Yes, it’s been a while since I posted.  I’ve been very busy, relatively successful and moving along quite well, but before I get into that, I have to get something typed as it is eating at me.

And yes, it is uncharacteristic of what you expect from me.

This is to you, Drew, and I hope you get to see it.

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I’m not sure why but it occurred to me the other night whether or not you were home with your mom and dad yet.  I looked online to see if I could find out and it was vague.  I had dates and lengths of sentences and other things to look at.  What caught my attention was the full and complete videos of your testimony in the trial of your one time friend.  I’m not even done watching all of it, but I’ve sat through 3 hours of it so far and I’ve still got more to go.  I’m going to watch it to the end.

For my readers that follow me, I’m going to keep this as vague as possible, to avoid any additional annoyance to their lives that I can, but I hope that what you see here will paint a picture of someone that isn’t what he has been made out to be by the media.  Drew was 16 a few years ago, and along with 3 others, was charged with first degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder of another teenager.

Drew is also the son of a man that I consider a very close friend, mentor and one of the strongest individuals I have ever met.  A man that has saved my ass many times, and put up with me when I let go of the vision I was supposed to have.  A man that was also smart enough to cut the ties with me when his message didn’t seem to sink in.

To him, I’ll say . . . it has sunk in.

Drew, I mention your dad because you are one of the luckiest kids on the earth to have the father that you have.  He’ll be the first to tell you that he isn’t perfect, but by the same token, he’s also humble enough not to take the praise he deserves when given to him.  He loves you because you are his son, and no matter what you have been through, he will always be your father and he’ll love you no matter what.  You got caught in an incredibly shitty situation, and as bad as it may seem, I know that your dad has thought when looking upon it, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”

I’ve thought the same thing looking at it myself.

I watched your testimony.  I choked back tears when you cried.  You stuttered, you stumbled and you were clearly nervous.  Who wouldn’t be.  You were just 18 years old and you had been in prison since you were 16.  The man of 18 that I have been watching in that video . . . I know him.  I see your dad’s face.  I hear his voice.  I feel his pain and I understand why you cried when you talked about your conversation with the victim prior to his death.

You loved that man.  You had respect for him and you tried to let him know.  You were young and scared and didn’t know what to do and if you could have changed what happened, you would have done whatever you could have to make that happen.

What the public sees is someone making an act.  “This is what they tell them to do on the stand” or “He’s just playing a part to get the jury to feel sorry for him”.  I’m here to tell you that I don’t see it that way.  You are, without question, your father’s son.  You look just like him, you sound just like him and the expressions you make, are just like him.

I’ll tell you this.  I know him.  I knew him years ago during years he’d rather not admit to, and I know him now, during the time of his life he is (and should be) most proud of.  When I see you there in that video, I see him.  Your emotion, your wording, your gestures, they are the same as his.

So I suppose the most important thing I can say to you at this point is, I BELIEVE YOU.

You are not a killer.  You are not one to help someone else kill and you would never participate in any way to plan to kill someone.  You were a kid, doing some stupid things (as we all do) that got caught up in a stupid place, and despite the errors you made in the situation, I believe what you said . . . I believe when it came down to it, you would have killed the convicted killer to save the victim.  I wouldn’t blame you for that either.

I was glad to hear that your sentence was short, but any amount of time in the prison system is miserable and I can’t even imagine what it would be like to enter it at the age of 16.  My son, who you once played Xbox with and hung out with while I was at your house is now about to turn 18 and I think seeing what has happened to you, someone that he actually knew and interacted with, changed his life for the better.  If you have nothing else to hang on to, know that you made a difference in another kids life.  A very good difference.  Also know that young man of mine also believes in you and has great respect for what you have been through.

If you have troubles getting ahead and this chases you through life and trying to get a job or whatever else, I’m sure your parents would hate you moving to Colorado, but I’ll make a job for you here.  If I can’t, I have friends everywhere and I’ll hook you up wherever I can.  Friends that when I tell them “I believe in him”, will believe in me.

