Posted on September 16th, 2005 by Jaymz
Has anyone noticed how many magazines there are now? It’s getting to be a little ridiculous. Almost every activity, no matter how small of a following that it may have, now has a magazine dedicated to its enthusiasts. I was surprised to discover that internet blogging has become so popular that there are several magazines devoted to even smaller niches within this online phenomenon. In fact, a couple of weeks ago, one of these virtually unknown publications approached me and asked if I would be willing to do an interview. I figured that this site could use the publicity, so I agreed. While they were conducting the photo shoot, however, they asked me to remove my clothes. I reluctantly started to comply, but then they started talking about me being a centerfold, and that’s when I bolted. The pictures in question are now the subject of a lawsuit. I still think that my cover shot is fairly tasteful, so when the issue hit newsstands, I made sure to procure a copy. Without further adieu ladies, here is my magazine cover for your ogling enjoyment. In all fairness, there are actually some interesting articles in there, too. Next stop for me: Playgirl….or Highlights, I love their hidden object exposés.
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Posted on September 1st, 2005 by Jaymz
Well, I suppose I’ve put this off long enough. It’s time for a little post about the anniversary of the day this miracle baby came into the world….Ok, so that’s a title that I gave myself and no one else uses it, but I consider myself to be very fortunate. I mean, before they were married my mother was in the convent and my father was in Vietnam after being drafted. Combine that with the fact that I was their final child, and I think that I register just below a “John Madden forms a coherent thought and expresses it eloquently” ranking on the “What Are the Odds?” scale. Perhaps I just have illusions of grandeur about myself, but I don’t think that I am exaggerating the significance of this. I can only imagine what it was like during the days and weeks leading up to my arrival. Wait, why don’t I tell you how I picture the momentous occasion and then you can tell me if I am delusional? Alright, here we go. In the days and weeks leading up to “The Birth” the staff at St. Rita’s hospital realized that they were about to witness something truly amazing. Doctors started to become nervous about their role in delivering the miracle baby. No one wanted to risk living with the onus that he was the one who mutilated this otherwise unblemished child. Rumors abounded about just how astonishing this baby was. Some claimed he could already talk. Others “overheard” that his ultrasound showed a faint halo. One nurse even remarked, “I heard that he is already a genius. A baby like that could make a lot of money…I also noticed that there isn’t much security around the recovery rooms. Who thinks I could sneak in?” That nurse was later fired. With all of the hype surrounding the birth of the unlikely offspring, the hospital was a media circus when, on August 28, 1985, James Russell Tobe was born. Reporters and camera crews gathered outside the entrance, desperate for a glimpse of this newborn celebrity. When the local news stations ran their stories that evening, they all labeled him as a fraud. He couldn’t talk, or walk, or use an abacus correctly…in fact, he spent much of his days sleeping and eating! His only remotely redeeming feature was his dimples, but those can only get a kid so far. There you have it. Twenty years later, I still feel like my life is building towards something great. I still sleep and eat quite often, but I like to think that I have become significantly more intelligent over the years. I don’t know how this journalism career is going to work out, but one thing’s for sure: those dimples are still paying dividends today.
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Posted on August 24th, 2005 by Jaymz
Has anyone noticed the brand of television show that passes for entertainment these days? A couple years ago, reality shows were all the rage. I will admit to watching the first seasons of shows like Survivor, Big Brother and The Mole. But when the ratings for reality shows skyrocketed, lazy network executives quickly decided that every show must feature reality stars so that these people would never have to go back to their real jobs…if they ever had any. Before you knew it, stars were appearing on reunion shows and for several seasons on shows like the Real World/Road Rules challenge and The Inferno on MTV. Now, in the year 2005, these pseudo-celebrities are appearing on brand new shows on different networks. My wrath is reserved today for Kill Reality on E! and Battle of the Network Reality Stars on Bravo. The fact that I have been virtually forced to know some of these people is bad enough, but now they’re trying to repackage this menagerie of wanna-be actors as an exciting brand new series. In fact, Kill Reality has the “stars” basically admitting that they desperately want to be a Hollywood actor. Meanwhile, Battle of the Network Reality Stars just reminds me of a watered-down version of American Gladiators with worse acting. Yeah, I said it, worse acting then American Gladiators. Does everyone remember that show? Sure, the Gladiators had ridiculous names like Zap, Ice and Nitro to name a few, and yes, the women were disgustingly muscle-bound and probably shaved their face regularly at some point in their lives, but I still enjoyed the show. I’m not quite sure why, but by the time the Eliminator arrived, I was cheering enthusiastically for one of the contestants. This is the kind of reality show we need again. Looking back at it now, were the performances any worse than the television of today? I say American Gladiators deserves a spot on cable television! This blog will be my soapbox! If you are an American, if you claim to be patriotic, you owe it to your country to sign this petition to bring back the show. This show has contributed so much to our modern society: steroids awareness, the giant hamster ball that would also later become human bowling, and it sent a clear signal to any girls thinking about becoming female body builders! So sign the petition. You’ll be performing a service to the youth of tomorrow. Hey, if we didn’t stop Jerry Springer, how can we claim that this show had no entertainment value?
