...and clean up your dog's feces!

So, I'm walking along the trails behind my house today, when I stop and take a closer look at the sign I pass everyday. It says (well, not actually says, because it is not the mythical talking sign that they wrote about in The Bible, it's just a regular sign, so, I guess it would be more proper to say it is written or something of that nature, but as we all know, I am really not a stickler for details, so bear with me)

"No Motorized Vehicles; No Alcoholic Beverages; Leash Your Dog and Clean Up Your Dog's Feces."

What? When did we get all technical with signs? You almost have to be firkin' Robert Langdon to decipher this, if you're a hill person. And, as much as we try to hide the fact, almost one out of every three Americans is actually a hill person. All of our other signs are dumbed down:

Stop
Yield
Merge

It's not like you see signs that say (instead of the previous):

Cease Progressing
Surrender the Way
Become United

So, why all the sudden are we trying to educate America with this sign? Why don't we just say:

No Cars, No Brews, And Pick Up Your Dog's Poop

Then, we won't have some Jethro standing at the sign for 4 hours, trying to figure out the meaning of feces while his dog stands there with her legs crossed and a back issue of Maxim sitting next to her.

Plus, everyone likes to see the word Poop. It makes us smile :)

Congratulations!

It seems that congratulations are in order for my brother Eric and his girlfriend, Becky, who got engaged over the weekend in New York. Way to go, young man, way to go.

Now, on a more personal note, that moves me one step close to being Creepy Uncle Brent, the Confirmed Bachelor. I assume that I will be getting my first cat any day now, and start referring to them as my kids. It's probably not too far in the future that I'll start celebrating their birthdays with cake and ice cream and send out Christmas cards signed "Brent and The Gang".

I am also going to start knitting stuff soon. Most likely sweaters for my cats. Yep...

Seems to me...

...that wearing a moustache out in public has become the 00's equivalent of wearing a T-shirt with a swear word on it. I mean sure, it's funny to joke around about with your friends and it might get a couple of chuckles, but when you wear that thing out to an Applebee's, you're demeaning yourself and everyone else in the place. I mean, come on man; there are impressionable women and children out there. Take that stupid mouse nest off from under your nose!

On a sidenote, if your boyfriend moves away and you haven't talked for a couple of weeks, you may not be dating anymore. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but that just seems to be the way it is. But, then again, we all know we shouldn't take relationship advice from me.

Wow, starting Mewelde Moore produced good returns. Who would have thought that? Craziness! Strange how sending Williamson deep seemed to work too. God damn, I should be coaching that team!

The Appendix...

Apparently the Vikings forgot to read the Appendix of the Super Bowl Book. I will delve into two very important topics that I totally forgot about. I admit, like Manfred Mann, I was Blinded by the Light. Here goes...

The Redskins Corallary (formerly the Oriole Corollary) - States that you can not sign an aging group of players who were solid two years ago, plug them in your line-up and expect to win. Real football and fantasy football are different, which is why I toil away at a desk instead of being general manager of an NFL team.

The Elway Axiom - States that you can not lose a star player, expect to replace them with someone moderately as talented and expect to win. Brian Griese and Mike Shanahan found this out the hard way, just like Mike Tice is doing right now.

Now, does this mean I've given up on the season after the drubbing at the hands of the Bengals?

A thousand times no. I never doubted them for a minute for I knew that their monkey strong bowels were girded with strength like the loins of a dragon ribboned with fat and the opulence of buffalo... dung.

There are some simple solutions that Mr. Tice (or whoever the head coach is after the bye week (hint, hint)) needs to do to resurrect the Viking ship.

• Let Smoot do his job. Put him on an island. Have him be Urkel to the other team's Laura. He talks as much yap as Deion, why not let him back it up? It doesn't help to have Winfield cover number one receivers. He's a good tackler, but not a great cover corner. Let Fred go out there and back up his trap.
• Pick a flippin' running back! You're not doing anyone any favors switching it all around. Pick a guy and stick with him for more than six plays. When people are watching their back because they know they can be pulled at any second, they play tight. And that's when mistakes happen. If they know they can continue to play after making a mistake, maybe they'll make fewer? Hmmm...wow! It's like rocket science for morons.
• Ummm...hi. Stretch the damn field! You drafted a guy with 4.2 speed; use him! Send him on a fly. Do something to open up the field. Cripes.
• Go back in time and let Birk play this year (this is the toughest of all suggestions). Better yet, maybe go back in time and teach your father the value of a condom. I'm just sayin' Tice; it may be something to look into.
• Work with Culpepper on pass progressions. He locks on one receiver and when he's not open, he freaks out, like a deer in the headlights, or a girl when I try to kiss her. So, lead him through some progressions, just like you would with a rookie.
• For the love of God, don't panic. It's a long season. You've started 7-0 and not made the playoffs. This is far from a done deal.

