I don't know about you, but I can't wait to get my hands on some fucking gourds and arrange them in a horn-shaped basket on my dining room table. That shit is going to look so seasonal. I'm about to head up to the attic right now to find that wicker fucker, dust it off, and jam it with an insanely ornate assortment of shellacked vegetables. When my guests come over it's gonna be like, BLAMMO! Check out my shellacked decorative vegetables, assholes. Guess what season it is—fucking fall. There's a nip in the air and my house is full of mutant fucking squash.

I may even throw some multi-colored leaves into the mix, all haphazard like a crisp October breeze just blew through and fucked that shit up. Then I'm going to get to work on making a beautiful fucking gourd necklace for myself. People are going to be like, "Aren't those gourds straining your neck?" And I'm just going to thread another gourd onto my necklace without breaking their gaze and quietly reply, "It's fall, fuckfaces. You're either ready to reap this freaky-assed harvest or you're not."

Carving orange pumpkins sounds like a pretty fitting way to ring in the season. You know what else does? Performing an all-gourd reenactment of an episode of Diff'rent Strokes—specifically the one when Arnold and Dudley experience a disturbing brush with sexual molestation. Well, this shit just got real, didn't it? Felonies and gourds have one very important commonality: they're both extremely fucking real. Sorry if that's upsetting, but I'm not doing you any favors by shielding you from this anymore.

The next thing I'm going to do is carve one of the longer gourds into a perfect replica of the Mayflower as a shout-out to our Pilgrim forefathers. Then I'm going to do lines of blow off its hull with a hooker. Why? Because it's not summer, it's not winter, and it's not spring. Grab a calendar and pull your fucking heads out of your asses; it's fall, fuckers.

Have you ever been in an Italian deli with salamis hanging from their ceiling? Well then you're going to fucking love my house. Just look where you're walking or you'll get KO'd by the gauntlet of misshapen, zucchini-descendant bastards swinging from above. And when you do, you're going to hear a very loud, very stereotypical Italian laugh coming from me. Consider yourself warned.

For now, all I plan to do is to throw on a flannel shirt, some tattered overalls, and a floppy fucking hat and stand in the middle of a cornfield for a few days. The first crow that tries to land on me is going to get his avian ass bitch-slapped all the way back to summer.

Welcome to autumn, fuckheads!

10/13/2010 12:15:59 AM

I realize this thread is about decorative gourds....which I don't currently have. Hear me out, maybe I can offer some insight.

I am in outside sales, which is currently salary+commission, but will move into straight commission starting at the beginning of July 2010. I have been in this position since July 2009. I have competition from several direct manufacturing sales reps, large distributors, and local distributors. Here are the advantages and disadvantages of each:

Direct Advantages: Immediate knowledge of new technology, no middle man mark up, one shipping bill (paid by manufacturer or buyer of goods), access to larger range of non-commodity items, control inventory, have access to many distributors that can effectively sell their goods which increases market share, and set prices of commodity they manufacture.

Direct disadvantages: Typically have 1-3 sales reps per region (i.e. southeast, mid-atlantic, northeast, etc.) limiting the number of accounts they can successfully manage/cold-call, lack physical customer service or physical technical service available to or affordable for smaller users or altogether, are sometimes not trustworthy because they will go in behind their distributors that sell their commodity to one account in large quantities (i.e. they missed a big account, and have found out about it through a distributor selling their particular product) which leads to the distributor not selling their product anymore, have too many distributors selling the product ultimately driving the set price down through deviations, possibly rely on distributors to actually sell the product, and competition from other direct sources.

Large distributor advantages: have access to other commodities that go hand in hand with other manufacturers (poor example- grocery stores sell milk as well as cereal), get direct pricing, many locations regionally or nationally easing the shipping burden of buyers with multiple locations, personal service either customer or technical, many sales reps that are able to cover a broader territory, access to multiple manufacturers of the same commodity allowing to keep prices in check, service programs that smaller companies can't offer and direct providers can't match in price or value, and experts of many many commodities as opposed to one or a few.

