my action-packed anals

Who Knows Where to Download Blah Blah Blah?

2010-06-14T20:41:00.002-05:00

You disappear forever practically and the spam comments creep in like ivy through the windows of an abandoned house. You know what happens when you abandon a house. Demons populate it. And ivy. Demons and ivy. Which is worse? I cast my vote for demons.

I've been thinking about planting some ivy in the hopes that it climbs. I'm supposed to abandon hope, though. Contructs collapse upon constructs. How do I make it through a second of reality when NONE OF IT IS REAL?

Ok. Spam. Spam comments. Emptiness is form and form is emptiness, Shariputra. Spam comments are the finger pointing to the moon. Am I right or aren't I?

LQ Halloween - Lauren & Amber

2009-11-30T23:11:00.001-05:00

LQ Halloween - Lauren & Amber
Originally uploaded by shangothecat

I smell armpits now. I stopped writing blogs to smell armpits full-time. Gotta go.

Sniff sniff.

my parent organization

2008-12-05T11:08:00.001-05:00

right this second, i feel like throwing my bird through a window. he's sitting in his cage, the door flung wide open, his wings not clipped (i.e. he can go wherever the hell he pleases!), screaming at the top of his lungs. i walk over and offer him a finger (not THE finger), and he rejects it. i sit back down. screaming.
usually it's the cat...
not at all what's on my mind. though related, i suppose. fragments are the sentence. you see how that can be taken a couple of different ways.
so the first tree went up. it's magical. i love it way more than the bird right now.
how do i transition to the topic of freedom? well, there is the bird's cage, i guess. na, no good.
i never really write anymore. it doesn't even bother me. not really. and if i read the right book, it doesn't bother me at all. i still love journals, though. beautiful empty journals with page after page of clean, white potential. it's like half of the breathing the process. well, the first half. stop.
but, to the point, the dreams are driving me crazy. i was writing solomon this morning (emails...i write emails. sometimes.) and thinking about how i don't think i'll ever loose sight of how grateful i am for his presence in my life.
freedom (freedom to think without god giving me the thumbs up, freedom to make decisions, etc) is a privilege i frequently loose in the night. an organization, my parents, or the hybrid that they were in reality commandeers my life in dreams and i struggle to find the thing which, awake, i found some time ago. the tidal wave of relief stymied by hallucinations recurrent. before i escaped the belief box(escaped? exchanged?), i had recurring dreams centered around 16 year old trauma: removal from school, humiliation, suddenly having teary-eyed disappointed affection slathered on me, shit like that.
now, the new EVENT. but the new EVENT heralded good change, not bad change, so why the dreams? huh? how many times do i have to move back in with my parents and sit in the back seat of their car and go to meetings (aka church) and "not pretend" all over again, this time, as an adult? it's exhausting. i guess that's all i have to say about it right now. enough already. are you listening?
i want to put presents under my pagan tree, kill both my pets and stuff them, and let an evening last for eternity.

"Everything that happens will happen today
& nothing has changed, but nothing's the same
and ev'ry tomorrow could be yesterday
& and ev'rything that happens will happen today"
-Byrne/Eno

Eye'm in the mirror

2008-06-05T16:53:00.001-05:00

Eye'm in the mirror
Originally uploaded by Belle Manure

yum. fingers.

a revelation (degenerating into despair)

2008-05-21T13:31:00.003-05:00

i am no good at writing. i think about it. i ponder it. but it doesn't happen gracefully anymore. there might be bathtub moments of introspective reverie in which words flow from my mind with a mellifluousness (see, i wanted to say mellifluity) that no longer occurs when the whale is beached.
nowhere is this more evident than in academic papers requiring that i expound on textbook knowledge with my own thoughts, opinions, and understanding of civilization. left to my own devices, rarely do i opine on ANYTHING!
i think, but my thoughts are globs of dough that i seldom stick in the oven. when was the last time i buttered the biscuit of mature mental reverie?
my thoughts are those of a child and i wish do the desires of a child. (john 8:44)
my posture is deplorable. there is a nagging itch on the back of my scalp that causes constant fiddling and scratching around. i feel like the kid the obligatory "lice letter" referred to anonymously:
dear parent,
please be advised that some piece of white trash filth has infiltrated our school and exposed us all to disgusting head bugs. clearly his or her family hasn't bathed in weeks and lives in a shit hole. thanks a lot, asshole.

principal ------

ughh. there is nothing worse than being untalented AND itchy. it's positively humiliating.

boo hoo
amber

A Tale Too Shitty: An Autobathography

2008-01-13T12:34:00.000-05:00

It was the best of baths; it was the worst of baths. Despite having been reminded, not so much of mortality or aging as of pain itself, by getting up out of bed the wrong way, my bathing satisfaction had, as if to compensate, increased beyond my wildest expectations. As though the waters were expanding through space to equalize universal injustice. Or perhaps just to throw me off the Cynic's path.
Pure Cashmere loomed above me from the shower walls like some Softsoap candle lighting the way to a cleaner, softer me as hot tea spilled down my chin into the waters. No need to stop it. I ignored a voice that told me not to dab my chin with a towel. Strauss' Also Spake Zarathustra so recently reminding me that I am not an ape. (We had been to the symphony the night before.)
A friend, over breakfast, revealed that when Homer (of Simpson, not Odyssey fame) circled the stadium on his motorcycle, he had recalled dreams of flying that he had never before had the opportunity to acknowledge--indeed these dreams had never before revealed themselves to his conscious mind--and opened up memories of imaginary places visited and revisited in the night.
In his story, The Expelled, Beckett says:
Memories are killing. So you must not think of certain things, of those that are
dear to you, or rather you must think of them, for if you don't there is the
danger of finding them, in your mind, little by little. That is to say, you must
think of them for a while, a good while, every day several times a day, until
they sink forever in the mud. That's an order.

I laid the book on the side of the tub when I had finished and, letting my head sink below the water line, listened to the amplified sound of my breathing and the ancient creaking of my spine as I shifted, not uncomfortably, in that limited space. I couldn't get out of the tub because I wasn't in it. It took a while. Finally, if nothing more, my toe returned to reality and flicked the drain. It was disobeying orders, but I spared its life, seeing as I was feeling particularly self-satisfied and artistic at that moment.(Artists are a self-satisfied lot. They like to act like they aren't. Hence, the tortured artist.) My hearing returned to normal as the waters went down. My back formed a suction with the bottom of the tub and I made repeated fart-like noises as I stuck and unstuck my wet back to the bathtub floor. I didn't even giggle.
Albert, the cat, usually flees the bathroom as soon as the blow dryer makes its noisy appearance. Today, he stuck around for a few moments, jumping atop the lattice-work encasing the radiator. I reached down to pet him with my free hand and puffs of hot air must have reached his little pink nose. He ran.

how you lichen me now?