And I do believe in you, my brother.

I hope my son will consider himself as lucky to have a father like yours.  I think about him, and you, every day.

I know, I know, I have been suspiciously absent in the last couple of weeks.  I have an excuse.  I’ve been busy.

and I managed to get Bronchitis.

So aside from the fact that I have wanted to die for most of last week, everything has been good.

Of course, that didn’t keep me from going to see a concert that my dear friend Tazer convinced me to go to last Tuesday, but that is a post for another day.  Let’s just say for now that I’m gonna blame my Bronchitis on a stripper.  Not that there were strippers at the concert, you see, but . . . . nevermind.  I said that would be a post for another day.

At any rate, as the title would suggest, I’ve got something to say to somebody and I wish to hell I had been able to actually do it.  In the miniscule chance there is of her ever actually reading this post, I’m going to straight up post exactly what she did today.  Uncut, in her voice and in her attitude.  If what I attempt with this post doesn’t work for everyone, I apologize, but it is my first attempt to embed an audio file into a post, so let’s see what happens.

First, let me set the scene for you just a little bit . . .

I was at work, of course, and as usual on a Friday (or any day for that matter), it was busy.  I had about 4 customers in front of me at the counter and I had another one that I was on the phone with.  Now in the event that this happens, and it regularly does, I have an answering machine that sits right there on my desk to pick up the slack in case I get more calls.

Now, I don’t have the answering machine turned down, so if you leave a message, I and everybody standing there can hear your message.  That said, this is what my 4 customers AND my customer on the phone heard as this message was left today . . . .

Click to hear the bitch (m4a file – QuickTime)

Click to hear the bitch (WAV file)

So commence my open letter to the bitch.

Dear Bitch,

Please allow me to explain to you how it is we can “go to voicemail when we are open to the public”.

Aside from the fact that the message that you had to sit through before you were able to get to your 8 second bout of assholery clearly stated that if you got that message during normal business hours that it meant that I was with another customer or on another line, it also said that if you left me a message with what you needed, that I would get back to you as soon as possible.  For some reason, you missed that part of the message.  Perhaps you were on your cell phone and busy pushing your way to the front of the line at the grocery store or something else that clearly showed your superiority to EVERY FUCKING BODY ELSE ON THE PLANET.

To quote yet another of my favorite bloggers, MommyWantsVodka:  Shut your whore mouth!

Let me make it clear to you that I run not one, but two separate stores.  ALONE.  I have no staff, I have no employees, and I have no help.  When I was sick last week and needed to be out for a couple of days, I had to call a district manager from another city to come down and cover for me, and guess what . . . he was sick too, so I still had to come back sooner than I really should have and work out the rest of my illness.

I work 60 hours a week and I drive almost an hour each way to get there so I can do it.  I have 4 phone lines and I do literally thousands of dollars per week in business just from the people that walk in the door off the street.  Let me repeat this again for you in case the all caps version didn’t catch your eye earlier . . .

ALONE!

Instead of leaving me a message and telling me what you needed and waiting for me to return your call and getting your needs taken care of, you chose to run your mouth and display your diva-ass attitude in front of customers that had actually dragged their fucking asses in to get what they needed instead of sitting on their lazy asses at home trying to get through on the phone.  Oh, by the way, the customer I was on the phone with . . . yeah, he had left me a message earlier and told me what he needed and I was on the phone with him because I had called him back to get him taken care of.

How’s your fucking day shaping up, Bitch?

Let me ask you something completely serious.  Would you really, honestly, with your head held high, walk up to a busy counter with one person working at it and push your way to the front of the line and insist you be taken care of first?  I hope so – no – I fucking DARE you!  Let me tell you, if you even made it to my counter without being lynched by the customers, your happy ass would have been kicked to the back of the line by me just for trying it.  But no, I don’t think you would even consider it, yet, it is essentially what you tried to do today.  Oh, but you were just calling in so you didn’t know that was what was going on.

