Funny Video.

Here.

And while your at it:

Garbage Man Prank
Creepy Girl
Commercial I've never seen.

Reading.

I was discussing yesterday how I am unable to read books. What makes this interesting is that I actually do a whole lot of reading of news and various things on the internet. I am not sure what the problem is with books but I blame it somehow on school and book reports. Although I don't think I have ever actually read a book I have done a report on either.

In truth, I should correct myself by saying that I don't read books, that is, except for Harry Potter.

Oh, on an unrelated subject, the Truth or Dare version of Jenga is a good game.

Snow Day!

Wee. No school...I mean work.

Phone number words.

Today I tried to make a word out of my phone number but I quickly realized there were 0's in it, which do not have any letters associated with it. Crap. If you want to try at home go here or someplace like it.

Panera.

Garden vegetable sandwich with brocolli cheddar soup. Delicious.

Damnit.

I would call in sick from work today but I don't know the telephone number. Damnit.

1000 people.

Wow, in a few short months 1000 unique by daily people have viewed the site. Kudos to me, suckers.

By the way.

As you can see I added a new poster, Tad, to the site so he could post the story below and anything else he wanted. If anyone else would like to become a guest poster just give me a holler. Also, my name is Ram, like CDROM... I don't think I've mentioned that before here. So don't be confused if it pops up.

Oh, also, as to the story below. Read it before this. I was the driver of one of the cars and what I remember is going to get the car and looking back seeing marco playing with matches. Once in my car with other people I headed back to the store to pick up marco and sean. To my surprise they were running quite fast towards me yelling "drive, drive". As we were making our exit we saw the then unidentified sedan coming in, luckily we were out of sight before the sedan actually got close enough to see what was going on. Even more amusing was the fact that it turned out to be vice principal, Mr. Silver. hahahahaha

The mystery of the Dreshertown shopping center's (Marco's) Arson (a.k.a- the night mr. silver got arrested)

Well, rammy asked me to give my best account of a particular night of our senior year in highschool when i used to work as assistant manager at the Video Update in Dresher. Please keep in mind that while the job was one of the greatest i've ever had to date, at this point in the year i believe everyone competent had quit or was fired (hence i was assistant manager). Therefore, i was at a fairly high level of stress because i was in charge of opening and/or closing 5-7 days a week, and also in charge of training the new incompetent supervisors while keeping the store in order [all i ever wanted was free rentals].

I will say this. Out of all the weird and fable-worthy jobs i've been a part of, Video Update by far and away had more bizarre and ridiculous stories gathered over time than any other job. AND, if i had been a full part of the events i will describe, this would definitely be the most amazing and ridiculous story of them all. I was only a primary witness really. This is just from my point of view:

So it's another friday night of highschool. I get off work at midnight. My friends and I are probably gonna end up hanging out at somebody's house or chillin at north hills or something. For now, it's about 11 and in rare occasion, almost everyone in our runnin' crew was there. Forgive me to whomever i forget or falsely include: Rammy, Neddy, Sara W., Douggy, Seanny, Weir, Carrie, and of course Marco (surprisingly, in my memory there were no shadies present that night). It was a fairly annoying night as far as customers go. I remember this because all i wanted to do was close the store and relax. My friends ended up sticking around until I had to kick them out of the store because i had to close the store. I should also mention that I was working with my least favorite of general workers. I believe his name was John. Kid was almost as annoying as he was stupid. Almost as loud as he was out of control.

Midnight. Time to close the store. There is a long list of procedures i need to go through every night as well as financial counts, drops, paperwork, and invoices. I'm in the back of the store by the time I get a phone call on the company phone. The only time it would ever ring after midnight was either a stupid customer who thought the store was still open, or the district manager checking on accounts. This is why it was so strange when the voice on the other end of the phone was Neddy asking me to come to the front of the store. I needed to see something important, he said. I initially deferred from the request because I was very tired and annoyed with John and all the paperwork I was doing. The subtle urgency of Neddy's second request to go to the front of the store got me up out of my seat. I believe he said something like, "seriously taddy. it's pretty important".

When I got to the front of the store, I found that whatever Neddy was eluding to was indeed fairly important. While John had managed to overlook the tremendously dangerous and growing problem just out in front of the store, I stood ten feet from the entrance staring at an enormous bonfire that was shooting twenty feet high out of a large metal trashcan. Before I could really predict how the fire had even come about, I was concerned with the height and power of the fire due to the fact that it was swirling higher and higher, tickling the overhang roof of the store. Then I realized that the Video Update roof was connected to every other roof in the inlet shopping mall complex. That's when John realized that something strange was going on. "HOLY SHIIIIIT", as he ran to the back to grab the fire extinguisher. I tried to explain that the fire was so huge, he was probably going to do more harm than good, but he was quick to not listen to anyone, especially his superior.

While John ran off, I was on the phone dialing the fire emergency crew. As I was dialing, I watched as a long line of fire trucks and police cars were already arriving far off in the distance. I hung up the phone to watch a man pull up in a nice looking sedan. Mind you, it was after midnight and the only cars in the large parking lot were local mafia, business van, or broken down car. Also, Video Update was by far and away the only business still open. The man got out of his car briskly but not startled and without paying too much notice to the fire starting to engulf the underside of the roof, quickly dropped a video in the return slot of the store, and returned to his car. It was then that I realized this was actually our assistant principal, Mr. Silver, whom we all hated and knew to be extremely dim. Without a second glance, he was back in his car and off driving out of the parking complex as the numerous fire and police vehicles were speeding in. As I turned my gaze away from the man who had disregarded the incredibly dangerous fire and driven off, I found my counterpart John attempting to use the store's small and apparently broken fire extinguisher on the now, extremely large fire. At first, it wasn't working at all and John tried to remedy this by shouting profanities and falling on the ground a few times trying to kick start the extinguisher with his feet. After a few fleeting shots of foam squirted out, John gave up on the tiny broken extinguisher.

Here's where the story actually gets funnier. To my amazement, as the firefighters and policemen were jumping out of their vehicles and yelling at us to get away from the fire, John began dropkicking what was now a very hot, mangled, and barely visable (through the fire) metal trashcan. In retrospect, I have to pleed ignorance on this one. I did not have the professional and scenario-appropriate training like John did, to know that even though the extinguisher (which wasn't going to work anyway) was broken, and even though the fire company had arrived in full, the finest solution with an out of control fire like this, was to dropkick the fire until it submitted. Needless to say, pieces of flaming debris went everywhere and the movement of the can only fed the fire. The firemen and police got John away from the fire before he set his entire body aflame.

While the firemen were saving the shopping center, the police immediately quarantined me and John to get information and find out everything they could. I'm gonna take this time to note that while i was too startled to realize it, after Neddy's phone call I got to the front to find that absolutely no one was in the parking lot (specifically none of my friends). Well, 5-O had taken over and I took one officer inside to prove that I had the store under control as acting manager and i had business there and wasn't just attacking the store with napalm. I had literally no answers for the officer as far as the cause or onset of the fire was concerned. John however, had a theory and a suspect wrapped up for the officer he was talking to outside. Unbenownst to me, John had explained to the police outside that he had seen a lone man get into a nice looking sedan and drive off as they came in.

The police were off like a shot to catch the guarenteed arsonist, whom i would have explained to them was Mr. Silver, the assistant principal of our township and prestigious member of many educational groups in our community.

Now, I need to take aim of this story from different sources other than mine at this point, because none of which i have left to explain, was i present for. I urge others who told me the missing pieces to improve or confirm the rest of the story.

Apparently what had happened while i was getting all of the nightly paperwork done was, in an impatient, immature, aimless, and often mindless manner, most of my friends were hanging out just outside the store, waiting for me to close. Neddy, who was probably smoking a clove, jokingly flicked its remains at Marco or at least toyed with putting it in his hair or face. As i was told, Marco attempted to retaliate by lighting a piece of cardboard from the ground on fire and chase Neddy with it. When the fire on the cardboard had grown considerably, Marco put it in the full trashcan to see how big the fire could get. Needless to say, the fire grew rapidly out of control and the many flammable items in the trashcan were only kindling for the minor explosive flammable items also somewhere in the trashcan (the firemen told me there were some oil products as well as condensed spray cans like arosol or something).

In a position where heroics were impossible and getting caught, arrested, and fined were all imminent, my friends took off faster than the fire started. I was told there were three cars everyone came in, but only two by the time Marco had set the fire. One took off immediately while the other had to wait for a beligerant Sean who had passed out in the back seat of one of the cars and woken up to see the fire in full blaze. Realizing the primary concerns immediately (anyone caught around the fire is number one suspect) as well as realizing he could not drive a car, but not realizing any of his friends were still around, Sean rolled out of the back seat of the car and took off running across the parking lot towards the woods across the main road everyone came in on. Fortunately for Sean, the last car caught up to him and got him just in time to peel out of the parking lot as a nice looking sedan was driving in.

In their haste, it's understandable that they did not realize that the man in the car (soon to be suspect no.1) was actually Mr. Silver. I'm actually amazed that they had the good sense to call as soon as they did, because any later and the complex would have caught fire and/or John. To add to the secondary accounts I can give, my crew realized that the heat was on and being the only cars on the streets, packed with highschool students, peeling down the main road away from the fire after midnight going 60 mph, was very foolish. They quickly pulled into the first Seven Eleven parking lot they saw and got out, pretending to be an innocent group of youngsters out for slushies (note: many indeed got slushies). I've been told, as they were weary of policemen patrolling the area, many of my friends saw a nice looking sedan go by at regular speed, only to be followed shortly after by a speeding police car with its lights and siren on.

While my friends were very concerned that i would get in some kind of trouble for the whole ordeal, I was actually in the clear. I must have seemed respectable or professional enough to the authorities, even though I was 17 at the time with shaggy hair and my normal dazed look, and my only backup, defense, and eye-witness partner was John. I was actually very amused by the whole thing, especially from my point of view. It was a relief for me because I was given a grand night of de-stress and glorious situational humor. None of my friends were arrested or even caught. The fire was put out before the complex could go up in flames, although to this day, the underside of the Video Update and grocery store roofs are blackened and cracked. The evidence is still there. What will never be found is the culprit to the crime of arson from intense boredom and chicanery. I won't say his name, although I fear I might have mentioned it numerous times throughout the story's account, as well as the title of this blog. Lost are the days of mindless shenanigans and fool-hearty decision making for the sake of fun and entertainment. Let's at least keep this story in homage of such days.

The moral of the story really, is never set a full trashcan on fire unless it's going to end up being a ridiculous story of hilarity. Also, don't be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sorry Mr. Silver. We know you meant well but, actually you didn't because you witnessed a full property damage threatening fire and simply dropped off that video and took off. I went to see what video that was, by the way. The one that he rented. It was Backdraft.


Just kidding.

I love technology.

The fact that I could probably call Vin Diesel and Pauly Shore at the same time right now is just cool, and a bit scary. Lots of private information about a lot of famous people. Paris Hilton is a wreck. Notice that all the pictures taken on HER phone have her in them. LINK by google association (look at the bottom of the post for the actual links)

The first site is down, but searching google groups for paris hilton phone book will probably get some new copies of the website. Here

Have you ever.

When no one is driving really late at night on a normally busy highway, have you ever made a complete stop in the middle of the road and turned off your lights? It's an interesting feeling.