2007-08-01T10:27:00.000-05:00

my search for effective antiperspirant/deodorant having left me a bitter, smelly shell of the spring-fresh woman i used to be, i decide instead to search for fresh new underarms. it seems a far simpler task to purchase replacement armpits than to vanquish mine stinky enemy. in desperation, i recently turned to the sparse terrestrial plumage of the tundra to combat my foe and purchased a lichen-based deodorant at the local hippie-mart. its rare and exotic plant extracts inspired new hope in the pit of my arms. "liken plant: natural deodorant" by earth science (and that's what really sold me: earth science. sounds terribly trusty, doesn't it? i like science. i like the earth. i believe in utilizing the flora of our spectacular planet to subdue odors, unwanted fauna and emotional troubles.) promised to "control odor all day long without aluminum or other harsh chemicals." however, a morning stroll in today's sweltering heat left my new toiletry spent--unable to perform in just under two arms and an hour. i think because i've jumped from one deodorant to the next in my search for an effective product, i've created a strain of super-sweat destined to destroy humanity with its knee-buckling stench. or maybe "liken plant" just wasn't designed to aid sweaters outside of its geo-centric area. like how only local honey helps allergies. perhaps i need rochester lilac-based (gag) deodorant. who sweats in the tundra anyway? maybe i'll just move there. i will move away from my sweat to a land flowing with algae and fungus.

on a similar note, i just read about how people are more likely to clean up their cookie crumbs if there is a faint tang of cleaning liquid in the air. this was part of a study on how strong the grip of the subconcious mind is on our actions. this being the case, i am thoroughly shocked that more of our guests don't just piss in the corner of our apartment after walking past the litter box on their way in the door. i'm pissing right now, just thinking about it. imagine how much i'd be pissing if i wasn't thinking about it....whaddaya have to say about that, scientists? and why can't i be part of an experiment that involves cookies? i bet they have some really gross cookies made of recycled paper or garbage on sale for two hundred dollars at the hippie-market. perhaps a sweet-smelling cookie that works on odor from the inside out... that could be helpful.

i smell saturn near uranus

2007-01-03T20:33:00.000-05:00

i guess i sort of really celebrated them this year, the holidays. not that i have
family or friends to buy for, or money to spend. heh. i did get some
lights, put up a tiny tree about the size of a modest vase and bought
a fresh wreath from boy scouts. or rather, a scout leader. i'm not
much for actual scouts. i don't agree with giving boys badges and
prizes for (wow, you know, if you slide your hand just slightly to the
left and type "for", you'll accidentally type "die". creepy! die,
scouts, die!) building fires and finding their way out of forests.
boys get enough recognition just for having penises.
what do i get for having a vagina? certainly not a badge. raped,
maybe? well, not me. i rarely go out or speak with actual people. and
i never wear miniskirts or provocative silk tops with diving
necklines. those sluts are just asking for it. if i wear silk, i'm
asking for a sweat ring the size of saturn, or rather, saturn's rings-
which, when you look at them through a telescope, are more
butterscotch coloured than anything else. i remember when i first
looked at saturn through a telescope and realized that the rings weren't
all candy coloured. at least not all the time.
at any rate, they aren't made of sweat and they probably smell better.
ice and dust smell way better than me.
of course, i was pretty young when i first saw saturn's rings. i don't
think i would have carried the childish notion of rainbow coloured
rings into my teens.
"cammie" just called and asked to speak to the lady of the house. eat
dial tone, "cammie"!
anyway. of course i don't have an actual problem with boys, badges,
and penises. only in theory, you know.

Despondent Fat Refuses to Commit Suicide

2006-12-05T12:01:00.000-05:00

So, I've taken to titling my blogs as though they were important news. I expect my career in journalism to take off any second now. All I have to do is suck the life out of my writings and present them to the public as news and a snooze. I may have already done that, actually.
I'm thinking of starting an exercise routine. I probably haven't had an exercise routine since, jeez, I'm not sure when. I did Tao-Bo once for like 6 months straight and nothing happened other than an unflattering photo of me punching invisible airbags in the living room. Oh, and an unfortunate predilection for leg warmers and yelling "double-time!!!" every now and then. When I realized that I wasn't going to "win" the "exercise race" and become the fittest, most attractive person on earth, me and my fat fell despondant. I thought if I insulted it enough it would just end it's own life, but instead, it appears to be weaving a basket on my stomach. Or maybe the fat basket is my stomach. But, I'd rather separate myself from the fat and pretend like it's just a prop. A snap-on accessory for the self-hating doll. I'm not fat, I'm wearing a fat vest. And a triglyceride anklet. Oh, and two basketball halves of fat for an ass. I'm like a combination plate of fat.
So, I've begun thinking about exercise, but this produces new worries. The acceptablity of my current fat hinges on it's favorable distribution. I'm lucky that all my fat hasn't congregated in one hideous area, causing the rest of my body to look freakishly disproportionate. What happens if I start to exercise, though? Will there be a rueful reapportioning, like someone squeezed a water balloon? If I do, say, crunches, will my stomach fat just pull up stakes and head to my waist? I'm uncomfortable even using words like "crunches". And I don't run. Running is out of the question. If I jump up and down, I'm sure the downstairs neighbors will be appreciative. Gyms are terrifying and would require the purchase of clothes to work out in. Who's going to finance my weight loss? That's what I want to know.
Besides, it makes me giggle thinking about ME exercising. Only, when I giggle, I jiggle, which brings me back 'round from amused to disgusted again. Life is a painful roller coaster filled with frozen pizza's and pecan pies and greedy landlords that won't let you break your lease even if you find a much better place and they don't really need your rent money anyway.
I should just move out and leave my fat behind. Good luck getting my fat to pay rent, greedy landlord.
Harumph!

Rumsfeld Suspected of Foul Play in Saget Scheduling Conflict

2006-11-09T13:25:00.000-05:00

so, it looks like we are rid of rumsfeld, but who do we get in place of him but another Bush family friend. great. in some of his parting remarks, rumsfeld blamed lack of support for the Iraqi war on the 'complexity of the situation being to difficult to comprehend' for most of this countries citizens. ridiculous! certain things do boil down. for example, cabbage and international politics. and if we're all so dumb, why waste so much life and money defending a nation of idiots?
and why are the elderly running our country? and since they are, why aren't we sending them in to throw their lives away for the cause that only they are wise enough to comprehend? rochester has plenty of those electric wheelchair thingymajigs we could donate to the elderly infantry. let THEM go out in a blaze of glory, i say. when 70 year olds start making bad decisions, we usually put them in a home, not give them more power. who gets to decide who's senile and who isn't? i'm irritated.
oh, and just so you know, bob saget's slated appearance at the auditorium today has been cancelled due to a conflict with his tv schedule....!!!??? must have an old person booking his appointments. i need to start watching more television.

Kitten, kitten, who's got the kitten?

2006-11-08T17:09:00.000-05:00

Everything I own- scarves, socks, birdies and bells- they all swing and jingle to fuel the furry grey fury of Achi the Kitten. She attacks life with claws out, poised for combat and unembarrassed by defeat. I, on the other hand, writhe in shame and misery at the slightest rumour of defeat, regardless how spurious the source. I sense disapproval from a virtual stranger and plunge into a coma of depression obsessing over wasted years devoid of talent and worth. Where is the zest of my kitten-hood? How I long for the days of my youth, when toys cowered in my presence and innocence triumphed over shame! Poppycock! No such days existed. I blushed upon birth and immediately demanded that my father put down his Bible and fucking dress me.
But then, there's Albert- the prodigal kitty. He disappeared the night Buffalo was buried by snow and we assumed he was corralling around that great cathouse in the sky by now. But (!!!) he returned last week, shivering and dirty, with a newfound zeal for napping. (A zeal that I personally find to be self-renewing. Naps spring from some great aquifer of torpor housed deep within my lazy-ass soul.) His is a renaissance of lethargy hitherto unseen in paranoid kittyland, where even blankets and pillows host hidden terrors unknown to man. Before he disappeared, he was a noisy, nervous cat. I'm quite glad to see that his tenure outdoors has lightened him up a bit. He can now almost certainly be spotted lazing about on beds and poof chairs alike, praising Jesus under his breath for guiding him home. I swear you can see a halo above his head and the slightest traces of angels’ wings. I've never seen him so content. Even his interest in Tiberius the Bird has waned considerably. I, for one, am certain that he was in a tight spot outdoors and some friendly birds came to his aid. Honestly, no more likely or alluring explanation can be found.
Earlier today, I walked home for lunch through sidewalks shrouded in a mist that popped and burst around my nose like freshly poured cola. The leaves that had not yet succumbed to winter glittered and hung from the trees like golden ornaments. I trampled their fallen brothers and sisters under my feet and thought about how I no longer have anything of interest to impart to the world. I have eked out my last bit of usefulness and am ready to collapse, a wispy wraith culled of value and left on the universal threshing floor. I used to work with this girl named Angel. She told me one day that I take nothing in stride, which was funny because I had fancied myself easy going at the time. I've second guessed myself ever since. Way to go, Angel.

autumn, by any other name...

