20% is like a normal tip, right? We tipped our waiter around 20% last night and he made a point to come over and thank us. Did he think it was a good tip because all his other customers are cheapskates and we looked good in comparison or have we been overtipping people for like ten years?

And are you supposed to tip your dog groomer? I don’t. I figure I’m already paying the lady three times what I pay to get my own hair cut so why should I give her any extra. Is that why my dog sometimes comes back with little bald patches here and there?

I was doing a search on how much to tip and I came across this:

Arlington VA: Gross AND embarrassing question for the servers who read this: What is an appropriate bonus gratuity to leave when one’s toddler has barfed at a restaurant. No, we didn’t know he was ill, and yes, we cleaned up as best we could, but we know we lowered the tone and ruined someone’s shift.
We feel terrible–can money buy forgiveness?

Eww. I may have had to sit next to a screamer once, but at least she didn’t barf.

Oh my God. JACK fm is playing “Run Runaway by Slade! I haven’t heard that song since high school! I loved that song! I love JACK.

Let this post be a reminder to myself to download Run Runaway when I get home tonight.

7/30 update: I’ve just read this post again. I feel that it is quite boring. I just wanted to say that in advance so, if you read the whole thing, you don’t think that I think that it is really good stuff. I do not. You can skip it altogether if you’d like. The gist of it is: I bought a new modem, my cable company annoyed me, I like Clay Aiken and mmmm…ribs.

Clay Aiken’s first concert of his new tour was last night. If you know anything about online Clay Aiken fans you’ll know that’s a big deal. So I really wanted to get online as soon as I got home from work. (Well, work and eating some ribs. It was rib night at the Village Pub and those ribs are good enough to miss the first couple of songs.)

When I got home and tried to get on the internet I had no connection.I kept messing with it and unplugging things and plugging them back in and checking connections but nothing worked. Finally I called the cable company and the weird little teenaged customer service kid mumbled something about how he thought the modem was going bad. Well, he finally mumbled that after he had mumbled a bunch of other stuff that didn’t work. He said they’d send someone out next Tuesday. I said I was working on Tuesday so they said the earliest they could come out was August 6th.

Yeah. Like I’m going to be without the internet until August 6th.

So I just went and bought a new modem. Radio Shack didn’t sell them. The girl that worked there suggested I call my cable company. I ended up at Fry’s, which sells just about everything as far as I can tell, including cable modems. I got back at around 8:30 and hooked it up and the cable company came online and said I had to do some setup thing. So I tried and they kept giving me error messages.

Finally I got everything to work so I called the cable company to cancel the service appointment and they tried to convince me to keep it. Ummm…why? I have service now?

Of course, by the time all that was finished the concert was long over. Bummer.

I like my boss. I really do. Sometimes he just drives me crazy, though.

At the end of every month I mail out the same payments. Every month for like a decade. And every month he’s just shocked…shocked!….that I’m mailing out so much money. “You have to mail how much?” And he always says it like I’ve personally gone out and bought a million dollars worth of Doritos and Red Bull and charged it to the company credit card.

It’s annoying. That’s all I’m trying to say.

My mother decided to take a shortcut through the Twilight Zone to get to the Fremont Street Experience. I was just chatting away in the passenger seat when I suddenly realized that I had no idea where I was. Then we passed a Hari Krishna watering his driveway. At least I think he was a Hari Krishna. He was wearing a robe like this. Except he must have been wearing the summer version because there wasn’t as much fabric. Pretty much just the shoulder drape part. Anyway, across the street from him was a house that just had a bunch of fruit in boxes sitting along the sidewalk. In Las Vegas. In the middle of summer. Then we went by a house with a table in the yard with two table lamps on it. It wasn’t a yard sale or anything. Just a table with some lamps. Then we went down this other street where, on one side of the road, there was this Leave It To Beaver style 1950s neighborhood. On the other side of the road there was like a ghetto with bars on all the windows. Like the criminals just don’t want to cross that street or something.

We finally made our way to the semi-private concert. Apparently, semi-private means that all the people who were attending a furniture trade show and had their credentials were corralled behind a white picket fence and the rest of us weren’t allowed in. Then, at one point, they moved the white picket fence and all the furniture people got to go up by the stage and the rest of us had to stand behind some metal gates about a foot away from them. Then the security just seemed to say “screw it” and let everybody go up by the stage. So, basically, it was a bunch of hullaballoo for nothing.

I should mention that it was like 130 degrees out there. At least it felt like it. It was hellishly hot.

