Poor white kid suffers from M.P.M.D. (Ms. Pac Man Disorder)

Today I treated myself to lunch, which as I rapidly approach fatherhood and therefore become gradually poorer, is a rarity. At any rate, as I sat there uvula-deep in a plate of Ledo's Buffalo wings watching obscure sports on ESPN with the sound turned down, I heard an old familiar tune that brought back memories from times long ago. I don't know quite how to describe it in words, but it was an increasingly rapid pulsating sound that I immediately recognized as vintage electronica that I had first heard in the arcades of yesteryear. Ah yes, it was the sound of a gobbled power pellet, the mere swallowing of which turned all the othewise unpallatable ghosts blue and therefore edible on a circa-1983 Ms. PacMan game.

I tried my hand at most of the popular video games growing up: PacMan, Frogger, Donkey Kong, etc. This was back in the early days before realistic space ship graphics and sexy heroines like that Tomb Raider chick. This was when a pixelated triangle represented a space invader and, as far as I know, no teenage boys fantasized about the maiden in Donkey Kong. Arcade games were more prominent then than they are now. Sure, you'd see them at the arcade and the skating rink, but there would also be at least one in the grocery store, the children's dentist's office, and some restaurants. Pizza Hut always had a two-player table Pac Man game where players could sit down and square off against each other. Looking back, it took forever for them to bring that pizza out to your table, and it was probably because they wanted you to keep throwing quarters into the Pac Man and the jukebox.

One particular machine I remember was the one in the Lawrenceville Food Giant grocery store on the corner of Scenic Highway and Gwinnett Drive. After the Food Giant closed up shop, Quality Foods took over. The same facility has been host to a Goodwill for years now and neighboring stores include a pawn shop and a cambianos cheques, but originally it was a Food Giant, complete with handwritten signs in the produce section and a Brach's candy display that called out to sweet-toothed cleptomaniacs of all ages. Near the front entrance where customers could return their glass bottles for credit was a Ms. Pac Man machine.

There was one guy who usually played it. He was a tall skinny white kid with greasy almost-but-not-quite-shoulder-length hair that looked like it was always in need of being cut. He was a few years older than me and I recognized him as the brother of a kid in my fourth-grade class. My classmate's name was Jerry, and Jerry looked like a smaller version of his older brother whose name I don't quite remember but something tells me it might have been Terry. Jerry had his older brother's unkempt hair, his stale cigarette smell, and I imagine most of his clothes once the older brother grew out of them. In the days when teachers segregated kids into reading group according to skill level, Jerry was never in the Blue Birds; he was always in the Buzzards. Once when I wasn't doing my homework my teacher took me aside and whispered, "Do you want to end up like Jerry?" I think the politically correct term is low-income Ivory Recycling.

Anyway, this guy -- the brother; not Jerry -- would ask to straighten store shelves or mop the floor for a period of time just so he could earn quarters to put into that Ms. Pac Man machine. He could play forever on a single quarter. He was just that good. Sometimes I would stand behind him along with other kids and watch while my mother was grocery shopping. He liked being watched and would give a play-by-play of what his next move was. He had learned tricks that most people didn't know like where to pause so the ghosts wouldn't find you or how to jostle the joystick so you could pass through a ghost unscathed. He would successfully play level after level until he used up all his extra turns. Then he would always curse and hit the side of the machine.

One day I asked my mother who got to keep the quarters people put into the Ms. Pac Man machine and she told me that the money probably went to the grocery store manager. Even as a kid I realized that Jerry's older brother was basically being exploited for his labors in exchange for a few short-lived moments of recreation. Sadder still is that he chose exploitation. Come to think of it, I don't remember seeing Jerry or his older brother in middle school or high school in the succeeding years. I'd bet money they each dropped out. Furthermore, something tells me they're still no strangers to that same store now that it's a Goodwill.

