Elephantitis

Quick! What's the first thing that comes to your mind when you see the following pictures?



If you said, "Brian's feet," you are today's winner.

I have ugly feet. There is no doubt about it. Wide, dry, hairy, sharp, and callused, are just a few adjectives to describe them.

If you have the stomach to view them, I posted a picture of them here (pardon the blur):


Was I lying? I know--They're disgusting!

This morning, Dawn mentioned that she was having her nails done. So, I decided to tag along and ended up doing something that I have never done in my thirty-four years of existence; I got a pedicure!

I'm not sure why I decided to get one today. I always said that I'd get one, but always put it off. However, I don't want one to make my feet look sort of clean. I want one because I have a bizarre facsination with the body, namely things that come from it or out of it. For example, I want to do ear candling because I want to see the wax that comes out. I occasionally use biore strips to see the little porcupine-like hairs that I rip off my nose, and yes, I want to do a high colonic because, well, you get the picture. Again, I want these done because I'm curious and gross, not vain.

So, there I sit, in the pedicure chair, soaking my gangly feet, receiving a chair massage. When the Asian lady started clipping, I immediately felt uncomfortable. I really didn't enjoy someone working on my feet: soaping, filing, and snipping. I felt guilty that someone has to touch my feet for a few bucks. That is, until she brought out the heavy artillery: The cheese grater. Once she brought that out, all guilt left the building immediately.

This piece of equipment is right up my alley. It literally shaves calluses off the bottoms of your feet! OK! I'm ready now. Bring it on! Each downward stroke of the grater brought me joy. Hearing the scrapes and the subsequent layer of skin that fell into her towel was better than Christmas. It was gross and beautiful at the same time. It was like tiny cheese slices floating to a napkin. Except that the cheese, in this case, was skin and its color was dirty gray. Mmmmm. . .

For the time being, I am proud to say that my feet are now just KIND OF dry, KIND OF sharp, and KIND OF callused, but still VERY UGLY.

I present, my newly-improved(?) feet:

Lower the Voting Age to Six!

(The day after Barack Obama became the presumptive Democratic nominee)

Chloe: Dad, who is Ocobama against next?
Me: John McCain
Chloe: He's old!
Me: (smiling) How did you know that?
Chloe: I saw it on Hardball!

(Can you tell what's on constantly in my house)

Fast forward to today. . .

I was combing Chloe's hair and watching MSNBC at the same time. Before commercial, they had a teaser that promoted some viral video of John McCain's head superimposed on a jugglers body. Chloe immediately shouted, "That's not a reason to be president!"

I proudly said, "Exactly, Chloe!"

Why is it that a six-year-old can identify what's NOT important in a candidate, while the rest of America is focused on lapel pins and religion?

Here's the video: