McGillmas Obsvd: Lasertag Edition

Since Joe shares a birthday with our Lord and Savior, we generally wait until after the holidays to observe it once everything is digested. This year, it was LaserTag in Virginia, somewhere.


Joe somehow finds a dragon/medieval-themed LaserTag joint. He likes those kinds of things.


In our party room, along with snacks and soda pop, the LaserTag people had included a real downer magazine display.


The signage at ShadowLandsLaserTagFamilyFunCentre was choice, and included a place where you can Create-A-Friend:


and get briefed



It also requires its attendees to come up with an alias. Ana: CHALUPA OF PAIN


Me: DEATHBLOW


In between rounds, old people tend to stand around and play skee-ball in silence.

Then later, Laura says she likes my blog. PANDERTIME

199th Post: Gross Drinking Competitions

Tonight was Teebz' (Teebz's?) going away party, in anticipation of our super wicked semi-cross country road trip. The party was good.

In particular was the decision of two young men (TBs and Owen) to finish the bottle of Sloe Gin they saw when they walked in.

For future reference: this idea is gross.

It included: Sloe Gin Fizzes (natch)
Sloe Mind Erasers (aka Mind Sloers--just substitute Sloe Gin for the Kahlua)
Retarded Matadors (Jager Bombs wherein one substitutes Sloe Gin for Jagermeister)
and finally
Pints of Sloe Gin on the rocks.


Hint: they finished the bottle.

Get ready for mophlogging, people.

Cuatro de Cinco

Katie had a Cuatro de Mayo barbecue yesterday, which means that these dudes wear straw hats.


And in what can only be described as a Cuatro de Mayo miracle, a ladybug flew inside and parked right on Katie's bangs.




Remember the other day when I posted a bunch of crappy pictures of stuff in our neighborhood? I forgot to include the picture of my neighbor's parrot, which she lets out every day.


When we first moved in it said goodbye to me and I responded. I hate birds.

Saturday Night Camera Phone Dump

Alot has happened on my phone lately. First, for some reason I used it to capture Colin working the ladies when I had a perfectly working real phone at hand:


He swore that he needed just five more minutes. Next time, Collard Greens, next time!

Also, Murph posed:


Before that, a couple of us went to DC's hottest only after-hours spot, wherein we were stuck for two hours in silence while the coppers tried to pinch us.


If I were 17, it would've been a great story. But I'm not. The coppers would've needed to actually pinch us for it to be a great story at 30.

I finally got my shirt. It's surprisingly high in quality and awesomeness:


And finally, Teebz turned 19! Here he is asking for his keys:

Baltimore: More Than Drugs!

True, it's mostly drugs. But it's also duckpin bowling!

So that's what we did for our work holiday party. But first, we got on a bus with a bunch of beer.

If you haven't been on a bus with condensation on the windows since you were a kid, you'd be surprised to find that the urge to write on them is still overwhelming.

I decided that it should be more adult-like window graffiti, though.


(It says "cocaine/crack".)

And of course, it's still awesome to be metal.


Duckpin bowling involves smaller balls, smaller pins, and three tries per frame.


Aside from that, it's pretty much like normal bowling, although the proprietors think for some reason that having "rental" on the instep of a bowling shoe is going to keep somebody from stealing it. I would argue that it increases the shoes' awesomeness.


Remember my new name? Sure you do! Also, I was totally winning until the end.


Bowling, like all games, brings out the juvenile posing gene.


The bowling alley was so awesome that it had converted one lane into a locker room/smoking area.


Something about starting to drink at six that makes people sleepy. I think it's the rufis.

Murph was sleepy from the beginning, though. He worked in what he called the "morning." I'm checking on it.

In other news, these two people are very photogenic.

This one is too, only in his own special way:


BONUSBONUSBONUS People always want to be on here. Guess what! You can be, if you see me when I have my camera!

Also, Evan does an impression of someone.

