I always feel like such a retard when I order apple juice at a restaurant. I'm just waiting for the day when the waitress looks at me like I have two heads and utters," Seriously? How old are you?" And that's so ridiculous too. Why should I feel idiotic when I order that drink? For some reason it just seems like a children's drink. Why don't I just say, "And can you throw in some Gerber smashed peas in a jar to go with that!" Why should I be forced into humiliation when I order something healthy to drink?

What's more, this country claims that it is very concerned with the growing rate of obesity, however just about every restaurant will give you refills of soda for free! What's the calorie intake on a single can of non-diet soda? 160 calories maybe? And that's just a can! Those giant plastic cups that are large enough to quench the thirst of Attila The Hun have to be capable of holding at least 3 cans! Okay, so you drink diet soda. Oh that is so much better for you! I mean there is no real sugar in that I suppose. Just cancerous artificial sweetener and the addictive, yet underrated drug caffeine. Rarely is a restaurant willing to give me a refill of juice for free. Plus typically a glass of juice costs on average $0.20 more^[1]. I guess one could argue that most juices contain just as much sugars and calories as soda, if not more-so. But I doubt that you would find a doctor that would tell his patients to drink more soda and less juice. Unless of course his name was Dr. Pepper.

¹My averages are based solely on the fact that I may or may not accurately remember the last 5 menus I've looked at and their restaurant's prices for juices and sodas. In other words, I just picked a number at the top of my head to make me appear like I know what I'm talking about like the rest of the world does.

Remember all those times you got your change in Canadian currency instead of U.S. currency? Well, obviously I don't mean all of your change. But I'm sure you've gotten the Canadian quarter or penny from time to time. And there was always that sense of disappointment you know? Because that Canadian quarter wasn't quite worth the U.S. quarter you should have received. You kind of felt that was the store's way of screwing you over like an intern for the president. Well, that day is no longer my friends! Thanks to our country's failing economy the Canadian dollar is now worth more than the U.S. dollar. So last week, when I purchased some coffee at Sheetz and I got a Canadian penny for change, I felt like saying for the first time, "That's right! In your face America!" I know, it's not like I made out with a free hundred dollars or anything. I mean really it was more like .05 cents or something I'm sure, but for the first time ever I actually enjoyed receiving my Canadian change and I didn't mind using it later in the week when I purchased another cup of coffee. This one was at Dunkin Donuts though. And as long as the vending machines still take Canadian quarters, I'll be screwing over the vending machine companies next! Boo yah!

I've been waiting months and months and months! Finally I have it! I am the proud owner of a brand spankin' new Cannondale bicycle! This is the story about how I finally acquired it, and why my new jeans are now ripped.

Way back in the warm summer months I decided I wanted to start saving some gas money and start riding a bike to work. The only problem at the time was I didn't have a bike. Not one worthy of riding to work anyway. So I started to search around and learn about bicycles. I never owned a real bike before. And by real bike I mean not a K-Mart, or Toys R Us special. A good bike costs money apparently. Name brands like Giant, Trek and Cannnondale are good bikes. Huffy, well not so much. Okay, so enough about bikes, I finally decided what I wanted based off of what I would be using the bike for. So back in the summer I put my order in for a large, bright orange, Cannondale Road Warrior 800. Ooh, I was so excited! So the summer was almost over and I was told that my bike had finally come in! Only there was a problem. It wasn't a large, but a medium. That wasn't going to work. The medium was just too small (good bikes have sizes apparently and need to be fitted. How cool is that?!). The error was the factory's fault so they were willing to take the bike back and give me a new one. Only there was another problem. The 2007 models were all out and the 2008 models wouldn't be available until November. So I had to wait. Another problem was that the 2008 wouldn't come in the same color. I really liked the bright orange! At one point Cannondale said they would do a special paint job for me since they botched up the size, but that fell thru when someone higher up in the company found out and nixed that.

