we'll take the trick, thank you

mr. nice guy has never fully understood the appeal of halloween. when our little guppy is born you can rest assured that there will be no strawberry costumes, midget shrek costumes, ladybug costumes, li'l punkin costumes, baby princess costumes, etc. no. not here. first, let's look at the roots of this all hallow's eve, this day before all saints day whence we remember our friends in purgatory, shall we? the pagan holiday formerly know as samhain (pronounced sow-wen. those crazy gaelic pagan bastards), which translates to "summer's end." the celtic druids (think larry bird in a cape) paid tribute with gifts, food and sacrifices--lambs, goats, virgins, virgin goats--to the spirit world to insure that next year's crop would be bountiful.

it was a time for communicating with the dead and receiving wisdom from past ancestors to ensure prosperity. and so how do we celebrate here? we dress up like pariahs, degenerates, deviants and lowlifes ... and GET REWARDED FOR IT by total strangers who open the doors of their innocent homes to us as they dole out chocolate (and it BETTER BE CHOCOLATE, no gum, no licorice, no little-boxes-of-raisins bullshit). now. what kind of message does this send to the wee ones? "look, every day of the year you are a lowly nobody but this one day you get to dress up like a tiny little lunatic and visit strangers WHO WE WOULD NORMALLY RUN MILES TO AVOID and grovel for sweet, sweet candy. then tomorrow you will throw up, be once again deprived of autonomy and will have that candy rationed out to you." sick, i tell you, sick.

but. that said. mr. nice guy is already planning for next halloween. when baby nice guy is five-and-a-half months old, s/he will not be a fairy, a bunny, a toaster or whatever the hell it is brooklyn yuppie parents have their west indian nanny pick up at the baby boutique. no. baby nice guy will be ... a tiny little hooker. or ... a wee bloated winston churchill. or even baby charles manson. perchance a mini drunk-driving nick nolte. just thinking out loud here. but you get the general cut of mr. nice guy's jib. after all isn't this why we have children? to parade them through the neighborhood, dressed up like ... like ... khalid shaikh mohammed :


tell me this isn't adorable

my child is going to require DECADES OF THERAPY, i tell you. you got a problem with that? make your own. i'll show you how.

mr nice guy's got your natural selection right here, buddy

mr. nice guy's eyebrows were raised by this month's cover article in the national geographic. david quammen asks the question: was darwin wrong? and answers, resoundingly, no. first of all the title of the piece is a cheap device to lure readers in. going by the copy alone, the hed should have been "darwin was right." there is never any question (the first word of the freakin' article is "no"). but how NatGeo chooses to sell its magazines is neither here nor there.

sure the 19th century geologist/botanist crafted a beautiful unifying biological theory that elegantly connected diverse dots to draw a compelling portrait of evolution by natural selection. but he was wrong! mr. nice guy contends it was all a parlor trick. mr. nice guy, himself no kooky creationist, can disprove charles darwin's theory with one word:

debilitating morning sickness.

(ok, three words.)


chuck d

seriously. darwin has to be wrong. you want proof? look on my couch. observe the shell of the woman that once was my vibrant wife. (no, the "benedictin" isn't working.) then answer me this: what is the evolutionary benefit to pregnant women spending months on end exhausted, puking, miserable, grimy, depressed, hormonal, hysterical, needing and generally glum bums? can't think of one? that's because there isn't one!

why would a woman, after having endured months of stomach-churning nausea and general hysteria ever want to go through it again? why would friends and relatives witnessing the torment of a loved one want to go through it themselves (or inflict it upon a significant other)? it is a sheer miracle that the human race has lasted as long as it has -- forget bombs and wars and chemicals and religion and politicians and paris hilton -- civilization should have ended millennia ago.

or maybe it's just that, as mrs. nice guy thoughtfully hypothesized this morning, my sperm is poison.

damn you, sims2 !!!

mr. nice guy made a big mistake. a colossal error in judgment. a massive snafu. we're talking on the magnitude of the metric-conversion-gaffe-that-resulted-in-the-mars-orbiter-crash. what did mr. nice guy do that was so terribly wrong? he bought sims 2.

it all started innocently enough. since i took the week off to be with my napping--and did we mention puking?--wife (not, i should point out, in spain), i figured it would be deliciously thoughtful of me to buy a few board games. so off to the new--and thoroughly uncontroversial--downtown target i went.

mr. nice guy likes scrabble. he is something of a wordsmith. so he bought scrabble. mrs. nice guy likes risk-- why do you think she deigned to marry mr. nice guy? so he bought risk. and then, as he was making his way to the cashier, something caught his eye. that's right: PC games. not normally a gamer, mr. nice guy has been a fan of sim city since its earliest days. and he was intrigued by the sims games. and they had the new one at a discount. and so he bought sims 2.

