SIDE SALAD - Everything crunchy is good.

PERHAPS FRITALIAN

I don't get a lot of people asking for interviews. So when I do, I take their requests very seriously.

Like this one I got from a guy named Matt Clarke:

Hi, I like your site. I write a comedy blog, I wondered if you wanted to take part in an interview to highlight your site. My blog is http://mrjoeblogs.blogspot.com.

Kind Regards,

Joe Blogs

(Please include any picture at all that you want to add to the interview)

I'm a trusting soul. So I replied:

Name: Jeff Houck
Age: 41
Location: Tampa, Fla.
Philosophy:

I have two guiding precepts by which I guide my soul:

1. "To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch... ; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded!" - Emerson

2. "Don't fruit the beer." - Man Law

Sum up what your blog is about.

Sombreros. Hula skirts. Adventures in traffic. Exploiting my sole offspring's quirky behavior for the purpose of garnering endless amounts of attention for myself. Sharing things that make me laugh so hard, milk shoots out my nose - even when I'm not drinking any!

Why are you doing your blog?

Because, for reasons that aren't exactly clear, friends, colleagues, neighbors, ex-neighbors, bus drivers, pilots, artists, hookers, former British Special Forces troops, Wonder Woman fanatics, redneck homosexuals, lingerie-wearing vegitarian shiksas and marathon cyclists consider me the eastern seaboard repository for everything they think is repulsive, stupid and hilarious. I am their cultural Dempsey Dumpster. As the recepticle for all the cultural lint they dispose into my mental trap - and as someone who has a dark talent for noticing the weird and ridiculous in every day life - I find that blogging allows me to reduce the resulting psychological pressure generated by the combined geothermal idiocy. If I didn't blog, my head would explode from too much stimuli. And that would be bad.

In short, I blog to help mankind.

What's the funniest entry on your blog?

That's like asking, "Which person in rush-hour traffic would you like to stab in the heart with a No. 2 pencil?" The choices are endless and too complex to whittle down.

That said, here are a few highlights:

This.

This.

This.

This.

This.

This.

This.


What is your writing style?

Perhaps Fritalian.

How much would you sell your blog for?

A half-used carton of cheap trucker speed.

What do people commonly say about your site?

"Please reacquaint yourself with the distance stipulations mandated in the temporary restraining order."

Why should someone visit your site?

To protect themselves against the inevitable global plague of bird flu.

Climate change is caused by man. Myth or reality?

Climate change is indeed caused by man. A very powerful and sexy man. A man named Charles Nelson Reilly.

Are there any blogs you enjoy reading?

Corporate Casual

Regret The Error

The Sneeze

The Percy Trout Hour

I Don't Like You In That Way

The Food Pornographer

Post Secret

Veiled Conceit

Retro Thing

Cupie Spew


What would you have written on your tombstone?

"Refrigerate after opening."


Would you go on a reality tv show?

You mean I'm not on one now?


What one website would you recommend and why?

HeyDumbassWebSiteIsTwoWords.com


Tell us a random funny story that comes to mind.

I dated a woman in college who had a drinking problem. (Wait. It gets better.)

To make matters worse, she harbored great fear of her horribly judgmental mother and would drink to excess on the nights before her mother came to visit. Despite her own history of alcoholism, her mother blamed me and my flippant nature for her daughter's drinking. The mother and I did not get along..

One Saturday night while her mother was in town visiting, I cooked dinner for my girlfriend, her mother and my girlfriend's two roommates, who also detested the mother. My girlfriend spent the entire evening interrupting dinner so she could run to the bathroom and heave into a toilet to relieve her stomach of the alcohol she ingested the night before. Instead of showing concern for her daughter's condition or seeking medical help for her, the mother attempted to dismiss the vomitous episodes by denying there was a problem.

"Well," she said between bites of dinner as her daughter wretched only a few feet away. "My daughter has always had an acidic stomach."

I looked incredulously at the roommates as they stifled a laugh.

"Hmm," I replied. "I didn't know her stomach was Jewish."

The mother fixed a death gaze upon me.

"You know," she said with a clenched fist on either side of her dinner plate. "I have never appreciated your sarcasm."

She got up from her chair. The dinner abruptly ended. I left soon after. I never again saw the mother, who two weeks later picked her daughter up in the middle of the night and took her to California to get away from me.

I love that story.

Had any supernatural experiences?

See above.

What advice would you have given yourself 5 years ago?

"Take whatever they offer - be it a million dollars, a moon pie or sex with a porcupine - just so you can get the hell out of Fort Pierce."

Can you tell us a joke?

A dog goes into a telegram office, takes out a blank form and writes: "Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof. Woof."

The clerk examines the paper and politely tells the dog: "There are only nine words here. You could send another 'Woof' for the same price."

The dog replies, "But that would make no sense at all."

Tell us just one of your favourite actors, actresses, comedian, song and film.

Actor: Bugs Bunny

Actress: Bugs Bunny (when he'd dress up like a girl bunny.)

Comedian: Richard Pryor

Song: "Xanadu" ("The love, the echoes of long ago, you needed the world to know, they are in Xanadu.")

Film: "Wolf," starring Jack Nicholson. I could watch that damn thing on a loop for days with toothpicks to keep my eyelids open.

What's the most incredible thing that's ever happened to you?

(TIE)
1. Watching the birth of my son.

2. Winning a Linda Ronstadt album in 1978 by being caller No. 3 on WLCY-AM when I was 13. It's the one where she's wearing roller skates and tube socks on the cover. That's hot.

And finally, what would you wish for with 3 wishes?

1. I wish we could all live in the mountains, at high altitudes. That's where I see myself in 5 years.

2. That some day we'll find it: the Rainbow connection. The lovers, the dreamers and me.

3. I wish I had never been broiled!

Now it's your turn! Ask me one question, anything you like.

Do chicks find it erotic that you still live with your mom?

Posted by Jeff at January 11, 2007 06:40 AM | TrackBack