On The Twelfth Day Of Christmas…

Lucky/unlucky you! I’ve decided to post this one early since… Honestly… I had some free time and I’m not going to want to deal with this at midnight, or at all on Christmas day.

I’m not sure if you’re going to like this or not, but… Remember last year when I tried to create my own 12 Days Of Christmas (and failed horribly)? Well… I revisited those posts, finished them, and combined them. I mean, I kinda sorta finished/updated them. They were started last year (some were actually started the year before last), so if you’re focused on dates you’re going to get lost rather quickly. Bottom Line Up Front, I did a thing for you. Here. In this post. You’re welcome.

Yeah, so um… Merry Christmas to you and yours, and enjoy my really long, REALLY awkward post that I kinda wish I never started. And sorta wish I never finished.

On the first day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

A needle for an STD.

Well, here we go. I’ve finally come full circle (kinda) and made my way back to the Days Of Christmas series that I attempted (sorta) last year. And first up on the chopping block, is one of our oh so beloved “most embarrassing things that I am willing to publicly admit” posts. I give you (drumroll please) my worst date!

This one is going to come as a bit of a shocker, both for those who have and have not heard the story before. I’m sure you can relate. This is one of those stories where you just HAVE TO tell someone, but you only decide to tell them bits and pieces. I’m not sure how many people I have told this story to, I’d say less than ten. And of those <10 I think only two of them know the entire story. And so… Without further ado…

I met Clap online and right from the start we hit it off. She was educated (and an educator… Which is apparently my type?), well spoken, funny, interesting, and extremely attractive… Or at least that’s what I had gathered from her profile, and our texts.

We were texting one Friday, about two weeks after we first “met” and realized that we were both free. So we decided to go out. I, as the gentleman, said that I would come pick her up, and I immediately took to Google to look up things in her area for us to do. Now, I won’t bore you with that back and forth, but I will say that the “would you like to…” conversation went as well as the cliché “what do you want for dinner” conversation does. Finally I got “just come get me”, I did. This was the first (and hopefully LAST) time that I had made plans to meet a girl prior to speaking with her on the phone.

I get to her house, she stumbles outside, almost falling into my arms. I open her car door and as she steps by me to get in, I get a whiff of her body spray (I don’t care what kind of body spray it is, I’m not a fan, either go with perfume or go without). I get in, we get on the road, and she starts directing me. As she’s giving me directions, she’s also telling me about her day, using a bunch of slang, cursing up a storm, dropping N-words, and just overall not sounding ANYTHING like our texts would have me believe.

The more she talks the more the smell of cinnamon fills my car. No, not the body spray, whiskey, from the shots that she had apparently taken before I picked her up. You see, her throat was sore, so she went to her cousins’ house (which is actually where I picked her up) to get some medicine, and he told her that fireball whiskey would heal her throat better than any medicine could… It gets better…

Now, she lives in Jersey (should have been my first sign, I know) and said that we were going to a place in Philly… We were not. We ended up going to Adelphia Restaurant and Bar, in Jersey. It’s pretty big, and pretty nice. There’s an outdoor bar where they play a mix of Hispanic music and Hip Hop, and a couple of different indoor bars. Her and I had talked about dancing before (just as you and I will talk about it in a later Days Of Christmas post) so she knew that I wasn’t the most confident dancer in the world. So, she chose to take me to Adelphia’s, to dance, on our first (and only) date.

We headed straight for the outdoor bar/patio where she batted her eyes and… I forgot to mention this before, but she looked a good ten years older than the pictures that she had sent to me when we were texting… Anyhoo, she asked for a drink, and a shot, then proceeded to pull me past the “no drinks on the dancefloor” sign to dance. When a Hispanic song came on, we danced. When anything else came on, she wanted to sit down. Back at the bar, in line for round two (well, round two for me), a group of guys walks by and one of them recognizes her. He says something in her ear and they have an awkward almost flirty back and forth. He looks up at me, she pulls herself closer to me, he scoffs and walks away. I kinda wish I could have heard that conversation, I kind of don’t.

We got more drinks. She got handsy. Handsy to the point where her hands entered the bottom of my shirt and came out the top of it. And of course, she was offended when I (very politely) pulled her hands away and placed them on to my shoulders. We go inside, get round three, dance for a song, then go back outside. When we get outside I smell cigarettes, and say verbatim “hey, we didn’t really talk about it before. That cigarette kinda reminded me to ask, do you smoke?”