You just assumed I was sitting there on my ass all day waiting for YOUR call.

Who. The. Fuck. Do. You. Think. You. Are?

No, instead you remained anonymously brave.  No number so I could return the call (Oh GOD I so wish that you would have!), no name, no nothing.  Which, ma’am, is exactly what your attitude got you today, nothing.  Please try again tomorrow.  PLEASE!!

I hope that when you do manage to get through that I am out of stock and need to make a special order that will take at least 3 weeks to get from some foreign country and that it is grossly overpriced and that shipping costs will make you have to take out a 3rd mortgage to get it to you.  You know why?

Because fuck you, that’s why.

Oh, and you have a nice day now, ya hear!

/rant

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For all my readers, it’s nice to be back!  Thanks for being here . . . both of you. 

Here is your Valentine’s Day trivia fact for the day: Today is the busiest day of the year for private investigators. You’re about to see why ….

As promised, I’m here to give you the latest (and probably last) chapter in the Craigslist Personal Ads Experiment. This post is going to be a little different in that this time I’m only going to pick on one guy.

Because he had it coming.

I’m also going to post this one a little differently in the interest of length, because it could get long and I don’t want to leave out any of the responses I got because of this ad, so what I’m going to do is make the majority of this post the actual ad that I posted, then I’m going to put the responses I got in the comments, leaving out the respondents name and email address to protect their identity. Comments that I am adding will all have my Twitter name (@u8mypants) in the header so you can differentiate between those and the comments you may decide to leave as well.

Once again, the lovely D posted the original ad on Facebook, and after a short exchange there, I decided to run with it again. If you are new here and you missed the original 3 posts about the Craigslist Experiment, please feel free to check back on Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3. To be fair, I have sent an email back to each of these wonderful ladies and invited them to who8mypants.com to participate in this post (or any other for that matter). One or two of them may already be lurking about!

I originally wrote this response and posted it in the Raleigh, NC personal ads where the original post started. It was then suggested that I repost the original ad here in Colorado Springs and also my response. So I did. The response was fantastic and all I have to say is . . .

Ladies, you are AWESOME!

Read, enjoy, have a laugh or two, but keep in mind, my response to this guy is exactly what I was thinking at the time I first read it. This guy clearly has a pair of big brass ones. He’s going to need them because he is probably going to be kicked in them a lot.

His original post will be in quotes. My response will be underneath. Put your hip-waders on . . . his bullshit runs deep:

10 Reasons why it is better to meet a MARRIED man (A response)

I felt the need to publicly respond before this raving douchebag ruins the image of all men forever. And yes, I am single and I am 43. I’m not mocking the guy when I stated my age in the header. As for the rest of this post, all bets are off.

(I’m not going to say that these facts will apply to all men, but these facts will be true for most married men, myself included, if they are completely honest. First, find a guy that is honest about his situation.)

What you are about to state are not facts. They are your opinion. Do not present yourself here as a representative of “most married men”. I have been a married man and I do not share your opinion now, nor did I then. You are on Craigslist trying to cheat on your wife – suggesting that the ladies here find a guy that is honest about his situation is the single best piece of advice you left in your post. Thank you for being the shining example of what to avoid since honesty is not your strong point. If I am mistaken about that, please have your wife post here and let us all know that she knows what you are doing and she’s good with that.

(1) Not incapable to love… He is married, and usually a sign that he once had love. The jury is out on single men.)

Also a sign that he once had love and had no fucking idea what to do with it, and if he is cheating on his wife, he still doesn’t. The jury is still out on single men because the deliberation on the married, cheating asshole husband didn’t take long. I’d much rather be standing before my peers on my side of this argument than yours.

(2) Not afraid of commitment… This guy is/was committed, and since something in the relationship changed, he lost that commitment. Find out what happened, and prevent it from happening again.)

