Whatever has been infecting my chest for the past week is now evacuating my chest at an alarming rate. I was going to Photoshop a picture of an alien from the movie Alien popping out of someone’s chest saying “I am mucus” to illustrate this point. However, I quickly realized that this was far less funny and far more graphically violent and disturbing than I originally envisioned.

So you can imagine that imagery for yourself as you go to bed tonight. Sweet dreams!

–Reid.

P.S. Tissue Sample.

…but it looks like the end of Ghostbusters outside.

–reid.

…it’s the full H1N1 Fever Edition with Special Edition “Airway Disease”! Airway Disease is a generic term meaning “the x-ray shows no pneumonia but it shows something that could be bronchitis or something similar,” which is nice. I’ve got the whole thing: fever, painful cough, body aches, bloody congestion, I lost my voice and so on.

It’s hard to say it (and not just because I lost my voice) but I’m actually glad I didn’t make the trip to NYC. I’m not sure what I would’ve done if the H1N1 had reared its head out there, other than germ all of my friends up.

I sort of feel like I knew this was inevitable all along. Once I’m better, I just need to try to evade getting a mutated strain of it, which I am coming to understand is happening fairly commonly. One crazy flu a season is good enough for me. I gotta get that ever elusive vaccination. Stupid Health Department, I curse your name!

Jerks.

–Reid.

—————-
Now playing: Sia – Under The Milky Way
via FoxyTunes

I have found myself fighting off a fearsome enemy inside my own head. It is also in my throat, my lungs and the rest of my body, for that matter. I call this enemy The Flu, jr., or The Flu Lite, or The Flu: Trial Edition. It is a fever-less flu, but with all the other weapons the normal flu (The Flu 2010: H1N1 – Business Edition) seems to throw at people. Oh, and this semi-flu, this little weenie of a flu, this poor excuse for a mutated alien cold that mated with a flu wannabe disease inside my already tender sinuses that can barely even ever hope to call itself a cousin of the influenza family? It’s not even going to be leaving me with any antibodies for the real big, bad threat this year, the so-called “Swine Flu” (patent pending). I feel so used.

Tomorrow I have an oncology appointment at the hospital. So I’ll huff, and I’ll puff and I figure I’ll probably pick up a copy of the full version while I’m there.

–Reid.

I can’t believe I’m posting this and yet here I am. This is a very personal issue that I have kept almost entirely to myself for a long time–and I’ll leave it at that.

When I was younger, I had a habit of eating “midnight snacks,” which are absolutely, positively bad news for the body. I was convinced by a pediatrician that this was causing a lot of my weight problems, and for years, I really tried hard to break myself of the habit.

Unfortunately, since I’ve been undergoing chemotherapy, I’ve had fairly constant nighttime insomnia. Being awake until 4am or 5am is not unusual for me. Right now, on top of my normal insomnia, I’m battling a wicked cold with coughing fits that, even though I’m loaded with Nyquil, doesn’t allow me much good sleep. There always seems to be something preventing me from getting “good sleep.”

By the middle of the night, dinner seems further and farther in the past and breakfast seems far in the future. I feel hungry. Sometimes I’ll get up and eat some fruit, sometimes some crackers and cheese, sometimes a piece of bread. I inevitably end up very mad at myself for contributing to my body’s already messed up metabolism. I am quite unhappy with the way I look and am scared of the health problems that may develop from being overweight, I am unhappy with this nighttime snacking habit, and yet, at 3am, I can’t seem to help myself.

I don’t really know what to do to break this habit. Will power alone isn’t cutting it. If anyone has any suggestions, I would sure appreciate them. Thanks in advance!

–Reid.

It’s Better Than The Machine’s frightfully funny Halloween video, a parody of the “Saw” films called “Mousetrap”! Steve and his friends are captured by a psychotic, albeit uncreative, puppet whose plans Steve simply cannot abide. Enjoy our ghoulish send-up of the tired Saw franchise:

Directed and edited by Ballard C. Boyd, who stayed up past his bedtime making a last minute change I requested. I believe the change makes a big difference for the better, so thank you very much, BCB!

The video was written by BTTM’s resident pop culture guru Carlos Cabrera, to great effect. I had minimal input, which Carlos and Ballard refined and polished. Special thanks are most definitely due for my mom Laure, who stepped in to provided the voice for the puppet’s mom. I think Ballard modified the recording in someway, as you can’t really tell that it’s her. Sorry Mom, I guess you’ll have to wait a little longer to become a YouTube sensation.

