaders and frontiersmen occasionally had to deal with bears.

The thing is, big dogs like shepherds, retrievers, danes and labradors, they would try to fight off the bears an protect their masters.

Obviously, they died. Horribly. By bears.

But little dogs? Those little rat-looking things and toys and spaniels? Things that were bread with tiny bodies and short legs so they could burrow down into rodent dens and flush out the offending vermin? They yapped and yapped and yapped at the bears until they got annoyed and left.

Those fuckers scared off bears and lived.

And that's why celebritants like to carry tiny dogs around with them. They're afraid of bears.

Idle Thought: Cat Lamps

Ba danna wa oda, wookie nipple pinchy.

What does my cat think of a lamp?

Is it like a little sun that doesn't know how to climb the sky right? A kitten? Where's its parent? Why isn't it teaching it how to be a proper sun when it grows up? Who's taking responsibility, here?

Or what about when I reach up to snuff out the sun at bedtime? Do I hold the power to kill the sun? It is a small sun, to be sure, but to kill a child does not take much power at all.

Then again, I create and obliterate these child-suns at will. Often I will extinguish one and mere moments later return it to life as if idly lost in thought, then, finding myself again, return it to oblivion and another room falls back to darkness.

Could I end the great sun above? I birth and undo so very many child-suns each day; is it so hard to think I could reach up into the gray-blue one twilight and pluck the very fire from the sky? Is my magic really that strong?

An eternal blackness. Perhaps this is what I fear each night as I create the tiny lights that guide me  through 'til morrow. Perhaps not even I know what secrets are held in the Great Sun, though my power be great.

Ooh, look, a cookie. I can haz it.

On The Recurrent Theme of Zombies In My Dreams

The other night I went to sleep an hour earlier than usual. (3 a.m. Sue me; I don't keep to your "normie" diurnal sleep cycles.)

I laid awake, constantly rolling over and making notes on my phone for what I had to do the next day. I recalled that the zombie T.V. show I'd been following had just aired it's last episode and I needed to remember to watch it online, lest I forget for several more days.

Then a thought occurred to me: maybe I could watch it on my phone. My phone is smart. It does things. Perhaps I could watch T.V. on my phone and not have to boot my computer back up.

So I rolled over and grabbed my phone. Fifteen minutes later I had verified that my phone could not do this, would not be able to until a certain mobile browser gets released and I don't have to rely on forced, hap-hazard Flash compatibility, and then, yes, I ended up just watching the episode on my computer right then.

It only took about 22 minutes, but now I was riled up with zombies. And surely though I am not frightened of zombies, my brain would conjure up escalating horrific trials for myself were I to attempt sleep right then with undead on my brain. So I read a comic for a few minutes.

The comic on which that T.V. show is based.

Of course this is a Japanese comic, and like Europe and the rest of Asia, Japan is always horrified that Americans have such a problem with sexuality on television but no problem with graphic violence. So when they make a zombie show, they play up all the sexy parts in order to counterbalance taking out all the really gory bits. Soooo I just read something even more graphic. Great. Wonderful.

So I watched another Japanese cartoon, this time something cutesy and silly about little girls and schoolyard misunderstandings. I wasn't getting to sleep any earlier, but I was pretty sure I wouldn't be dreaming of zombies.

NOPE.

Dreamnt something was grabbing and clawing at my foot. Very unpleasant. As I fell to the ground (off a school desk, I think; at least the schoolgirls did some good), I awoke to find our new kitten attacking my foot at the end of the bed because it was between him and his big brother cat.

I fear no zombie. I fear my cats, because that's at least a rational terror.

On The Truth About Cats & Dogs II: "Cat You Later"

My friend Carolyn has a puppy who runs during REM sleep. She also has a fully grown Labrador who also runs and twitches as she dreams.

She also has a cat.

I've had plenty of cats and I can assure you: no cat has ever ran in its sleep. Why? What is up with cats that they don't do this? Do they not experience REM sleep? Is there dignity and self-control so powerful that even whilst they slumber cats will not permit their baser instincts to make them look the fool? (Considering the positions the often sleep in and their confounded reaction to laser pointers, I refuse to believe this possibility.) My theory?

Cat's don't have hopes or dreams.

They merely have a list of demands, and only remain with us so long as we meet those daily.

