Beta Breakers

Today is a national holiday for some people. Some people like me...and most of San Francisco. It's the day of Bay to Breakers, one of the most festive and silly, stupid days the Bay Area has to offer. Way back when we were just young kids just bein’ alright, Danny Krueger moved to Yay Area and would tell me tales of this deliriously fun and drunken day where people would put on their Sunday best-themed team costumes and come on out to celebrate and support those undertaking the footrace from one side of the city to the other. The first picture evidence I was presented with was in 2006, where key members of the DFT donned impressively skimpy outfits for the grand event:

And here are some other pictures of B2B past. It’s the kind of day where you could lose a toenail and have no idea how, where you could wake up after your midday nap with an excruciating headache and not remember it came from going on a makeshift see-saw and slamming your ass into the ground on a piece of plywood. Where the aftermath rears its ugly head in a jumble of scuba gear, pimp train costumes, wigs and mardi gras beads. Where an impromptu rave happens in Golden Gate Park because someone has built a DJ float. It’s one of those days where anything is possible…

Now, me being of sound biology studies background and not so sound geography knowledge of San Francisco back then, I didn’t realize that this event was named due to the map of the race—from the Embarcadero, the BAY, to the Great Highway at Ocean Beach, where waves crash into BREAKERS. Instead, I assumed it was called Beta Breakers. I couldn’t think of a reason why Beta would factor into the name, I just accepted that San Francisco is weird so of course they’d have some weird, nerdy science-related race parade that just gives people an excuse to dress and act like idiots while being drunk from dawn till dusk.

Thus, for the longest time, I went around calling it Beta Breakers until finally I asked Danny one day what it meant, why was it called Beta Breakers? And the truth came out. But of course, the phrase remains. This is the second year in a row I’m missing B2B due to working out of town and let’s hope it’s the LAST TIME!!! 

Susan Cho to me

show details 10/2/09

4:41 PM

Susan: Did you know, I can't stop laughing at leotardo da vinci? did you?

me: haha! we saw it last night, at the end of the jane fonda complete workout, their wardrobe was provided by leotardo da vinci

Susan: oh my god. retardo da vinci! i logged onto gmail ths morning and laughed out loud, so loud.

me: um...is there someone named daniel gonzales? that you know?

Susan: Yeah. You know Dan.

me: he put me on some weird email chain about composting, it's like me and some girl named alice and some girl named egan

 

me: megan

Susan: Alice is his roommate. She's french. Do't know megan. Maybe he meant to email another erin, but you know how on gmail, it saves people you've been on an email chain with, and he just wasn't paying attention to which erin he was emailing.

me: hmm

Susan: hmmm. thats funny and strange. maybe he wants you to move in..they hva really cute place in teh mission.

me: damn. that would be really fun. can they have cats?

Susan: Probably. I feel like evrywhere can I have cats.

me: wait is that where we met for beta breakers?

Susan: No. Thats Emily's place. Dan's place is on like 15th and Capp.

me: I feel like everywhere can I have cats.

Susan Cho to me

show details 10/5/09

Susan: is it cold there? or cooler? everyone i know in la is commenting on the weather.

me: really? i mean, it's not excruciatingly hot like it was a couple weeks ago but it's like mid-70's-80's

Susan: dang. thats still pretty damn warm. oh man. i can't wait to get a little la getaway made.

me: it's too bad you're not coming the weekend before though. There's a DANCE LIKE MICHAEL class happening that krista and are getting made

Susan: ooh. dang. that sounds hella fun.

me: i know, but maybe we'll pick up enough things that we can teach you guys. danny sent me a very promising text this morning

Susan: oh yeah. learn some moves, adn then we can do them.

? promising text about what? coming to la with us?

me: yep. he asked if we could do my staple drunk dance move if he comes. which, of course, is a no-brainer

Susan: yes. he was showing me your dance, but i feel like i need to see you do it to get the full effect.

me: it's the dance from beta breakers with the firecrotch, apparently

Susan: oh my god. but i missed the firecrotch dance!!!!!!!

me: i know. but that is the birth of that dance.

