I'll be shootin sparks tomorrow...

This weeks St Patricks day forecast for Brody: partly rowdy with a chance of furious. Stay tuned for your long range forecast, and Ryo with sports.

Uhh...yeah...Dad? It's Bro...ummm...

Remember those "Choose Your Own Adventure" books from when we were kids? I do. Let's try one out, minus most of the organization of a novella...well...all the organization of a novella. We'll call this question, and those (if any) that follow it in the weeks to come "Don't do as Brody does" or something. Here goes.
1. You are working on your girlfriend's Jeep in an attempt to fix a minor electrical short in the tail light that is draining the battery. Do you:
a) Inform her that automotive electrical systems are complex and that the repair should be done by a professional.
b) Carefully study a wiring diagram from a shop manual to determine the area to check then meticulously inspect each wire until the short is found and repaired. With the problem fixed, you can go home and enjoy the adulation of a grateful girlfriend.
c) Start to grab random handfuls of wires and shake them in order to see if anything sparks. Nothing happens, so you yank on the tail light wiring harness to get a better look at it, and it breaks off, creating the sparks you were looking for but also shorting out the ignition so that the Jeep no longer starts. After four hours of trying to fix the original problem and the fresh damage caused, you finally admit defeat and are then required to call your dad for help and admit you are a jerk and should have been more careful. Fingers crossed he can fix it tomorrow.

I'll let you, the reader, guess which choice I made...

Brody vs. ________

There seems to be a recurring theme with this whole blog thing, generally it's been things that are against me or that i'm against. Now, at the risk of sounding like I may be develpoing a persecution complex, I have two more struggles to report. The first: the ebay seller that sold me the mini dirt bike. Oh what pain this machine has caused, both physically and mentally... for every twenty minutes of riding the thing, I spend an hour doing repairs or modifications ( 6 ft tall, 200 lbs + tiny Chinese made motorbike = broken parts. no ha.) and at least ten minutes getting bandaged up. (You haven't lived until you've flown over mini handlebars at top speed only to have the bike crash into your groin...special thanks to Jamie and her medical training) But I digress, back to the Ebay seller; the bike is advertised as 49cc and upon tearing the motor apart to replace a clutch and spun crank bearing, I measured the bore and stroke of the piston and lo and behold...42cc. False advertising! An Email battle is currently being fought between myself and the douchebags running the company, but I assure you victory will be mine and they will have to pay for a stroker kit ( and maybe nitrous...)
The second, and more pressing is the battle between myself and the giant raccoon in the backyard. Now, I know what you're thinking, Brody has really lost it and thinks raccoons are chasing him. Not so, everyone else has seen it too. Only in Thunder Bay can you have a "normal" conversation about the 35 pount rodent hiding under your deck. Every night before bed I go outside for a cigarette, and every night that goddamn raccoon is there eating the garbage like he owns the place. This raccoon is both large, angry and unafraid of humans, plus he's on my turf, and me peeing all over the yard to mark my territory is both unsanitary and unsettling for the neighbours. There can be only one outcome...one of us must die. Since tonight is Valentines day, I mustn't spend it chasing raccoons rather than spending time with Jamie or else I'll have another battle to worry about, but you bet your ass the clandestine recon operation codename "raccoon bait and blast" will commence around 2 am tomorrow. Avenge my death...

Presents for birthday boy!

Maiden voyage of the minibike today, its pretty snowy out, fingers crossed...will post later with performance results, but must get to beer store first.
P.S. I have old balls.

Ever take it off any sweet jumps?

As we get older, it becomes more and more difficult to buy birthday gifts for our significant other(s). Women expect romance and thoughtfulness in gift selection when they are on the receiving end, and often fall into the wrongful assumption that men expect the same. My lovely and thoughtful better half, Miss Jamie Hamilton, has come out of left field this year with a gift that shall ruin me forever (Even more so than the refrigerator for my truck, if you'll believe that...) and shatter my once held beleifs on the inability of women to truly understand the concept of "awesome". I was told to expect something "tits" but nothing could have prepared me for the shock I was to recieve. For my 26th birthday, I have been presented...a minibike! Yeah, as in motorized mini dirtbike 80km/h deathmachine! Super tits!!! Everyone feel free to come wish me a happy birthday at the hospital...

Grade 7 science fair revisited

Purpose: To determine empirically the amount of time it takes the subject "Brody" to return to a state of lethargy after the workplace simulus is removed.
Hypothesis: It will take at least three days of idleness, but no more than seven.
Procedure: 1. Take one mid twenties slacker/sweet dude, give him a job that sucks, preferably involving some type of menial task(s) and some angry customers, preferably American.
2. Have the subject work said job for two months, just long enough for the subject to devellop a deep sense of hopelessness and hatred for anything related to the job.
3. Remove the subject from his workplace emvironment in a manner that will burn any bridge he encounters, and remove any possibility of regaining employment with the company or using them as a reference for future employment/experiments.
4. Measure and record the time it takes for the subject to return to a sedentary lifestyle ( read: broke and bored)
Observations: 1. First day. Subject does not appear to act in a noticeably different manner, still wakes up at 7:30 am, but shows slight signs of wanting to find other employment. Clearly the brainwashing of the past two months has not yet been overcome. Subject spends the entire day on the couch until feelings of ambition subside.
2. Second day. Subject sleeps in until noon, decides to check online job bank for employment opportunities, gets sidetracked by pornography, abandons hope, rationalizes that there are no good jobs in town anyways, returns to couch for video game marathon.
3. Third day. Subject begins to lose track of time and date, but is informed that it is Friday, and therefore decides to get drunk. This triggers flashbacks of the suject's previous lifestyle, and the rush of joy that being a bum/sponge/mooch once provided him.
4. Fourth day. Subject holds little memory as to the employment that was his captor only a few days prior. He has returned to spending his days (which once again do not start until 3 pm) eating nachos and thinking of excuses for why he can't go looking for a job today.
Findings: The subject had returned to a state of equilibrium after an astonishing four day period. At the start, it appeared as though the subject had suffered irreversible damage as a result of his employment, but after an elapse of time he was able to recuperate and resume his natural agenda with minimal long-term side effects or residual trauma.
Conclusion: The original hypotheis of three to seven days held true, as the subject was able to recover in a four day period. The subject managed to shake the unnatural urge to be productive and even managed to fall back into a pre-captivity state of being with minimal long term damage or mental anguish. The experiment appears to be a success.

vroom.crunch.zap.shit...

Ever seen a shear pin on a snowblower let go while the auger is spinning full throttle? What makes a snowblower barf out an auger blade set? Running over a plugged in extension cord, thats what. Thunder Bay first of july fireworks have got nothin on me.