Fat head.

I had a fat head. For awhile. The one up there. Did I notice that I had a fat head? Not really. People every once in awhile would make some comment about me. Somebody would mention something. I didn't really notice it. But then, last year on my birthday, in an act of kindness, Liz bought me a slice of cake for my birthday. In the cake, she put a picture of my face on a stick as a joke. The picture up there. I truly hated this picture. It was a picture of me, at some damn point in time over the last few years, with a god damn salt filled head. Just a giant head. In a cake! This was horrifying to me. 

'Happy birthday!'

'Ah my GOD. THAT'S what I look like? And THAT'S what I'll continue to look like if I eat this cake?'

'Ha...ppy Birt....hda...y to....'

'No! I look like a slug in pants!' *Throws cake against wall*

'Why do you always ruin things?! Why?!"

"It's my birthday! I'll ruin it if I want to! Don't make me yell, it makes my stupid fat head jiggle!"

That picture is and has been beside me at this desk for one year. I look at it every once in awhile and think, 'Jesus. No chocolate today.'

Chocolate actually was never the issue. You know what I was addicted to? The piece of food that I probably had two pounds of a week for about four straight years? Wings. Ol' dirty wings. I LOVED wings. The sauce, the chicken, the damn blue cheese. Loved it all. I would eat these for dinner. Dinner! On just about every menu they are an appetizer. People decided years ago that these were BEFORE a meal. Maybe to split with a couple of people. But for me? No way.

'Excuse me. Would I be able to just get some bread. Like two orders of bread.'

'Of course. And for dinner?'

'Wow. Did you not hear me you? Maybe you'll hear this, garCON. BREAD. THAT is the dinner. The dinner... is.... BREAD. LOTTA balls on the french.' 

Wings were my deal. When I was about ten, my mom would take me and my brother to this bar. This bar was in a mall, and directly outside the bar was an arcade. When arcades were a thing, sick, and every game was fifty cents max. My brother and I would play games in here forever. It was great. In the bar though, we would eat chicken wings. Why? They were ten cents. Ten cents a wing! At a time when wings were a thing, but people looked way down on them. 

'We're gonna toss these in the trash. Cool?'

'I'll give you ten cents for one of them.'

'You think other people would?'

'I don't know. Can I have the one that I'm willing to pay for?'

Would eat like twenty wings here. This went on here for years. Then in high school, I used to go to this bar that had karaoke, and a wing night. Wings by this time had gone up a bit in price. This wing night was thirty cents a wing. I remembered being angry about that. 

'Thirty cents? Back in my day, you could get THREE wings for that?!'

'Nathan, you're 18.'

'Yeah, and BACK IN THE DAY, when I wasn't PAYING for them, they were cheaper.'

There was also a time years ago when I was addicted to Lime Coke and Dill Pickle chips. Loved these. One Friday after work, I bought three big bags of Dill Pickle chips and a two litre bottle of the Lime. Went home, and played Midnight Club Three: Dub Edition. Crushed two bags of those chips that night, and like half the bottle. Just stupid. The last couple years, I didn't notice too much. My last day job five years ago, I bought a can of pringles on pretty much every lunch break, and eat the whole thing! 

'Huh. Once you pop you can't stop, right Nathan?'

'What?'

'You're eating a can of pringles.'

'And? So what?'

'The chips are gone. You're just eating the can.'

'... Jesus, CHRIST. Gotta get my stuff together.'

Seeing this picture of myself in a cake is what made me get serious. That gross head, to me, made me say no cake is worth this. My birthday is next month, and I'm going near cake. Unless it's carrot. And all the cake stuff has been taken out and it's just a carrot on a plate. 

'Happy birthday, Nathan! Here is a piece of ca.....'

'Carrot? You're about to say carrot, right!? I swear to GOD if I see cake I'm flipping this place!'

'Why do you always have to ruin things?'

'It's my birthday! I'll ruin this damn thing if I wa... Oh, it's not cake. It is a carrot.'

'Ha...ppy Birth....day.... to.... oh god.'

'Don't cry. It'll make me want to eat cake and get a fat head again.'

*Note* I'm not an animal. The above will not happen. And I'll probably have cake on my birthday. But, that fat head? I CANnot again. This is my own thing. You do whatever you want. 

Twitter @nathanmacintosh

Fringe people. Do they get gifts?

Christmas time! That means presents and gifts for people you really know, and maybe some for some you don't. Who do you get gifts for? Everyone you know? Only people that have been to your house? It's hard to tell. Here is a list of fringe people in your life and whether you should get gifts for them. 

Person at work you want to sex.

Do you get them a gift? Everyday they walk through the office and you want to blow them. So does that mean they get a gift? If you've never slept with them, this could be a way in. But even better, don't get them anything. You know who people want to have sex with? People who they think hate them. 

A guy you work with who tells you racist jokes.

I mean, this guy is always on. Always on racist jokes, but still. They are always racist. Does this guy need a gift? He's made you laugh a couple of times. He has great thoughts about polish people and black people walking into the same bar. But no, this human does not need anything from you.  Around this time of year, just laugh extra hard at these dumb jokes in lieu of a gift. That's all he wants anyway. You could even tell him a joke in his style.

"A racist man walks into a bar. He asks the bartender for a gift. The bartender says, 'Stop telling these ridiculous jokes, Barry! It's 2014!"

Your girlfriends best friend.

No. 

Dad of a guy you met five times.

