These boots are made for Walken.

Today is a very special day. In almost every developed nation, the streets are filled with wide-eyed revelers casting off the shroud of winter and putting on their party hats. Yes my friends, today is Christopher Walken's birthday!














Thanks to www.irancartoon.com and www.zuhlu.com for the pictures.


I don't know about you, but "I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell!" The man, the myth, the legend (the Walken!) has well over 100 TV and film credits to his name during a career spanning 6 decades. If he would marry and make babies with Jeff Goldbum, the world would be perfect.

Happy birthday to the ultimate Hollywood badass!

Site 60 Vikings

I like to go camping. In particular, I like to go camping with groups of people that involve the Brothers Brown. There’s just something about adding Shannon and/or Kris Brown to a camping trip that makes it unique.

For those of you that may not know, Shannon is also known as Frumpkin, Frumpkinhead, Fuzzy Lumpkin, or Shannon Leigh Frumpkin. One can often hear an enraged yeti verbally berating Shannon with many a frumpy reference. Kris Brown on the other hand is known only as Kris Brown (always the full name, mind you). If you’re drunk, I might let you get away with calling him Brownie, but please ask for permission.

But back to the camping. When Shannon had his truck, he was a camping machine. This kid would roll up to a campsite with a tent, 2 coolers, 3 fishing poles, all the cooking implements you can think of, and a bed full of fire wood. We’d buy tubs of wood from the old man up the road for $3, and Shannon’s truck loved every minute of it. He made breakfast like you wouldn’t believe too. Shannon D. Brown can do things with eggs, meat, hot sauce, and an iron skillet that would make a grizzly bear attack itself. I think he got the skillet at Dick’s for like $12, so he’s also a bargain shopper.

Kris Brown is a child prodigy of fishing. He’s like a fish Rainman or something. If the Brothers Brown and I go fishing and collectively catch 12 fish, Kris Brown is responsible for 13 of them. He once caught a marlin in the Juniata River with nothing but braided pubes and some old lady’s cane (he thanked the old woman for her pubes and cane by slapping her with the fish too). I mean, anyone can bait a hook with their own body and jump taint-first into the lake to catch carp, but you can always bet Kris Brown is coming home with enough fish for dinner. In fact, the only two people in recorded history that have produced such bountiful fish are Jesus (if you believe that shit) and Dr. Snail.

[Sidenote] – The PA Fish and Boat Commission can go choke on Virginia creeper for raising the price of a fishing license once again. Kill!

The only camping problem the Brownies and I have ever faced is campsite choice. We’ve never had a nice lakefront site, and seldom do we get one that’s not in the “primitive” area of Susquehannock campground. Don’t get me wrong; Susquehannock is nice. That’s where you can find Brownie Bluff and some decent fishing. The problem is, we always get stuck with a site on a hill or something. We’ve never scored any lakefront realty. This usually leads us to get drunk (thus morphing into the Site 60 Vikings) and loudly demanding that all of our camping neighbors send us their beer, women, and spiced meats in a dinghy. That may sound a little ignorant (and it is), but at least we’ve never gotten into a loud domestic dispute while our children screamed - much like Jared, Shannon, and I heard the night we camped and drank moonshine from a jar.

Oh man, I can’t wait for camping season…

PAT buses

Oh my god, I just had the most intense bus ride ever.  The entire bus was crammed with the craziest people you’ll never see (unless you spend several minutes in Pittsburgh riding some form of mass transit).  Let me describe what I can remember before cruel, cruel fate kicks me in the brain.

The guy – Sweet fancy Jesus!  “The guy” weighed 350 pounds if he was an ounce, but that’s being conservative; I’d hazard a guess of four bills.  He was holding a large tree branch, ostensibly to be used as a walking stick.  He had at least one lazy eye…at least.  His head was crowned with a mop of hair that resembled Krause’s when it was long, and it flowed into well-groomed sideburns like Dave Hayes’ if they were just a little mutton choppier.  He had a patchy scraggly almost-beard surrounding a mouth that emitted the silliest lispy high pitched voice I’ve ever heard.  Also, he wouldn’t stop talking to, nor giggling at, the dude in the wheelchair across the aisle from him.

The dude in the wheelchair – Whoa!  “The dude” had the smallest feet I’ve ever seen.  He had what looked like normal-sized legs, but his shoes could’ve been hiding hooves.  I wonder if he has to use the wheelchair not because his legs don’t work but because his feet are too small to support him.  As far as I could tell he didn’t speak, so I’m just going to pretend he’s British.

Matrix Vag – I blame his parents.  “Matrix Vag” was wearing a long black leather trench coat.  The pockets were full of beef jerky and tampons.  He had a ponytail pulled back with a woman’s scrunchie.  He complimented “The guy” on his tree branch.

Hoss Stiller – Meet the fucker.  “Hoss Stiller” looked like…well…imagine this.  You take Hoss and distill his inherent Ben Stillerness.  Then, take Ben Stiller and leech out the Hossness.  Combine the distillates and BAM you’ve got Hoss Stiller.  He was rocking out the Fu Manchu as well.

