The Best Butler Toast

The Best Butler role is a time-honored position dating back to ancient Greece. Terminology coined as a play on words: a Maid of Honor is the indentured servant of the bride while a man-servant, or butler, serves the groom.

In weddings where the Best Butler is called upon, the Best Man generally serves as a figurehead. Duties such as the bachelor party, tuxedo fires, and making it rain may transfer from Best Man to Best Butler. Truly, the Best Butler is there to be the man behind the Best Man behind the groom. A well respected three-way.

This past weekend popped my Best Butler cherry as I serviced one of my Best Friends and helped him marry his lady. After 24 hours of brainstorming, 12 hours of memorization, 6 shots of Crown Royal, and 3 beers, my toast went a little something like this...

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My name's ShavedGolf, and for those of you who don't know me, I went to university with the bride and groom. I also happen to be the groom's Best Butler, which the bride assures me is a title of endearment. I'll keep this brief because no one wants to hear the Best Butler ramble.

To start this toast off right, I need to address all the ladies in the audience: yes, it's true, I am single. However, I can speak from experience of being in a committed relationship, the one question guaranteed to get to the guy: when are you getting married?!!

The groom has fielded that question for as long as I've known him...and maybe longer.

Now...I'm not saying this to call people out because I'm as guilty as anyone else. I too went to the groom, maybe a couple times, to ask, "Hey man, so...what's the game plan? I just wanna know what I can expect. What sort of timeline are we thinking here?"

The groom's answer was short and probably well rehearsed, "ShavedGolf," he said, "we'll get married when we're ready."

Obviously that day has come as we celebrate tonight the commitment these two best friends have made to one another. I'm honored to be a part of this ceremony and I couldn't be happier for both of you.

So here's a toast, to two of my best friends, who took their time, did things their way and did things the right way by them.

To the bride and groom!

xoxo,
ShavedGolf

Amusing Searches: The First

Blog maintenance is a bitch. Each week I wrack my brain for trivial tidbits and pull some random topic out of my ass that's just entertaining enough to keep you fockers coming back for more. Failure to entertain leads to dwindling readership. Dwindling readership leads to a deflated ego. Deflated ego leads to erectile dysfunction. So you see, I MUST entertain to maintain this prose boner.

This week the audience will be entertained with its own creativity. I've kept an eye on the blog stats and collected some of the off the wall shit you people are searching that somehow lands you on my page.

Of course, I can't just leave you with your own idiocy, so I ridiculed the searches for your viewing pleasure. Please enjoy.

sexual hand gestures
Undoubtedly searched by a naive junior high school administrator confused by hand gestures being made by unruly adolescents. He wants to write them up, but had to consult my blog for evidence of their wrongdoing.

jedi regret
Clearly a mistake. This search is a paradox. First, Jedis do not make mistakes, so there's nothing to regret. Second, regret is an emotion, and Jedis don't have that shit. Fucking, noob.

is my plasma donation fee tax deductible?
Are you seriously coming to Blogger for tax advice? That's like using Wikipedia to write a research paper or relying on Urban Dictionary for Scrabble reference. Next up, soliciting legal advice on your Facebook wall.

disguised masturbator
A plethora of meanings could be drawn from this search. Masturbator dresses up in costume for a roll play scenario to spice up love life with self. Masturbator disguises self to blend with surrounds and surprise attach unsuspecting victims. Masturbator disguises action of self pleasure for the purpose of performing publicly (see: Mike Cooper).

pubic floss
You sick fuck.

army men fighting godzilla
Truly an unfair match up. There isn't a military force on the planet capable of taking out Godzilla. Fuck...if Matthew Broderick couldn't do it, what chance do army men have?

dub mother f*cking step shirts
I get it. Dubstep is popular. Wait. No I don't. This shit looks like the crappy animatronics at the Pirates of the Caribean ride. Dubstep is the robot reborn. Shame on you for liking it and the shirts they make about it. But more importantly: how the fuck did this search get you to my blog?!

Ahhh...just reached prose boner climax.

xoxo,
ShavedGolf

The Real 99

Portland weekend news coverage television was dominated by Occupy Portland protesters and the Portland Police efforts to retake Chapman and Lownsdale Squares. The cluster fuck was entertaining for five minutes.

