Whether it be cigarettes, chew, cell phones, microwaves, computer monitors, Sweet’N Low, or any other guilty pleasures that can lead to cancer, you can now add another item to the list. If you enjoy diving for oysters or licking the blue-veined junket pumper, think again. In this article, scientists have given the human race yet another obstacle in our pursuit of happiness.

ORAL SEX HAS BEEN LINKED TO MOUTH CANCER!
[Insert imminent doom]

Sweet! I was wondering what that taste was. It was cancer! But the taste isn’t sweet. Don’t let my excitement confuse you. The best quote from the article: “The link was even stronger in people with tumors at the back of their mouths.” The researchers made a mistake by stating it was “people” instead of “women.” You see, in my world men don’t suck dick. It just doesn’t happen, so of course they meant “women.” And you all know what those women were doing to get those tumors at the back of their mouths. A talent harnessed by few, but desired by all.

So, another one bites the dust. Let’s face it; if pregnancy weren’t enough to worry about (or accidentally getting juiced in the eye) we now have another thing to keep us from totally enjoying our nocturnal bedroom fiesta. It’s like sex can’t be enjoyed anymore. I guess for my generation it never was. Since the 80’s we’ve all been taught to be scared shitless of HIV.

This just means we all have to conform. Instead of making herpes and syphilis a bad thing, they should just become the “in” thing. There should be parties for people when their herpes flair up. Just like beer, it should be an acquired taste, or in this case a burning sensation.

Asian people are funny, there’s no denying that. That is, Asians that aren’t Asian-American. Asian-Americans are too serious and don’t understand why Asians are funny. Besides their inability to drive, their ways of communicating and interacting is downright hilarious.

A friend of mine was dating a nice, quiet Chinese girl. She didn’t really talk to begin with, but when she would attempt to talk she usually just stopped mid-sentence and started beeping. Someone really screwed up her programming. It’s just weird to encounter someone who beeps at you, but the weird thing is the beeping comes off completely normal to them. But my Asian encounters don’t stop there. There are two people at my work who have similar traits; Mister-err and The Whistler.

Everyone is “mister.” “Thank you, mister.” “Here you go, mister.” (and the shorter version) “Here, mister.” Then you’ll have the one word statement and question. “Mister.” And, “Mister?” It’s not beeping, and it’s not whistling. I don’t know what it is, but it sure isn’t like this next guy.

I usually pass our security guard about ten times in a day. No matter how hard I try to have a conversation with him, he just whistles different tones at me. And it’s not like he’s whistling a song, it’s more like the movie The Goonies when Andy is playing the bone organ. It doesn’t really sound like a song, but the notes symbolize a right of passage. Get the right notes, pass go and collect $200. Maybe that’s why he’s whistling at me. He’s allowing me to continue onto the next step of my journey. I guess on those rare Twinkie missions, it makes it all the more worthwhile.

- Two members of ‘the crew’ and two honorary members of ‘you are cool enough to hang out with Steve and Brad’ made the trek to Las Vegas. We found modest accommodations at the Excalibur Hotel and Casino. I was sporting a cold and I was on the counter attack with my remedy of choice – Cold Eaze. I have to suggest Cold Eaze to every Man, Woman, and child who may be in the midst of a cold epidemic. It can be found in the cough drop section of your local pharmacy, and though it may cost a little more than the regular Halls, it kicks ass! (And this whole time I wonder how I even got a cold in average 70/80 degree weather.)

- So, we’re all walking around and I’m poppin’ Cold Eaze left and right. I won’t give you the details of our gambling experience, that’s not important. As it was time for us to lay our little heads down on our pillows, my cough was non-existent. I decided that a late night Cold Eaze wouldn’t be necessary. I later awoke to the sound and pain of my own coughing sometime in the middle of the night. In fear of disturbing everyone’s slumber, I decided to slam some water and pop the Eaze. The first Eaze didn’t do the trick, and about a quarter of the way through it I started coughing violently, once again. I dashed to the bathroom where my coughing became so intense that I lost the lozenge in the sink along with some stomach acid. Damn. Ok, time for round two. I finally got my cough to settle and decided to place another orange flavored drop on my tongue. Unfortunately for me, my saliva glands went into standby mode during my slumber and as I awoke I found an encrusted Cold Eaze cough drop on my tongue. I felt like a dog that has fallen victim to the cruel joke of placing peanut butter on its tongue. It took about a minute, but I finally scrapped the remaining particle of drop off of my tongue.

