The Game of the Name

I get a few weird looks from people when they see "crushthemall". I'd say the majority of looks are looks of confusion.

"Is it crush them all, or crush the mall?"

I reply, "Yes."

When I first came up with the name, I was inspired by what is now one of the oldest Firefox extensions I use, DownloadThemAll. I always read it as something that downloads all of something, but I also had it in the back of my mind that it was also something that downloaded the mall, and it always made me smile and think to myself, "Why would someone want to download a mall? Ridiculous, if you ask me."

So, circa fall 2006, a little after the release of the Xbox 360, I decided that I needed a new moniker for my online exploits on their Xbox Live platform. I hadn't played on Xbox Live for a long time, and my last handle for that was "Pep-X", which was short for Peppermint Extract; the highly flammable, highly minty, all-purpose flavoring agent that we used while making minty shakes and malts at TGI Friday's. It was the focus of my attention waaay back in 2002, when Xbox Live first launched. I decided it would be a cool name, until it was found out that:

 A) it looked like POP-X on the tv screen, so people were calling me that all the time
and B) I barely played Xbox Live games, so that fell to the wayside.

Fast forward back to 2006 and my new name choosing scheme. I ran some potential names past my roommate. I'm sure they were ridiculous, like "Capt. Coolguy" or "TheKiller8833". I included "crushthemall" as an option and he said that out of the bunch, that one was the coolest. I agreed, and crushthemall was born.

If someone asked me the definition of the name, I'd have to tell them that it's the two following things: it looks super awesome when I kill someone in a video game, and it says, "crushthemall has beaten you" (unfortunately, that never happens very much), AND, I'm not a super huge fan of shopping malls (especially those outdoor plaza-type malls where you have to walk outside to get to any of the stores you want to go to. What kind of bullshit is that? It's friggin' Minnesota. The busiest shopping season of the year is in the wintertime. I know...let's make everybody walk outside to shop. Asshole mall planners.

Since then, I've registered a website, started a blog, created tens of online accounts with the name crushthemall and it's pretty much the new name of the day for me. I like the ambiguousness of it and what it implies.

Can't wait for the next alter ego.

nut-buttery goodness...

Did someone say peanut-butter machine?

 

To quote Linda Richmond, this this is "like buttah!"

Holy crap. I want one. It's only $50, plus shipping and handling. And it's from one of my all-time favorite catalogs I loved reading as a kid (true story), the Lighter Side Catalog. That, along with the Johnson-Smith Co. catalogs always had the craziest shit in them. I always thought that they were related to each other, somehow, and by visiting the Johnson Smith Co. website, it was pretty much confirmed.

Lovely reader(s)....feel free to buy me one! I will make you all the crazy peanut butter you desire!!!!

posting!

yup...that's right, true believers! Another fine edition of "Let's post once a week or so!".

This week's edition will have such stories as:

"I'm getting internet this week! The only problem is that I'm not going to be there for the setup, and I have a feeling that my roommate is going to get taken for a ride."

and

"I don't hate my job, I just hate everything else."

Also, look for an editorial from my darker side, pointing out the finer aspects of road rage, and over-cooking Spaghetti-o's.

Today's short story is entitled, "I didn't get a lick of quality sleep last night, and I'm pretty ticked about it."

I didn't get a lick of quality sleep last night, and I'm pretty ticked about it.



What's really funny, is that I'm so lazy that I didn't even want to lift my hand from the keyboard to select the text so I could copy and paste it again. How bad is that? Right now I'm debating whether re-typing it was being lazy, or if copy/pasting would have been lazier.

Brilliant.

remember when I used to blog?

It's been so long. The newest excuse is: I don't have internet access. Plain and simple. I mean, I have pseudo-access through my phone, but it's mediocre at best, and my battery gets all drained to shit when I use it with internet, so I try to keep it at a minimum.

Tonight, though, the computer gets transported from old place to new place. I don't really have a place to put it, but I'll figure it out. Can't be any worse than my old roommate putting his tower on the floor, the monitor on top of that, and sitting on a pillow in the living room, next to the couch. Worst desk ever.