I feel bad for her hair – Ouch!  “I feel bad for her hair” had bad hair.  It was bleached, apparently with much severity, from its original much darker color.  This, additional hair product, or genetics also made it the frizziest mess of locks ever.  It was like a rat was trying to build a nest out of straw or something.  She may or may not have been related to Sock Full of Nickels Girl.

That’s all I can remember because Mala just mentioned the OC and erased my brain.

Bobby Walters hates Mexicans.

Yesterday was the annual “trick the first year grad students into getting drunk before class” day.  Well, I don’t even know if we trick them anymore, but it’s fun to pretend.  At this time of the semester, the first years are getting ready to pick a thesis lab, so the premise of the lunch is to take them out and give them some advice on lab picking.  Really, all we want to do is get the youngin’s shitfaced and then send them back to class to try to absorb a developmental biology lecture.  Meanwhile, the older grad students walk by the class and giggle like school children at the next generation of scientists falling asleep.

As long as I’ve been involved with the process, lunch has been at Mad Mex, and the alcohol of choice has been tequila.  Back in spring 2004 when I was a first year, I must’ve had 8 shots and a Big Azz Margarita that legend says contains 6 shots of tequila itself.  I’ve never believed that, but suffice to say that I was drunk at 1 PM on a weekday.  What can I say?  When there’s drinking to be done, Matt Bochman puts on his drinking shoes.

The following year, I did much the same thing (big surprise).  My theory was that it would be easier to get the first years to do more shots if I did some with them.  In reality, I’m just a glutton.  We got at least one of them so drunk that she had to leave class to throw up for an hour or so though.  Light weight…

Anyway, my ridiculousness was again evident this year, but with food instead of alcohol.  I still had three shots (maybe more?) and 1.5 margaritas, but I also ate two giant burritos and a boatload of chips with three different salsas.  If you ever drive past one, it’s worth it to stop by Mad Mex for some food.  I wouldn’t eat that much if it wasn’t tasty.  To be honest though, it’s no Don Pablos.

If you go to Mad Mex, get the Picka Dippa with black bean, XX queso, and fire roasted tomato dips and a burrito.  If you go to Don Pablos, order yourself a Negra Modelo and the Conquistador.  It’ll melt your face off.

Pittfinger

I want to write a little about the crazy people in my family (like the literally crazy, asylum types), but I don’t have a lot of time now.  I’ll give you a little teaser email about it that I sent to the department though and write more later.  To read other Pittfingers, go here.

Ok, I don't want to blow anyone's mind, but I have a confession to make. There's a history of mental illness in my family.

I know, I know...I never would've suspected it either.  There are crazy people on both sides of my family, and sometimes I wonder if it's genetic. I mean, is it normal for me to be working in lab and start thinking about werewolves and Chuck Norris?  Shouldn't I sleep more than 10 hours/week? On some days, I think I can see beta-emissions coming from my radiolabeled DNA too (they're blue).

See, those are the kinds of things that make me worry.  That, and the vague childhood memory of having electrodes attached to my head and colored lights rhythmically flashed at me in a dark room.  But nights like last night let me realize that lots of people ponder crazy things.  I had the good fortune to be involved in a conversation to determine which was bigger: umpteen or eleventy.  Logic demands that umpteen must be less than 20, while eleventy = 110, but think about it.  Bilbo Baggins turned eleventy-one, but I never read about him turning umpteen years old, and umpteen's always had a large connotation, so the smaller version is really probably impteen.

What does any of this nonsense have to do with today's BASH?  Uhhh, nothing really.  Let's just blame it on the crazy kid thinking he can see through time and pretending this was the most effective email for luring people to the TKO BASH (thanks to Christine Berliner for the cool nickname)!  The Traw, Kiselyov, and Oke labs are hosting the happy hour today at 5:20 in A298 Langley, and like Christine said, the TKO BASH "ought to be a knockout!"

We hope to see you there,
Matt, Tom, & Henry
Social Hour Committee

P.S. A298 Langley was recently voted less cheerful than the average Newark funeral home (i.e. most in need of natural light) by an informal poll of N-terminal sequencers.

Batteries Not Included

Do you remember “Batteries Not Included,” perhaps the best film released in 1987? We all know and love “Rawhead Rex” from 1986 (duh!), but I haven’t seen or thought about BNI in years. It’s got the “Driving Miss Daisy” lady in it and some huge black guy that’s autistic or retarded or something. He’s good with his hands though. Anyway, I was cruising the On Demand free movies a while back and there was BNI in all its glory, so I decided to watch it again.

Well, I kept getting distracted by one thing or another during the movie, but I caught enough to realize a few things. First, the movie included a Caucasian-Latino romance. That’s groundbreaking for 1987, and predates “Jungle Fever” by 4 years. BNI is obviously the template for all subsequent interracial relationship movies. Next, it demonstrated that urban renewal isn’t always a good thing, and it made me think of Captain Planet for some reason. But I digress…

The real take-home was that I finally figured out what the title meant. The little sentient spaceships needed electrical outlets to recharge because…wait for it…batteries weren’t included in their designs! Wow, it’s nice when things all come together like that.

