Calgary gets shit on

I can't help laughing at this news story: Ice from airplane potty crashes through Calgary roof. Edmontonians could have a hayday with this one!

Poop accidentally released from an airplane above Calgary hit the home of a woman, who luckily wasn't hurt by the flying feces. In effect, you could say that the plane "sharted," since apparently the release of solid material was completely involuntary.

Scott Adams writes a funny blog about this story, check it out here: Death by Frozen Poop.

He's right, being killed by flying poop has the potential to erase a lifetime of accomplishment. Oh God, I'm not feeling so well right now. I think my thantophobia is acting up again (for explanation, click HERE)... No wait, this is a special case of thantophobia, which I'm going to call catagelothantophobia.

Luckily I'm not on the top floor of my condo building. Little do those 5th floorers know, they have a much higher chance of being shit on. You know that saying, "Eat shit and die"? Well, it looks like you don't even have to eat the stuff for it to be lethal!

BOO Bad Bacteria, YAY Good Bacteria!

Apparently my healthy diet has saved me from a day that can only be described as a potential 'spontaneous colon blow day'. This is a very good thing.

Let me explain.

A friend of mine took me out to a new East Indian restaurant the other night (friend and restaurant names withheld, although perhaps I should warn others about the seemingly inocuous eating joint). Anyways, I always call East Indian buffets "the thousand calorie download" because I'm pretty sure you'd be hard-pressed to find a place where you could wolf down more calories in less time, barring some fast food joints of course.

Oh and we ATE till we hurt.

And we hurt the next day too.

I have to wonder how many of those calories were actually absorbed since my whole meal plus half my intestines and maybe even my appendix escaped out the back of me by noon the next day. I was literally in awe. Hey, if you want to do one of those 'colon cleanses' then perhaps this restaurant is for you. There was seriously about an hour there where my butt was married to the toilet bowl, indefinitely. It was rude. Which is why I had to bring it up on this blog of course, haha.

Yeah whatever.

Here's where my healthy, good bacteria colonized gut saved me. My friend called a couple of days later and said, "uh, how were you feeling yesterday?" I knew exactly what he was referring to so I gave an appropriate description to the world-of-turmoil my intestinal tract had experienced the morning before. He proceeded to tell me that my hour of excrutiation constituted his WHOLE DAY. He couldn't keep anything down. He had cramps. He was at the mercy of the latrine, a jester at the porcelain throne, a hooker to the john... THE WHOLE DAY. And the worst part -- he had a date that night!!!! The poor guy. The details of this he mostly left out, except to say that the call of nature occured on his way to pick her up. He couldn't exactly open the chutes at her house, so he stopped at Walmart and the washroom there had no toilet paper! At this point he had to leave his stall, buy some toilet paper and return to finish his business! I had a pretty good chuckle at his expense, I must say.

The only thing I can figure is that all the healthy bacteria in my gut prevented the bad ones from doing much damage. They ameliorated my diarrhea by "stimulation of the immune system, competition for binding sites on intestinal epithelial cells and elaboration of bacteriocins." (Source: Probiotics in the Treatment of Infectious Diarrhea). Booyah to the little buggers! Now excuse me while I chow down on some yogourt, bananas and barley.

Hmm... I get a feeling that if I ever wrote a column about nutrition, it would be a little less than conventional. But it would get the point across.

Not worth it

Hey, this weather rules! So yeah, not posting so much lately. Summer gets a bit nuts. It's a good nuts though, can't complain.

So just a lil gabby gabby...

I fell when biking up a hill the other day. Just went to jump off because I have no idea what I was thinking going up that steep death trap. It was so steep that when I went to hop off, gravity stepped in and forced me and my bike downwards. Got a bruise on my stomach where the handlebar broke my fall.

Thanks a lot handlebar. Ouch.

I looked around. Phew! No one saw me. That's the worst, an audience to my foibles.