This Halloween video is much, much, much (infinitely much) better than the last one BTTM did, back in 2007. I still have nightmares about that video–but not the kind of nightmares that a Halloween video is meant to instill. Rather, the last minute, thrown together, embarrassed to have my name on it and my face in it, probably my personal worst, “what was I thinking?,” Paul-was-right-about-this-video kind of nightmare. Although, Dave and I did make one of my favorite episodes of The Guys in 3A for Halloween that year…

Anyway, I like this new video a lot, even though it has brought to my attention that we’re going to have to stop using the names Steve and Gerald in our video sketches for awhile. Those seem to be our go-to names! Gerald is also the name of Matt Gallo’s kidnapper character (if not many others) and there’s a Steve in almost every sketch we’ve done, whether you know it or not. Whoops! Oh well.

I’m very proud of Los, and really enjoy his sketch. Make sure to check http://bttm.net next week for a brand new video… if you dare! Mwahahaha!

Happy Halloween!

–Reid.

I did not go to New York City for a long weekend due to fears of my catching H1N1–yeah, way to go Health Department; stir everyone into a panic and then don’t offer vaccinations within any sort of reasonable time frame! Way. To. Go. Right, so anyway, I didn’t go to New York and then I ended up getting sick in Denver. I won’t say sick as a swine, but definitely as sick as a dog! A sick dog. I’m plenty sick! Which is why Congress’s Bill on Irony is great on paper, but no good for daily use.

I have been writing a gay homonyms, homophones and homographs sketch to pass the time or:

Eye halve bin righting eh gay homonyms, homophones and homographs sketch two pass the thyme ore:

I(homophone) have(homophone) been(homophone) writing(homophone) a(homophone) gay(homograph) homonyms, homophones and homographs sketch(homograph) to(homophone) pass(homonym) the(homonym) time(homophone) or(homophone):

I’m sick, I need my sleep, I’m done with this silliness.

–Read.

Indulge your senses with Better Than The Machine’s classy new video, dedicated to all those classy ladies out there:

Written and directed by Paul, who, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, is actually quite classy himself.

–Reid.

I got to see CAKE live in Boulder tonight with the guy who first introduced me to CAKE’s music 14 years ago at Campus Middle School. CAKE was invited to etown, a radio variety show that records in the Boulder Theater. The show includes interesting artists playing music and being interviewed, along with some other neat stuff. etown is heard here (Denver) on KBCO (97.3), and also on NPR. It’s on stations all across the country (and the world).

CAKE is of particular interest to a place like Boulder and a show like etown since they converted their recording studio to run entirely on solar energy and they give away trees at shows and they are pretty darn opinionated. They noted that they’ve really scared off a lot of their Mid-West and Southern fans. We got to hear some new CAKE songs, some old CAKE songs and a totally unrelated live phone call to a lady in Florida who won an etown award for starting a volunteer organization that helps the homeless. Another guy played music and was interviewed too, but I found him to be totally devoid of noteworthiness. Other than him, it was great. They announced tonight that there is going to be a special Denver etown recording on November 8 at the Paramount Theater featuring Playing For Change. That’s pretty tempting to go to, also. (If you don’t know who they are, do yourself a favor and just click that link.)

I’m glad I got to finally see an etown show and I’m glad I got to see CAKE! They played “Wheels,” “Jolene” (their usual encore song… played as their encore song), “Stickshifts and Safety Belts” and three new songs. The new stuff was really neat, and some was so new, John McCrea, the lead vocalist and vibraslapist, had lyrics on a piece of paper. They also played “Sympathy For The Devil,” which, if you know anything about CAKE’s setup, sounded very different from the Rolling Stones’ original song.

–Reid.

ADDENDUM 10/20: CAKE played one other song that I can’t believe I forgot. John McCrea said one of the great tragedies of the last century was the fall of the 3/4 time signature and that people fear 3/4 time. Then they played “Mexico,” an old, sad CAKE tune in 3/4 time.

I just stumbled upon a copy of the ESPN/Alltel Wireless “My Circle My Picks” commercial that I was in back in ’07. It’s called “Wide Circle” and has something to do with college football. This was the first national commercial in which I acted. It was filmed around the time I started noticing that I was getting sick, and I had all-but given up hope on ever finding a copy until I randomly came across it tonight.

It was directed by Harold Einstein, who (rumor and a bit of Wiki-ing has it) is related to comedy brothers Albert Brooks and Bob “Super Dave Osborne” Einstein. It was a lot of fun, and since then, I’ve seen several of the other guys from this spot in other commercials. They were all nice guys, so that’s really cool. Oh, and the great NCAA football commentator Lee Corso was there and he, too, was very nice. I will admit that *ahem* I had to look up who he was after I met him.

It was a great experience, and I’m glad I finally get to share it with all of you! And, wouldn’t you know it, it’s really, really weird.

Enjoy!

–Reid.