You know what else apparently doesn't come with batteries? Sex toys. Some of you may have read about the "pleasure enhancer party" that all the female scientists went to and spent their paychecks at. Well, too bad none of them thought far enough ahead to buy any juice for their vibes. There must be remotes, digital cameras, and radios all over Pittsburgh missing their double A's today. For the less crafty or less fortunate women, I suppose they're sorta frustrated right now.
Like the budding scientists used to say in Mission, "It's been a long summer."

Personally, I always have a shitload of batteries around the house. On the same note, I also have a penis (if you can even consider my little tic tac a wang). Perhaps the two are interconnected.

Steve the postdoc

If anyone ever tells you there’s a shortage of women in science, they’re either lying to you, or they’re idiots.
Feel free to call them out and embarrass their simple asses.
In my department, many of the labs are either all female or heavily populated by chicks (as they no doubt prefer to be called).  This isn’t a Pittsburgh phenomenon either; grad student recruits have reported seeing this all over America.  

Now normally, this is the point where I’d go on a tirade about how there are tons of scholarships/fellowships/grants aimed at women and minorities but nothing specifically for white dudes and how ridiculous that is due to the current overabundance of estrogen around here.  Instead, I’ll tell you about Steve the postdoc.

Steve the postdoc works downstairs in one of these labs that’s filled with a majority of women.  He’s married and has a couple of daughters (if I’m not mistaken), so it’s not like he’s never had to deal before.  I still feel kinda bad for the guy though…or at least empathize with his plight.

Steve the postdoc has to hear and see a lot of things that would shock many non-scientists.
Scientists are a different breed.  What others may consider scandalous is common place to them.  Well, I should say “us.”  I am The Scientist after all.  Anyway, talk to The Socialite about it sometime if you’re interested in this silliness.  She’s privy to our science ways.
A while back, the female scientists decided to have a sex toy party.  You know, like a Tupperware party, but with dildos, edible panties, and shit like that.  
A guy checks out a girl in a restaurant, and his wife brands him a pig, but women have penis parties, and it’s cool…
Anyway, Steve the postdoc walks in on a conversation involving nipple clips that were purchased at this party.  Being a scientist, his natural curiosity gets the better of him, but he learns a little more than he bargained for.  In a nutshell, the nipple clips are pink (and accessorized with several pink feathers each), and they made Debby’s nipples bleed.

Ouch.

Steve the postdoc was also greeted by the site of a giant hickey on Julia’s neck this week.  He later found out that Debby was connected here too, i.e. as the sucking device.  I think he walked in on the conversation at the, “She’s like a Hoover” point.  That’s a little tamer than nipple clips to be sure, but he also learned of Debby’s proclivities in this arena.  The girl gets riled up and will suck on any skin she sees.  I’ve never seen any hickies on her husband, but maybe she attacks him in more private places…

That’s just a little of what Steve the postdoc deals with every day.  Just imagine his life when every woman in that lab has their period at the same time.  The man deserves an award.

A little penis-vagina action

My friend Cristin (aka Steve) is dating Aquaman.  At this point, I can’t remember his real name, but I have heard that he’s hung like a horse…a seahorse I guess.  Aquaman was named such by Mala one night while she, Crisitn, and I were watching Smallville.  Aquaman made a special guest appearance to woo Lois Lane and clash with Lex Luthor.  That’s the TV Aquaman though.  The real life Pittsburgh Aquaman is too busy wooing Cristin.

She has this to say about his aqua-love:
CristinF3: what can i say about aquaman. he has a mean 5 o'clock shadow, big thick dick, and loves pasta
CristinF3: he's also terrified of pissing me off
She goes on to claim that he’s the new Chuck Norris, but I’ll have to disagree.  You can’t have a new Chuck Norris when the original is still alive and (roundhouse)kicking.  Also, Chuck Norris wouldn’t be terrified of pissing a woman off.  All he has to do is point at them and say “Booyah!” to elicit an orgasm.

Anyway, uhh, where was I?  Oh yeah, Aquaman.  So, Pittsburgh is the perfect place for Aquaman.  He’s got ready access to three, count ‘em, THREE rivers!  That’s a lot of aqua-options.  The swim from the confluence of the rivers to Miami takes less than an hour from what I understand, so even a landlocked state like PA is the perfect base of operations for him.  Plus, it’s in the north, so he can get some good pasta.  Jared tells me that the Italian food in the south sucks ass (especially the pizza).  How hard is it to make good pizza?  Jesus, what’s wrong with you guys down there?  I know a lot of food in the south is awesome, but don’t half-ass it.  Go for the culinary gold.

Damn, I keep getting side tracked.  Anyway, Cristin and Aquaman…  Cristin’s Irish, therefore, she’s got a bit of a fiery temper.  That makes her the Human Torch.  What do you get when you mix a water-based superhero and a fire-based one?  Steam.  Or in this case, steamy Magnum-encased love.  Good, good for them.

