I’d Rather Suplex February Through A Salad Bar [Friday Thoughts W/ TeeCoZee]

Good Moleman. I just wanted a place to sit down. It’s Friday, March 1st, Two Thousand and Nineteen. The weather in Brooklyn is 30˚ & Pantone 426 and somewhere, somebody is leaving the house with no socks on. They know that this will be a huge mistake, but they can’t be bothered with spending the extra 20 seconds to put a pair on. They take a few steps outside and to their delight, the shoes are holding all the warmth in. It’s the middle of [the end of] Winter and their sockless feet are toasty. “What are people even wearing socks for?”, the person asks silently. “Clearly, it’s an industry funded by suckers. Or maybe they’re called, ‘sockers’. Heh.” While thinking of new puns to call sock wearers, they come to the horrible realization that their feet are actually sweating. With no place to go, the sweat seeps down into the sole, creating the mucky sensation that’s akin to walking in a swamp. They have Swamp Feet. And the second a cold breeze finds its way into a shoe, it’s gonna create a reality that’s unfit for most. They regret everything. And me? I just ride it out whenever that happens. I stick by the decisions I make. Some days, I just don’t feel like being a sock puppet. I also have some things on my mind…

– Oh hell yes. March is here! And he’s ready to curb stomp those Jabroni months that came before it! January is gonna taste steel chair to the face and February is getting suplexed through a salad bar. BAH GAWD THE CARNAGE! But seriously though, say hello to the best month that has ever lived. It starts with snow and it ends in sunshine. Florida and Arizona actually get bona-fide tourism, as baseball’s finest gather to claim that they’re all in the best shape of their lives and play 5 hours games that usually end in a tie [because they’re all in such great shape that they perform on equal levels]. There’s a holiday that celebrates donuts and another one for corned beef. We get our government-mandated extra hour of sunlight. Some of us also get our government-mandated extra stash of cash that makes us briefly feel like we’re rich and invincible [until April comes]. Millions upon millions will watch a tournament featuring the nation’s finest slaves as they try to put a ball through a hoop so that their owners can make boatloads of cash and they can get a “free education” despite the fact that they’re thousands of miles away from class and it’s a school night! We also get one of my favorite holidays, “Hey, You’ve Got Some Shit On Your Face, Oh wait, It’s Ash Wednesday, Sorry” Day! I actually thought that HRGSSOYFOWIAWS Day had passed me by, but nope, it’s coming up! March has so much going on, I don’t even know what to do first! Here’s the Top 5 Things That I’m Going To Do In March:

5) Eat the burger
B) Drink the beer
3) Watch the baseball
2) Clean the apartment
1) Drink the soda

I’m so excited to do all of these things that I might just do them today. Look out, year! March is here!

– As the saga of me catching people stealing cheap things continues, I had another incident this week. A mere minutes before closing, some punk ass kid came in and pocketed a container of mac and cheese. An old, greasy serving that was going to get thrown away the second he walked away from it. Stopping him seemed like a fruitless endeavor because he wasn’t stealing any fruit. He was also wearing a Do The Right Thing T-Shirt, which made my decision even more loaded. There’s a good chance that he had never seen the movie and bought the shirt at Urban Outfitters. There’s also a good chance that he’s wearing the shirt ironically, as he is clearly not doing “the right thing”. There was also a good chance that if I were to approach him, I’d probably just start quoting the movie in an act that would confuse him into dropping the food. Instead, I did nothing. I maintained the rationale that the night before, Spike Lee got robbed at the Oscars. That Best Director award was rightfully his after he got robbed in 1989, as Do The Right Thing was clearly the superior movie to come out that year. It’s an unspoken agreement that whenever that happens, the next movie the person makes that’s worth anything will get sympathy awards. That’s why The Departed was such a big winner. But even when it came time to make up for Spike’s robbery, he was robbed again. So, I let the guy go. Call it my way of paying it forward to the universe. Besides, he’s definitely regretting eating that mac and cheese.

– I never understood the world’s fascination with keeping stickers on clothing items. This is probably something I complained about before, by BFD doesn’t have an efficient search engine. Whenever I buy a hat, I immediately take the 4 or 5 stickers off it and ask the clerk to throw it away for me. I do this because I have an irrational disgust/fear of loose stickers but I also like to see the hat master’s jaw drop. To them, it’s blasphemy. To me, it’s hilarious. It’s the hatular equivalent of keying my car before it even leaves the dealership lot. It’s my car, I can wear it however I damn please! I’ve seen people get vocally angry at me for peeling off stickers and it only fuels me to do it more. Sometimes I buy hats just to peel off the stickers. Such a satisfying feeling. Nothing like drying glue on a fresh hat brim. Makes me feel at home.

I saw a guy in the train last week that really took the cake. He had knockoff Timbs, untied, with tags hanging off each one. His dirty jeans still had the size sticker on them. And his USA snapback had a sticker on the brim that read “snapback”. He basically looked like Danny DeVito robbed a V.I.M. 2 months ago. He had his phone a mere centimeters from his face, straining really hard to see the screen. His ability to read his phone was hindered by the fact that he left the prescription sticker on his reading glasses. I repeat: The guy was so fresh that even his reading glasses had a sticker on them. I’ve seen some stupid things in my day, but this one was pure kazoo. If only I had the balls to get a picture. I would be a meme champion and immediately lose my title to a dancing geriatric. That would’ve been sweet.

– I knew the Dodgers didn’t need Bryce Harper. As a matter of fact, his inclusion would create a ridiculous logjam in their outfield. Alex Verdugo and Andrew Toles paid their dues and now there’s finally space to give them real playing time. Bringing in some egotistical primadonna that has an incessant need to play every day would throw a wrench through those plans. Snowflakes like that belong on the ground, not the outfield, which I guess is technically the ground, shut up. I was totally fine with the inevitable reality of Bryce Harper going to the Phillies. But then on Sunday, it all got flipped upside down when skipper Dave Roberts paid him a visit. Suddenly, all of Dodgers nation was going apeshit over getting the best free agent on the market. And I bought into the hype tenfold. I spent hours upon hours refreshing Twitter and Reddit, just trying to eat up what little shreds of info I could find. It was all I could think about. I couldn’t even sleep at night, because sleep meant that I would miss breaking news. I alienated friends, coworkers, customers, fiancés, everybody. I was borderline stalking Bryce, trying to figure out his every move. The hot stove was burning and I was hungry for some pasta. And then finally, with no lead-up, climax or anything resembling drama, he signed with the Phillies. My stomach dropped. I felt like my soul had been ripped out. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I guess…I could keep refreshing Reddit? For no reason? But then after learning that they locked him in for 13 years with no opt-outs, I sighed in relief. That wasn’t my soul being ripped out. It was a body snatcher. I was possessed to think that a low-defense outfielder that hit .249 last year was going to send my pennant-winning franchise to the promised land. And now they’re stuck with him for 13 years?!? Holy balls we dodged a bullet! I guess that’s why they’re called the Dodgers, amirite?!?

– Try this trick over the weekend: Trick yourself into thinking that your favorite baseball team needs Adam Jones. Just look at him. He’s just sitting there, rotting in free agency. He could be in your outfield, doing Adam Jones things for you!

Have a Pacmanny weekend, everyone!

-TeeCoZee