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On life and living

Occasionally in the wonderful world of blogs, you stumble across an entry someone has left up in memoriam of someone they loved and lost. Though I generally read these entries, I, like most others I imagine, do so quickly and somewhat half-heartedly almost out of a sense of obligation either to the deceased or to the blogger and not because I find such postings particularly touching. After all, it's difficult to feel sympathy for someone you know only by a screen name who has lost someone you don't know from Adam. For that reason you'll have to forgive me as I try and keep this from being yet another one of those many cyber obituaries out there and instead just write a few words on death and dying. Besides, the person I know who died was a dear woman and I daren't mention her name out of respect for her so that if anyone should google her, they don't associate her with some of the mediocre quality cyber fodder that I normally write to litter the internet.

The deceased in this case is someone I met while having chemotherapy treatments. If you've never darkened the doorstep of a chemotherapy ward, don't. Those places are about as cheery as a convalescence home the day after Christmas. There's a row of reclining chairs, each one containing some poor soul who is having to sit while a delicate blend of Drano, contact lens solution and DDT is pumped through his veins which by the way are likely either collapsed or inflamed from phlebitis. Anyway, she and I were two of those souls sitting side by side and discussing family, friends and life before baldness. I showed a business card depicting me with hair and she noticed I was a real estate agent. I later received a phone call from her daughter and son-In-law who were shopping for a home. To make a long story short, they became dear friends whom I would not have met were it not for my chemomate a couple years ago. She touched my life in a major way that far transcended her own death.

Before my wife was going to the obstetrician twice a week and I was figuring out how to install a car seat, we wondered if we could even biologcally have children as one common side effect of cancer treatment is sterility. At that time I decided that if I could not spread genes I would spread memes. In other words, I wanted to die knowing that I had shared ideas, humor and views in such a way that those I knew and loved would feel affected and carry on those same thoughts to others long after I was gone. I wasn't shooting for philosopher, world leader, or international man of mystery, but I wanted to try and scatter shards of who I am long before my family scattered my ashes. I wanted to leave my impression.

Last week I was asked to sign a sympathy card for a coworker whose relative had died. When I opened up the card to read what others had written, I saw a lot of brief three- or four-word expressions, the most popular of which was Sorry for your loss. I suggest that whenever someone dies, we cherish the people around us even more. Furthermore, don't just cherish them. Let them know that they're cherished. If we wait until someone's death to reflect on what they had to offer us, it's too late. In that case, their death truly is a loss.

If you look around at the people near you, statistically none of them will be here in a hundred years. There's no cure for death and life is short. I implore you to determine what everyone you know has of value to offer so that you can partake of it and use it to make your life better. Conversely, find out what you have of value to share and share it. In the scheme of humanity, your time is running out. Make the most of it while you have the chance.

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Six Weird Slash Interesting Things About Me

Having been befriended mostly by girls as I was growing up, I would sometimes have to acquiesce to such foolish things as three-way phone calls, organized alliances and those stupid-ass quizzes found in the pages of teenaged girls' magazines. The party-line phone conversations and forbidden friendships led me to better understand the intricate workings of the female mind and the endless joys of catty gossip. The allure of the quiz on the other hand I never could grasp. For the most part they were very girl centered and didn't translate well for a reluctant male audience. Now I'm 33 years old and although it's been a while since I was asked to take a quiz, I was recently asked to join in something equally as chickish. I was tagged with a meme, namely the Six-Weird-Slash-Interesting-Things-about-You meme. Fine. Girly though this may be, I'll play. Aside from the multitudinal quirks and shortcomings mentioned elsewhere in my blog, here are six weird slash interesting things about me.

1. I have a long-standing fondness for Smurfs.

Before the days of the TeenBeat surveys, I declared myself Papa Smurf and dubbed several girls in my fifth-grade class with Smurf names. I don't remember who all was what Smurf, but we had a Brainy, a Handy, a Jokey and a few others. Rachael was the only Smurfette though perhaps because I had a crush on her. By the time Smurfette made it to our fifth-year high school reunion, she was on an all women's bowling league and she only dated other Smurfettes. Clearly gaydar wasn't something I had developed by age ten.