In a snap, she pushed me away, yells at me for having “the audacity to ask her a question like that” (yeah, she said that), and storms off to the far corner of the patio… Where she digs into her purse, and pulls out/lights up a cigarette. I followed, and when I got there she looked at me and said “if you tell my cousin about this I’ll kill you”… It gets better…

I suggested leaving, she refused. I suggested getting some water, she refused. We head to the bar where I give the bartender the ‘cut off’ hand gesture and he serves her a shot. A shot that I paid for. We go to the inside bar where the bartender refuses to serve her and offers her water. She starts to fall asleep on the bar. I wake her, get her to my car, ask “are you ok to give me directions?” and get a tongue down my throat instead of a response. She tasted like a cigarette. I make a comment about having to get up early, put the car in gear, and she starts giving me directions. Odd directions. I ask if she’s sure we’re going the right way, she says yes. I ask if we’re taking a different way back to her cousins’ house, and she says that “we aren’t going there. I thought you said that you lived in Philly!” At this point we’re past the last exit before the bridge back into PA, so I decide to take her home, give her the bed, and I would stay downstairs.

I give her the quick tour of my place, and she goes to the bathroom as I’m changing the sheets. I kid you not, she spent an hour in the bathroom. She came to the bedroom, dropped her one piece whatever they’re called, gets into the bed, and says “you don’t expect me to stay in this big bed all by myself do you?” At this point, I was still in the process of moving in. The only piece of furniture that I had there was my bed, which was on the floor. I planned to sleep on the floor in the living room. Instead, I hopped into the bed… And you can probably guess what happened from there…

On my way to drop her off, we somehow ended up in a conversation about our previous sexual experiences and partners. She wasn’t too thrilled with some of my answers and asked if I had ever had an STD. I responded with “nope, you?” and got an “absolutely not” in return. IMMEDIATELY after dropping her off I felt sick. My stomach was upset, I was coughing, sneezing, light-headed, the works. I was supposed to spend the day with Noodle but ended up spending it in bed instead. A couple of days later I feel a bit “irritated”, I look down, and (this next part gets a bit graphic. I tried to clean it up with some witty word play but there’s only so many ways that I can describe Clap giving me The Clap. If you’re squeamish, feel free to skip down to the “until next time” bit) discover that Gaston (yep, that’s his name… Don’t judge) has sprung a slight leak.

I haul my still sick self to the hospital where they give me a well deserved verbal lashing, a cup to relieve myself into, a couple pills, and a couple shots, in my rear (the shots, not the pills). Wow, this post is long! Luckily, that’s basically the end of the story. That ladies and gentlemen is the story of my first and (hopefully) last Sexual TouchDown.

Until next time, date responsibly.

P.S. Luckily, I don’t have a picture of anything that happened on this horrible date. However, this one fits almost perfectly since this post was about the first date that I had after Al and I broke up and this picture was taken at Al’s after a random booty call where… Well… We’ll get to that in one of the up coming Days Of Christmas posts that I have planned… Stay tuned!

On the second day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

Last year around this time I was recovering from my first run-in with plantar fasciitis. The running gift that keeps on giving. During one of my workations last year I got invited to do a run, after a night of drinking. I never understood how people could drink the night before a race, I’m so paranoid that I won’t have a sip of alcohol for at least 12 hours prior to a race, usually it ends up being more like 24-72. But yeah, I heard about the race, gave some half hearted “I’ll see how I feel in the morning”, and come morning time I couldn’t find it in myself to say no. Especially since it was a free race. I had a choice, either do the 5k or the 10k.

So… It just so happened that one of the bosses that I reported to during this workation was also a running. That’s kinda where this all started. Someone mentioned “marathons” and her and I both said (in unison) “I hate when people call 5Ks marathons”… Because, I really do hate when people call 5Ks Marathons. I’ll dive into this more later… Maybe. Anyhoo, we struck up a conversation about running, she told me about the race the next morning, and out comes my “I’ll think about it” (more or less). Sorry to Tarrentino this, but I think we’re caught up now.

