What a weekend. Well, all that time spent searching for a decent priced 2002 Acura RSX finally paid off. Little did I know, all it took was a trip down to San Antonio to be treated like a customer. A rundown of events:

Friday Night - Emily and I travel down to San Antonio, making a midnight cannonball run. I had to bring my "financial muscle" along, because nobody would expect somebody as sweet as her to be the definitive HAG OF SAVINGS as she would transform into. After blowing two hours going down the backroads of Texas to miss the enormous traffic of IH-35, we showed up and all went well. To make a long story short, we drove home in a new ride. The saddest thing? Seeing my ole' 98' Integra (aka 'The Moisterizer') sitting all desolate in the parking lot.

The funny thing was, after we completed a majority of the sale, I asked to borrow a screwdriver to get my amp and subwoofer out. With my ass in the air and the Integra a' rockin', it was quite a site to see as Emily held up a lighter so I could unscrew everything. We looked like bandits--bandits with a SWEEET G'RIDE!

Saturday - Had to show off the car to all my buddies. First off, we had my sister Linda with us as we showed it off to the Triolas. I could smell my insurance premium go up as they asked: "Can we drive it?" hahah just kidding. Afterwards, swung by Troy and Angela's where I found out they were heading to Vegas in October. Hope they have a good time and come back with more than they left with! My "Personal EffecX Posse" (aka Meth and Wally) ran through the gadgets and gave me their thumbs of approval.

We went to the Austin City Limits Festival afterwards. To sum it up: 1.) Sun is hot. 2.) Wilco rocks! Ran into Dames and Joey and all four of us waited an hour to buy hot-dogs. Hey, at least they were good. Went home to wring the sweat from my shirt and baseball cap.

Sunday - Went to day two of the festival. Shuttle Bus almost breaks down going towards the festival. Everything looks dim when the A/C is intermittingly going on/off. Show up with enough time to watch Mr. Ryan Adams who put on an AMAZING set. Better than Wilco I could safely say and one of the better performances i've seen. Just slightly shy of THE greatest performance I had ever seen: A stocky Italian man wriggling and dancing to the beat of disco. I'll let you guys guess who that could be. =P

Sleep. Sleep...and more sleep.

Peace!
posted by The H.Bomb| 5:31 PM | email | archive

A Big screw you to David McDavid and for fucking over what could of been, a repeat customer. Let me ask you something, after insulting my intelligence and undervaluing my car 50%, you figure there would be some damage control to be done at David McDavid Acura of Austin. No phone calls asking how my visit was, no nothing.

Well, good riddance. The good people at GUNN Acura of San Antonio not only gave me what I was expecting for my trade-in, also undersold David McDavid on the new car without me even mentioning what David McDavid offered.

I hope that same snake that told me those lies (COUGH GREG FINANCIAL MANAGER) searchs Google and finds this. On top of that, the ENTIRE staff of GUNN Acura stayed with me hours past their closing time on a Friday Night to complete the sale. They never once hurried me, made us feel comfortable and treated Emily and I with more respect than the experience of my first purchase at David McDavid.

Fortunately for David McDavid, they have a very courteous Service Center and will still keep my business when it comes to my new car. As for that jackass Greg The Finance Manager Barbarian, he can wrap his serpetine around that NSX exhaust pipe and blow it out his ass. Because your incompetence, your disregard of customer service and rude behavior, it got me in a Silver 2002 RSX from a competitor.

This award goes out to you my friend, without you, we now know that your entire front end of your dealership isn't much more than a Pirate Ship waiting to plunder, rape and steal. Congrats!
posted by The H.Bomb| 9:47 PM | email | archive

Greg, the Finance Manager at David McDavid Acura: "Hey Hai, in regards to your trade in, just grab your ankles and let me finance you in the ass." For real, i'm spittin' mad. Went in, got a decent price for a 2002 Acura RSX Automatic and went to get my old g-ride appraised. The Antiques Road Show monkey over at the used car division offers 50% of the listed TRADE IN value of my car. No way in hell I say!

So they send out the big guns. Greg, THE Finance Manager who has the gaul to lie to my face and offers me a simple solution: "Hey, I can ask you to leave my lot right now!". Wow! I'm sure he recieved many 5 gold stars at those Customer Service Workshops. After calling him on his bluff and REITERATING my stance that he is indeed lying to me, he backs down: "Hey, i'm just trying to help you out."

The lie you ask? "No bank will finance a car (my trade-in) with 90,000 miles on it." I have two witnesses that can verify that is EXACTLY what the FINANCE manager is telling me.