Susan Cho to me

show details 10/26/09

Susan: last night, i bought myself a 12 pack of pbr, had like 4, and then slept at like 1130.

me: nice. we had red stripe and i went to bed around midnight. i kept watching it's always sunny and then i randomly watched a nip/tuck on demand. that show has gotten ridiculous.

Susan: has it? i've never gotten into it..

me: i used to watch it. i stopped around the time jennifer was on it. i mean, it was weird then, but like, now one of the sons is all into mime. and he robbed a grocery store dressed in his mime costume.

Susan: uhhhhhhhhhh. thats weird.

me: and he's like kind of girly looking so he made for a real creepy mime

Susan: ugh. why do people go into the mime arts. oh wait. i knew a girl, tracy, who was in my bookclub, and she had friends who were mime's. like real ones.

me: that's gross. if i can't find a dress, i'm being a mime for halloween. ew or we should be team mime for beta breakers. that would be so creepy!!!!

Susan: ahhh!!! actually, mercedes and amanda said we should be team: men on film (from in living color).

me: ooo that'd be fun

Susan: which would be so funny. we could wear those little hats and give eveyrthing 2 snaps up.

me: even just team in living color. i want to be wanda. or no, who is jim carrey's musclewoman character?

Susan: vera de milo

me: vera yeah. i LIKE team in living color. because then different people could be everybody like fire marshall bill

Susan: yeah totally.

me: and the fly girls for people who just want to dress slutty, but not be a real part of the show

Susan: i wanna be that one woman whos' like, "but i'm not one to gossip, so you didn't hear that from me."

 

Or, i'd TOTALLY be a fly girl..

 

heh. 

erin shea to Danny, David, Russ, Debra, Mercedes, Susan, Amanda

show details 8/10/10

Ooo danny did you like that? Can we all be team kims for beta breakers next year? Also, I just walked deep into a tree just now. Some people need to put their BBM's away when they're trying to walk to lunch.

Susan Cho to David, Mercedes, Liz, Amanda, me, Danny, Russ, Debra

show details May 12 (2 days ago)

Plllleeeeeeease...Reeleease me?

Debra, is it going to be ZPH's first beta breakers?

You guys, I ate too much pizza and now I have a stomach ache.

- Show quoted text -


Beta Breakers: The scientific name for Bay To Breakers, the annual footrace that takes place on the 3rd Sunday in May in the lovely land of San Francisco. Beta Break Yo'self, fools! 

Jean Pants

You didn’t think I’d let all of April go by without a little advice on how to live your vest life ever, did you? Whelp tickets, if you did, you’re stuuuuuupid. The word of the day is: jean pants. Go ahead, try it out, feel it. IN YOUR MOUTH.

Jean pants came about one night when I was hanging out with good ol’ Erin Haglund, checking out her new pad in Los Feliz and trying to win the affections of her moody black cat, Fritz (not to be confused with Lyle Dohl, who shares the name, albeit in nick form). Erin was telling me all about how Fritz has a little piece of carpet he just loves to sit on, though it’s quite miniscule in comparison to his size, because he’s a huge ass cat.

This is Fritz:

This is Fritz trying to fit himself on his square of magic carpet:

As you can see, I’m not exaggerating. This guy is huge. Now, a lot of his massiveness is due to furriness, and big ass furry ass cats can really be high-maintenance. Especially in the area below the starfish…you know…where the poop comes out. And since most cats believe their human owners to serve as personal assistants, Erin has spent a lot of time helping Fritz out with keeping things sanitary in that area—those furry backs of the legs that Erin referred to as Fritz’s…you guessed it…JEAN PANTS! She’s even had to resort to trimming the jean pants with scissors and thus giving Fritz an easy breezy Capri jean pants look to sport for these upcoming summer months.

