Because I'm waaaaaay to lazy to write anything today, read about Saturday night's Knappuccino's, featuring The Hearn.

posted at 2:41 PM | 0 comments

posted at 3:59 PM | 0 comments

A rambling column this week! Try to follow along. Each item is related to the other in a small way, and you have to figure out how!

• So my coworker just sent me pictures of the inside of his knee. Pre- and post-surgery, specifically. I guess it was kind of neat and all, but my mouth still tastes like stomach acid and bacon. I can't really say I'm a fan.
• We started rehearsals for Brigadoon on Tuesday. The director seems really really cool, except that he keeps expecting me to actually ACT. I don't know about all that. First of all, I haven't acted in 8 years. And I was never really all that good. So we'll see what happens. Maybe I have to find myself or my soul or something, which I guess would be nice, but I'm terrified of finding out I'm really a lesbian axe-wielding psycho murdering woman trapped inside the body of a mid-20s hardbody. Ya know?
• I worked another all night outage last week, and started to keep a blow by blow diary of my mental state, but I actually managed to remain pretty sane all night. So it turned out pretty boring. I think I'm finally growing up! I better do something crazy soon or I'll have to buy a minivan.
• How about that Randy Johnson? He throws rather, um, hard. As Rick put it, that was some serious "ched." Get it? Yeah, me neither. Anyway, Randy Johnson is to batters what Snoop Dogg is to blunts. (He smokes them. Get it? Yeah, me neither.)
• Saturday night is my performance at Knappuccinos, and I'm both incredibly stoked and absolutely terrified. I suspect I should actually practice my songs so I'm not an embarrassment to my family. Oh well. Show starts at 7. If I screw up, I'll be wanting to get hammered afterwards at Timothy's. You're buying.
• As a shining example of the kind of friends I keep around, here is the entirety of a conversation I had today over AOL Instant Messenger with the aforementioned Rick:

  matthearndotcom: wiznord
  matthearndotcom: So how's the new place?
  RGShanley11: Im on my cell at the detroit airport
  matthearndotcom: uh...why?
  RGShanley11: Because im bored
  matthearndotcom: why are you at the airport?
  RGShanley11: Because i needed to buy a new car
  matthearndotcom: 1) Why do you need to buy a new car? 2) Why did you go to the airport to do it?
  RGShanley11: Sigh im flying to virginia
  matthearndotcom: I am beyond confused at this point.

  What in the honeybaked hell (alliterative turn of phrase copyright Jeff Kay, who has pissed off some Polka lovers this week)was he talking about? Please help me. My brain hurts.

• Okay, I got nothing today. My bad. I point you over to Milo, who's been leading a FAR more interesting life recently.

posted at 11:00 AM | 0 comments

Mitch Albom rocks out:

It was a code we boys were taught. The thinking was, you didn't start fights, but you didn't stand there and let yourself be a punching bag, either.

Today, it's not so clear. According to one school superintendent in Georgia, "Students cannot fight back. There are other means they can use."

This is such bull, um, poop, that I can't even see straight. Although that might be the scotch.

Before I rant, I should note that I love my parents. But somehow, there was always this feeling that "fighting was wrong, no matter what." It's not like I was raised Quaker, but the implicit instruction was always "walk away and live to fight another day." And I can't help but assume that that's the reason I'm a total wuss to this day.

I admit it. I can't fight for anything. If you want to take advantage of somebody, I'm your man. And the reason was, I was never told, by school administrators, parents, or anybody else in authority, that fighting back against agressors was okay. As a result:

1. I now believe strongly in fighting back against anything even remotely approaching aggression, hence my strong support for the (continuing, admittedly) War in Iraq. Fighting back is TOTALLY cool, as long as somebody else is laying his sack on the line.
2. When it comes to personal confrontations, I back down like my spine is made of jello and my wang is made of paper maché.

