Randomy randomness is random

Welcome back to your regular dose of citrusy lovin' from that not so cordial blog:  Edge of the Lemon.  It's been over a week since my last post, things are starting to get crazy / stupid / busy at work, M and the kids are doing well, and I'm still in search of new shows to watch on TV.  With that said, M and I have started watching the new episodes of Castle (which have been piling up in the DVR) while taking shots of Rumple Mintz throughout the course of the show.  I have dubbed this new game CastleMintz, and I expect it to start catching on in certain areas of world very soon.

As you may have noticed (look to the right), you may see more stuff added to the sidebar.  This stuff is commonly referred to as gadgets in the blogging circles.  I realized that there wasn't really much going on over there so I decided to go crazy with these gadgets to try and attract more readers.

New gadgets include:

• Top 10 most popular blog posts
• A new "Followers" option (since people tell me Facebook sucks at letting them know I have a new post) - PLEASE JOIN SO I KNOW WHO YOU ARE!
• Some gadget called Feedjit that shows where the last 10 viewers are from
• And a bunch of fish...feel free to feed them or just simply ignore them (they don't have any feelings so don't feel bad)

Anyway, I hope you enjoy some of the new features and that they bring you hours of enjoyment in the future. 

Now, on with the post:

Several months ago, I posted a series of Random Thoughts.  Considering this was about as successful as any other post, I decided to try it again.  We'll start with some complaining...

Actors are posers and they suck!

In my search for new shows, I have noticed that the wonderful world of TV/movie make believe is not afraid to provide a character that plays video games.  These "gamers", if you will, are often shown in their natural environment in front of a television, controller in hand with the dumbest f%&$ing look on their faces and spazing their bodies like they just stuck a paper clip in an electrical outlet.  What's worse, have these actors who are trying to be "gamers" ever held a controller before?

For those of you who don't understand this frustration, let me try to use a more mainstream example to show you what I am trying to convey.  Imagine an actor has a role as a baseball player; however, this actor has never played nor seen a game of baseball ever in their life.  If they walk up to the plate with a catcher's mitt on their head, a bat sticking out of their ass, and third base stapled to their chest, you'd probably realize right away that actor has no right pretending to be a baseball player.

The same holds true when actors grab a controller and pretends to be a gamer.  In the 30 years I have been playing video games, not once have I ever been required to constantly mash all of the buttons at the same time for five consecutive minutes while contorting my body through an imaginary tennis racket.  Seriously, are you playing Call of Duty or trying to take off a woman's bra for the first time?  Man Up you posers!  ***See what I did there?***

Along with gaming, as a musician I can tell almost right away when someone is not actually trying to look like they know what they're doing when they hold an instrument:

It's almost embarrassing to watch people mess around with the fake confidence that they actually think they are convincing the viewing public they actually know what they are doing...for shame!

For the record, this is how you play a guitar:

***rock hands***

The faster the food...

Dear Wendy's "new" Old Fashioned Burgers with natural cut fries:  You suck!  I miss your old burgers and your old fries were way better.  Goodbye forever...and yes, I am serious.  That is all.

Dear Culver's Butter Burgers:  You're really starting to look good these days (for some reason).  Would you like to come over this Saturday for dinner?

Dear Chipotle Burritos:  Yes, I am still mad at you...you know what you did.  But I will be forgiving you very soon.

Right faux pas, wrong audience:

I recently participated in Employee Appreciation Day at work.  As a Director in my company, I have many "leadership-like" duties where I must be accountable.  For Employee Appreciation Day, it was my important task of welcoming employees as they came into the cafeteria, handing out lunch trays (I gave out vouchers for flashlights last year) and directing them towards the buckets of free chili.  I also had to wear an apron and remind everyone how appreciated they were...it was epic!

After lunch, I ran into the HR director who put the whole thing together.  She told me there was a whole bunch of cornbread left over and that they were going to freeze it so they could give it to a soup kitchen this week for Thanksgiving.  She was obviously very excited as we openly discussed in the elevator on our way back to work:

Did I mention this cornbread was going to a soup kitchen?  For the homeless?  Yeah, not my best moment...