Blogging Schmogging

Much like society at large, I enjoy Jared’s suffering.  There’s nothing quite as satisfying as seeing a Yeti get the short end of the stick.  Well, no…I take that back.  There’s one thing that’s better: being the one to ruin his life.

Like anything else though, Jared’s suffering is best when enjoyed in moderation.  I don’t want to see him lose every time; that would take the fun out of it.  I’d rather see him have a really great week and then get whacked in the crotch with a waffle ball bat or something.  Or, it would be awesome if Jared was hired for a great paying job and then got tasered and beat by the police because he looked like a serial rapist they were after.

But enough about ruining Jared’s life, what about ruining mine?  What do you think would ruin my life?  I’m not so sure a lot of stuff would.  Most things just roll off my back, either immediately or within 5-7 minutes.  Yeah, I think mostly I’m immune to ruination.  Literally, the only thing I can think of that would make life horrible would be a meat allergy.

Sweet Jesus, can you imagine being allergic to meat?!?  Eating would suck ass.  I mean, vegetables and other non-meat items are ok, but they’re no meat.  I’d rather have all of my limbs cut off than not be able to eat meat.  Hell, if my arms and legs were cut off, I guess someone could cook them for me.  Johnny Rakar always wondered what human meat would taste like and if it would be so delicious that you’d want to kill to get more.

Ok, that just got me on some kind of FBI watch list.  I’m going to shut up now.

Oxymoron

Today, I saw the tallest midget ever. Yes, you read that right, the tallest. I went to Qdoba for a burrito, and there manning the salsa/sour cream/guac station was the gigantic midget. I think to be legally considered a midget (you know, for government disability type purposes), you have to be under 5 feet tall as an adult (18 I’m assuming). This midget must’ve been 4’11.9”. I thought she was standing on a box or something.

So, here is where a rational person asks themselves, “Did this Bochman asshole just see a shorter normal person and mistake her for a freakishly tall midget?” No. How dare you doubt me, KILL!

This chick definitely had dwarfism. She had the little stubby chubby arms like midgets do. And her head looked like a midget head. Maybe she had those leg extensions put in. I saw that on TV one time; it looks like it hurts something fierce. I guess she could be saving up the cash for the arm extensions…

Dr. Snail, the rest of the internet, where do you weigh in on all of this? Was she a huge midget, or did she have some kind of small arm syndrome?

We have a perpetrator.

The bathroom on my floor at work has seven urinals, one for every day of the week.  In fact, due to my obsessive compulsive disorder, I’ll only use the urinal designated “Monday” (closest to the door) on Mondays, “Tuesday” on Tuesdays, etc.  It’s a good system, but no one else seems to use it – savages.

Anyway, seven urinals is a lot for around here.  That’s as many or more than are found in every other bathroom that I’ve been to in this four building science complex (except for the lobby but that shit doesn’t count).  Apparently, it’s not enough for everyone though because I just found the toilet seat in my stall covered in urine.

KILL.

There’s never anyone on the 5th floor, so I refuse to believe that the perpetrator was shy and had to use the stall because there was someone else in the bathroom.  However, on the off chance that the obviously small-penis’d culprit did encounter such a situation, why didn’t he pick the other stall that’s closer to the door?  It’s bigger; there would be more room for him to prance around in as he gaily sprinkled his piss around the porcelain like fairy dust.  Why did he have to ruin my life?

Anyone can pee on the toilet seat.  Be a hero and shit on the ceiling if you want to be adventurous!  See this is why Matt Bochman should be allowed to cull the human population of anyone he deems utterly useless (Olsen twins, I’m looking in your direction).  

I haven’t slept for three days.  This is my life.

Ballad of Forty Dollars

This song has been in my head now for some time.  It’s called “The Ballad of Forty Dollars” and sung by Tom T. Hall.

The man who preached the funeral said it really was a simple way to die
He laid down to rest one afternoon and never opened up his eyes
They hired me and Fred and Joe to dig the grave and carry up some chairs
It took us seven hours and I guess we must have drunk a case of beer

I guess I ought to go and watch them put him down but I don't own a suit
And anyway when they start talking about the fire in Hell, well, I get spooked
So, I'll just sit here in my truck and act like I don't know him when they pass
Anyway, when they're all through I've got to go to work and mow the grass

Well, here they come and who's that ridin' in that big ol' shiny limousine
Look at all that chrome, I do believe that that's the sharpest thing I've seen
That must belong to his great uncle, someone said he owned a big ol' farm
When they get parked I'll mosey down and look it over, that won't do no harm

Well that must be the widow in the car and would you take a look at that
That sure is a pretty dress, you know some women do look good in black
Well, he's not even in the ground and they say that his truck is up for sale
They say she took it pretty hard, but you can't tell too much behind the veil

Well, listen ain't that pretty when the bugler plays the military taps
I think that when you's in the war they always had to play a song like that
Well here I am and there they go and I guess you'd just call it my bad luck
I hope he rests in peace, the trouble is the fellow owes me forty bucks


I relate to this song in a way I guess.  I buried a guy’s ashes in the cemetery by my house the other summer.