High up in the attic is a box that contains my Smurf figures collection, what's left of the Smurf board game, and a few mushroom houses. As I write this, I'm drinking orange juice from a Smurf glass, one of several I own in fact. If memory serves me correctly, the glasses were orginally offered as a promotional gimmick from Hardees, although most of my current collection of smurfy glassware came either from Ebay or . . . sigh . . . an antique store. While I did not see a single Smurf when I went to Belgium, their originator's birthplace, I did buy some Smurf comics at a market in St-Remy, France. More lately, I won $50 at a Halloween costume contest at work for coming as Papa Smurf.

This was not the first time I had worn said costume.

2. I have an artificial testicle.

Now really, does this one require further explanation? Click here to see a picture. Not of me, Perv! I mean the gadget itself. My wife calls it Eggy. We sometimes joke that it was actually Eggy that got her pregnant.

3. I can turn my tongue 360 degrees.

OK, this one is a half-truth. I actually can turn my tongue 180 degrees in either direction, so although I tell people I can turn my tongue all the way around, I really turn it over in one direction, then right-side up and then turn it over the other way. This is a genetic thing. Some people can do it; others can't. Whenever I demonstrate this capability as I am often want to do, people are either disturbed or intrigued by it. Those who fall into the latter category will sometimes make a lascivious comment about my sex life. I suppose this skill and the ability to speak French do make for a cunning linguist.

4. I have stepped foot in eleven different countries.

Including the United States that is. I've also visited France, Germany, Chile, Belgium, Holland, Luxemburg, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Mexico roughly in that order. My wife trumps me by one as she took some family vacations to Canada as a kid. I've also had a layover in England and once had to touch down in Peru to refuel, but I generally don't include those in the count. Sometimes when I can't sleep, I try and rattle off all the airlines I've flown in alphabetical order. They are: Air France, Air Litoral, AirTran, American Airlines, Avant, British Airways, Continental, Czech Air, Delta, KLM, Lan Chile, Malev, SouthWest, Swiss Air, and US Air. I may be leaving out a few. Some borders I've flown over and others I've driven over. To get to Mexico, I walked across the border. I love to travel. For five steps to alleviate crabby traveling, check out my VirtualTourist page.

5. I have a recurring dream of breaking into someone's home.

Who's home I have no idea. It's usually a different house each time. This may be a byproduct of working in real estate. Realtors are sometimes asked if it's weird being able to just walk into someone else's home. On a conscious level it's not, but it must bother me on some level because I keep having this dream. I'm either alone or with other people and I just want to go in and walk around without being caught. I'm not there to steal anything -- just look around. Often the house is large and labyrinthine, and I can't figure out how to get out. Many times I'll be upstairs and hear the owners coming home. Occasionally I get caught trying to sneak out a window. Weird.

6. If I'm chewing on a fingernail and have to eat, I will retrieve the fingernail from my mouth, set it aside and save it for later.

Originally for Number Six I was going to reveal that I couldn't swim, but my wife (always the shoulder surfer) suggested that this particular quirk was even weirder slash more interesting. I know some people find any degree of nail biting odd. I've done it ever since I was a kid, and yes, I've been known to put it either on the corner of my placemat, rest it on my knee, set it on my desk at work or even slip it into my shirt or pant pocket. Once you've bitten off a nail, it's not suitable for biting again until it grows back in another week or so, so you may as well get as much nervous tension relief out of it as you can, right? It frustrates me when I've rested it on my knee (this is preferable to the placemat when dining out) and then later I realize I've stood up forgetting it was there at which point if I remember promptly enough the five-second rule comes into play. Occasionally I'll reach into my jeans pocket and find the nail I put there earlier in the day along with another one dating back to a previous wear. I'm a little bit happier when that happens. It's not as gross as it sounds. It's been through the wash after all.

I should have stuck with not being able to swim. After all, is this really so weird slash interesting?