BREAKING: Philip Seymour Hoffman Plays Conflicted Intellectual

And he does it well. The Savages is good; I recommend it.


In other news, Senior has been found out. She'd better watch herself.

BONUSBONUSBONUS Heck's Kitchen has taken my poorly thought-out idea and begun making lots of different products that people might actually like to buy. So what, you say? So I need better ideas, so I win. Please feel free to include them in the comments.

Oh, and our work holiday party is going to include a party bus and duckpin bowling (they have a snack bar!) in Baltimore. Feel free to hold your collective breaths.

Superevil Times

To get ready for our trip to Medieval Times, I decided that it would be prudent to wear my most appropriate t-shirt, in case I was called on to join in the tournament proceedings. Spoiler Alert: I wasn't.


Riding in a van with a dozen other people: always makes one feel like one is in high school. When the destination is a birthday party for your friend, it makes the feeling even more prominent.


Especially when you have coupons.


The only disappointing thing about Medieval Times is that you can't enter through the drawbridge. This is made up for by the fact that there are archers in the turrets waiting for approaching enemies.

(While it looks like I'm posing here, I'm actually looking across the parking lot to the Golden Corral Buffet restaurant, where an ambulance was carting off what could only have been the third coronary victim of the evening. I still wanted to go.)


So when I said that I was going to root for the red and yellow knight, that was before I realized that we would be assigned a knight to root for because stupid monarchies always want to be in control. Anyway, our group was split between the blue (me and Ana's knight, the awesome one) and the yellow (boring loser) knights. Hence our blue crowns.

I can only surmise that the light streams in this picture are faerie trails unseeable by the human eye.


While the princess is being wowed by boring girl stuff like pony tricks, everybody gets their meal. You eat with your hands, but you already knew that because you saw Cable Guy. What you didn't know was that they had plastic:


as well as garlic bread and Campbell's soup. Although I guess it's not surprising that Campbell's was around then, because that company is an American institution.


It's also good to know that they had wet naps back then, because otherwise their tunics would be really greasy.


I also said that my favorite wench would be the one with the choicest grog or mead. But they only had enormous goblets of beer, and we had a serf, not a wench. His name was Chris.


Paul decided that he would both root for and fall in love with the blue knight.


The blue knight recognized this and threw him a flower, totally on purpose.


So when the fights started, the yellow people were all cheering for their knight, who promptly kicked his opponent in the junk (they didn't say what it was called back then), which was considered dishonorable even then.

I don't have a video, but Murph promptly screamed "The yellow knight fights with no honor! His color befits him!"

If you are interested in going to Medieval Times, I would highly recommend taking Murph with you.


Our knight was the winning knight, obvs. If you have the sound on, at the end I call out Chick-fil-A Waldorf, who was there for their Christmas party. For some reason I had decided that they were rooting for the red and black knight.

(You'll also hear calls to "chop his head off!" and "there can be only one!" from our table. The cinematography is unfortunately not too good. Cuz of all the excitement.)

In other news, there was this scary shit involving an oracle, who was all enveloped in fog.


In the end, ironically, the red and yellow knight ultimately came back (there was some goings-on involving treason and some squires fighting each other) to win the competition. Which was weird because he was the first loser. But anyway, I totally called it so I was happy.

Afterward, Joe got knighted.


And the king signed his old, non-knighted crown. I'm pretty sure Joe is going to use it in some sort of forgery scheme.


Then they took a picture together.


One of the unforseen consequences of going to Medieval Times is that when you take your 40-ounce goblet to the bar afterward to show off, they fill it up with beer, even when you tell them to just give you a little bit. This is not necessarily a negative consequence, but it's a consequence nonetheless.


And then everybody wants to wear the crowns.


BONUSBONUSBONUS: Andy noticed that my check card wasn't signed so he signed it for me:


If you can't read it, it says "Awesome McAwesome." That is my new legal name.

Also, Katie gave us posters for Christmas. This one is of Ana's boyfriend: