Expect The Worst

69th & Amsterdam

2009-11-01T17:28:00.003-05:00

Considering the traffic-avoiding skills of the emergency drivers on the Upper West Side, I wouldn't be surprised if the actual emergencies around here resulted in higher-than-usual statistics involving fatalities. Have a look at this video I shot this afternoon.

St. Luke's hospital is ten blocks away on 59th Street. There's a firehouse three blocks away on 66th. The people driving the ambulances and fire trucks could cut west to West End Avenue or east toward Broadway (where traffic is less likely to occur compared to Amsterdam), yet most often, these same drivers never fail to take Amsterdam where they sit in traffic while people suffer and die needlessly.

(I have no idea if people are suffering and dying needlessly due to the traffic I can see from the window on the seventeenth floor, but when I say it like that, as if I'm a journalist writing for the ever-accurate and ever-ethical New York Times, it sounds pretty damn dramatic, doesn't it?)

Here's some more video I took less than five minutes after filming the video above. Clearly, the EMT are yet to upgrade to GPS systems with live traffic updates.

Yet while it may seem an anomaly restricted to the corner where I live, I was talking recently to a friend who bought a house on Staten Island not long ago. He's a fireman stationed in Manhattan. At one point in our conversation, he mentioned, "Response times out on the island suck. My house ever catches fire, I'm screwed."

Wonder why?

Where Does Yahoo Find This Stuff?

2009-08-20T15:55:00.004-04:00

There's a simple, inexpensive way to settle this: simply ask the athlete's father, "When your daughter was born, did the physician or nurse who delivered the baby say anything remotely similar to, 'It's a, um, you know. Yeah. It's a gi--wait. Okay. Yeah. It's a girl. Is it? It could be . . . no. Yeah, it's a girl?'"

If it sounded anything like that, then she may very well be a he in disguise. Then again, they could save even more time and just ask the runner if she shaves that mustache every day. If indeed she does shave her face every day, she may be a he.

Man Detained at Newark Airport

2009-08-19T14:54:00.004-04:00

Apparently, Yahoo finds the following newsworthy: the actor you've never heard of, Shaka-kanh, was detained at Newark International Airport and, as a result, is now threatening to limit his trips to the US.

It also appears that Shaka-kanh is under the impression that we actually give a shit how often he visits the US.

I can't be the only one who, upon finding the above, thought, "Who f*cking cares?"

[Disclaimer: The author read absolutely none of the actual news coverage beyond what was available on the front page of Yahoo.com. Despite the mention of his detention at Newark Airport, Shaka-kanh may be threatening to limit his trips to the US due to his being completely unfamiliar with indoor plumbing, which is available everywhere stateside as opposed to what the author hear's they've got over there in India. Unlikely, but completely possible.]

WTF???

2009-07-11T12:27:00.001-04:00

The Airport

2009-07-04T08:51:00.000-04:00

When people think about traveling, they (yours truly included) always fail to forget how miserable of an experience the airport can be. Invariably, people will always say, "But it's only a three-hour flight!" They never add, "But you'll probably sit in miserable traffic on the way to the airport, then security will take you another forty-five minutes, and don't even get me started on weather and mechanical delays."

Of course, I can't really say these are necessary evils as travel is more of a luxury rather than a necessity (for leisure, that is), but given a choice between flying and driving and I'll drive every time.

Frog in Garlic Sauce

2009-06-22T17:13:00.002-04:00

Unless your name is Rachel Marcus and you happen to come across homeless men hell-bent on attacking you morning after morning after morning (one would think that one might find a new route to work if attacked by the same homeless guy every goddam morning), life tends to follow the usual pattern: birth, childhood, adolescence, high school, drinking, college, maybe some drugs, work, dating, serious dating, serious drinking, more work, maybe some more drugs, marriage, having kids, more drinking and more work, maybe another one or two kids, spending a lot of time thinking about how much fun you used to have before you had kids, more drinking, more work, retirement, and a lot more drinking

After all that, you usually die.

I mean, unless your name is Paris Hilton or Tommy Lee, that’s pretty much how it goes, so when you come across things or people that fall outside far outside your day-to-day circle, you tend to take notice. These are the things you tend to talk about over dinner, like this douche bag with his shaggy hair.

If you scroll down the page, you can read all about how I feel when it comes to grade school or high school kids with hair like this kid’s hair. I spotted this dipshit in a Barnes & Noble a few weeks ago as he stood there, checking his Blackberry and waiting for an overpriced ice coffee.

Really, the biggest favor I could’ve done for this little pussy was throw him down a few flights of stairs although considering I’ve reached the married-and-now-have-a-kid-on-the-way part of my life, going to jail and getting sued for assault is not exactly what I need right now.

Apart from that dipshit, I took a spin down to Chinatown about a week-and-a-half-ago as I needed some spices that were unavailable in the supermarkets around here. What did I find not far from the front door?

Frogs, my friends. Frogs stacked upon frogs, all of them quietly waiting for the imminent deaths.

Of course, we’ve all heard of frog legs on menus, although I was under the impression frog legs were considered a delicacy in far-away places like Paris . . . and Los Angeles. Have you ever seen General Tso’s Frog or Frog Lo Mein on any menus when you’ve sat down for Chinese food? I haven’t either, so why the hell are they being sold in Chinatown like lobster? I mean, look at this poor sucker--he’s gotta realize he’s about a day away from a hot wok.

Speaking of Chinatown, when was the last time you spotted an Asian chick with fluorescent pink hair? What the f@ck?

I Got Your Bridezilla Right Here!

2009-06-09T18:07:00.003-04:00

Somehow, my wife has become obsessed with that ridiculous TV show, Bridezillas. You know the one I’m talking about? It’s this one:

Considering I don’t find the same entertainment value in the show as my wife does, we don’t exactly microwave a bag of extra-butter popcorn and get cuddly on the couch every time it’s on the boob tube. As a matter of fact, whenever my wife sits down to catch an episode, I tend to avoid the living room the way a fat kid avoids exercise. Unfortunately, though, if she happens to be watching while I’m making dinner, I can still hear the show, which, as far as I’m concerned, may be just as miserable as being able to see it at the same time.

Yet the point behind me telling you all this is that I don’t find this particular program, Bridezillas, obnoxious simply because the brides-to-be who are cast are overly abrasive, intolerable, and insufferable. Rather, the show bothers me on a much deeper level and I guess what I’m trying to say is, somehow, Bridezillas manages to disrupt the natural order of the universe as we all have come to know it.

Let me explain (as usual).

It’s generally accepted that the more attractive the partner, the more the other partner is willing to suffer by way of treatment.

For example, if I were to ever find myself single again and somehow I magically found myself in a relationship with Jessica Biel, I have to imagine the amount of potential bullshit I’d be willing to put up with would be pretty frigging high. Why? Because Jessica Biel may qualify as one of the hottest women on the face of the earth (apart from my wife, of course) and when your girlfriend/fiancée/wife is that hot, any man in the world would just about say yes to anything she wanted. As long as Jessica came home at some point--middle of the night, next week, whatever--I think I’d be okay with whatever she wanted to do. Even if that “whatever” meant posing nude for Hustler magazine or sleeping around with business associates or throwing incessant, Turret’s-like temper tantrums every time I put four cubes of ice in her Diet Coke rather than the requested three cubes, as long as I got mine, I’d be just fine with any kind of behavior she tossed my way.

Flip side of the coin. I somehow magically (and unfortunately) find myself in a relationship with a woman who looks a hell of a lot like Jabba the Hut and has the personality of Simon Cowell, just how much B.S. do you think I’d be willing to stand? Essentially, if I ever heard anything that even remotely sounded like attitude coming out of her pie hole, I’d dump her faster than Dennis Rodman dumped Carmen Electra. (You didn’t think I keep up on this stuff, did you? To be honest, I don’t. I actually just looked that up online. Remember when Carmen was married to Rodman? Christ, what a freak show.)

So all that brings me back to Bridezilla. Given the universally-accepted laws of the universe that I’ve outlined above, how the hell does a hag like this even have a ring on her goddam finger?

This one’s even worse:

Again, I can’t help but find the show absolutely mind-boggling. How these girls have managed to not just snag a man without the help of a serious tranquilizer rifle, but have talked their partners into letting them act like nothing short of whopping [insert C-word here] on national television, is a mystery that ranks right up there with the Bermuda Triangle and the fact that Britney Spear’s still has a career.

And you know what’s even worse? Well, I’ll tell you. Flip the coin again. Imagine there’s a show titled Groomzillas. How long do you think it would be until our friends in the mainstream media (think Keith Olbermann, that whiney, candy-assed be-atch who also still has a career somehow) quickly labeled it misogynistic and likened the producers to wartime Nazis?

I don’t know. I’m just sayin’ . . .

To Build On My Previous Note . . .

2009-06-05T15:24:00.007-04:00

[Author’s note: After several failed attempts to upgrade to the latest version of WordPress (the blogging program that hosted www.expecttheworst.com) and many, many, many hours of frustration spent attempting to work with the program, I finally said, “The hell with this!” As a result, you have been redirected from www.expecttheworst.com to www.alwaysexpecttheworst.blogspot.com. I would have taken expecttheworst.blogspot.com if it had been available, yet alas, that exact URL was unavailable via Blogger. I guess we’re all just going to have to live with this.

Regardless, I hope you continue to enjoy the updates because, trust me, I have a fantastic time creating them. As they say in certain parts of the world, muchos gracias.]

I realize it’s been a while (as usual), although I wanted to elaborate a bit on my previous post (rant) concerning how absolutely miserable (a term I picked up from my friend Mr. Kenneth Picco) I find men’s magazines to be in general. I wanted to provide some examples related to the content I find in my mailbox month after month. (Not recently, though, as it thankfully appears as if my subscriptions have finally reached a blissful end.)

