Charles Brown

I'm making a cartoon about Charlie Brown as an adult.

It's the tragic yet uplifting struggle of a man whose childhood was wrought with failure and ridicule, overcoming the stress and schoolyard woes of the 1960s suburban social structure with a strong, positive attitude time and time again, learning that with life comes pain and after every failed football kick you still get another attempt, only to grow up to become a mildly successful insurance salesman.

Charles Brown.

Coming Soon.

Look forward to it.

It's one of those boring "What I Did Today!" posts that I always hate reading but tend to write in my own blog because I'm just a hypocrite I guess.

It's 1:54 A.M. and I just got back from a late night stroll. I needed to clear my head, and there's no better way to do that than to walk about a mile and a half to Steak 'N' Shake and get one of those orange cream shakes someone was telling me about that sounded so good. The night is the best time to go on a walk (at least in this area) because you're the only one out. I stood in the middle of a crosswalk of the normally busy I-150 and just stared down the straight line of empty lanes and shining green traffic lights. It was relaxing.

I can never sleep at night. Night time is when my brain turns on, and it won't stop unless I administer a goose tranquilizer or two. (I was going to say something like "horse tranquilizer," but frankly a goose tranquilizer would probably do the job, and what happens if I need to sedate a horse? No need to waste tranquilizers.) It has honestly gotten to the point where the sound of birds chirping and the sight of a sunrise is what makes me tired. How can people sleep when it's so dark out?

Like any sane human being (as far as I'm concerned), I'm in love with music, and I obviously had an iPod in my pocket and headphones on my ears as I took my walk. I've been in a bit of a Coldplay mood lately because of the release of their new album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends (I prefer to use the full title because it's much better that way). I've always been a casual fan of Coldplay, never really getting deep into their music, but always being able to enjoy it. So I listened to Coldplay throughout my walk. It was the perfect sort of mellow music one should listen to while walking along empty, silent streets.

I had a few of their albums on shuffle, and the second song that came up (after "Viva la Vida," which is a song I quite enjoy) was "Cemeteries of London" (also from Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends). I haven't listened to the album much, so I'm not yet familiar with how most of the songs go. I listened to the opening lyrics of this one and smiled at how perfect they were for the situation.

At night they would go walking ‘til the breaking of the day,
The morning is for sleeping
Through the dark streets they go searching to seek God in their own way
Save the nighttime for your weeping

I thought that was fiarly applicaple to my situation, though I wasn't entirely weeping. Just in a really bad mood.

Anyway, it was a pretty good walk.

Oh, and apparently that particular Steak 'N' Shake is the only one in America not open twenty-four hours.

Tough shit.

The Lowest Point of Your Life

You'll never truly know yourself until you've cut open a bottle of chocolate syrup to lick the remaining chocolate stuck to the sides.

My Flossing Situation

I don't floss nearly as often as I should, and I'm beginning to suspect it's because I'm just not wild enough for the type of floss I use.

(I do, however, believe that I am Cherry Berry enough to use this floss.)

I'm just an idea machine.

I had a great idea for a new reality TV show. Kidnap the entire cast of Lost and strand them on an actual deserted island.

Throw a couple dozen bears in the mix too, whatever, it's good TV.

Alarming Search Queries

Like many people who maintain a website, I have a way of checking how many visits the site receives, how people were referred to the site, etc.

This means that I can also see the search terms people use to find the site. They're often funny, confusing, offensive, or (usually) some combination thereof.

But I just looked at some of them a few minutes ago and was slightly alarmed by what I saw:

i ate soap, will i be okay

At first I chuckled to myself. Then I became a little worried. Will this person be okay? How much time does he or she have? Will they be directed to appropriate advice? Did the soap have a cheesecake scent or something?

They sound so concerned and trusting of the Internet to comfort them in this time of dire need. "Will i be okay"? I hope so. I hope so...

For anyone who reaches this webpage in the future with questions such as this, I give the following advice:

1. Don't eat soap.
2. Did you eat the soap even after I told you not to?
3. Why the hell would you do that?
4. Alright, calm down, just listen. Brush your teeth. No, no, not like that. Take the soap out of your mouth first. Okay, brush your teeth. Good.
5. Okay, I don't think that really helped. I was just kind of winging it and hoping I'd come up with further steps after that.
6. Uuuuummm...
7. If your mouth is foaming, call poison control. If not, you should probably still call poison control, but you're allowed to lie and say you weren't doing something retarded like eating soap. Don't say it like that, though. Tell them you think someone put anti-freeze in your Jell-O. Apparently that stuff's undetectable.
8. Oh no, now I'm going to get "how to use anti-freeze as poison" search hits.
9. Just DON'T eat soap again.
10. NO. Put it down.

I hope that helps. I need to go now, but I wish the best of luck to the poor sap who searched this:

hot pocket burns

I've been there.

Pondering the Monkeypuzzle

I've started something of a solo music project. I've entitled it "Pondering the Monkeypuzzle."

It's a project I've been putting off for a long time now, due in part to the fact that I have no decent form of recording equipment (simply a single microphone) and I just recently got the keyboard I've been talking about buying.

Nevertheless, it's off to a start.

I have two songs completely finished, and two more in a sort of "rough draft" stage.

One of the two unfinished songs has proven to be quite complicated to record, but I'll get it done sometime soon (hopefully). The other one hasn't been recorded yet because I'm just so lazy that I haven't yet bothered to move an amp where I need it to be. But anyway, these songs will be done soon, and more will come after them. A lot of songs have been stewing in my head, and until recently I had no medium with which to create them.

This is one song. It's entitled "Dawn."



The song I mentioned before (the one proving to be more complicated than I had expected) is particularly more well-thought-out than this one, and considerably longer. I was going to wait until I finished it before unveiling my little project here, but I got impatient. I never have time to work on it. (I'll never finish it unless I quit my job. Oh wait, I did that already. I have no excuse.)

Anyway, thanks for reading and/or listening. You can hear this music at my MySpace page. If you use Internet Explore, I noticed the page looks all wonky. If you don't like wonky things, you should use something good like Firefox instead of the retarded web browser you're using right now.

myspace.com/PonderingTheMonkeypuzzle