Otherwise I did a lot better than the motorcyclist I saw face down on the highway just minutes later. Yikes. God, if I owned a motorbike instead of a car I would've been dead years ago. Literally. Not kidding. I've totalled 3 cars and none of it was my fault. I know, you're thinking, "riiiiiiiiight" and "how is that even possible?" You're thinking I was either not paying attention or a very non-defensive driver, or that I must have even been at least 25% at fault. But no, I was NOT at fault. I'm dead serious. Not dead, luckily, but deadly serious. After the 3rd accident the insurance companies were wondering though. God, you could not pay me enough pain and suffering cash to make it worth all that fuss. NOT worth it I tell ya.

Anyways, it looked like the guy was breathing and a minute later I could hear the ambulances on their way. It happened on the one day I didn't have my camera on me. There's no way I could take photos of that anyways. I'd feel like a meathead. It might make the blog more interesting, but it's not worth it. Nope.

Speaking of which, I was biking on the High Level Bridge and a pigeon was flying along with me. It would fly beside me (which is very cool, feels like you're flying with them) and then it would go above and cross over a few times. The thought of being dive bombed with pigeon poop crossed my mind. It truly felt like one of those near-poop experiences. My fantasy world was quickly crumbling, perhaps flying with the pigeons wasn't all good times. Then for a split second I thought, "man that'd make a good blog post, getting pooped on, haha, hilarious" ... What the? What exactly was I thinking!?! Not worth it. You gotta watch what you wish for these days I tell ya. I do love it when others get pooped on though. 'The bird pooped on me' stories always go over well in my world. I just don't want to be the one telling it.

Ok, lunchtime is over. Each minute I burn on here is one less minute in the sunshine. Enjoy your day, eh.

Whistler: The extremely abridged version with no pictures

So I guess my one cat poops on my bedroom floor when she's upset that I've been away awhile. That was lovely. Poo is a gross thing to behold, in your hand, even separated from your skin by a plastic bag... But CAT poo is a whole other level of gross. Yeesh.

Whistler was great, except for the weather. Cold. Rainy. Yet we still ventured out.

Our flight out of Edmonton was delayed by almost 2 hours on Saturday am, which wasn't so special since we'd all gotten up that morning at 4. Missing 2 hours of sleep AND 2 hours of vacation in one fell swoop sucks just a wee bit. And all Air Canada did was apologize. No free trips to Mexico or upgrades to first class for us. Nope. Not even extra snacks in an attempt to appease our tired attempt at bitterness.

I have no idea why I take on the role of the entertainer at some of these functions. Why do I have to let people into my weird little world so quickly? I did a good chunk of my repetoire of sound effects/impressions for about 10 people, some of whom barely know me. There was my Chubby Checker, Kermit, Axl Rose, the technologist in our lab, a bird, a coyote and a rooster. Luckily the rooster had to be done by everyone when we were playing a drinking game and I got the "rule card". Each person had to crow before they took a card, every time. Hehehe. Seeing our supervisor crow like a rooster was classic.

And boy did we ever pig out on yummy food. Mmm.

Good times.

Unfortunately my camera's memory card has something wrong with it. I took a shitload of videos and photos over the first half of the weekend and have nothing to show for it. Alas, there's nuthin to see here folks... :(

And now it's back to work. Ugh.

Nap time not crap time

There's a guy in my office who completely sacks out at the end of the day. Quite regularly. I had to get real sneaky to take this photo, uh, and the other 25 I got at different angles and zooms. Hehehe. I'm only kidding. But I took a few. I thought about playing a joke on him one day-- like somehow sneaking a photo onto his computer so it magically appears at the end of his defense presentation.

Ah but I don't want to humiliate him. It'd be a good joke, but also kind of mean. Mind you, I just posted his pic on my blog... Aw c'mon, it's anonymous!

It could be worse. I could get a new gmail account. I could sign up as his supervisor. I could send him an email with photos attached and give him a hard time. End result? He'd probably crap his pants. That's when you know ya done good on a practical joke; the rank smell of feces wafting through the office...