So there you have it, six weird slash interesting things about me plus a bonus. Cheesy as that was, I did it. Now in the tradition of trendy memes I'll credit the blogger that "tagged" me and pass it on to a couple of unsuspecting people who likely have better things to do but might actually enjoy doing this if they played along. Go check out Kyle and the Quiet Mumbler.

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Atlanta Center for Reproductive Medicine account is now closed

I recently received a bill in the mail for $250, that unlike my more run-of-the-mill bills (water, electricity, garbage pickup, etc.) I will choose to no longer pay. Joy of joys, I am no longer in need of this service. The bill is from the Atlanta Center for Reproductive Medicine (heretofore referred to as ACRM) for 365 days of cryogenically preserved sperm storage, but guess what? I'm not paying it anymore. They can close my account. Freeze my assets -- or rather, thaw them. Unfortunately, while it's relatively easy to make a deposit to your ACRM account, it takes everything short of an act of congress to close it out.

When I provided the specimen almost two years ago the process was simple. I got my own small room complete with reclining chair, remote controlled TV/VCR, some heavily thumbed-through porno magazines, a 7-minute X-rated video and dimmable lighting to set the mood. Come to think of it, they had everything except Marvin Gay's Let's Get It On playing in the background. The magazines were pretty tame as far as men's secret reading material goes and the video was so bad (girl on girl, each of whom wore an ill-fitting wig) that when I returned to to the center to make a subsequent deposit, I seriously considered leaving one of my own movies behind for the next guy to enjoy. The funniest part to me though, aside from having to drive on three expressways and pay $250 to do what I could have stayed at home and done for free, was that the first instruction on their laminated list of things to do is wash your hands so as not to contaminate your specimen. Then they invite you to flip through their germy stack of last year's Playboys. If you took the CSI cam to this room, the TV remote alone would have lit up like a Christmas tree. Old germs and sperms aside, I couldn't wait to get out of there so within minutes of discovering Miss February's likes and dislikes I was dancing with myself.

Flash forward to present day minus 48 hours when I called and inquired as to how to close out my account. I was told that I'd receive a consent form in the mail to thaw and dispose of my 6 vials of mini-me's on ice. Low and behold the form arrives and not only do they need my signature on this paperwork that warns me that after signing I can no longer use these vials for a pregnancy -- no kidding -- but also I have to sign this before a notary. Furthermore if I myself am a notary, which I'm not but if I were, I must find another notary to notarize the consent form. Lucky for me, my boss who is a notary, was kind enough to sign it, seal it and not ask too many invasive questions.

Being the paranoid soul that I am, I pictured the kind people at ACRM not thawing and disposing of my two-year-old kevpops but instead just peeling the label with my name off the vials and sticking them in the anonymous donor drawer next to the samples from serial killers and third-year college freshmen. I called and asked if I could witness the vials being destroyed. Alas, my request was respectfully declined mainly because the vials aren't disposed of on site but instead sent in a medical waste container to a company that incinerates them. "So you don't just leave them out on the sidewalk," I asked. The woman on the other end of the phone assured me they did not. Additionally the ACRM claims to not accept anonymous donations so the likelihood of my future daughter having a half-brother raised by a kind loving lesbian couple is slim. I can't imagine someone would opt for a cancer-ridden sperm donation but even still, I wonder if there isn't some Isle of Dr. Moreau experimenting going on. Until some 18-year-old sheep-boy hybrid comes knocking on my door trying to collect unpaid child support I guess I'll never know.

One of my most recent fascinations is looking at the site meter at the bottom of my page to find out what words people typed into a search engine in order to find me. If you've stumbled across my blog as a result of googling the Atlanta Center for Reproductive Medicine because you have an upcoming (pun intended) appointment, let me fill you in. Yes, you will get a private room in which to self abuse. No, you do not get to ask the nurse for assistance. Yes, the door locks, but yes, you can hear people walking around outside so you presume they can hear you inside. Yes, you will be provided with a run of the mill lame porn flick in which women share adult novelties, but no, if you're into midgets or transexuals or both, the center will not have a video to suit your needs so you're advised to bring your own. Yes, you will first sit in a waiting room with at least one other guy, and if his ethnic makeup varies significantly from yours, yes, you will wonder what happens if they mistakenly swap your sample with his. No, you do not have to aim at an actual beaker or vial at the climactic moment, but yes, you will have to make love to a plastic cup, which in all honesty is about as enjoyable as it sounds. No, the lab tech will not comment about the amount or make judgemental statements after you hand her your cup like, "Just not in the mood today?" No, no one will be timing you. Furthermore, under no circumstances can you knock on one of the other closed doors before leaving and announce, "Your mom's on the phone."