I went to Fallcon '08 on Saturday, and was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it. Caroline came with, and my brother showed up, too. The $10 admission ($11-$1 for a canned food donation. Caroline supplied re-fried beans...I'm sure the kiddies will be thrilled)
for 2 hours spent there was WELL worth it. I saw Ghostbusters, Spider-Men, Superman/Superwoman, Green Lantern, the Flash, Thor, Wonder Woman (va-va-voom!) Elasti-girl, the original Batmobile, the Bat-Cycle (complete with Robin's sidecar, WITH the go-kart accessory...brilliant!), and a slew of other things. My friend, Dan, of bewilderedkid.com had a table there and was selling his wares. He was also sporting the best handlebar horseshoe moustache I've seen since the 70's.

All in all it was a really good time. I'm so glad I went. And I wasn't even looking for anything in particular. I just wanted to go.

The worst thing about the con? No camera. Seriously, my freshly re-charged batteries...not fresh...not recharged. Soooooo upset.

edit: It's horseshoe, not handlebar. Poster is a big dummy.

Fallcon!

I'm going to my first comic book convention next weekend. I'm pretty excited for this.

My hopes:

-Spandex-clad women
-Awesome superhero costumes
-Hand-shaking and signatures from industry giants

My expectations:

-Spandex-clad men
-cardboard versions of my favorite heroes
-30-40 different versions of Iron Man costumes
-very smelly people (we can sense our own kind)
-industry midgets

I'm sure it will be a good time.

MCBA FALLCON COMIC BOOK CELEBRATION
October 4 & 5, 2008 - 10AM to 5PM Both Days!
Minnesota State Fairgrounds - In the Grandstand!
1265 Snelling Avenue - Saint Paul, MN 55108
20th ANNIVERSARY 1989-2008

Admission is just $11.00 per adult. Good for both days! Children 9 & under are FREE!

really?

I opened up the blogger webpage, hoping I'd be inspired to write something of relevance. Nothing popped for 30 minutes, so I decided to close the window.

As soon as I close it, I overhear my co-worker talking to another about "how radioactive cell phones really are. Watch this video. They pop popcorn with 4 cell phones."

Man...I know I'm on the internet 23-6, and I try to keep up with all of the relevant viral videos and bullshit phenomina, but really? You're watching these videos for the first time now? Maybe you should stop watching TV and start downloading the internet more.

The popcorn scam is almost a year old, if it isn't already.

All I'm saying is, hit up Snopes before you involve everybody in the office, and get everybody chattering about something that isn't even real. This place is starting to feel like church at times.

under the bridge

Hm. Sounds like a bridge has been opened. I wouldn't know it because my commute isn't affected by it one bit. I'd be interested to see what my drive home is like, being that I usually take 280 from University Ave. to 35W, but I won't even find that out until next week.

I never saw the bridge in person. I never saw the damage that happened. I was curious, but I don't think I'm one of those "needs to see it" kinds of people. I hate gawker slow-downs while driving for the same reason. It's an accident. Leave the poor people alone.


boat trip

I was on a paddleboat on the St. Croix last night for work. It wasn't a bad time at all. I got a fist bump for being a member of the singles club, had a few drinks, ate some good food, got a little drunk with my co-workers on a Wednesday night...who could really ask for anything more? I mean...for a Wednesday, that is. In a perfect world, this would have been on a weekend, a hotel room would have been gotten, and much drinking would ensue. But beggars can't be choosers, can they?

bless me father, for I have sinned

it has been 31 years since my last confession.

I...um...accidentally watched some of Mike Meyers' The Love Guru. I'm so sorry for this. I'll do whatever it takes to appease the gods and win the respect of anybody who reads this.

On a completely related note:

Shame on the following people for being in the movie.

Shame on Val Kilmer. Shame on Jessica Simpson. Shame on Jessica Alba's boobies. Shame on Verne Troyer. Shame on Justin Timberlake. Shame on Sir Ben Kingsley. And most of all, shame on you Mike Meyers. You should know better. Quit while you're ahead.

I only watched 20 minutes of this movie, and I couldn't get any further.

what day is it today?

Oh that's right...the other, OTHER day that went down in infamy. I look forward to the constant reminders I'll hear. It's bad enough that people are still conspiracy theoring about it, but to have it mentioned every other minute...no thanks.

And then I realize that even by writing about it is a reminder. This is true, but it's also a declaration that people just need to let go.

It's like talking about the high score you got in Pac-Man in 1982. Sure it's pretty impressive and important at the time, but after a while of constantly hearing about it, the shit gets old.

It's like seeing John Kerry bumper stickers, or "WELLSTONE!" bumper stickers. I think they still sell both of them. I understand that there's a concept behind the dedication, but man...that shit is the past. Think about what's ahead.

where nobody knows my name

I'm not complaining, by any means, but I don't think people like using my name.

One of the guys I work with either calls me "Round Head", "wingnut", "G-off", "Fuzz Nuts" or some other nickname.

Almost everybody I've worked with at TGI Friday's pretty much called me Geo, or G-off. A select few would even call me, "G".

Pet names don't really count, but I had an ex who called me Monkey.

My soon-to-be-married friends, Andy and Megan, call me Pablum Geoff. Good story behind that one.

Hell, even my dad calls me Julio. It's such an old nickname, I can't remember why or how it came about.


It was funny. I met my roommate's uncle last night.
She says, "This is my friend, Geo."
"Eh?" the uncle goes, confusedly.
"Geoff," I say.
"Oh! Well, how are ya?"
It made me smile.

I did, at one point in my life, literally wish to be called some kind of cool nickname.

I think that wish came through. Tenfold.

blogging to get some

I think I might have a new goal for blogging.

To get some.

Some what?

..at this point, I'll take anything. But money and sex are right at the top of this list. Power, recognition, popularity, free stuff and stalkers are pretty darn close to the top, also.

office scams

if there's one thing I've noticed, it's that by working in an office, you eventually will become familiar with office scams. These are the workplace equivalent of the 419 Nigerian Scams. Basically a company calls you up, saying that they're the supplier of the toner for your copier, and that they need the model of the copier for whatever reason.

Well, there's a few ways to deal with these asshole liars.

1. You can commit to what they're selling, and get ripped off. BAD IDEA.

2. You can hang up on them. LAME.

3. You can fuck right back with them, and make their jobs so much more exciting than what they had planned on.


The girls in the office like to choose option 3 100% of the time.

The most recent ploy was as follows:

Sheryl takes the call, and immediately figures out that the fake copier people are calling, and puts them on hold for a second, to talk to Julie. Sheryl asks Julie what her name should be. In this case, Julie picks "Twyla". Sheryl pops back on the line saying that "Twyla" will be right with them.

In the meantime, the call gets put on speaker and Sheryl and "Twyla" proceed to argue to each other as to whose responsibility it is to take care of the toner. They argue until the caller hangs up. I think this was record time. Less than a minute.

Needless to say, it's funny to overhear, and even funnier to see the girls hootin' and hollerin' over their latest scam-scam.

movie locations

When I was in Chicago earlier this year, I wish I'd come here, but I'm glad I didn't. But the record store John Cusack's character owned in High Fidelity, looks like it's boarded up and graffiti'd, circa whenever GoogleCorp drove their surveillance vehicles through that neighborhood.


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I mean, yeah it's sad, but it's Chicago. They'll do whatever the fuck they like. Movies are always temporary to cities like that. They'll never commemorate the fact that a good chunk of a great movie was filmed there.

There's no Filming Location Preservation Society (FLPS). People driving by most likely just look at that corner property and go, "Hrmph...there's that old 7-11 I used to go to as a kid. Now it's nothing."

That is, if they even actually care.

All I know is that whenever I drive past the place that used to be the cafe where Marissa Tomei worked in Untamed Heart, I shed an invisible, misty tear. It's a good thing I don't drive past it often.

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Labor Day Weekend!

Enjoy it!

I miss my blog

It seems I get more readers when I don't write than when I do. It's weird.

I'm still waiting for that light at the end of the tunnel where it finally doesn't seem all that bad. I'm not depressed or feel like I'm in a hole or anything. It's more like the carrot dangling in front of the donkey, and I'm the ass. Well one day, I'm going to figure out that sitting down is going to get me that carrot. After that, I'll be one happy burro. (I don't know...is burro/ass/donkey the same thing?)

I really can't wait to get home tonight. I get to paint my new room. Well, ok...I get to "prime" it first, and then probably paint tomorrow, because hey, what's more fun to do on a Friday night than paint? Ok, there's 3 bars within walking distance, and I need to "prime" my stomach for a bachelor party on Saturday night, too, so I'll see if my roommate is up for shots and tall beers.