I’ve spared Fritz the embarrassment of sharing a photo of said knotty, gummed up jean pants and will provide the following as examples so you can see what I’m talking about:

Now, this probably makes no sense. Those brownish-black haunches don’t resemble denim in any way and the style is much more of an MC Hammer-type pant than the jean variety. Well, this is where my bad hearing comes into play. A normal person would’ve probably heard correctly been able to make the connection between ‘magic carpet’ and the type of pant Erin was referring to. But not this moi. No, it wasn’t until I had fully embraced the term jean pants, started using it liberally and involved the DFT in usage, that I finally one night asked Erin where she got ‘jean pants’ from anyway. Below, you’ll find that answer, as well as the various ways jean pants has become incorporated into our vernacular. It may be wrong, but it feels so right. And the honorable mention this time goes to, well, me, for being a deaf ass dumbass. 

Susan Cho to Amanda, me, Mercedes

show details 5/28/10

Yay. Amanda, you shoulda just stayed home.

Nordstrom was ok. I went to exchange my shoes, but they didn't have my size, so they had to DTC them to me. BUT, the good news is, they're on sale now, so I got like..30 bucks back! NICE. I shoulda ordered another pair. I went to H & M and got this sheer striped longish tank top for $5. Guh. I just want to wear it in the heat. Preferably NY. It'd be real cute with some jean shorts, or jean pants.

Ha.Mark said I could stay with him, I just got kinda excited when I was typing.

Ugh. You guys. Now I'm just pricing out flights to NY for the summer, and they're all like $500! Since when does everyone want to go to NY in August? Since when!

-       Show quoted text –

Reply

Erin Haglund to me

show details Feb 23

2:50 PM

me: you guys, mercedes is in love with fritz

5 minutes

2:55 PM

Erin: i just texted you a pic of him

 i think he misses all the excitemtent

2:56 PM

excitement

2:58 PM

me: i mean, he definitely gave me something to remember him by

oh my GOD

Erin: oooh noooo! i'm sorry, but he isn't

me: he is having a rough day obviously

Erin: he's remorseless jerk

me: haha

i think he was just pissed we were giving him so much shit about his jean pants

Erin: hahaha

he's proud of his jean pants

me: cats just must know all the shit we talk about them and get so irritated that they can't talk back so they just unleash violence

Erin: yeah

but he could NOT stay away!

me: hahah i know! he loved it

Erin: if he didn't like it he could have stayed in the bedroom instead of being an asshole

me: i mean, he's RULL protective of his magic carpet

Buzz from erin shea

Apr 15

 - Google chat status - 

erin shea wants to jean jam in her jean pants

erin shea to Susan, Liz, Mercedes, Susan, Russ, Amanda, Debra, Danny, David

show details Apr 15

chareth cutestory!

gha you guys. last night at around 5 i decided yoga was out and drinking was in and to my delight, EH was right on that bandwagon. So we went to Danny's good ass restaurant and had a fancy ass meal complete with black bottom jean pants fluffernutter pie with the furrrrrr. That place is TOO SOON it's so good. Then when Danny finished his shift we went to East of 8th, which Susan I guess you guys went there too. They have a late-night happy hour so we had some beers and then split. But some people did nahhhht appreciate getting woken up at dawn by Elliot JERK and snoozed all the way until the time I usually leave for work. Erin just showed up and I got here about 15 minutes ago. Luckily, our office is so tucked away that no one notices us come and go so it is a-ok.

I'm tired and hungeeeeee.  TGIEFFFFFFFF. I've been in NY a whole week!!!

- Show quoted text -

erin shea to David, susancho78, Mercedes, Liz, Amanda, Danny, Russ, Debra

show details Apr 15

WAIT.

you guys, last night Erin and I were talking about Fritz and his jean pants and it turns out I heard wrong (me?) and she was saying that Fritz has GENIE pants. You know, because he has a magic carpet. And his leg fur DOES look much more like genie pants than jean pants. But she was like, 'well, jean pants caught on, so I just never clarified.' STUPID. Also:

http://thehairpin.com/2011/04/what-to-get-the-man-in-your-life-for-easter

- Show quoted text -

Liz Pfeffer to Mercedes, me, Russ, susancho78, David, Debra, Amanda, Danny

show details Apr 15

That makes me feel so much more sane (sanity is a cozy lie whispers) because the jean pants thing was NAAHT registering when you guys were trying to tell me.