SOMEBODY PLEASE KILL ME! please, mr. nice guy begs you. i can't ... seem ... to break ... free. i can't turn my confounded computer off and since mrs. nice guy is pretty much always asleep i have NO REASON to turn it off. mr. nice guy is slowly losing what is left of his tiny mind. i need to pick up a crack habit to wean myself from the devil's candy that is sims 2.

a word about sims 2. if some evil pusher ever convinces you to try it, DO NOT make sims that look exactly like you and your spouse. mr. and mrs. nice sim moved into a house and ... mrs. nice sim promptly got pregnant. fair enough. then she started throwing up a lot. how eerie. then the toilet broke and mr. nice guy couldn't convince mrs. nice sim to stop puking in it. then they just stopped doing anything i told them to. then mr. nice sim wet himself. then the baby came and the sims kept putting it on the floor, even though mr. nice guy supplied them with a PERFECTLY GOOD CRIB. distraught, mr. nice guy euthanized his own creations (how's that for incredibly evil karma?) and started again -- by making sim versions of his anthropomorphized cats.

i need sleep. it's been almost two solid days. and i think the toilet is broken. or was that the sim toilet? i can't ... tell the ... difference anymore.

still not in spain

mr. nice guy's in-laws are in spain as he types this. the initial plan was that we were going to join mrs. nice guy's extended family at costa blanca (which translates to, roughly, TOPLESS FROLICKING HONEY-SKINNED SUN NYMPHS), but someone got pregnant and too sick to travel.


the beaches of not-brooklyn

anyway, i love my in-laws. all of them. those mother-in-law jokes that miserable unsympathetic 40-year-olds tell each other? i don't get them. go tell 'em somewhere else, pal. my particular mother-in-law is, yes, insane, but deliciously insane. also, she keeps mr. nice guy well lubricated with the vino. she knows how to butter a man up. that said, mother-in-law did not win too many points when she called the nice-guy estates the other day FROM THE SUN-KISSED BEACHES OF SPAIN to tell us that she was so sorry we couldn't come because the weather is so gorgeous and her brother's beach house is so stunning. they were all just enjoying tapas and sangria and the company of none other than bacchus himself when they decided to give us, vomitus-interruptus, a ring to tell us how delightful a time they were having and how they do so wish we could have joined them. wasn't that toughtful?

mr. nice guy's fearsome List just grew longer by several names.

wherein mr. nice guy gets the munchies

dear, sweet, fuzzy, gentle, little, tiny readers. please forgive mr. nice guy for being so incredibly remiss these past few days. a quick recap of what you missed. since last we spoke, here is what has made mrs. nice guy gag:

• the garlic on a slice of pizza she attempted to eat
• the garlic on mr. nice guy's breath after eating his slice of pizza
• coughing
• hearing mr. nice guy hiccup
• the trash, which, admittedly, needed to be conveyed outdoors
• mr. nice guy's breath, basically, always
• the thin layer of grime which had settled over her own unwashed body
• watching mr. nice guy imitate her gagging after she had just completed gagging
• et cetera, or, if you will, ad nauseum

basically, you get the point. which brings me to my point. i was recently reading a seminal (no pun intended) publication on what to expect when one is expecting called, aptly, "What to Expect When You're Expecting." here is a typically unintentionally hilarious passage discussing the third month of pregnancy:

cunnilingus ... is safe throughout pregnancy as long as your partner is careful not to blow any air into your vagina. doing this could force air into your bloodstream and cause an embolism, which could obstruct a blood vessel and could prove deadly to both mother and baby. (p.163-4)

first of all, the expression is blowing hot air up someone's ass, but that is neither here nor there. second, does anyone know of anyone who even remotely knows anyone who has DIED FROM CUNNILINGUS? i mean, has this really happened, like, ever in the history of all time? how does one explain this death to the law? or, for that matter, to the in-laws? "i am sorry to tell you this, but your daughter died in an unfortunate muffin-munching incident. when i bit the little one, she bit the big one."

third, and most important, this raises a crucial question: who the fuck is having her muffin munched during the third month of pregnancy??? who is able to use her legs to walk, much less throw them over someone else's shoulders? i want to meet this dynamic she-hulk, because mrs. nice guy, bless her tiny vomitous soul, is not exactly a steamy, gurgling volcano of libidinous lava these days (which is fine, really JUST FINE, with mr. nice guy, thanks FOR ASKING). we throw a little party in our heads whenever mrs. nice guy has the fortitude to eat toast AND cheese in the same day--to say nothing of what i have (or in this case have decidedly not) eaten.

lastly -- the implication in this book is that even non-pregnant women run the risk of courting a FATAL EMBOLISM whenever a significant other, uh, pays her lip service. this is pure crazy talk. (and, aside from the obvious benefits to a husband looking for a foolproof method of offing a rich wife, utterly horrifying.) obviously we are witnessing the evil designs of some vast right-wing conspiracy. the dark forces of the world are conspiring against us, people! we must rise up and go down! do not listen to The Man. if we want to drink from the fountain of youth, we shall drink from the fountain of youth -- what's the worst that could happen? i mean, since mrs. nice guy gags when she smells mr. nice guy's breath, why not let him improve it a little ...

the rain in spain falls nowhere near my pain

mr. nice guy apologizes for his recent bitter rant indulgence. happy jokey nice guy will return shortly.