If on the other hand you have stumbled onto my little corner of cyber space by googling midgets or transexuals or both, I'm sorry this blog did not meet your expectations. Keep hitting the "Next Blog" button in the upper-right corner. You're bound to stumble across such a site sooner or later.

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Miracle of birth about to happen for 83rd billionth time

Riddle me this: If women have been birthing babies since the dawn of time, why did I have to spend all day in a birthing class? Tis true that this is my wife's first pregnancy and therefore the first time I will be on the receving end of a slippery newborn, but won't our daughter come regardless of whether we've taken this class? If after my wife's water breaks (and I knew of water breaking before ever going to this class, thank you) are we going to show up at the delivery ward and be quizzed on what we were supposed to have learned in this class? I can just see it happening this way:

Me: (approaching the check-in desk) Hi, my wife's water just broke and our contractions are 10 minutes apart.

Receptionist: (typing furiously on an outdated PC) Your name, sir?

Me: Kevin Black

Her: And your wife's name?

Me: Elaine Black.

Her: How do you spell that?

Me: B-L-A-C-K.

Her: Did you say V as in Victor or C as in Charlie?

Me: B as in baby. We're having one. Can we go in now?

Her: Just one moment, Mr. Clack . . . (more typing) Sir, I'm afraid because you failed your birthing class we're going to have to ask you to return once you've received a passing grade. You can sign up for a retake at the next window.

Me: Wait a minute. What do you mean "failed my birthing class?" We were in there all day.

Her: (more typing) I see here you didn't actively participate in the rythmic breathing exercise and instead preferred to feed on the complimentary snacks. Is that correct?

Me: Look Lady, first of all the snacks were lousy. Secondly I don't need a class to teach me how to breathe. I can do that just fine on my own. I can even do your stupid rythmic breathing. See? (performing the rythmic breath with exaggerated head bobbing) Hee hee hee hooooo hee hee hee hooooo.

Her: You for got your cleansing breath, Sir. Now would you please either move to the next window for a retake or join the other non-birthing fathers outside the door. (She points to a group of jovial men chatting it up outside the hospital door smoking cigars and drinking scotch on the rocks.)

Me: Well, what about my wife? She is having a baby after all.

Her: (More typing) Wow! We don't generally see birthing scores this high. Ma'am, would you like one of the ultra-posh birthing suites complete with sitting area and mini-fridge? We can find you another birthing partner if you'd like.

Elaine and I stepped into the waiting room of her obstetrician's office at 9:00 Saturday morning with two pillows, a blanket and a packed lunch in tow. After signing in for our class, pinning on our nametags and setting down our birthing class accoutrements, we chose two seats near the door. At that point we sat down and half-heartedly watched a movie on baby's development immediately after birth. The movie served as background noise while we waited for fellow birthers to file in.

Once everyone was present and accounted for we went around the room introducing ourselves. I forgot people's names almost as soon as they said them. I could care less about who they are. I wanted to know things like how old people were, who was married, who wasn't, what pregnancies were planned, which ones weren't. I'm catty that way. Sue me.

Next on the agenda was a game of charades in which men were assigned a pregnancy syndrome to act out in front of the group. I lucked up and got swollen ankles, but other blokes were less fortunate and had to pantomime things like sore nipples or frequent urination. The guy who picked constipation, after confirming he could use words, grabbed his stomach and said, "I can go number one, but I can't go number two." You know, game or not, this falls into the category of things you don't need to hear a grown man say.

