Wednesday, April 7, 2010

who can fix me up before the big policeman's ball?

Good lord, it’s not even 9 and I’ve already been identity thefted this morning. It started when I got an email suggesting that there’d been odd activity on my card, which, since I was just in the UK, made sense to me. It directed me to a website where I filled out all sorts of personal info (dick size, favorite snack, pin number, songs that make me cry [“there’ll be sad songs” by Billy Ocean] etc). Well, Next thing I know, I’m realizing that it wasn’t a legitimate website and so I’ve been on the phone all morning fixing what I broke. Jesus. I feel like a grade A rube. I guess all I’m saying is that if you come to this blog soon and it says something like GROW YOUR PENIS IN JUST TWO WEEKS or HELLO MY NAME IS ABDULLA MARTINEZ ON BEHALF OF THE DISPLACED CROWN PRINCE OF CONGO or anything like that, it’s probably not me. It’s the internet, which, if you take away all the beautiful young girls getting happily pounded by throngs of high fiving misogynists with huge cocks, is actually a pretty dark and exploitive place. Who knew? Not me. That’s for sure.

Before all this ID theft craziness took over my morning, I was going to talk about the garbage man. I think I’ve touched on this before, but I’m gonna go ahead and repeat myself. In the morning, especially a spring morning my windows are open and I’m asleep. I live right by an alley that’s full of dumpsters. On certain days (in this case Wednesdays) the garbage men are out there just backing up their trucks (which loudly beep, imitating an alarm clock pretty perfectly) around five forty five/six AM. This, unsurprisingly, wakes me up and causes me no end of stress. I mean, I don’t get a lot of sleep. I’ve got an almost two year old running around every day starting around 645-7, and I’m about three weeks out from having a screaming infant keeping me up around the clock for three months, so I cherish these moments of sleep when they come. The garbage men rob me of that precious sleep. It’s a sack pummeling on the highest level.

BUT, you can’t get mad at the garbage man. I mean, think of the exchange:

“Hey asshole, quit backing up your goddamned truck! I’m trying to sleep up here!”

“Oh, sorry. I guess I lost track of what time it is because I’ve been up since 345 picking up YOUR FUCKING GARBAGE YOU UNGRATEFUL PRICK!”

And, well, he’d be right. There’s nothing so thankless as being a garbage man. They get up SO fucking early…howard stern early, but they’re not rolling in millions of dollars and interviewing strippers. They’re rolling in your diapers and old casseroles and maybe getting a crappy members only jacket or old tube tv set here and there.

Oh, they’ll say shit like “you’d be surprised at what dumb motherfuckers throw away!” but you know what? I’ll go ahead and miss out. When I get caught behind the garbage truck in the winter, in my car, when the smell is at its lowest possible level of putrescence, I still have to turn or pull over because it’s so gnarly. In the summer, on my bike, it makes me feel faint. And that’s once the shit’s in the truck and sealed behind those giant metal jaws. But those dudes just ride along on the back of that truck like it’s not absolutely fucking disgusting. Know why? Because they’re used to the gross pitfalls of their job just like we’re all used to the gross pitfalls of our lives.

The garbage man doesn’t want to change my kids diapers or stand in front of a crowd of hostile NOFX fans and try to play music. The garbage man doesn’t want to suck off six strangers and have them blow loads all over his face. The garbage man doesn’t want to sit in a cube all day and fill out timesheets. The garbage man gets his tube TV’s and old playboys and takes the stench, just like the middling rock musician takes the sliver of appreciation for the heckling and the pornstar takes the cocaine for the facial blasts and the person in the cube takes the crappy health insurance. It’s all kind of the same thing, but still….

Can’t yell at the garbage man. Oh, I know. People tell me they make tons of money. So do porn actresses and guys that service high voltage wires at the bottom of the ocean.

No thanks. I’m fine here wiping asses and getting woken up by garbage trucks.

What else? Oh, right! The Menzingers have dropped what will probably soon be considered ‘the release that made red scare famous’ in their new full length “Chamberlain Waits” which is now available on itunes and streaming on their myspace page. Check it out while they’re still obscure, because let me promise you something, after this record hits the teeming unwashed hordes, you’re gonna want to say you were there first, before they got huge. Yes you are. I know you. So go ahead, get out there and check out Chamberlain Waits by the Menzingers. Tell em I sent you.

Or don’t. Sheesh. You people are so touchy sometimes!

27 comments:

planespotting said...

"Yes the garbage man can/
and he does it with a smile/
and never judges you ..."

Anonymous said...

The garbage man really fucked my sleep hard in the ass this morning. My apartment window faces our alley and the 4 dumpsters that our used by our building. Seems the garbage men like to bank the dumpsters off the brick wall of the building before resting them on the concrete.

I began reading this and was about to get on board with the lashing you were going to give garbage men.... That didn't happen and I kinda feel like a dick for being so annoyed with them.

Regardless, this was a real 'free tube tv set' of a post. Well done.

Jayzilla said...

i was required to volunteer at a garbage sorting center when i was in highschool...

whats ol' jerry, the guy that sorted recyclables, up to these days?

prolly still thumbing through old playboys (truth) and hitting golf balls into the trash pile (also truth)

STACEY MCCOOL said...

There was a garbage strike here in Toronto last summer and people were fuh-reaking out. Bins were overflowing on the streets, diapers were strewn at the side of the road and city parks were converted into writhing cesspools of waste.