but first: the nice guys were supposed to go to spain with mrs. nice guy's dutch family for 10 days. that trip has been canceled because mrs. nice guy can't be more than three feet from a toilet at any given moment.

mr. nice guy is learning the hard way why the french call orgasms "petit morts." the one i had about two months ago will surely end up being my actual death. may it come swiftly.

call me benedictin arnold

you know what, sweet gentle reader? we may have found a morning sickness remedy that actually works. a morning sickness remedy that is admittedly a little sketchy ... ok, freakishly sketchy ... but it's apparently working. mrs. nice guy now only pukes when she isn't on it. what is this wonder of wonders? why, it's homemade benedictin.

a wee little history lesson: benedictin had been widely prescribed to pregnant women from the mid-1950s to the late '70s as an anti-nausea agent. and, lo! it worked. but. benedictin was pulled off the market in the wake of the meltdown over thalidomide, a morning sickness remedy ... that caused horrific birth defects. the company that makes benedictin essentially had to stop producing benedictin because they were afraid of litigation (there's something else we can all thank lawyers for). but benedictin is a totally different drug, you see. benedictin, in fact, was never removed from the FDA safe list. but no one wants to risk making it and facing lawsuits.

but! as it turns out, the chemical components of benedictin basically comprise a unisom tablet and a vitamin b6 pill. the main ingredient that is in unisom, it would seem, is the same active agent in benedictin. combine it with b6 and, boom, no puking. for reals.

the totally ironic thing is that our OBGYN prescribed zofran to mrs. nice guy. what's zofran? funny you should ask. zofran is a very, very, very, very strong anti-emetic for people coming out of surgery and, uh, chemo-fucking-therapy. also, dig this: zofran (did mr. nice guy mention that zofran is very, very, very, very freakin' strong?) has NEVER EVER NEVER BEEN TESTED ON PREGNANT WOMEN EVER. i mean, what the fuck? it's certainly being prescribed to pregnant women. (many of whom have, admittedly, seen no problems after giving birth. yet.) but did mr. nice guy mention that it HAS NEVER BEEN TESTED. like, no clinical trials on pregnant humans. deeply unsettling. so mrs. nice guy is not taking that, but instead opting for a little trailer trash kitchen-cooked benedictin (fear not, freaky fans, she is cutting the dosage down to 25 percent of the amount STILL PRESCRIBED in europe and canada). sit tight and mr. nice guy will let you know if his kid is born with eight feet and no head.

think this is an unwarranted risk that the nice guys are taking? well, mrs. nice guy, whom we might have mentioned is pregnant, has LOST NINE POUNDS in two months of, you know, being pregnant. so fuck you.

parenting advice from a parenting pro

here is an exchange that mr. nice guy and his father had over brunch in brooklyn on monday morning:

pater nice guy: the thing about having kids is that you have to nurture them. you have to identify their talents and nudge them in the right direction--let them develop those strengths. but you never want to put undue pressure them.
mr. nice guy: ummm.
pater nice guy: i was never a strong piano player, but my father had perfect pitch. he really wanted me to play piano, though, so he pushed me. i think that's the wrong approach. find the thing the child has an innate gift for and encourage it to grow.
mr. nice guy: i, uh, couldn't agree more. [not said: who are you and what have you done with the man who raised me?] you really ought to try this wonderful homemade granola.

ah, yes. this, mind you, is the same man who told his 14-year-old son that he WILL PLAY FOOTBALL whether he likes it or not. let's state the obvious, shall we? mr. nice guy is not an athletic fellow. he likes music; he likes books; he likes prancing about in his mother's knickers. there was never no room here for no football. (five ... count them: FIVE knee surgeries later, pater nice guy refuses to admit he erred in "nudging" his child to develop that particular "talent")

and yet. AND YET, his father now says without irony that it is important to encourage one's child to explore its strengths and interests. delicious. he advises against "pushing" a child in a direction that said child is perhaps unsuited for. this, mind you, is the same man who 20 years prior called mr. nice guy's short stories and doodled drawings "artsy fartsy crap." also the same man who, when mr. nice guy failed to name all the schools in the pac 10, called his son "pussy-whipped"--in a room full of strangers.

mr. nice guy would laugh if he could stop crying ... or prancing about in his mother's soft, soft knickers. whatever.

someone ought to kill me to avenge my wife

by the way, the parents are still in town. with pater and mater, mr. nice guy has been chewing his way through this big apple like a clan of worms. you will notice that mrs. nice guy is not on the list of those with whom mr. nice guy has been cruising the city. this is because mr. nice guy has been a very good host. and a very horrible husband. here's how saturday went, a day which started with me at the office and the folks on a ferry...