On Language Recall

I went out today to look for signs that someone nearby has lost the kitten which recently showed up, literally, on our doorstep. I found none. So she's ours now. Awesome.

But what I did find was a family of deer grazing on somebody's backyard shrubbery in the middle of the day. Also, a generic Latino family having a barbecue. I thought about asking them if they'd misplaced a kitten, but they were all busy having a good time. The closest guy was on the phone, turned away from me, in fact.

But I wondered, if it came to it, could I ask them in Spanish? My Spanish is terrible. I mean truly, frighteningly bad. If it is of any importance, if it would not be completely useless, I cannot say it. Ask for holy water to put out a cow fire in my pants? Sure. Not a problem. But something simple? Screwed. Royally. "Tan que el rey." Pretty sure that meant, "As the king." You get the idea.

But I thought to myself. Quickly, so as not to over think it. "¿Te buscando para un gato pequeño? ¿Todo negro, pero con blanca aquí?"

Holy crap, that wasn't terrible. Granted, that was a grammatical nightmare, but it could have been far worse. The last time a Spanish guy asked if I could speak Spanish, not only did I forget the word for "a little," but I forgot the word for "no."

I'll give you a hint. It's "no."

So I can talk about cats, still. At least if I ever get stuck in Spain I'll always be able to order Chinese food.

KITTEN SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT

IMPORTANT BULLETIN!

LOST KITTEN DISCOVERED NEAR NEW CHALET APARTMENTS!!

• Small (~6-7lbs) possibly female kitten
  
• All black except for white tuft on chest
• yellow eyes
• NOT declawed
• a little wary but very sociable/loving around new people.

This is clearly somebody's pet and has been outside for at least two of three days. She is very nice as long as you move slow and was very hungry and thirsty when we took her in, but she has been friendly and playful except around our older, male cat.

If anyone has any knowledge of this cat's owners please contact me at the following number or email address:

914.450.3301
dzucker1@gmail.com

I wouldn't normally use my blog as a soapbox for anything serious, but this cat is definitely missed, so we need to find her home. Again, if anyone hears anything, please let us know. Thanks.


Oh, a joke: Um, this cat is adorable, tiny, and answers to no name at all because it's a cat and it doesn't give a crap about what you think.

Things I Have Learned Housesitting

Things I Have Learned Housesitting:

• Always bring your own toilet paper.
• Dogs are fucking crazy for chasing rabbits.
  
• "Unbreakable" Kryptonite brand bike chains have a lifetime warrantee that does cover gettin chewed through, but after three run throughs customer service starts getting a tad miffed.
• Birds don't eat fucking anything.

On The Truth About Cats & Dogs

Yup, that's a hairball, alright … and IIIIIIIIII helped!"

I'm going to be very honest with you.

I have never seen Cyrano de Bergerac, nor do I even like "Roxanne" by the Police. I neither have seen The Truth About Cats & Dogs and particularly dislike Uma Thurman's face, though like all good misanthropes I harbor an unrequited geek-crush on Janeane Garofalo.

I'm willing to bet this is for the same reasons I like cats better than dogs.

I know, I know, I'm a traitor to men everywhere, whose ancestors hunted with their semi-tamed wolf partners to bring down enormous prey and eat its delicious, delicious flesh-bits.

Fuck it. Dogs smell bad. I know men smell bad, but I try really hard not to. I'm not even allergic to dander in the slightest, I just don't like how dogs smell. I don't like that that scent gets all over you immediately as you touch one, that it's not even completely water soluble and takes some serious scrubbing to get off. Cats? Cats are fuckin' OCD about bathing themselves. On top of that they don't do much all day long. They don't get tired and pant since they can't sweat. When a cat gets hot they just know to cut it the hell out and lay down 'til it cools off.

Cats are lazy. Not only does this keep them from smelling just awful–or at all; you really have to get a facefull of cat to smell anything off them–it also means they don't require a lot of maintenance. Feed a cat and change its litter box every so often. The cat will take care of the rest himself.

Cats are dicks. We recognize our own and they appreciate my bluntness, my honesty and my aloof attitude. The nastiest cats in the world love me, because I don't cause them grief and I don't pump out fear-mones like they're paleolithic giants and I'm a tiny, wounded gazelle of some kind, an impala, perhaps.