But I don't feel like smelling poo. And I'd rather not know I was behind the whole pants pooing thing. I need to sleep at night.

Hmm, I'll think of something...

Everything comes down to poo

In the comedy turned musical episode of Scrubs last night, there was one song that stood out for me: Everything Comes Down To Poo. The lyrics were so classic, Jen grabbed me a pen and paper so that I could scribble them down. I started to jot them down, but just ended up writing a note to Jen. It read:

Everything comes down to poo.

From the top of
I was unable to finish this - without a computer keyboard I am absolutely, completely, 100% useless!

If you're wondering why I would want the lyrics to the poo song, the reasons are four fold:

1) Rose likes poo. If I emailed the song, it would make her 2x happier than it made me.
(Phew, too much writing already - cramping up.)
2) I want to learn the song and sing it while I'm working, or visiting my parents. It's sure to make my mom say, "you're sick."
3) I wanted to make a parody of that song. Everyone loves a good parody.
4) I have a running blog post on poo. Fodder required.

God I love when I say that something is four fold, and it turns out to be true - it was totally just a wild guess...

Ok, so truthfully, that #3 is a bunch of bull. Everyone knows you can't make a parody of a parody. That'd be like doing a cover of a cover. Lame. #4 is true though. It was originally part of my Ramblings on Research series - "Stool Studies". Icky icky poo poo. Thank GOD I don't do stool studies. Never made it to print though.

Anyways, I found the poo song on YOUTUBE. Enjoy it here.

Mind Purge

I got more sleep last night then I did in the last two put together. I'm half awake and ready to blog! I've been gorging on some ideas lately... are you ready for the purge???

There are now officially about 1024 versions of the song Crazy by Gnarls Barkley. Everyone loves it because we can all relate! In the song he says he thinks he may be crazy and then says you may be too. I guess that makes us all freakin' crazy! (Probably not too far off). My favorite version of the song is Crazy Logic. (The original version is featured on a past post of mine, Gnarls is Gnarly.)

I got a lot of flack about my previous post The Tiny Ant and the Giant Foot. People responded, "What's with the ant post?" (like it was substandard or something) or "Did you get bit by an ant today?" Uh, no. But I saw the little guy down by my foot and he was thinking of making that fateful journey! Stupidass ant!!! And I've been bitten by the buggers many times before. They must know they will die if they make the choice. Maybe ants are like the suicide bombers of the insect world. I was like, "What are you THINKING little ant?" Does that make the ant crazy? Possibly.

I'm always at odds when I go on a date over whether to mention any of my blog topics or even reveal that I have a blog. Recently a guy mentioned that he's a practical joker. Oops. There's the bait for me to tell the story "You didn't just EAT that..." where I got Deneen real good with the fake poo. I told him later that I bet he'd never had a girl mention the word "excrement" on a date before. I figure it's just a matter of time before he drops poo-girl. Hey, I'm a nutritionist! We nutritionists (like the Inuit for word 'snow') have about 1000 words for the 'poo'. The arsenal is ready. Haha, arsenal. Ok then. Guess I just answered my own question... either drop the blog and poo talk, or never ever ever get a second date.

Why is it that whenever I call any communications company, they begin every phone call with "We apologize for any inconvenience, but we are experiencing a larger then usual call volume at the moment..." Coincidence? I think they use that old trick of giving you the bad news first, so that IF they get to you sooner, you're pleasantly surprised. Anyways, it turns out that Rogers Wireless wants to penalize me for being a customer of theirs for 8 years by making me buy a new cell phone. If I sign up as a new customer I get one free. WTF? That's customer appreciation for ya. Guess I'll be shopping elsewhere Rogers.

Did you know that there's a city in the U.S. called Rancho Cucamonga? I love it. It would make me smirk everytime I had to admit I lived there.