The dregs of society

There were a lot of horrifically ugly people on my bus home from work today.  One of them looked like Chester “E-Train” Evans’s girlfriend.  Another one was me.

That is all.

Colonial America was totally gay.

Once, Becky told me to watch a movie called Party Monster.  I tried to find it a while back and couldn’t.  In the mean time, I’d basically forgotten about it until I saw it on the preview channel today.  I decided to watch it because a.) nothing Chuck Norris-based was on any other channel, b.) Jess says things that involve the word monster all the time (i.e. I feel like such a [insert word here] monster) and used to play a game called Lace Monster, and c.) movies recommended to me usually turn out to be good.

Well, I was eating and watching at the same time, so I missed a lot of the movie.  It looks interesting, but the really interesting thing happened when the commercials came on.  The normal ads were there, and then one for tours of historic Philadelphia popped up.  It featured gay men in tri-cornered hats.  Yep, gay historical tours…

Turns out I was watching LOGO, the channel for homosexuals and Matt Bochmans that don’t know better.  Is there really a market for gay-centric historical tours?  I didn’t realize the world was that brokeback.

Happy Birthday Goiter!

I have a younger sister named Shannon. I call her Goiter or some variation thereof (i.e. Goity). She doesn't actually have a goiter, but it would be pretty silly if she did. I could draw a different face on it with colored markers depending on her mood. Chances are if she did have a goiter though, I'd come up with a different nickname for her, Lumpy maybe...

Anyway, Goiter felt the need to give me crap for publicly wishing Our Lord and Savior Chuck Norris a happy birthday and not posting anything about her birthday on March 6th. Let me dissect my decision not to spread birthday cheer to her online:

1. She was most likely drunk for 13 days straight (centered roughly around March 6). Why make a big deal of her birthday online if she's too retarded to use a computer? Her roommate wouldn't have been able to help her either; the girl is stoned out of her gourd 24-7. She would've been distracted by something shiny and/or edible long before she could've logged onto the blog.

2. I'm a dick.

3. I'm busy. I'm here working every day trying to make the world safe for democracy...or something like that. I do enjoy firing off a good blog post when I can, but some days I just don't have the time.

4. Chuck Norris is better than Goiter. Until my sister can pull a sweet maneuver like roundhouse kicking Bruce Lee in half and then forming Jackie Chan and Jet Li from the pieces (much like Chuck did once when he was bored), she's taking a back seat to Walker, Texas Ranger.

Now, Goiter did once bruise one of my testicles (probably lefty), so that at least merits a belated happy birthday. Way to turn 22 Goiter! Stay away from my 'nads...

I declare shenanigans!

I’m tired, dead tired.  As Jess might say, “I’m way two-tired like a bicycle.”  I spent all day painting my grandmother’s basement…and dining room…and bedroom.  Oh yeah, I also carried furniture either up the basement stairs or down the attic stairs for hours.  My family was there helping, but mostly they just stood back and beat me with things if I wasn’t working fast enough.

See, my grandmother’s too old to take care of her house anymore, so she’s moving into an apartment.  I’ve been dealing with this for four weekends now – moving, cleaning, painting, and dealing with the family.  That’s all well and good, except she’s one of these old people that won’t ever throw anything away.  There is so much shit to deal with that it makes me want to roundhouse kick myself in the neck.

My grandmother has like 4 sewing machines and enough thread, buttons, needles, yarn, and other crap to start a medium-sized craft store.  Between the bedrooms, basement, and attic, she has no less than 300 dressers.  She has more purses, shoes, and shirts (or what old ladies call “blouses”) than you can count.  

That last line probably has all the ladies in the audience excited.  Women love shoes and clothes.  Hey, I can understand that, but this nonsense is from like 1967.  It’s old, it looks like hell, you wouldn’t want these things – EVER.  

Now, the real problem here is that no one in my family will let me throw anything away.  My grandmother only has so much room in her apartment.  In fact, it’s full now, but her house still is too.  All I want to do is gather everything up and start a landfill.  With some gasoline and a match, I could put on a show for the neighborhood.  If I could blast all of this paraphernalia into the sun, the extra fuel to burn would extend its life by a million years.

Why does my family hate me?  I don’t care what they do.  If they’d leave me alone, I could’ve had that place cleaned out, cleaned up, and sold by now.  If you ever need help moving, come to me.  I’ll get it done fast.  But I have to warn you, I’m not going to screw around.  I’ll move your stuff, throw things away, and fix things, but it’s all going to happen in one day.  No more of these month-long shenanigans.

Does anyone want any old records from my grandparents?

Happy Birthday Chuck Norris!

Today is the greatest day in the history of Earth. Today is Chuck Norris's birthday. I could go on and on about how Chuck Norris is the world'’s biggest badass. I could tell you that the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse live in his nutsac. I could regale you with tales of roundhouse kicks to the face and busting drug cartels, but then I'’d just be like every other Chuck Norris fan. Instead, I'’m going to write a little about Chuck Norris'’s birthday celebrations as a young man.