2006-09-13T18:56:00.000-05:00

autumn's smell draws me out of the house and walks me down synaptic lanes fired in the kiln of my hippocampus. (bet you're sorry you started reading this already. yeah. woo-hoo!!!)
inhale decay, exhale life. wash the dishes and wake up with the grey light of a fall morning placed and displaced through leaded glass. my best friend sleeps beside me wrapped warm in a soft blanket.
what am i waiting for? life gurgles up from the wellspring of my heart, not the fluid world around me.
craving communication and warmth, i open a soup can of letters only to find that my lover has found satisfaction with another. so i hit the old anticipation bottle once again.
it's only a feeling. none of it is real, despite the catch in my throat.
i was reading about the nature of the mind the other day. apparently, my mind knows what it's doing if i can just learn to leave it alone. i pile story upon story on top of it and then blame it for all the trouble it's causing me. it's beautiful. with the exception of the fact that i'm not sure what it would do without me, it really doesn't need me at all. from what i gather, if i could explain it, it would be wrong. conceptual intelligence cannot describe the supranatural. thinking about myself is the same as thinking about someone else, which both gives me free license to egocentric behavior and makes it completely undesirable. it's always two people- or more. me and me watching me. i would think it's all a bunch of hoobajube if i didn't feel things that are completely diametrically visceral and yet fundamentally concrete. will i ever get comfortable with uncertainty?
will i ever stop writing maudlin metaphysical poo-poo? will i shave my turds down to a more anally managable size if i drink more water and eat less cheese? will my shamrock plant survive winter and a house full of cats? how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck would chuck wood? did anyone see the death of the australian alligator-pants animal planet guy coming? i sure didn't. but then, i'm living in the present. i don't solve mysteries, man, i live them. hee hee.

Welcome, Kittens

2006-08-14T14:33:00.000-05:00

Tiny, grey and blind, Mother Maria welcomed three small wonders (remember that old television show about the robot girl?) into the world of our apartment sometime early Saturday morning. This is her first litter, borne of unwholesome gallivanting unsanctioned by her owners, who were either worried sick or gleefully indifferent for the three or four fantastic stink-free days that she was out seeking tomcat suitors in lieu of leaving her spectacularly malodorous hourly craps in her Igloo-shaped kitty toillette. BUT, she seems to have taken to motherhood like a duck to water. We are ever so happy to welcome the tiny little creatures into the world.
She's a haughty, Hollywood type, though, and prefers to keep her babies identities private. No pictures. She'll introduce them to the public when she's ready. I personally think Tom Cruise is the father.

sand in my corporate vagina

2006-08-08T12:51:00.000-05:00

if you'd like to have a strong masculine figure train you how to do your job and how to make constant glaring mistakes but not accept personal responsibility for them because you know the female of lesser human value sitting next to you will eventually fix them and help you appear to be a shining example to your peers, come to the bank, where i work! i hear they are training young men for this very purpose RIGHT NOW! hurry! get off your ass! you, too, can be a strong presence in the male dominated corporate world. there are tons of hard working women just waiting to crawl on their elbows to clean up your trail of pathetic, shitty work in the near future. men should have to train women and women should have to train men. "but that by means of an equalizing your surplus just now might offset their deficiency, in order that their surplus might offset your deficiency, that an equalizing might take place." (2 Cor 8:14) you see, god says. funny how "god says" only works as an excuse for the nation of israel.
Whooops!

A Film of Redemption Without Redemption

2006-08-06T10:35:00.000-05:00

John Huston's Wise Blood was a more horrifying misrepresentation of Flannery O'Connor's book than I could have imagined. From the utterly terrible acting performances (and don't you, "Oh that was done on purpose, you just don't get it", me!) to the musical score that was more suited to an episode of Rockford Files, this film was revolting. I viewed it with no ill-will present at the outset, and, in fact, expected a pleasant experience. But the misrepresentation of the southern characters, from the ridiculously fraudulent southern drawl to the lilting, comedic way their faith was portrayed, was inexcusable. Right down to it's end, which was completely devoid of any character sentiment, it failed in every place that O'Connor's book shined and resonated. The actors portraying the "southern" policemen may as well have been eating smothered hot-dogs from NYC street stands and quoting Godfather. The one redeeming acting performance was Ned Beatty's lively and dead-on representation of Hoover Shoates, a religious con-artist who hears Moates preaching the Church of Christ Without Christ and sees dollar signs and business opportunities. O'Connor's powerful book is most well-known for it's creepy, religious undercurrent that jibes the seemingly lifeless cadaver of "Faith". Mr. Huston's film is a shameful mockery of the author's intentions, as they are understood by me and most of her fans, if I may be so bold as to say so. While I acknowledge that I can't know exactly what the author wished to convey, I have enough affection for her and her works to desire to remain a fan. If I viewed Wise Blood the way Mr. Huston apparently did, I would have thrown it in the trash. For Flannery's sake, and mine, I forgive you, John Huston. The forgetting....that will take some time.

the tears of a clown

2006-07-12T19:06:00.000-05:00

i saw a field of robots in an athletic club today. it looked like a field of robots, rather than what it was- an astonishing number of rows of treadmill bodies with television heads. i would feel much more comfortable if words like "athletic" and "club" could be removed entirely from the human language. human language. there. i said it again. once again, humanity has been thrust in my reluctant face. i see the outer shell, the human hull, and i judge. i spent the day with a women that i was sure was loud, obnoxious and utterly unhuman. i saw her as a pushy sales machine. i dreaded spending the day with her, riding in her car, listening to her talk. but she is my mother and she is beautiful. how can i keep misjudging people and yet continue to form opinions and hold to them so staunchly?
her name is parivash. her initials are p.e. if we want to continue the athletic theme. in fact, i suggest that you stop reading this now and engage yourself in a rousing bout of calisthenics.
p.e. moved to the united states from iran when she was 17 years old and has a cute iranian accent. she's a stockily built 40 or 50 something sales machine. a cannonball with a cute accent and a strong personality. so strong, in fact, that i dismissed her like a cheap perfume- an irritating presence that would eventually clear out of the air. my air.
today was a day of interminable rain and i spent the whole thing in a car and in an office, in a car and in an office, in a car and in an office, with parivash. i listened to her talk about religion and growing up in a third world country, about her daughters and her casual, motherly disappointment in their limited passions and interests. even the things that seemed so stereotypically motherly- the sort of things they depict mothers feeling and saying in movies that infuriates their newly "self" realized(not in a buddha-hood kind of way) daughters- seemed like the beautiful feelings of a woman who had lived her life. HER life. why is it so hard to see the big picture of other people's lives? sometimes it seems like such a revelation that other people have feelings. i KNOW they do, but that knowledge rarely makes me think of them as a human, like me, that was born and grew up and got married and had children and loved them. a person that goes to sleep every night with a host of memories that i know nothing about. we took a break for lunch and she put it on her corporate card. instead of thinking about our lunch going on a "corporate card", i watched her from across the table as we talked. i felt like i caught a glimpse of her soul. not long after she moved here, she found herself with a family. one day she went to the grocery store with her two daughters and got angry because there were so many varieties of cereal. i guess they don't have cocoa puffs or lucky charms in iran. she told her children they could only have one kind and that was it. after a time, she said she looked in her pantry and saw five different cereal boxes. i guess that was it. a story of reluctant acclimation.
i don't think i could take it if i saw every person i met as a human the way i saw p.e. as one, today. how would things be different? i happened to see my ex-husband walking into his apartment building later this afternoon. due to religious differences, he declines communication with me. he's a human, too- with thoughts and feelings he'll take to his grave that i'll never fully understand from his perspective because i don't go to bed at night with his brain in my cranium. but he has a heart and i have a heart and i wish i could never hurt anyone again.