I should of thrown my cell phone on the table and ask him to call every local bank within a mile radius and ask if they financed cars with that many miles on it. The very intersting thing is even the FINANCE manager, who has no business even looking at the value of a trade-in, says I have some door-dings. Apparently, $4,000.00 dollars worth of door dings. I'd hate to see what one of those "Grateful Dead Dancing Bears" stickers takes off the value of a car.

After all was said and done, that tool walks off and doesn't come back for quite some time (after offering to get another David McDavid Financial Wizard to back up his claim). The funniest thing is that Emily was with me who is now a First Level Loan Officer at her Credit Union and was able to repute everything the guy said, in regards to bank finances. When the H-Dog requests backup, he get's it! Now on to GUNN Acura in San Antonio! No repeat customer here YOU LIARS!
posted by The H.Bomb| 8:50 AM | email | archive

Yasser Arafat ousts West Bank Idol finalist Ariel Sharon by a slim margin; "Waited a lifetime for a moment like this." After a powerful live performance, Yasser Arafat won the hearts of millions of viewers and became the first West Bank Idol last night. Shortly after singing his own cover of Fleetwood Mac's 'Go Your Own Way', the phone lines were clogged with votes for Arafat and the other West Bank Idol finalist, Ariel Sharon. Although both contestants were weeded down from a field of hundreds, both conceded that "there are many beautiful, talented people out there who deserve this as much as we do." Ariel Sharon, current Prime Minister of Israel, performed first. He sang The Ohio Players 1976 hit 'Who'd She Coo?', which many experts regarded as the superior performance. Randy Jackson, one of the three talent panelists, remarked "Dude, you got it bro! YOU GOT IT!" to Sharon's singing. It was evident which of the two had a better stage presence and crowd charisma. Arafat, a former cocktail waiter from Oklahoma and the current President of Palestine, saundered onto the stage and swaggered to the music. With balet like leaps and frequent winks and nods to the mostly female crowd, he made sure that everyone went home with a smile. "Sometimes, I feel so alive out there on the stage." Arafat said in a phone interview. "When I was out there singing like a bastard Lindsey Buckingham, I made sure that I 'shook some tush' as well." So what does the founder of the Al Fatah and former leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization say after winning the competition? "Cool Beans!" "I was like, totally shocked." Arafat explained, "I mean, Ariel is such a beautiful guy and can sing like nobody's business. I would have of totally been ok with him winning...but I'm sure glad I did!" Yasser Arafat will release his first single for The West Bank Idol compilation this December with the songs 'Before Your Love/A Moment Like This'.

posted by The H.Bomb| 11:12 PM | email | archive

New G-Ride. The gamble of waiting for my timing belt to be replaced is on. Not that there is any indication that it's going to go out, just the recommended lifespan is coming up. Not one to shell out more bucks for a new one, the option of purchasing a new car has come up. I'm thinking thrifty this time and looking at a 2003 Toyota Carolla S. Silver, just like my baby's. Since the ravages of old age are hitting me hard, a four door is going to have to be a little more practical in my already eXtreme lifestyle.

We looked at the Matrix yesterday too. As much as I like it, it does seem too much like a chick's car, plus the price is more than i'd wish to pay. Why the sudden interest in Toyota vehicles? After driving Honda's all my life, I figure it's time to change it up a little. Get a little 'wild' as they call it.

A couple more days until the Austin City Limit's Festival. Can't wait to see Wilco / Ryan Adams!!!


posted by The H.Bomb| 1:36 PM | email | archive

Austin City Limits Festival. Gonna go check out 14-acres of music this weekend at Zilker Park here in Austin, TX. I'm pretty sure it's gonna be chocked full of bleepin' rednecks and downtown hipsters--but hey, it's all about the music right? Check out the entire lineup here.
posted by The H.Bomb| 3:59 PM | email | archive

My Big Fat Greek Chick-Flick. Yeah, saw the new Indie hit My Big Fat Greek Wedding last night with Emily. How did the H-Dog get dragged into this one? Payback. After a slew of summer blockbusters, it was time to pay the piper and sludge it through an hour and a half of Lifetime Network caliber stuff. Now, the film wasn't that bad. The love story behind it seemed too much a diapause for the racial humor of the movie, which isn't a bad thing (it was it's best trait). Yet, I could see Emily's smug face snuggle down in her theater chair with that 'Now this is what I call a movie!' look.

Don't get me wrong, i'll be the first guy to admit that I've liked some girly films like Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones and the entire Die Hard Trilogy, but I think this one had a bit too much chicksapeel.