- But wait! That is not the last that you’ll hear of the Eaze. We were moments from checking out of the hotel when one last gambling craze came across those that still had the money to do so. Steve put stock into a Wheel of Fortune slot machine. This game is great! It has the typical “7’s” and “bars” and all of that jazz, but oh-man if you hit on a spin the true excitement begins. At the top of the slot machine there is a scaled wheel of fortune with a credit amount on each slice of the wheel. When someone gets to spin the wheel, you can’t help but clap and cheer “big money, big money!” Steve had been on a good run, and all of the excitement had irritated my throat. Time for the Eaze. At some point soon after I had dropped the fine medicine on my tongue, Steve came up big with another big spin. I started to cheer with excitement! “Big Money, Big Moneuhhuuugg hugu gg..ugu ugg gloop.” (Cough, cough). I guess you had to be there, but my Cold Eaze had become entrapped in my throat and I started to gag on it. Then whoosh, straight into the pit of my stomach. The End.

- I’m sure most of the world realizes that California traffic blows. It’s a common occurrence to be driving at a reasonable pace and then come across a field of brake lights. I was coming up to the 710 / 405 interchange when traffic came to a halt. The car in front of me, which was a recent model Mustang with custom plates that read “Modee,” was tailing the van in front of him so closely that when traffic slowed down, Modee had to swerve off onto the shoulder to avoid colliding with the van. And me being me, was tailing Modee so closely that I didn’t swerve, and almost hit the van. We sat there for a few seconds in stopped traffic. Modee looks back at me, then down at my plates, then back up at my face. I think when he realized I was from Ohio, he decided to give me a lecture on driving. He held his hands up next to each other and started making gestures to suggest that I need to allow more room for stopping in my future travels. Modee, this completely makes no fucking sense for YOU to lecture ME since you’re the jerk-wad that had to drive off into the shoulder to avoid a collision. – Fucker! (Sorry home viewers, I had to get that out of my system.)

- If you have been following Steve’s Journal, which I am sure you have been, you’ll notice that we went to a Jeepers Creepers 2 signing – at the time we had no idea that Victor Salva was the man that he is. I tend to try and make many situations to be less mundane and add some spice, or at least a little bit of flavoring. When I got up to Victor, I asked him to write a haiku on my poster, instead of just signing his usual banter. Now, at first the haiku seemed pretty cool, but it has a totally different meaning after you read Steve’s Journal. Try and read it once as if you didn’t know who Victor is or what is past is comprised of. Then, get a refresher from Steve’s Journal and read the haiku again. It has a whole different meaning.

- Oh, and by the way, the haiku isn’t standard issue 5, 7, 5, so Victor completely has no idea how to write, if the Jeep Creep movie wasn’t enough evidence.

Dear Motorists: I would like to take this brief opportunity to discuss the speed limit of the 405 Freeway. The posted speed limit is 65 miles per hour. Not 5, not 10, not 15 – it is 65. When I am traveling on the 405 Freeway, I expect everyone to be traveling at a speed no less than 55. Thank You.

- I wrote an email to Steve to apologize for my unfriendly remarks in my last journal entry. I have yet to send the email, and I will probably delete it, but here is my first draft:

- It appears that three out of five The Decking Crew Website members can grow a beard. The day when I can call my facial hair a beard will be a bitter-sweet day. I have been doing research on my stubble, and have found that when my stubble finally decides to grow some balls and come out into the light, I will look like Keanu Reeves. The following pictures will show you the horror that will be my face.

- I hate the new Madonna, Missy Eliot commercial for the Gap. At least someone has half of a brain and made the decision to halt airplay of “version A” of the spot. You know which one I am talking about, the one where Madonna throws a little butt tap over to Missy’s way, and Missy stumbles all over the sidewalk because of the rump-shattering blow.

- Why can’t Madonna become a recluse like Johnny Carson? She’s proved her point – now leave.

- I am glad to see that Missy is like Oprah, and that they are both like marshmallows. They can shrink in size, but then fluffedy-puff back out. Brittany Murphy, on the other hand, needs to eat something. Better yet, she needs to continue to starve herself and disappear. I cannot believe she was the delightfully plump, nerdy side-kick to Alicia Silverstone in the movie Clueless. I also can’t believe she still has a career. “Swinging door!” God I hate that fucking line.

- So far, I have mentioned two things I hate. Both are somehow linked together. I don’t hate Oprah.

- I saw a bumper sticker the other day that was intended to say, “Fuck Terrorism.” The letter “U” in Fuck was the shape of a star, which bore the colors of the United States of America Flag. Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t the shape of a star resemble the letter “A” and not the letter “U?”

- Fack Terrorism.

- And now, a haiku:

sitting on the sand
thinking of a happy time
moon glows all alone

This is where Steve, Dave, and Tom insert a witty line with the attempt to get you to email them or post on the message board. Well fack that! I don’t want anyone facking emailing me.

- Little did Steve know his ‘Fuck You’ article would backfire. Why? Because he is an asshole. He forgot to add to his list of whining, “Fuck you if you’ve ever cock-blocked a friend and confidant!”