Lobster Quadrille Doesn't Need An Amen

2006-06-17T17:42:00.000-05:00

A local counter culture (i think this has to do with the germ civilisation in kitchens) paper featured our band this week! I thought I should explain the picture on the cover...
Jeremiah Johnson, i.e. solomon, graces the foreground with a very serious expression- clearly nervous about bears.
The rest of us wade in the background praying for his victory over the hidden Great Lake Bear. Solomon wields the sign of our Lord hoping to ward off the fearsome creature. Minutes passed slowly, flowing off the universal clock like so much molasses. After what seemed like an eternity, on solomons mark, the tambourines clanged, the washboard clattered, two members of the band drowned themselves just for effect, and slowly the bear climbed back up the hill away from Ontario Beach.
Kevin Farrell & Amy McDonald, R.I.P.

xoxo
Amber McAlister

flowery lamentations

2006-04-25T10:08:00.000-05:00

there is no shortage of beautiful walkways, dusky breezes flirting about, and endless rays of warming sunshine that stretch out in a display of luminescent geometry. birds were chirping and expensive houses were sitting pretty. i was trying to cross the street, reading the dhammapada, and all these arrogant pricks were zooming in and out of their driveways as if their life, or at the very least, their happiness, depended on keeping me from crossing the street and walking home for lunch. streams of disgusting, negative filth gushed out of my mouth, violently spewing into the spring air. i came home and cried. why can't i be nice??? anger and shame are served on the rocks of my soul. i'll stand you up to a drink sometime. or knock you down to one. i'll never be mindful. the buddha said:
mindfulness is the path to immortality.
negligence is the path to death.
the vigilant never die,
whereas the negligent are the living dead.

i feel ghostly. i want to command the rolling chariot of my body and not just hold the reins.
phil collins once said:
Oooohhhh, you know i wish it would rain, rain Doooowwwwnnn on me now.
hee hee.
at least my self-hatred quickly turns flippant dismissal.
as drivin and cryin' once said:
i'm goin' straight to hell
just like my momma sa-a-aid.
i'm goin' straaaight to hell.

had they been buddhist, they would have specified "cold" or "hot"

Post Marital Syndrome

2006-02-16T19:13:00.000-05:00

Sweet wisteria hung from the branches of the trees I drove past many years ago. Pulling over one afternoon, I crossed a ditch hoping to hold them in my hands.
My hands are covered by a million lines. Curtis used to say I must have kept them balled into tight fists as a child.
The wisteria escaped my greedy grasp that day- spared by the approach of a protective country dog. I kept driving.
I don't remember anything else about that day. I wonder how many days I've forgotten entirely. Each of these moments were as real as the one right now, which will soon pass into an endless void.
Years later, on our second anniversary, Curtis and I went to Riverbend Campground and pitched a modest tent by softly murmuring waters. We stayed up late and talked by the fire under the dark, southern sky in North Carolina. The following day, a gentleman carried us upstream in his truck carrying a canoe in its bed. That afternoon, we canoed down a shallow, winding river that cut through farmland speckled with herds of cows.
It being late August, the nights were turning cooler and a cold that hinted of approaching autumn crept through the canvas of the tent. An achy back and high spirits greeted us with the dawn.
A few months later, when tragedy struck, I would look back on that trip as the happiest memory I could conjure.
All my memories are glossy or matte.
I wish they were flesh and blood.
There is noone to connect me to the times I can't remember.
I don't feel like this is the end.

Bathtub Terror!!!!!!!!!!!!

2005-12-21T19:50:00.000-05:00

My feet were covered with three inches of warm, cloudy water. (Low-level cirrus clouds, to be exact- cirrus being latin for curl of hair, which I'm quite sure I spotted.) Large forceful drops were falling from above as I nervously crept along at a snails pace. A hot, wet, female snail- barren, in search of food and struggling to survive. The water just kept pouring down. As I lifted my face heavenward and felt the raw cleansing power of the showerhead, an uneasy feeling crept along my spine like a homosexual cat. Feeling lightheaded from the glorious exhalation that never ceased, I wanted to close my eyes and yield entirely to the masculine drops that were beating down on me without thought of remorse, but I knew danger was afoot- and quite literally. The shower alligators were preparing for a foot feast. Why wouldn't the bathtub drain any quicker? Cirrus, cirrus- like a secret whispered by a midnight ghost. Damn you, curls of hair.

Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down

2005-11-06T19:03:00.000-05:00

The leaves blew violently in the air like spooked birds ready to attack as we made our way to the Farrell-Manitsas farm in Mt. Morris, NY, where pumpkins grow and the virgin mary never sleeps. At the stroke of five, the dominant luminary made a hasty retreat, as though it suddenly remembered that winter was almost upon us and it wasn't supposed to show it's face anymore. So we drove home in premature darkness and solomon called every person he knew. We had spent the previous evening, Saturday night, at a kind friend's home who was throwing a birthday party for her cat. A couple of folks brought over their fat felines and it was a cat's night in. Catnip was present and the birthday boy got ripped.
I feel exhausted and slightly more somber than I'd like. It's hard to settle in to a Sunday these days. Johnny said it best.
"On a Sunday morning sidewalk,
I'm wishing, Lord, that I was stoned.
'Cause there's something in a Sunday
That makes a body feel alone.
And there's nothing short a' dying
That's half as lonesome as the sound
Of the sleeping city sidewalk
And Sunday morning coming down."

God vs. The Girls Scouts of Genesee Valley

2005-10-21T18:57:00.000-05:00

During my tenture at ---- bank, I have come to know people from various walks of life.
(That is a very serious opening sentence, isn't it?)
Today I helped a couple of Girl Scout troop leaders get some financial matters squared away. That the gentle reader may know, girl scout bank accounts are practically a work of art- if you take away aesthetics. They are scary paperwork monsters.
My boss was laughing at my ill-fortune in being the new go-to person for girl scout accounts in our area.

This is where the story starts to get good. This is when you realize, ahhhhhh....this has all just been prefatory information.

My boss asks me if perhaps I was a former girl scout and that's why all the girl scout leaders were drawn to me. I assured him that, heavens, no! Jehovah's Witnesses wouldn't allow their children to get involved with bad associates like the girl scouts! Goodness knows what seemingly innocuous, but no doubt vile, moral indiscretions I would have been witness to had I been a part of such an ill-reputed, egregious group as the Girl Scouts!