Then the most wonderful thing happened. The Beach Boys came on stage and introduced John Stamos. John Stamos! The crowd went INSANE. This guy who was standing by us started screaming “Oh my God!! John Stamos!! He’s my idol!!” I just went into a Blackie/Uncle Jesse stupor for the next two hours. The Beach Boys were there and they were singing hit after hit and I was enjoying them. Really I was. They were great and I guess I’m a big ol’ fan after all because I knew and loved every song they sang for two hours. But they could have had monkeys playing the tambourine for all the attention I paid them. John Stamos was on the stage grinning and bouncing around and getting all hot because it was like 130 degrees out there and his shirt got wetter and wetter and started clinging to his chest and…well…I enjoyed the show. A lot.

After they played Fun Fun Fun and the band had left the stage I heard one lone man screaming “Uncle Jesseeee!!!” to no one in particular. Alas, Uncle Jesse was already gone.

To sum up: Las Vegas has some weird neighborhoods. Even at night, Las Vegas is hecka’ hot in the summer. A lot of grown men watch “Full House.” The Beach Boys deserve their legendary status and I recommend you see them even if John Stamos isn’t there. Although John Stamos makes it better. But John Stamos makes everything better, now doesn’t he?

So the Beach Boys are playing an unadvertised concert at the Fremont Street Experience tonight. It’s a “semi-private” concert, though. What the heck does “semi-private” mean? It’s either private or it’s not. I can get in or I can’t.

I’m not a huge fan but I’m going down there anyway just to see what all the tourists walking around with their cups full of nickels and plastic footballs full of beer do when the Beach Boys just show up and start singing.

Since I was completely bored last night I decided I’d start another blog for my postcard collection. I have a tendency to get sort of obsessive about things and, at one time, that thing was buying old postcards. I’ve got a ton from the early 1900s up through the 70s. I’m going to try to put one up every day.

Anyway, it’s “Wish I Was There”.

My laundry still isn’t done. I did do enough that I don’t have to fear for my life if I need to go to the bathroom, though. That’s something, right?

You know what’s pathetic? When I was sorting my laundry I found clothes that I wore back in the winter. Apparently I just keep stuffing them back down to the bottom of the hamper. That’s just sad. I’m ashamed. I’m washing it tonight.

You know, I’ve been thinking that “Six Feet Under” had lost something. This year seemed a little boring and predictable and I didn’t really care what was going on. Then Nate’s arm went numb and a second later he was flat on his back. And no previews?! What the…?!!? Is he dead? That was awesome!

I watched “The Forgotten” yesterday. I really like that Dominic West guy. I may have to start watching “The Wire”.

Wow. I really don’t have anything to say today.

TV Land is having a “Good Times” marathon. I watched an episode. Now I can’t get the theme song out of my head. It’s driving me crazy.

Keepin’ your head above water,
Making a wave when you can.
Temporary lay offs.
Good Times.
Easy credit rip offs.
Good Times.
Scratchin’ and surviving.
Good Times.
Hangin in a chow line.
Good Times.
Ain’t we lucky we got ‘em.
Good Times.

There. You take it for a while.

Well, I got part of my list done today. There’s still a massive amount of laundry overflowing the hamper in my bathroom and causing me to fear for my life if I need to go in the middle of the night, though. I fear that I will trip sometime and crack my head open on the toilet and then CSI will come investigate and see what an utter slob I am and somehow it will get in the press and everyone at work will know that I’m not the neat, efficient person that I’ve led them to believe. That CSI show has caused me a lot of paranoia, actually. I’m always afraid that something’s going to happen to me and some Grissom-type is going to show up and make an obscure comical reference about the dishes in my sink or something that, if I were still living, I probably wouldn’t understand.

That’s it. Tomorrow I’m doing all my laundry.

I went out to dinner tonight and the lady at the table behind me totally didn’t know how to use her indoor voice. The entire dinner she was just yelling everything. And they forgot her salad. THEY FORGOT HER SALAD. They didn’t charge her so she claimed it was ok. IT WAS NO PROBLEM AT ALL. Except, even though it was no problem, she WOULDN’T STOP TALKING ABOUT IT. Then, when the check came, she said that she was tipping FIVE DOLLARS. To which her dinner companion exclaimed, FIVE DOLLARS!?!? So I got to hear exactly how she came to the five dollar total. SHE TOOK THE TAX AND MULTIPLIED BY TWO WHICH IS FOUR BUT SHE GOT GOOD SERVICE you know except for how THEY DIDN’T BRING HER SALAD so SHE WAS GIVING FIVE DOLLARS even though SHE DIDN’T GET HER SALAD. So, HALF OF FIVE IS TWO FIFTY which is what her companion OWED HER FOR THE TIP. Then she TALKED for a while about some METAL GLASSES that she has that MAKE HER DRINKS TASTE FUNNY. And then she finally left. THANK GOD.