On Chuck Norris's 10th birthday, his mom and dad bought him a new bike, which he promptly ate. His amazing metabolism utilized the metal to make his beard fuller and more deadly. After he was done destroying the birthday piñata (and several spectators) with blindfolded roundhouse kicks, little Chuck ate all of the candy and won the Korean War. Also, he set several world records for swimming while he frolicked in the backyard pool. See, he lived in the Southwest, so it was warm enough to swim in March. Of course, Chuck Norris had been swimming the English Channel naked on Christmas Day every year since he was 3, so the cold wouldn't really have bothered him anyway. After his friends and the ambulances left the party, Chuck wished himself a happy birthday by having sex with all the women that lived on his street, twice, and then traveled to the future to watch his favorite show, The OC.

Now, that story, which you won't find in the history books until historians get their heads out of their asses (or until Chuck Norris roundhouse kicks said heads out of said asses), is completely true. My uncle told it too me once when I was about 15. My uncle grew up in Arizona, and he used to go see Chuck fight in local kickboxing tournaments and shit like that. Well no, that's not entirely accurate. He didn't watch Chuck Norris fight, he watched Chuck Norris pummel, destroy, humiliate, and most importantly win.

Now, I'd like to leave you with a small poem (of sorts) that I found written on my bus seat this morning:

Bang fucka
Bang East Side
Sin City, PA
Bang with Wilkinsburg

Wilkinsburg, you have now replaced Penn Hills as the worst Pittsburgh suburb ever.

Yeti lobster

I noticed today that the blog was seeing some increased traffic.  “Where, oh where did it all come from?” you might ask.  Well, I checked out our visitors based on referring URLs and searches, and I noticed something weird.  Many of today’s hits came from people searching for “yeti lobster” on MSN.  It’s weird enough that I would never search for the phrase “yeti lobster” myself, but the thing that gets me is that people from all over North America were looking for information on the same thing.  People from British Columbia, southern California, and Illinois all needed to know about yeti lobsters.  You know what that means?  Yeti lobster is going to be the next big thing.  This is going to be the next Sloganizer, the next viral video, the next Numa Numa Dance.  If you want to make a million dollars, invest heavily in yeti lobster stock.  Go!

Also, not only did these people find the Dr. Yeti blog on the search engine, but we’re the number 1 hit.  We’re also tops if you search for “yeti jeans” or “yeti toss” via the MSN portal.  It’s good to be the king.

Ok, a new episode of The OC is coming on.  I have to go and be a little girl now.

Bulleit Bourbon and bikes

A while back I got a great, yet unsolicited, email from George Dickel. Old George wanted to tell me about a potentially limited supply of whisky. As a confirmed alcoholic, I appreciated the update. It looks like Georgie-boy has a little competition now though:

From: Bulleit Bourbon
To: The Scientist
Date: 8-Mar-06
Subject: You could win a Bulleit Bourbon mountain bike

So, you think that you are Bulleit Bourbon's Adventurer of the year? Tell us why and let us be the judge.

Bulleit Bourbon(tm) is reminiscent of an era that helped define the character of a nation - an era of adventure, risk-taking and prosperity, when the frontier offered hope to those willing to take a chance.

Submit us your ideal outside adventure or an extreme adventure that you have already experienced in fifty words or less!

If you win, you can experience your adventure on a brand new Bulleit Bourbon mountain bike!

To enter, visit www.bulleitbourbon.com/bike

Isn't that an extreme and awesome offer!?! This is my 50 word essay:
"Dude, my ideal extreme adventure would be awesome! A helicopter would drop me off at the top of a mountain, and as I hiked down, I'd wrestle a grizzly bear and eat pine cones. Also I'd catch fish with my bare hands like an Aborigine while drinking Bulleit Bourbon!"

I hope I win. I'll get loaded on bourbon and then take my bike for a ride. It'll be totally extreme and reminiscent of an era that defined my character.

Back to the Future

Gotta get back in time.

All of you Back to the Future freaks know what I’m talking about.  Yeah!!!!!  Huey Lewis and the News (Huey Lewis scoffs at dot coms, he’s a dot ORG!!!).  I had a bus driver named Huey in high school.  He would always be smoking a big cigar at 6:15 when I caught the bus in the morning.  He was a portly son of a gun.  Always wore a belt buckle.  Had a gruffy/nasaly voice, if you dig.  Huey’s hair was always perfectly coifed.  I’m pretty sure he was a Dapper Dan man.  He enjoyed him some country music too.  We always listened to the country music station on the way to school.  One time, his grandson who rode our bus, called in and had the morning show give a special shout-out to Huey.  It must have been the happiest day of his life.  He sure had a big smile.  Even more than country music, Huey liked to know everything.  Who lives there?  Why are they plowing that field?  What are they going to plant in that field?  Etc etc.  A popular response to his constant prodding was, “Don’t worry about it.”  This really pissed him off.  His face would turn beat red and he would scream at the person that eluded his questioning.  He didn’t like to not be in the know.  But he was a decent guy, so he got a can of mixed nuts every year for Christmas from the Miller children.  It’s been rumored that today, Huey spends his retirement singing karaoke at a bar/restaurant called Bud Murphy’s in Connellsville.  Considering the dumbass nature of persons around these parts, he’s probably a karaoke all-star.