Do you know what it feels like to get that unconditional love from a pet or another human being? Doesn't it feel much better when you actually respect the other creature? When you feel like you've earned that love and deserve it?

Of course it doesn't. You're dog people. All you want is someone to throw you another stick to fetch.

On Mini Bikes

Despite my enduring illness, I chose to go out in the sunshine and cool breeze today, endeavoring to blow the germs off me.

This is what I call a lie. In actuality, I went out to play a couple half-assed rounds of Wiffle Ball. However, in doing so I was able to witness a young boy of perhaps fourteen years cruise past on the nearby sidewalk, riding on of these:

This is what is called a "mini bike." You can understand where the name comes from, if you were to look at one and say, "Well, that just sort of looks like a … mini … bike, as it were. Huh."

You hear that last, "Huh," echoing in the back of your head? That's the part of your brain that hears warning claxons every time real life conflicts with supposedly common sense. It's registering "WTF?" or more often, "WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?!"

Frankly, I have no idea. As best I can figure it's a type of novelty, something First World nations buy out of Brookstone catalogs with rebate checks from the taxes they cheated on, the type of thing that makes people who are well off (but not well enough to actually afford their own) think, "Well, maybe the terrorists do kind of have a point about us."

Let me put it another way: The kind of people who would buy an mini bike are the same people who think that it is alright doing this to their pets –––>

What's that dog thinking? Doesn't he look happy?

NO! He's thinking, "GODDAM IT, YOU FUCKING BITCH, PUT ME DOWN! I AM A DOG! I SHOULD BE ON THE GROUND! YOUR REFUSAL TO LET ME USE MY LEGS IS GIVING ME CANINE DIABETES! DO YOU SEE MY TONGUE OUT?! I'M NOT HAPPY! I'M A DOG; I DON'T SWEAT! THAT IS ME DEHYDRATING AS YOU DRAG ME ACROSS THE BEACH, YOU FUCKING WHORE! WHY DID YOU EVEN BRING ME HERE?! I HAVE SAND IN MY EYES! THIS IS A TERRIBLE PLACE FOR A DOG! GODDAM SHIT ASS!" (I may be paraphrasing.)

These people have no consideration for how things are supposed to be. They see something cool, like a car:
and immediately assume that anything smaller than a regular-sized thing is either hilarious or adorable:






Yes, this might apply to animals, or hand-carved miniatures, or even little metal Monopoly pieces, but the sad fact of the matter is this does not apply to motorcycles.

Let's look at a motorcycle.
Yeah, that's a motorcycle, alright, but it looks a little like the mini bike, doesn't it?

This is what Big Strong Manly Men call a "crotch rocket." You sit like the more receptive partner in a gay relationship, waving your big, brightly colored attention flag which shouts, "Lookit me, lookit me!" as you drive by.


Real men prefer something like this:



Just look at that. That is what, ideally, I will own before I'm thirty-five. That is a black Honda Rebel. It's not some little Japanese sport shit, that's a road bike, technically a touring/cruiser hybrid, with great gas mileage and a starting price of only about three grand. Plus it's a Honda, which means it's actually made in Ohio by American jobs. This is the bike you get as a first bike, something to dent and ding and wipe out in so you're all practiced by the time you get one of these:

Yeah, babe. That's a Harley. No one questions your heterosexuality (out loud) when you're blasting down the street on one of these monsters. These things start at an asking price the same as a foreign car, dude. A foreign car with options added.

Even with a gay little windshield and a bitch seat and the sissy bar and a couple of those saddle bags I can't stand strapped to its motor-ass like a combustion pack mule, these animals look sick.
I'm probably going to stick just to the Rebel because I know I'm not man enough for one of these. That's how badass these are.

Which brings me to my final point: smaller versions of things are cuter than regular-sized versions of things if those regular things are already supposed to be cute. Tiny versions of many things are not manly. Tiny motorcycle? Not manly. Tiny King Kong? Regular monkey.

In fact Manly Things only get progressively more manly when they get bigger.









Manly beer. Manly steak. (That's one steak.) Manly giant saw thing.

I guarantee you no man riding a giant motorcycle will look as stupid as a man riding on a ridiculous little mini bike.























Alright, unless it's wearing tiny little training wheels. But still only maybe, then.