More Albom:

I don't understand why the little tortures kids pour on one another are allowed to go on unabated, but the minute a kid brings a pair of scissors through a school door, he's treated like a terrorist.

I agree (surprise, surprise). Not in the way that I think that the school administration should just turn schools into a Nazi state, cracking down on bullies as if they've committed assault; instead, schools need to back off. It's unlikely that a 2nd grader is going to bring a 9mm Beretta to school, so let them learn about fighting back (in a NON DEADLY WAY) early! Children are EXTREMELY malleable, and I would pay 100 grand now to ingrain the lessons that I could have learned for free in the 4th grade if my elders could have made it possible for me to defend myself without worrying about my "permanent record."

I guess what I'm saying is I wish I'd just kicked Paul's ass in the 7th grade like I easily could have (look at me...I'm huge) if I wouldn't've been so afraid of "getting in trouble." Not that I'm bitter. ::sob::

posted at 12:55 AM | 0 comments

Have you ever considered exactly how much you can tell about a man by his landscaping? It's true. I think we can all agree that somebody with a yellow lawn (possibly strewn with car parts) is not a man with whom you wish to trifle. (That sentence was a grammatical masterpiece . . . let's move on.)

Other examples:

• A man with a lot of weeds should be left alone. Either he doesn't care that his lawn has weeds, and is thusly an insensitive person who probably tortures turtles, or he cares very deeply and is so pissed off that he has weeds that he's liable to snap at any time and garrote you with weed-eater string.
• Just because a man has a lot of flowers, that indicates absolutely nothing about him other than he appreciates the beautiful things in life. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.
• 
  A man that plants bushes in his yard that look like sperm is a man who has severe emotional problems.
• Mowing your lawn more than once every 4 days is an indicator of serious OCD. (You probably go through soap like I go through Diet Pepsi, you hand-washing freak.)

Now that I'm thinking about this, though, I've come up with a few more intriguing tests of a man's character that are unrelated to lawncare.

• Never judge a man by the song that comes on his radio when he starts the car. However, you can certainly judge him by whatever song he was listening to when he turns it off.
• A man should not be judged by the things he says when he is drunk. Unless, of course, he is drinking tequila.

What kind of things do y'all use to judge the character of somebody? Post it in the comments or email me at spam (at) matthearn (dot) com.

posted at 9:55 AM

This is a public service announcement brought to you by matthearn.com:

Golf SUCKS.

Of course, many of you may disagree with me. You are, no offense, idiots. Don't be ashamed, though: I once felt that golf was a nice game, an excellent opportunity to get outside. I thought these things just 5 or 6 days ago, when I walked off the driving range thinking, "Wow, I'm really hitting the ball well this year. I should be able to break 100 on Saturday easily!"

Those of you who are longtime golfers know exactly what happened on Saturday morning. But before I go into that, let me explain what exactly was going on. Our buddy Dave is getting married at the end of the month, so we took him out for a nice Bachelor party, at which nobody had ANYTHING to drink, and during which the groom-to-be most DEFINITELY did not get bitten repeatedly by a stripper. (She also did NOT tie him up, nor did she threaten to pierce his testicles with a stiletto heel if he didn't behave.) Hi Grandma!

Anyway, we began the festivities with a 10:37 tee time at the Skippack Public Golf Course, in Skippack, Pennsylvania. I even warmed up with a bucket of range balls first, and was having great success slamming my 8 iron 140 or 150 yards. I was ready.

Ready to suck, I mean.

My first drive sliced neatly into the woods, but I recovered and managed to get on the green in 5, finishing with a 7, unless you ignore the fact that I lost the ball, which I did, scoring myself a 6. Things went downhill from there, until finally on about the 15th or 16th hole, I scored something approaching a 10, and after that decided it would be best if I just didn't keep score anymore. (I most definitely did NOT drink most of a bottle of Canadian Club while we were there.)

So obviously I'm never playing again. Until next Sunday.

posted at 11:54 PM