So time went by and I waited. In the meantime, I was out on location one day for work and wound up catching my jeans on a screw and ripping a small hole on the leg. So that weekend I went out to the mall to buy myself a replacement pair (as I only have two decent pairs of jeans and I just alternate between wearing them at The Workplace). I like Gap jeans, so that's where I went. I know they are expensive, but I like them anyway. So I tried on a couple pairs and decided on a darker blue, Boot Cut jean. I stayed with my usual size, 32-34, which seemed to fit pretty nice in the dressing room. They seemed a little longer than usual but I figured they'd shrink once they got washed. Apparently I was wrong. The first day I wore them to the Workplace I noticed that I started walking on the bottom, heal of the pant leg after a few steps. Well that obviously wasn't going to work so I cuffed them about an inch to keep that from happening. Of course all of this could have been avoided had I went with the Relaxed Fit instead of the Boot. But, well, what's another bad decision on my part? So after about two weeks of wearing cuffed jeans I noticed that my brand new jeans had acquired a nice little rip along the fold. I would have returned the little bugger, but they were too long anyway, and my grandma had been nagging me for years to hem my pants a little shorter for me. I figured I'd finally take her up on her offer. So I gave her the ripped pants and she fixed them up all nice and they fit perfectly. But it still irked me that these pants were causing me a lot of issues when at the price I paid, they shouldn't have.

So a few more weeks went by and I got a call that my new bike was finally ready, fresh from the factory. And it was the right one this time. So I borrowed a van to go pick it up. The bike was beautiful! They changed the model numbers a little in the 2008 models, so now I own a Cannondale Road Warrior 2. And actually the 2008 models were cheaper than the 2007 models due to some change in the manufacturing process. At least that was one good thing that happened. So the weather was pretty nasty when I picked my bike up. It was cold, windy, a little snowy, a little rainy. But I got the bike home safely and returned the borrowed van. I wanted to ride the bike more than anything because I'm a big 8 year old, so when I got back home, I threw a sweatshirt on, turned on my house flood lights and took the bike for a little ride down the lane adjacent to my house. Now if you haven't guessed already I was wearing the jeans that had given me so much trouble the past few weeks. And as I was checking out the awesome gear changing smoothness of the Road Warrior, I felt my pant leg catch on the gear at the pedals. "Oooh!" I thought. I figured if I didn't tone it down I was going to rip my pant leg. Well, I had barely finished that thought when I felt the jeans catch again only this time I heard a loud SCRATCH! That was it. My pants had caught on the gear and ripped a nice three inch tear from above my ankle down to the bottom of the leg (don't worry, the flesh on the leg was completely untouched!).

Now most people would probably be pretty upset at that. Me however, well I just started laughing. I mean honestly, I had a brand new bicycle that was flippin' amazing (weighing in at a brilliant 24 pounds by the way) and I now had a pair of jeans that were not going to be giving me any issues anymore because they were going to get pitched. Sure I was out $60 or something but to be honest, I could hardly care. Will I buy a pair of Gap jeans again? Probably. Will I make sure they last me a little longer? Most likely. Will I rip another pair of pants some day riding my new bike? Oh I'm sure I will!

AI, or artificial intelligence, in your home is still a far cry from happening. Don't get me wrong though, it will happen whether you like the idea or not. And to be honest, I think you're going to like it once it happens. Most people associate AI with robots and androids and I know a lot of people that wouldn't want a robot in their homes. But really, all AI is is the ability for a computer to learn. And whether you want to admit it or not, computers are EVERYWHERE! Even in your home. Your TV, Cable/Satellite box, vacuum cleaner, even your coffee maker, they are all micro computers. Basically these days, anything that is electronic is a computer.

Let's take a closer look at your coffee pot shall we. What do you do to make coffee? You measure the water out, put it in the back of the pot, put the grounded up coffee in, and turn that bad boy on. The coffee pot does the rest. Inside that little coffee pot is a microprocessor that turns the water pump on, turns the burner on and then shuts the water pump off when all the water is gone from the reservoir. In a sense, the coffee pot is programmed to do its thing when you tell it to go. It abides by its original program and will never deviate (unless of course something mechanical breaks, but even then the coffee pot will continue to execute its program, it just appears it's not working). I bet your coffee pot even has a timer so you can set it all up the night before and have fresh coffee waiting for you the next morning. Ooooh I love when that happens.

