THE GENE POOL MOVIE: PART I.

One day when this Web site hits the big time, some movie executive is going to green light a movie project about it. I'll be sitting there in a special chair on location giving the actors pointers and telling the director that he's doing it all wrong. After months of toil, the movie will be completed and hit the theatres. The Gene Pool movie will inevitable become a cult classic, and millions of kids will tell their parents: I want to be just like that Gene guy.

But before the movie can start filming, we must find the right actors to play all the parts of the people who have been mentioned right here. I can tell all of ya'll are overwhelmed with excitement to see yourself portrayed up on the big screen. Since there are just so many people who have graced the site, I have to break this feature into parts.

A special thanks to Jelly for inspiring this project. Naturally, she got to pick her person. The rest of you will have to live with my decision, which is final. The actor chosen may not be pleasing to you, but this is my site dammit, and I'll match you up how I want. Got it? The first installment is half of the T-P sports desk. Action.

Me: James Roday (star of Pscyh). This match was suggested by AGG. Who was I to argue with it? We both have a sharp wit, an irrestible charm and a daring sense of adventure. Runner-up: Seth Green.  

D: Morgan Freeman. It was D who first suggested this site could turn into something big. He's also offered to edit it, for a fee. That is why I think of D as the narrator of The Gene Pool. Freeman is well-known for his ability to narrate, so much so that it was part of a Family Guy episode. Runner-up: Ice-T.

Jelly: Mandy Moore. Mandy can do it all. She can sing, she can act, she can date every available famous bachelor. Jelly also can do it all. She can edit, she can do pages, she can do stats, she can turn into Yelly. Runner-up: Jenna Fischer. Though until her crazy turn, Katie Holmes was the winner.

Lopes: Chris Rock. Lopes loves to tell long, captivating stories. Rock likes to do long standup specials. Just remember, Lopes. There is no sex in the champagne room. Runner-up: That kid from Everybody Hates Chris.

Bake: Christopher Walken. Both are old. Both are funny. Walken can make you laugh just by looking into the camera. Bake has his Bake-isms. Runner-up: That guy who plays the knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. 

Derry: Louie Anderson. Anderson was a host on the Family Feud and occasionally poked fun at the contestants. Derry thinks the show picks idiots to play the feud on purpose. Plus, Derry is always quoting Anderson from Coming to America: "And that's when the big bucks start rolling in." Runner-up: Jonah Hill.

Liam: Pierce Brosnan. Both are tall and dashing. And isn't doing all that agate coding kind of like doing spy work and breaking the enemy's code? Runner-up: The guy who plays Jay (as in Jay and Silent Bob).

THE TINA CURSING CORNER

My mom was paying close attention to the weather Thursday. "We had all that fucking rain earlier, and then it just stopped." We go outside to scoop up a dead squirrel and throw it away. "Man, this fucking wind." We're eating lunch. "That fucking wind is blowing."

Mom tells me to plan on us going on a vacation next June to Miami.

Me: Can we plan it so the Cubs are there?

Mom: You want to go to fucking Miami to watch a baseball game? With fucking women galore and beaches.

Mom reads that Colston is out for six weeks. "That's fucked up."

I think mom's favorite phrase is What the fuck? She says it by itself sometimes and other times completes a phrase after it. She said What the fuck twice Thursday. Once while watching a soap and the other time because a disc for season 5 of CSI: Miami doesn't fit into its slot in the DVD case.

9/11 REFLECTION

It has been seven years since that fateful day. I thought about Sept. 11, 2001, a lot today. The weird part was that I didn't hear much talk around me about it. No one at work mentioned the anniversary. Mom didn't offer a comment. It wasn't on every TV station. I didn't read a wire story about teams paying tribute. I saw a couple of stories on news sites. That's it. I hope that was just me not paying enough attention and not people forgetting or blocking it out. Maybe everyone reflected to themselves. 

As one of the two big events of my life, I couldn't help but picture where I was seven years ago. I was sitting in religion class. First period. Same old, same old. The bell rings. 8:34 a.m. I start to gather my things to head off to the next class like normal when another religion teacher enters the room. Still normal. He taught in there for second period. But he had an ominous look about him. He went past the desk and headed for the TV in the corner of the room. I stopped, as did several other students, to see what his rush was about. He turns on the TV. You know the rest.

1) We watched the news in every class (with one exception) for the rest of the day. 2) I got a big hug from mom when I got home. 3) My calculus teacher made us take our test anyway. Those suckers took almost two periods to finish. So, we had half a lunch on test days. After an hour-plus of doing calculus problems, it seemed like the beginning of the day was a dream. Reality set in as soon as I left the classroom.

PARTING SHOTS

Derry is trying to defend me. Instead he brought ridicule upon himself.

"I went to a Rod Stewart concert with a dude."

We're talking about an ex of mine.

D: She's got places to go and people to see. 

Marcus: Or people to do and places to see.

Marcus feels sorry for me after reading Wednesday's entry.

Marcus: We need to hook him up. Library. Church. ...

Derry: Dog Pound. (Twenty seconds pass with other comments and people working.)