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Posted on August 21st, 2005 by Jaymz
I don’t mean to make a morbid, depressing post but this article about the dying wishes of writer Hunter S. Thompson made me think about what life will be like if I die. I say if because I am hoping to make the final list for that top-secret immortality experiment. Right now I’m just an alternate, stuck behind Jimmy Fallon because it is sorted by first name, but they said if he makes another movie like “Taxi”, then I’m in. Oh, I’ve already said too much. In case you’re too busy to read the whole article, basically Hunter S. Thompson asked that his remains be cremated and then mixed with fireworks and fired out of mortar tubes. Well, I don’t need anything extravagant like that, but I do have some ideas for my funeral. I don’t want everyone to be crying and upset. I just want people to talk and reminisce about the good times that we shared while avoiding any discussion of the money I may owe them. If I die before I get married or really explore the dating scene, I ask that my female friends work the room, telling exaggerated stories about my sexual escapades. You know who you are and what I’m talking about, and I assure you that you will be handsomely compensated. Now, if I do get married and pass away before my spouse, please, everybody just be quiet. Telling her the complete truth would only make me look bad. Hopefully, there will be an open bar so everyone can just relax, have a drink and enjoy themselves. Before I end this post, here’s one idea for an epitaph: “James Tobe: We Hardly Kne…..No, I Guess We Knew Him Pretty Well. He Sure Was A Demon In The Sack. I Remember This Time…”
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Posted on August 19th, 2005 by Jaymz
Well, it’s mid-August, and in my world that means that football season is upon us. Specifically, college football. Don’t get me wrong, I love the Cleveland Browns and the NFL. Fantasy football, Sunday afternoons, Monday Night Football, they’re all great. But ever since the Browns were absent from the league for awhile, I’ve been more enamored with my favorite college team: The Ohio State Buckeyes. When the Browns moved to Baltimore and became the Ravens, I was devastated. I was a young boy of ten who had just began to follow professional football and attended my first Browns game. I had autographs from many of the players that were now suiting up for a rival team while my team no longer existed. I needed an outlet for my passion for the sport. Now, I’m sure cynics out there will jump at the opportunity to mention the scandals surrounding the university and the fact that many of its football players are essentially semi-pro athletes with a questionable workload. To them, I say, have you ever tried to manage the homework assigned from underwater basket weaving, ballroom dancing, and bowling all in the same semester? I am willing to overlook all of the flaws with the current system, including the BCS, and just enjoy the qualities that allowed college football to capture my heart while I was on the rebound. There’s the tradition. Every Ohio State home game, the band spells out Ohio in script and a lucky sousaphone player has the honor of dotting the “i”. That’s gotta be about the only conceivable reason someone would aspire to play the sousaphone. There’s the upsets. Every week, a top 25 team could be upset and it only takes one loss some years to ruin the dream of a national title. And of course, every November there is the Ohio State/Michigan game. If you are a fan of either team involved in this rivalry, you know when it is long in advance. People plan weddings around it, sign off from work to see it and talk about it until it takes place the next year. It has determined the Big Ten champion, Rose Bowl representative, and even helped shape the national title landscape over the years. I don’t know why exactly, but I get goose bumps during the minutes before the kickoff for certain Ohio State games. I imagine that this feeling is something like what having pride in your college must be like. So if you want to make plans with me on a Saturday during football season, be sure that I really like you, because otherwise I can’t make any guarantees. If you’re a girl, your odds increase significantly.