It's funny. I used to spend so much time trying to defend my "beliefs"- which included a staunch stance on such things as having wind chimes, feng shui, joining the girl scouts, attending a prom, etc. Such useless time spent having to feel like a jerk because I wasn't 'supposed' to say, "You, too", when nice people wished me a merry christmas or when i couldn't attend the funeral of a friends' loved one because it was at a "church". Every other church unwittingly worships satan, you know- the poor bastards. What a bunch of arrogant bullshit!
I miss feeling like my parents might at least have nice thoughts about me, even if they didn't feel comfortable expressing them. I miss having my parents say nice things to me in my imagination and being able to actually believe that in real life, it could possibly happen. Now, even if I imagine having a nice conversation with my parents, I can't enjoy it because I know it's a sickening reality that they would never have a normal conversation with me. I can't imagine my way past it. It turns my stomach.
Somehow little pieces of life get wrapped up in the issues that trouble us. When that happens, you start to see girl scouts and have moral dilemmas and biting pangs of heart. I don't recommend putting yourself in that situation.

Fecal Matters: An Encore

2005-10-20T12:15:00.000-05:00

i got home and solomon said no more meat and that he had found religion.
i had just come from the therapist where it was decided upon that i needed to go vegetarian again in order to keep from shitting giant brick-like turds. and apparently i need to create a god. that's what she said anyway. maybe i'll build a god out of my own giant brick-like turds.
social anxiety was discussed. solutions seem simple, but i'm not sure how actions add together to equal said solution. either way, i came away with this:
i am wearing the same clothes i have all day, so why should i feel less comfortable in them right now? but i suspect that that's just a sentence that i think sounds good to end the topic but that doesn't really mean anything.

weather.com(read all about it)

2005-10-14T18:51:00.000-05:00

this is a desk not a dashboard, you asshole. solomon wants wax in the insence buddha(elvis kind)so as to burn insence. suddenly flames. that'll do. no more fire. buddha's got a big black stick- what? no! flaming buddhacock.

"Flamin' the Buddha's dick, boys," he screamed,"FLAMIN' THE BUDDHA'S DICK!!!" The fighter plane hurtled off into the raining night over the goddam ocean.

no no

pankacek

pankace

pancake

i finally got it. pan-quake the typewriter is completely backwards in my eyes...like i'm typing through a lake...

flamin' the buddha's dick, boys...beouys......s

he stands majestic. weren't we watching t.v.? there is still smoke wafting in front of my face. i wish i record paste a small world picture on here of the "Disney's Family Reunion" album cover on here. Granny, praise jesus, may she rest in peas, gave me the bright colours of the mad tea party. pisspoor representations of the walt disney renditions.
I.O.in. es. yes!ahhhh. mister pickwick!!!
kitties....kitties.....into the dark.
it's wonderful.

Current Mood: Female

2005-09-26T13:05:00.000-05:00

My ovaries are growing a robotic exoskeleton bent on bloodshed. Jutting spikes and synthesized venom inside needlelike metal shards pepper the armor creeping across said ovaries.
They are alien to me and my brain pleads with my body for a destructive intervention. They must be removed.
Lionhearted volunteers wanted.

Equine Knocks and Argyle Socks

2005-09-24T22:30:00.000-05:00

a large square was built by someone. they sat it on the ground and then i moved all my stuff inside. fall's crisp air skipped lightly across my skin in my imagination as i sat in front of the computer and thought about how not to fool myself. i feel like i'm pretty honest with me about me. i'm not one of these people that think that they are just so goddamn enchanting and mystical. don't mistake me: i love enchantment and mysticism- but this only makes me one of many. i'm like a nickel and so are you. so there.
bushes and cigarettes and boys and girls
amber is childish
and likes her peas whirled
i want to assign layers to my flesh and name them- rather like scientists do with the atmosphere and the planets and whatnot. remember the scientists? i definitely have a core and an outer crust. these two seem completely incompatable.
i want to purchase yards upon yards of soft fabrics and roll myself up in them like an autumnal tamale on a sacrificial plate, yielding myself up to the equinox. equinox sounds like it should be the mother of all horse steriods.
i've been good lately. i mean, i have acted reasonably well and tried to work on generating compassion. when i'm not compassionate, i'm jealous. prozac makes me want to kill people.
i feel like my blog just flew off the crazy cliff. whoopsy daisy. using invisible footholds in the air, it will wander gently and purposefully down to the ground and then it will most likely hunt something down obsessively and kill it.

.

9x4x1

2005-08-22T18:09:00.000-05:00

The black corded phone was in the house when we bought it and moved in. It sat in a dusty corner and was perhaps first used by my friend Lydia who accompanied me on the long journey from Georgia to New York. Now it sits on the desk or floor of my small apartment. When it rings, I know no one who used to call will be on the other end. In fact, it's very rarely for me. Nowadays, I regard the ringing phone as a suspicious stranger rather than meeting it with the usual anticipation of the past. It is small, plain and appeared in my life as an unexpected and totally negligible item. Now it handles the lions share of my telephone correspondance. I feel an odd suspicion toward it, as though it is a monolith causing an evolutionary effect on my household and perhaps the world. I suppose it's more likely that my life has evolved without the shady support of this unsuspecting, and yet suspect, telephone. Maybe it's the cord that throws me off. Either way, it seems so very strange that I should end up with this item that was never mine when I've lost, albeit somewhat voluntarily, almost every other stable factor in my life.
Remember how Holly Golightly said the cat wasn't hers? It's kind of like that. The phone and I don't belong to one another. I feel like I could throw it out of a cab into the rain, but I know I'd probably run, panicked, down drenched city alleys calling for it and hoping it was alright. That pretty much seems to be the way most relationships in life end. We call people and hope they are alright and wish we had appreciated them more when we had them. Maybe I'll start kissing the phone goodnight and telling it what a good phone it's been. Seems like a logical preemptive measure, don't you think?

I Heart Birdies

2005-08-18T14:13:00.000-05:00

In the spirit of doing laundry, Tiberius is knocking down a small stack of quarters and preparing to eat them, or at least hurl them mercilessly to the floor so that they know who's boss. I think they get the point, those quarters. Tibby (for short) doesn't understand what the deal is with the state quarters and why so many humans run to walmart to buy books to store pretty new quarters in and harass jaded bank employees who are currently ruing the decision this country made to have so many states. The United Drawn and Quartered States of America.
I just recently started reading this GREAT book by Bob Tarte entitle Enslaved By Ducks. It comes highly recommended by someone who thinks highly of her own recommendations. I also bought the Dalai Lama's (Dolly Llama) foolproof guide to being happy. I decided I should try to offer something better to the blogging world.
Should I get Tiberius's wings clipped so that I can take him on pleasant strolls, but take away some of his flying prowess? Or should I continue to confine him to an indoor life (not to be confused with life on planet Endor) but let him flying around with full wing power? Please let me know, oh great blogging birdie who knows all.
It Tibby had his own blog, he would just poop on it and then toss it to the floor. I respect this in a bird.