In other news, The Houston Texans are going to the playoffs with a 10-6 record in my Franchise Mode NFL 2K3, New Comic Strip Out, and Emily starts her new position. Good luck!

Song of the Day:
1.) Radiohead - I Might Be Wrong.
posted by The H.Bomb| 9:49 AM | email | archive

Tarantino's back. Just read a script review of 90's Film Noir darling and one of my personal favorite writer/director's upcoming movie, Kill Bill, and the results are mixed. I can't wait.
posted by The H.Bomb| 3:40 PM | email | archive

Oh man..oh man.. Phillipe hooded pullovers!! where's my credit card..
posted by The H.Bomb| 9:18 AM | email | archive

Asian Farmers May Sow 'Super Rice' in Two Years.
Wed Sep 18,12:25 AM ET
BEIJING (Reuters) - Farmers in key rice-producing Asian countries are expected to start growing high-yielding "super rice" in two to three years to feed rising populations, a senior scientist from a non-government organization said.

Use of the hybrid rice, now grown on 50,000 hectares of farmland in China and being tested abroad, is expected to expand steadily, Gurdev Khush, consultant at the International Rice Research Institute, told Reuters late Tuesday.

Whoo. That's good news for me!


posted by The H.Bomb| 8:33 AM | email | archive

Whoo! Phillipe T-Shirts at achewood.com! Order some now!
posted by The H.Bomb| 11:46 AM | email | archive

Whew. Thanks to everyone for making my birthday truely s-s-spectactular! Never has growing old been so meaningful, thanks for everybody's well wishes, happy birthday's and I can't wait till' everybody elses comes around--because payback's a bitch!

Thank you's:

The WESSSIDE Lowriders - Meth and Wally
Troy/Angela
Jake/Amy
The General
Mr. Funn (aka The Gimp)
The Triola's
My Old School Krew
The White's
Linda, Julie, John (aka The Fever), Mom and the rest of the Asiatics
My Work Posse
All my brothaz in lockdown and death row
The Crenshaw Dogg Pound at The Saltgrass
All my peeps working the rides at Six Flags

and of course Emily, who I love with all my heart (can you say that on the 'web'??) ahhhhh.... =P

PEACE!


posted by The H.Bomb| 1:14 AM | email | archive

24. I be creepin' up on my twenty fouth' b-day, yo. This is that crap age just like 20. You know, all these people talking about how your body get's creaky and dilapitated the older you get--whatever man. This fine tuned machine I call 'My Body' is still kicking it. Sure, there was that "slept on my neck wrong" mishap a couple weeks ago, but that was pure ergonomics, not the degredation of this temple.

Anyways, gonna get ready for Six Flags this weekend!
posted by The H.Bomb| 12:01 PM | email | archive

September 11th. Man, what the hell do you say someone today? "Happy Sept. 11th, man!". Sheesh. Everybody here at work watched most of the anniversary stuff they've been playing on the Networks. The most chilling thing? All the Post-Sept. 11th paranoia and urban legends sprouting up like wildflowers. Everything from Bin Laden's small penis envy to those damn "Nostradamus" predictions.

Weird thing is, my mom's flying back from California today. Hope everything goes ok. I guess the rates were cheaper today--doh!

Song of the Day:
1.) Grant Lee Buffalo - Truly, Truly.
posted by The H.Bomb| 10:34 AM | email | archive

Signs. Went to go see Signs yesterday. A pretty cool flick. Emily, of course, couldn't watch most of it without covering her eyes. After all was said and done she goes: "It wasn't that scary. But I dunno, if I was in that situation (in the movie) I'd shit my pants!" Well, seeing how you almost shit your pants just watching them go through that situation, i'll take your word for it! =P

Since we're on the topic of shitting our pants, I think I shat in my pants way back in the day. It wasn't from being scared, but from a slight discomfort in my stomach regions (which has had rebel resurgances in my later years--mostly quelled these coups with equal dose of Delta Force Pepto and Navy SEAL Kaopectate). I think I was at a Kindergarten field trip to the zoo. When that Elephant turned slightly to rear it's MASSIVE manhood, the gates to my bowels opened up, much akin to Hannibal crossing the alps into Roman Italy to reap havoc and general tom foolery. Are you grossed out yet? I probably made that up. ;)

Man, hopped up on the Drixoral this morning. Those dang allergies be creeping, so I'm not taking any chances. The caffienated coffee is doing wonders for the sedation of the meds. I need to go pee again. Peace!


