I received some items for Christmas, purchased at Sears, that didn't fit me well. So I returned them and got some store credit.

After being dangerously close to purchasing a waffle iron, then a battery-powered adjustable wrench, I decided to head to the men's section to look for some shirts. You really don't need a lot of detail here, as this part is not the point of the story. Suffice it to say that I found a couple of shirts in which I look hot.

I went to the checkout counter to pay for the shirts. The total, after store credit, was $7 and change. I swiped my card, punched in my pin, and waited. It went through, and my receipt started printing from the register. Here's where the fun starts.

"Here's your receipt, Mr. Phillips." She handed me my receipt. More was printing out. "The long part at the bottom is a feedback survey, if you complete it online you will have a chance to win a $4000 gift card," she told me over the sound of the printer. "And here's your customer debit record." As she handed it to me, I looked at it because I wasn't sure what a customer debit record was. It said "CUSTOMER DEBIT RECORD" and "THIS IS NOT A RECEIPT" on it. On this record, it showed the date of my purchase, the amount of my purchase, and how I paid for my purchase. Very similar to a receipt, but clearly NOT A RECEIPT. I didn't have too much time to ponder it though, because the register's printer was still going.

"Here's a coupon for 15% off any tool purchase of $50 or more," she continued. It was still printing. "Here's some information on home improvement financing specials." That was wasn't too long. But she wasn't done. "Here's a coupon for $30 off treadmills. (pause) And coming out now is a voucher for $15 off tax preparation at H&R Block."

I chuckled, audibly. "What, no gift receipt?"

"Do you need one? I can print one out for you," she said with a totally straight face.

I was caught off guard, because I think she thought I was serious. "No, no I was just... no, I don't. Thanks."

"And coming out now is your complimentary copy of Tolstoy's War and Peace."

I left the store feeling guilty for buying the two shirts, because in doing so, I watched two trees die right before my eyes.

Posted by omar at 7:41 PM | Read entire post | Comments (23)

(originals here)

I'm sorry. Blame NaBloPoMo.

Posted by omar at 10:02 PM | Read entire post | Comments (11)

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Posted by omar at 1:17 PM | Read entire post | Comments (10)

Omar: I'm just wondering if you think I'm being unreasonable?

Telly: No no, I - I - I just haven't had a chance to --

Omar: Because, I thought I told you I wanted my money by Wednesday. I swear that's what we agreed to. And now, here it is... what day is it?

Telly: It's... um --

Omar: I'm sorry, you're going to have to speak up. What day is it?

Telly: Saturday! It's Saturday. And I - I - I'm sorry, I know I'm late, but I'm --

Omar: You're what? No, in fact, I'm gonna tell you what you are. YOU ARE headed to your apartment, or house, or bungalow, or tent, or burrow, or cave, or whatever it is that you live in, and then YOU ARE coming right back here with my $600. Am I understood?

Telly: Yes, I --

Omar: I thought I told you to SPEAK UP?

Telly: YES! I - I will! I'm going right now!

Posted by omar at 9:19 PM | Read entire post | Comments (10)

Jermaine: She was like a beauty queen. A beauty queen from a movie scene, y'all.

Jackie: For real? Well what happened between you two, then?

Omar: She got pregnant and had a kid while we were out on tour last year. Then when I got back, she kept trying to tell me that the boy was mine. I was all like, "girl, you crazy! The kid is not my son!"

Marlon: I didn't even think that you two...

Omar: We didn't! Crazy broad was NOT my lover. She's just a girl, trying to claim that I'm the one. All I ever did was dance with her, then she got mad when I didn't call her the next day.

Michael: You all don't listen! I'm always telling you, be careful what you do! Don't go around breaking young girls' hearts!

Jermaine: (laughing) Man please! "Breaking young girls' hearts"? You're ten years old, what do you know about girls?!

Michael: Apparently I know more than him, because nobody's trying to claim I'm their baby's daddy.

Omar: Watch it, before I punch you in that big ol' nose.