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Posted on August 11th, 2005 by Jaymz
I am usually a fairly calm, cool, collected guy thanks in part because my Degree deodorant kicks-in in the clutch. There are few things that can upset me. They include: when a jerk treats a girl unfairly (especially one of my ladies), someone messing with my friends or family, and David Faustino for some reason. That’s the list. At least it was, until the day Wright State told me that my scholarship was being placed on hold because I had not taken an honors course since my first quarter last fall. Suddenly Bud from Married with Children occupied his lowest position on my list in a long time: I had other priorities in the hate department. Allow me to explain the situation. My scholarship requires me to complete six honors courses by the end of my sophomore year here at Wright State. During my first quarter, I successfully finished three of the six. I felt relatively comfortable being half way done with my requirements, so I decided to take a break from honors classes for the rest of the year. When it came time to register for classes for the first quarter of my second year, I got a bit of a late start because the honors program did not send an e-mail telling me that I could register and listing the honors courses available. This was something that I had grown accustomed to during my first year. Anyway, by the time I realized that I could select my classes most of the honors courses were full. I decided to meet with my “personal advisor” that was assigned through the department of communications. I use the quotations because this person did not know anything about me. Not only that, but she could not find the honors courses listed on ROX. I tried to help her, suggesting that when I registered in the past, they were listed separately under University Honors, but she still claimed that they were not there so she just suggested some general education classes for me to take. After I thought that I had accomplished what I came to do, she spent half an hour of my time trying to figure out what college I was enrolled in and what honors program I was talking about. I tried to explain that A.) I was directly admitted to the College of Liberal Arts, B.) I was involved with the University Honors Program, located just two floors down in Millett Hall (the building we were in), and C.) Neither of these facts mattered because they didn’t affect what honors classes I needed to take or anything. After that whole fiasco, I was beginning to subscribe to Tone’s famous “Come back, burn down the school, piss on ashes” mentality, but I still had a small bit of faith in Wright State. What a naive fool I was. That all died when I got the e-mail that discussed my honors scholarship. Because I had not enrolled in an honors class for the fall, they were concerned that I would not be able to fulfill my requirements. When I learned that my scholarship was in jeopardy, I did what any responsible college student would do: I scheduled a meeting with the head of the honors program, and I made sure that I did not tell my mom anything about this. After all, there’s no need for her to worry if I could fix this situation or at least delay her finding out about it. This is this same strategy that allowed me to put off working on homework until the day before it was due in high school. It turns out that all that the honors program wanted to do is get my attention and ensure that I was aware of my requirements. Apparently me ruining a perfectly good pair of pants worrying about the situation was just a bonus laugh for the gang around the office. All I had to do was change my schedule, registering for one honors class in the fall. Before I calmed down and gained perspective on the whole ordeal, I decided to make a PowerPoint presentation that provided a detailed plan. Here it is, I hope you enjoy it.
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Posted on August 10th, 2005 by Jaymz
Well, this idea hasn’t taken off yet. I haven’t received any questions, so I was forced to scour the internet in search of people in need of help. This week’s questions were taken from the Frequently Asked Questions section of the P-mate website. I have substituted my name for the product name where necessary and assigned names and personalities to these questions. Our first question this week comes from Jessica in London, England. She writes:
“Dear Handsome (Jaymz),
Can I use Jaymz with trousers on as well? By the way my phone number is, ___-___-____. Give me a call sometime. Oh, and kippers, what-what and bangers and mash and all that, if you know what I mean.
Cheerio,
Jessica”
Well, Jessica, this is sort of an odd question to ask, but of course you can. This blog (and its author) can be enjoyed with or without trousers, or pants, as we call them stateside. I’m not sure if I understand all of your colloquialisms there, but judging from all of the material that my censors edited out, I do know what you mean and it is quite suggestive. The other question this week comes from Heather in Sioux Falls, Iowa. She writes:
“Hey Jaymz!
Sometimes I go somewhere and I only want to take 1 or 2 Jaymzes. How do I have to do that? Thanks for always being there.
Your number one fan,
Heather”
Heather, this question is one I get all the time, believe it or not. Human cloning has not been perfected yet, and until it is, I will not even consider creating another Jaymz. Even if the technology improves, there are legal and religious ramifications that complicate this issue. All I can tell you is that you’ll have to live with just one Jaymz for now like everyone else. Wow, some weird questions this week. I hope I don’t have to resort to this sort of post again, but if I don’t get questions from other people, who knows? Signing off, I am Jaymz.
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Posted on August 3rd, 2005 by Jaymz
(This post is dedicated to my “You Have Died of Dysentery” shirt, purchased at BustedTees.com).