The bulk of the class was either listening to the instructor dish out candid information on the birthing process or watching a movie about it. She was informative enough. After all, birthing is one of those things you don't do every day, so much of it remains a mystery until you do. The movie was not one I'd add to my Top Ten list however. I never thought I'd finish watching a movie and wish that it had contained less female nudity. That's not to say I don't find pregnant women attractive. It's just that these were some really granola looking women. I'll say little else for fear of stepping on toes, but let's just say this movie could have served as corrective therapy for those pregnancy fetishists out there. You know who you are.

Next we broke for lunch. Elaine and I, along with what Elaine described as "the other old couple", opted to stay and eat our packed lunch. All others filed out and returned with bags from Wendy's and Chick-Fil-A. I imagine these same women bragging about how they aren't eating soft cheeses or drinking caffeinated beverages for the sake of their healthy unborn. For some reason however deep-fried fatty McFat sandwiches are still kosher. That's like parents who when their child is 12 months old have all the cabinet locks and outlet plugs installed in the home and yet when the kid is twelve years old the parents drop him or her off at the mall alone in the midst of perfect strangers for hours at a time. Selective safety. Just as a quick aside on that nutrition note, have you ever compared the information your child gets at school regarding nutrition and then looked at what he buys in that school's cafeteria and vending machines? OK, I'm rambling now.

Cleansing breath.

Which brings me to the next segment of class. Once everyone was through eating, the instructor said, "OK, now the women are going to get down on all fours and the guys are going to get behind them."

"Isn't that what got us here in the first place?" I said. It got a chuckle from some of the couples around us. Others were too busy arranging their pillows and getting into the position of the Milch Cow to pay me the attention I crave.

I forget exactly why we were told to get in this position. I seem to recall having to squeeze my wife's hips which she said felt good. We were also then given other squatting and squeezing positions to try out during the early labor period to alleviate discomfort. Early labor period is code for that time preceding delivery when the woman knows she's about to give birth but it's too early to show up at the hospital. The instructor discouraged us from showing up at the hospital too early because they don't provide food from the time you show up until after you give birth. Factor in the eighteen-hour labor that some women experience and you figure that's a hella long time to go without eating.

Eventually we reached the point in the course where we had to practice our breathing. This sounds as ridiculous as it looks. This is the famed birthing woman's breathing technique popularized by movies and television that I predict is used by absolutely no one. Think about it. If panting like a puppy helped to reduce pain, wouldn't we be taught to do it in the dentist's chair? Regardless, we all watched and repeated this silly rythmic breathing technique ad nauseum until we all got the hang of it.

The class ended after another video and some Q and A. All in all it was relatively painless, not like I imagine labor and delivery will be. I won't say I didn't learn anything, but what I learned isn't much more than I could have found via Google. As for the rhythmic breathing, I suppose if I ever find myself in the position of having to blow down the house of some pesky little pigs, I'll be well prepared.

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Sam's Warehouse receives accolades once again

As a wee lad, all of 16 years old, I worked at the world's biggest toy store, Toys R Us. Like the working crew of any other retail establishment, my coworkers and I had developed dislikes for certain types of customers that came into the store. Parents who initiated their conversations with things like "I have a son who's eight but he has the intelligence of a twelve-year-old" spring to mind. Another was the tearful mom who showed up at our door sobbing on Christmas Eve after the store closed begging to be let in and buy some trendy tchotchke her kid had seen an ad for on TV. We always let her in, but I imagine the toy usually wound up in pieces at the bottom of the kid's closet by Valentine's Day. One of the most difficult parts of my job however was dealing with people who wanted to return an item. You would be surprised at the number of people who hope to return something after it's been subjected to months and months of abuse. On many an occasion I had to turn away the forlorn cash-seeking customer trying to return just such an item. Bearing that in mind, you can imagine how hesitant I was this weekend when I had to return a computer to Sam's Warehouse Club that I had owned for barely under 90 days.