Michael: Shut up, my nose ain't big! Is it?

Posted by omar at 7:53 PM | Read entire post | Comments (17)

I occasionally get questions about how I do some stuff in Photoshop, so here's a somewhat glossed-over tutorial (please note that this is not intended to be my best work, it's just a quick and dirty how-to). Hopefully it will be useful to someone. Perhaps someone who wants to learn some things in Photoshop, perhaps Dennis Kucinich.

And I'd like to point out that though I do have some Photoshop skills, and I am admitting that some images previously posted on this site may have been fabricated, that SI "Greatest Athletes" cover was totally real.

1. Find a suitable photo of a president.
   
2. Find/take a suitable photo of yourself. Taking a photo to fit the first picture makes the process way easier (and it often yields far better results), but is not always possible. For this example, I used an existing photo of myself from the holidays. Note that this photo goes against the cardinal rule of fake Photoshop pictures: NEVER choose a photo in which you are looking at the camera, because it makes it look super dee duper fake.
   
3. Legally obtain a copy of Adobe Photoshop (or Photoshop Elements)
4. Open Photoshop, open both images.
5. Using the magnetic lasso tool, roughly trace your head. You'll want to set a two-pixel feather first, so that the edges don't get choppy (the "Feather" option should be in the toolbar when the magnetic lasso tool is selected). Try to be accurate, but don't go nuts. We'll fine tune it later.
6. Press the letter "Q" on the keyboard to enter "quickmask mode."
   
7. When in this mode, use the paintbrush and eraser tools to do that fine tuning I mentioned 10 seconds ago. The red areas are the parts of the picture you don't want, the correctly colored areas are the parts you want. Post-fine tuning, it looks like this:
   
8. Press "Q" again to exit quickmask mode. Press Control+C (or Command+C on a Mac) to copy the selected area, then Control+V (Command+V) to paste it into the presidential photo.
   
9. You know what they say about guys with big heads, right? Right? Anyway, adjust the opacity of the new layer (with your head) so that you can see both heads at the same time.
   
10. Press Control+T (Command+T) to adjust the size of your head so that it roughly matches. Err on the side of making too big. You can make it smaller later without affecting the image quality. If you make it too small and have to make it bigger later, it'll get blurrier.
    
11. Now that you have the size roughly correct, hide the layer showing your head. Using the rubber stamp tool, "erase" the outer parts of the head you want to replace. Contrary to how it worked in "Back to the Future," erasing a person in the photo does not affect that person in real life.
    
12. Unhide the layer with your head. If necessary, do a little more shifting and resizing to get it to look right.
13. Fool around with Levels (Control+L) and Hue/Saturation (Control+U) until the tone and brightness of your head looks appropriate against the background.
    

Posted by omar at 9:34 PM | Read entire post | Comments (15)

Barack: Just give it a thought. That's all I ask.

Omar: Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the offer. But I'm not even sure I'd want to be Vice President. All that hectic travel and campaigning, and my prize is that I get to be President of the Senate? And seriously, you think America is ready to vote for two brothers named "Barack" and "Omar"?

Barack: Prize is to be "President of the Senate"?! (leaning in, whispering) Let me let you in on a little politician secret: (showing his empty pocket) I haven't carried a wallet since my keynote at the '04 convention. Once people learn your name, everything is free! Free food, free clothes, whatever you want! See this BlackBerry? I've got four more of these things back at my office. All free.

Omar: Yeeeeaaaaah, now you're talking my language, B. Gimmie your card, I'll give you a call.

Posted by omar at 8:50 PM | Read entire post | Comments (16)

Omar - ...OK, but I'm just saying, IF we make it out of this alive.

Catherine - This is just a movie set, I'm pretty sure we're going to make it out alive. And I'd appreciate it if you'd quit coming on to me.

Omar - Whoa, whoa, whoa! Someone is a little bit full of herself! I wasn't coming on to you, I was just asking you a hypothetical question.

Catherine - Yesterday, you asked me out to dinner.