Bang the Wii-mote Slowly:

The below picture is the aftermath of one of my children using a Nintendo Wii remote to hammer pretend nails into a very real wall while their brother and sister cheer them on:

This is why we can't have nice things...


Go Cowboys!

Several weekends ago, Ayris went over to my dad's house, and in between some yard work, they took time off to watch the Cowboys football game.  Ever since, Ayris has been begging to watch more football (I'm so proud!).  She wanted so badly to watch more that she continued to pester M about it.  When Sunday finally rolled around, Ayris wanted to go visit my mom for a few hours and completely forgot about the game coming on.  When M went to go pick her up later, Ayris was very upset when she realized she missed the Cowboys game, and the following conversation took place in car ride home:

I can't wait until Ayris becomes a teenager...

And so ends another series of lessons sometimes known as really real life.  Hopefully everyone enjoyed a nice, fresh glass of randomness along with a whole bunch of new gadgets to peruse (seriously, become a Follower, all the cool kids are doing it...you want to be cool don't you?).

Before we go, I leave you with the latest pic I found online that has been giving me my daily laughs lately:

Get well soon, Mr Dead Bird...

-Cheers!

Enter the Year Two

That's right, it's The Lemon's 1st birthday!  Can you believe it?  Yeah, me too...whatever.

Anyway, as I was planning on what I wanted to do for this special edition, I was reminded of something that happened earlier this year.  I was interviewing a potential candidate for a project manager position on my team, when one of my peers, Kevin, decided to ask one final question:

Yes, Kevin really did ask this question in the interview, I'm not making this up...right Kevbo?

So since this was an interview and most interviewees are REALLY EXCITED, the answer was an energetic and passionate "no..."

But regardless, it made me wonder - What if the world HAS heard of Edge of the Lemon?

With a common theme in mind, I decided to re-introduce the world to Edge of the Lemon.  Now I know what you're thinking - "Photoshopped pics peddling your stupid site?  That's totally been done before..."  To that I say, "Why yes, jerkass, it has been done before...it all has.  And here it is again!"  So, in all it's glory, I present to you a deluge of pictures based on Edge of the Lemon (okay, so maybe it's more like eight pictures and not a full deluge, but it can still feel overwhelming...sort of):

So there you have it, year 1 is officially behind us!  Looking forward to the future, you can expect more zany stories about M and the kids, more yarn spinning, amazing new products from Uncle Buckey, and of course, more Mike Wheeler.

As we close this special edition, I leave you with something I saw at the Newark airport a couple of weeks ago:

Cara rolled her eyes at me when I made her wait so I could snap this picture.  For those of you who don't know me very well, this is really fricken funny!

-Cheers!

Witness Protection Program

It's that time again, yep, you guessed it - time for yet another post from that unknown blog - Edge of the Lemon!

First some updates:

Baby Alex is now four weeks old and doing fine.  He's a good sleeper and a good eater (and a stinky pooper).  His siblings are still helping out with him, but that interest is starting to dissipate rapidly.  He's definitely become one of the family, and it's only a matter of time before we give him some embarrassing nickname.

I'm still in a desperate search for a new show to watch.  I've tried a couple recently, but nothing has really grabbed my interested too much.  I have found myself re-watching Firefly on Netflix while I work out...otherwise, I'm still shopping around.

M recently tried to get me into the Big Bang Theory; however, her approach was a little questionable:

She's a big, silly goof isn't she folks?

Just because I know the difference between a rhombus and a Romulan, play video games and laugh at the humorous Lord of the Rings and sci-fi undertones doesn't make me a...oh my god - I'm such a nerd!  Well, there you have it, M was right once again...thanks a lot Universe.

Anyway, you might recall me mentioning that my friend, Jerry the Tool, loaned me the first season of Burn Notice.  The status update on me watching that one is that the DVDs have officially left the front seat of my car and are now somewhere in my house.  I remember putting them on my desk and I think I saw them in a drawer about a week ago...more to come!

Well alright...on with the post!

