SmackFu Apprentice

Wow. So apparently someone other than myself has invoked The 24 Hour Rule. I received the following email (unedited, except I removed the persons name) this morning. Warms my heart to know that something I’ve been developing and working so hard to perfect is proving useful for others:

Dear Mr. SmackFu,

I wanted to take a moment to thank you for sharing the 24 hour rule with the world. I came across it via a twitter posting over the weekend. On Saturday night my friends and I went out for our usual guys night. This normally ends with me getting completely bombed, my friends pushing me out of the car and my disapproving wife scolding me, then reminding me of my “chores” that I have to do the next day (and me agreeing that I will do them). This night was no different, except I was now equipped with the ultimate weapon.

Knowing I could get out of these stupid tasks I actually slept pretty well that night and in the morning when I was again “reminded” of my list of tasks, I did it. I told I was invoking the 24 hour rule. After asking me what the hell that meant, I showed her the link on your site and left the room planting myself squarely on the couch in front of the TV in preparation for the rest of my day. After about 10 minutes she came in fuming, used some very bad language and left the house for pretty much the remainder of the day.

It was the most peaceful day of my life.

Sure, I had to sleep on the couch that night. But the TV is there anyway. So it’s kind of like a double bonus. And I don’t expect I’ll be getting any action soon. But I’ll live. It’s not like there was an abundance of it happening before anyway.

I’d like to extend my gratitude to you for your fine work. I’ve told all of my friends about the 24 hour rule, and I suspect we’ll be living the lives of bachelors again soon. You are my hero.

P.S. If you are ever in San Antonio, drop me a line. Although we probably shouldn’t tell my wife you are the author of the 24 hour rule.

For most people who know me, there is one word in the English language they would rarely, if ever, use to describe me. That word, of course, is agreeable. In fact, for whatever reason, given the opportunity to disagree about something I usually will, even if I fully agree. An example:

Random person: George Bush is an a**hole, worst President EVAH!!!!

Me: Nah, Millard Fillmore was a much bigger a-rod. You have no clue what you are talking about.

I don’t even know if Millard Fillmore was even really a President of the United States. What I do know is that I agree with the random person, but for the sake of being an a**hole myself. I have to disagree.

There is one time, however, that I become completely agreeable. When I’m sh*t faced. Women know this (and in general know this about many men). But for me it’s a special time of vulnerability. For whatever reason, the social self defense mechanism I’ve so carefully developed and crafted over the years gets shut off. Like the Enterprise dropping it’s shields right as a Romulan warbird de-cloaks off the starboard side.

Women, being the secret prowlers they are, wait for this moment to ask me to do things. And like the helpless baby gazelle surrounded by a pack of hungry lionesses I easily fall prey to them. Now that said, there are some things that I simply can’t agree to. Even during my most insanely, almost blacked-out, tripping over the air in the room, drunken state, there are a few auxiliary protection mechanisms that evolution has blessed me with. An example:

Group of Women (they hunt in packs and have no shame): Hey come on, let’s go out on the dance floor. It’ll be so much fun.

Me (drunk off my ass, mumbling, about to worship the porcelain god): Are you f**king crazy? Get away from me. Evil temptress.

Even in that state, them trying to pull me on the dance floor, this playa simply won’t play. He doesn’t dance, never will. Similarly, you can’t convince (guilt-trip) me into calling my mom because I’ve stealthily avoided speaking to her, using a mix of caller ID, empirical analysis and spidey sense, for the the last 4 months. Ain’t gonna happen.

But everything else is fair game. And it’s bad. Here are some examples of things I’ve agreed to (this is just a small, small sampling):

- Going to the ballet
- Going to see The English Patient
- Taking a road trip to see the fall foliage in New England
- Spending a wonderful day clothes shopping and being the bag holder
- Agreeing to go to Bed, Bath and Beyond AND Crate Barrel and buying you those extra throw pillows, that I’ll never be allowed to touch or, horror of horrors, rest my head on. Seriously, WTF.

The list goes on. And all of those things I’ve agreed to in about 0.68 seconds of being asked when drunk. Some of the things I’ve been asked, and agreed, to do are far worse. But my shame in agreeing to them means I must bury those moments of weakness in the back of mind. Forever. Never to be spoken of again, lest I become forced to turn in my testicles permanently.