What happened is that some poor woman married an asshole. I’ll give the guy this, he’s right . . . prevent it from happening again by not being the next woman he cheats on. As for being afraid of commitment, nobody is more afraid of commitment than this guy, because actually being committed means facing your significant other during the hard times and working through it. The chicken-shit asshole runs to the arms of another woman to hide from his issues.

(3) Will not cheat on you… He is looking for something that he lost. Provide that to him, and he will stay with you. Single men are a crap shoot.)

This is almost too absurd to even mention, but it pretty much has to be, so I’ll go with ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?! You are cheating NOW! The thing that you have lost is your mind, and nobody is going to be able to provide that for you. You are right, sir, single men are a crap shoot. Some might cheat, some might not. You are indeed the safe bet, because we all already know that you will cheat.

(4) They will pamper you… If you are giving him everything that he is looking for, he will do anything to keep you, even if it is over his budget. Single men will do enough to keep you around, which is sometimes nothing.)

Your use of the word “pamper” is cute, it sounds much less sinister than the word you replaced . . . “bribe”. In other words, he will buy you shit and take you places so you don’t tell his wife what a prick he is.

(5) Wants to spend all of his free time with you, and not with friends. Why should he hang with friends, if you give him what he needs?)

This entire statement is so full of shit, it defies logic. Please let me know when the smoke he has blown up your ass clears. This is a not-so-blatant way of saying “I have no friends”.

(6) Crutches may go away. Smoking, drinking and drugs provide happiness. If you provide this true happiness, why wouldn’t he give up the bad stuff? (Casual smokers or drinkers are OK)

What about the cheating on your significant other crutch? When does that one go away? (Oh, and casually cheating on your wife is NOT ok.)

(7) He will not smother you…Since he will not be there 24/7 the both of you can decide the level of too much and not enough. The single guy will be like a leach, and often does not understand why you need alone time, or time with friends.

No, you probably won’t smother her. If she is smart, however, she will smother you . . . with a pillow, while you sleep, until you are dead. May your wife and children find you that way. A truly intense relationship will cause the “leach-like” tendency in both parties, that time at the beginning of a relationship when the couple can’t stay away from each other. That isn’t smothering, you asshole, that is a step in the process of building love that eventually works itself into a more balanced way of being between two people who care about each other.

(8) He will not argue with you… About what? You are the one that is giving him what he needs. Just make sure that he gives you what you need, and there will be no arguements. Give him the choice. Make me happy or go back to your wife! Again, there will be no arguements. Single men have nothing but time and energy to save for arguing.

This pretty much rolls back around to #4. Of course he won’t argue with you, he doesn’t want you to tell his wife! At what point did a man’s status as single make him have “nothing but time and energy to save for arguing”? Last time I checked . . . you know, when I had a moment when I wasn’t at work or doing something to take care of my kid, or maintain my home and generally contribute to society . . . I don’t “save up to argue”, but as luck would have it, when I do have some “argue” built up in my system, there are fucktards like yourself for me to vent on. I suppose my gratitude to you is in order then.

9) He can be whatever you need him to be… A hopeless romantic??? A wild, no boundry guy??? A shy, timid guy??? An experimental guy??? All your choice. You are giving him what he is missing. He will conform to what you want…at least from time to time. A single guy will be who HE wants to be, and you have to like it.

Whatever they want you to be??? REALLY??? How about SINGLE??? LOYAL??? HONEST??? NOT A SMOKE-BLOWING ASSHOLE??? Yeah, I didn’t think so. Yes, at some point I will meet another woman to have in my life and you are goddamn right that I will be who I want to be. The woman I meet will fall in love with me and who I am, not some fake, ass-kissing poser, obedient puppy dog just trying to keep from getting caught.

