Sunday, June 12, 2016

The Libertine Manifesto

http://liber-manifesto.blogspot.com/


OK!  I am trying this again.  I am starting a new blog called the Libertine Manifesto focusing upon my efforts to once again embrace my hedonistic tendencies  to live a life less ordinary and to encourage others to do the same.  The Libertine Manifesto is intended to be an outlet appealing to the independent thinker to promote ways to overcome the natural human herd instinct, achieve a renewed exuberance for living through the collection of experiences rather than objects and to unrepentantly revel in behavior frowned upon by those who you really should not car about impressing anyway.

The goal is to publish at least weekly, with posts shorter and more to the point but still crafted while heavily under the influence so the the JEP Report fan will still feel right at home.  I hope to see you there!



Tuesday, April 23, 2013

The Terabyte Boddhisattva is now online

Just to let you know, I am no longer posting in the JEP Report.  Please check out my new blog, the Terabyte Boddhisattva at http://terabyteboddhisattva.blogspot.com/!

Hope to see you there!  Please check in and comment to let me know you've crossed over!

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Coming Soon

 
I am getting back into the blogging scene, but switching gears a bit.  I'm a bit older, a bit wiser than I was before and have sort of a new take on things.  I am learning the new blogger features now, but hope to have my first post up in a week or so.  If any of you are still out there, chime in and let me know who you are and whether or not I'll see you on the new site!

Friday, December 21, 2012

Happy Mayan Apocalypse Day!


To be honest, there was a part of me that did not think that the alarm clock was going to go off this morning, that the paranoid might have been right and the Mayan apocalypse had somehow come to fruition while I was sleeping.  The night proved rather uneventful though, which in hindsight made me seem kind of foolish for going to bed so heavily armed.  On the other hand, had I fallen asleep under a lesser degree of preparedness I likely would not have found myself in a position to appropriately respond to a clock radio blaring John Denver music into an otherwise peaceful bedroom at 4:30 in the morning.  There are undoubtedly some people that may think that letting loose four rounds from a .357 magnum to force a premature ending to “Rocky Mountain High” may be a bit of overkill, but as my surprised wife, 5 terrified kids and two suddenly incontinent dogs discovered, I was not one of those people.

Things got moving pretty quickly after that.  As my wife insisted on trying to have a “heart-to-heart” regarding me going on some sort of medication, I got through my shower and breakfast in record time so that I could start talking with sane people at the office as opposed to having to converse with hysterical spouses at home.  I tried to make her realize that problems were never solved through conversation at 5am, and she should know that considering how many ill-fated roadside discussions I have had with law enforcement authorities at that ungodly hour, but despite the evidence she kept chattering away anyway until I finally slipped out of the kitchen door and into the garage.

I hit the button on the wall to raise the garage door and while it was climbing, poked my head into the refrigerator to fish out a Mountain Dew for a solid caffeine fix to get myself to work. When I emerged from the fridge, I was startled to find the garage door opened and standing in front of it, a form standing at least 8 feet tall.  It was a truly horrific creature, with a torso shaped vaguely like an upside down triangle, whose head and body were one, with no neck separating the two.  It had long, sinewy arms that hung off of the top corners of its body and stretched all of the eight feet it took for them to reach the ground.  Its legs were much shorter, but no thicker, but quite bowlegged suggested that this beast must have ridden one fat horse on its way to my driveway.  This was a fur bearing beast, bearing a deep red coat with yellow tiger stripes.  It had three bright green reptilian eyes lined up across the top of its forehead between its two shoulders, the nose of a swine and a wide mouth from which two enormous fangs protruded out of its lower jaw.  I stared at it for a little while, trying to figure out if this monster was yet another side effect of the Chantix I used to quit smoking a few years before or the result of some other substances I had ingested during my youthful forays into street pharmaceuticals.  Having been years since I had to confront a hallucination of that caliber, I was not entirely sure what to do, so I just gave him a nod and acknowledged it with a “ ‘sup.”

The creature nodded back to me, grinned and returned the greeting, but with a bit more enthusiasm.  “‘SUP!”  It then produced a blade shaped like a gigantic Gurkha knife and charged, loosing a deafening roar as it lunged to take my head off.

