Fucking Bitter, Angry Guy

Fucking Football Matters

In the past month or so, I’ve read a lot of blogs (most written by women) and heard much complaining (always from women) about how football season destroys their social lives, monopolizes their weekend activities (and televisions) and serves as the single-largest source of domestic discord from Labor Day right through the Super Bowl.

I could spend the next 5,000 or 6,000 words explaining in excruciating detail why football is so important to us men but I’m not even going to waste my time. For most men, football is the only thing that gets us through the work week in the fall. Nothing is more depressing than the conclusion of the Super Bowl. It’s no coincidence that more men commit suicide in February than any other month of the year.

There’s simply nothing else to live for until the draft rolls around again in April.

Whether it’s gambling on the games, fantasy football teams, the local team, the team of your childhood or your alma mater, there’s always a reason to watch each and every professional and college game broadcast. That’s just the way it is.

Baseball might be our pastime but football is its all-consuming passion. It’s practically a religion. Any priest or rabbi will tell you that attendance plummets every fall. That’s no joke.

In recent years, either by force or choice, more and more women have discovered why football is so important and entertaining.

While still in the clear minority, these women recognize the value of spending a solid nine hours each Saturday and Sunday and another three hours on Monday night (oh and Thursday nights, too) with their man glued to the television screen, breaking only to have sex (during halftime or that frustrating one-hour void between the conclusion of the late afternoon game and the start of the Sunday night game), get food or use the restroom.

These women are highly evolved creatures. They have their priorities straight. Whether they like it or not, they realize and accept that the success of their relationship hangs in the balance. To sacrifice autumnal weekends and the odd weekday night in exchange for, roughly, 8 months of normality and relative social balance is a deal they happily make.

They’re the winners, the women who have happy marriages and long-term relationships.

But, like I said before, they’re in the minority.

The rest of you are a real fucking problem.

I’ve known and mated with your type, the selfish bitch who wants to actually leave the home for an undetermined period of time at some point during the football weekend. What the fuck are you thinking? What could possibly be going on out in the world that’s more important than the second half of the Jets-Chargers game? Nothing, I tell you. Nothing at all.

I’ve been to the mall, the fucking beach, the local fucking coffee shop. Been there a million fucking times. It ain’t that great. I’ve visited with your friends, my friends, your relatives, my relatives a zillion times. Unless the game(s) is going to be on wherever the fuck you’re proposing we go, I want none of it.

More to the point, I promise you I don’t and won’t like anyone who wouldn’t be watching the game right now anyway. Go hang out with Jenny and her fag husband at the art and wine festival without me. I’m going to spend the next three hours watching fit young men in tight uniforms jump on top of each other. Are we clear? I’m out.

The only thing worse than a woman who doesn’t understand and appreciate the life-and-death importance of football is a man (loosely defined) who doesn’t schedule his entire life around football games. These mother fuckers are the worst. Completely unaware of the standings, the statistics, the point spread, the importance of the “Tuck Rule.”

And why is it that these guys always have facial hair? Is that the artsy, non-conformist thing to do? Grow a fucking goatee and swear off football. Yeah, that’s intriguing. I’d ask you how that’s working out but I already know because you’re the guy aimlessly wandering the aisles of Target or Bed, Bath and Beyond every Sunday, pushing your little shopping cart a good five feet behind your bitch wife and constantly adjusting your Baby Bjorn.

Don’t tell me there’s more to life than football. That’s a fucking lie. Other things might be going on but nothing that really matters. You know what matters? This field goal matters. If it’s good, I’ll be cashing a four-team parlay which means next weekend you can blow right past Old Navy on your way to Nordstrom’s. You follow?

As for the TV issue, how many people only have one TV in their home? If that’s you, go out today and buy another. They’re fucking cheap and might save your life. You go into that room and watch fucking “While You Were Out” and “Rachael Ray” and I’ll be out here monitoring our investments.