(10) A possible future… Look, I can’t promise you that he will leave his wife for you. Shoot, maybe you will just enjoy being on the fruitful end of the relationship and may never want him full time. But at the end of the day, he will naturally want to be with you, more than his wife. If you do want him full time, understand that things will certainly change for the worse. He probably will be paying alimony and child support, and many of the things that you benefitted from, while he was married, will go away. Expensive dinners will be less often, gifts will decline naturally, and overall pampering may slow down. Be wary of buying the horse. Single guys will give you…uncertainty. Ask yourself why they are single, and why they can’t make a relationship work.

Basically you just wasted a whole lot of time to say “Hey, we can fuck around, but I’m not getting divorced because she will take my ass to the cleaners and I’ll be lucky to live in a refrigerator box and eat Ramen noodles.” So what exactly is this possible future you are offering? And it’s the SINGLE guys that will give uncertainty? You are married and on Craigslist trying to get laid. Please explain to us how that is making your relationship work you self-righteous prick? I’m single because my relationship wasn’t working on a variety of levels, the difference between you and I being, I had the balls to get out of that relationship and get on with my life.

Speaking of which, your wife clearly isn’t doing anything this weekend . . . and I don’t have any plans. Tell her to give me a shout.

As you have already figured out, I am a married guy, that is not getting what I need at home. I have asked, and have not received. As far as she is concerned, she is happy, because she gets what she wants. i am capable to love, I am not afraid of committment, I will not cheat on you, I will pamper you, I will want to spend my time with you, (I do not have any crutches), I will not smother you, I will not argue with you, I can be who you want me to be and we may have a future.

You are absolutely right, you are NOT getting what you need at home, because what you need is your ass beaten to a pulp. As for your wife being happy, I’d bet 6 months pay that’s bullshit. No way she’s happy married to a shithead like you. So please, let’s do the honest summary of your post: You wouldn’t know what love was if it bit you on the balls, you have no idea what commitment even means (much less how to spell it), you will cheat faster than I can blink, your bribery knows no bounds, you have far too much time to kill what with all that not doing a fucking thing to save your marriage time you’ve got, (more crutches than Wake Medical Center is my bet), we can cover the next three with one short statement – you will be their bitch in order to keep from getting caught, and finally, there isn’t even the slightest possibility of a future – mostly because it won’t be long before this dickface gets caught and his refrigerator box will only sleep one.

Sound good? Send me some information about you, and a pic, if you wish, and I will get back to you. I will not go to your website and sign up for free to anything. Don’t say that your real, and then send me the link to a website or any information grabbing process. I will not comply to pic collectors either. I will call a phone number that you provide to me, if you wish, or I will reply to your e-mail.

Seriously, ladies, if you respond to this ad with any kind of serious interest at all, you deserve what you get. Personally, I give the female gender credit for being a hell of a lot smarter than to fall for this bullshit. In fact, I’m pretty damned sure I’ll get more responses to my post than he gets to his, and I’m 1300 miles away.

Talk to you soon.

Not likely, but seriously, can I have your wife’s number?

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Needless to say, he didn’t respond to the email that I sent him, which contained a link to my response post as well. Maybe he’s still thinking about it. No, wait, that would imply that he thinks.

And yeah, I’m pretty sure I got more real responses than he did. Just check out the comments to see what I got.

Girls, I can’t say it enough . . . YOU ROCK!!

Technical difficulties out of the way, it’s time to make an actual post!  I still have a fourth Craigslist post in the works and I still promise to get to that later, but I had this little idea go through my head the other day and it’s been making me chuckle ever since.  I hope it makes you laugh too.  If it doesn’t, then you are clearly a Microsoft “fanboy” and you need to be publicly flogged anyway.

So let’s see what would happen if Microsoft built and sold new homes:

Given MS’s way of doing business, I’ll point out a few of the most crucial things you need to know before owning a Microsoft Home.

Pricing – At the introductory price of $300.00, the place is an absolute steal!  Of course, if you want to get in the front door, you’ll need to purchase a 73 character Authorization Key for $127,000 that you’ll need to renew every six months. . . . for another $127,000.