Walking up to the registration table, my boss and I go back and forth on which distance we’re going to do… Ok, I’ve gotta Tarrentino it again for a second. Prior to leaving our hotel it was decided that we were going to run the race in our uniforms, “Boots and Uts”. Not a huge deal, just means that I’d need to take it a little slower. Then, as we made our way to the exit, we were handed backpacks (very, very nice under armour backpacks). One boss says “go take these to your rooms and hurry back”, another says “fill the packs up with gear and hurry back”. As one of the bosses, I too had to follow suit and fill my pack up with gear. This was a problem. I’ve done Humps (Army calls them Rucks, I prefer our lingo) with a loaded pack. I’ve run with a small Camelback. But I haven’t combined the two before. Prior to this, when I was asked about the race in the morning, my response was “if the 10k is just the 5k course times two I’m not doing it. I’ll settle for the 5k. But if it’s a different or extended course I’ll do the 10k.

Now walking to the booth, talking to my boss, I refused to back down on my 10k/5k stance… Hoping that the stars would align and I would end up doing a 5k. But, it was a bright and sunny day, not a star in sight. They were different courses. We ALL sign up for the 10k and make our way to the starting line. Again, not a huge deal, as long as I ran it properly. The gun sounds, and my boss takes off.

At some point I should mention that I had my eyes set on running a marathon a couple of months after this race, so with that in mind taking it easy and self preservation should have been in the forefront of my mind. They weren’t. When I saw her take off I took off. I hung with her until just before the 5k turn around, which is exactly where I felt the first twinge of pain in my feet. I slowed my pace a bit and pushed through until the 10k turnaround. The pain stayed with me the entire time. I did a walk/run back to the finish and honestly by the time that I finished the race the pain was gone completely. The rest of that day, no pain. The ENTIRE next day, no pain. The day after that, as we were making our way home, I was in so much pain that I could barely walk. I dragged my feet through the airport, got back to PA, and had to drive 4 hours home.

I took some time off of my feet and pulled myself out of the marathon. When I went to the doctor (about two months later), he took x-rays, told me that I have plantar fasciitis (Google it), and it turns out that at some point between my last foot exam (ten years prior) and now I had developed flat feet. And I suffer from the occasional pain in my arches to this day, although I still haven’t experienced anything as excruciating as that near-crawl through the airport.

Until next time, don’t let an injury defeet (not a typo) you.

P.S. Race day I woke up to a zoomed in picture message of the signature/message board from my buddy who ran the race. This was the picture.

On the third day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

I think I’ve talked your ears off enough over the past couple of days. I’ll keep this one short and sweet. As I’m sure you already know, I’m in the military. As you may or may not know, I’ve pitched in my $3.15 (if you get this reference we need to get married, like IMMEDIATELY) and deployed, twice to Iraq and once to Afghanistan. That… That pretty much sums this up.

Until next time, freedom costs a buck o’five.

P.S. I’m pretty sure that I’ve used this picture before… But I don’t care. It’s one of my favorite pictures of Noodle and I… In the airport, the day that I got back from my last deployment.

On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Four gaming nerds

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but in highschool I had a group of friends who called ourselves The Three Musketeers Plus One. See, originally there was three of us (Twigman, B-Rad, and myself), and then B-Rad’s brother, T-May, started to join in more and more. Usually we’d spend weekends bouncing back and forth from one house to the next, and end the night with a video game tournament sleepover.

I have almost always hated video games. Sort of a love/hate relationship, but definitely more hate. It’s like taking a nap, it may be nice while you’re doing it but once it’s over I feel like I haven’t accomplished anything and I’ve waisted my time. Also, I’ve always sucked at them, so there’s that. But, hanging out with the Musketeers I was forced to do it pretty often. And they all were well aware of how much I disliked it. So it made it that much better when I would kick their candy asses and come out victorious at the end of a game night. It didn’t happen often, we were all pretty well matched, but win (perfect typo… It stays) things went my way I would not only win the game(s), I would win the word war as well.

Oh, I only won because of a technicality? Should have picked a better game. What? My character was the best option for that level? You shoulda picked them then. My smack talking threw you off of your game? Man up, loser.

Oh yeah, when I won I would turn up to eleven! I think you get the picture.

Until next time, nothing beats Kirby.

Check out this sticker from Mac! Thanks again for letting me use it for this post. If anyone is interested, you can find this one and more of his work here.

