Combined Hanukah / Birthday Present

What do we have here?


Huzzah! It's a package from father!


What could it be? First class mail, do not bend (not pictured)...hard, substantial...oh I think I know what it is...in his study, there's a photograph (about this size) of my father at about age 9 with his father (who died before I was born), leaning against a motorcycle on some sandy street in Israel. It's the only picture he has of himself as a child, and although we don't look much the same now, it might as well be me in that picture.

Last time I visited, we stood looking at the picture for a few moments, just looking and talking, experiencing what is for us, a rare MoOaHFSL (Moment of Open and Honest Father Son Love™).

He told me I could have the picture, If I wanted it...trying to sound so casual but loving me so much on the inside (I could tell). I gathered also that he felt some grief about the impending loss of his nostalgic item. I told him I'd love to have the picture someday, asking that he hold on to it for a little while longer. He smiled thankfully.

This has to be it. It's exactly the right size...

Wait...even better!


It's Phase 10!!! A Rummy-Type Card Game with a Challenging and Exciting Twist!

The Challenge: Be the first player to complete 10 melds (phases)


The Twist: The phase to be completed is specific for each hand. Those that complete the phase advance to the next, but those that have not must try again.

I wasn't going to blog it

but then it happened twice. Alright here it is, I sneezed on my hands.

Rugby damn

Rugby Dan,

For your achievements in the twin fields of weightlifting and trapezoid-becoming...


...I named a star in your honor.


Forever your loving disciple,
The ACTUAL God

New low

Felt guilty picking out the dark chunks from a can of tuna.

Virginia Tech Nightmare

filling in for Joe Dumars at a pistons game, high. get to the bench late, through the wrong entrance - band/security stops me, i tell them i'm joe dumars, they apologize and carry me to bench. i'm wearing a green long-sleeve t so i take it off. "no no no, not too soon." playing with a livestrong bracelet making machine, choose color called gunsmoke, get a skinny yellow rubber band instead, and it's broken. tell brett i'm not going to shoot much in this game. brett tells me if it wasn't all official i'd knock down all my shots. cut to: brett on playground swishing a 3, saying "yes!" brett's mom aka fan aka ref says "yes" in the same voice but also rocky's voice. back to pistons game. filling in for laimbeer is joel mchale from the soup. jewish moms all left to tend to a certain tragedy, all sons notified by text.

cut to 20th floor, british hotel. possessed joel mchale holds a hundred people in lines of 3, waves gun, lectures ably, puts people on spot. says to one asian girl, "you've got the perfect face for television" and puts one through her dome. he turns to me, "see, if you'd try a mini-muffin with some ketchup..." and hands it to me. for survival, i pretend it's a gross and funny combination but i don't mind ketchup on a muffin. he waves gun at me. i beg him, "i'd make horrible tv," kneel behind someone. mchale aims at my forehead, i'm sure it's about to happen, but he shifts his attention, shoots through another guy's palm to make a point about pop culture. lots of crying, everyone's losing calm, descending into madness. some tv dad enters (it's patrick duffy but it's not), i slip out the door, book down the hall, waste 3 seconds at elevator, realize he'll just stop me at the 16th floor, go to staircase, fly down whipping around corners, jumping whole flights. pass the 16th floor, mchale screaming, vowing, gunshot victims screaming and dying. whip down more stairs, twist ankle, find a janitorial space with exposed pipes, no lock, no door. curl up, beg for police to come scoop me, told to sit tight, they're pretty busy.

wake up, horrified, don't want to pee, sad about the real shooting, less sad but still sad for having a second negative association with joel mchale (first was his appearance on pos improv show "thank god you're here"). plan for the moment is to watch msnbc until whenever.

I like cartoons

Professor Brothers

Update: haha so cute

Slaying of the first born

This weekend I lost my entire actual hard drive because of an Apple genius' negligence. It's complicated and devastating and I'd rather not talk about it. My dad's been calling me round the clock about it.

AG: (groggy) Hello.
Pops: Did I wake you up? Oh shoot, I'm sorry.
AG: No, I should get up, what's up?
Pops: Hear anything from Apple?
AG: Not yet.
Pops: I know this doesn't help the situation at all, but a good thing to do is to back up your data on a zip drive.
AG: A zip drive.
Pops: Yes, I can get you one if you want -
AG: You know I had my shit backed up on a regular external hard drive. How do you come up with a suggestion like that? I don't even think zip is a thing anymore.
Pops: I have a zip drive -
AG: Not relevant.
Pops: I'm just saying -
AG: Just -- don't bring up retarded things, okay?

No matter what happens to my data, I always get up for Passover. My dad's folk dancing friends Yankeleh (m) and Shuli (f) hosted the seder tonight in the Valley. Dinner was delayed a few minutes because Yankele couldn't Tivo "Deal or No Deal" and "Dancing with the Stars" at the same time, so a group of Israelis yelled at each other about that for a while.

Pops: Who is that guy?
AG: Apollo Anton Ohno.
Pops: Oh yeah! Apollo Ohno, the speed skater.
AG: It's Apollo Anton Ohno.
Pops: No no no, Apollo Ohno, the speed skater.
AG: Wrong.
Pops: You sure?
AG: He goes by all three names, trust me, I'm positive.
Yankeleh: He's a beautiful dancer.
(joey fatone tangoes across the screen)
AG: Hey, that's not fair, he's a professional dancer!
Yankeleh: Oh, he's a beautiful dancer too.
Stepmom: Who is that?
AG: Joey Fatone, he was in 'N Sync. They did a lot of hardcore dancing, so it's kind of bullshit that he gets to be on the show.
Stepmom: Who's in sync?
AG: The pop-band, with Justin Timberlake?
Stepmom: That's Justin Timberlake?
AG: No, he was in the band with him. But they all did a lot of precision dancing so...
Stepmom: Oh. You know, I was thinking of another Timberlake.
AG: No, no you weren't.
(the announcer presents fatone and his dance partner, cheryl burke, a random professional dancer)
Stepmom: (feigning a note of recognition) Cheryl Burke, hmm...

That's pretty much how it went most of the night, very fun seder, lots of singing - I was one of the last to leave at around midnight. I stopped to get gas on the way home, and as I was pumping, this skanky blonde in camouflage and black tights was straight eyeing me from inside the store. I made a Pesach resolution to be more bold, so I went in and walked right in front of her, decisively choosing the most ballinest Fiji and wintergreen tic-tacs. When I got to the register, I heard the girl say into her phone, "And he's so healthy."

"Me?" I asked, and she said "Yeah you."

I said "This is my dinner," and she laughed, and so did the Korean guy behind the counter. I looked back from the Korean to the blonde, who made a little shimmy like she was trying to undress without her hands. She said "Yeah, I gotta go" into her phone, and followed me outside.

AG: Not getting anything?
Her: Where do you live?
AG: Just a couple minutes from here.
Her: So...I'll just follow you then?

Then I put a tic-tac in her mouth.

Right now she's under my covers biting on matzoh I took home from the seder, getting crumbs everywhere and asking me what I'm doing.

Her: What are you doing?
AG: Bolding the dialogue shits to make it readable. It'll just be one sec.
Her: Oh come on back to bed, people will be able to read it regardless.
AG: Relax, I'm not even colouring them.