8-27-01

In the Residence Hall I’m living in this year, people actually lock the bathroom and shower doors, which means that I have to unlock the door every time I need to spend a penny. I don’t understand this precaution. What the hell are they worried about happening if they keep the bathroom doors unlocked? Somebody sneaking and stealing a quick piss? Honestly, that wouldn’t affect me in any way. Community bathrooms are just simply one of those rooms that you don’t need to lock.

I also feel that planners and notebooks could do without including a list of “frequently misspelled words,” because no one ever consults this mysterious chart. Nobody’s ever been like, “Oh, I can’t spell ‘conscience’! What am I going to—wait! Frequently misspelled words, you’ve saved me once again!” Additionally, I don’t need the following in my notebooks: multiplication tables, linear measurement conversions and graphical listings of time zones in the USA. Come to think of it, I don’t really need the notepaper either. Christ, I shouldn’t have bought so many damn notebooks.

Incidentally, I now have what the kids call “AIM” on my computer, so if anybody wants to chew the fat with me while I’m for some reason on the “internet,” I am listed as wickensworth. I prefer goat fat, but any fat will do as long as isn’t baboon fat. I can’t stand baboon fat.

Speaking of baboon fat, it’s good to see that adamkangas.com is back on the trolley. I don’t know how that relates to baboon fat, but I couldn’t think of a better segue. Keep up with the Kool-Aid metaphors, Adam! Kool-Aid is both poetic and delicious! Oh hell yeah!

8-24-01

Has anyone else noticed that the Olson twins are aging at a faster rate than humanly possible? When I was ten, they were maybe two or three years old. Now that I’m nineteen, they’re somehow already fifteen. At this pace, they’re going to be older than I am when I’m thirty. Also, there’ll probably be three or four of them by then.

Another weird thing that I noticed today is that, when I’m driving alone, I tend to call all the other drivers on the street “buddy.” I’ll be like, “let’s go, buddy, go ahead and switch lanes,” or, “way to go, buddy, you just ran that red light and totaled my car! Well, you’re my buddy, I forgive you.” But these people aren’t my real buddies, because my real buddies wouldn’t need to be reminded that they’re the first person at a four-way stop sign, or that it’s a green light and they need to start moving. These people are really just jackasses.

In conclusion, the Olson twins are mutant children who age faster than anybody else, and I call everybody else on the road my buddy.

8-20-01

The most shameful thing about me is that sometimes I like to watch a show on the Disney Channel called Bug Juice. It’s the true story of a bunch of kids who go to summer camp and have to deal with such issues as having to wake up when they don’t want to and having to go hiking when they don’t want to. Ultimately, they learn the true meaning of what summer camp is all about, which is that summer camp is very special.

Watching Bug Juice always reminds me of how I never went to a real summer camp when I was a child. This always makes me very sad. I mean, suppose I somehow get transported back to medieval times: I will be completely lacking in the archery skills taught at summer camp. If somebody challenges me to an archery contest in the Middle Ages, I’m as good as fucked. Or what if I get stuck in a tree one day, and the only way down is by walking across a bunch of carefully laid out ropes? I have no rope course experiences whatsoever, which consequently also means that I’ve never learned that I can conquer any challenge that stands in my way. But the worst part about having never been to summer camp is that I’ve never discovered the true value of team spirit, which is the greatest lesson of all.

Anyway, I’ve got to go back to Michigan State next Saturday for about my second or third year of college—I don’t know the exact year, but it’s some shit like that. I know that I’ve already been to college once, so it can’t be my freshman year, and I don’t think I’m old enough to be a senior. Either way, I’m looking forward to school this year, as it will give me an opportunity to skip classes and avoid studying for tests. I miss not going to classes and not studying.

8-15-01

It used to be that when somebody wanted to make a children’s show, all they had to do was take a disheveled old man off the street and force him to mingle with a few retarded puppets for a half an hour. Mr. Rogers, Mr. Dress-up, Mr. Wizard—all of these shows were about senile men who hung out with puppets in their living rooms, except for Mr. Wizard, which was about a senile man who made rockets out of baking soda and milk cartons. But you could definitely tell that Mr. Wizard wanted a puppet.

I imagine that these shows were first created with loftier goals, but then the producers were always just like, “Well, we ran out of money, so instead of that awesome cartoon we were going to make, all we can afford is an old man and a few socks.” And kids bought that shit up. We were all, “An old man and some puppets? Well, fuck, I’m only four years old, I don’t care what the hell I watch.” We were so lame.

On another topic, I think every movie should be like The Princess Bride in that they should all be interrupted every fifteen minutes by Fred Savage telling his grandfather what he thinks of the story. Imagine how much greater Jurassic Park 3 would have been if, right when a dinosaur was about to eat somebody, the scene suddenly switched to Fred Savage sitting on his bed and saying, “But the dinosaur won’t eat them, grandpa, I just know it!” Then his grandfather would say, “Do you want me to continue telling the story or not? Now, as I was saying, the tyrannosaurus was chasing after them, when all of a sudden …” And then it would switch back to the action. This would make any movie way more interesting—in fact, I now find it difficult to watch a movie that isn’t being told to Fred Savage by an old man. And that’s a hell of a lot of movies.