Large distributor disadvantages: smaller local distributors creating price wars (think Michael Scott Paper Co vs Dunder-Mifflin), direct mfg's going in behind and stealing business, limited access to all of the mfg's (you won't find Harris Teeter name brands in Food Lion and visa versa), can't truly set prices because it's based on both supply and demand, territory management, and tough growth prospects in slower economies (this is true for direct as well really)

Local distributor advantages: Typically a good ol' boy setting where the seller and the buyer know each other for years (this does happen at all levels, but mostly at the local level), local folks are right down the street and can be used in emergencies, if the local guy buys at high enough volumes then there is no shipping charge to the end user, and access to both direct mfg's and large distributors.

Local distributor disadvantages: easily beaten in price, array of commodities, array of technology, lack of trained staff, low cash flow, etc etc etc.

This is what I have noticed in my six months, I am sure there are plenty more that need mentioning. The way I am setting myself apart as a sales person is this: I go after the big accounts right now while I am new. The big accounts, if I land them, will take care of me while I am new and building a customer base. The money made off of those allows me to focus free time on smaller accounts that get me higher margins. I build up big accounts, I would like to have 5-10 of these, then get 20-30 medium accounts. If I lose 1 or 2 big accounts, the 20-30 medium accounts keep me afloat while I go after new big accounts. I don't really waste time on small accounts simply because they basically pay for breakfast or something really small.

I will say this, if you can't get a big account in the first 6-8 months (assuming you have cash flow that you can ride this long) you could be in a world of trouble. If you can get one, it will really make going after the others a lot more enjoyable and less stressful. It's simply just very exhausting wasting any time on anything other than big accounts in the very beginning. You work just as hard on the medium sized accounts and see 1/3 to 1/36 of the money in my situation.

If you have any other questions, you can PM me. I hope this helps in the slightest!

10/13/2010 12:19:45 AM

There's nothing wrong with fucking and enjoying yourself and college tends to be a place where some girls really take advantage of the new found freedom. I won't lie, college was an awakening experience for me...however...and here's a story, feel free to ignore and skip down to the 'Moral':
So freshman year, guy in my building, let's call him "Sean". So I notice him and think he's cute, ends up talking with me and a few friends. I proceed to tell him all about how I once kissed a girl (mind you this was back in the day when this was a 'big' deal. (Note, I was making this up, I'd never kissed a girl). Anyway, cut to a few hours later, he tells me to come back to his room. I'm only too happy to go. First thing he says is, 'Wanna see my blacklight?' and I'm like, 'oooooh, yeah'.....well that was just the beginning of his 'lines'. I was giving him a blowjob but trying not to laugh at his ridiculous shit coming out of his mouth that he clearly learned from watching porn....'Oh suck it', 'You know you love it', 'You want that big cock in your mouth'..etc...etc.... mind you this was the second dick I'd ever had in my mouth. I go back to my room and of course tell all my roommates in great detail.

Next week, frat party, we go, I see him there and he says, 'so...you coming by my room later?' and I say, 'of course'. So I go, I'm naked, sucking his dick and he starts with the lines again, 'Who's your daddy?!', 'I wanna rub my dick all over your hot little body', 'suck it hard'...etc...etc...I can't remember what his other lines were but I know they were way over the top because when I got back to my room, I proceeded to tell all my friends his new lines. Well my one roommate thought it would be hilarious to write a bunch of his 'quotes' on our message board with the words 'Ode to Sean'. Well the next day my other idiot roommate was giving him notes or something for class and he walked into our room. It took all of 30 secs for him to see the board. I panicked and slammed my bedroom door, as did my other roommates. Needless to say he was fucking PISSED. He was screaming, 'GET THAT BITCH OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!' and I was terrified so I went no where. Anyway, he stormed out, I went to lock our door, he busted back in and yelled, 'ERASE THAT SHIT RIGHT NOW!' to which one of my roommates furiously went ahead and did.

Well I have a big mouth so EVERYONE in our building knew what happened and for the rest of that semester he avoided pretty much everyone in our building like the plague. He was really embarrassed and I suppose I would have been to. Cut to the next semester I saw him on Spring Break, we fucked, and were fuck buddies for the next 3 years so it worked out for both of us but that's besides the point.

Moral of this story is, I told a handful of people, not wrote a power point presentation on it and it caused a shit storm. He's a good guy and it would have been fucking terrible if his name was forever plastered all over the internet in a story like this. It's one thing to be a girl and 'have fun' doing shit like this, but it's quite another to completely expose someone and go to the extreme that this chick did.

10/13/2010 12:29:59 AM

Wow Bry-ry.......

How bout them Mets?

