Poor Behavior Modeling From A Fictional Monkey

I recently decided I will no longer read another Curious George story to my kids. Not only do I find the Man with the Yellow Hat‘s supervision skills suspect, Curious George is a shining example of how not to behave. Each one of George’s “adventures” has these key elements:

  • The Man with the Yellow Hat decides to leave a juvenile monkey that he stole from Africa and smuggled into the country alone for a moment. This moment is usually prefaced with, “Wait right here, George. I have to go and do this thing….”
  • George, unsupervised, gets distracted by something. He then sets off to investigate the distraction thereby disregarding the instructions he received to stay put.
  • George causes a problem(s). At the height of said problem(s), authority figures and the Man with the Yellow Hat come rushing in to reprimand George and clean up the mess George created. George gets upset and doesn’t understand why everyone is mad at him.
  • George fixes an issue (usually minor) that was the direct result of a problem he created. In Curious George At The Aquarium, for example, George hops into the penguin exhibit and opens the door letting all the penguins out to run amok. As authority figures swoop in to wrangle up the liberated penguins, George sees a baby penguin in the water that cannot swim. He then dives in to rescue the baby fowl in the chaos.
  • George is praised and rewarded for fixing an issue that was the direct result of a problem he created. Again, in Curious George At The Aquarium, George is not only thanked for “saving” the baby penguin, he is given passes and invited back to the aquarium to visit “anytime”.
So, George disobeys his slave owner father figure, runs off, causes trouble, fixes something that is a direct result of his actions and is praised for being a “good monkey”? Not on my watch. If one of my kids jump in the penguin exhibit and frees the penguins, the aquarium better not be thanking my kid, giving them free passes and inviting us to come back anytime soon. They better be calling CPS.
Continue Reading

Friday The 13th Link Goodness

  • All the Friday the 13th Movie Posters. I caught the 2009 Reboot on late night cable a few months ago and I think it should qualify as a new movie genre; Horror Porn.
  • Hot Girls with Hulk Hands or Hot Girls with Nosebleeds? Personally, I lean towards the hot girls with nosebleeds. It’s the mystery of how she got the nosebleed that does it for me. Something to be said for that instead of her posing with some random kid’s sticky-ass toys she picked up off the floor.
  • Prom advice from a second grader that knows too much about life. Well played, Emma Clark.
Continue Reading

The Broz Girl Child Arrives Sandwich Interruptus

While the boy’s birthing was a marathon fight like Rocky Balboa versus Ivan Drago (minus the sweet “No Easy Way Out” montage), the Broz girl child fired her way out of the chute like a Hitler-hating Jesse Owens in the 1936 Olympics.

As labor approached the noon hour, my mom asked if I wanted to run downstairs and get a sandwich with her because, “You need to keep your strength up too, Matty.” The wife gave me the go ahead as her contractions were light and I was not planning on being gone for long. 20 minutes later I walked back into the labor and delivery room and the wife had gone from being dilated at 4 to 6 (for those of you unfamiliar with the cervix during childbirth, this is like hitting a thirty-pointer in basketball).

Within the hour, the girl child was being tagged and our nurse was quoted as saying, “That was pretty intense.”

The House of Broz is currently fun, crazy and full of poop. Lots of poop.

Continue Reading

Sabbatical Off The Rails

Almost a year has passed since my last post on the MB. To say I have been focused on other things might be more of an understatement than when General Custer uttered, “Where did all these Indians come from?”

What have I been up to, you ask?

  • Making Babies. The wife and I are expecting a girl child at the end of March. I am studying my Disney princesses and learning how to braid hair.
  • Fathering The Boy. His obsessions with Spider-Man and trains are either legendary or emotionally damaging. He also has a penchant for stripping naked in the middle of the night and yelling at his stuffed animals.
  • Broz Design-ing. I have entered year three and may have to let go of some of my control issues and hire some help.

I am drinking copious amounts of coffee and occasionally sleeping. Every so often I will wipe the crust from eyes and emerge from the design bunker to kiss the wife, play a hockey game and have a whiskey.

I have been a creative juggernaut this past year. I will be uploading a smattering of essays in the coming months that I am hoping to piece together someday into a book. I am currently getting my Rembrandt on and painting a self-portrait. Finally, I am back posting to the MB once again. Bestiality links will be imminent.

Continue Reading

Obama Addresses West Point

Last night I actually watched the presidential address. It was not my fault. No decent hockey games were on, our DVR was empty and Jeopardy was not showing due to the speech. I will take “Apathetic American” for $400, Alex. Obama is a great orator. He is take your panties off smooth. I am so used to Bush tripping over words and fumbling around at the podium for the past eight years that it is refreshing. My love for Obama ends there, however. Aside from appreciating the historical context of his presidency, I think Obama is all spectacle, no substance. Case and point the public relations sweetness of giving a military-themed speech at West Point. Here is my rundown of what Obama said last night:

We are pulling out of Iraq and re-mobilizing to Afghanistan. This should excite you as I have talked with generals and advisers who told me this what we need to do. Here is an exact date of when I will bring home the troops. Yes, I think war is timed like a football game and America just entered the fourth quarter. Go Bears! Here is a comparison of me to FDR. Please ignore the irony that New Deal programs failed miserably and/or saddled future generations of Americans with the burden of contributing to programs that will go bankrupt in their lifetime (Social Security). Something about liberty. We like Muslims now. Support your troops. It is all Bush’s fault.