For starters, check out this chick:

Sadly, it’s not a chick. It’s actually a guy (and apparently a Jewish guy judging from his name, Martin Cohn). If you can’t see it on your screen, the copy on the bottom of the page reads as follows:

“If I get in a cab, they’ll say, ‘Where to, ma’am?’ or ‘Hi, lady’--stuff like that. At first it was kind of annoying, but you get used to it and laugh.”

I’ve got news for you, Martin. The fact is, I don’t think “I’ll” ever get used to cab drivers calling me ma’am or lady because, to be honest, I just don’t see myself dressing like a woman at any point. And, even if I did have a hankering to dress like a chick, I can’t imagine anyone ever actually confusing me for a woman despite my best efforts.

More importantly, Mister Cohn, if you didn’t dress like such a [insert derogatory term commonly used to refer to men who like men] and wear your hair in a ponytail like you’re wearing it in this picture, I get the feeling you might not be mistaken for a woman as much as you are.

I don’t know, though. That’s just me and I could be totally wrong, Martin.

Anyway, here’s another one:

Before I go any further, let me say straight out that I’m not the biggest Michael Chabon fan. I tried reading one of his books about six or seven years ago and found myself pretty bored with not only the content but the actual writing itself. While Stephen King may enjoy Chabon’s work (I mention that as I usually tend to enjoy most of the reading Stephen King recommends and I tend to follow his recommendations as I enjoy Stephen King’s work immensely), I find Chabon’s shit to be just that--a bunch of literary manure piled onto one page after page.

With that out of the way, let’s first focus our attention on the subtitle, which reads:

“’Don’t be a dick to girls’ is a hard lesson to teach your son when you realize that you are one yourself.”

The statement itself irritates me considering that the majority of men--and women, now that I’m thinking about it--are major assholes. It’s the equivalent of a parent telling a child, “Well, kid, for the most part I’m pretty much an asshole myself and most of the people outside our front door are assholes--when it comes right down to it--but if you could, I’d appreciate it if you yourself did not act like a complete asshole.”

Further, my understanding of psychology is extremely limited, yet I would imagine there exist two main factors that will ultimately determine how a boy/man ends up treating the opposite sex. First, he’ll very much be a product of his environment and, as a very close second, he’ll treat women the way his father treats his mother.

(I realize that how a man treats a woman by spending years observing how his father treats his mother would also be environmental, but I’m trying to simplify here.)

Are we in agreement on this?

When I say environment, what I mean is that, most people will give what they get. I know I wasn’t any exception when it came to that rule and by that I mean I treated women in response to the way they treated me. If you treated me like an asshole, I would treat a bitch like a major asshole. If a girl was nice to me, I tried to be as nice to her as possible, so on and so forth.

Makes sense, right?

And, unfortunately, if a boy grows up watching his old man smack around his old lady, I would have to imagine that kid might eventually take a few swings at his wife when she inevitably burns the Sunday roast. While I’d love to take the high road, I have to sadly admit that whenever my own wife fails to correctly fold my shirts when she’s doing the laundry (because, as we all know, laundry is women’s work), the belt comes off and it’s beating time in our one-bedroom cooperative here in the pleasant Upper West Side.

(I know, I know. I shouldn’t joke like that considering those TV commercials produced by the National Organization for Women have informed me that sixteen million women in the United States* are battered every hour. Based on that, this means that every woman in this country is battered 3.84 times per day, on average. And how do you know those numbers are accurate? Well, why would the National Organization for Women ever promote anything using unreliable data?)

Above and beyond all the psychological-makeup bullshit, take a good, hard look at that kid in the picture. If you’re anything like me (which, hopefully, you’re not as I’m pretty much a major train wreck), or if you even think anything remotely like me, you’re probably saying to yourself, “You know what that kid needs? A good fucking beating. And I’d drag his sorry ass to the closest Supercuts the second I was finished kicking his ass.”

Is that a wig he’s wearing? Yes, I admit I had long hair during college, but that was college--during which time I was legally an adult and allowed to do whatever I wanted with my hair--and not the private grade or high school this little schmuck is apparently attending.

Really, I don’t know what else to say other than, every time I scroll up to take another look at this kid, I just want to ram the bottom of my shoe through that stupid freaking grin of his.

But seriously, I’m not angry. Not at all.

Okay, one more. I promise this one will be quick.

Much like the “Don’t be a dick” kid, this guy’s haircut may very well qualify as the worst ever and I mean ever. Further, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man dressed this way except for the ugly magazine models who are supposed to be attractive, so why the fuck to they feature people like this?

And finally, anybody who pays $325 for a shirt and almost $1,000 for a blazer should be shot in the frigging head. As my mother used to tell me every goddam night at the dinner table, “There are people starving in Africa . . .” For $0.17 a day, that $326 could feed an entire Ethiopian tribe for more than five years.

And we wonder why the Arabs hate us so much? They’re probably reading too much Details and GQ and incorrectly assuming that actual Americans are somewhat similar to the jackass people in all these jackass magazines.

TO BE CONTINUED.

*Data may also include Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Yemen, Iran, and Iraq.