I hated having to take the computer back because I not only had recently installed $70 worth of virus protection software on it but I had also gotten the computer for a steal. In December when I bought it, the original price at the Gwinnett Place Sam's was $750, and that was probably a good $40 cheaper than it would be in any other retail store. All they had available however was the floor model. The Mall of Georgia Sam's, also in my area, had it on sale for only $700, but they had no more in stock. When I asked a manager at one store if he would match the price of the other, he not only agreed but also lowered the price of the floor model to a mere $650. When I complimented him on how well his store was handling the post-Christmas rush, he took the handwritten price tag from my hand, scratched out the $650 and wrote $600. Floor model or not, this was a whopping $150 savings, the last $50 of which was due to nothing more than simple flattery on my part. So pleased was I with the courteous service and generous discount that I received that I sent an email via samsclub.com expressing my gratitude.

Sadly, the computer had issues from the start. Somewhere in the inner workings of the machine I would hear a ticking sound. This being the first desktop I had owned in a long time, I thought maybe that's just how they behaved. I let that slide but the Compaq Presario's errant demeanor didn't stop at mysterious noises. It refused to burn CD's, and let's face it, in this modern era of bootleg music and movies and disrespect for that antiquated thing we used to call copyright, making CD's is one of the main reasons many people use computers. If it can't make endless copies of Barry Manilow's Greatest Hits, what good is the thing? Did I mention that it corrupted several files on a flash drive I had received as a Christmas gift? This thing wreaked of bad juju, and try as I might, there was no taming the ghost in the machine.

I knew obtaining a cash refund was a near impossibility, and because technology outdates itself every twelve minutes getting an identical computer (minus the Poltergeist activity of course) was also out of the question. I would have been happy with a store credit. I did want another computer after all, and I was happy to get it from Sam's. A coworker had suggested having my visibly pregnant wife accompany me into the store which I thought was a novel idea. What self-respecting clerk would deny an unborn baby 512 megabytes of memory and a 17" flat screen monitor? With no box, incomplete paperwork and a receipt showing I purchased a big-ticket item just two days short of the 90-day return cutoff, I headed to Sam's to plead my case.

If you've never ventured into a Sam's Club, it's worth a visit. Yes, I know their corporate cousin Wal-Mart is trying to snatch away people's property by way of imminent domain to build more stores, but as long it's not my backyard, what do I care? Much like Wal-Mart, Sam's always has a senior smile and greet customers at the door. Apparently his job description is just that: smile and greet. Occasionally you'll see him perform more physically demanding tasks like coo at a baby or pick his nose, sometimes not in that order, but for the most part he smiles and greets. When I walked in with pieces of a computer in tow, I thought for certain red flags would go up and sirens would blare, but nothing of the sort happened. The greeter smiled, offered a hearty greeting, put a sticker on the monitor and directed me to the return desk.

Once at the return desk I presented my receipt to Claudia Cashier and explained that I had purchased the computer as a marked down floor model. She listened as I nervously explained that the drives weren't working and that I had attempted to rectify the issue several times myself by using Compaq's online chat support. Allow me to interject here that trying to communicate with a non-native English speaker halfway around the planet about technology via a medium that was designed for tweenagers to tell who hearts who is an utter waste of one's time. At any rate, Claudia at Sam's was most helpful. She called someone over from the computer department who gave a cursory glance at the cart of failed technology. Without being prompted I rehashed my story of trying to repair it according to the transoceanic cyber-tech's shoddy directions. I went on to explain that I regretted having to return it after buying it for such a bargain basement price. I maintained the calm and courteous composure I usually find gets me what I want in negotated retail transactions, but I was also prepared if need be to defend myself against potential accusations of computer abuse. No, I didn't download any malicious software; No, I didn't stick peanut butter in the disk drive; No, I didn't trust Dotcomma BinLaden to tell me how to fix it. But the Sam's computer guy just nodded saying that all the components were there.

"Do I have to get store credit?" I asked Claudia.

"You paid cash: You're getting cash," she said counting out hundred-dollar bills. Sweet.