But Huey is not the reason why I write, merely a tangent.

The real reason is that for the past two days, the township (okay, okay for you folks that ain’t from around here that’s basically our local government…you have your cities with big concrete buildings and your boroughs…we in the mountains have townships…I think their office is in, wait, I’m not sure they even have an office….basically the township covers roughly 5 named communities and all lands in between) has been “fixing” the road that goes past my driveway.  Matt can attest to the fact that this isn’t the best road in the world.  In fact, it may be the worst paved road ever known to man.  The road starts at the top of a hill, near the church and cemetery.  This part of the road is very bad.  You have to swerve back and forth to miss all the dips and at one part, you can only drive on one side of the road because the snow plows ripped up the other side.  Come down the hill (be careful of the big bump halfway down right in the middle and stay to the far right, it’s smoother), over a small crick, veer to the right a bit, go up a gradual incline and on the left you have my driveway.  Past my driveway, the road is flat for about 100-150 yards and then goes back up another hill.  It is in this area where my uncle has his sawmill, on the flat and up the hill.  

So hooray, they’re fixing the road!!  Well not quite.  This post ain’t titled “Back to the Future” for nothing.  It seems that the township is changing the road back to its former glory, back to a dirt road.  They have been layin’ down gravel and flattening it with their “earth mover”.  Who knows, maybe this is the eventual base of a new paved road.  I highly doubt it.  This is the mountain after all.  The township is not all that wealthy.  All you need to do is look around at some of the people and realize that they do not constitute a tax base able to construct superhighways.  So, while all of you out there in “the future” are progressing, we here in the mountains are digressing.  We don’t take kindly to these modern conventions.  They are an incursion on our way of life.  We don’t want your fancy, sissy-boy paved roads anyhow!!!  Real men like it rough, and yes, that’s the way your mother likes it too!  

Oh, and while I’m at it, if you’re someone from the ‘Burgh or some other “metro” area thinking of buying land/building a house up here to be closer to 7 Springs or the mountain way of life, don’t.  We don’t like you either.

The Sloganizer

Stuff on the internet is viral, and I don't mean it all infects computers. I'm talking about the way one person can find a sweet website, and then pretty soon all of their friends, coworkers, and family have seen it. Your 15 minutes of fame on the internet can spread wordwide really quickly, and fizzle out just as fast.

Today, biologists discovered the newest strain of internet virus: The Sloganizer. It's sorta like Snoop Dogg's Shizzolator, but this thing just takes a word or phrase that you give it and puts it into an advertising slogan. For instance, inserting "Jared" could yield "The best part of waking up is Jared in your cup."

It's a pretty good way to waste some time (like you needed another one, right?). Check it out. Lots of them sound dirty, so if nothing else, it's a cheap laugh. It's also damn intelligent:

"Bochman - One name. One legend."

Life or something like it.

“On one side is the imprint of his body, on the other, the wetness of his salty tears.”

- Mala’s brother describing my life (in relation to my bed).

The chemistry of lubricants

The Chemistry Department at Juniata College has a lot of really smart faculty members. Normally, that’s a good thing for a school, but not necessarily with this gaggle of sillingtons.  See, they were too smart for my own good.

What do I mean by that?  Actually, I’ve never quite decided.  It’s either that they were so smart that they couldn’t teach down to my level, or they just didn’t want to deal with assholes like me so they taught any damn way they pleased until they had separated the wheat from the chaff.  I’m talking about the hardcore chemists here too – organic, bioinorganic, physical, and analytical chemists.  I don’t group the biochemists with them because, while also smart, they had enough biology infiltrating their systems to mellow them out a little.

Anyway, these choads didn’t teach me very much (or I didn’t learn very much, again, pick your favorite explanation from above).  By the time I started my junior year, I called it quits with the chemistry nonsense that I was dealing with and started writing my own major.  I’ll never forget those characters though.  One guy looked like an orangutan with unkempt toenails showcased in sandals at all times.  Another was your average pompous college prof that couldn’t write a coherent explanation of the concept of Avagadro’s Number to save his life.  There was the narcoleptic who didn’t mind bad mouthing Martin Luther King Jr.  And of course, there was the foreign professor that you couldn’t understand but whose accent became remarkably clearer when prospective students would sit in on his classes.

Now, all of these guys were tough.  If you took a chemistry test, you weren’t going to get off easy.  In fact, students almost ubiquitously referred to the experience in terms of anal rape, i.e. “Hey Whitford, how’d you do on that chem test?”  “Oh, I basically got anally raped by it.  We’re talking no lube…”

Rape’s not necessarily funny to talk about (at least for people with feelings and shit I guess), but I think it’s pretty hilarious in this sense, and there’s a short but sweet story that goes with it.  Before one of the foreign chemist’s tests, a student left a jar of vaseline on the podium at the front of the room.  The prof walks in, takes one look at the jar, and simply says, “This no enough.”

Ouch.