Things are harder out here on the trail then I could have ever imagined. I thought this two week trek was going to be easy, but the hardships that have befallen my party have made this excursion dangerous and possibly deadly. My father must have been crazy to force us to embark on this journey. “It’ll be like a vacation,” he says. What an idiot. I’m starting to think Papa chose to be a banker just so he could buy more ammunition at the general store. He could have been a carpenter or a farmer, but no! Well how’s your knowledge of how much interest is applied to a 15 year loan coming in handy out here!? Now he just spends his time hunting pixilated game, and killing four buffalo when he knows we can’t use all that food, while his family dies around him. He puts the lives of his family in jeopardy on a daily basis. I swear the man tries to ford every river. Ever hear of a ferry, dad!? He’s so cheap. “We don’t need to buy a spare axle”, well, guess how that worked out. There are so many wagon ruts out here it’s ridiculous. And the thieves! They’re so brazen that they’re starting to steal our diseased and deceased oxen. There are just so many threats to worry about out here: cholera, dysentery, drowning, snakebites, and recently, Papa’s developing an eerie glint in his eye when he holds the gun. I don’t know if I will survive to see Oregon, or make it on the “Top Ten List” that Dad keeps blabbing about, but I sure hope so; because I don’t want my name to be on a makeshift tombstone.
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Posted on August 2nd, 2005 by Jaymz
I don’t know if anyone cares about baseball anymore, but the news today of Rafael Palmeiro’s suspension upset me as a sports fan. For those of you not familiar with Palmeiro’s career, he is the first baseman for the Baltimore Orioles and someone who many writers consider a potential hall of fame candidate. He recently earned his 3000th major league hit and has over five hundred home runs in his career. During the steroids hearings on capital hill, Palmeiro firmly denied that he had ever taken steroids and acted indignant that Jose Canseco would even suggest such an outrageous allegation. What a phony. I mean, I would like to believe him when he continues to deny the suspicions, I really would. He now states that he never “knowingly” took any steroids. Why, in this era of heightened testing would you take anything that could possibly be contraband? This is someone that most people consider a hall of fame candidate! Does he not care about having credibility or a legacy? Whatever happened to baseball being America’s pastime? I have heard many analysts say that baseball has long been subject to rampant cheating and rules violations. If that’s the case, maybe I don’t want to associate our country with major league baseball anymore. Palmeiro was supposed to be one of the good guys. I didn’t think of him in the same light as Sosa, McGwire and Bonds. Now he is just as tainted, and so is the game of baseball. Just when it seemed as though baseball was emerging from the cloud of suspicion created by the steroids allegations, another player, this time a big one, is caught. Baseball is now just a novelty sport to me. Until my trust is restored, the athletes are just juiced-up sideshow attractions competing in a modified home run derby. Perhaps I am just naive, but I don’t feel betrayed by the other major sports like I do with baseball. Having said all this, I will probably still watch because the game has embedded itself deep within my heart. There are too many honest, hard-working players in the league for me to abandon it completely. Sorry if everyone is bored out there, but I had to get that off my chest.
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Posted on July 30th, 2005 by Jaymz
I don’t know if anyone noticed that I failed to post yesterday, or if anyone cares. Should there happen to be a die-hard fan looking to hold my feet to the fire about my promise to post for two weeks straight, I had an excuse. Some friends from the old country (Ottawa, Ohio) were in Beavercreek to hang out like old times. We saw Wedding Crashers in its entirety at the theater, without an interruption for a fire alarm. It’s always nice to get the old gang together, even though our war with the south-side rival gang ended last year. It’s a shame because I had finally gotten into my cap-bustin’ prime and I was rounding into form. By the end of this quest, I will have posted fourteen total entries. I guess I will have to post two on one day, but I have also been working on some special projects that I hope you will enjoy. Anyways, I just wanted to use this forum to discuss my reaction to this article that I found at Netscape.com. Does everyone remember Al Gore? No? Well, he ran for president way back in the year 2000, trying to capitalize on the momentum he had gained following the success of his invention: the internet. After failing in his bid for the presidency, Gore entered a bit of a funk and grew a beard that no one deemed acceptable. Now, he’s back in the news because he is preparing for the launch of a new television network that he co-founded called Current. The thing that caught my attention was that the staff of reporters and producers at the new network includes Gotham Chopra and Laura Ling, of Channel One News and MTV….well, I don’t want to call it fame, but they worked there. I don’t know if anyone else had to endure Channel One News during their high school years, but at my school it was about as popular as mandatory drug testing. I can only wonder what happened to the other, less fortunate “journalists” of Channel One. Are they working at Burger King? Or did they thrive in the business world, and advance to the ranks of a TGI Friday’s or an Olive Garden maybe? Wherever they are, I hope they realize now just what they put students through. If I’m ever employed at a job that resembles Channel One News, I hope someone will have the courage to inform me and tell me to stop. I would do it for you.
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