I was telling my friend Jen that she gets hit on a lot at the bar. Her reply? It's not a compliment if: 1) the guy is so drunk he can't see straight or 2) it's almost 2am. She has a point. We noticed that at about 1:45 there's a mad scramble to pair up. Then they look at you like you're crazy when you say, "Uh, no thanks" and RUN.

My love of food and my love of clothes is in direct odds with each other. I don't get a large enough paycheque to have my love of clothes keep up with my love of food. Recently I had to explain to a friend what a "muffin top" was. That is, the rolls that hang over your low-rider jeans in a muffin top manner. (He was thinking it was something altogether different). Oh well. Guess I'll be sportin' my muffin top all the way to the Heritage Festival this weekend!!!

See ya!

Got fibre?

I think I'm getting ripped off, in a sense, because of my high fibre diet. You see, I don't get much reading done at all because I'm never on the can long enough to read a magazine, newspaper or *Don't Sweat the Small Stuff.

But then, I suppose I also avoid the hemorrhoids too. Hmmm, painful ass but well-informed... What to do what to do...

Guess I'll stick with the fibre.



*Perhaps if I read that book, I wouldn't have a blog. Think about it.

Cat Conundrum

I don't know what's up with my cats lately... or likely ONE of them.

The other day Deneen was laughing at the fact that I'd planted a fake cat poo in the hallway. Uh, no I didn't. ALL EVENING she waited for me to fess up. She examined it closely, "How did you get it all shiny and wet looking like that?" "It's real," I kept saying. Finally she took a piece of paper and pierced it and smelled the extracted specimen. "Yeah it's poo," she said, "Do you wanna smell it?" "NO, I KNOW it's poo!!!"

Then the next evening she found pee in her bathtub. The next evening there was more. And more in my tub too!!!

WTF is going on!?!?!

I know some people pee in the shower, but the cats??? I guess there are worse places they could pee, like on my pillow or something. That would be ultimate-rude. I've heard of cats leaving "gifts" on the bed when they're pissed off at their owners. But what did I do? I don't know but this is fricken STRANGE. It's never happened before.

I'm a bit scared as to where we'll find something next.

Oh the joy of pets!

The bathrooms are on temporary lockdown while I conduct an investigation of this catastrophic situation.

Vegetarians Taste Better?

Some time ago I'd heard this about vegetarians. The first thing that went through my mind was 'how did the heck did they test that?' Geez, that's a study I wouldn't be lining up for!!! Although there's enough sickos out there that maybe they wouldn't have too much trouble finding volunteers, on either side of the taste testing.

I've done sensory evaluation tests before, whether it be tasting salsa or pizza, and evaluating several aspects from taste to texture to smell to hotness. I've even done olfactory testing on, ahem, poop smell? I know it sounds weird, but in this study they were trying to figure out the concentration of pig barn smell that could be in the air before it was detectable to the human nose... so I'm assuming I was smelling pig poo air, or more likely a component of it. ANYWAYS, the point being that these sensory types of tests are very common in research, I'm just not sure about actually tasting people. I'm sure it's done outside of the research setting all the time, hehe (as well as the olfactory thing, I know I've been forced to smell things against my will, which is completely unethical btw).

Anyways, I digress. In designing the study, there are so many things to consider. For instance, there's something called the contrast effect... meaning if you taste something really good and then taste something average, the average thing tastes worse. Whereas if you taste something awful and then something average, the average thing tastes awesome. So designing the study to be blinded and randomized, etc, would be quite the task. Hmm, there would be so many confounders, let alone difficulties with ethics and recruitment, that I'm sure it will never be done.

In my speculation, tastes are variable and a matter of perception, but I actually wouldn't doubt that vegetarians taste better. As a rule, they are more health conscious, and I could imagine that a healthy person would be tastier than a greasy hamburger eatin' fatso. Now, would this be because a person who tends to be health conscious is also more aware of their hygeine? Perhaps. Although if granola-type people are healthier, uh, they definitely DON'T smell like it. Also, one thing I'm not sure of, is how long does it take for the digestive tract of a person converting to vegetarianism to adjust to the higher fibre diet? This could pose a smelly conundrum. Geez, this gets more complicated the more I think about it!