Dude

I'm not sure as to why, but my mind drifted to a ghost of the past this evening and I got a chuckle.  I used to work for my uncle at his sawmill.   He employs all sorts of unsavory characters.  For most, this is the best job they could hope to get, albeit low pay and no benefits.   One such person that worked my uncle, more in the role of a subcontractor, was a man named Allen and his brother-in law Dude.  Dude's real name was Andy, but to everyone, he was simply known as Dude.   Why was he known as Dude?  If you're astute and wily like this author, I'm sure you've guessed that "dude" was his favorite word, or so it would have seemed.   Dude looked like a fat Jim Bruer with a mullet wearing a worn-out Carhart jacket and muddy boots.  He did like the ganja and always made me laugh, but other than that, I can’t remember too much else.  Dude was in charge of running a “Skidder”.  This is basically a machine that pulls the fallen trees out of the woods to a “log yard” where a “log truck” can come, load them up and take the logs back to the mill.  It’s a fairly mindless task, as is all sawmill work, so it’s no surprise that he had his one hitter present with him on the job.  Nothing like catchin’ a buzz and operating heavy equipment.  For some reason, Allen, who he worked with all the time, didn’t know about his “drug” habit.  It’s just better sometimes that people don’t know and an especially good thing that Allen didn’t know because he didn’t take too kindly too hippies or anyone that wasn’t a WASP for that matter.  Allen wasn’t a man you’d like to piss off either.  He was as burley as they come, probably still is.  I’ve heard stories of him picking up 16” logs and tossing them around.  Hell, he could pick up a 170lb man and carry him under his arm.  Good thing Allen didn’t know that Dude’s breath wasn’t showing in the cold air or that he wasn’t smoking a cigarette at lunch when he snuck down on the other side of the Skidder.  Good thing.  So, this has been a tribute, of sorts, to Dude.  I'd like to think that he is out there somewhere, out there working hard and tokin' on a number.

Johnny says, "Taste my pain, bitch."

Courtesy of Dr. Snail

Hank's Packard

I sent a few Johnny Cash-themed emails to the department this week. This promted one of the profs to send me the following picture entitled Hank's Packard:Did he really mean Johnny's Packard? Dr. Snail, what's your take on this situation?

The finale of 6 Feet Under is sad.

I like meat.  I like to cook it, and I like to eat it.  To tell you the truth, I like to go to the store and just look at it too.  Meat is delicious.  If I was a cow, I’d grill and eat myself.  

I know there are a lot of vegetarians out there that don’t share my love of animal flesh.  That’s cool; vegetables taste ok.  You all can keep eating them, because that just leaves more meat for me.

I’m definitely a beef man, but I don’t discriminate.  Pork, lamb, alligator – I’m down.  Chicken and turkey – pass me a wing.  Fish, mussels, shrimp, lobster – lower the price and serve me up a hardy portion.  Grill it, bake it, broil, fry, roast, baste, marinate, slather it in BBQ sauce and let me at it!

I like game too.  Fresh-caught fish is ungodly good.  Elk and moose are really tasty if you know how to cook them.  Mostly though, I like to eat deer meat, or venison as the fancy pants’s call it.  It tastes good, and it’s good for you.  Deer cooks up really quickly, and because it’s so lean, it doesn’t get everything greasy.  That makes it perfect for tacos and meat sauces.  It doesn’t really make a great hamburger, but no meat is perfect.

The reason I’m telling you all this is because my uncle just gave me two grocery bags full of deer meat.  And this is just a week after my mom gave me a giant bag full of beef.  I had to totally rearrange my freezer to fit everything; it was like playing Tetris with meat.  

There’s a weird noise coming from the kitchen now.  If the refrigerator decides to break tonight, I think I’m going to cry…and then eat as much meat as humanly possible before it goes bad.

Freaky Friday

Today’s the big day.  I have to give my talk at the Pittsburgh Yeast Meeting and then drink a bunch of free beer at the 3rd Annual Johnny Cash BASH being hosted by the Relyea Lab.  As Dr. Snail might say, Uh yeah Johnny Cash!!!” (you’ll have to imagine the animated twinkle in his eye and random finger gestures).

Johnny Cash is the patron saint of the Relyea Lab, so this is a big deal to them.  They’ve requested that everyone dress in black and hinted that there may be a few surprises.  It looks like I’m the only asshole that’s dressed in black so far, but at least I’m getting some more use out of the shirt I bought for Halloween.  I couldn’t bring myself to wear the stupid pleated and cuffed black pants again, so I’m rocking out the jeans as usual.  I pretty much have to because the Bochness Monster is “an enigma wrapped in a riddle wearing blue jeans.”

Like I was telling Jess earlier, I feel the need for a cowboy hat though.  Then I’d either be totally Johnny Cash or totally Brokeback.  Well, I guess if I was wearing the pink cowboy hat I’d be a little closer to man-love status…

Yeah…I’m not sure where I’m going with all of this.  I am viciously hungry though.  I could go for several bagels, some Chinese food, and maybe a donut right about now.

Mountain Moonlight

Spend my dollar, parked in a holler, 'neath the mountain moonlight.