posted by The H.Bomb| 11:24 AM | email | archive

posted by The H.Bomb| 9:58 PM | email | archive

"No Mr. President. I'm not sure who's gonna win it. Kelly? That talentless bitch? I don't think so bro! What's that? A.J.? I'm pretty sure he's not gay." Justin turns to A.J. "Hey, are you gay? George, he said he wasn't. Yeah, I know. Ha!" Pauses. "Sure. You can search my hair for terrorists."

posted by The H.Bomb| 2:03 PM | email | archive

Work updates. Some updates going on here at my workplace:

1.) German Engineering...and tech support? Our Micro-Drill station wasn't working the other day. This is a high dollar piece of equipment, engineered and manufactured in Germany. It has very high precision stages as well as the ability to do drill holes smaller than the diameter of your hair. So Albert sends an email to the German headquarters asking what the deal is. The damn thing won't power up. He get's a response in this manner: A.) Open the back panel up behind the machine. B.) Look for a green box that housed in the assembly. C.) Take a hammer and hit the green box. I'm not kidding you. But then Albert says: "I'll be damned. It worked."

2.) Power supplies. I'm working on this redesign of this son of a biatch project that I did last year. It originally took me three days to complete it...well they want me to do it again because they made some changes. Anyways, two hours of peddling away, making some great progress when BAM! the breaker overloads and my computer shuts off. As Dave was telling me afterwards (to some degree): "When the power goes out on a computer, the Devil bitches and moans but-- Jesus Saves." Doh.
posted by The H.Bomb| 1:55 PM | email | archive

I'll take a minute to describe my weekend-- It was one of drinking, of having fun and mostly of the seering Texas heat. Friday night, we talked the The Champ into going downtown with Emily, her brother Frank, New Jersey and myself downtown. I can't really recall where we went to first, but I do know that Emily's brother and her cousin got smoked at their own game: Pool. At first, I was to think that this was another case of "The Color of Money", where they were going to kick some ass, but it wasn't. That's alright, because these guys were **REAL** good. I mean, they could get the pool balls in the those holes on the table. Amazing. =P

Afterwards, there was some discussion to head to Casino El Camino, a local devil worshiping bar that included some of the friendliest Satanic wait staff on the face of the planet. Actually, it has affiliation to the netherworld, but I couldn't resist writing about it in that manner because that's how everybody described it as.

More talks of relocation continued and we finally ended up at some bar down the street. The odd thing is, we ran into Damien and his buddies from out of town in there. Also, my bouyant dancing was described as "embarrassing" and "totally embarrassing" by a one, Emily. It's just another case of jealousy, because my skills on the dance floor cannot be contended with--except for at the Wedding Sat. Night, which I'll go into detail later.

Saturday's wedding was held at St. Catherine's in South Austin. The ceremony was very nice, especially the part with the pyrotechnics and then the complete Jazzercise cast came running out, handing everybody a program. Hahah, that didn't happen suckers. The reception was at the Hyatt on Town Lake at the 17th floor. When we got into the elevators, the buttons only went up to the 16th. "Is it on the roof? Like in that cool Guns N' Roses video"? Nope, we had to walk up the grand staircase to the 17th floor, which had a beauitful view of Town Lake and Downtown Austin.

Some interesting moments:

Uncle James from the other family walks up to Emily's mom, smelling of beer:
"Hiya there. Name's Uncle James, but alot of people call me Fiesty."
"Well, hi Uncle James."
"I just came over to welcome you to the family." Proceeds to squeeze some prime butt.
"Oh! Ok..Well, thank you Uncle James!"
"No..thank you." Smirks, walks off.

I was close enough to the conversation to hear about that much. Of course, i'm not totally sure if it went like that, but my memory has never failed me before. =P Emily's brother did an awesome Spider-Man Dance thing on the wall that left me in hysterics. Do you have to take years of dance conditioning for that?

Anyways--The quality moment came though when Emily's dad did a rousing rendition of...the only way to describe it is: A Stocky Italian man flailing arms and legs for dear life. The entire room was flabergasted, wondering "Where does he get these skills?" Nobody wanted to dance during this--I mean, how in the heck do you follow that up? Quality stuff.

When the reception was over, I went home and crashed. Yesterday, went to Damien's BBQ he was having in honor of his friend from out of town. Was a nice little gathering where alot of dance moves were exchanged. They decided to go out and do the 6th Street again, but we opted not to go.

Well, that was my weekend. I'm chilling out here at home for the rest of the day, and trying to finish up today's strip. Take it easy.

Song of the Day:
1.) How Emily looked Saturday night: Eric Clapton - You Look Wonderful Tonight. I know: Awwwww..you guys are disgustingly disgusting!
posted by The H.Bomb| 6:44 PM | email | archive