10/13/2010 12:54:11 AM

words ITT

10/13/2010 12:55:42 AM

I kicked off my last summer as a boy by rubbing one out on the 10th story of a South Waterfront skyscraper.

The South Waterfront was Portland's latest urban renewal district until the economy crashed. Now it's half glassy towers and half vacant lots. FOR SALE signs decorate the condominiums.

But The Oregon Health Science University Center for Health & Healing—a gleaming building among empty chain-linked squares—is pretty cheery. I checked in with its fertility lab's receptionist on a sunny May morning. I wore my bright green dress. It matched the weather, but I would've worn it in a hail storm. I usually wear T-shirts with a skirt or jeans, but nothing less than a dress seemed fitting that day. It had taken me so long to get to this point; dressing in anything resembling men's clothes would've felt like giving in.

I was at the fertility clinic because of the hormones I was planning to take in the Fall. Feminizing hormones will cause a dude to grow boobs, soften his skin, lower his sex drive, melt his body hair and shrink his balls. (For starters.) This happens gradually, over a few years, and the changes are generally reversible—except for sterility, and I want kids someday. So I made the appointment and paid for a year's storage of my cryogenically frozen semen ($280). I figured, if I had trouble making subsequent payments, that this would make for a reasonable request of parental money.

The pleasant man who took me back wore a shiny grey shirt and was named Brian. He told me how to label my cup and pointed to the magazine drawer "if you need them." It was all very professional. "Make sure you lock the door," he advised.

It was a typical medical examining room, except there was no patient table, and instead of overhead lighting there was a dimly lit floor lamp. I looked through the magazines. There were layers.

1) Playboy and Penthouse. Classy ones on top. Okay.

2) XXX Club International. Lots of cocks in lots of holes. Fair enough.

3) Random gay mags. The covers are ripped off of these. I can't see the names. And the pages are tearing and the bindings are falling out. I would've hoped for sturdy smut, at least, for $280.

I realized I was blissfully unbothered by the fact that these magazines had touched freshly jizz-producing hands. I felt like I should've felt more disturbed. But I'm here to ejaculate into a cup, I thought. I'm here because I want to be a girl. A sperm-dyed piece of paper, really, is probably not one of the strangest things a person could find themselves encountering.

4) Maxim and FHM. Okay, what the fuck.

5) Your Prom. This is a teen girl's magazine. With Taylor Swift on the cover?!?

Perturbed, I closed the drawer.

Posted to the door was a list of guidelines. At the top of this list was MAKE SURE THE DOOR IS LOCKED.

The next guideline read, SOME MEN PREFER TO BRING A SPOUSE/PARTNER WITH THEM TO HELP COLLECT THE SAMPLE. IF YOU WISH TO DO THIS, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE TO DO SO.

A giggling twosome strides in and bones by the glow of the dimly lit floor lamp. I pondered attempting to talk ex-partners into helping me "collect my sample." Hey baby, want to bang on a cold floor and watch me splooge into a cup?

I looked further down the list. INFORM LABORATORY PERSONNEL IF PART OF THE SAMPLE WAS LOST. What a polite way, I thought, of asking you to let them know if you came on the floor. A lost sample. Lost kids. Future kids were swimming in me, soon they'd be swimming in a cup, and then they'd be frozen by a technician I'd never meet, and neither would they. I looked at the drawer that held a torn Taylor Swift.

I'm sorry I can't give you a better beginning to your journey. I bowed my head, and lifted up my dress. I swear, if you make it, I will give you the best life I can. I will be the best damn mother to you I can. You will never have to hide who you are. You will never have to feel guilty for who you want to be. I promise you'll be safe. I promise I'll always love you. I promise you, I'm already there. It was too hard to keep the bottom of my dress pulled up. I took it off. Standing naked, I threw it in a corner.

10/13/2010 1:01:24 AM

If I were built I'd go out to bars with friends. I'd sit on the barstool with immaculate posture, my polo taut against my chest and shoulder blades. My friends would tell stories about embarrassing things that had happened to mutual friends, and I'd laugh loudly from somewhere deep within my core muscle group. I'd order bright red lagers and pumpkin ales and thick stouts with high alcohol contents, and I would drink them, one after the other, very rapidly, and still I would not be drunk.