• while mr. nice guy's parents were sailing around the statue of liberty, mrs. nice guy was at home puking.
• while mr. nice guy was wrapping up some things at the office and awaiting the arrival of his parents for lunch, mrs. nice guy was barfing.
• while mr. nice guy and his parents were enjoying lunch at the burger joint, mrs. nice guy was at home yakking.
• while mr. nice guy and his parents repaired to the marriott in times square for a scenic drink at the hotel bar, mrs. nice guy was at home retching.
• while mr. nice guy and his parents enjoyed an after-lunch overrated cupcake from magnolia bakery, mrs. nice guy heaved bile at home.
• while mr. nice guy and his parents enjoyed a marvelous dinner at locanda vini & olii, mrs. nice guy sobbed hysterically as she spewed sporadically.
• and as mr. nice guy and his parents chuckled at a friend's show at the upright citizens brigade, mrs. nice guy finally passed out on the bathroom floor, exhausted from vomiting.
• also, she was vomiting.

mr. nice guy called home a few times to listen to his beloved wife weep. his heart broke with more vehemence than he knew he could stand (good thing he was drunk).

but really, his parents had never visited him in new york (and he was beginning to wonder if being so insistent on their coming was wise). he was torn between filial responsibilities and husbandly duty. alas, the role of son won and he was a damn good guide, if he does say so himself--charming, informed, generous. but now he loathes himself for abandoning his bride on a day of dire disgorging. mrs. nice guy now slumbers, sapped of all vitality. and mr. nice guy sits in the dark, stewing in self-hatred.

clearly, it's time to self-induce a little sympathy nausea ... paging doctors ernest and julio gallo, you are needed in the den. stat.

a sucker for the G string

come closer, little tiny readers, and allow mr. nice guy to let you all in on a little secret. sure, mr. nice guy is a devoted husband, bien sur he's a master chef, no doubt he will be a better father than anyone who has ever come before ... but there is one weakness to which he will admit.

let's put it this way: it occurs to mr. nice guy, in perusing this piece on graham greene, that the author of "the power and the glory" and the auteur of this particular blog are remarkably--dare i say undeniably--akin. both men were excommunicated by the pope himself. and both men--aside from their commanding presence, insatiable wanderlust, rakish charm and astonishing ability to finesse a deft turn of phrase--are known as connoisseurs of the female of the species.

there is indeed another woman. in fact, as mr. nice guy types these very words his first true, undying and everlasting love sits in his lap. mr. nice guy met her in sunny los angeles eight years ago and she has not once left his side in the intervening years. in fact, he is stroking her now as he admires his own shimmering prose, burned forever into the permanent medium of blogger. he is not ashamed of the love that dare not speak its name ... the love of a married man and his flaxen concubine.


homewrecker!


her name is ella mae and she sounds just like honey poured all over a goose down pillow ... which sounds surprisingly good.


please forgive mr. nice guy: his parents are still in town, he is not at all stressed out and he is definitely not drunk. all will return to normal as soon as he gropes his way to the bathtub where he shall slip into sweet oblivion and never bother you again with his bloviating

check, please!

clearly, mr. nice guy is a bad, bad husband and father-to-be. mrs. nice guy is home alone telecommuting (read: surfing beefcake sites when not plotting her escape) and she just wrote to tell mr. nice guy that she is pecking away at our dwindling food reserves like a little bird. a little, crazed, wild-eyed, feral bird. you see, while mr. nice guy is gleefully twiddling his thumbs at the office (read: surfing beefcake sites when not plotting his escape), mrs. nice guy is slowly starving. and going insane. but what is a mr. nice guy to do? he will be saddled with parents for the next two-and-a-half never-ending days. how will he provide sustenance for his bride and unborn child?

mrs. nice guy e-mails from her crackberry:

maybe i will try and go to the grocery store tomorrow. icky thought - but will probably need to. need food. for me. for guppy.

ok. clearly she is trying to kill me. why does she not just come out and tell mr. nice guy that he is a failure as a husband, as a lover and as a human being with a soul? that e-mail is simply KILLING ME, i tell you. and when i go, it's a one-way ticket to hades. don't get mr. nice guy wrong, he may be devastatingly handsome and irresistibly charming, but he knows exactly which side his burnt toast will get buttered on.


mrs. nice bird


UPDATE: mr. nice guy has just returned from a post-dinner, midnight grocery shopping jaunt. crisis averted, there is now food in the house. sleep soundly, my friends.

advice from a master harasser

speaking of bill o'reilly, mr. nice guy actually had to undergo sexual harassment training at the office this very week. (note to self, no matter how many times your colleagues sue you, it is still funny to refer to your workplace as "the orifice" ... as in "i'll be stuck in the orifice all night, honey" or "there has been an awful lot of drama in my orifice lately.")

now fully trained in sexual harassment, mr. nice guy is very good at harassing people sexually. he has a company-issued certificate to prove it. and so, o'reilly, take a few pointers from a pro. obviously you have mastered lesson #3: "when harassing someone make sure to do it really thoroughly and then sue them preemptively for extortion before they have a chance to sue you first." nice work, commander. but, really, what's with the falafel already? everyone knows that tzatziki is what one should rub into the soft, creamy skin of interns (or subalterns or elevator repairmen), not fried garbanzo beans. how do you think mr. nice guy so successfully wooed mrs. nice guy? really, o'reilly, get thyself trained!

ps: mr. nice guy is suing the colleague who sent him the smoking gun link. i feel totally harassed! this sexual harassment training is the best; so many people to sue around here, so little time to count mr. nice guy's money.