Whenever I hear a woman say “well, you could TIVO the game,” I have to fight back an overwhelming urge to snap her neck. The thing about football is that you have to watch it live for it to be entertaining. Even if you don’t know the result, you know that everyone else does. It makes it impossible to enjoy. You just end up fast-forwarding to the scores and never get to savor all those penalties or incomplete passes.

Plus, the world doesn’t let you not know the score. Scores are fucking everywhere. On the radio. On electronic billboards. Wherever you go on a Saturday or Sunday, grown men are talking about the scores of football games. If you happen to change the TV to a channel with those ubiquitous scrolls at the bottom, you’re sure to see all the scores whether you want to or not. You can’t escape it.

TIVOing a game and watching it later is akin to asking a woman to read the newspaper to find out who won all the Oscars at the Academy Awards show. It’s the same thing, right? Why do you need to see what so-and-so was wearing or hear so-and-so’s speech? Just read the results. Because it sucks, that’s why.

Bottom line: If you can’t handle or accept that every fall weekend for the rest of your life will be consumed by football, move along.

It’s not like guys keep this shit a secret and then spring it on you two or three years into the relationship. We might fake it for one weekend early in the relationship to get laid. But once that door’s been kicked open, there’s no turning back.

As we men get older and have more responsibilities and less free time, football becomes even more important. It’s the one thing we can count on for distraction and enjoyment. Sometimes it’s the only thing.

Hey, no one’s holding a gun to your head. There are plenty of goateed or bearded guys out there just waiting to spend their Sunday afternoon at an antique sale.

Knock yourself out.

 

Fucking Jeff George

And there it was.

I’ve seen a lot of headlines on a lot of Web sites over the years, but nothing prepared me for this one:

“Raiders sign QB Jeff George”

Holy Fucking Shit.

I’ve never been a fan of the Raiders organization. Like a fish, it rots from the head down. Managing General Partner Al Davis, once formidable and respected, is now just an old man who has lost his way. An embarrassment. A fucking caricature.

Fans who have supported the vaunted Silver and Black for generations have turned their backs. Commitment to Excellence now sounds like a cruel taunt.

Those of you old enough (mid-40s) to remember when the Raiders were a proud and competitive franchise surely must be embarrassed by today’s signing.

Jeff George, perhaps, no, in fact, IS the living, breathing definition of a fucking loser, has been signed to play for the Raiders this season despite the fact that he hasn’t thrown a forward pass in competition in more than five years.

I can’t even dig deep enough inside myself to find the words that best articulate why this is both the saddest and most hilarious bit of news to hit the wire in the past decade or so.

Jesus Christ.

Jeff Fucking George.

He couldn’t be going to a better place.

An afternoon at a Raider game is worth burning if for no other reason than to completely debunk Creationism. The missing link(s) are on display all game long.

The best part about attending a Raider game is walking out to the parking lot after yet another loss and watching the faithful (so thoroughly fucked over by the team, the county, the refs, the league and the world) beat the living fuck out of each other with beer bottles, barbeque grills and parking cones.

A good half to three-quarters of all the people who paid between $51 and $71 each to “attend” spend the entirety of the game with their backs to the action, arms extended above their heads, screaming profanities and other unintelligible noises. The rest of the time, they’re either punching or kicking each other or somebody else who mistakenly thought they’d come to watch a professional football game.

So Jeff Fucking George, the prodigal son, returns.

Nothing makes more sense.

Fucking Mark McGwire

I’m no fan of Barry Bonds.

He was an asshole to teammates, fans and the media long before steroids and human growth hormones became such a hot-button issue. There’s no doubt in my mind that a fucking jerk of this pedigree was surely an asshole to his wife(s), friends and other family members as well.

Now the federal government, thwarted in its exhaustive efforts to nail his ass to the wall for juicing, is trying to make a tax evasion charge stick, alleging he forked over tens of thousands in undeclared memorabilia profits to one of his mistresses.

Fair or not, Bonds has become the de facto villain of the Steroids Era. And everyone wants to see this guy punished. They want the 73 home runs he hit in 2001 erased from the record books. They want to see him rot in jail.