P.S. Funny how a couple of days ago I was joking around about how the shade of the controller here makes it look a little bit like she’s um… Pleasuring herself… And today I find myself reaching out to use the picture for a post! Either way, it’s a great image, and I’m sorry if I just turned this into another one of those things that you can’t unsee, like the FedEx arrow.

On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

A while back I had to have a conversation with Noodle about watching what he says. I can’t remember the word that he used, but I remember that it was pretty jarring to hear, and I remember being able to tell that he didn’t fully understand it when he used it. I told him that he shouldn’t use the word and my little genius asked “oh no, is that a bad word?”

I thought for a moment, he was pretty patient with me, and I explained that it wasn’t bad but that it was an “adult word”. I went on to say that there are certain words that you hear and you know that they would sound better coming out of an adult’s mouth than a kid’s, and vice versa. They aren’t curse words, but they aren’t words that should be used by children.

Luckily, he understood immediately. We went on, tossing around words and phrases that are more appropriate for children than adults and vice versa (more the former than the latter… A lot more… The majority of the conversation was about how weird it would be for him and his friends to hear his mother and I saying some of the things that they do). And honestly, we haven’t really had an issue with this at all, until now.

He’s not using bad words, or adult words… It’s more off color words if you will. He called someone an idiot, obviously joking, but I realized that it might be time for another language conversation. I may sound stupid for saying this (especially since the start of this sentence is in direct contrast to what follows), but growing up I was taught that nobody was bad, or dumb, or stupid, or… Um… Etcetera (yup, I had to Google the spelling). Their actions were, not the person. It’s a small change, but imagine hearing one teenager say “that was dumb” instead of “you’re dumb” to another. See my point? No? Well, that’s because you’re stupid.

I may not be the best father in the world, but it’s conversations like these that makes it pretty damn hard for me to think otherwise! Ok, back down to earth. Honestly, if not for the level of maturity and understanding that Noodle has I’m not sure how well I’d handle conversations like this. I am definitely one lucky Dad.

Until next time, don’t be an idiot.

P.S. Looking at this picture in relation to this post all I can think about is the skit when Gary Owen asked his friend to help him say… Well, you can see for yourself.

On the sixth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

I already hit on this on the third day, but yeah, I’m in the military… And, if all goes well, I’ll be able to retire in a little less than 6 years, wish me luck!
~

Until next time, one more enlistment.

P.S. I don’t know what the deal is with my finger. It… It just… It just looks weird… But, check out that mustache!

On the seventh day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Seven fish a-swimming,

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

You’ve had your break. Now, I’mma get a little nerdy and talk your ear off… Um… Write your eyes off*? I don’t know… One of my first memories with my father is in his old apartment, sitting in front of his fish tanks, watching him feed his fish. At some point I’ll have to write about the zoo (with a revolving door) that I grew up in. The one constant on the “farm”, fish.

I grew up with a pond in my basement and a fish tank in almost every room of the house, in a three story house. We had fish! So, it should be no shock that I LOVE fish. Monster fish (my favorite is the snakehead, which unfortunately (but rightfully so) is illegal in The States). Specifically Cichlids… Actually, more specifically South American Cichlids. Keeping fish is a science, I know some of you laughed/scoffed at that, but it is.

I’m not talking about your Betta in it’s bowl, or your goldfish in it’s one gallon “tank”. I mean keeping fish in a 50+ gallon aquarium. Mixing and matching types of fish with varying housing requirements and temperaments is harder than you think. A lot harder. Before I go on, let me state for the record that the person working the fish section in your local pet store knows little more than what’s written on the sticker on the side of the tank. And, as a general rule fish should have around about one gallon of water per inch of fish. So a fish that grows to 10 inches should be kept in at least a ten gallon tank. Two of those should be in a twenty gallon, and so on.

I cringe every time I see an overstocked tank, which is usually any tank that you see outside of a fish store, like in hotels and restaurants and such. Some fish swim less and some more, which requires the correct amount of space. Some prefer to swim at the top of the tank, some towards the bottom, some in the middle… Some are territorial, some are nomads, some are carnivores, some are more susceptible to illness… Trust me, it’s a science.