- I don’t like to use the phrase ‘cock-blocked’ but this calls for extreme measures.

- We were at the Circle Bar. I was sitting beside one of the twins, Rose. Steve was standing. I went to go grab a frosty brew for myself and the Beard Barer. When I returned to the party zone I was surprised to find Steve’s ass forming dimples in my seat! That’s not important.

- I decided that the four of us weren’t being social enough, so I started picking random people to introduce to the fab-four. My first victim, Mary. At first we thought she was married, but later realized her name was Mary. Must’ve been in her 30’s, kind of freaked out by my introductions to Steve and crew. Mary was scared by the beard – she left.

- Next, enter Jerome, or Jeremy, or Jake. Black dude with a white shirt, white headband, and I believe he was sporting some bling in his ear. Black dude was a lot nicer than Mary. He was as gentle as Skeelow. Anyway, BD was glad to meet Steph and Rose, but again I think the beard scared him off. The twins later commented that they weren’t ‘feelin’ the headband.’

- And then it happened, straight from Wayne’s World, the moment would’ve been perfect if ‘Dream Weaver’ was playing in the background. Two very attractive ladies walked into the room and took their scouting place a few tables down. Immediately, a couple of drooling dudes accompanied these fine specimens of woman. At one point, I think that Joe Loser number two was feasting on one of the girls left ear. I guess what he had to say was so important that he had to bury his whole face in her lobal region.

- Gasping for air, looking for an escape, the ladies caught site of me. I don’t know if it was my posture, or lack of a white headband, but they were feeling me. I didn’t think much of it. I looked away. Later, more glancing occurred from both parties. It was on. Only one thing could possibly fuck this up – Steve. I gave Steve the old ‘head nod, eye glance twitch’ in the direction of ‘the ladies.’ Steve declined to show interest, or hope. These women were obviously in need of rescue and I couldn’t go it alone. I needed Steve, and the ladies needed us!

- Soon after, we left.

- Moments later, Rose commented about the ladies givin’ me the eye. Women have that radar that men wished they had. I forget how this all went down in the parking lot, I was too angry. I think somehow Steve didn’t believe that we had a chance, but now feels remorseful after Rose was quick to confirm the desperate despair on the cleavage bearing beauties.

- Dammit.

- This entry is already ridiculously long. Bill Bell is turning over in his grave at the thought of the Bearded Betrayal.

- Ok, enough about Steve, this is my journal. So, I made it to Southern California in once piece, but I’m worried about the neighborhood I am living it. Last week I left at 8:30am to go edit some b-roll. There were two police cruisers parked across the street. I thought nothing of them. I returned hours later to find the same police cruisers still occupying their space across the way. I left to go to the post office. I returned to find the same to cruisers along with two unmarked squad cars. I left a few hours later and found the whole street lined in police cruisers, unmarked vehicles, a mobile crime lab, and a coroner. When I discussed the situation with my roommate, she was unfazed and commented that it happens all the time. Great!

- If you are the operator of a motor vehicle and there are signs posted “no parking sunset to sunrise,” I wouldn’t suggest parking. Even if thirty other cars are parked and you think that means you have special rights as a citizen to break the law. If you are a passenger in that vehicle and notice the sign, and then look at Steve, and he notices the sign, maybe it’s a good idea to inform the driver.

- Steve, they were gasping for air, dude! They wanted the beard! Even though they were looking at me and not you. Maybe they were imagining me with your beard. Maybe they were looking at Rose.

- Fuck you, Steve! And your beard!

- We talk about Steve and his beard as if his beard was a separate entity. Like a pet. I’ll name his pet beard, “Cha Cha.”

-Following my viewing of the Matrix, I was watching Oprah some odd amount of days later. Jim Carey was her guest, and he brought a digital camera along with him. During his interview with Oprah, Jim kept snapping off pictures of the audience, and then turned to Oprah for a picture. He was egging her on to do something funny, and then he instructed "Give me the finger!" Hmm, I thought the standard practice for this line was "Give me a flipper!" This proves that Oprah kicks whoop-ass over the Matrix, and that Oprah could kick Neo's ass!

-Since I am on the subject, have you ever taken the time to actually think about how harmful swear words are? If someone decided that "Shit" and "Fuck" were no longer swear words, along with any other word deemed profane, and then there wouldn't be any bad words. Is shit or fuck really that bad of words? They are just words formed by vowels and consonants, just like any other word -- poop and pee.

- I like songs with the word "Ohio" in them. I also realized that I now like cole slaw, and I haven't really liked it before.

- Why do movie credits have a "special thanks" section? Typically, you do not thank anyone else in the movie other than the special thanks section. The rest of the credits are acknowledging the cast and crew. So why are these people being specially thanked, and not just thanked. It doesn't make it special, does it?

- Johnny Cash will be dead soon.