batten down the hatches

mr. nice guy may be incommunicado for a couple days. the parents are coming, the parents are coming. (don't shoot till you see the whites of their cold, steely eyes.) they arrive this very evening from the left coast, a shore that mr. nice guy abandoned nigh on eight years ago. in that span of time, pater nice guy has visited once, mater nice guy twice. in eight years. traveling anywhere at all out of the way to see their prodigal son must rank on their list of priorities somewhere just under having their tonsils forcibly removed. with a spork. it took creating new life to get them to deign to visit. (buying a condo, alas, did not work.)

a brief word on la famille nice guy -- here's how they reacted upon hearing over the phone the news that their first born had procreated:

mr. nice guy: mrs. nice guy is pregnant.
mater nice guy: aaaaaaagh! [high-pitched falsetto-style abbreviated screams, not unlike those of janet leigh, may she rest in peace] aaaaaaaggh!
pater nice guy: congratulations; i think you'll find that a baby makes your house a home
mater nice guy: aaaaaagghh!
pater nice guy: just don't give it a weird name.

mater nice guy also confirmed that she did not want to be called "grandma" (for the record, pater nice guy, traditionalist that he is, said "grandpa" was just fine with him). mater nice guy is a young soul and her son agrees that perhaps "grandma" is too harsh an appellation for such an impish spirit.

"crazy nana" will do nicely.

remedies that don't do a damn thing to mollify mrs nice guy's unyielding nausea but people feel compelled to recommend every 13 fucking minutes anyway

trust me. these don't work. she still pukes:

1. ginger ale
2. hard candies
3. ginger tea
4. saltines
5. ginger hard candies
6. vitamin b6
7. ginger-flavored children's chewable vitamin b6
8. acupressure on her wrists, or anywhere else for that matter
9. sweet, steamy lovemaking with her ginger-slathered husband
10. graham crackers
11. fish tacos, oddly enough
12. lemons
13. cinnamon
14. have i fucking mentioned goddamn ginger yet?
15. toast
16. drinking lots of fluids. ok? she's drinking a daily yangtze fucking river of fluids
17. potatoes, be they mashed, chips, baked or drizzled with ginger
18. getting plenty of sleep (can't sleep when you're puking, people)
19. folic acid (really, now, what the fuck?)
20. apples
21. yogurt
22. wheaties

and, for good measure ... : ginger

mr. nice guy is a filthy jew

mr. nice guy is strongly considering putting a call in to the anti-defamation league. not only did the OBGYN aggressively practice her love upon his wife, but to heap insult upon affrontery, he was subsequently handed a Genetics Testing Requisition form and told to get checked out for a battery of jew genes.

it seems that, with three out of four jewish grandparents, mr. nice guy may potentially carry the gene for any one of a number of hideous, filthy jew diseases! this is news to me. but, there it is in black and white: mr. nice guy should really go get his "Ashkenazi Jewish Carrier Test" to determine which horrendous early death is in the pipeline for the fruit of his loom (even though, at this late date, it's a moot point since his filthy seed has already been sown).

take for example the gene for "gaucher disease," which results in an enlarged liver, spleen and brain ... and only exists in, oh, one out of every 13 dirty, filthy, despicable jews. dig those odds. then there's tay-sachs disease, which will result in the horribly agonizing jewdeath of my infant before the age of 5. delightful!

still, if there's any disease mr. nice guy actively wishes upon his unborn genetic cesspool, it's got to be bloom syndrome. not so much because he wants his unborn guppy to die painfully of cancer before the age of 30, but because he always did feel a pang of simpatico for the struggles of leopold bloom. but to wish such a fate upon my child would merely be mr. nice guy's misguided attempt at vicariously trying to achieve some propinquity to james joyce ... and that probably wouldn't be right.

oh, you pretty things

today mr. and mrs. nice guy went to have the OBGYN practice her love on mrs. nice guy. this was our first pregnant journey to the doctor and, well, it was our lucky day. actually it was mrs. nice guy's lucky day as said love entailed having a footlong greased phallus forcibly rammed into her uterus. that's right: hot internal ultrasound action was the order of the day.

we saw the guppy! it was simply, beautif-- oh, who is mr. nice guy kidding? it was weird, surreal, to say nothing of the fact that it was awkward to have a technician diddling my wife with a seeing eye dildo. mr. nice guy wasn't sure if he should have tipped her 20 percent or punched the OBGYN dead in the face.

anyway. the nice guys saw their little baby today, about the size of a jelly bean. we also saw its poppyseed heart beating at ... 174 beats per minute. the technician, mid-molestation, informed us that this was a "strong" heartbeat. i'll fucking say it is. if mr. nice guy worked his heartrate up to 174 at the gym, his ticker would explode in his chest. mrs. nice guy would be ms. instawidow -- and probably not too unhappy about it either, saucy woodland nymphette that she is.

still. one thing is obvious here: the nice guys are mutants. clearly, we are building a new superbreed of humans. i am but the ur-nice guy. you mortals would be best advised to stand aside and let the new race take over.