But I have a new weapon (well it’s actually not new, I’ve been using and refining it for the past several years). But I now present it the world, so that other men, too, may adopt it and begin using it. I know I’m not the only one to fall victim to the wiley and cunning actions of women. This has worked so well, I can drink in peace, knowing that the next day, I will not be hungover, sitting at the beauty salon, waiting for the paint on some woman’s toenails to dry so I can drive them their next mind numbingly boring activity.

I present to you: The 24 Hour Rule

The 24 Hour Rule is simple. It states: That anything I agree to from the time the first molecule of alcohol touches my lips to up to 24 hours AFTER the last bit of alcohol has entered my system (meaning my last drink, injection, beer bong, keg stand, steamroller, shotgun etc…), ANYTHING I agree to, I can take back and back out of.

This is important. Not only am I protected while I’m drinking (admittedly when I’m most weak), I also have a buffer period while the booze clears out from my system. What happens if I start drinking again within the 24 hour period…clock restarts. Not only are the previous 24 hours protected, the next 24+ hours are also protected (remember it’s a rolling window from the time you finish your last drink).

With this rule, I pretty much don’t do shit anymore (other than what I want to do, when I want to). Going to the in-laws for dinner? One shot before leaving the house will protect me nicely from being roped into anything. Mom calls and tries to trick me into coming to visit, I can pound a beer faster than she can ask. Wife asking if I want to go to dinner with her friends, on a Tuesday night, when I’d rather be watching paint dry, a nice glass of the house red will fix that before I’m guilted into agreeing.

There are also some important concepts and protections to keep you safe and to keep The 24 Hour Rule from being abused.

1) First and foremost, women cannot evoke a similar rule. If you get drunk and agree to you are obligated to do it. We may let you out of it (probably not) but if we do it’s because we are merciful and good.

2) There are no loopholes. Period. Whatever silly, convoluted logic some woman tries to use to get around it, simply won’t work. They can’t, The 24 Hour Rule is a fundamental law of the Universe, as I’ve mathematically proven, but will not furnish the proof of, to anyone other than a man. Think e=mc2 type of shit. It simply works.

3) A woman does not have to, and in fact CAN’T, agree or disagree to The 24 Hour Rule for it to be in effect or legally binding. It simply is what it is. It’s a fundamental law, like the conservation of energy. There is nothing you can say, do or hope for that would revoke the inherent rights and protections The 24 Hour Rule imparts. Don’t try. The Universe may explode.

4) The 24 Hour Rule, it’s corollaries and any future derivative rules, formulations, re-evaluations, applications and so forth, are cyclical. When you are done reading and accepting the rules and it’s corollaries, you can re-read them and accept them again, thereby amplifying it’s power.

5) There can never be a female equivalent of The 24 Hour Rule (see corollaries 1-6, again it’s cyclical and inclusive and by re-reading you’ve now amplified them. Good work!).

UPDATE: A question was asked on Twitter about non-drinkers and what recourse, if any they have. This is a brotherhood. You too may use The 24 Hour Rule. So I present corollary 6:

6) If you do not drink alcohol, you may either assign a drinking surrogate, whereby you are protected the same way they are for the same time period. You do not need to be acquainted with this person (so that old drunk at the end of the bar will do just nicely). If no suitable surrogate is around, you may select a non-alcoholic beverage and imbibe that as a replacement, thereby granting you the same rights and honors as your fellow partiers.

So how do you use The 24 Hour Rule, you may be asking yourself? A simple example:

Woman: Are you ready to head out for that romantic evening of dinner and dancing you promised me last night?

You (23h59m59s after agreeing): I’m invoking The 24 Hour Rule.

BOOM. And with that, you are free to resume sitting on the couch, picking your nose, while watching the Cathouse marathon on HBO.