This one is tough. You met a guy five times. But, you liked him. You'd like to hang out with him more. How do you do that? You can't give him a gift. You only met him five times! That's insanity. So, get his dad a gift. Yeah! Dads don't get a lot of gifts as it is. Also, the guy you met five times will appreciate the fact that you went out of your way to hunt down his dads address, break into his house and find out what size his shirt is, and get him a shirt! You'll be hanging out with that guy for the sixth time, and his dad will  be shocked by a gift from a human he doesn't know. 

You're a man. A best friends wife.

Can you just get her a gift for her alone? Well, no. Not unless you are trying to steal her away from your best friend. Not unless you are secretly doing the Christmas Secret Santa stocking stuffer under the tree sex dance. If you are not, you have to get her and him a together gift, and give it to them while they are together. Or just mail it to them or whatever. But gift for her alone and given to her alone? You are not a good person. You are a demon who can not be trusted around anyone's partner. 

The cashier you see every week grocery shopping.

You two have a repoire. You have over twelve items? She waves you in anyway. You don't have your points card for the discounts and sales? She gives them to you anyway. So, Christmas time, do you give them a gift? No. For gods sake. Of course not. This is a CASHIER, at a place that you SHOP. Is it your mom? Your sister? Somebody at work that you want to do the Christmas wrapping pantsless eggnog dance with? Then no. You want others to see you handing a gift to a cashier? Your funeral, bud. Your funeral.

Jesus Christ. Lord and Saviour. 

The whole day is supposed to be celebrating him. He died for our sins, and was born on Christmas so that we could all wear sweatpants and go buy popcorn in the theatre. So, do you get Jesus a gift? First, what do you get the man who has everything? Do you get him anything anyway? Answer is... no. What an ignorant thing to get Jesus a gift. He's the son of god! You work at Wal- mart! He needs something from you? Please. He can turn water into wine. He doesn't need your chotchkies. Also, how do you get it to him? Leave it at a church? Throw it into the sky? Just calm down. He's fine without the 'Don't Pray To Me Before I've Had My Morning Coffee' mug.

twitter @nathanmacintosh

College Sports. I can't.

Maybe it's because I'm from Canada, but I am not a fan of college sports. Sports, I like. College sports? Can't do it. Is it because I didn't go to a college in the states with a team? Maybe. Is it because I'm not from a town in the states that has a college team? Possibly. Is it because I find it really hard to watch someone who has homework due play a sport? Or watching people play who I know had to finish homework to do it?

"Nice touchdown, man!"

"Thanks! You like that, you would LOVE the essay on badgers I wrote to be able to do it! You know badgers like to burrow? I do, and that's why I was here to get this touchdown! I'd like to thank Mr. Williamson for giving me a good grade."

There's no god to thanks for college players. Just teachers and study partners. Either way, I'm not into it. 

I'll never understand having college sports on prime time TV. Friday night at 9pm. A time when other athletes are playing for millions? When real leagues have actuals teams playing for actual things? Having college sports on at 9pm when there are pro sports on is like having a movie that was made for a school project playing in a theatre beside hollywood movies.

People say that college sports are professional. If they were professional, they would be paid. There's no pilots flying for no money. No cops out there for the love of the game. Pros get paid. I do know though that that's not players fault. It's pretty amazing to me really that these college players don't get paid. They bring in so much money. They should be paid. Or at least, for the people who are not their on sports scholarships, should have some money taken off of their tuition. Something! Look, I don't want to watch them, but people are, people do, and they generate millions of dollars. Some of the time the justification is that they are going to school for nothing. Because your school is great you don't have to pay them? Why doesn't McDonalds do that?

"Look, drive-thru guy, you will not be paid. Why? Because we are giving you the opportunity to work with a great company. We are known worldwide! And you can be a part of that! And you want to be paid? Wow. SOMEone is a little selfish."

Fans of college sports, I get. But, if you have student loans, stop cheering for your old school's sports teams. It doesn't make sense. These loans are the reason you can't get the car you really want and you still wave a banner for them in the air? It's the same as having credit card debt and cheering for Visa commercials.

“Yeah, Visa! Way to go! You bug me to pay you all the time, but look at that nineteen percent interest rate! Wooooo!”

Unless the school knocks a couple hundred bucks off your loan when you cheer, or a few thousand to start the wave, you shouldn't be doing it. Your alma-mater is not your alma-mother. The love doesn't have to be un-conditional.

And if you are going to cheer, why buy a hundred and twenty-five dollar hoodie and a twenty-five dollar hat to wear at the games? You already paid hundreds or even thousands of dollars for books that only get used occasionally. Show up to the game with a math textbook! Wave that around in the air.

“2, 4, 6, 8! I learned how to count because of this book!”

These text books need a couple more uses anyway other than taking up space in the bottom of a bag and being an 'I'm supposed to be studying but I'm really tired right now' pillow.

Colleges want you to go to the games, want you to support the teams, but there's no credit given for doing so. Shouldn't there be? You take the time to support the school, you should be given a mark for that. Mostly because students and teachers will have something to say about it whether you go or not. Students will say,

“Hey, did you go to the game?” “I couldn't. I was studying.” “Loser.”

Teachers will say, “Hey, did you do that assignment?” “I couldn't. I was at the game.” “Loser.”

Why do students have to pay to get into these games? Didn't they already pay to go to school? Do you have to pay to join the chess club? Or pay to sit in the student activities center on your phone? Paying for school then paying for school sporting events is like paying to get into a club and then paying to be able to approach that girl or guy you want to talk to. Actually, those clubs exist. They're called strip clubs. And the difference between strippers and college athletes? Strippers get paid.

Twitter @nathanmacintosh