But what if your coffee pot was an AI coffee pot? Probably named the AICP3000, this motha trucka would truly be the most fantastic coffee maker ever! Like I said be before, the whole concept of AI is a learning computer. The AICP3000 would study your coffee drinking habits and change its internal programming, all by its mechanical, err computational little self, to better serve you. Maybe it would learn that on the weekends it needs to make the coffee two hours later than normal to allow for you and the hubby to have your weekend morning "romp." Maybe it would then learn that it also needs to make coffee when there is company over for dinner. It can learn that you usually let the pot sit for hours with the heat still on and a quarter of an inch of coffee still in the pot so it turns the heat off and flushes more water into the pot to keep that disgusting layer of tar from building up, especially since you don't actually wash the thing you just rinse it out. Heck it can even learn how many times to fill the pot up before you stop drinking for the day.

And AI doesn't have to stop with the coffee pot. How fantastic would it be if everything electronic could learn? Your car could start itself and warm up during the cold days, and learn what your favorite radio stations are at certain times of the day and switch to them automatically. Your TV could learn what types of TV shows you like to watch. Your shower could know what time to turn the water on each day and to what temperature. It's not just for robots and science fiction anymore. Computer code that modifies computer code. It's a reality! A world of AI is just around the corner and my guess is that it will be just like the Internet, once we have it for a little while we'll never know how we ever survived without it! I guess potentially this blog could write itself too . . . I don't like that.

At the risk of sounding extremely girlie and/or possibly stereotypically gay (which my track record can prove is not the case), I'm still going to write about this topic. Why? Simply because, while reading it may sound girlie, I still know just about all 3 of my male readers think this too, but just choose not to discuss it at the risk of sounding, well, not manly. I just figure, screw it!

So with the advent of the cooler weather I decided to check out my sweater collection. Of course I really only delve into that drawer during the cold season because, well, only women wear sweaters in the summer. Upon opening the drawer I gazed in at my stash and was suddenly in sheer amazement. There, on the top of the pile, was my all-time favorite sweater! It shone like a brilliant light was cast upon it from On High at which time a chorus of Angels sang a single note that was the most beautiful sound ever known to Man! The sweater was less than a year old and was a birthday gift from The Sister (or so I seem to think. This little tidbit could be entirely not factual) last Christmas. Frankly the sweater isn't that impressive looking. It's a single shade of brown and looks like it is turned inside out all the time with the stitching and whatnot on the outside. I know, nothing to gawk at, but it could just be the single, most comfortable long sleeve shirt in existence today since the dawn of Long-Sleeve-Shirt time (or since year 0 LSSE [Long Sleeve Shirt Era]). In fact, I encourage any of you reading this to find a sweater that is more comfortable! Of course it ultimately would be my decision as to whether yours was more comfortable or not and to be honest, I would always pick mine just to prove that I was right. Because that's the kind of person I am, or so I try to project I am anyway.

So back to my point. I grabbed my brown sweater and threw it on, and headed off to work smiling like Steve Carrell who just told a joke only he thought was funny. How is it even possible that I forgot that this garment existed?! And now that I know I have such a thing, I'll be wearing it as much as possible while attempting to not allow my work colleagues to think I only own two articles of clothing, which frankly is much harder than it should be. People at The Workplace are way to perceptive when it comes to clothing.

Seriously (and I know you all think it), isn't it great when you find some article of clothing you completely forgot you had?! It's even better when it's your favorite piece of clothing. It's a feeling about as good as when you find a rolled up 10 dollar bill in your winter jacket that you haven't worn for 8 months. Although it is sort of the same thing really. I mean who doesn't love finding 10 dollar bills? Frankly I'd love to find 20 or 50 dollar bills, but I'm lucky to even have one of those in my wallet, let alone find one in a pocket somewhere. I'd also like to someday find a magic genie bottle and possibly even a giant vat of free Papa John's pizza, but preferably not in a pocket.

I've had a fair amount of things on my mind for the past few days. Some are rather important, other's are just things that pop into my head because I am some kind of erotic turbo-charged organic thought machine. While you don't get to know the important things, I will share with you my pointless thoughts. Aren't you just so darn lucky!