A Cautionary Tale

2005-08-15T15:56:00.000-05:00

Errant ways de-stress the days of the would be weary moth. Powdered wings are fancy things- not to mention antennae.
Dressed to be seen on a moths night out, the ladies take care with appearance.
A powder room is filled with white and shimmering bodies aflutter.
Drawn to light as a Christian might, endangering themselves and others- waxen wings in candles lie, outside, an unfortunate clutter.
After a weekend on a farm, I am covered with bites and sadness. An ostensible shell of emotion covers my skin. I remember singing in cars. Other people elicit pity by existing. When I'm down, the last thing I elicit is pity. My sadness is putrid to others- those that hate me and those that love me. Bizarre.
There was a store in Riverbend Mall in Rome, GA called Bizarre. That was back before they closed Riverbend Mall due to the obnoxious annual flooding from nearby Coosa river. Bizarre was filled with wicker items, sea shells and collectable fossils. There were hanging beads and peacock feathers aplenty. The store was packed with interesting items to fish through and excellent hiding places for a reclusive child. I spent many an allowance there on seahorse skeletons and aquatic items that looked like cigars. I kept them in a clear, pumpkin-shaped jar and looked through them frequently. Half the store was filled with things that looked as though they could be used in eerie ceremonies or rites.there were coasters that smelled lik etea dn I inhaled this lustily. I always felt like I was on the verge of being bad just by standing in that store. It gave me a creepy feeling like I was about to get in trouble.
Certain parts of life give me a creepy, far-away feeling.
My father told me he hoped I was unhappy- a view I understand, but find creepy.
I'm am frequently viewed as a no-no and that is somehow more easily justified than others being viewed as a no-no.
I should be happy for others who have more than me even though they are sad with what they have.
My father told me life wasn't fair for any righteous person. But he doesn't think I'm righteous anymore. Spread the word. Maybe my luck will turn.

it's unmistakable

2005-07-30T13:00:00.000-05:00

there is just something about the way a lesbian wears a wristwatch.

69.207.187

2005-07-28T21:14:00.000-05:00

hello 69.207.187.
how are you today?
stop looking at my blog!

sorry, i have an obsessed bad-mouthing stalker. 69.207.187 is her IP address.
so, i started seeing this REALLY nice older woman who is a licensed therapist. the last therapist i tried was a skinny man who wore a shell necklace that seemed permanantly embedded in his chest hair. that gave me the hibby-jibbies.
this new woman is wonderful and caring and offers very helpful suggestions and i feel affection for her.
ALERT ALERT run on sentence ALERT ALERT
so, i hear that the lady who used to give me piano lessons is going to move into my apartment when i move out in a few weeks. that should be interesting since she can't talk to me anymore and she is going to be my neighbor. i am just moving next door- next door in the same building.
do you want my address? i would love some mail! heh.
do you know what i find most annoying about this whole divorce and disfellowshipment mess, apart from the fact that curtis is my friend and i miss him? it's that people constantly show pity for people who are EVERY bit as guilty as me and who are even now doing things deceptive and worse than me. i've talked to curt about this and he tells me that things will eventually come to light and people will realize the mistakes they have made in judgement.
time truly is a harsh mistress and i am an obsessed person. i remember what it was like to not know what true anger felt like. i miss those days.
sometimes i think i am going crazy.
i will talk to the nice lady about this. oddly enough, her name is jeanne.

none implied, none intended

2005-07-12T18:53:00.000-05:00

i guess i just decided to fall off the face of the blearth.
i never cease to be amazed by the inconsistancies of life and love and every person i've ever known. i feel like this really old rock that sits there and is too heavy to move. people come and go and sit on the rock and enjoy it for the temorary purpose it serves them and then they leave. i can't leave because rocks don't have legs. that, in a nutshell, is my problem. i never bought that paul simon crap about rocks feeling no pain. rocks seem to embody pain, with the basic exception that they appear to be not sentient. maybe they seem pained because they are so old. they wear down with age. i wear down with age. solomon is gone to a Photoshop class. he is having a difficult week. he misses masumi. i miss curtis.
curtis moved into his new apartment this past week. it's big and nice and he has it neatly arranged.
i lost my wallet somewhere between the moon and new york city. let "the moon"= philadelphia.
what has everyone else been up to?
i'm sorry for being remiss.
the merriam webster word of the day today was "ninja". those mw people crack me right up sometimes. today, rosemarie used the word loquacious and reminded me that we haven't had a word of the day email sent out at work in a long time. i used to send one out daily to subscribing coworkers. the word of the day was usually designed to be used in respectfully insulting irritating but mentally unsuspecting clients. if you don't look at the last part of that last sentence just right, it appears to be a jumbled up mess of too many modifying type words.
i hope all is well and progressive on the planet mars and the planet sweden. i've decided to give jeanne her own planet. i think she would be a just and fair planetary ruler. as for me, i will form a nation and call it stag.

Tight lipped

2005-06-09T11:40:00.000-05:00

Yep. Everyone is pretty tight lipped these days. I would almost think people are trying to teach me a lesson about proper and improper blogging subjects.
I declare June bird-saving month. If you see a bird that needs help, go the extra mile.
I would also like someone to send a small motorcycle to me. No need to bill me, you can just make a gift of it. Preferrably nothing larger than a 250.
It's getting pretty sudorific up here in upstate NY. This weekend, solomon has his first cd release performance at a place in Pittsburg. It's exciting to see things working out so well for him. After all, he helped save a bird this month! That solomon (lower case "s" please- hee hee) sure is one bird-savin', EP-releasin', belt-buckled son of a gun.
Please join me in congratulating him on his recent success!

Butthole is Hot Shit!!!

2005-06-04T11:07:00.000-05:00

I'm sorry, I'm sorry!!! It's shameless self-promotion. You might think that emphasizing the butthole would not be an effective way to self-promote. You might think that. Of course, you'd be dead wrong and apparently not in the know. I guess everyone probably knows the marketing power and pull of the butthole, but most people have enough built in shame (either that or common decency/moral conviction) not to play up the power of the butthole. The thing is...now I have tasted the power of the butthole (just the power, mind you) and it has made me heady. I had no idea how many depraved people are typing in the words "butthole" and "shit" on google and the like! It's amazing? The internet is teaming with coprophagous weirdos!
I must admit to a mild fascination with poop, but it's mainly because I only do it on special occasions once a week or so. In the past, I have even considered entitling a blog "Fecal Matters" and making it kind of poop-centric, you know. But apparently, I would get far more hits if I entitled it "blah blah blah BUTTHOLE blah".
The word butthole never seems to get less gross, you know- even with age. When you are a child, you get mild amusement out of the childlike grossness of the word. When you are older, it takes on a more refined, pure grossness. I mean, anyone can curse up a storm and look silly. But only people who mean business use the real hardcore "bad words" like butthole. The only reason children giggle at the word butthole and don't recognize it's power and purity is because they were only too recently pooping out their own buttholes and sitting in it until someone wiped them clean. The only thing nastier than buttholes is babies. Babies instinctively mock our fear of the butthole. But don't worry, we'll teach them shame yet. People are great at passing down shame generation after generation.
You know, some icons or groups seem untouchable. No one makes fun of them. There are no hate groups forming against them. Babies used to sort of fall in that category, until the advent of Dead Baby jokes and the like. In our modern society, babies are now a target too. What really bothers me is that Hello Kitty is NOT!!! I have searched for a Hello Kitty hate group and come up dry. Someone has GOT to corrupt her image.
I personally suggest throwing a butthole on that fat cat and watching the crowds rip her to shreds. Buttholes also make people violent. Remember when the angels visited Lot and the men of the city wanted Lot to send them out so they could have at them, or rather, their buttholes.
There is no denying the draw of the butthole.
The End.

Who Is Tired of Blogging?

2005-06-03T12:53:00.000-05:00

me me!!!!!
let's all go on strike.
let's build and stain furniture.
let's regiment our daily affairs so as to reach optimum production.
sorry about the butthole post.