Yet, another cocksucker who is at least as guilty and, in my mind, even more duplicitous has somehow managed to dodge both the long arm of the law and the undistilled venom of the sporting public.

Say what you want about Bonds, at least he’s still here taking his shots and facing the music.

You can’t say the same about Mark McGwire, the biggest pussy that ever walked the planet. Mr. Fucking “Morality” who went into the stands to bear hug Roger Maris’ relatives after hitting his 70th home run in 1998 and cried like a little girl when announcing the creation of the Mark McGwire Foundation for Children.

While I’m sure there are some legitimate medical reasons for it, I find it ironic that this coward’s foundation is primarily focused on helping children overcome chronic bed-wetting.

The last time most of the world saw Mark McGwire was when some stranger weighing at least 80 pounds less than the one who hit those 70 home runs showed up to testify before Congress on St. Patrick’s Day 2005.

With his fancy-boy reading glasses and his cliché green tie, he tried really hard to portray himself as a “regular” guy who just wanted to help Congress get to the bottom of the steroid issue. He famously said, again and again, that he “wasn’t here to talk about the past” and that he couldn’t answer any of the questions that would have “helped” Congress because “my lawyers have advised me that I cannot answer these questions without jeopardizing my friends, my family and myself.”

No shit.

You acne-riddled, constantly-injured, teary-eyed fraud, it was your friends, family and yourself who most benefited from the salary you earned while taking steroids throughout much of your career. You fucking cheated. You’re a fucking cheater. You were the guy who broke Roger Maris’ single-season home run record and you knew that you were juiced throughout the whole fantastic ride.

When you were hugging Maris’ relatives and bumping chests with Sammy Sosa and soaking in the thunderous applause at Busch Stadium that night, you had to know deep down inside that it was all a lie.

Fuck your fucking phony pleas on behalf of children you’ve never met. What about all the kids who looked up to you throughout your career only to learn that you cheated and, WORSE, never fessed up to it? You’re a fucking pussy of the highest order and a complete fraud.

During your testimony you said “I’m here to make a positive influence on this.”

Well, Mark, if you really wanted to make a positive influence you should have admitted to using performance-enhancing drugs, apologized and then committed yourself to a lifetime of public service. Instead of dodging the issue, you could have committed yourself to a lifetime of public service dedicated to educating kids about the severe physical and psychology damage steroids and HGH inflict on the human body.

But you “lawyered up” and made an embarrassing spectacle of yourself, erasing all the goodwill you managed to artificially engender during your career.

The truth is you deserve to be locked up in jail just as much as Barry Bonds or Rafael Palmeiro or any of the other cheaters who destroyed the integrity of the game for more than a decade.

But what do you care? You made close to $100 million in your bullshit career. You won a World Series ring, albeit one that was tainted by a mid-series interruption courtesy of the Loma Prieta earthquake. You lived and continue to live a life of privilege and luxury for playing a game that you felt compelled to cheat at in order to maintain your competitive edge.

It would be fascinating to see you explain that to your own son, much less the millions of other kids who idolized you throughout your bogus career.

Speaking of kids, if forced to choose between your sorry ass and Pete Rose as a role model for my kids, I’d take Rose in a heartbeat. He never cheated on the field. Flawed as he is and was, Pete Rose busted his ass and never took a shortcut to accomplish what he did on the field. Eventually, he took responsibility for his transgressions. You’re too much of a fucking coward to ever do that.

You’re a great case study for kids who want to learn how to get everything they want in life without really earning it.

Well, almost everything.

Next year, your name will come up for nomination into baseball’s Hall of Fame for the first time. There’s no doubt you WERE a slam-dunk, first-ballot Hall of Famer before you went and shit all over yourself during your congressional testimony. Those 583 home runs don’t inspire much awe these days. However, your career .263 batting average jumps off the page, especially to baseball writers who watched you add muscle mass at an incredulous rate throughout your entire career.

Today, there’s almost no chance you’ll be elected in your first year of eligibility. That’s bad news for you because as more and more of this scandal is exposed, the less likely it is that writers or current Hall of Famers will forgive your cheating ways.

You’re fucking out.

Fucking Unwanted Golf Partners

Few things in the universe piss me off more than showing up at the local golf course, either alone or with a friend, only to be saddled with a couple of ass fucks who invariably ruin the entire experience for me.

Anyone who golfs knows exactly what I’m talking about. Like it or not, you have to spend an entire morning or afternoon with complete strangers who seem to always say or do exactly the wrong thing(s) to stir the rage and utter contempt I usually try to hide from the world.

The problems start immediately as we all hover around the tee box in those awkward moments before the round begins. Eventually, someone will make a move to initiate the pre-tee shot introductions.

“Hey, how ya doin? I’m Mark.”

“Steve.”

“James. Nice to meet ya.”

“Connor.”

“What?”

“Connor.”

Hand shakes all around.

Yeah, yeah. Fucking “hi” and “good luck” to you, too. Connor.

By this point, I’ve got a pretty good idea of which of the two, if not both, is going to drive me fucking crazy for the next five hours. It might be the name, or the way they say their name, or the limp-ass handshake or the stupid fucking visor they’re wearing. It’s all the same. Only the names change.

Even after playing hundreds of rounds of golf, I can’t really say with any certainty how it’s decided who will hit first. But someone eventually steps into the tee box, plants a tee, places the ball and then steps back for a practice swing or two.

Here’s where it all starts. Always, ALWAYS, the first guy spends a good 20 seconds telling everyone else how long it’s been since he played. Or about the new driver he’s not sure he can control. Or how tight his fucking back is. Whatever. Just hit the fucking ball.

Four or five practice swings later, the ball is (usually) struck. I don’t give a shit about the quality of your play. If you’re out here at a municipal course on a weekend, chances are you’re not just getting in a practice round or two before heading out for Augusta. Me neither.

From time to time, I’ll hit a good shot. Maybe even string together a couple decent holes. But for the most part, I’m just happy to score in the 90s. I’m here to have fun, hit some balls around, drink some beer and tease the shit out of my friend. That’s it.

Despite these relatively modest aspirations, I almost never seem to achieve my goal because of all the fucking morons randomly assigned to my foursome. After years of watching these fucks in action, I’ve learned that most fall into one or more of the following categories:

THE INSTRUCTOR: These are the guys, usually in their 50s and 60s, who can’t play a round of golf without offering unsolicited and painfully obvious advice to everyone in the group. It usually comes immediately after the first tee shot of the day. Sadly, these cocksuckers are also incapable of recognizing subtle and non-subtle social cues from recipients who clearly don’t want nor care for their fucking shit-ass advice.

With rare exception, the summation of The Instructor’s vast wisdom always boils down to: 1)You’re not keeping your head down or 1A) You’re rushing your swing/swinging too hard.

Really? Here’s a bit of unsolicited advice for you, Grandpa: Shut your fucking mouth before I wheel around, take a measured back swing, keep my head down all the way through and release the business end of this titanium driver into the sorry-ass sack of fucking hanging meat that you call a torso. You hear me, old man? I’m not fucking around. One more “tip from a pro” out of you and the only advice you’ll be dispensing in the near future is how to properly attach a colostomy bag.

Playtime is over. You get one free “get out of the emergency room” card per round. You’ll know your card’s been redeemed when, after my errant shot and your fucking pedestrian analysis, I look you right in the eye and say ‘No shit, Tiger’ while simultaneously lighting a cigarette.

THE PRO: These motherfuckers crop up from time to time, usually with the wrap-around shades and freshly pressed khakis, the fucking Polo shirt tucked in just so. He’s the one who lines up every putt as if his Tour card was on the line.

He’ll shoot in the high 70s but all you’ll hear is him bitching about stuff like his “fade” or how “they” need to re-sand the bunkers and aerate the greens more often. What’s most frustrating about this breed of cat is that The Pro has little tolerance for the wayward shots and general indifference that afflict the rest of the foursome. And he won’t hide it.

He’s the kind of fuck-o that makes you feel uncomfortable taking yet another mulligan after your tee shot ends up in the woods, lake or, more likely, in the middle of fairway about 50 feet from the tee box.

Hey, Arnie, would you prefer to wait around as we hack-hack-hack-hack our way up and across the fairway for the next 10 minutes or just sit tight for another 10 seconds so we can hit a playable ball? Fuckhead.

He’s the guy who wants everyone to patiently wait the good two minutes he takes to survey the undulations and breaks of every green before his 20-foot putt (which he always leaves short because he’s such a pussy) but strides off to the next tee while me and my buddy three-putt our way to another set of 8s.

On those rare occasions when one of us actually plays well and musters a par or birdie, this fucking asshole doesn’t say shit despite the fact that we’ve lauded his pars, birdies and screaming drives all afternoon long. Fuck you. And, what the fuck do you think you’re doing? We saw your two-putt. I’ve got honors.

Go back to your cart, put another clump of fucking Copenhagen in your mouth, check your fucking Blackberry and watch as we take a couple mulligans to celebrate our lone par of the day.

THE SOCIALIZER: Hate this species with a passion. More often than not, this guy sneaks up on you. He’ll wait a hole or two and then it all starts with something as innocuous as ‘So, where do you guys live?’ or ‘What do you do for a living?’

I’ve taken to inventing different personalities, hometowns, professions, even sexual preferences to ward off the endless small talk that accompanies The Socializer. I’m not a dick. I’ll answer the first five or six questions and reply in kind.

But more often than not, his little Q&A is nothing more than a precursor to tell us all how important he thinks he is and how little this round of golf means to him in the grand scheme of things.

“So, you’re a stockbroker, huh?” he’ll say two holes after the information was disseminated. “Yeah, I’ve got an online account with Schwab. Doing really well. Got Altria at 48 and National Semi at 16. But in the past year I’ve mostly been in gold and copper.”

Bullshit. You mean you read the Journal this morning while you were shitting out yesterday’s tuna salad on focaccia and, worse, only skimmed the headlines. Fucknut.

This shit was especially obvious and pathetic back in about 1999 when every golfer forced upon me was holding several thousand shares of AOL, Cisco and fucking JDS Uniphase. Amazing the portfolios held by some of the guys I played golf with who always drove off in their Accords and 626s.

Look, you perineum-soup drinking, fucking Johnny Come Lately, constantly interrupting, small-time piker, I come out here to play golf with my friend in an attempt to forget about everything else that constitutes the reality of my life. I don’t want to hear you recite your CV and gush about the “best” sushi place in Toronto.

I don’t fucking eat sushi. It tastes like shit. And fuck Canada. Fucking freeloaders.

Go home and tell your wife about your great investment strategies, your real estate coups and your sexual conquests. I’m sure this will all be news to her.

THE SCOREKEEPER: Yeah, you know who you are. You’re the fucking annoying little parrot cunt that asks COMPLETE FUCKING STRANGERS their score after every fucking putt out. “What’d you get?” “So was that 5 or a 6?” “How’d you do?”

First of all, we haven’t made any wagers. We’re not competing in any fucking tournament. I sure as hell don’t ask nor give a shit about whatever score you’re inventing for yourself, so why are you asking me for mine? Dickhead.

Just take your little fucking pencil and write what you want for us just as you are for your own score. Make it interesting. Keep it close. Build some drama. Whatever you do, don’t fucking ask me again.

If you’re a purist, interested only for the purpose of determining who should tee off first at the next hole, let me save you some time: You’re up!

Don’t want to go first? Fine, get the fuck out of the way. Whatever. Just stop pestering me like a 4 year-old, you fucking passive aggressive jackass.

You want to use MY score as a measuring stick for your play. Fine. Keep it to yourself. If you’re so fucking interested, just count my strokes. If you can’t pull that off, guesstimate. I don’t give a shit. I’m not interested in “convincing” you of my score, good or bad.

As a matter of fact, the same rule applies to my handicap, the manufacturer of my clubs, the particular club I will/did use and anything else you think is important enough to open your cum-gurgling mouth about. For kicks, sometimes I’ll indulge this asshole for my own sadistic pleasure.

“So what was that for you?”

“What’d you get?”

“Five.”

“Four.”

Fucking Bicyclists

Every morning and afternoon, I see you stupid motherfuckers pedaling your little two-wheelers up and down the crowded, commute-strangled streets of the city. You fucking assholes.

Maybe you're trying to get a little exercise. Maybe you think you're doing something good for the environment. Maybe you don't have a car. Whatever.

Everyday, one or two of you jackasses comes within a whisker of being crushed beyond recognition by a bus or ragdolled by a Tahoe. And no one would care or sympathize.

Why not?

Because you believe red lights and stop signs don't apply to you. And you think that lane splitting is your God-given right. You don't get out of the way, you don't yield to faster moving traffic and you always have that pissy, indignant look on your face.

You must be a degenerate gambler to lay such long odds against human nature. You've got a warrior's heart but the common sense of a squirrel. I wonder how long it takes you to clean up after you peel off those fucking ridiculous biker panties to mop up the shit that involuntarily oozed out your ass after yet another near-miss with an Escalade.

You think you have a right to share the street with other people safely tucked inside their steel vehicles? Well you don't. And even if you have a legal right, it won't fucking matter when I slam into your rear wheel at 30 mph just to see what'll happen.

You must be all about pyrrhic victories. You're the kind of guy who has to be paralyzed or killed before you figure out that maybe your "passion" for pedaling won't be accommodated nor appreciated by thousands of angry, Starbucks-adled people safely bunkered down in two-and-half tons of steel and glass.

Hey, at least your friends and family will have an icebreaker at your internment. 'Well, you know, he DID have a right to be there. The guy just never saw him.'

Here's the deal: Rails are for trains. Waterways are for boats. The sky is for airplanes. Streets are for automobiles. Sidewalks are for pedestrians.

You want to relive the summer of your 11th year? Do it on a lightly traveled suburban sidestreet. Or at a velodome. Otherwise, get the fuck out of the way.

Call me old-fashioned, but if you want to ride a little bike, get your ass over to the FAR FUCKING RIGHT SIDE of the street. If you can't navigate the parked cars, the sewer grates or the double-parked delivery trucks, go buy a fucking car. Or take a bus. Or a cab. Or walk.

Just because a bike can fit onto the street, doesn't mean it belongs. Shit, I can fit my car onto a sidewalk without any problem. And have, many times.

And, by the way, that stupid-ass "LiveStrong" bracelet that you're wearing doesn't make you Lance Armstrong.

To be Lance Armstrong, you'd have to: get testicular cancer; become completely dependent on your wife as she nurses you back to health; then, once your cancer goes into remission, better-deal her for a rock star; take performance-enhancing drugs and dope your blood while winning (multiple times) a race that no one really cares about; dump the rock star just as she's, ironically, diagnosed with cancer; threaten the media and former colleagues and competitors who know about your cheating ways; host the ESPY Awards where you will suck ass and have your ass sucked by people who don't know anything about you or the person you really are and, finally, thankfully, fade away into both infamy and anonymity.

Fucking Carpool Lane Addiction

I’m addicted to illegally using the carpool lane.

It started out innocently enough. I just wanted to pass some jackass doing 55 mph in front of me and had to temporarily access the carpool lane to make it happen.

But as soon as I passed the fuck, I found myself unable to return to the original lane, which I’ve learned the government mockingly refers to as the “general purposes” lane.

I’m too good for the general purposes lane. Do you hear me?

I felt a rush of adrenaline and extreme euphoria as I whizzed past car after car after car. I kept telling myself ‘Okay, that’s good enough. You’ve made up a ton of ground. Get your ass back where you belong.’

But I couldn’t do it.

I kept on breaking the law all the way to my exit. When I finally merged over to catch my exit, I felt like I’d gotten away with murder, chuckling to myself and congratulating myself for such a shrewd maneuver.

I knew I’d do it again.

The sign says only cars with at least two occupants can access this Autobahn between the hours of 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. and 7 p.m. I think, anyway. I don’t pay any attention to these signs anymore. They make me feel guilty.

The threat of a minimum fine of $271 does nothing to deter me. That’s probably because I haven’t been caught yet.

That’s not to say that I’m ALWAYS in the carpool lane. No, I pick and choose my spots.

For starters, every morning I abuse the carpool lane when I’m on the onramp to the freeway. When I see a line of 10 or 20 or even just four cars patiently waiting their turn for the green light to merge onto the freeway, I laugh and call them “suckers” as I use the diamond lane to make my entry.

After that crime, which in all honesty probably only saves me 2 to 5 minutes, I immediately throw on my left-turn signal and get my ass over into the carpool lane for the brutal five-mile stretch of bumper-to-bumper traffic that my “general purposes” brethren must endure to the next freeway interchange.

As I drive past the hundreds if not thousands of cars, I know many frustrated commuters take a peek into my car to confirm whether or not I’m allowed to use the lane. But the features of my vehicle make it difficult to ascertain the exact number of occupants standing still and all but impossible as I scream past them at 82 mph.

The cheating is repeated in the evening through this same congested stretch of freeway, shaving at least 40 minutes of total commute time off my daily route. That’s 40 minutes of free time that I can better spend being bitter and angry about something else.

I know it’s wrong.

As I cheat along, I’m constantly checking my mirrors, the traffic ahead, and all the shitty little places that CHP motorcycle pigs like to hide in the hopes of catching me. I feel like I’m transporting a couple dozen kilos of cocaine in my car with expired tags, broken tail lights and a string of aluminum cans tied to my bumper.

Once or twice, I had to quick duck into the general purpose lane when I was uncertain of the make and model of the dark-colored sedan behind me in the carpool lane. I’ve actually been in the carpool lane and passed pigs on the side of the road who caught other offenders who surely deserved their tickets more than I do. Fuck ‘em.

I tried to go straight once.

From the morning entry to final exit of the evening, I was a good little boy. I stayed in the general purpose lanes. I endured the aggravating stop-and-go traffic through the worst part of the commute. Both ways. I fucking hated it. I loathed the carpoolers who whizzed past me.

I think I saw a couple cheaters and it pissed me off. I hated them and prayed they’d be caught and fined. They weren’t. They got away with it.

I knew I’d be back in the carpool lane the next morning, refreshed and perhaps absolved of all my previous cheats.

It’s not the life for everyone.

Once you start, you’re in for the long haul.

Every morning and evening, I have to psych myself up by convincing myself that there really is another passenger in my car. Visualize who it is, what they’re wearing and develop some storyline in your head that would explain why the sole passenger in the vehicle is sitting in the backseat.

I’m serious. You can’t be a half-assed cheater, spending some time in the general purpose lane and then poaching in the carpool lane at strategic points along your commute. That’s a rookie move.

You have to own the carpool lane. Everything about the way you merge, change lanes, accelerate, check your mirrors, hold your facial expression, listen to the radio and dial up your buddies on your cell phone has to be done with an air of entitlement.

NEVER, EVER make eye contact with anyone on the road. Don’t read the posted signs that clearly define who can and cannot use the carpool lane. They will only fuck with your head. And go really fucking fast.

You have to accept that eventually, the pigs will catch you. I spend a good minute or two everyday practicing my “Aw Shucks” speech for this occasion. I’ve mentally written the check to pay the fine a couple dozen times.

But I can’t stop. There’s no going back to that shit now.