Who needs a drink? And some Obama Jesus gear? And some Hope Is Fading Fast gear?

Continue Reading

Link Goodness

  • Sarah Palin is MILF-tastic. I could care less about her politics or shitting developmentally disabled babies out of her old dried-up uterus when she has that slutty soccer mom thing working for her.
  • Foreign policy lessons for America from the Byzantine Empire. Very Art of War with guerrilla warfare sprinkles on top. I agree with most of these points, however, the United States has the tremendous advantage of geographic isolation which the Byzantine Empire did not. This means we can wage wars on six continents with a slim a chance of the conflicts spilling over into the Motherland. So unless we drop bombs on Canada or Mexico, I am guessing Americans will flourish historically a lot longer than the Byzantines.
  • The more I see of Ice-T’s wife Coco, the happier with him as a person I become. Continue to Peel Their Caps Back, good sir.
Continue Reading

Halloween Ideas That Humiliate Children, The Handicapped

I have to give credit where credit is due: this kid has a fantastic idea for a Halloween costume. He does not need a double amputee to pull it off, however. Roll behind a Kohl’s and look for some discarded mannequin parts in the dumpsters. Piece together a torso and some arms and legs. Pick up some gold spray paint and you have yourself a rudimentary (yet light) C3P0. Imagine the logistics of having a double amputee strapped to your back all night. What happens if you (or the amputee) has to take a shit? Even without legs I am assuming a double amputee weighs 75 pounds (if not more). That is a lot of weight to be huffing around sober let alone with your veins pumping Jack Daniels. What if there is a slut dressed as Slave Leia at the party? Are you prepared for that menage-a-trois?

I think my idea for a Halloween costume is better than what this kid is attempting to pull of, anyway. Me as the “host body” and my infant son strapped to my mid-section as the alien Kuato from the movie Total Recall. I may have to hold out until next year for when the boy is talking so he can quip “Open your mind” upon presentation.

Continue Reading

Patrick Swayze Sleeping With Jesus

The Bodhizoffa is no more. Unlike most celebrity deaths, this one takes the wind out of my sails. I grew up on the Swayze. Outsiders. Red Dawn. Youngblood. Point Break. And his masterpiece opus; Roadhouse. I even sat through multiple viewings of Dirty Dancing because it taught me that a) spoiled bitches should get credit for carrying watermelons and b) nobody puts Baby in a corner. Nobody. 11:14 made me realize how much I missed the Swayze in cinema. Fucking cancer. Both my grandfathers and Patrick Swayze? I guess it is your way or the highway, cancer. I cannot help think that if cancer manifested itself in the form of a human fighting opponent the Swayze would have torn its throat out with his bare hands and thrown its lifeless body into a backwoods lake and then scream, “Cancer! Cancer! Fuck you!” Sounds about right to me.

Continue Reading

1984 Equals Cinematic Gold

After reviewing this list, I would have to say that 1984 was the best year for movies. I can quote countless lines of dialogue from memory on most of those films. My dad really let me watch some inappropriate films during my impressionable years. He took me to see Ghostbusters, Gremlins, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (the very first movie rated PG-13) and Police Academy in the theaters. Terminator, Red Dawn, Revenge of the Nerds, Nightmare On Elm Street and Sixteen Candles found their way to me via HBO with my dad’s standard caveat, “Don’t let your mother know I let you watch this.” There was some excellent gratuitous nudity in those films; Police Academy, Purple Rain (Apollonia jumping into Lake Minnetonka), Revenge of the Nerds (full frontal), The Terminator (right before Sarah Connor’s roommate gets “terminated”) and Sixteen Candles (Caroline in the locker room shower). Sadly, there will probably never be a year of cinema packed full of winners like that again. Unless someone decides to resurrect Steve Guttenberg and Ralph Macchio’s careers.

Continue Reading

Infectious Disease 1, Infant Son 0

My mom called this morning to inform me that the boy was exposed to some form of a coughing disease a few weekends ago at her house (my young nephew being the little monkey from Outbreak in this scenario). I told my mom that this weekend the boy was exposed to the drunken stupidity of my sixteenth annual fantasy football draft, his dad repeatedly calling the Rockies a “bunch of dirty ball sacks” for getting swept in San Francisco and the assorted programming of the History Channel including Gangland and one very disappointing show about prison tattoos that mostly focused on the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas. She said I should get him get him “checked out” just to be safe.

Continue Reading