Ketchup catch-up

My belly full of burger and chips and beer from my work's bi-weekly cookout, I'm going to try to make some semblance of blog retribution and catch up my with the latest big events in my life.

THE CRUISE MY AUNT LU AND NANA TOOK ME ON
Frigging awesome. What else can I say? Pure gluttony. Everything you hear about cruises is true. The mediocre entertainment, the overpriced port towns, the shuffleboard and the food. Good lord, THE FOOD!! I know that every comic from Paula Poundstone to Gallagher has made a crack about cruise food (okay, maybe not Gallagher, he's too busy revolutionizing the art of sledgehammer cookery, which reminds me, NOTE TO SELF: develope a cooking show with Gallagher) but I have to admit, Dave Barry and the lot are right. There's a lot of flipping food. And it's all good, too. Plus you feel like you are never going to have another meal in your life, so you're always stuffing yourself.

That's a funny thing about cruises. Everything is very time oriented. You'd think that you would exist in a land outside of time, like Las Vegas, but no. You're constantly being reminded, "the dining hall closes at 10", "the bar doesn't open til 8 am", "The line to the vomitorius will shut down by midnight". Constantly. So there's always that constant anxiety of "I've gotta be doing something". Which I enjoy.

The best part, of course, was getting together with the cousins. So much fun to hang out with them, while they gambled of course. But we did have a lot of fun, especially dancing in 'Da Club. There's nothing like seeing your grandmother shake her booty to the lyrics, "To the windows, to the walls, til the sweat drips from my balls." Classic. Thank you so much, DJ Jazzy.

It was wicked fun, though. And I suggest that if any of you has an amazing aunt, uncle and grandma that wants to take you on a trip, say yes. It'll hurt your waistline, but will fill your heart with love. And cholesterol.


GIVING BLOOD
A couple days ago, I heard about this guy at Improv olympic, Eric Filipkowski and that he was in the hospital getting open heart surgery. This was forwarded by the great E.J. Scott, who in addition to being a really nice guy, is a really nice guy. So the thing was, if you wanted to help Eric out, then come down to Cedar's Sinai to donate blood.

Now I don't know this guy, but I thought it would be a really nice thing. I also thought how by doing it, people would think that I was a really nice guy and wow what a sacrifice or whatever. Which made me not want to go. But then I thought this dude's getting open heart surgery, you know, so screw my own ego battles and just do it. Even if I was doing it to show how effing brave I was, so what? I get to be a gallant dick, and he gets some free blood. Everybody wins.

Then I thought, well hey, I'll just go and do it and not tell anyone. But then I had already told Ben and Andrea and everybody at work, so that pretty much screwed that up. Plus when I got to the hospital there were a couple other IO people there who probably didn't know my name. Nonetheless my cover was blown.

So I filled out all the paperwork, but when it got to the part about "Have you been out of the country in the last year?" I told the nurse that I had been in India and Mexico over the last month. Which made me feel like Superdick for bragging. I might as well have said, "My penis is like two cans of redbull stacked on top of each other, will that be a problem giving blood? My giant wang?"

They told me that in deed that is a problem, and that I can't give blood for a year. Hallelujah. Cause I was really scared. I've done it once before, and they really up the biology factor on you. You see the redness filling into a plastic container. Who needs that in their life? Can't blood just be a secret, mysterious, abstract concept? Like brainwaves, or neural pathways? It still is a mystery of course, and why that red stuff is the difference between me typing into a computer and me turning into dirt is beyond me, but still keep it behind a curtain.

The next day, I heard that Eric came through, and that everything is fine. So we all win. Eric got a tear fixed in his heart and I got to be a hero without ever having to do anything. Of course come 11 months from now, I'll need to go to another exotic disease ridden country to keep this thing going.

I wonder if they give cruises to Calcutta?