I’ll Take the ‘Helper and a Brutus of Bud Light

Hopefully this will be the last blog I begin by referring to my new job. I promise I’ll try and make that so. But for the most part I just simply can’t set up the premise without telling you that although I’ve chronicled the trials and pitfalls of my new career, I have yet to reap the spoils of my first paycheck.

That came yesterday.

It was touch and go before that… the wife, the kid, and the me have been pinching pennies trying to get by…all the while trying to keep food flowing through our gullets.

This is pretty easy to accomplish with the Kalenator; a Lunchable here and there, some PB&J, or maybe some leftover pizza and her engine fires on all cylinders. The wife and I are a different story, we’ve been doing whatever it takes to stay full. Sometimes that means not so big spending on Little Caesar’s (that place is a life saver), but mostly it means a metric s#!t ton of Hamburger Helper.

It’s funny, in college, Hamburger Helper was almost celebrated. It was a key ingredient in most of our male feasts. That and some beer made for the beginning (sometimes end) to many a great night. It was the choice fuel in our manly machines. Now I look at it as possibly the surf and turf of the mid to upper lower class.

If Applebee’s decided to change its business model to cater to the same demographic, they could virtually do an entire menu devoted to the “Double H”.

All that having been said, one of my most glorious achievements as an early twenties adult was a homemade variation of the ‘Helper called Hamburger Surprise. The surprise was that it was incredibly good. And I’m fairly certain it was not unlike rice in a sense that it took minimal amounts to fill you up… and it stayed with you for days.

It might be modern man’s most perfect food.

Just chaulk that up to one of my many great discoveries. I feel that one day I should publish a book of all my great accomplishments; Hamburger Surprise, the McNugget Happy Meal, and Dominos giving you a side of pizza sauce for dipping. Just to name a few.

These things could be my legacy to my offspring, something that would let them know their dad was a great man.

That is if they couldn't figure it out on their own - J

.32 Special

New job. New things to learn. New headaches.

I think the best way for me to illustrate my first two weeks at my new job for you is to compare it to being a catcher squating to catch ten balls from ten different pitchers throwing to me all at once. Sure… every once in a while I get lucky and catch a few. But mostly the majority of them go flying by.

It’s not all bad all the time, I just feel that maybe sometimes the information isn’t being given to me in a way that hardly anyone would ever catch any of it. And that makes it more then a little frustrating at times.

I could be wrong. It could be that I am just getting to be an “old dog”. And all of this info is like the “new tricks” that you just can’t teach me. Maybe it is way easier to teach a pup to roll over and speak then me about mitered corners and soffit. After all, it did seem way easier to start to teach Kalen the alphabet.

Or maybe letters are just a much cooler thing to a four year old then siding to someone thirty-two.

The sponges we call brains must be bone dry as kids… mine appears to be all soaked up. This could explain why 5 weeks ago Kalen couldn’t tell you one letter in her name, now she can practically write it out. I on the other hand, can barely tell you what color siding can be matched with what caulk or if we have it in stock.

Ok…

It isn’t as bad as I am letting on. I am actually picking some stuff up here and there. By the time it gets to be the busy season it should be old hat. It’ll be a while before I am an expert, but I bet I’ll be able to talk shingles with the best of ‘em by the first of the new year. Hell, I bet Kalen might even be able to spell her last name as well by then. But that’s cheating… her last name is only four letters long and two of them are the same.

She clearly has the upper hand.

Ah well... they say nothings lost or won, and what you learn is soon forgotten.

That sounds about right to me - J

That Empty Feeling of Having Not Ate For Days.

I would love to be typing a new and historically funny blog for you right now.

But I can’t.

Sadly the new job has been information overload in the first two days, and I just haven’t felt completely creative. Well… that’s not completely true. I did manager to sketch out this week’s Random Funnies while watching some mind numbingly boring videos... so at least I have that.

I promise to give you normal blogs in the coming weeks. I just need to find my "sea legs" before I can find my way back into my creative mind set.

In the mean time, thank you to my wife and daughter for my birthday. And thanks to all that gave me birthday wishes. And to the handful of guys that gave me a much unexpected rowdy time on Halloween. I am fairly certain that you guys lead me in a direction that caused me to crop dust two Playmates and Hugh Hefner in an elevator.

Yeah, I smiled as I typed that - J