My Butthole FInally Exploded

2005-05-13T13:34:00.000-05:00

I've always known this was going to happen sometime. And as time keeps on slippin', slippin', slippin' into the future, my intestines keep slippin', slippin', slippin' right on out my butthole. My poor butthole.
There are several things that run through your head while you are losing your reverse anal virginity. The asshole may not have a hyman that breaks if something large enters it, but it sure as hell has plenty of blood and swollen tissue just dying to see the light of day if you have consistantly giant turds, which I do.
My mom always had bathroom trouble, but that was mainly because she screwed up her digestive sysytem with anorexic antics when I was a child. My dad is fairly regular. I'm not sure what went wrong with me. My recently acquired therapist says that anorexia is basically an addiction and he feels that my life has been very effected by addiction. Maybe I became addicted to not pooping until I form large mossy rocks in my bowels. I have Greco-Roman bowels. I'm shitting corinthian architecture.
So, a pertinant question at this point is what to do about it, right?
I've thought of several things. I have really relaxed on my vegetarian stance lately and that could be causing adverse effects. I have considered upping my fiber intake and applying soothing creams or oinments. I have considered moving into a Sitz Bathe for a year or two.
But I finally decided that I must just be remiss in my communication with Saint Anustine, the patron saint of buttholes. To remedy this, I am repeating a latin prayer to her on the occurance of each bowel movement.
"In nomine anus, et spiritus rectum..."

I Am A Girl: Discuss

2005-05-06T12:15:00.000-05:00

I personally have mixed feelings on the subject. My dad used to think I was a feminist. I definitely disagree there. I just get annoyed when I hear stereotypes and when I see people of my gender fall into them so easily. It's the same with anything else though. But, I suppose I do have a sore spot when it comes to female stereotypes. I mean, I can hear a joke making fun of my race or someone elses and, as long as a know that the person telling the joke isn't racist(and sometimes even if I don't know- I know I'm not and that's good enough for me. Naturally, certain times call for discretion), I will usually find that sort of humour appealing. All the jokes about women seem to have to do with mood swings, poor driving skills or addictions to such things as shopping and chocolate. I don't particularly care for jokes about males either. They usually involve an average heavy-set couch potato type who lacks skills of observation. I guess I just don't find funny anything relating to gender.
Part of me gets very angry with myself for the natural suspicion that seems to dwell in most females regarding the other members of their gender. It rears it's ugly head in myself sometimes. Women do seem more suspicious of your average 'other female' than men seem of your average 'other male', don't they?
I want more female friends. I want more people worldwide to restore my faith in the general intelligence of both genders.
It would be strange if there was some sort of guided genital missile that targeted the genitalia of a certain race.
Would anyone like to sponsor me in the AIDS Walk in June? I am accepting checks and money orders of all sorts.

there's a star man waiting in the sky

2005-04-20T18:24:00.000-05:00

why's he gotta be so fly
and why'd he make my mommy cry
he's a star man
...smushy smushy smootch

well. pardon my absence. AbSense. Absinthe.
Tiberius sends his greetings. It feels really strange and wholey unnatural to return to blogging right now. I feel creepy and taciturn.
I have so much to say that I feel like if I opened my mouth (i.e.keyboard) and let words spill in a vomitous flow that the massive density of it all would create a literary blackhole.
As y'all know, blackholes is serious business.

why...

2005-04-18T21:36:00.000-05:00

...should i watch my back? that is not a very nice thing to say.

An update

2005-04-08T08:12:00.000-05:00

Hi. Ms. Blancmangemoi has asked that I post a brief paragraph assuring you all of her continued survival and welfare. My name is solomon.

Amber and I would like to offer our thanks to those of you who have expressed concern about her well-being and whereabouts. La Fille du Fromage is currently working and inhabiting a small apartment with me and Tiberius, where we have been watching innumerable films, reading innumerable books, and eating a lot. Oh, and listening to the Wu-Tang Clan. We are quite content.

If you have questions or concerns for Ms. Pants, please feel free to email her. She does have access to email. Hopefully we'll have some sort of computer situation worked out soon, and you'll be able to hear from her directly once again.

Kind Regards,

solomon

then i woke up

2005-03-08T13:42:00.000-05:00

so i was in this room talking to these people and i said that i wanted to work in the lobby of the grocery store. they said okay and i was very excited indeed. i've always wanted to scan items and whatnot. i kick this girl out of her little cashier place and i prepare to take the next customer. before that, there is some sort of problem with an atm that i have to fix. after that is taken care of, this GIGANTIC rusted out truck with monster tires pulls up in my grocery lane and asks if i can check his oil. so i open the hood and climb up there and pull out the stick, but i need to wipe it off with something. i go running through the yard (the grocery store has now turned into my grandparents yard) looking for something to wipe the stick off with. right about this time, a voice, as if from god, makes it known that the guys head is actually empty- the truck driver, that is! so i finally wiped the oil stick off with a dried leaf and ran back to put it in his truck and actually check the oil, but now there is this big commotion because the godlike voice said the drivers head was empty. so he takes an almost empty bottle of salsa and somehow pours it in his head, which is now semi-transparent and you can just see this salsa-ish pulp swishing around trying to mask the fact that there is no brain. then he starts running around the yard until his head explodes. working at the grocery store was not as i expected.
that was the last dream i had before waking up last night.
also, a moment ago, i saw a commercial for heated condoms. this is strange. is this for eskimos?

Dryer Sheets

2005-03-03T08:18:00.000-05:00

I childishly clung to a vision of goodness. I guess I thought it softened the load of life.
As far as softeners of the fabric (of the space time continuum) go, Snuggle reigns as king. I presently hold that to be a symbolic universal axiom. If everyone snuggled, I think many problems would be solved. Take, for example, jihads. You would feel kind of silly declaring (do you actually declare jihad, or is the enemy just supposed to 'know'?) jihad against someone you just snuggled with, wouldn't you? I think snuggling would move people to shame in a variety of helpful arenas. Body odor and it's cousin, perspiration, would be effectively eliminated. Who wants to snuggle with a sweaty person? People who sweat should feel ashamed. The only draw-back I can see to this, is that it might encourage obesity or generate a softening in our attitude toward it. People might start to like snuggling with soft pillows of fat. There are still a few kinks that need to be worked out, I suppose.

2005-03-01T17:54:00.000-05:00

"SHE SEEMS TO HAVE INVISIBLE CRUTCHES!!!!"

I'm Very Nice

2005-02-25T19:15:00.000-05:00

I do nice things for people, passively, on a regular basis at work. Some people that I deal with do things that keep me from doing the normal, nice little extras that I usually do. I want to tell them that I would do this or that for them if they would stop taking the opportunity away from me. For some reason it really chaps my hide. If I don't get to do the "nice thing" that I was planning on doing, I don't turn into "regular Amber", I turn into "more irritated than I would normally be Amber". This doesn't make sense and it makes me question my own motives. It also makes me think that those people think I must not be nice enough to do nice things and that is why they preemptively do them themselves, thereby robbing me of the opportunity and making me furrow my brow.
Don't make me get mean, y'all.

It really should be called...

2005-02-24T21:25:00.000-05:00

...CS-Ouch!!!
ha ha
ps:i don't even watch it. i promise. boston legal, on the other hand...
pps:sorry this is so short. i taste onions and i need to go eat peanut butter and beer.

2005-02-23T18:50:00.000-05:00

This book was written in 1936 by Hugh Morris and contains "The Secret of Wooing and Winning the One You Love". I think most of mankind could use reading it. According to page 7: Man, it is, who must be the active partner. It is he who makes love to woman. He chases the woman who was made to be chased. The success of love depends entirely on the understanding of this basic relationship.