The strike was just shy of 7 weeks and after the workers returned to their routes locals continued to harass, spit and throw (their personal) garbage at them.

Despicable, right? These goddamn clowns sitting, fuming about piled up empties and take out containers in their cubicles while some poor sap is just trying to get health care for his fucking kids.

Respect the people who clean up of the scum you leave behind!

Stizzy said...

frankly, I never intend on listening to the menzingers until after they're fucking huge. that's how I stick it to the man.

Unknown said...

i've allready listenend to the myspace stream before you mentioned it, thanks to the members of the other sock drawer. but yeah, it's totally you who drew my attention onto them in the first place. and yeah, it will probably end up as number one on many year ends lists. one thing that could chance that would be a new tla record. but i don't think that is going to happen this year, so yeah, it's the menzingers.

Anonymous said...

(i assume)i'm the only person from south america that knows them, so yeah, i'm pretty cool.i also have brand new wheels on my bicycle and i fixed my piano, wich i don't know how to play but...like that obscure band from ireland once said, "it's a beautiful day"

peter said...

yeah that album is mad good, i hope they do break out for it, they deserve it.
i also wouldn't mind a new tla record...as the guy above me said, that's one of few things that could top chamberlain waits on the year end lists

FranklinStein said...

first saw the menzingers in san antonio at a place called rock bottom. they were opening up for o pioneers!!!, the only band there that I knew and wanted to see. During the Menzingers' set, I was watching an nba playoff game with my friend and in between one of their songs, tom berated my friend and i for watching "millionaires throw a ball into a hoop" or something along those lines. my friend and i ignored him at first, but then they busted into "straight to hell" and i could no longer do so. gawddamn i was impressed. seldom do i go to a show and find myself blown away by a band i've never heard of. the next day, i ordered "a lesson..." and the rest is history. stoked for chamberlain waits, stoked for the new sundoucher as well...

Jimmy Collyer said...

I don't know if this was already brought up but brian fallon of the gaslight anthem tweeted about your post "concerning keisha." He also stated you were the coolest person ever.

Drunken Acorn said...

Garbage man is my dream job for all the reasons you listed and maybe one day as a garbage man I can have an adventure involving a dead politician and a environmental cover-up. So me, Keith David, my brother and a pizza delivery boy have to stop it.

Justin Drake said...

menzingers=kinda boring, nothing new, regurgitated alkaline trio riffs.

Sean said...

....... but I love Alkaline Trio!

limited nobility said...

Wait a shake shit up drakefx!Hey,do you play in one of those awesome acoustic crust duos that substitute folk for fuck in the band name and play ironic kiddie pool parties at the gainesville fest because "the larry's subs gig uhh, kinda fell through"?the new menzingers is so great because I wont have to explain to people why its better than the debut like I've tried to do a bunch with rubicon vs sitting army.Caveat free the record will speak for itself

Robb said...

c'mere limited nobility - lemme kiss you

Scott said...

first: New Menzingers Album rocks. fucking amazing album. Soooo good.

Second: interestingly enough, i had a discussion this week about garbage men and "Can't someone else do it?"

Unknown said...

limited nobility: maybe you DO have to explain. it's an awesome album, but i think it still has to grow on me to get the full potential out of it. i liked the first record from beginning, but after listening to it hundreds of times it's one of my absolute favorite albums ever. so... at this point i still like the first one better, but that could change.

Erik Steven Moore said...

remember that movie Men at Work? They made garbage men look like kings- rollin' around Cali, hollerin' at the honeys... i actually don't remember anything about that movie. besides the opening scene and they were hangin' off the truck like it was the greatest job of all time

Justin Drake said...

I don't really want to argue about how much I like or dislike a band. Music is subjective, this we all know, or should. But...this is the internet and how lame would it be if I didn't indulge you right? I don't dislike any of Menzinger's music, but I agree with Maxamilian's opinion on the new stuff. I just think their older albums are a bit more interesting.

Unknown said...

www.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D_-agl0pOQfs&h=cc889583a6b978ec88e6c148c483a0c4

Dan Theman said...

http://videogum.com/166711/holy-shit-the-insane-clown-posse-miracles-video-is-fucking-cramazing/music-related-content/

Sean said...

Brendan... PLEASE mention this comedic gold in tomorrow's post...

Potentially the best line in music ever: "Fuckin rainbows, after it rains."

http://videogum.com/166711/holy-shit-the-insane-clown-posse-miracles-video-is-fucking-cramazing/music-related-content/

Sean said...

[P.S. I need to learn to check other peoples comments before I blindly post... seeing as that exact link was posted directly above mine... my bad, haha]

JSIN said...

Great Simpsons reference with the title. New Menzingers is good, not great but good.

Brian said...

New menzingers is good. Seems to be on par with their fist though. I don't see them getting "huge"

Owner Operator said...

new menzingers is ok, not great, but pretty good... A Lesson In The Abuse Of Information Technology was/is still 10 times better... that said... i can see them getting huge and writing albums that sound good in sold out stadiums but along the way loosing their roots yadda yadda yadda.

word verification: speik
... i speik da troof

Harley said...

My grandpa was a garbage man for the city of Grosse Point in Michigan. It's an upper class kind of ritzy neighborhood. My grandpa lived in shitty Roseville though and my mom's family was hella poor. But I guess he found some good shit in the rich peoples' garbage including but not limited to every bike my mom and her sibling ever owned, a box of rare coins, a box of Cuban Cigars, the list goes on.