I returned to the Mall of Georgia Sam's that day and purchased a nicer computer than the one I had returned. It only set me back $700. Three months ago the upgraded model would have gone for around $900. I also successfully reinstalled the virus protection software on the new computer without much ado. In fact, I'm really floored at how little to-do there was regarding the whole transaction. The way I see it, I got three months worth of free computer use. I even restored the gifted flash drive to its original unblemished state.

Sure, I had to reformat and wipe off all the tunes, but in the age of modern technology Barry Manilow's hits are just a mouse click away.

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Standing eggs on end for the vernal equinox

Well begosh and begorra! Another truth falls the way of myth. Before getting to the bulk of what I want to say, let me preface by stating that I never believed Elvis Presley was alive after 1977, nor did I trust in that whole Neimann Marcus cookie recipe fiasco, and it never would have dawned on me to believe Mikey from the Life cereal commercial died from mixing Pop Rocks and Coke. As a kid, that last one might have seemed more plausible to me until I watched my younger cousin Adam mix the two deadly ingredients while riding in the back seat of his parents' car. The carbonated sugar muck bubbled over the neck of the green bottle and got all over the car upholstery, but after drinking what was left, Adam went unscathed. I have always prided myself on not being the gullible type, and I'm not one to buy into the latest meme just because everyone else does. There is however a popular myth that, until this morning, I took as scientific truth. You can imagine my bitter disappointment when I discovered evidence to the contrary.

The actual year eludes me, but I distinctly remember taking a Polaroid picture of three eggs all of which I successfully righted on end out on the front porch of my parents' home. Although this may be a fabrication that I later came to believe as true, I also seem to remember them falling over one by one in order from right to left. I think it was my mother who had introduced me to this concept of standing eggs on their end during the vernal equinox, but there had also been a news story on it one year, so I was sure it must have been true. I wasn't a scientifically minded kinda kid so I didn't understand the process behind it, but it was supposedly due to some special gravitational pull and consequently some ultimate cosmic order to the universe unique to that particular calendar day. It all sounds hoaky now that I think about it, but until recently I bought it hook, line and sinker.

What's so special about an egg anyway? Why wasn't the rumor propagated that you could stand a cucumber on it's end on the first day of Spring? Or a light bulb? Any round-ended object? Count Chocula? After all, if you could stand an egg on it's end one day out of the year, why wouldn't a Weeble stand on his head that day also? I imagine the incredible edible egg came into the picture as a symbol of fertility during the equinox the same way we worship plastic eggs and chocolate bunnies for Easter. Millions of years ago one fine Spring day some caveman steps out of his hovel and sees that since the weather has warmed up chickens lay more eggs and rabbits do it bunny style. Apparently he was so excited he decided to paint the egg and stand it up on it's posterior. If you think our fertility rituals are weird, get a load of this: When we were in Prague, my wife and I saw men coming home from the florist with willow branches. According to Czech legend, the men beat their women with the sticks to increase their fecundity. Then the women, as a thank you I guess, offer the men an egg. Wild, huh? I suppose anything's better than marshmallow Peeps though.

But anyway, back to the vernal egg balancing. It's a sham, folks. Well, not a total sham. You can balance an egg on it's end during the vernal equinox if you work at it hard enough, but -- NEWS FLASH -- you can do that any day of the year. Equinox, solstice, tax day; it doesn't matter. There is absolutely no rhyme or reason or gravitational anomaly or special order to the cosmos on March 20th or 21st that doesn't occur every other day of the year. During both equinoxes, there are equal amounts of light and darkness. That's it. That's the magic.

If you're wondering how I got wind of this debunking, or if you too are one of the mislead sad sacks rushing out once a year to balance eggs on end and you're not yet convinced that your efforts are fruitless, click here. That's a link to a site I found via Google that dishes out the scientific truth about this widespread theory and offers up evidence to the contrary. The author also gives links to other sites that go into even more detail about the equinoxes and why they're not much more special than any other day. It's on the internet, so you know it's gotta be true.

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