Anyways, I won't be writing the grant on that one... I think I'll stick to studying what goes into the body, rather than whatever comes out.

Instant messenger... Instant entertainment for the bored.

For lack of a better idea, I thought I'd feature a previous messenger convo. I shall not reveal the identity of those involved in the convo, and furthermore, these events may or may not have actually happened...

Bealer says:

holy smokers - you can smell me from there??? I just went to the bathroom to try to get the doody off my shoe -

fatty says:

HAHA... don't blame it on the shoe!

Bealer says:

and it IS the shoe

fatty says:

did you really step in doody?

Bealer says:

yeah I did

fatty says:

hahahaha no way

fatty says:

too funny

Bealer says:

I'm glad you think so!!!

fatty says:

hee hee

Bealer says:

I think it was gum originally, with some doody, grass and poo mixed in

fatty says:

hahahahaha

fatty says:

what a mix!

fatty says:

maybe it was gum that a dog ate and pooped out into the grass

Bealer says:

LOL!!!!!!

Bealer says:

why do I think that is a perfect explantaion

fatty says:

haha ... only i come up with that shit

fatty says:

no pun intended

fatty says:

hehe

fatty says:

and only you step in it!!!!

Bealer says:

nice one LOL

Bealer says:

and yes - only you.

Bealer says:

Anyway...after lunch I was walking around, and noticed I was sticking to things, so I take off my shoe, and have a look...and sure enough there is this black blob with grass and hair in it

fatty says:

eeeewwww!

Bealer says:

I go into the kitchen to get a plastic knife to scrape it off, and this big, main chunk is hanging off the heel. So I go to work on it...and next thing I know - its gone!

Bealer says:

like GONE!!

Bealer says:

I looked all around the kitchen for it, thinking it MUST be on the ground....

fatty says:

HAHAHA

Bealer says:

but I CANT FIND IT

Bealer says:

so all afternoon, I am walking around, knowing I have this shitty blobby goop in my hair, or on my back or ass or somewhere

Bealer says:

cause i cant find it anywhere!!!

fatty says:

HAHAHA

fatty says:

did you find it???

Bealer says:

NO!

Bealer says:

still havent

fatty says:

so you went to scrape it off...

fatty says:

and it was gone?

Bealer says:

no, I started scraping at it hardcore, going at it

fatty says:

oh yeah...

Bealer says:

and got it into this chunk

Bealer says:

then closed my eyes, and gave her one last big scrape.....

fatty says:

HAHA... you must have flicked it?

Bealer says:

opened my eyes, thinking it would be on the knife or ground

Bealer says:

totally!

Bealer says:

and I am in the KITCHEN!

fatty says:

hahaha... its probably not ON you

Bealer says:

its probably in someones coffe cup

fatty says:

HAHAHA must be!

fatty says:

that's too funny!

fatty says:

the case of the missing poop gum

Bealer says:

totally! LOL

Bealer says:

I cant wait for someone else to find it

fatty says:

hahaha that would be hilarious... wtf is this???

Bealer says:

TOTALLY!

Bealer says:

lol

Bealer says:

EWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEee

fatty says:

hahaha

fatty says:

everything gross in it... hair, gum, poo... close to the worst combo ever

fatty says:

hair... why is it nice on someone's head but gross anywhere else

Bealer says:

yeah - no kidding hey?

You didn't just EAT that...

I get a bit giddy when I successfully sucker people in with a practical joke. A while ago I got a great idea for a joke, but hadn’t executed it… Until NOW. Wah ha ha ha ha ha!

I always thought that refried black beans look just like poo. And I thought that putting them in some sort of cake decorating tube and squeezing it out into a coiler on the floor would be an awesome practical joke. And get this, a couple of nights ago I was eating Mexican food and my roommate wasn’t home yet… Opportunity knocks!

Well, I couldn’t find any kind of a cake tube so I had to improvise with saran wrap and ended up making a fairly convincing-looking log on the floor in front of the fridge. It had to be just right because my roomie works at a vet clinic and would be able to spot a fakie a mile away. I went and sat back at my computer when she arrived home. It took a few minutes for her to notice, and then (paraphrasing from what I remember):

D: What is that? Is that a joke? Did one of the cats… is that throw-up or poo???? What is it!!!???
Me: What the? Where?

I get up to check out the scene. Of course, I already know what I"m about to find. She’s still going on about what it might be.

D: It looks too big for poo…

[Dammit!]

Me: Oh man, that looks like poo to me. Eewww!

I lean down and sniff at it.

Me: Hmmmm. I can't smell if it's poo...

I’m still bent over inspecting it and then I reach down and scoop a little bit off with my finger and put it up to my nose to smell it.

Me: Hmmm… doesn’t really smell like poo.

The whole time she was watching I couldn’t look at her, which is too bad because I would have LOVED to see the look on her face after the next part.

Then I licked it off my finger.

D: You didn’t just EAT that…

At this point she starts to laugh and I’m starting to giggle a little too.

Me: Hmmm. It doesn’t taste like poo.

Just as she’s at the height of disbelief, I reach down, grab the whole log, pick it up and take a bite out of it.

Me: Actually, it tastes like refried beans!!!!

By this time she was actually ON THE GROUND laughing. I was laughing too. She told me that when I touched it and smelled my finger, she didn’t think that was TOO weird because her sister makes her smell things all the time… but when I tasted it, oh my.

I still laugh every time I hear her words in my head, "You didn't just EAT that…"

Epoophany

I had an epiphany the other day. I was thinking about how it’s been a long time since I’ve fallen victim to the Poo caper’s stinky shenanigans. (If you’re confused, see the Poo Caper entry: The poo caper strikes again.

Then I noticed, I haven’t seen any sign of the dreaded PC since my friend (we’ll call her “Assenav”) graduated and moved out of this building. Hmmm, coincidence? I think not. I know that she will try to deny it, however it is too crazy of a coincidence to NOT make a connection.

I hate to say this, I really really do… but Assenav, if you are reading this, you should think seriously about sneaking in unnoticed one day and leave a little present behind for the world to see. Even better, while you’re on holiday get someone who still hangs out here to do it for you. That is totally the best alibi. I mean, IF they can muster up something like that (can you say “2 cups of all bran?”). That would clear your name once and for all. Of course, it would have to be someone you trust and that you don’t care if they know you’re actually the dreaded ‘Caper’ of course.

As long as they don’t end up enjoying the experience and take over your PC shenanigans. Shit. This is all too confusing… I think you’d better try to clear your name on your own Assenav.

This was a very very bad idea.

The poo caper strikes again

There's some freak on this floor that enjoys not flushing the toilet after taking a big dump. I know it's sick, but it's true! I don't make this shit up (no pun intended).

Anyways, it's pretty rude to go to the washroom and go into a stall and see that. What kind of feces exhibitionist sicko actually wants people to see their crap? I don't get it. And if it's not some kind of sick exhibitionist plot, then someone needs to figure out how to flush a fricken toilet! It happens too regularly to be coincidence or just a random event. And I've even had to do a double take because it's sometimes rather shocking... and not simply due to the presence of crap where a clean toilet is supposed to be. (Without going into details, I'll just say that one time I wondered how something that size came out of a person and not an elephant... like, it didn't make sense given the sheer physics of the human sphinctor? And how many days did this person go without crapping to produce such a thing?)

I know, a little too much brain power wondering about the capabilities of the human gastrointestinal tract. Unfortunately this is a mystery that shall not be solved upon my sheer speculation (or perhaps fortunately because what would a person do with this information once found out?).

Guess I'll never know who the weirdo is, we'll just all have to warn each other as to which stall to avoid on any particular (poopy) days.

... for an update on the poo caper situation, see Epoophany.