Though by no means known for my cat-like reflexes, particularly before six am, I ducked just in time for the blade to miss the top of my crown and pass effortlessly through my refrigerator as if it were a hot knife through a stick of butter.  The appliance seemingly exploded into a foamy mist of vaporized PBR and I found myself marveling at the power of what I had believed to be a psychotropically inspired figment of my overactive imagination.  Back in my gloriously misspent youth, when I was being attacked by one of my hallucinations, I would drop my defenses and allow whatever apparition was bothering me to have its way with me.  Once my body saw that my visions were harmless, they would generally go away.  This time however, I just could not get my body to play along.  As the demon before me swung, stabbed and parried his weapon, my body was involuntarily ducking, weaving and leaping out of the way of the cutting edge.

At one point, the demon thrust his blade at my chest, but I turned out of the way just in time for it to miss me and get itself stuck into the wall of my garage.  I then grabbed an axe off a nearby shelf and buried it deep within the head of creature before me.  The beast instantly split nearly in two and fell backwards, unleashing a swarm of fluorescent colored centipedes that rushed out of the demon’s deflating corpse, down my driveway, into the street and down the nearest manhole cover into the sewers below.  I was now convinced that someone had spiked my drink last night with some sort of hallucinogenic substance and I made a pact that by the end of the day I was going to find out what it was, mainly because I REALLY wanted to score some more of that stuff before New Year’s Eve.

While on my way to my car in the driveway, I took a quick look around the neighborhood and had to stop and marvel at the chaos erupting around me.  The widowed Mrs. Henderson sped past my house screaming bloody murder, her wheelchair being pulled chariot style down the street harnessed to a half dozen half-man, half horse centaurs who were trotting along at an easy 60 miles an hour.  This made me smile as at least three times a week I get caught behind that harpy in the Honda Civic she has owned for 12 years without her ever managing to figure out where the accelerator was located.  There was a small army of goblins tearing up the perfectly manicured lawn of the Roberts house which also lifted my spirits as I would now have a good reason to complain to the neighborhood association about THEIR landscaping for a change.  There were winged trolls relieving themselves in the Mayfields’ swimming pool and I spotted a trio of gargoyles trying to mate with Tomlinson’s Great Dane.  Apparently, I was on some REAL good stuff.

For the most part, the monsters ignored me until I pulled out of my driveway and started making my way down the street.  Then every twisted creature within a two block radius came rushing at me.  I decided that for the most part, I would just drive right through them.  I seriously doubted that any of those things were really there and if by some chance they were actually running amok throughout the subdivision, I am sure that my neighbors would greatly appreciate the fact that I was running them over.

The chaos did not end once I was out of the neighborhood.  Once onto the main road, I spotted a fire-breathing dragon take out a convoy of tanker trucks in a spectacular fireball that left me with a sudden craving for marshmallows, chocolate and graham crackers.  I then passed a Satanic choir of lesser demons caroling classic Iron Maiden tunes.  I also spotted a fluorescent orange python in a corn field the size of a passenger train, a flock of flying piranhas tearing apart an escaped hippopotamus and a swarm of razor-toothed tree frogs attacking stray dogs.  Normal, vehicular traffic was surprising light.  It was nearly ten minutes before I spotted a police car roaring at me with lights and sirens ablaze.  It cut in front of me, forcing me to stop and then pulled up beside me while a frantic police officer rolled down his window and leaned half of his body out of it to scream at me. 

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?!?!” the officer bellowed.  “ARE YOU INSANE!?!?!  YOU NEED TO GET OFF OF THE ROAD AND GO…”  He was cut off when a passing pterodactyl swooped down and plucked him out of the vehicle to carry him off for an early morning snack.  This proved too much for his partner in the passenger seat to bear, who proceeded to melt down, throwing his hands to his cheeks while hysterically screaming, “RUUUUUUNNNNN!   FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE!!!  GET OUT OF HERE!!  RU…”  He was silenced when an immense elephant-like leg came down upon the patrol car, smashing it flat against the pavement.  The beast that huge leg belonged to was so gargantuan that I could not even begin to make out what it was as it stepped over me.  Once it passed though, I noticed an ancient Native American shaman standing on the road’s opposite shoulder, smiling warmly and waving at me.

I waved back.  “You’re Mayan aren’t you?” I asked suddenly doubting my hallucinogenic theory.

The Indian gave me a thumbs up. 

“And this is the end of the world?”

The shaman answered me in an ancient Mayan dialect, but through his magic, I was able to understand him perfectly.  “Yes, young one.  This is the end of the world.  Go back.  You know what you need to do.”

I did.  I needed to race back home and get my Facebook status updated before Beezlebub cut the power lines.

Happy Mayan Apocalypse Day Everyone!

Saturday, August 18, 2012

JP's Law of Parenting #36

Unlike a fully automatic M-60 machine gun with a thousand round belt of armor piercing ammunition locked into the chamber, a child's mind does NOT come with a friggin' safety switch.

Sunday, May 27, 2012

JEP's Law of Parenting #35

JEP's Law of Parenting #35: Always think safety when having your children performing yard chores in the stifling summer heat. Hydration is key so keep plenty of beverages on hand and ice cold so that you can keep yourself cool and refreshed while following your spawn around the yard pointing out all of the spots that they missed with the lawn mower. If you're going to pass out from anything, you want it to be because of Molsen over-indulgence and not heat stroke.

Jep's Law of Parenting #33

JEP’s Law of Parenting #33: Just because your kids can casually reprogram every piece of electronics that comes into your house within 15 minutes, recite the vital statistics of every Pokemon character ever created and intricately analyze and critique the minute details of ancient Greek mythology does not mean that when it comes to working the handle to flush the damn toilet, they will not approach it like it is some sort of un-freakin’-solvable variant of Pythagorean theorem.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

JP Law of Parenting #34

JP Law of Parenting #34: Very small children of opposite genders may be bathed together for efficiency and water conservation reasons, but the practice should come to an instant and abrupt end once the boys are old enough to try and show his little sisters a really neat "helicopter" trick.

Monday, May 30, 2011

JEP's Rules of Parenting

Wow! I haven't been here in nearly three years. I miss blogging, or actually, I kind of miss the time of my life when I actually had time to blog. Between a job that keeps me working 14 hours a day and 5 kids that consume whatever little free time I have left, there is just no time for wordsmithing. If it wasn't for Facebook, which gives me the opportunity to occaisionally write (in 435 characters or less) I wouldn't be writing at all. Anyway, if any of my old readers stumble by the site, here's a little something new for you to read. I hope all of you are well and safe in these uncertain times.
JEP's Rules of Parenting

JEP's Rule of Parenting #1: If you’re caught in a dilemma about whether to grab your child to prevent wardrobe damage or grab a camera to document the act, always go for the camera. Soggy socks are a small price to pay for the opportunity to positively mortify your kid on prom night.


JEP's Law of Parenting #2: Clowns are innately evil creatures with insatiable tendencies towards cannibalism. Any three-year-old knows this and would be just as traumatized discovering his mommy hired one to play his birthday party as he would be to find she wrapped up a pair of rabid porcupines as his gift. She would be doing less damage to his nascent psyche by just hiring him strippers.

JEP's Law of Parenting #3: The more time, effort and fresh ingredients that are put into a family meal, the more your children will think it tastes like a midnight snack accidentally liberated from the cat's litterbox during the immediate aftermath of an epic tequila bender.

JEP's Law of Parenting #4: Men who complain about how hard it is to get a female out of her clothes have obviously never been subjected to the trauma of trying to get their squirmy 18 month-old daughter into them.

JEP's Law of Parenting #5: Omerta is not an adolescent concept. If you need to extract information from a five-year-old, just threaten to narc them out to Santa Clause and the little rats will sing like they were being waterboarded by Delta Force.

JEP's Law of Parenting #6: A multi-state drive should never be undertaken with a van full of children without several the use of several portable DVD players for there are only so many "Are we there yet?"s that a man can take before he starts reconsidering his views on abortion.

JEP's Law of Parenting #7: Kids' television shows are not made for adults and should not, under any circumstances, be watched by them. A lobotomy performed by a highly strung chimpanzee in the throes of a caffeine overdose could not begin to do the damage to the adult psyche that 15 minutes alone with the Wiggles could do.

JEP's Law of Parenting #8: The younger a child is, the higher its threshold for handling disgusting things is. For this reason, housholds with toddlers should reinforce the importance of flushing toilets early and often unless they want to find themselves frantically rifling through every nook and cranny of their home hunting down a "Deuce on the Loose".