I recently had one of my direct reports from work forward me the strangest email.  To protect the innocent (and punish the guilty), I have masked this person's real name and have strategically called him Lason Jane:

Now Jason La...I mean, Lason Jane (see what I did there?) sent this email to me recently and thought I could use it in a blog post.  This was sent to Lason by a consultant working with him on a project, and this consultant is someone who has rarely spoken to Lason since the project first began.  I assure you, none of the contents of this email were altered in any way (I just made it more appealing for blogging purposes):

Now, I'd like to think I can give anyone the benefit of the doubt on things like this, but even I was a little thrown back by this email.  I kept thinking to myself:

For those of you wondering - no, I did NOT find this picture on the interweb...I made it!

***applause***

Also, show of hands from those of you who read that quote in Hank Hill's voice...anyone?

Anyway, I could not help but think of Lason and how he could possibly have become a part of the Witness Protection Program (WPP).  My initial thoughts went to the standard stuff - witnessed a mob hit, was a bookie for the mob, was a soldier in a mob war, turned in his mob boss because of unpaid parking tickets...something/anything to do with the mob (because in the movies that's the only reason people go into the WPP right?).

I then started to think of the kind of person Lason is and realized it probably had nothing to do with the mob...so I did some digging.  You would not believe the crazy stuff that this Lason Jane character has done in his life.  He's not in hiding because of the mob...he's in hiding because most of the world is after him (for one reason or another).

Here's why:

Early in his career, Lason started out as a mid-level product exec for the Coca-Cola company during the mid '80s.  This was Lason's million dollar idea:

That's right, Lason is responsible for the train wreck once known as The New Coke, which soon became Coke II.  Shortly after that, it was then repackaged and sold as a discount anti-freeze which was quickly taken off the market when cars began intentionally driving into trees and waking their owners up in the middle of the night to brutally beat the crap out of them.

After leaving Coca-Cola soon after that (for unrelated reasons), Lason joined the music industry.  It was his job to listen to unknown songs and determine which ones should be played on the radio and offered up to sell to the public:

That career lasted about a week...

Venturing not far from his role in the music industry, Lason then decided to become an agent and publicist (he got two pay checks that way).  His newness to the music scene and radical thinking sparked the interest of country music sensation, Garth Brooks (who had been struggling with his own career and needing something to do with that assload of money he had acquired by being a successful country music star).

Lason had the answer:

Let's take a quick pause from our story to explain something.  For those of you who did not catch the above joke, back in late 90's, Garth Brooks (pictured top left) created a fake persona known as Chris Gaines (pictured top right) who played more of the pop/alternative music of that era...why he did that, only Lason knows for sure.  The other picture is of magician Criss Angel who would go on to steal Chris Gaine's image and haircut.

So in summary:

Garth Brooks is Chris Gaines...

Criss Angel is Mindfreak...

Questions???

Moving on...

After his lucrative career in music, Lason decided to try the visual arts and become a studio exec for national television.  Lason's vision of the future was less plot / memorable characters / story lines / substance, and more REALITY!!!  That's right, it was Lason Jane who canceled Firefly, Arrested Development, Futurama (the first time) and Family Guy (the first time too)...along with all of your other favorite shows that are no longer on the air.  It's all Lason's doing!  Instead, Lason decided to pollute the airwaves by rehashing the same craptacular formula into spinoff after spinoff.

Some of Lason's more popular projects included the following:

And of course, the ever popular:

So after conquering marketing, music and TV, there was only one place left to go - movies.  But along with the other areas of Lason's career, that too was short-lived:

And so ended Lason's career in the movie industry.

After so much angst and hatred of the world towards one person, Lason decided to go into hiding.  He has since joined the humbled ranks of a project team tasked with implementing new clients into their pharmacy benefits.  From a promising career to public enemy #1, Lason has truly experienced it all.  But through it all, Lason has kept his head held high and his whereabouts unknown.  I for one salute Lason for his actions, for without him, I would never know pain, bad ideas, or the meaning of the word idiolect.

So if you ever happen to meet Lason in your path through life, thank him for a job done poorly.  After all, someone has to take the fall for all those bad ideas right?

In closing, I leave you with something I found on the wild, wild web.  I know we (just like Lason) all wish there was always going to be a backup plan:

May you all reach for that furthest star, and be ready to jump to a backup plan when you fail miserably.

-Cheers!