See, I'm still on the wagon. Who's with me? Who's coming with me??

The Goggles Do Nothing!

I stepped out of the car, already feeling a bit self-conscious. Since I was having LASIK surgery in a week, I had to wear my glasses, and since I'd worn my contacts since sixth-grade, my glasses had not been updated in quite some time. It was almost like looking into a time-machine to that awkward stage that everyone goes through; only I was living it right now, at twenty-five.

I had already taken jokes from everyone at the office, who had taken to calling me Mr. Magoo, which went right over my head, since that's a show from the 30's. And, let's face it; I wasn't around in the post-depression world.

Even my own mother, who is supposed to unconditionally love her son, said that I looked like an owl. And not the good kind of owl either. She said I looked like Mr. Owl from the Tootsie Pop commercials and made me play along to the commercial.

"Come on Brent, you have to do it, " my mom said.

"I don't want to."

"Mr. Owl how many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop?"

"Ugh…fine. You better appreciate this."

"Oh, I will. So, Mr. Owl how many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop?"

"Let's find out," I said while I mimed unwrapping the Pop and licking it once.

"One ... Ta-whoooo," I said and then acted like I bit into the Tootsie Pop. "Three... ahem... three licks," I cried as I ran away in tears while a vicious smile appeared on my mom's face.

So, you can see that I had been mentally abused over the past two days. And the weekend had finally arrived, so I was going over to hang out with my friends.

Since we normally hang out with people similar to us, my friends are a sarcastic bunch of assholes, so I knew I was going to get ripped to shreds. I was nervous, because it's normally me who is doing the ripping on people.

I started walking up the stairs towards Paul and Joe's apartment. Each step felt like my legs had gained twenty pounds so by the time I got to the top, it felt like I had the combined weight of Delta Burke and Rosie O'Donnell on my back.

I reached the door and took a deep breath before turning the handle.

I turned the handle and walked in, expecting the worst.

Joe took one look at me and said, "Wow. So, wearing the glasses huh? I'm not going to lie; they make you look gay."

I really didn't know what to do with that. Sure, they were a little big and oversized, but does that preclude anything about sexual orientation? I didn't know, but I thought I should explain a little about why I'm wearing the glass.

"Well, I'm having LASIK in a week and they make you wear glasses so your eyes have time to revert back to their natural state," I said as a way of explaining why I was wearing my glasses.

"Yeah, but did they have to be special glasses?" Paul quipped from the kitchen.

Joe broke out in a laughing fit that would have ended with milk coming out of his nose, had he been drinking milk at the time.

Damn it Paul, I thought. I had not a one comeback to that one. But, again, I figured an explanation was in order.

"No, these are just old. You see, I've been wearing contacts for so long, I never updated my glasses," I said, hoping that would end all the discussion.

"Oh, I see. Well, I guess they're good if you were in some sort of industrial accident or something. They'd probably keep your eyes in tip-top shape," Paul said.

"Fallout Boy will untie Radioactive Man and pull him to safety moments before he's hit with a forty-foot wall of sulfuric acid that will horribly burn everything in its path. Now, that's real acid, so I want to see goggles, people!" Joe said while doubled up on the floor with laughter.

"My eyes...the goggles do nothing!" Dan chimed in from the bathroom in a Rainier Wolfcastle voice, whilst sitting on the toilet.

He hadn't even seen me, only heard their laughter and he was making fun of me too? Damn him and his sarcastic nature.

I took a seat on the couch next to Tom.

Paul said, "Tom, aren't you even going to make fun of Brent and his glasses?"

"Oh, that's Brent? I didn't even recognize him and I didn't want to make fun of someone I didn't know," Tom said.

And with that, I hunkered down into the fetal position as my fragile ego shrunk by fifty percent. There was nothing to comeback with and I knew it, they knew it and it seemed like all of America knew it. I knew the jokes would keep coming all night.

So, I sat back in the chair and got ready to take whatever they said, while silently making notes to rip on each of them when my surgery was over with.

"Hey, Nelson looks like Hitler; if Hitler looked like a gay fourth grader with stupid glasses," Dan said as he came out of the bathroom.