Oh, I forgot to mention this. It should go without saying, but, ALL fish need filtration, air, and a current (levels vary, but no fish should go without). Again, I don’t care what your 16 year old petshop guru says, Bettas and goldfish are supposed to live longer than a month. And given adequate space, as long as they prefer the same type of water (this blog would turn into a rather LONG series if I tried to explain the different water preferences), you can keep darn near any type of fish together… You just have to know how.

Ok… I think I’ve written your eyes out enough on this one. Do yourself a favor and read a book on fish keeping before making a trip to the pet store… Then drive past the pet store and go to a Fish Store.

Until next time, fish need love too.

P.S. My babies, in my old 150 gallon tank that was too big to fit into my new apartment. Oh, and there’s 7 fish in this picture… A snail… A crab… live plants (that you can see)… With two more fish, two crabs, and four snails in hiding…

P.S. Like Father, like Noodle!

On the eighth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Eight sexaholics (whitey 9 times/ 9 “sexaholics” doesn’t fit with the song, and I’m pretty sure that the well ran dry before the ninth go-round, so we’ll plop this baby down at 8…),

Seven fish a-swimming,

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

To the few that read my posts as soon as I put them out, I’m sorry that this one was a little later than usual. To everyone else, what the heck took you so long!?

So, yeah… This is one of those posts the I only managed to write a couple of sentences for when I was doing this last year. And now, it honestly doesn’t seem like it’s worth talking about. I would find another rhyme to post for day 8 but as I’m combining thses I feel like it might end up throwing everything off if I did.

Long story short, way back when, I had sex 9 times in one day. I have since broken this record (hold your applause, I had help), but I didn’t tell anyone about those times. After bragging to my friends about the day of 9 times the nickname “Whitey Nine Times” became a thing that still occasionally pops up till this day.
~

Until next time, can you count, sucka?

P.S. That’s right, the Bitmojis are back! I mean, what kind of picture were you really expecting to get for a post like this!?

On the ninth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Nine Phonzies dancing,

Eight sexaholics,

Seven fish a-swimming,

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

I know, that last post isn’t up yet… Deal with it… As for this one? Little known fact: I can’t dance, but I will on special occasions… Or if I’m drunk… Oh… And way back when, I went by Phonzy. Seriously, I will dance on occasion, but seriously I’m not a “good” dancer… You’ll see…

Until next time, do a little jig.

P.S. I TOLD YOU guys that I can’t dance… You didn’t believe me! You all did this to yourselves… Actually my date who vehemently refused to step foot on the dance floor did this to you guys. But yeah… I’m sure that at some point each and every one of you did something to deserve the agony you just endured while watching this. Taste that karma.

On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Ten Grievances,

Nine Phonzies dancing,

Eight sexaholics,

Seven fish a-swimming,

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

Man, I’m sorry. It’s been a tough week, kind of all just caught up to me this weekend. But… That kind of helps this post out, and seeing as how it is Festivus today… I’ve got a lot of problems with you people, now you’re going to hear about it.

1- Obvious racism seems to be making a comeback.

2- Women, there’s a difference between “showing the best version of yourself” and “purposely deceiving” when it comes to the pictures that you post on dating websites.

3- Also, women, just because someone doesn’t randomly send you a nude picture doesn’t mean that they aren’t interested.

4- People who shortchange and/or give limp handshakes do not deserve to have their hands shook. Shaken*? Shook*, I’m sticking with shook).

5- If you’re rude when you’re correcting someone you’re wrong.

6- Open your fucking eyes during sex! Don’t stare, but nothing is sexier than the occasional gaze.

7- Also, make some noise. Talk, moan, whistle, hum a tune, I don’t care, do something.

8- Listen to opposing views. Like, actually listen.

9- Close your mother fucking mouth when you’re chewing!

10- Stop texting “can I ask you a question?” And waiting for a response before you ask. Just fucking ask!

Until next time, 11- Don’t talk about it, be about it

On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love sent to me:

Eleventh eleven elevens,

Ten Grievances,

Nine Phonzies dancing,

Eight sexaholics,

Seven fish a-swimming,

Six years reserving,

Five adult words,

Four gaming nerds,

Three deployments,

Two fallen arches,

And a needle for an STD.

I know, it doesn’t REALLY fit… But, it kinda does. Eleven is my favorite number, followed by the number 3.

Until next time, couldn’t they just make 10 louder?