Apparently a ‘blog-buddy’ is a thing… or my wife just made it up.  Either way, I have told her that people are following my blog and I don’t like most of the blogs I read.  I mean I enjoy them but they aren’t something I would want to read every morning on my way to the office… but I am reading them a couple of times or catching a few blogs from each to be sure I didn’t catch them on an off day.

But then out of the blue, I find two sites today that I am quite convinced that I like the authors.  Enough to “follow” them at any rate.  I am not sure if that is a compliment or not, “hey this guy is just about as crazy as me and I understand him”, but I sure hope they aren’t offended.  Actually, I don’t care.  I am not a nice person.  Ask any of my kids.  Well ask the older one’s that don’t need my permission to eat ice cream for a bedtime snack.

Kevin Hellriegel’s Blog of Worthless Advice (his name, not mine) sounded right up my alley.  He recently wrote a post about giving up stuff for a resolution that I almost didn’t read because I have never even tasted coffee but damn… that was a good read.  And unlike me, Kevin seems to be able to get his story out in under 1000 words.  How many people have already gone back and clicked on his link to find a shorter blog?  Hello?  Anyone there?

I don’t mind talking to myself.

The Notebook

Kevin started another post with the paragraph below, and despite the fact that I cry my ass off at movies like Million Dollar Baby and The Notebook, I decided that the guy who wrote this paragraph is a kindred spirit.  I do not at all mind my wife calling him my blog-buddy!

The other day I was told not to use my blog to express my “feelings”.  First of all, I am a guy and I don’t have feelings.  If I did have feelings, I would be a woman.  I would cry at sad movies and care about what I was wearing that day.  I merely have opinions based on how I have perceived the facts of a particular situation and the observations I have made over the course of my meager existence.  My whole attitude and philosophy of life can be attributed to the movies I have watched, books I have read, and songs I have listened to.  These influences are mostly comical in nature and lean heavily towards the sarcastic side of the humor scale.  I also like science fiction so you can throw in a bit of the nerd factor as well.  Kevin Hellriegel

Read the whole blog here if you feel so inclined (and I would recommend it).  I love the way he has grown up learning how to use humor to lift people.  Somewhere along the line I learned mostly how to piss people off with my humor, but it is funny as hell to me, and sometimes other people.

I am trying to cut this blog down.  It is the least I can do to honor my new blog-buddy right?  I mean here I find a guy with so many things in common with me, I should be going out of my way to show him my appreciation.  Without being a stalker of course.  I hear that getting restraining orders is a pain in the butt.  I hear that a lot actually.

But then there is the comment about not crying at sad movies.  I do that.  Probably more than my wife.  So apparently I do have feelings… or one at least.  And according to my new blog-buddy, that makes me a woman.  Better than a girl I guess.  He is assuming that I have some maturity at least (apparently he doesn’t know me that well).  But c’mon, what is wrong with crying at a sad movie?

I have a couple kidlets just like Calvin

What about when you cry out of happiness?  Bill Waterson has brought me to tears more times than I could count.  Calvin and Hobbes have brought so much joy to my life that I actually started reading the Complete Calvin and Hobbes Hard Cover Set my to my 9 and 11 year olds last night, one of whom could be mistaken by Calvin on a daily basis.  I remember reading this comic back in 1985 and I was hooked for life.  And who doesn’t remember laughing their ass off over Calvin’s snowmen family… I can’t wait till  my Frozen-infatuated 3-year-old daughter sees what that little brat did with a snowman.  Hey Cydnee, “Do you wanna build a snowman?”

I cry at funny movies too.  When Will Farrell was running around in his underwear asking Tom Cruise to save him with witchcraft… or streaking down the street by himself with his wife laughing at some strangers naked ass… come on… that killed me.  I am sure I remember a tear escaping that night.  When I think of Dumb and Dumber I think of how much I love Jim Carrey but I cried watching Jeff Daniels going to the bathroom.  I am still smiling… that definitely came out wrong… both in the show and in this blog.  That’s funny, even though I know lots of you are audibly making ewww sounds.  Yep, still funny.

I have to say, I think it is okay to cry in a movie though.  Hell, I have shed a tear at a good AT&T commercial.

The Pursuit of Happyness

Alright Kevin, you are a father, what about the Pursuit of Happyness?  I will hold off on whether or not we can be blog-buddies until I hear whether you cried when he was holding his sleeping son with his feet braced up against the bathroom door in the subway station.  If that scene didn’t upset you then you might not be a man at all… you might be an alien.  Has anyone else ever asked you to take a DNA test?  I mean besides your father and your children, that happens to all of us.

Doesn’t it?

Apparently I didn’t want to be blog-buddies very much because i never stopped talking.  Sorry Kevin.  I suck.  But the apology wasn’t really real, it just comes out a lot because I am Canadian.  You don’t have any feelings anyhow.

Calvin and Hobbes 1985-12-27