Marcus: That's rough.

Marcus tells me how to fix a romantic dinner. He mentions using parsnip.

D: Parsnips. Parsnips. Is that something a cat eats? No. That's catnip.

THE DAILY TOP LIST

My top five most embarrassing moments. Warning: Personal stuff in here.

5) The T-shirt incident in sixth grade.

I was on the junior varsity flag football team. The JV (6th and 7th) practiced with the varsity (8th). We had some big boys in eighth grade that year. At one particular practice, I get out to the practice field kind of late after changing from the school uniform. One of the big 8th graders starts laughing at me and quickly points out to the others the reason. They join in on the laughter. My P.E. T-shirt was inside out. The bastards wouldn't let it go the entire practice. 

I tried to put my shirt on the correct way, but they said I couldn't. They told me that since I couldn't put on the shirt right in the first place, I had to wear it inside out the whole practice. No, I didn't cry.

How I rose above this moment: For the rest of the season, I practiced with my shirt inside out. This endeared me to the older kids, and everyone came to enjoy the running joke.

4) The torpedo incident. Summer 1999.

I hung out all summer at Elmwood Fitness Center. We had a little clique going and patrolled the place like we owned it. One of the girls had this torpedo thing that you could throw back and forth underwater. Pretty cool. One time, we're in the area with the indoor pool. We decide to go in the water and play with the torpedo. Heads out of the gutter, kids. 

I take the torpedo and try to throw it across the way into the pool where we're headed. That pool was empty, and I was trying to show off my arm to the girls. Unfortunately, my aim was terrible. It fell short and landed in the jacuzzi. It hit one of the old ladies relaxing in there.

How I rose above this moment: I apologized profusely. The lady didn't report me or anything, but she still was pissed after five minutes of apologizing. Who could blame her?

3) The "bad" grade incident in eighth grade.

Back in eighth grade (and really my whole life except the last part of senior year in high school and college), I cared too much about grades. I was an excellent student, but this went beyond wanting to do well. It was an obsession. I couldn't help it. I hardly missed any school, never didn't do an assignment, went all out on projects and studied until I memorized everything. And in eighth grade, I was at the top of my game in doing all of this. I was kicking ass early in the year, until one day I got back a Louisiana history test. B minus.

Here's the story that spread across campus: I lost it. I broke down crying. I left the room without permission and didn't return for the rest of class. Another teacher later in the day still was trying to calm me down. 

That did happen. But the people spreading the story were leaving out an important detail. You see, people still remembered that incident in senior year. I was still being made fun of for it. I was the freak that couldn't handle getting a B and ran out the room crying. That's what makes it an embarrassing moment. The missing detail? I wasn't upset with the grade.  

I took great notes from the lectures. I memorized them for the test. There were handouts. Memorized those too. There was a chapter in the book covered on the test. Read it twice. Yet somehow none of the questions I missed were anywhere to be found in these materials. The questions came from nowhere. I don't think they were difficult. But I didn't know them. I think they had something to do with common sense and not history. 

Basically, I was pissed. I was already pissed while I was taking the test, but I thought maybe I had guessed correctly. And the teacher could give a shit about the out-of-the-blue questions. I asked why that part of the test wasn't covered in the two weeks of class before the test. He shrugged me off. That's when I lost it and broke down. 

How I rose above this moment: Later in the day, another student told me I was totally right and that the questions were unfair. He just didn't say anything because he didn't want to ruffle any feathers. After all, it was eighth grade at a high school, and we had just started. That made me feel better. Oh, and I bitch-slapped the rest of the course.

2) The missing pants incident in eighth grade.

One day after P.E., I was changing back into my school uniform when I couldn't find my pants. I looked everywhere. Nothing. So, I had to walk across campus with my school shirt, penny loafers and gym shorts. And across campus meant crossing two residential streets. Boy, did I feel funny and hear some comments. "Dude, you're missing your pants." and "That's a nice look for you."

The kids in my next class got a hearty chuckle as well. Turns out, one of the kids in the class had accidentally put my pants in his bag. So, the kid put his pants on after P.E. and then accidentally put my pants in his bag. Right. I still have the note the P.E. teacher gave me to give to the next teacher for my ridiculous appearance. "Please admit Gene without his pants."

How I rose above this moment: I gave sarcastic responses back to people as I walked across campus. 

1) The bathroom incident of third grade.

I have to go to the bathroom one day while doing math problems in class. I walk up to the teacher's desk and ask if I can go to the bathroom. She says no; I'll have to wait until the period is over. I tell her that I really have to go. She sends me back to my desk.

I'm doing some complicated multiplication problem a few minutes later when I can't hold it anymore, and I piss my pants. I'm able to prevent it all from coming out, but there is a monster pee stain on my pants. I go back to the teacher's desk. She sees the damage. "Why didn't you tell me you couldn't hold it?" Of course, now everyone is looking at me. After I go to the bathroom to finish, the teacher calls my mom to come pick me up. Lord knows what she was thinking.

How I rose above this moment: I took advantage of the early dismissal and played video games the rest of the day.