Omar - Well excuse me for thinking we could be friends, I mean, I've --

Catherine - Then you said you loved me.

Omar - Sheesh, get over yourself! If you didn't want to rehearse at the time, you should have said so! All that stuff with the bodyguards was totally unnecessary, and so unprofessional.

Posted by omar at 10:29 PM | Read entire post | Comments (19)

Omar - I don't have to defend myself to you guys, the editors made the choice to give the greatest athlete the biggest picture.

Michael Jordan - Man, you didn't even play in the NFL.

Omar - Excuse me, but yes I did. I'm an NFL hall of famer, and --

Carl Lewis - Yeah, in the widely recognized "Neighborhood Football Leauge" Hall of Fame.

Omar - Who's that? (looks towards Wayne Gretzky) Wayne, did you just hear something?

Wayne - (pointing to Carl) I think it was --

Omar - Champ, did you hear someone talking?

Muhammad Ali - It was Carl saying that you played in the --

Omar - Carl? Carl Lewis? You do me a favor, you tell Carl Lewis that he can talk to me when I see his picture on the cover.

Posted by omar at 5:58 AM | Read entire post | Comments (20)

Beyonce - Well what did you think we meant by "jelly"?

Omar - Oh I know what you meant, I just think it was a stupid choice of words, and that it was only thrown in there because it rhymes with "ready." In fact, now that I say it out loud, it occurs to me that those two words don't even rhyme. That makes it even stupider.

Beyonce - So I suppose you'd do better as a songwriter?

Omar - I would have tried harder, that's all I'm saying. "I don't think you're pre-PEERED for this REAR," or something.

Beyonce - WHAT?! HAHAHAHA!!! That's what you say is better?

Omar - Shut up! I just came up with that off the top of my head, and I'd argue that it's not any stupider than "I don't think you're ready for this jelly."

Beyonce - (singing in a mocking tone) I don't think you're pre-peered for this re-ear...

Omar - I'm not even listening to you. I'm trying to watch the game.

Posted by omar at 8:25 PM | Read entire post | Comments (13)

Omar: I know you don't like to talk numbers and stuff, but it just occurred to me that the two of us, right here, we have a combined net worth just under FIFTY BILLION DOLLARS. How crazy is that?

Bill: ...I suppose you're right, yeah, but --

Omar: Let's not sour the moment, Bill. Let's just sit here for a second and think about that. Almost fifty billion. We could pick us up a couple of fancy cars, and on the way home, stop for a sports franchise.

Bill: Yes, I guess we could. But Omar, my net worth IS fifty billion dollars, so why do you keep saying "almost" fifty? That's only possible if you have a negative net --

Omar: Didn't I JUST say something about not souring the moment?

Bill: (nods apologetically)

Omar: (continues) We could buy a record label and start a rap group. We'd call ourselves "50 Bill," as like a play on words because part of it's your name, but also the whole name is almost what our combined net worth is...

Posted by omar at 10:36 PM | Read entire post | Comments (19)

Babe: ...so finally I demanded she take the kid in for a paternity test. As soon as I threatened that, suddenly she wasn't 100% sure the kid was mine anymore. No phone calls from her or her lawyer since then.

Omar: (shaking head) That's crazy, man. Kid doesn't even look like you anyway.

Babe: No kidding! I'm telling you man, girl was nuts.

Omar: So now that she's out of the picture, you free tonight after the game?

Babe: Only if your plans include beer, hot dogs, and flappers!

Omar: Nah, I was thinking we should take it easy tonight.

Babe: (confused) ...What?!

Omar: HA! I could barely even say that with a straight face! Babe, those are numbers one, two, and three through fifteen on tonight's agenda.*

---
* omarphillips.net does not condone womanizing. Or manizing.

Posted by omar at 8:22 PM | Read entire post | Comments (15)

Omar: ... and 3 trailers, so my wife and kid don't feel cramped.

Spielberg: Mmm hmm.

Omar: Oh, and internet access is a must. Did I also mention the massage chair? I love the way that feels on my lower back.

Spielberg: Omar, please have a seat for --

Omar: Excuse me, but I wasn't done. There are a few more things I'm going to need. Let's see, I already mentioned the cars, trailers, internet, chairs... SUNCHIPS, that was it! French onion, that is. Don't come with the "plain" or "cheddar crap" flavored ones. French onion Sunchips. Unlimited. And who do I talk to about tickets to the premiere? Because you KNOW I'm gonna need, like, three dozen.

Spielberg: Yeah, I don't think you --

Omar: And this script? I'm gonna need to make some changes. Like this, right here. You think a brother would really say that? Nah. I'd be like --

Spielberg: OMAR! I brought you in here to let you know that we finally heard back from Tom Hanks, and that we've decided to cast him in the lead role instead.

Omar: ...so, no Sunchips?

Spielberg: Goodbye, Omar.

Posted by omar at 6:44 AM | Read entire post | Comments (21)

Photographer: Omar! Halle! Over here, over here!

Omar: Seriously, that stuff with Billy Bob, you two weren't really... you know...

Halle: OH MY GOD, I can't believe you just said that!

Omar: So is that a yes? Because, I'm saying, it looked pretty believable...

Photographer 2: Over here! Guys!

Halle: I am SO not talking about this right now.

Omar: (singing) She got jungle fever, he's got jungle fever... They've got jungle fev--

Halle: SHUT UP!

Posted by omar at 8:11 PM | Read entire post | Comments (21)

LBJ: Are you sure she wasn't checking me out?

JFK: Lyndon, dude, get over yourself. I'm positive. She looked at me for a minute, then she kept looking Omar up and down. I'm not even sure she saw you were there.

LBJ: Omar, I know you saw it. Right before she was looking at you, she gave me those "come hither" eyes.

Omar: With all due respect, Mr. Vice President, I think the ladies stopped (air quotes) "checking you out" sometime back during the Wilson administration.

JFK: AAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaahh haaa! (high fives Omar)

LBJ: Pfft. Your mom was checking me out just yesterday, punk.

Posted by omar at 9:51 PM | Read entire post | Comments (19)

Paul: Omar, I thought we all agreed we were going to wear our hair the same way?

Omar: You know how hard it is to make a black dude's hair look like that?

George: See, Paul? Ringo and I told you that he's always got bloody excuses for why he's got to do things differently.

Omar: I'm tired of you ganging up on me. I thought we were past the 'black vs white' or 'British vs American' issues. I guess --

(everyone pauses and smiles for the above photo)

Omar: (continues) I guess not, huh?

Ringo: Actually, Omar, you're the one who brought up race.

Omar: You see? More ganging up! You know what? I'm through with y'all. I quit. Good luck making it in the USA without me, wankers. Ha! I used your own word against you!

Posted by omar at 9:47 PM | Read entire post | Comments (20)

When I was out buying a magazine at Borders (book store, if you're not familiar) last week, I was coerced into joining the "Borders Rewards" club. I don't know if you've been in a Borders store recently, but their rewards club is being advertised rather heavily. More accurately, you can't look more than 4-5 feet in any direction (including up) without seeing some sort of promotional material about the rewards club.

Since joining, I get coupons sent to me via email once per week. Some of them really aren't bad, offering 25-30% off in many cases. One of the coupons was for 30% off a children's book, so I decided to go grab a new book for the boy. As a result of the recent Curious George movie, a lot of the old books have resurfaced. I read them as a youth, but I really don't remember them too well. After thumbing through a few, I decided on "Curious George visits the zoo." I picked that one because it wasn't overly wordy, and the boy's into animals these days.

Not that I'm trying to ruin it or anything, but the story involves a monkey named George who visits the zoo, and his inherent curiosity leads to him getting involved in some crazy capers. Ultimately, he ends up doing the right thing and eating bananas with a man -- no, THE man -- in the yellow hat.