The bachelor party should be a good time. It's starting off with horse racing, but I'm not so into the whole gambling scene, so I'm skipping out on that, but meeting up with everybody at 7:30 at Rudolph's. Should be a good time. I've never eaten there. I've only had their famous cole slaw dressing from the grocery store, and lemme tell you, I might just get a plate of that and deal with the CS farts later.

The night will end at the Vegas Lounge in NE Minneapolis. From what it looks like, if you want to get your karaoke on with a cold PBR and Grandma Betty, this is the place. We'll see. I'll wear my Saturday night best and aim to please.

Can't wait for Saturday, lemme tell ya.

worst blogger ever

So much has happened in the past month, it's hard to want to sum it all up. I've been really sad/upset/confused/angry lately that it make me not want to write about it and just keep it all inside.

So, a basic summary. My dog was put to sleep, I went to Six Flags and Chicago, I joined the ranks of the dating crowd, I saw dragsters and funny cars, I set foot in a lake for the first time in 20 years, camped, decided to move into a house in Anoka...

And that's not even including the filler. Hopefully I'll get an opportunity to sit down and write some more, and do it on a regular basis. I'm setting goals, and doing whatever I can to achieve them.

This is going to be good.

Hurts my friggin eyes to watch this:

talking 'bout my, my va-ca-shun

Saturday, 7/12/08
Woke up at 6:30 to get the oil changed in C's car. Drive to the Edina Toyota, arrive at 7:30. Oil changed by 8:30, grab breakfast at Perkins, then leave for Chicago. Oh wait, gotta drop some paperwork off at C's work in Minneapolis. Not a problem, we'll just cruise on up 35w and...SHIT...it's closed. How about we hit up Cedar. Just a hop skip and a jump away....aw shit...there's a triathlon running all across Uptown and South Minneapolis. We finally get out of town around 10:30. Still not bad.

Saturday night we arrived in Chicago. We stayed at the Silversmith Hotel, which was way more luxe than I'm used to or really care for, but it was pretty nice. Walked around town. Hit up Milennium Park again, walked to Buckingham Fountain, and back to the hotel. and ended up at Navy Pier. At the pier, I saw the most fantastic fireworks display I think I'd ever seen. And some crazy trapeeze artists ringing bells and doing stunts. Crazy. End of the night.

Sunday 7/13/08.
At midnight, I got a little older, and that was ok. We woke up the next day and decided to go to the Art Inisitute of Chicago. We saw priceless works of art, and I got to see American Gothic:

 American Gothic by Grant Wood

And Nighthawks:

 

Nighthawks by Edward Hopper

Two of my favorite paintings. I also learned that the woman standing next to the man in American Gothic is NOT his wife, but his unwed daughter. You can tell she's unwed because she's UGLY.

More to come...

future zombie

We got a fella here at work who is pretty much on his way to zombie-dom. He's already showing signs of becoming one, including the glassy eyes, a penchant for brains, and most of all, the awkward, stumbling walk, as seen in many of George Romero's "... of the Dead" flicks.

I'm thinking about wearing a helmet to protect my cranium from any attacks. As stumbly as he is, he's pretty quiet on the feet. The sucker could sneak up on me, and I wouldn't even know it.

Can't read? Click here!

I'm trying to send my Portable Firefox 3 from my home computer to my work computer. I didn't want to do this until the final version of FF3 came out, which it did in the last 24 hours. I decided that an online file sharing service would be the best option, since most web email providers have a size limit on their files, and the zip of my Portable FF3 is roughtly 90Mb.

I decided to choose my method based on having to register for the service or not. I just want to quickly upload the *.zip file, and then download it here at work. That's it. I don't want to register, verify my email address, wait for a beta invite or anything. Upload, then download. U/l or d/l speed didn't matter...the only thing I needed was a service that provided sending and receiving of files bigger than 90Mb.

I selected GigaSize.com to do the dirty work. No registration at all...just upload up to 300Mb, and download with the link they provide after the file is uploaded. I didn't care how long the file was to remain on their servers or anything since I was going to get the file almost immediately after downloading it.

The process went painlessly, and I now have the file. The only funny thing I noticed was this:



"Can't read?" Well...if I can't read it, how am I supposed to know that I'm supposed to click it? And even then...why am I on the internet at all, unless I'm on Hobo Internet, and there's nothing but Hobo Signs showing where it's safe to sleep.

Ok. I understand that the "Can't read?" is referring to the CAPTCHA right above it, but I think it could be a little more descriptive.