-       Show quoted text –

Susan Cho to Mercedes, Russ, me, Amanda, Debra, Liz, David, Danny

show details Apr 15

God dammit. Jean pants is like the creeper for today.

Every time I think I'm over it being funny, I think about it, and it

makes me laugh out loud.

Guh. I have to go get a damn oil change on my lunch.

I hope its like me: fast and cheap.

Susan Cho to Mercedes, Russ, me, Amanda, Debra, Liz, David, Danny

show details Apr 15

GUh. And all those y's in her "hey" are really bugging me. They're

getting my jean pants all twisted into knots.

erin shea to Danny

show details Apr 28

well i'na care. i will nahhhhht be looking to meet the next JB tonight, considering my jean pants are still wet from being outside long enough to cross ONE street back to the office from the deli where I picked up lunch and although I'll shower after yoga, it won't be pretty. But yeah, it's just plain Brindisi for me to get to 14th from my yoga studio, so legs go! We can always switch it up if it's TOO gay. Or Erin and I can just pretend we're a couple. A couple of Erin's!

- Show quoted text -

So, that's that. And in case you didn't click on that link in whichever email that was above, feast your eyes. Jean pants are a real thing, my friends. And they're not just for never-nudes. 

And if you're looking for more jean pants fun, this is funny: 
http://www.toplessrobot.com/2011/04/super_terrific_japanese_thing_jeanpants.php

So get out there and start talkin' about your jean pants!


Jean Pants: 
The pants-like fur covering the hind haunches of furry ass cats. Also a term for regular old pants, panties, undies, grundies or whatever you wanna put on them new-boot-goofin' legs.

ONG Get Ready!!

This one's dedicated to Mr. Danny Krueger, for, amongst the obvious reasons, the fact that, come April 7th, we'll be bashing around living our vest New York lives ever.


You know those mornings when the buzz of your phone wakes you up and it’s Saturday and you’re realllly not ready to be awake, let alone letting any sort of light source penetrate your eyes? And then you manage to peel your eyelids apart enough to expose the part of your eye that reads words and once you’ve recovered from being blinded by the li-ight, you see that your phone has buzzed because someone has texted you, and when you look to see who it is, it’s one of your friends, who should know that it’s wayyyyyy too early to be texting on a Saturday? Well. I know those mornings. I know them all too well.

One such morning, I was peacefully sleeping off one of the most random nights I can own up to in Los Angeles; needless to say it had ended with a trip to the Smogcutter for last-call karaoke. As my eyes adjusted, my nose became perfumed with the stench of stale beer and secondhand smoke. Delicious. As my stomach turned, I focused the name of the son of a bitch offender text sender—Danny Krueger. It read simply,

‘Ready for what?’

I was thoroughly confused. ‘What?’ I managed to type out.

‘Last night, you texted me, twice, ‘ong, ong get ready!’’

Well. Thanks a lot, Smogcutter. My best guess is that I sang one of our signature karaoke songs and fully planned on calling Danny mid-rendition, as we tend to do, but…forgot? Didn’t sing? Wasn’t referencing the karaoke at all? Hmm. Guess we’ll never know.

But that doesn’t mean it has been forgotten. Oh. Quite the opposite. At least when it comes to Danny and me: 

erin shea to Amanda, Susan, Danny, Mercedes

show details 4/16/10

omega you guys. DUMB. they just opened a zip line on catalina. even more incentive to go on our best open waters cruise life ever!!!

- Show quoted text -

erin shea to Amanda, Susan, Danny, Mercedes

show details 4/16/10

i mean vest. definitely vest.

- Show quoted text -

erin shea to Amanda, Susan, Danny, Mercedes

show details 4/16/10

also, i just thought about when i sent danny those two drunk texts that i didn't remember and the next day I had a text from him that said, 'get ready for what?' and when i asked what he was talking about, he said, "last night you sent me two texts that said 'ong get ready.'" DUMB!!!

- Show quoted text -

Danny Krueger to me, Amanda, Susan, Mercedes

show details 4/16/10

HA!  I forgot about ong!

