As the resident jock of this gnome gang, I’m sending this friendly reminder to you all to make your March Madness bracket picks this morning. What? You think just because we’re gnomes we don’t follow college basketball?! Bitch, please.

Okay fine, so this IS the first year that we’re doing a gnome bracket tournament, but I hope this will be the first of many new gambling opportunities in the future. Gamble more! Work less! Gamble more! Work less!

Now that we have a laptop set up in the backyard, I came across an article about these wacky bracket obsessions that have spread across corporate America, decreasing workplace productivity by people that don’t even give a shit about sports. See I told you so: http://www.dailyfinance.com/2010/03/11/march-madness-a-march-to-lower-work-productivity/

Unfortunately, that’s the only article I read about these brackets. I didn’t read any articles on how to actually construct a bracket. I figured constructing a bracket meant doing some sort of woodworking project so I pulled out my toolbox and started sawing. As I’ve said before, I’m the resident jock, NOT the resident woodworker. It was only a matter of time before shit hit the fan.

I’m typing to you all today with one hand because my other little gnome hand looks like this! Ow freaking ow! Fortunately, Jerry was shoveling nearby when the saw took on its own agenda and he ran over to rescue me from those evil saw teeth. Thinking quickly, he found some tighty whities next to the back dumpster to wrap around my bleeding hand. I didn’t even have to make a trip to the ER this time! Jerry can be so resourceful. And I’m actually getting kinda used to the stench of these dirty underwear on my hand.

While explaining to Jerry the string of events that led up to this horrific incident, he started laughing hysterically. WTF, Jerry?! Apparently, making a bracket doesn’t involve woodworking at all! You just click names of basketball teams on a computer! Well that would have been nice to know a couple hours ago!

Jerry took the time to show me what a March Madness bracket ACTUALLY looked like and how to fill it in. I feel like I’m totally losing credibility as the resident jock now, but at least I have another injury story. Everyone loves a good injury story over a beer or seven.

So here’s what my bracket looks like. I’m pretty confident that I’m going to kick every other gnome’s ass in this game.  But I need some competitors to talk shit to and help decrease my productivity. So go fill out your brackets now, but don’t try to build one. I learned my lesson the hard way so you don’t have to. You’re welcome.

Bleeding on the keyboard but I don’t have any diseases so it’s okay,

Benjamin The Gnome

The morning started off like any other morning. George sipping a flask while digging a hole with a shovel for no apparent reason. I was raking some leaves under a bush, keeping an eye on him. A thunderstorm had come the night before leaving the yard just a horrid mess. That lazy Alyssa really should appreciate all the yard work we do for her while she is out gallivanting around. I don’t even think she notices. I digress.

I glanced up at the clouds just in time to see a huge clump of dirt flying in my general direction. I tried to duck. I tried to cover. I tried to stop, drop, and roll. But my efforts were futile. I was knocked flat on my buttocks and my hat flew off and blew across the yard. I screamed at George to be more careful. He had not only ruined my perfectly groomed leaf pile, but now my ceramic skin was totally dirty.

I brushed myself off and went back to raking. All the sudden…another clump of dirt! What the hell, George! What the hell!? I marched over to him, shaking my rake above my head with more anger than I’ve felt since that whitewater rafting trip went awry last spring.

George threw down his shovel and started screaming in unintelligible gnomish. I was still swinging the rake above my hat-less head screaming in incredibly intelligible gnomish. In one swift drunk move, George grabbed my rake and it came loose from my overworked and underpaid hands. He swung it above our heads and the rest all seemed to have happened in slow motion.

I felt the rake hit my head and brought my hand up to hold it. I wondered why it felt warm. Then I looked down. Blood! Blood! Blood everywhere! I didn’t even know ceramic produced blood! But there it was. I looked in the mirror and puked the egg salad sandwich I’d had for breakfast just at the sight of my own horror movie reflection.

George sucks at life. But he was at least smart enough to run inside the house through the sliding glass door and dial 911 on Alyssa’s rotary phone (she really needs to realize it’s 2012).

The ambulance rolled up to find a bloody gnome screaming in the grass. One paramedic hesitated to take me in considering my non-human status. George was nice enough to pull  my wallet out of my back pocket and flash my Blue Cross Blue Shield card. Next thing I knew, I was lying on a huge white table with bright florescent lights and there were eleven staples in my head holding my skull together.

Rake Axe of Death

The nurses called me a “freak accident” and hypothesized that there must have been an axe attached to that rake to create such a long and wide laceration. They read me my discharge instructions to not come with a 100 mile radius of a rake for the next three months. I gotta go hat shopping because I’m totally self conscious about all this metal in my head. I hate George’s stupid drunk ass, I really do. But in the end, I suppose he kinda sorta saved my life. And he has a whole stash of Vicodin in one of those holes he dug, so that makes me like him even better.

Yours in heavy metal,

Benjamin The Gnome

I was finally able to hobble over to this Internet machine after hours of screaming in agonizing pain. Have you ever had an ankle injury? Yeah yeah, it sucks whatever. Now. Have you had a CANKLE injury?! OMG these are like 104% worse. For those of you who are skinny and/or stupid, let me learn ya something…..

It all started at my friend Katie’s retirement party Saturday night. Well I thought it was her retirement party anyway. Turns out she had just gotten hired at a new job instead and she’s only 29. Who knew?! Katie and I go waaaaaay back. She and I used to make out behind the maple trees at recess during out time at the Woodlands Academy of Magic Arts. Ah memories…

I found a brilliant receipe for blueberry vodka/Godiva white chocolate/Licor 43 martinis and had about 8 of ’em before heading out to Katie’s retirement, er hirement (?) celebration. There was hugging, there was groping, and there was an entire martini list that begged one of each to be ordered.

I was hoping Katie would go back to my mushroom pad in the garden to shack up that night but she was playing hard to get. I think there’s someone else.  Rejected and wasted, I pulled back up my suspenders, buttoned my vest and much as it would button over my ever-extending waistline, and staggered towards the door. This is the precise moment that a magical evil stair appeared from the void of darkness and attacked me for no reason whatsoever.

“Ow! Ow! My cankle! My cankle!” I screamed as I tumbled in slow motion and saw my life flash before my eyes. (Eh, it was okay). That cankle cracked like no cankle has ever cracked before.

The bouncer nervously glanced around to see if there were any witnesses to this horrific incident. There were not. He took his pretentious metrosexual shoe and shoved me out the door into the frigid 31-degree night.

Due to the swelling, my cankle is now 5 times the size of my normally sized cankle. Work boots will never fit over this horrid thing. I’m thinking of buying some of these socks to see if they live up to the hype. The folks on the infomercials can’t stop raving about them. What do you think?

Cracked cankle curing sock

Hobbling but not a Hobbit (I hate those snooty bastards),

Maurice The Gnome