Crap, I thought. This is going to be a long night.

Possibly the Lamest Dedication Ever

Today, as I was doing some research for work, I stumbled across what could be described as the lamest dedication ever. Heck, it could possibly be the lamest thing ever, sending Emilio Estevez into a shame spiral that very few could recover from.

Now that I've whetted your appetite and your anticipation has shrunk smaller than Culpepper's hands, I will not keep you in suspense anymore. Currently, we are in the (drumroll please)

The Bone and Joint Decade!!

That's right. I know you didn't know this. This whole decade (that's 10 years for you guys who went to Roger Bacon) is dedicated to healthy bones and joints. Huz-zah!! If only I would have known earlier, maybe I could have particpated in the Stretch for Life or maybe even the Bone Density Walk for the Boneless. Gosh, I could have helped so much, because I am huge into joint health.

Now, while this cause may be a ridiculous reason to dedicate a whole decade (while it would take 120 years of Black History months to match the amount of time dedicated to joint health), I haven't even mentioned the strangest part.

The craziest thing about this is it began in 2002. That's right, they picked a year out of the blue and decided to run a decade from that point, so this asinine stunt lasts until 2011...or until about 3 years after Barry Bonds's neck snaps in half from his cranium being too large and his neck not having enough density to sustain that massive sphere. Hmmm...maybe this knowledge is useful and this is a worthwhile cause.

Have I spoken too soon? I mean, we're only 3 years into this decade. I'm sure they'll start bringing out the heavy ammunition in a couple years, what with ticker tape parades featuring Marty the Musculoskeletal Disorder and Carl the Curved Spine. I, for one, can't wait until this decade hits America like a ton of bricks! Let's do it up...Chiroprator Style! Who's with me??

Mike Tice is a douche.

Um...Mike Tice is a douche. A laundry list of gripes from the Vikings game this week for Mike Tice...

• Pick a running back and let people know who it will be. And don't have it be Michael Bennett or Moe Williams. I think it's nice that Moore had more rushing yards than Bennett even though he didn't get one play in the backfield. Yep. Bennett had -1 rushing yards.
• Your ball control offense blows. You have the QB and receivers to open it up. Every pass does not have to be a three yard out to Wiggins or Kleinsasser.
• Your punter had the best performance of anyone this week.
• You suck will the challenge flag.
• Your mom is a hermaphrodite (just throwing it out there).
• Good signing of Sharper. He looked solid.
• Might want to stop covering receivers with linebackers.
• Ummm...Troy Williamson is on the team. Just an FYI.
• You look like a gorilla who doesn't know what is going on.

Well, with all the being said, I still think they're going to go deep in the playoffs this year. My butt is in the Vikings bandwagon driver seat. Hop on...if you dare.

Pumpkins??

So, I'm at Target today, stocking up on various Target items, such as t-shirts, trail mix and a kayak when I saw something out of the ordinary. In the back of the store were two pins, stacked to the gills, with pumpkins for Halloween. It's September 9th!

How long does a flippin' pumpkin last once you cut it? Two weeks? Then it starts to liquify into a pool of it's own putrid innards? Wouldn't this be akin to buying a Christmas tree at the beginning of November? What kind of brain dead mountain person is going to walk their butt into Target on September 9th and buy a Halloween pumpkin?

This is going to be the same moron who's going to be in front of me in the Target return line in three weeks with his sack of liquified pumpkin remains, wondering if he can get a refund because his pumpkin didn't make it until Halloween. How about you just come up to me, I'll punch you in liver and take your 5 bucks and we can call it a day?

Mountain people; the human Opossum.

Have you read the new Harry Potter?

So, Vanessa (VR) stopped in my cube today to chat about world events, politics, you know, the whatnot. Of course, the conversation quickly got streamlined to more of what America wants; my "love" life. After deciding not to see Katie anymore after 3 dates, Vanessa wanted to know if there were any new ladies on the line. What follows is how the conversation unfolded.