Floor plan – There is only one floor plan available, but they’re sure you will find it pleasant and easy to navigate.  If you don’t, you will get used to it soon enough.  About the time you get used to it, your home will be automatically updated to a newer, “more secure” version, making you safe from intruders but you won’t know where in the fuck your bedroom is anymore.  When you do manage to find it, it won’t look anything like it did when you last saw it.

Location – You can choose to have your Microsoft home placed anywhere you like, but certain areas will require the purchase of additional licenses depending on the number of people in your family.  Areas included in this requirement are :  Earth, The Moon (they’re planning ahead).

Check out these great additional features you can purchase for your new Microsoft home!

• Floors – Floors do not come standard with your new home, but can be purchased as an add-on.  You can opt not to have this add-on installed but you will fall into a spacial rift in outer space to be lost forever if you don’t.  Take advantage of this great package right away for just $37,000.  (Carpeting, tile, linoleum, etc are not included)
• Doors – The front door comes included in the original price and once you’ve purchased your Authorization Key, all internal doors are yours to do with as you wish.  They will be piled on the living room floor so you can place them where you wish at your convenience.  Instructions for doing so will not be included and only about a third of them will work anyway.  There is no option for a back door as Microsoft doesn’t want anyone having a back door into anything.
• Appliances – Microsoft certainly wants you to have all the creature comforts you have become accustomed to in your home, so by all means, make sure you have a full set of appliances.  As long as all of them are Microsoft brand appliances.  Nothing else will function inside the home, so say goodbye to your Maytag.  (Unless, of course, Microsoft buys Maytag, in which case you can hang on to it.)
• Security – Security features come packaged with your new home and are brought to you by Norton’s.  Your home and its contents will be kept safe and secure for the first 30 days that you own it.  If you would like this protection to continue, you may purchase a license for it to do so for $12,000 that you will need to renew every year.
• Ambiance – Your new home will be decorated in any color you wish and will appear to be a glorious mansion to you and all your friends and family.  Every nifty little nuance will seem to be at your fingertips and you’ll feel as though you never could have lived without this house.  Every neat little toy you ever wanted will be right there for you whenever you want them.  Enjoy the moment because everything that you actually like is a trial version that will expire in 23 minutes.  All the useless crap that you’ll never use and just gets in the way – those are full versions and they cannot be uninstalled.  Speaking of which, you have 22 minutes to get your car out of the garage or it’s going to cost you $700.00 a year to get it out.
• Support – Should you encounter any issues with your home, Microsoft has made a support line available to you that you can call 24 hours a day.  It will be promptly answered by a guy that sounds just like Larry the Cable Guy named “Achmed” (Hey, it’s only fair, right?).  His first line of business will be to ask if you’ve “taken a claw hammer to it”.  If this doesn’t solve your problem, he will suddenly only speak Chinese.
• Windows – (Oh yeah, there is a reason I saved this for last!)  With Microsoft being the leader in window technology, you can rest assured that your Microsoft home will have the most advanced windows you can get.  All homes come standard with the basic “Home” version windows which will all function fully with the understanding that when you look out of them you will only see the industrial area of New Jersey.  If you’d like to see your actual neighborhood, you will need to upgrade to the “Pro” version for just $357,000 (per year, of course).  Please note that opening more than 3 windows at a time will cause your home disintegrate and fall into the above mentioned spacial rift causing you to have to move into a hollowed out tree.

For the love of God, just make sure it’s an Apple tree.

C’mon folks, we wouldn’t put up with it in our homes, why do we put up with it in our technology?

What else do you think would happen if Microsoft built homes?  Or anything else?

The appearance of my blog may change dramatically over the next two days while I feed my indecision with ideas.  I’ve got some great ideas for some new posts and I’m ready to start writing them for you . . . but I’d really like everything to work because I LOVE reading your comments!

I promise a new post before the end of the day tomorrow.  Tonight and tomorrow afternoon . . . I will wade through theme options.  I have a great new logo design and I’m going to be working around that.  Many, many thanks to Darren for putting it together for me!!