• Do blind people turn on the lights when they walk into a dark room at night? I mean it's just habit for me.
• Do cops get irritated when they get stuck behind someone that is driving exactly the speed limit? I do when I'm behind a cop.
• Will I ever pay less than $3 a gallon for gasoline ever again? Maybe when water becomes less than $1 a bottle.
• I've had my bedroom furniture for over 4 years now and I have never once changed the drawers my clothes are in. How is it that I still get confused between which drawer has my white t-shirts and which drawer has my gym shorts?
• Why does Scientific American charge you $35 to renew your magazine subscription, but only charges you $25 to get a new, gift subscription? Why would I ever renew when I can get myself a gift for $10 less? Stinks for those of you that already renewed this year I guess.
• Why are toilets in the over-sized handicap stalls always elevated, but sometimes the toilet paper dispenser is not? This only benefits the handicapped if they have freakishly long arms and/or extreme flexibility.
• Why doesn't Jay Leno just write his own monologue? Didn't he used to be a stand-up comedian? Oh what?? He still is???
• Does anybody other than myself actually say the term properly? It's Daylight Saving Time people! Not Savings!

I guess that's it for now. It's apparent that my thoughts get more and more lame as I continue to list them. Might as well stop there before I start listing stuff that just makes you think I'm a complete wacko. Mmmm, too late.

Ever plan on going to a Penn State football game? I'm sure you have. But were you ever curious what to expect when you got there for the tailgate? Well be curious no longer. The Captain is back with his list of what to expect at a PSU tailgating extravaganza! Of course this comes from personal experience so any opinions and/or views that may conflict with yours is just tough. Suck it up and quit being a baby about it. Here it comes, in your face! It's Captain Jimmy's Top 10 Ways to Get Jiggy Tailgating at PSU.

10. Make sure you bring your earplugs because if all the generators aren't loud enough, the music from the amps that they are supplying power for will surely make you think Beethoven had flippin' dog-like hearing!

9. Forget your 6-pack of beer? No worries. Just walk up to some stranger's cooler and grab one for yourself and your friends. They'll be too drunk to care. If the strangers do happen to ask, just say you were looking for some shots. Oh, and if you say that, you'll be expected to do some.

8. Forget your crazy, drunk friends that you don't like to hang out with because they are crazy drunks? No worries. There are at least two every 20 feet.

7. You'll definitely want to make sure you brush up on your Flip Cup skills. Or maybe your Beer Pong skills. Okay, maybe just your drinking skills.

6. Three words, Dizzy Bat Relay. Race your friends (or complete strangers). Spin around a Wiffle bat 10 times with your head down, sprint 20 feet, down a cup of beer, sprint back, next in line goes! Oops. Wiffle bat break? No worries, now you can fill it up with beer and drink from it!

5. Don't ever, ever, ever wear the opposing team's colors. Unless of course you enjoy getting the finger and obscenities yelled at you no matter where you are. I hope you like hearing the F word!

4. Make sure you have plenty of gas in your tailgate vehicle. Not so much for while you're tailgating, but for when the game is over and you're attempting to leave the parking lot. If you're one of the lucky 10,000 that get stuck in the middle of the lot, you're looking at a minimum of 2 hours before getting the heck out of there. I hope you like the smell of exhaust and getting high!

3. If you have a small bladder, you might as well forget about going tailgating all together. After you wait in line for 45 minutes you'll have peed your pants twice and gone thru 3 beers. By the time you get in and out of the crap-filled portipottie, you might as well get back in the line so you don't wet yourself when you have to go again.

2. Are you an attractive chick looking for a nice guy? Are you an ugly chick looking for the love of your life? Are you a chick that's drunk off her crapper looking for a dude that's the same so you can make out? What's the difference? They're all the same when you're a drunk chick.

1. Don't bother bringing petty foods like bags of chips and pretzels. What will most likely happen is some drunk guy that you just met will end up tripping over himself at some point and come crashing down on the chips, or he may just deliberately jump on your bag of pretzels, because, well when you're drunk that's fun apparently. In fact you're much better off meeting sober people in the other parking lots and being invited to kick-a** food tents with all the hot dogs and sausage you could possibly dream of! If that doesn't get your juicy intestinal track gurgling and leaking, I don't know what will!

If you really want to have a fun time, just bring your fun hat and join in the festivities. It'll be an indescribable experience and if you ever embarrass yourself just remember; nobody else will likely remember. Oh yeah, don't forget to scream, "WE ARE! PENN STATE!" "Thank you!"