I would be hungry, and I would order cheese sticks and chicken fingers with extra ranch dressing, and as an experiment I would dip one of the cheese sticks in the ranch dressing, and I would eat it, and I would like how it tasted, and I'd dip the rest of my cheese sticks in the ranch dressing before eating them.

If I were built, I'd be attracted to petite women. I'd see a petite woman approaching the bar. As she ordered her woman drink I'd see her staring at my food with an expression that seemed to say, "Are you eating what I think you're eating?" and I'd lick my fingers suggestively and say, "I invented it. I invented a new kind of food," and she'd stand in front of me and sip her drink and talk to me about cooking shows and spices and stationery, she'd tilt her head and bite her lip and play with her necklace, and the guy she had come to the bar with would see us flirting from across the room, and he would see how veiny and muscular even my neck was, and he would stay right where he was and get drunk on his light beer and wait for his petite woman to return, but she would not return, she would come home with me.

If I were built, the petite woman would come home with me and she would be my wife. She'd fill our condo with all sorts of tasteful furniture—Amish-made oak armoires, recessed bookcases, shapely desks with many compartments, brightness-control lamps, firm-cushioned couches and armchairs, and a firm-cushioned love seat, which I would sit on, wearing a tank top and tight boxer briefs, watching whatever television shows my petite wife wanted to watch. I would complain about these shows, talent competitions and prime-time soaps, but my wife would understand from the tone of my voice that actually I enjoyed them, that I was just complaining because I believed intellectually that a man of my power and heft should rather be watching sports or bad sitcoms.

And so my petite wife would cuddle up against me and disappear into my armpit as we watched television together, and she'd buy obscure kitchenware from infomercials and use it to make us elaborate dinners, Waldorf salads and twelve-cheese quiches and pan-grilled walnut-encrusted mahi mahi, and we'd feed the leftovers to the big purebred dog we would have bought at a very high price with money from my six-digit salary, and my wife would say "Baby, you're spoiling him," and I'd say, "He's a big boy," and she'd say, "Just like you. I've got two big boys in my life," and later that night I'd roll over in my sleep and I'd almost crush her, I'd almost crush my wife's bones with my muscles.

If I were built, I'd have a petite wife and a big purebred dog and still I would join my friends at bars from time to time, and when I did I would order a round of shots named after a professional football team, and we would drink them simultaneously, and I would emit a resounding noise to indicate that I was not just satisfied but refreshed, and I would laugh at my gagging friend and say, "You all right, buddy?"

If I were built my wife would love me and my friends would admire me. If I were built the world would be my dog, and it would roll around at my feet, and I'd bend down to rub its tummy and scratch behind its ears and give it a vigorous parting pat. Then I'd go fix a sandwich.

10/13/2010 1:24:33 AM

Id like to know what idiot actually read every word in those posts

10/13/2010 2:21:05 AM

< This guy

10/13/2010 2:35:08 AM

i did, and enjoyed it

10/13/2010 2:51:29 AM

The ones that don't think reading is hard.

10/13/2010 4:57:11 AM

bump

with the exception of the two memes posted initially all the large blocks of text are from McSweeney's



[Edited on October 13, 2010 at 9:30 AM. Reason : I want to subscribe to Wholphin and/or the Believer]

10/13/2010 9:28:12 AM

I am amused

10/13/2010 12:06:33 PM

Children need sex. They require release like you do but are denied it with a partner who can teach them and guide them through it lovingly. Many young children masturbate for relief-and what does mom and dad do when they find out? Why, they slap the kids hands and tell them to stop or they will go blind! Once again, this only leads to oppressive, damaging GUILT. By age 11, I was a compulsive masturbator & collected hard-core pornographic magazines like HUSTLER! I was VERY sexual and I was asking for it on a regular basis (and never seemed to get it!) and yet society would have believed I was as innocent as can be. This harmed me. If I had only known a pedophile then, I would have been much happier in my childhood! But then again, if I had decided to have sex with a pedophile adult, they would have been imprisoned and I would have been in therapy for brainwashing to accept my "abuse". But my childhood had a happy ending-fate soon blessed me at 11 and a half with a woman pedophile who sexually educated me! Other kids are more like I was than you maybe would like to admit. Perhaps you were something like this in your own youth and due to guilt you wish not to admit this side of yourself existed. Think back and be honest with yourself-it is ok to be sexual and you are not alone or wrong! Stop feeling guilty about a natural bodily function and do not infect our kids!