UPDATE: a kind anonymous reader asks, "did you cry?" mr. nice guy feels compelled to answer here and not in the comments section.

ahem. cry? where to begin? let's put it this way: mr. nice guy gingerly held mrs. nice guy's hand as they gazed at the monitor. the jellybean's hummingbird heart looked too tiny and fragile to sustain such a torrid beat. mr. nice guy dabbed the corner of his eye and said to no one in particular: BEHOLD THE NEW LIFE I HAVE WROUGHT FROM INANIMATE CLAY! BOW DOWN TO MY OMNIPOTENCE!

alien vs. predator, part deux

it was recently brought to mr. nice guy's attention that the film alien vs. predator ends with (forgive mr. nice guy if he gets this wrong; although an ardent cineaste, mr. nice guy has not yet caught this particular chef d'oeuvre) predator carrying alien's baby.

now, being one half of a currently-expecting mixed-race couple, mr. nice guy thinks this is simply wonderful (mrs. nice guy is actually the product of a biracial union; mr. nice guy is the product of a jewish and norwegian-shiksa-bombshell-hottie union. also, mr. nice guy has mom issues). mr. nice guy is thrilled to see american cinema once again tackling the serious issues of the day--racial politics, interspecies mating--with an unflinching eye. mr. nice guy cannot wait to see the sequel. think about it! there is real potential for a true sidney poitier-spencer tracy moment. predator, carrying the unholy seed within her fecund womb, brings alien home to meet the parents ... i mean, you're talking academy award guarantee!


the happy couple

initially the predator family is shocked, they don't understand and they don't like it one bit. normally progressive parents who taught their daughter to have a mind of her own (i mean, check out her bitchin' dreads), they get all hung up on alien's slimy teeth and weird sightless head. but alien turns out to be cultured and charming. he speaks fluent predator. ultimately, he wins dad's respect.

"you're two wonderful people," says papa predator at the scene's most tear-jerkingly climactic moment, "who happened to fall in love and happen to have an intergalactic space-pigmentation problem." and then, just as everything appears to be all patched up, BOOYAH!! predator's chest explodes and baby devours grandpa!

seriously, mr. nice thinks he's onto something here. drama, action, suspense and romance all rolled into one. have your people call his people and we'll make this happen.

on mrs. nice guy's impeccable timing

today was mr. nice guy's time to clean the estates. normally, the chores are equitably distributed -- mr. nice guy does the shopping at the Slark Pope Food Coop (much more on that later), and a fair bit of cooking for mrs. nice guy. mr. nice guy is quite the nimble chef, if he does say so himself. he also usually cleans the cat box (and now always cleans the litter box because, the missus claims, litter is poisonous to our unborn guppy. mr. nice guy find this staggeringly specious, but swallows his criticism and agrees to always clean the leavings of his prolific felines).

anyway. mrs. nice guy usually cleans up around the house while mr. nice guy is at the office on saturdays (he works tuesday through saturday. is there nothing more glorious than having every monday free? he thinks not). but. no longer. she being couch-ridden and puke prone, sweeping and scrubbing duties fall to yours truly. don't feel bad for mr. nice guy. he can take it.

or so he thought. just as he was finishing the bathroom -- he put a wicked shine onto the old porcelain throne -- mrs. nice guy came scuttling in. she flipped up the blindingly white lid and ralphed repeatedly into the spotless bowl. after collapsing backwards into mr. nice guy's strong arms, she flushed. closing the lid she ran an exhausted hand across the top of the toilet and said in a weakened voice:

"you missed a spot, right here."

how can mr. nice guy not love this woman?

slip another guppy onto the grill

so, a colleague of mr. nice guy's went to canada on a pleasure cruise (read: mission to acquire cheap oxycontin knockoffs and creamy v1@gr4 goodness). mr. nice guy was exceedingly disappointed that she did not return bearing a superfluity of much-needed dilaudid, or as i believe they call it there, "dilaud-ish." whatever. she did send this, however. a portrait of beautiful downtown halifax in full autumnal glory:


but just wait till spring and ... mcbabies

her choice comments: "not as much meat as a regular 12-buck lobster roll but it was just $4.50 canadian." solid.

mr. nice guy fights the law

mrs. nice guy minces not her words. actually she does not mince at all. she is inclined to sashay. (mr. nice guy, to his credit, is a devoted gallivanter. but that is neither here nor there.)

mr. nice guy is usually very good at taking orders. especially when they come from someone who has achieved a certain facility with projectile vomition. but there comes a time in every man's life when he must be brutally honest ... let us just say he told mrs. nice guy, in a firm, yet charming manner: "babysnookumsbear. you do realize that you are the queen until end of may, but then a new boss comes on the scene."

mrs. nice guy: whoa. i am the boss. there will be no new boss. das guppy IS NOT and NEVER WILL BE the boss.

oh-ho-ho, is that a fact? guess who's lacing up his dancing shoes. it's on now, woman!