JEP's Law of Parenting #9: If a parent has been forced to pry three random insects, belly button lint, the toilet brush and a sibling’s booger from a toddler’s mouth, they should be overjoyed by the fact that the kid refuses to try a single bite of the meal they’ve spent all day preparing. By the same token, given the same child’s enthusiasm for McDonalds, the folks behind the Happy Meal should be duly concerned.

JEP's Law of Parenting #10: Kids must stay active and exercise often, but care must be taken to ensure that they do not over-do it. The last thing any parent needs is a child that can outrun them. Particularly if the little pagan has your wallet and a single-minded determination to catch up with the ice cream truck that went through your neighborhood a half hour before.

JEP's Law of Parenting #11: Parenting must be approached with a sense of humor. Without it, vasectomy clinics would be more plentiful than tattoo parlors.

JEP's Law of Parenting #12: A parent should not consider it their job to publically humiliate and embarrass their children at every given opportunity. They should consider it a perk.

JEP's Law of Parenting #13: If your toddler tries to hand you something, ALWAYS identify what it is before you open your hand to blindly receive it unless you enjoy having boogers wiped across your palm. That goes double for that little "Open your mouth and close your eyes..." game.

JEP's Law of Parenting #14: Before dropping several thousand dollars to take your toddler on a Disney World vacation, consider that Mickey Mouse is to most one-year-olds what Jason Vorhees was to nymphomaniac counselors-in-traing at Camp Crystal Lake.

JEP's Law of Parenting #15: It will never be easy to teach our children the virtue of tolerance until we somehow make the act of delivering a swift debilitating kick to the crotch of the person irritating them significantly less fulfilling on a personal level.

JEP's Law of Parenting #16: The "Facts of Life" should only be taught to children by women. Generally speaking, men are blissfully ignorant of all elements of human anatomy that can not be seen in a Playboy centerfold and tend to overemphasize the role tequila plays in human reproduction.
(Ed. Note: I shudder to think how many of my former navy buddies tell their children the story of they got here by saying, "I'm a little foggy on the details but I remember ordering my sixth pitcher of Mojo in some Third World strip joint and next thing I knew it was nine months later and some doctor handed me this writhing little slime covered baby saying, 'Congratulations! It's a boy!' I'm afraid that until we teach your mother how to speak English, whatever happened in between is going to be shrouded in more mystery than the disappearance of Amelia #%!@?!$ Earhardt.")

JEP's Law of Parenting #17: If you REALLY want your child to expand their vocabulary dramatically, pitch the "Hooked on Phonics". Buy them "Calvin and Hobbes". Seriously, they'll start using words that will have YOU running for the dictionary.

JEP's Law of Parenting #18: Experts say that if you desire a house of tranquility and harmony, always approach your children with a toolbox full of unshakeable calm, limitless patience and unconditional love. In addition to that, its wise to keep a roll of duct tape, a loaded tranquilizer gun, an athletic protective cup and a bottle of Crown Royal in the junk drawer just in case that hippy shit doesn't work out.

JEP's Law of Parenting #19: A toddler’s ability to mimic words her parents say is directly proportional to the vulgarity of the profanities streaming out of a parent’s mouth. It may take months of pleading to get her to say “mah-mah”, but if she is within earshot of her father when his hammer strikes thumb instead of nail, she’ll easily recite a 15 minute stream of vindictive that would cause a union welder to blush.

JEP's Law of Parenting #20: Unrepentantly loud flatulence may be offensive, crude and indicative of an extreme lack of social graces, but there are few tools more effective when it comes to attempting to get multiple children to smile simultaneously for a family portrait. Children should be fed a high fiber meal at least 90 minutes prior to their appointment time at JC Penny’s photo studio.

JEP's Law of Parenting #21: Though the operators at Poison Control may beg to differ, one of the most effective ways to induce vomiting in an infant is for the father to hold it far above his head, look up, open his mouth as far as he can and in the highest pitched, puppy dog voice he can muster say, “Look at da prit-TAY smile on da prit-TAY bay-BAY!!” She’ll spew Similac right down your gullet inside of 15 seconds.

JEP's Law of Parenting #22: If you really want to know the honest truth about whether or not the jeans you’re wearing makes you butt look big, just go ask a child. If you really want to know the honest truth about how your grandmother’s antique lamp got broken however, you’d better have video surveillance footage.

JEP's Law of Parenting #23: Unless a man enjoys addressing his family in an octave that is reminiscent of Mickey Mouse suffering an emasculating industrial accident in a helium processing factory, he should never attempt to change a squirmy one-year-old's diaper without wearing a protective cup.

JEP's Law of Parenting #24: Just because you know from experience that your son is right when he says that there are times during the school day that could use a little livening up with an airhorn does not mean you should let him test his teacher's bladder control by actually letting him bring one to class. Unless, you know, you enjoy discussing the early signs of pre-pubescent psychosis with the school psychologist.

JEP's Law of Parenting #25: When coming up with a meal plan for the week, be sure to limit the fruit intake of un-potty trained children on bath night as a toddler basking in the afterglow of a furious high-fiber feeding frenzy can catastrophically foul water quality in ways that evenTony Hayword's misguided minions at British Petroleum could not possibly have dreamed of.

JEP's Law of Parenting #26: Every child is unique, therefore no parenting "expert" has the magic answer that will cure your kid of misbehavior. The exception of course, is the omnipotent and all-knowing Dr. Spock. I haven't read any of his books but that Vulcan Death Grip he came up with stops kids from doing what they're not supposed to EVERY FREAKIN' TIME!!!

JEP's Law of Parenting #27: The prospect of having to shave one’s legs is apparently quite mortifying to a young lady. In fact, she will go immediately to her mother for confidential counsel on the topic if she needs it. During this time, she is very sensitive about her appearance so a father needs to respect her privacy. And stop referring to her as “Grizzly Adams”.

JEP's Law of Parenting #28: Though you may consider yourself quite the domestic Magic Johnson, you should NEVER give in to the urge to attempt a twenty-five-foot hook shot into the kitchen garbage can with a dirty diaper unless you want to end up cleaning far more of the house than you first intended to when you got up that morning.

JEP's Law of Parenting #29: A father should not feel left out if his daughter does not come to him for advice on grooming. The fact is that leg shaving is just not a male area of expertise. Men know how to deal with unsightly ear and nose hair. If your little girl needs help with ear and nasal fur, you should still tell her to see her mom though because, genetically speaking, you’ve done enough damage already.

JEP's Law of Parenting #30: The plethora of naked Barbie dolls in a three-year-old girl's bedroom closet is primarily caused by the fact that the fine motor skills required to dress such toys are not usually developed until a child's fifth birthday. Not because of her overwhelming desire to constantly play "little lesbian nudist colony", therefore, there is no need for therapy.

JEP's Law of Parenting #31: If you have young children who live to argue amongst themselves, owning Pixar's "Toy Story" franchise is a must if you want to get them focused on something besides each other. It is the only way a man can approach a domestic confrontation with a Buzz and a Woody and not end up with more problems than he started off with.

JEP's Law of Parenting #32: Cherish the time in your child's life when they think that you are the coolest individual on the planet because it typically only takes them about thirteen years to figure out just how big of a dork that you actually are.

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Thursday, December 25, 2008

An Ode To My Christmas Gift

‘Twas Five days before Christmas,
In the evening quite late,
And upon my poor shoulders,
Was a terrible weight.

The gifts were all purchased,
My accounts were all bare,
My job hung o’er a cliff,
By a fast-fraying hair.

The stock market was mauled,
By corporate hordes,
And my 401k,
Couldn’t buy three cans of Coors.

From an employment view,
I felt dreadfully cursed,
And just could not see how,
Things could get that much worse.

Then my wife had approached me,
‘cross the living room floor,
Then quietly told me,
She got knocked up once more.

My sphincter then puckered,
My ass felt so torn,
While my rear compressed diamonds,
From half-digested corn.

My head started reeling,
My stomach fell ill,
How could this have happened,
While she’s on the pill?

I glanced down at my winkie,
While my soul filled with dread,
Then pointed and shouted,
“NOW OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!”

Now I fear how I’ll clothe it,
Or school it or feed it,
But all things considered,
I still can’t wait to meet it.

So, anyone want to say good-bye to my nuts before I stick them in the microwave?
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