With this rule, however, comes great responsibility. You are now a shepherd of the rule. To use the title of a shitty movie, “The Constant Gardner” of it. You must protect it, and indeed be willing to sacrifice your life, your worldly possessions, your marriage and all hopes of getting laid ever again, for it. The very law, it’s meaning, the hope it brings to the downtrodden, the tired huddling masses, yearning to be free of days lost to inane activities and female rituals. You my brothers, have reclaimed your sense of being, taken ownership in your destiny and exercised your inalienable male right to be free of all ridiculous social encumbrances.

I give this gift to you, and the world, in the hope that you will use it well and usher in a new era of peace and prosperity for yourself and your Monday night, porn watching, wing eating, get the f**k out of our clubhouse/fort buddies.

Finally, any weak comebacks, comments or remarks made by women in regard to The 24 Hour Rule have no bearing or meaning. Period.

Now please. Spread the gospel.

Haven’t been good about documenting this, but so far so good in terms of no junk food, no bacon, no sausage, no wings.

Last night for example, had grilled pork chops and some mashed potatoes w gravy. The gravy was a light chicken stock based gravy (using stock that was fat free). Not bad. During the day, I had various fruits and vegetables. Although at some point my craving for cheese kicked in.

So… this morning I’m having cheese and crackers for breakfast. Good way to start the day. I have no clue what my weight is though at the moment.

I used to get tons of email regarding features and such for iGotchi. Last year around this time, when the App Store was opening, I was getting a steady stream of hate mail. Here is an example of one piece of email (admittedly the worst I had received). So as the anniversary of iGotchi’s release approaches, I thought I’d share this gem.

Please, let me introduce the world to Fernando C. He writes:

Are you seriously kidding me?
Your application is a SCAM!
Can you please, seriously, tell me what makes that idiotic app so
special that I have to waste my time to check it all the time to press
a button 1000x and still have to send an email to someone because I’m
allegedly a “bad parent”? Are you saying that this piece of crap is my
son or something? THAT LOOKS LIKE MY BALLS, SERIOUSLY, NO WAY ON EARTH
YOU ARE GOING TO TELL ME THAT I AM THAT THING’S PARENT.
If you are not creative enough to make a worthy app, then give me my
money back or stop this ridiculous “activation thing”.
The code for that retarded thing is: 153205227
I can’t believe that I’ve just had to do this… This is totally
ridiculous! Comparing a piece of junk like your “software” with a
son…
I would kill myself if I were you, charging for your useless app that
I can’t even chose the kind of food that I can give the stupid bugger.
That baby chuckle is so ridiculous and the computer generated loop is
so lame… Thank god people are getting the perception that your app
is crappy and hopefully they will not buy this piece of troublesome
junk and Apple will take it down from the store.

My reply:

Dear Fernando,

I appreciate your feedback and will take it into account while I do
my best to improve iGotchi in future releases.

Best Regards,

Dave

P.S. Your reactivation code is: 794772846

Didn’t actually eat much yesterday, but I did drink a lot, so got plenty of calories from that.

I ended up having some bread + dip. Then for dinner had one shish kabob, some potatoes, corn and salad. Forgot to check my weight.

Ok. I weighed myself. Wearing clothes, I come in at 153 lbs. For reference i think i weighed 115 lbs in high school. That’s 40 pounds I’ve put on since then. Obviously some of it is muscle, as I’m pretty ripped now (kidding). But I need to get that number down a bit.

I think I’m going to get my bike fixed up and start exercising too.

Ok… starting off today lightly…

http://twitpic.com/99p3p

Will have real food in later today perhaps or tomorrow. But for now, I’m celebrating our independence.

So far I haven’t eaten much today. Just a plum. I actually should keep track of my weight too. We have an electronic scale, but it needs a new battery, so I’ll start tomorrow.

For dinner we are having wine and cheese plus some prosciutto. I’m looking forward to that. But I need to come up with some recipes otherwise this will be a boring food month.

I’m coming to realize that if you want to have poor eating habits this society can accommodate you quite well. Eating well, requires much more forethought and effort. You’d think we’d have a vested interest in making it be the other way around.

So far doing well. Cheese and crackers for breakfast and a grilled chicken sandwich on whole wheat bread for lunch. Will probably eat some fruit (a plum and orange) as well.

Going out to dinner and a movie with my sister-in-law, so it’ll be interesting to see where we go and what’s on the menu that isn’t junk food.