Your Prostate Can Thank Me Later

If you've followed the blog for a while, you know we have some issues with our facial hair. We also have issues with our prostates. This makes a deep run into Movember (or even no-shave November for the uncultured among you) a forgone conclusion. John recently gave his status, so I thought I'd catch you up on my progress.

November 1 - It's the final countdown. 

Much like every month, I just let my beard grow until I start looking like a hobo (I do have a job after all, and the missus doesn't exactly have a drifter fantasy). Then I get a haircut, trim my beard all the way down, and start the vicious cycle all over. For this year's Movember I decided to have a little fun and actually cut down to an honest-to-goodness mustache.

Went with the goatee in between. 

About this time I realized I had a lot more neck/chins than the last time I fully shaved. The last time I went all skin-faced, my current wife and then girlfriend said, basically, that if I ever did that again I'd be staying in a motel until it grew back. So this time I decided to leave some handlebars.

You know, tastefully.

And just for the weekend.

Because - based on the wife's reaction - the next time I try this, I'll be staying in a motel until it grows back.

For all of your trucking needs.

C'mon people, let's not waste this disturbing opportunity. Get out there and sign up for info, donate to the cause, and encourage your doctor to go ahead and drop a digit to save your life.

Turkey Rant

Every year about this time I get fed up... with Christmas. You mean the holiday that comes AFTER Thanksgiving and it's not even Thanksgiving yet? Yes, that one. What gets my gravy boiling is the opening of stores on Thanksgiving Day,the most family friendly day of the year. It pulls people away from their families and completely nullifies the entire spirit of the Holidays.

I was at my in-laws last night and the topic came up. See, my Mother-in-law works part-time at Barnes & Noble in a mall. She sees it every year and luckily B&N is closed on Thanksgiving. However, opening the next day at 5am isn't much of a consolation prize for the workers. So during our conversation last night a great point was made by my Mother-in-law. If the customers wouldn't fall for these limited time deals, stores wouldn't have to open. And that was just it... The stores can only be blamed so much for being open, having no morals, and not caring for their employees' families. If consumers wouldn't act like brainless neanderthals when trying to save an extra buck, would the stores be open? And God forbid, what if no one lined up outside a store?

So it got me thinking, Why do people act like complete idiots, disregarding family, budget, and (sometimes) physical well-being to get a "deal"?

• Is it our innate hunter-gatherer make up? Doubtful, we are aren't getting a deal on a Turkey and our families typically have enough food in the pantry to get by. 
• Do we actually need what we are buying? No. At the end of the day, and if your TV goes out in April, you'll just buy another TV. You won't wait until November.

So what is it? Well, I think it's a bunch of stuff that I'm sure a psychiatrist could better explain, but in lay terms, it comes to two things:

1. Some people strive on competition. They have to be the best of the best when it comes to certain things. They live for the rush of beating someone to the finish line, or iPad in this scenario. If they could just get the same rush from hanging out with loved ones...
2. People like to brag about how much more awesome they think they are than you. So, while you were schlepping it and playing cards with your family after Thanksgiving dinner, somebody way cooler than you was out getting a deal on a Kindle and will then have no problems posting it on Facebook to prove their awesomeness.

So there you have it. If I offended anyone by suggesting that spending time away from your family and in-turn making people work on your behalf is a bad thing, so be it and enjoy your new TV.

Justin Timberlake, Still Bringing It Back

Although I'm not what you'd call an avid concert goer (my last one was 2011), I do enjoy a good show, especially on the cheap. The missus was fortunate enough to win some concert tickets to the Justin Timberlake 20/20 Experience tour, and wasted no time letting me know just how excited I was to get to go with her to it. I was a little skeptical, but I obliged.

I still miss you, Simba.

The first thing I noticed actually happened hours before the concert. Facebook was straight blowing up with almost every 25-45 year old woman I knew in St. Louis talking about going to the concert. This was promising to be a cougar convention for the record books, and it did not disappoint. I'd estimate that 80% of the attendees fit the Courtney Cox Arquette-type. It was like a wedding where every guest was a drunken, single bridesmaid.

And an hour after the concert was meant to start, JT took the stage and you could simultaneously feel all of them going through puberty all over again. And that was before he entered the audience.

You know, on a floating stage thing.

We're lucky more ladies didn't slip.

The most interesting thing about this show was that it was a concert that wasn't even remotely about music. Just about the only time people sang along was when he belted out Bel Biv Devoe's Poison. Every other time he encouraged St. Louis to carry the chorus, St. Louis just sort of looked at each other like "we didn't know there was gonna be a quiz." Every one there was there to watch him dance. And dance he did.

He went on for 3 full hours and miraculously didn't even pit out his "Suit and Tie S*it." Speaking of sh--, he tried really hard to be grown up. Some full frontal on the jumbo-tron (not him), a bunch of swearing (where he sounded like the sort of person who doesn't do a lot of swearing). I'm sure this thrilled all of the parents who brought their pre-teens. Regardless, it was a great show. He's an entertainer.

Movember Update

Where is this mustache taking me?

Great news everyone. I have a mustache. Not just some barely-there, fly by night, wispy hair thing. Its a fuzzy caterpillar below my nose. And I've noticed two things carrying it around with me. People will stare and people will ask questions. So far my favorite question has come from my boss. She was gone for the first week of growth and when I walked into her office, she said "Now this (pointing to her upper lip)... Is this on purpose?"

Now most self-conscious people would take this as an insult... However, I took that opportunity to explain to her the whole Movember movement, about how men's health isn't just a magazine, and why the cause is important to me. Since then, I've had similar questions and it felt great to explain why I'm doing this have chosen to look like Tom Selleck.

So now that we are fully engaged in the month, I'm gonna do something I've never done to the blog audience, sign up online and make yourself aware of some of the issues that face today's man. You can join my "sub-team" under the mothership of the Midwest Mustache Alliance (more on them later). If you want to donate money, great. Please do, but just signing up means a lot. It means you care enough about men's health issues and want to do something about it.

Now, as mentioned before, go check out the boys over at the Midwest Mustache Alliance. they've teamed up with a couple of organizations that are offering some Movember goodness.