R-ant

So remember the "Bring out your dead!" scene in Monty Python and the Holy Grail? Well, it is being re-enacted as we speak in my bathroom on a very small scale.

Up until recently we had an ant problem. They liked to sneak in through the gap where the top of the bathtub and bottom of the tile meet. Which meant there were always lots of tiny ants crawling around the ledge of the bathtub and the occasional pioneer who would climb down the porcelain canyon toward the drain in search of gold. Or a nice spot to put the homestead. Or a better life for their family. I don't know. We rarely spoke. They had the decency to turn the other way while I showered two feet away.

Now I don't really have anything against ants, but when they hit the 1,000 mark in population, I draw the line. Being the googlenut that I am, I spent at least 5 hours looking up old wives tales on how to get rid of these things without using pesticides. Honesty Corner: 4 hours and 55 minutes of that time may or may not have been spent at thesuperficial.com following the sordid details of the Linsdsay Lohan/Samantha Ronson saga. In the remaining 5 minutes I found a commonly agreed upon method of mixing icing sugar and borax together and sprinkling it around as food. The smell of the sugar attracts the ants and when they start eating it, they also ingest the borax as they can't distinguish between the two granules. Then I think it just sort of poisons them (in a loving non-pesticidey way; like morphine to a eutheniz-ee) and then maybe they bring some back to the rest of the gang and it poisons them too. Or maybe its more Heaven's Gate-ey and there's a whole wacked-out ceremony surrounding the sweet Borax cocktail consumption. Ha! Teeny tiny ant Nikes! What, too soon? The statute of limitations has definitely run out on that one, people.

Anyways, I did that for about 2 weeks and they ate it up like candy. Borax-laced candy that is. This reminds me kids: stay away from creepy Philip Seymour Hoffman look-alikes in brown panel vans offering candy. Even the non boraxy stuff. Their sinister plans might revolve around making you watch Capote over and over. Or worse yet, Marley and Me. Oh the humanity!!!

Right, where was I? Ah yes. Two weeks of happy poisoning. And then nothing. Not a single ant. Tumbleweeds. The sound of crickets. A creaky dilapidated door swinging in a tension-filled breeze. And then.....the dismembered ant bodies started to appear. Everywhere! Think Platoon meets Terminator 3 meets Quentin Tarentino's entire filmography meets Wile E. Coyote meets The Spanish Inquisition. And not the John Cleese Spanish Inquisition. Ant arms, ant legs, ant heads, ant abdomens, ant second abdomens, ant brains, ant spleens (at least I think it was a spleen - my Grade 12 high school biology is a little fuzzy at the moment. Did you see what I did there? I just used that spleen comment to let you [the reader] know that I [the author] took Grade 12 biology and am probably smarter than you. Unless you took Grade 12 Biology too. But even if you did, can you honestly tell me that you got 96% in it? I can. I have the transcripts to prove it. Don't MAKE me get out the high school transcripts people, because with it comes the stack of Grade 11 Creative Writing assignments I kicked ass on).

Whoops. Off topic again. Recap: War Amps Society worst case scenario in my bathtub. And this has been the state of affairs every single morning when I go into the bathroom! I have been washing them away at night and then waking up to a plethora of more ant chunks strewn about. It's like Attila the Hun lives in the crack above my bathtub.

So what we think is going on, is that another ant colony has moved in (or a Russian spider) and is basically cleaning house and quite literally bringing out the dead. And in this little play, I'm merely the cart pusher, submissively rinsing them down the drain each night. I'm worried that I may have setup a dependency situation. My bathtub is the new transfer station for the insect world. I have considered putting up a tiny "No Dumping" sign but ants don't read English. And mistranslations can be damaging. That's how "Grandpa Fucking Space Shuttle" came to be printed on millions of children's t-shirts in the Jiangxi Province of China....

So, what the hell?! How long is it going to be the killing fields in my bathroom? This is really creepy stuff. Maybe it isn't a new ant colony cleaning out the nest. Maybe its a sign from the Ant Mafia. They know what I did. Its only a matter of time until I wake to find a severed horsefly head in my bed....

My Passions Have Been Ignited Once Again

So I left out some milk and cookies to see if that would entice my blog elves out of hiding but alas, all I found in the morning was a jolly looking white-haired old man dead on my living room floor. After the coroner left, it was Mrs. Clause who filled me in on her husband's Type 2 Diabetes and adamant negation of the doctor's warning to stop partaking in the goodies the children leave out. I do regret that Santa's last cookie was a stale Chip's-Ahoy I found under the couch cushion, but in my defense the only person I thought would end up eating it was a midget or the huge spider that lives behind my hot water heater (yeah that's right buddy. I know ALL about you!). Had I known the tragedy that would befall the old man, I would have at least sprung for cookies with the chocolate chunks in them. If its your time to go, then go out with a bang. Actually when I think about it, I suppose I would have just put out some celery sticks and a bowl of cottage cheese and avoided this whole 'death' thing altogether. Hindsight is 20/20. Telling your child that Santa is dead due to an EXTREMELY avoidable and reversible disease is priceless. How's that for a Christmas morning Kodak moment? "Merry Christmas Tommy. We thought this year we'd get you the gift of a reality check. You know how much you love your Fruit Loops? Well so did Santa. And now he's DEAD. Adult Onset Diabetes is no laughing matter. Let us all learn a lesson from this. Oh look! its snowing out....."

