My 13th Birthday Was a Friday the 13th

Ah, August 13, 1993... the year I turned thirteen on a Friday the 13th.
What a glorious day it was, indeed.  At least in my mind I seem to think it was.  As I sifted thru photos looking for some to accompany this blog all about my thirteenth birthday, I realized I don't have any.  The early 90's weren't like today.  Not everyone had a camera in their phone to take photos of every little detail of their mundane lives.  And the phone was attached to the kitchen wall anyway.

Also, it occurred to me as I did some fact-checking that I kinda lump my 11th and 13th birthdays together in my mind.  I often reminisce about how on my thirteenth birthday I was given my first little boom box cassette player and the new Spin Doctors tape, "Pocket Full of Kryptonite."  I'm also warmed by fond memories of being given a cassette single for Bryan Adams' "(Everything I Do) I Do It For You", and how my friends and I all played a WWF Wrestling Challenge board game with the Ultimate Warrior featured on the box.  But all of that stuff really occurred in 1991, not '93.

Where the hell did my memories go?

So when I think a bit harder about all of it, I vaguely remember having a couple friends over for a sleepover, watching "Cool World" and "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" on VHS, drinking an entire case of Loeb Cola, and having pizza.

My friend Brian sneaked in some dirty porno magazines that he stole from his older brother's room and we gazed over them in the basement after my parents went to sleep.

My twelfth birthday gets lost in the mix of it all, because my sister's wedding was two days after so there wasn't time to have a party or anything like that.  Luckily, the WWF was in town on my birthday and I saw the Ultimate Warrior fight Papa Shango.  However, after trying to Google anything about it, I can't find a single thing about the WWF coming to my town on my birthday.

I'm actually starting to think this never existed and it was all made up in my mind.

Being thirteen was pretty good, and it lasted about a year until I turned fourteen.

And hey, here's a photo that isn't at all from my thirteenth birthday.

The end!

Happy 16th Birthday Ryan!

What It's Like To Fall In Love

With Valentine's Day almost here, I find myself reflecting on the one hundred years or so that my lovely wife and I have now been together.  Did I say one hundred years?  Maybe it's only ninety-nine.  Time sure does fly.

2002.

I met my lovely wife in the summer of 2002.  We were high school sweethearts.  And by that I mean she was still in high school and I was not anymore.  I'm nearly five years older than her.  At the time I took a lot of flack for it, but hey, I ended up marrying that girl so I guess the moral is... well.... I don't know.

The first time I met my lovely wife, she was working at a convenience store.  I bought a drink and a pack of gum.  This is an important detail to the story, so pay attention. Future Lovely Wife was so enamored by my hotness and raw sexual aura that she fumbled around and only charged me nine cents for the pack of gum.

Score! 

Hey, even if this relationship never went anywhere I could at least say I got a really good deal on a pack of gum.

Believe it or not, I never asked her out.  We got to talking on the phone a lot, and on ICQ (uh-oh!) and it turned out that while she'd had boyfriends before she'd never actually been out on a real date.  Future Lovely Wife had a great rack and gave off all the right signals, so I told her I was going to take her to dinner and a movie.

And I did just that.  But first, a stop in the park - because, really, what's more romantic than taking a seventeen year old girl to a boring park when you promised her dinner and a movie?  You got it - convincing her to give you a sweet back massage in the park!  And gosh darn that was a good back rub.  This was where we shared our first passionate kiss.
(On a side note, when I finally proposed to her years later so she could become Lovely Fiance I did so in the same park.  I'm a sucker for nostalgia and tradition)

So I took her to dinner at Frankie Pesto's.  It's always been a great date spot.  Vines on the wall.  Sinatra playing while you eat.  And, since I don't drive, there's a very convenient bus stop only a few feet away from the restaurant.

The movie of choice was The Master of Disguise, starring Dana Carvey.  You may have noticed it showed up on my Top 11 Romantic Movies list, only because it was from our first date.  That movie is otherwise complete and total shit.  But, if you think about it, that movie needed to be total shit in order for us to not want to watch it.   I mean, seriously, can you imagine if your first date movie was something like Star Wars?  You don't want to actually watch the movie during a first date, but at the same time it's fucking Star Wars.  That bloody classic deserves your attention.  Unless, of course, it's The Phantom Menace, then by all means start making out.

And that's what we did, because The Master of Disguise is a waste of film, and there were only five or six other people in the same theater as us.  We sucked face in the theater during a shitty movie where Dana Carvey repeats the line, "turtle turtle turtle."  Boy, do I know how to show a girl a good time.

Our hot make-out session was only interrupted for a moment by two little girls.  They were at the movie with their parents a couple rows ahead of us and took the time to inform said parents that we were, indeed, "ewwww kissing!" And those two little girls grew up to be Taylor Swift and Miley Cyrus.  Okay, that last part is a total lie, but I'm sure they remember more about The Master of Disguise than I do.
(Side note number two... I bought The Master of Disguise on DVD for Lovely Wife one year for our anniversary.  We've still never sat through the entire thing)

There was an awkward moment during the movie though.  Future Lovely Wife was concerned that I wasn't having a good time because I kept getting up, leaving, and then coming back.  She thought maybe I didn't really like her... even though I had already stuck my tongue in her mouth by this point.  Silly. In all actuality, I was starting to get the flu and I kept running to the washroom to blow my nose.  I didn't want her to see me blow my nose.  Thought it would ruin my chances of getting in her pants later.  Am I right, ladies?  Exactly.

After the movie I took her back to my place.  Okay, I took her back to my PARENTS place because I had moved back home for a little while.  This was an opportunity for Future Lovely Wife to meet my mom and dad, even though it was now close to midnight.  Mom was asleep.  Dad was awake when we came through the front door, and he was in his tighty-whities, peeing with the door open.  For the whole world to see.

This is where I'd like to end the story of my first date with Lovely Wife, and I'd love to be able to do so in some classic Disney-ish fashion, where we share another passionate kiss and promise ourselves to each other forever and ever.  Instead, I tried to get in her pants.  But that's tough to do when you live with your parents.  Some things take a little more time.

And hey, would'ja look at that - I ended up marrying her.  Now that's a love story.

- ryan of the ryan fan club

For Hallowe'en she was Supergirl and I was Johnny Depp.

Top 11 Romantic Movies

Yes, Valentine's Day is almost here.  It's a day in which many of us take those we love out to dinner and a movie.  The big talk is all about Fifty Shades of Grey being this V-Day's must-see controversial movie.  I dunno, I'd probably watch it on blu-ray when it comes out.  Besides, my lovely wife is going with one of her girlfriends to see it on Friday night.  Any way, if you don't have tickets for it or you don't want to watch it, here are 11 other VERY romantic movies for a nice, "stay in and order pizza and a movie" kind of Valentine's Day.  There's something on this list for everyone. 

11. Edward Scissorhands
10. Grumpier Old Men
9. Chasing Amy
8. The Master of Disguise
7. Saved By The Bell: Wedding In Las Vegas
6. Don't Tell My Wife I Assfucked The Babysitter Vol. 15
5. Cocktail
4. How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days
3. The Wedding Singer
2. Somewhere In Time
1. Rocky 

Top 11 Things To (Not) Say At A Wedding

... before I'm reminded that it's been forever and a day since I've done a Top 11 list, here's the Top 11 Things To (Not) Say At A Wedding...  I'll let you use your own judgement when opening your mouth.

...weddings always make me cry wolf.

11. "Always a bridesmaid and never a bride, huh?  Probably 'cause the bride don't sit around getting all fat n' sweaty while watching Maury Povich all day!"

10. (in response to that question of 'do you take fucktard to be your lawfully wedded whatever"...) "What does the fox say?????"

9. "Yes!  Yes!  I goddam love this song!  Fucking awesome!  Baby, let's dance! ... What?  ... What first dance?... Their...?  No fucking way!  This was the song we danced to at our wedding!  It was our song first!... It wasn't? ... My first wife...?  Well, fuck it!  I goddam love Air Supply!"

8. "Yeah, sure, right now she's like mint in package.  Ain't nobody opened her up and played with her yet.  But give it time, I tells ya, pretty soon those elbow joints won't be so stiff and her arms are just gonna hang there.  And then you won't be able to find her accessories anymore.  She'll end up in some cardboard box at a yard sale."

7. "By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you Mr. and Mrs. Herman Hendezelbengerstein!"

6. ""Can I have the vegan option?"

5. "Who fucking gets married on Columbus Day?  Fuck this shit!  I've got a case of beer in the trunk that's in need of my lips!"

4. "If they get up the next morning, all married and stuff, and he finds her eating frogs in the bathroom, he's gonna be super pissed."

Greatest.  Couple.  Ever.

3. "You know, that WAS going to be my dress.  But then my fiance left me for another woman.  Then, I got a tongue ring and he took me back.  Then he left me for another woman again.  Not the same woman.  I guess that would be another another woman.  I can't keep track of them all.  Anyway, so I got this sweet boob job done for him.  I had a coupon.  And he took me back.  Then he left me for a dude.  That dude already had a tongue ring, and then got a boob job done.  The difference?  He paid full price.  And really, neither of our new boobs would have fit into that dress.  So I gave it to the other other other woman that he left the dude he left me for."

2. Wait, before you put the ring on me... lemme grab my phone... gonna instagram this shit!"

1. "If every word I said, could make you laugh... I'd talk forever.  I'd ask the sky just what we had.  It showed forever.  Forever.  Forever.  I've been so happy loving you.  Let the love I have for you live in your heart and be forever.  Forever.  Forever.  I'll be so happy loving you.  And a tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable."

So there you have it.  Get married!  It's fun AND you get presents!

- ryan