Anticipation spurred on by the events of the Oakland occupation had me hoping for so much more. Tear gas rolling along at ground level of the muddied parks. Police hurling stun grenades. Occupiers returning fire with concrete and Molotov cocktails. Police on horseback mowing bitches down. Occupiers lighting street fires and tipping cars. Police wielding batons and slapping unruly fuckers.

Instead, I was treated to docile police, crippled by local politicians and cell phone cameras, politely handling the uncouth mob. Chanting crowds almost obediently following orders. Portland Police asking, by show of hands, who would like to be arrested and then obliging the request. All followed by a tedious period of confusion and indecision on the part of the occupiers attempting to make their next move. Seemingly the most courteous eviction ever.

Truly horrible television.

Perhaps if the showdown had gone the way of my occupation crackdown fantasies, I wouldn't have found myself so pissed at the interruption of my weekend football routine. But as it was, local media, foaming at the mouth and wanting something to happen as desperately as their audience, kept on rolling through some of my NFL R&R.

I raged.

The experience drew me to one conclusion: the occupation is done. At the point the movement can't hold my interest during a lethargic Sunday and I opt to wash dishes and do laundry instead, we have a problem.

I'm not a part of the 1%, but I'm sure as hell not a part of what has been dubbed the 99%. I'm the Real 99. I'm plugged in. Hold a job. Own a car. Rent an apartment. I contribute to the GDP. And after a hard week, I like to occupy the couch with my ass, turn on the TV, and veg out to some fucking football.

I don't think it goes too far to say that I've earned that right.

Now don't get me wrong. I'm sympathetic to the idea of protesting for beliefs. Raising awareness through protest is a fantastic way of exercising the right to freedom of speech. However, the period following awareness must be filled with action.

The systemic issue with the Occupy movements across the US is their impotence to incite change. Rhetoric pours out from the camps, but inactivity diminishes the goal. Change will only be sparked by action. Start at the grassroots. Create community outreach. Get involved with charities. Form a PAC.

Change will be spurred by doers not complainers. Be the catalyst.

Alternatively, my advice is simply to go home. Because while you're out in the winter cold occupying some clod of dirt that used to resemble a city park, the 1% is getting richer and laughing at you.

And the next time you decide to get semi riotous, please consider all football schedules.

xoxo,
ShavedGolf

Raging Data Boner

Data was the fun-loving and adventurous robot on Star Trek: The Next Generation. He was one of my favorite characters because of his logic, feats of strength and charming personality. As a robot, Data was unexcited by events, situations, sensations, etcetera that would arouse humans. Instead of reaction based on emotion, Data responded to external stimuli with rationality and practicality.

Because of Data's thought process, it can be assumed that he would never pop a raging robot boner from intimate encounters, raunchy daydreams, or morning wood. His robot upbringing would lead to a ferocious Data boner from robot activities.

Number crunching. Coding. Programming. Analysis. All create opportunity for a raging Data boner.

Sadly, *spoiler alert*, they killed Data off.

However, my weekend festivities ran me straight into an individual of seemingly similar trait. A logical thinker. A numbers guy. A real stuporous personality. Stuporous and sponged.

Roughly six feet in height and weighing upwards of nineteen stone, the plump and inebriated man stumbled his way towards our table. His hair was thin on the sides and bald on top. He wore a large pair of rimless glasses. Wardrobe was not dawned to impress. The facial hair: a chimo 'stache, not long, not short, hued a slight tinge of red.

As if Data was back, yet, had let himself go.

The thick-bodied, drunkard announced his intention to join our party of two by stumble-stepping his way over, sloshing his beer as he set the pint glass down, and pulling a chair from the adjacent table to rest his fat arse. Clearly boozed and further faded than either of us, he drunkenly sipped his brew as we hurriedly finished our conversation.

Drunk Data was not demanding attention with his actions but commanding it with his presence, so as the conversation reached an uncomfortable point of "who the fuck is this guy," we turned to him seeking the answer.

In a response that can only be described as a naturally reserved man, fueled on liquid courage, and attempting to play coy, drunk Data began interrogating us. Do we live in the area? What do we do for a living? Would anyone notice if we went missing?

We humored him with dribble dialogue.