'gah!' is for guppy

this, gentle reader, is the tiny guppy, at week 8.5, that is currently swimming inside mrs. nice guy. not our exact guppy, but a reasonable facsimile of what a healthy 8.5-week-old guppy under normal circumstances ought to look like. look closely, now:



sweet and tangy yahweh! THAT IS INSIDE MY WIFE! (even mrs. nice guy herself admits to nearly gagging when she looks at this photo [fair enough, as we know, everything from water to oxygen makes her gag these days]). but this is cause for pause, dear sweet friend. what kind of sick, monstrous freaks are the nice guys?!

yeah, yeah. the miracle of life. blah diddy freakin' doo dah. have you ever seen V? when poor, unsuspecting blair tefkin is carrying the poison spawn of extra terrestrial colonists inside her fertile young womb? remember the horror of it all? of course you do! well, that's how we feel in nice guy estates today.



ps to that sweet, beautiful guppy child of mine: if by some cruel fluke of fate you are reading this entry in the distant future, CONGRATS! you apparently have a cerebral cortex! we were a little worried about you. please don't take anything too seriously here, your old man is just drunk again.

la famille nice guy

surely by now you are curious. who is this mr. nice guy? did he, like pan gu, swing an axe to break forth from his confinement in a cosmic egg? or was his mother more of a coatlique figure? the aztec goddess was impregnated by an obsidian knife through which she produced a litter of moon and stars. yet, after getting knocked up, shamefully, a second time, she bore the god of war, huitzilopochtli! ahhh, getting warmer, my friends.

here is an exchange mr. nice guy had with his mother, a real-estate shizzark, via an "instant messaging protocol" this very day. true facts:

mater nice guy: hiya! i just finished sending an email to s____.
mr. nice guy: how is that crazy bastard!?
mater nice guy: his mom has azlherimers, quite advanced, and he just got the settlement data for his divorce.
mr. nice guy: sounds like things could be better for him. [azlherimers is rough, though not nearly as rough as alzheimer's--ed.]
mater nice guy: i wanted to support him on the stuff with his mom and dad, and yet ask for the listing on his property as he has to sell it.
mr. nice guy: sweet
mr. nice guy: yet delicate
mater nice guy: walking on thin ice, but if you don't ask, someone else gets the apple.
mr. nice guy: so true
mater nice guy: i also told him to talk to your dad, as he is his true friend, and also, told him that i'm sure [pater nice guy] would like some support from him as marriage isn't all wine and roses.
mr. nice guy: whine and roses?
mater nice guy: good one.

and this! this is an e-mail mrs. nice guy received from mr. nice guy's little brother--much less a cain to mr. nice guy's abel than a romulus to his remus. what's that? mr. nice guy, splitting hairs? ha!

frere nice guy's emailed sympathy to a spectacularly vomitous mrs. nice guy:

i knew having sex with [mr. nice guy] would prove to be hazardous to your health.

mr. nice guy would be offended if it weren't so true!


ps & nb: la famille nice guy (as well as mrs. nice guy's own kinetic kin) has, to date, been the only ones notified of the Knocking Up of mrs. nice guy ... though, to be sure, not yet of this blog.

mrs. nice guy's twitchy chemoreceptor trigger zone

mrs. nice guy really ought to consider patenting her unparalleled puking panache. just this morning, as mr. nice guy was heading out the door, mrs. nice guy polished off her breakfast of almonds and dry toast. he kissed her, ever so gently, on the forehead.

mrs. nice guy: i think i'm going to be glrpruugu u.
mr. nice guy: um. let's move this into the bathroom shall we?
mrs. nice guy: glip.

she almost made it. i have to hand it to her--so dedicated is she in willing herself not to disgorge that mrs. nice guy waits until the inexorable process of reverse peristalsis has begun before she actually starts moving towards the latrine. she's not one to just up and admit defeat so easily. the downside: mr. nice guy and a bottle of lysol got to spend some time getting to know the linoleum before work. mrs. nice guy was tolerably apologetic, but mr. nice guy suspects she is testing his resolve.

a little caveat about mr. nice guy: you up-chuck on his chuck taylors, you better be willing to go the distance. he's not afraid to rhumba!

mmmm, blood

come, mr. nice guy, join us in the delicious sacrement of orgiastic blood-letting!

mmmm, raw sherpa

sit down and let mr. nice guy tell you a story. comfy? good. ahem:

yesterday mr. nice guy went to his friendly downtown red cross outpost to donate some of his precious plasma (a word to the wise: much like the dire wolf on the trail of rotting herbivore flesh, once they get the slightest taste of your blood, the red cross will hound you forever. they will pester you remorselessly for another, and another, donation until you reach the point where you are prepared to slit your own wrists. which actually works nicely for them, as long as you do it over the blood bucket). generally, mr. nice guy is all for donating--he does it as often as his blood is untainted by alcohol or the clap. he is, after all, a nice guy. also he believes in karma and would rather not--simply because he never took the time to give up a pint when it was his turn--risk bleeding out in an emergency room after some domestic cat-stroking incident gone horribly awry .

so after being repeatedly reminded by the red cross that the nation is in the midst of a severe blood shortage and ONLY MR. NICE GUY HAS THE POWER TO MAKE IT STOP, mr. nice guy agreed to donate yet again. mr. nice guy is bringing a fragile little angel babychild into the world, after all, so he wants the world to be as blood-soaked a place as possible. down to the donor hut he went.