However, the most notable parts of the book were not in the story, they were in the pictures. I don't know exactly when the book was written, but it was published in the early 80's. I guess back then, the following image was acceptable (click on it for a larger view):

In case you can't tell, the fellow having a nice picnic with his family is smoking a cigarette. Right next to that little child, he's dangling his cancer stick around. Hardly children's book material, at least not in this day and age! But it didn't stop there:

This other fellow is puffing on a pipe while ogling the monkeys. Again, he's around kids. Nice. The final straw, however, was this:

I'm no expert, but if I'm not mistaken, that's a bong in that guy's hand. That may have been OK in the 80's, but it's not OK right now, certainly not in front of my toddler son. I WILL be writing a letter to someone about this. And before I ever buy another Curious George book, I'll be sure to pay a little more attention to the content.

Posted by omar at 9:12 PM | Read entire post | Comments (12)

Last time the wife went to the grocery store, she picked up one of these:

It's a large box of Goldfish crackers. We had been purchasing smaller, more regular-sized boxes, but we were going through them pretty quickly. The boy often has some of them as part of his afternoon snack, and his parents enjoy them on occasion as well. After I heard that food with artificial cheese flavoring counts towards your daily recommended vegetable servings, I've been inhaling Goldfish like oxygen!

When I say it's a "large box," I'm perhaps misleading you. Without any sense of scale in the above photo, you may not actually be able to understand how big the box is. Are you familiar with the comparatively big cereal box that Honey Comb cereal comes in? That's like a jewelry box next to this. When you buy a refrigerator, that comes in a "pretty big" box. This Goldfish box, this is collosal.

(That's over 1400 kilograms, for those Americans who deal drugs or to those who primarily use the metric system.)

In fact, I went into the kitchen the other day and found small-to-moderate sized pieces of garbage orbiting the box. Hobo Bob called dibs on the box when we're done with it, because it is, and I quote, "palatial." I did some research and found that when these particular boxes get shipped from the Goldfish plant in the south Pacific, they only have room to ship them 4 at a time:

These are large boxes. Thank goodness for wholesale prices.

Oh, and I estimate that we'll have this one empty in 4-5 days. It would have been 3 days if the Olympics were still on.

Posted by omar at 5:55 AM | Read entire post | Comments (16)

Every night before the boy's bedtime, we read a book. I tend to only read the one or two books I like, so last night I tried to look for a book that I hadn't read before. The one I picked up is just a generic picture book called "First Words."

Basically, it is just a book with pictures and associated words; it's not a story with a beginning or end. Each page (or group of two pages) has a theme, like "Toys," or "Fruit," or "In the Garden." So we begin going through it.

On the first couple of pages, I came across items that I thought were weird. On the page for "Animals," for example, one of the pictured animals is "Toucan." Really, how often do you find yourself needing to say toucan? Or on the "On the Farm" page, there's a guinea pig. Huh? Are there guinea pig farms? But whatever. It's just a kids' book, and they should be exposing kids to a variety of things.

When I got to the next page, I was ready to take those words back. Of course you want to expose your kids to a variety of things and ideas, but there is a line. And this book crossed it. First was the following page, the theme is "Clothes." I think you'll see why I had a problem with it. (Click on thumbnail below to see the image.)

Thank goodness I have a boy, I could explain this one away by saying that those are just for girls. But why did they think that's appropriate?! Then I turned the page. Next theme, "Around the House."

I have two concerns with this one. First, does everyone really have a Hobo Bob around the house? I always thought it was just me. Second, I think it was a little unfair of them to publish this with him in there. He always tells me that as soon as his "whore of an ex-wife" stops screwing up his credit, he'll be back on his feet. Thanks to this book, he's now immortalized as a hobo. I hope he sues the hell out of them. Once he gets back on his feet, that is.

The last page in the book didn't do much to restore my faith in this publisher's judgement.

I don't even know how this made it through editing. What message are we sending here? How do I explain to my boy why you would find that on the beach?

Like I said, exposure to lots of different things is good for kids. But there is a line. At tender young ages, there is such a thing as too much reality.

Posted by omar at 7:10 PM | Read entire post | Comments (21)