You guys, that would be so fun to go to Catalina!  As soon as I get rich, we're going.

erin shea to Danny, susancho78, Amanda, Mercedes

show details 6/15/10

you guys.

o.n.g. get ready.

http://www.sporcle.com/games/LaCosaNostra/90s_tv_themes

-       Show quoted text –

                                                                       

Danny Krueger to Susan, me

show details 9/11/10

Fwd: Your hotel booking confirmation (Itinerary #15436696521)   

Ong, ong, get ready!

 We're going.  Susan, if you can't afford it, we'll totes help you out.  It's like 57 per person, total.  You must come, you juice head.

 Disney bottoms, get on top!!!

Danny Krueger to Liz, Amanda, Russ, me, to, Mercedes, Debra, David

show details 9/17/10

Um, if anyone is not working during the day, they need to call me so we can go drinking.  Seriously.  I'm bored over here.

Although now I'm off to spin class.

But basically I'm saying I'm available for going out ANY night.  Or any day.  I want to soak up my friends while I still can.

ERIN.  What's going on with you?  Ong, ong, get ready.

-       Show quoted text –

Danny Krueger to Russ, susancho78, Amanda, me, Mercedes, David, Liz

show details 11/4/10

I know, the one thing I'm bummed about is that I let myself get low-balled.  Like, I should have said "That's not enough money" and held out for something else, but I guess I was just kind of desperate.  And it'll be over before I know it, and it'll be money in my pocket.  So I'm gonna keep my eye on that prize.  Maybe the temp agency is just testing me.  I want to be on their good list, so they'll keep searching for stuff for me.

The commute isn't awful.  I've been doing it practically every day since we got here.  It's just expensive.  But we'll definitely be living the Sex and the City lifestyle in our Upper East Side apartment before the end of the year, so my commute is about to get MUCH easier.  So that's good.

And I just applied for another real job this morning (afernoon here!) so hopefully SOMEONE will bite.  We'll see.

Oh, speaking of Sex and the City, I was walking through a subway station yesterday, and the Sex and the City theme shuffled up on the Dave and Danny-ilation album, and it totally made me smile.  You guys are the best.

My parents said it was 80 degrees in SLO yesterday!  Can you believe that shit?  East Coast is fucking crazy.  Ong, ong, get ready!

Time to memorize my lines for this puppet show.  It's...real cute.

- Show quoted text -

Now, the honorable mention this time around goes to Mercedes Taylor, who coined the audible expression by pronouncing ong as its own word rather than as an acronynm. So it sounds like Mike Hong's last name if the H was silent. So ong ong, get ready to start using another DFT phrase like it's your job. Go on. Do it. 


ONG Get Ready!
An anticipatory statement used to let errrrybody know it's time to get excited!!! Maybe ONG can stand for Oh Now Girrrrrrrl....GET READY. Yeah. 

The EFD Bonus: February 2011

Just the tip...titles and excerpts of this month's daily chain emails. We're a strange ass breed, but wouldn't have it any other way.

DANG haters..                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, Liz, David, Debra, Russ

show details Feb 1

I'm just sitting over here, listening to Baby Birch, and trying not to be sad about some abortion I never had, and none of y'all are writing any emails.

is that cyclist getting peed on by a bird?                                                                        

Russ Sharkey to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, David, Liz, Susan, Debra

show details Feb 2

I mean, what is going on here?  http://eroticfalconry.com/

oh my god oh my god you guyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyys                                                                 erin shea to Russ, Susan, Mercedes, Danny, David, Amanda, Liz, debra

show details Feb 3

you guys.

i cannahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhht go to bed. i'm in deep protest mode. i went to el compadre with my old OC editor and Mick and we had a good ass time and now there's a 3-day-old donut in my lap. 

um. happy thursday buddies day! oh shit. work in 6 houses? hours? yes. i would suggest leaving the restraint within the next three hours.

Women are crazy, Men are stupid                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, me, Mercedes, David, Debra, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 4

Seriously you guys.

ABC was going to pilot a show with that title. Thankfully that shit got shelved. Stupid name, formulaic dumbshit comedy screams.