Children do many things that are new to them. Sex is one of those things. A child must learn sometime, and "waiting for their wedding" is WAY too late! The sex drive is the most important one in our species besides breathing air and eating! We are made for sex! Children are made to enjoy it too! Repressing these feelings is NOT healthy. It is also unhealthy for kids to deny themselves relief. Sex by itself is NOT damaging to kids. This is a myth designed to attack pedophiles and deny kids their rights. In a misguided effort to "protect" kids, society has actually HARMED them by repressing perfectly natural feelings which DEMAND expression. Without it, healthy development and beliefs about sex are problematic. Kids masturbate and climax, and it does NOT "scar" them for life! By itself (remember-it is the guilt not the sex!) having sex with an adult (or another child) will NOT harm a child! It is a normal bodily function. Kids urinate and defecate as you do-they also experience sexual gratification (usually via masturbation) just as you do. A 10 year old boy may not ejaculate semen, but he CAN climax. A 10 year old girl can and often already does masturbate and she climaxes. Society needs to accept that kids are sexual beings.

Give them that chance. Do not deny them the right of sexual free-expression. Children DO intitiate sexual contact with adults and there is nothing wrong with it. Adults can also intiate. We must teach our kids the importance of their right to own themselves. This means they can REFUSE sex with an adult at any time. It also means they can accept an offer and inititiate one themselves! This is the part that society hypocritically refuses to allow. They say kids own themselves, but when that belief is tested, society applies a double-standard and denies kids a right to do as they wish to themselves. Implied in the belief that kids can say no is the acceptance of them saying yes! You cannot have it both ways. Either they own their bodies or they do not. If they can only say "no" according to you, then they do not own themselves in your eyes! Pedophiles are the opposite of "predators". In fact, they are the ONLY TRUE "child advocates" in this regard on earth, since the take the opinion of the child and his/her wishes into full account! Pedophiles love children. That is what the word means, (pedo=child phile=lover) it is not a bad word to describe a monster-except in the eyes of the media which distorts and sadly shapes public opinion against child-loving advocates-i.e. pedophiles. It is time for a new opinion about us-a positive one.

The problem pedophiles have (particularly male ones) is that if ANY adult shows a special excessive interest in kids, that person is immediately suspected of being a pedophile. This leads to pedophiles being separated from their outlets & it harms them. It also leads to kids being taken away from people that truly care about them. It is often the case that people who show unusual interest in kids are pedophiles but is that a bad thing? Pedophiles can be a VERY positive force in the life of a child. Society does not think so and wonders why pedophiles must add the sexual element. They ask why we cannot always be happy just doing things with them that are non-sexual. The reason is that is one very important aspect of life and one that is something we find very pleasurable when it is with the people we like and love. It is no different than you! If I have sex with an 11 year old girl I love and care about, why do you care if she is willing and loves me too? The trouble is, society assumes that she is incapable of loving, or understanding it. She IS capable-she loves her parents, which is one kind of love. I am only showing her another kind that she is gladly and voluntarily experiencing with me. You must accept that she IS capable of wanting sex and relief, and feeling LOVE for me-her pedophile. You can bet that if I were in such a situation, I would love her-not just use her. It is not merely sexual. I prefer young girls. I do not cruise the streets looking for them to molest! If it happens it does and that is fine.

Pedophiles do not talk down to kids & treat them with respect and listen to them. This is not the case with an average adult, and kids see right through it. Kids like pedophiles very much, whom they do not see as a heavy-handed authority figure, but rather, as a sort of "older" PEER. That is what confuses the general public about the motivations and methods of pedophiles. Society assumes the pedophile views the child as an object, and uses his/her superior smarts/abilities/experience to control the child to extract sex. But pedophiles do not do this and never advocate such tactics! It goes against their very nature to do that! The reason society falls for this assumption is it is "transferring" what IT would do if in that situation. Since "regular" adults do not really respect or understand children, they assume the same mindset applies to pedophiles-and it does not! A "regular" adult does not understand pedophilia or pedophiles, & so they assume the pedophile is approaching the situation as a "regular" adult with a perverted streak in them-bent on taking advantage of children-since that is what the average "regular" adult could see himself/herself doing if they were sex maniacs looking for an easy outlet to prey on. But pedophiles are not this way-we are not predators looking for targets! Being a pedophile is a way of life-not a sick perversion.

10/13/2010 12:29:43 PM