VR: So, there any new ladies on the line?
BN: Nah. I got nothin' right now.
VR: Nothing?
BN: Yeah, Why don't you hook me up?
VR: (long, uncomfortable pause)
BN: Um...so, why don't you hook me up?
VR: Well, all my friends are either engaged or washing their hair, so that won't work.
BN: I see.
VR: See, that's why you should have lived with Paul and Devo. Then Carla could hook you up. She has girl friends.
BN: Yes, she does, but the only two times I've hung out with her, I've made out with girls. Probably not looking like I'm the guy she wants to hook up with her friends.
VR: Yeah, that could be a problem. Well, you could try going to a Barnes & Noble.
BN: Ppphhhh. Right. And what am I supposed to say? Read the new Harry Potter? Get outta here.
VR: Okay. You could try poking around a Blockbuster then.
BN: Ppphhhh. Right. And what am I supposed to say? Seen the new Harry Potter? Get outta here.
VR: (frustrated) Fine. Maybe you could try Sex World?
BN: Ppphhhh. Right. And what am I supposed to say? Have you done it Harry Potter-style? Get outta here.

And people wonder why I'm single. Or maybe they don't.

New Blog fools - and Scattered Eggs

I have been sub par on my updates to the blog. For my various fans and allies, I apologize. While I'd like to blame my strenuous sex life, exotic night life and sheer amount of things going on in my life, I can't. I basically have to chalk it up to pure and utter laziness. I've turned laziness into a new artform and people are starting to call me DaVinci. Which utterly rocks...and/or rolls. Like Snapple.

So, anyhoo, I have started a fantasy sports advice site. It can be found at rotocop.blogspot.com. See, I call myself the Roto Cop. It's like Robo Cop...but not. So lame. So lame indeed. I feel like my right arm when I sleep on it; lame and useless. But I will offer sage advice there and would like people to feel free to ask questions, make fun of me and generally enjoy themselves. Like Snapple.

The Sports Guy is finally coming out with a book. I have been anticipating this for quite awhile, then I heard what it was. It's him stringing together 50 of his columns about the Red Sox. Are you firkin' kidding me? First of all, I pretty much want to rip my fingernails off everytime he writes a column about the Red Sox and now there's a whole book? Cripes! Why didn't he just throw together a bunch of his reader mail and make that a book? Ooops...I probably stole his next idea. (For the record...I will still get the book and probably enjoy it...but I was a bit disappointed.)

I hate Lacey on The Real World. She's such a joke. Two thumbs for Danny on calling her on being that seterotypical person who bucks music just because it's popular (I sometimes do the same thing). Too bad he didn't do it to her face. He's exactly like me; except he has a hot girl fawning all over him and is on TV. Otherwise, we're like Siamese Twins born to different mothers. Like on Perfect Strangers.

So, I like Prison Break. Duh. I knew I would. Now, of course, there's people complaining that it's not realistic. Who cares? It's not a flippin' documentary. Seriously, if you want realistic, go rob a liquor store at gunpoint and spend the next 5-10 in a cell. That will be the realism for you. I'll take full body tattoos, sneaky hot girls and cell phones made of soap. Kick it...

I was walking around the lake at my new house today and the whole thing was covered by either pond scum, algae or the Toxic Avenger in liquified form. I prefer to think it's the Toxic Avenger...mostly for selfish reasons.

Apparently, Duluth turns me into the make-out king. 2 for 2 this summer, so rock it and roll it people. Were the girls hot? Ummm...well, short answer short...no. Did I care at the time? Not one bit. Do I care now...well, besides the fact that Carla probably thinks less of me than Shawn Kemp, I really don't. See, I've ruined any chance of Carla hooking me up with any of her friends I would suppose. But that's the way it goes when you go to drink pitchers of long island iced tea. Butt happens. Deal.

If I ever get shot, I hop it's a glancing blow off the elbow. Just seems like the safest place to me. Can't be sure though.

I know someone who complained about how mad he was he was forced to watch hurrican coverage instead of Friends, Seinfeld or The Simpsons. I can't tell you how bad I felt for this person, not getting to watch what he wanted and having to watch all these people lose their homes and...um...lives. Actually, I was watching The King of Queens, so I'm totally not one to judge. I'm coming Emilio.

I never want to see another Kevin Costner movie again in my life. I've had enough. Can't he just retire and leave us all in peace?

My goal is to bench 315 lbs. by February. Right now, I'm at 265 lbs. It can be done. We'll see.

If anyone is interested in specific lifting or diet advice, feel free to contact me. I am setting up personal diet programs for $50 set-up and then $20/month maintenance fee. I will do the same for a lifting program. If you combine the diet and lifting programs, I will cut it to $75 set-up and $30/month maintenance fee. Feel free to ask about the friend benefit, which offers reduced rates to folks I consider friends. Spread the word.

I hope to update more often...and will try to be funnier than I have been today. I think I'm broken. On a scale of 1 to sucking, this was like a 6. Sorry.

Till next time...