Like making sangria in the toilet                                                                        

Mercedes Taylor to Amanda, Danny, David, Debra, me, Liz, Russ, Susan

show details Feb 7

Hi guys.

Peace out

Topless Tuesdays                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, me, Mercedes, Danny, David, Debra, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 8

Send me your topless tuesday work pics....

Laces OUT. Laces OUT.                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, David, Debra, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 9

You guys. New chain screams.

I'm so hungry my stomach is growling so loud, it sounds like the noise Lisa Simpson's stomach makes in that one episode where she gets i.b.s, and Homer takes her to the sensory deprivation tank.

I got your crazybones                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, David, Debra, Russ, Liz

show details Feb 10

You guys. The casting director for that show emailed my sister and said they wanted to meet her and Bella asap.

I mean, I'll be really sad if she ends up some crazy sound bite on Talk Soup. But I guess she really wants on this show, cause when the casting director asked for pictures of her and Bell, she sent like..10 pictures. 3 of them were from Bells' 3 last birthday parties. And the comic strips she's made of Bella. Yeah. She's crazybones.

sucks, or canadian? Is there a difference?                                                                        

erin shea to Danny, David, Mercedes, Susan, Liz, Amanda, debra, Russ

show details Feb 11

hey isn't it funny that 30 Rock was all about how Jack and Avery didn't want to have the baby born in Canada? After all our Canada-bashing yesterday? We're SO in SYNC!

heavy load                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, David, Debra, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 14

Happy valentimes my lovelies.

I miss you all.

Debra, how was PDX? Did Carlos like it?

I will literally be up there like once a month if you guys move.

Wait, so Erin. What happened the other night? That guy responded to your text and came over for some bone, bone bone boning?

You guys, that  guy that Erin had offended weeks before was at the Thirsty Crow the other night, and he was like...really aggressive about giving Erin his phone number. Like, he asked her for it, then, went away and came back with his business card. It was realll cute.

Can't wait for this weekend screams.

Tuesdays can SUCK it                                                                        

Debra Hamilton to Mercedes, Amanda, David, Danny, Russ, me, Liz

show details Feb 15

I started back to work today.  That's all I have to say.

Wednesday's can SUCK it TOO                                                                        

Russ Sharkey to David, Danny, Amanda, Susan, me, Debra, Liz, Mercedes

show details Feb 16

Happy Scary Buddies Day!                                                                        

erin shea to Danny, debra, David, Amanda, Liz, Mercedes, Susan, Russ

show details Feb 17

You guys, I cannnahhhht stop laughing at something. First of all, I've had a LOT of mystery beers.

Secondofly, someone texted me this, about whether I want to come over or not:

'Or you can say no scary pants'

I mean. So obviously, the naturaly (hmm. or 'natural,' if you're a sober typer) response was, 'What are scary pants?'

You guys.

The salad that said, "Weow!"                                                                        

David Tousley to me, Susan, Danny, Debra, Mercedes, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 23

I made that salad again and this time its in the train with me!! Susan, I owe you a tenner.

Rock it                                                                        

Russ Sharkey to Amanda, Susan, me, David, Debra, Danny, Liz, Mercedes

show details Feb 24

What issss it?                                                                        

Susan Cho to Amanda, Danny, Mercedes, me, David, Debra, Liz, Russ

show details Feb 25

Russ, what was that vidja? It just said, "Removed due to copyright infringement from Disney"

Was it a clip from Mulan?

cock for free!                                                                        

erin shea to Amanda, Mercedes, Danny, debra, Russ, Liz, Susan, David

show details Feb 28

ugh you guys. what WAS that oscars bull shit? I thought they would have at LEAST given my boyfriend who looked sexy even in that red dress his trophy for putting up with Anne Hathaway's WOO'ing every fucking person who walked on the stage. The Charlie Sheen joke was funny as hell though. And Robert Downey Jr. was really funny too. But boring that King's Speech won. So much for appealing to the younger demographic. I also liked Christian Bale calling himself out on his rant. He's fine.

Gha. Where is my mind?