At some point he mumbled about programming, the state of the economy, Linux, and the Romulan Star Empire.

Both parties soon tired. We sat there in silence.

The bar was dead and the tenders were preparing for close. As my friend and I had already squared, we had no obligation to hang around. Not wanting to get phasered, we patiently waited for drunk Data to make the first move.

"There are girls," he said, dramatically pausing, possibly for effect or possibly from a buzzed tongue, "over there!"

We sat blinking.

He continued his thought, "We...should go talk to them!"

Drunk raging Data boner had targeted a table of women out of eyesight but clearly on his robot radar. Alcohol had changed Data's body chemistry to crave more than numbers. Logic had escaped him. Determined, drunk Data staggered from his chair to his feet and sloshed more beer to the floor. He turned his back to us and headed towards the women.

We slammed our drinks and ninja vanished.

xoxo,
ShavedGolf

Adventures of Young ShavedGolf: The Four Year-Old Transgender

Keen and astute observation of the world and people who inhabit it was a gift I was graced with from a very young age. I was an early bloomer. Memories of early childhood go back as far as my terrible twos. Complete sentences were formed around the same time, and my favorite book was a tie between the Oxford English Dictionary and the New York Times.

Doctors attribute this impressive toddler cognition to my extended stay in Mum's womb. After a few weeks of extra maturation past due date, it was decided a Cesarean section was necessary. If I wasn't coming out, they were going in after me. I was evicted by surgeon knife. I didn't go quietly.

Unfortunately the preschool percipience provided an unwanted side effect: an understanding and self-awareness of appearance. Turning to Mum and Dad as my role models of proper presentation wasn't enough, and because E! News didn't exist, I turned to my only other outlet: Walt Disney.

Cartoons weren't the first choice of a boy genius, but I played along to amuse my parents. Plopped in front of a TV, VCR rolling, I'd spend time examining the make-believe world and the ridiculous Disney creatures that inhabited it.

The study of Disney drew me to one obvious conclusion: eyelashes were the key in determining gender.

In a cartoon world where few wore pants and the unabashed had no shame in flaunting their "private areas," indication of gender was most easily taken by a character's eyelashes and their propensity to bat said lashes. If they had eyelashes, they were female. If they batted their lashes in a flirtatious manner, they were definitely female.

I was stunned. I had been lied to. I was living a sham.

Pants clearly were unnecessary, but more important was the horrific discovery that I had eyelashes and was clearly batting them with every blink. This little boy genius knew he was a boy, but cold the eyelashes also mean that I was some sort of mix? Perhaps some combination of man and woman. An in between gender.

Logically, I was a freak.

Scared and alone in the world, I did what any transgender four year-old would do: pick a side and commit. I was a boy, goddamnit, and I wasn't about to let some luscious girl lashes destroy my world.

Scissors were an obvious choice. The kindergarten shears with the round blades would allow me to trim up the unwanted eyelashes to a length deemed manly. I snatched the pair of mini scissors and calmly walked to the bathroom. Once in front of the mirror, however, I chickened out. Scissors? Eyeballs? These two clearly did not go well together.

The realization that I was more afraid of the scissors in my face than I was afraid of being a girl led me to the only plausible option left in my childish sex change arsenal. I would pluck the fuckers. While plucking wasn't enjoyable, it seemed like a more permanent fix. Perhaps the repeated pluck would also rip out the follicle and the lash would never grow again. Essentially extinguishing my femininity at the root.

The plucking process was long, arduous, painful, and lasted most of the afternoon. Breaks were necessary. Between plucking sessions, I'd admire my handiwork. I was truly looking more manly with each eyelash destroyed. Affirmation of manhood.

At around 5:30, Dad arrived home from his white-collar workday. He was greeted by his son. He was greeted by a man.

The family sat down for a well deserved dinner after a hard day's work. Dad coming home after a successful day of doing whatever the shit he did when he was gone, and me, busy at home, manning up.

But...wait...hang on...

I paused from my eating and examined my dad closely. Dad, he who embodies all that is man, had hair attached to his eyelid...like eyelashes...like me.

Relief.

Lessons to take away from my childhood traumatization: eyelashes do not determine gender and pants are unnecessary.

xoxo,
ShavedGolf