8-12-01

As a general rule, if you have arrived at eKarjala using Google, this page is almost certainly not what you were looking for. For example, according to the Bravenet.com hit-counter at the bottom of my page, today somebody staggered onto this site looking for “vicodin pictures.” I don’t know why Google thinks that I specialize in pictures of Vicodin, but I really don’t. Meanwhile, another person recently came across this page using the search “gifts after getting your wisdom teeth pulled.” This guy was apparently looking for a gift to generously give their poor friend who just got his or her wisdom teeth pulled, but instead they ended up listening to me call a bunch of things retarded. I feel bad about this, and incase this person comes back, I would like to suggest that they get him a caramel apple, and then delight in watching him struggle to eat it. Then they should get him a book about airplanes, because airplanes are neat.

What some people may not know is that this is not the only site called eKarjala on the Information Superhighway of Fun. For the discerning viewer, there is http://www.ekarjala.fi/, which makes way less sense than my site does, possibly because it is written in Finnish. Their slogan is Maakuntaportaali, which I wish I had thought of first, as it is a clever double-meaning: It refers to the fact that their site is concurrently both Maakunta Port and Taport aali aali aali. Additionally, it raises an interesting question: Can anything truly be Maakuntaportaali without first being Maakunt Ali Port, or is that an oxymoron? Then again, Maakun Portaali Kunta. No pun intended!

If you don’t understand eKarjala.fi, I recommend checking out this page, which is a random list of gibberish that may help clarify things. Here is an actual quote from this page:

Intra 3

asian-

tuntija

Thanks a lot, eKarjala.fi, that really answers a lot of my questions about Asian Tuntijas. However, you forgot to mention the following:

fornita-XTR7

mexian-

teenage mutant ninja turtles cereal

In conclusion, Maakuntaportaali.

8-6-01

It has occurred to me that I have not updated this site in a while. While I’m not at liberty to reveal the complete reason for this, I will admit that it has everything to do with ninjas. But ninjas aside, here are some more reviews of old sayings, with one dollar sign being the least totally rad and five dollar signs being the most.

There’s more than one way to skin a cat: I think that, no matter how you skin a cat, you’re still a sick person for mutilating an animal. I’d hate to meet the person who first said this. I picture a crazy guy who lives in somebody’s basement, and who always has a bunch of sharp tools spread out around the floor. “Must … skin cat. There are … several ways … to do this.” I have no idea how this saying got popular. There’s more than one way to kick a dog in the head, but you don’t hear me going around mentioning that. $

Don’t cry over spilt milk: Until I heard this quote, I would lose myself in a fit of tears every time I dropped a glass of milk. I’d say, “My glass of 2% milk! No!” I was an emotional wreck until this quote came along. It taught me to suck it up and keep all of my tears bottled up inside, and now I’m unable to cry. Thanks to this saying, now I just get really depressed whenever I spill milk. $$$

People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones: If you live in a glass house, there’s a lot of things you shouldn’t do. For example, you should never go upstairs, because you’d probably just crash through to the first floor in a horrible mess of glass shards and blood. If I lived in a glass house, I’d be more concerned with affording a real place to live than with throwing stones. Not even the three little pigs were retarded enough to build a house out of glass. Hell, I recommend throwing stones at your crappy little house. That place is a goddamn health hazard. $$

You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink: I hate when this happens. I’m leading my horse to get her some water, and she’s walking along behind me with no noticeable problems. Then when we finally get to the water, that little bastard doesn’t drink. I’m always like, “Damnit, Ginger! If you weren’t thirsty, why did you make me walk all this way?” Horses are very stubborn animals, but also very wise. $$$$$

You can’t have your cake and eat it too: The hell you can’t. If I bought a cake, I’m going to eat that son of a bitch. You have the cake, and then you eat it. You do both. Or you eat half the cake, and keep the rest, thus fulfilling both the act of having and the act of eating. Or you just buy two cakes: one for having, the other for eating. There’s a lot of ways to simultaneously have and eat a cake, and none of them are that difficult to figure out. The guy who said this was probably an idiot. $

The pen is mightier than the sword: The obvious argument denouncing this adage would be that nobody has ever won a sword fight using a 23 cent Bic pen, but let me play devil’s advocate for a moment and say this: “I’m the devil’s advocate! Ahh! Go to the dark side! Trust the devil!” So you see, the pen really is mightier than the sword. $$$$

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks: For some reason, this saying reminded me of those paintings of dogs playing poker, and I laughed for about twenty minutes. This saying is hilarious. $$$$$

Beggars can’t be choosers: Beggars have gone through enough hardships in their lives without people telling them that they don’t have the ability to chose. When somebody begs me for something, I make it a point to give them at least three choices. I’ll say, “Here you go, pal, take your pick.” It’s always good to raise beggars’ spirits in their time of need. $

A dog’s bark is worst than its bite: This saying sounds pretty accurate until a dog actually bites you. Then it’s just kind of like, “Well, hey, that was much worse than the bark was. I’ve … I’ve got to get to the hospital.” These dogs aren’t bluffing: Their bite is pretty much as bad as you inferred it would be from their bark. This is why some people are afraid of dogs. They’re very scary animals. $$

Curiosity killed the cat: Curiosity didn’t kill the cat, that guy who skins cats in his basement killed the cat. And anyway, from what I know about cats, they’re not very curious, as they always seem really, really tired. Whoever said this must have been thinking of the monkey Curious George, and he’s not even dead. $$