after filling out the approriate forms (no, mr. nice guy has not recently engaged in heroin-fueled monkey sex; no, mr. nice guy has never eaten raw sherpa in the himalayas), and after WAITING UNTIL 1 PM FOR A GODDAMN 11:45 APPOINTMENT, mr. nice guy was interviewed by a decidedly tetchy nurse ... oh, did mr. nice guy forget to mention that he had horrifying oral surgery last month? alas, 'tis true. he had a chunk of meat carved from the roof of his mouth and sewn onto his gums. mr. nice guy brought it up in passing as the tetchy nurse was re-asking all the questions on the form (no, for the last time, mr. nice guy does not partake in the ancient blood-drinking rituals of the orthodox wicca).

tetchy nurse: but you have had a graft?
mr. nice guy: well, yeah. but i was also the donor. the graft came from me.
tetchy nurse: sorry, you can't give blood for a year.
mr. nice guy: what? that doesn't make sense!
tetchy nurse: it's a new policy. no autogeneic grafts allowed. you'll have to wait a year to donate.


autogewho? do they think mr. nice guy contaminated his own blood? seriously, what the fuck? as if i've given myself the hep, or something. christ. no wonder the red cross has a shortage, it won't even allow its most enthusiastic donors to donate. add to that the shuddering embarrassment of it all: mr. nice guy had to slink out of the red cross building right past all the donors in the waiting room. he could hear every last one of them thinking "not giving blood today, are we hmmm? looks like someone had a little heroin-monkey sex. pervie pants." so, if anyone needs a pint of mr. nice guy juice, he's got your piping hot O-positive right here. drop him a line and he'll open a vein for the needy.

and is mr. nice guy sure that's his blood type? O, positive!

what married life is really like

mrs. nice guy took the day off from work today, largely in order to hone her vomitting skills. mr. nice guy, who works tuesday thru satiddy, usually has monday off. after making an impossibly bland veggie soup for the missus, mr. nice guy glanced at her form, splayed in seductive deshabille across the mudgreen couch and realized it's been a little while since he gave mrs. nice guy a ride on the pony express.

mr. nice guy: "you look nice today."
mrs. nice guy: "thank you. i don't feel so nice."
mr. nice guy: "i have half a mind to jump your bones."
mrs. nice guy: "i'll puke on your dick."

she actually said that. verbatim. it made mr. nice guy well up inside with pride and love.

anyway. i guess this is why god invented insanely hardcore internet porn.

what the hell are we getting ourselves into, anyway?

ps: this is basically how we all feel at the nice guy household

the perks of fatherhood

mrs. nice guy is not allowed to drink the booze while she is pregnant.

i, on the other hand, am pretty much perpetutally pickled.

salud!

wasn't that starring a young gerard depardieu?

why, you're wondering, does mr. nice guy feel compelled to keep this little diary? because, dear precious reader, this is the furtive ear into which i whisper my deepest, dankest secrets. you see, conventional wisdom has it that one ought not divulge one's pregnancy before the first trimester is over, otherwise, ninja fairies will spirit your unborn guppy right out of the expectant mother's womb. never tell anyone you're pregnant unless you have written confirmation from zeus himself that your child will be born with 10 fingers and toes (not cumulatively, of course). that confirmation usually comes, via USPS, on week 13.

anyway. you know how hard it is to keep a secret for three months, right? now. compound that with a secret of this magnitude. for example, this exchange risks inviting an awkward element into your relations:

dude: what did you do this weekend, mr. nice guy?
mr. nice guy: oh, not much, dude. watched the 400 blows on dvd. good flick. (by the way I AM A FERTILE GODMAN THAT HAS BROUGHT NEW LIFE UPON THIS TINY PLANET. YOU WILL SING MY PRAISES.)
dude: isn't that truffaut? i can't really get into that new wave crap.

it's kind of hard to go about your daily routine when none of your friends know your dutiful wife is harboring a budding life-flower, sprung from your fertile seed, sewn at the culmination of a sweaty passiondance. and yet, one must go on. surely, the first of several burdens of fatherhood. i am guessing that, in all, there are maybe 17 burdens of fatherhood. twenty-three, max.

anyway. 400 blows. there's a movie that will make you question your will to be a parent ... in paris. in the late 1950s.

smells like victory. or vomit. whatever.

ok, who's the asshole who thought "morning sickness" was an appropriate name for "puking your fucking legwarmers off every 12 minutes?" seriously. that's some sort of jedi mind shit to make the ladies think a quick burp before breakfast will ripple through their system in time to hit pilates before work. fuck that. you know what mrs. nice guy told me this morning? the smell of the newspaper made her gag. the smell of the goddamn paper. christ, and there was even some good news in there today.

here goes nothing

my wife is pregnant ...

... thanks. that's very nice of you to say. all i did was hump her, though, so no need to congratulate me.

anyway, here we go. i am going to be stuck home a lot while she is puking. and sleeping. so i decided to start a hobby. ergo, this thing you're reading. welcome.