Ok. Where was I going with all this? Oh yes. The elves have forsaken me. This blog rests entirely on my untiring shoulders. Big responsibility. I will fail you not, Good People of Internet-a-lot.

And now for today's important and socially relevant topic.....


Philip Seymour Hoffman: Man or Sweaty Pervert Better Suited for Meat Grinder?

Let's discuss.

Why do people like this guy?! And by people I mean Nayt Keane and Julia Hilton. Perhaps there are more (doubtful) but my circle of friends is limited and my reclusive nature keeps me from going any further in this poll. I actually did ask them why they think he's so great but I really struggled to hear what they were saying over my yelling "HE'S SO GROSS I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU LIKE HIM WHAT OTHER CREEPY ACTORS ARE YOU OBSESSED WITH THAT I DON'T KNOW ABOUT MAYBE WE CAN'T BE FRIENDS ANYMORE HOW CAN I RESPECT YOU ANYMORE LA LA LA LA NOT LISTENING, NOT LISTENING CAN'T HEAR YOU LA LA LA LA!!!!!" We often have spirited debates like that. Eventually I make them see how unreasonably and totally wrong they are (hey btw, do you remember when Burt Reynolds did that 8 episode stint on "Friends"? He was so great in that. Offered a lot of credibility to the role of Monica's older boyfriend. Yuuuuup. Burt Reynolds. That was him. In all his Burt Reynoldy glory. Just acting his little heart out. As only BURT REYNOLDS can do......)

Anyways, I thought rather than have a serious face-to-face discussion with people where I run the risk of being proven inarticulate at very best, I'd rather blog about stuff knowing full well that once its on the internet, it cannot be taken down. And thus must be FACT.

So. Lets begin.

Strikes Against Philip

1. beady little eyes - inbred or just demonic? discuss.
2. profuse sweating. ALL the time. Trait also found in serial killers. Compare and contrast.
3. heavy breathing. And grunting. And strange almost-vomiting sounds whenever he speaks/open his mouth. Hopefully not some sort of disability or else we'll have to take the gutless high road and talk about how he's "overcome" so much in his life and blah blah blah.....
4. the internet's strange love affair with him. Now, it is not easy to find a website dedicated to how terrible this guy is. I have looked. Oh, how I have looked. I googled until the cows came home in hopes of finding some sort of Philip Makes Us Wretch online club that I could join and then send away for a complementary "Don't fillMEup with Philip" coffee mug. No dice. Which leads me to believe two things. 1.) In his movies he performs some sort of weird hypnotizing act with his beady eyes and heaving throaty grunts that brainwashes the viewer. I have of course only been exposed to 1.5 of his movies and possess phenomenal brain capacity that could easily withstand even the most intense of Jedi mind tricks. 2.) People who publicly denounce Phillip Seymour Hoffman are killed within the hour. I am lucky to be blogging this from a secure bunker in an undisclosed location. Fear not people. I will live on. Dedicated to bringing light into my public's dark little lives. Its the least I can do. Seriously. I was originally going to write a blog on how to convert leftover toilet paper rolls into bird feeders but then I realized there was something even LESS useful I could bring into the world of blogging. Personal opinion. So don't thank me. Unless you feel really compelled. In which case I always accept cash (no coins please, what do you think I am, a hobo?) and baked goods.

Wow. How did we get on the subject of my awesomeness again? [Side note - one should never ignore a recurring theme as there is often much truth behind it]. But I digress. Back to Philip.

After doing a little research I came up with some other interesting views that are worth noting:

On the highly respected movie news website digitalspy.com, Hoffman is quoted as saying "There's a certain amount of pain that goes into [acting]. It's painful. It's not easy."

On the even more respected 'pearls of wisdom' website sarahmacnabb.blogspot.com, Macnabb is quoted as saying "There is an EPIC amount of pain while watching Hoffman act. Its so totally MORE painful to be the person watching his films. It's, like, not easy but times infinity. Squared. Cubed. And then times infinity again. Plus one."

Even the STARmeter on imdb.com has him down 4% this week. Vindication.

There you have it folks. When your status starts slipping in the STARmeter, you know its all coming to an end. Move over Chuck Norris. Your 4:00 a.m. informercial slot is in jeopardy. There's a new has-been in town ready to make those paychecks flogging one Ab-sizzler at a time....

P.S. Nayt is quoted as saying "Everything he does, I love. His acting is so enriched. I like him." Keeping in mind that Nayt is a new dad that has not slept in almost 10 months. And might have been a little bit high at the time of said comments. Not to discredit his opinion in any way. And by a "little bit high" I mean caught doing blow out of a hookers navel. Not that that should in ANY way taint your belief in his statements. And also I think the hooker might have had a wooden leg stuffed with cash and anthrax. I'm just saying......