Abject Terror 101

2005-02-22T09:50:00.000-05:00

one of the WORST feelings is realizing that the floor isn't where you thought it was. it's always too late by that time.
douglas adams said that there was an art, or rather, a knack, to learning to fly. and that the art, or rather, knack, was in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.
seems treacherously reasonable.

Time spent...

2005-02-19T17:09:00.000-05:00

...in acts of unprecedented kindness toward my ovaries is time well spent and guaranteed not to go unnoticed. I was ready to drive a knife deep into the hearts of those useless, little suckers when my gay coworker appeared beside me like the shadow of the hint of an effeminate ghost. He then performed the said act of kindness toward my ill-mannered ovaries and all those evil, dormant little eggs inside me suddenly felt something like a ray of sunshine do something that I imagine is not very similar at all to darkening their door, but seems akin to as as far as idioms go. At that moment, those little eggs became seeds of hope- hopes of similar acts of kindness that may be taken on their behalf during future and hopefully less gut-wrenching menstrual cycles. Thank you Max Denler.
PS. I wish that all the brainless ninnies that keep hounding me about teaching them to learn how to knit or crochet would go out and learn how to comprehend diagrams of poorly drawn fingers and yarn like the rest of us. I feel like closing my eyes and touching their hands and saying, "There. Now you can knit." No doubt, they would say, "Really?". And my natural response would be, "No, dammit! Now go buy yourself a book and learn how to teach yourself something for a change!" People just expect arts and crafts to be delivered up to them on silver platters. And they smile like they deserve a reward for wanting to learn something just enough to exert no actual effort on their own parts. It's like they are saying, "I want to learn. Here! You do it."
Man...those evil, evil ovaries.

2005-02-15T18:35:00.000-05:00

My grandfather lives in Georgia and people affectionately refer to him as "Curly". Last time I went to his house, this sign was posted in his yard. He was trying to tell the Georgia Power people not to cut any trees on his property without consulting him. Apparently, the best way to do this is to write in your own blood. I want a sign like this in my yard. I think it is the best thing ever.

2005-02-15T18:28:00.000-05:00

the aforementioned unsuccessful choker of aunt heather's, went on to start a stunning anti-career building ultralight aircrafts. the diminutive looking woman standing in front of the work in progress in my mother.

2005-02-15T18:25:00.000-05:00

in the 80's, i had a small rectangular camera. in the 80's, my father had a red sport coat. this is my all-time favourite picture of him, choking my aunt heather. sadly, not only did she live, she reproduced. if someone had told me that when i was eight, it would have been quite disheartening.

am i trying to date a girl?

2005-02-15T16:05:00.000-05:00

Upon driving home from the grocery, I ONCE AGAIN started getting frustrated by the politics of friendship. Natalie Portman started me thinking about this because, you see, she checked me out at the grocery store. She was a little snaggle-toothed, but cute. Since I was buying beer (Genesee Cream Ale in a can! I never buy canned beer. This was 5.98/12pk and according to a recent Brew Magazine, it is award-winning and tastes similar to MALT LIQUOR!!! Yehaa!), she checked my license and saw that my first name is Courtney. So she says, "You're a Courtney, too! Aren't we the best?" I looked at her name tag.
Her demeanor was award-winning- which brings me back to beer- which is, at this point, no revelation.
So, anyway, imagine a slightly snaggle-toothed Natalie Portman saying it. This girl had the most sincere smile I have ever seen. I admitted that I was partial to Courtney's and immediately wished I was friends with this girl. At the least likely times, I run across people that I randomly feel a strong connection to despite my pseudo-antisocial nature. (I say it's pseudo because I honestly can't tell these days.) The next logic evolutionary progression in this series of afternoon events was, of course, melancholy. How could I possibly become friends with this girl? This is a subject I've waxed poetic on at least once before, but, folks, the horse ain't dead. In fact, I'm starting to wonder if it's a horse at all. I was giving this matter SO much thought- trying to figure out if there was a good way to become friends with strangers (ahem, the other Courtney) without scaring them/her. If you don't want to come right out and tell someone that you want to get to know them better, then you have to orchestrate events so that you "coincidentally" run into someone enough times, preferably in settings conducive to the budding of friendships. And then, what if they find out later that you became friends with them on purpose? That could be the end of your long sought after friendship. Frankly, you will look and feel like a weirdo- even though my whole body and mind revolts against the idea of letting society and normalcy dictate the birth and construction of any friendship. It should be that hard to become someone's friend. It just shouldn't. Ladies and gentlemen, it was at that point that I started questioning my motives. The whole line of reasoning, the whole consternation over a thwarted friendship with a snaggle-toothed cashier at the grocery store, the devious plotting to make her mine- was I trying to ask this girl out? It hit me like a wave of poisonous relief. Telling someone you want to get to know them better sounds suspiciously like asking to date them. And somehow, I feel like asking her out on a date would probably be more well-received than asking to be her "friend". I mean, come on. One option makes me look like a loser and one makes me look like an attractive lesbian. I pick attractive lesbian. In the immortal words of Mr. Richard Butler in the post-Psychedelic Furs fame that went by the name of Love Spit Love, Am I Wrong?

Comments given by charming girls named Courtney with friendly countenances will be given preferential consideration. Thank you.

i want...

2005-02-10T14:18:00.000-05:00

...accidental death and disfellowshipment insurance. that way, if i get kicked out of the christian congregation, at least i can live in sin AND style.

Morality falls at the wayside

2005-02-08T23:30:00.000-05:00

So, I've given the matter a lot of thought while gazing lustfully at bacon off and on for about three years, and you know what? Pigs don't trompe all over the earth in herds and ruin topsoil. Political moguls in third world countries don't starve their own nation while profiting from the grain sales to the pig-raising industry. Forests aren't being cleared for pigs to stampede around. They aren't contributing to flooding and wildfires. Pigs don't require tasty grains to subsist. Why! Their very food is called "slop"! Also, pig farmers occasionally give their pigs baths in buttermilk before entering them in county fairs and the like. Where are the "Save the Buttermilk" picketers? Is it just me, or is morality in general so very arbitrary? To sum things up: I'm eatin' pigs.
I'll just join PETA and call it even.

Sweet Surrender

2005-02-06T21:32:00.000-05:00

For some twenty-seven odd years (27 being an odd number), I had nobly resisted the urge to purchase a Weekly World News tabloid, despite it's obviously riveting content. I have lusted after it while standing in line at many a grocery store. Today, I lost the fight. A bride combusted at the altar and all that was left was her skull and the wedding ring! A space alien cookbook was found! Supposedly, I'm not going to believe what they gobble! I had to know what the Martians eat. What if they ever come to my neck of the woods?
Sadly, I received a minor bitching out due to my purchase. What is the appropriate age to start filling ones mind with meaningless, albeit hilarious, fodder? I thought I was doing good to have lasted this long?
To further compound today's significance, the annual "polar plunge" took place in Lake Ontario. This is the event where southern-ridiculing northerners strip down and run out into the freezing lake waters to prove what a bad idea that is and that it should never be done. I suppose it is a lesson to children. Ps: the north rules, the south drools!
I ridicule the South too, but I have a free pass. I grew up there, therefore it is a form of self-deprecation and hence, passable.
Also, I don't plunge into freezing waters annually. This does a lot to validate one's claim to level-headedness. Not that I need to validate it. Or that I am claiming it... I'm just saying. I don't. And I am.

the struggle for levity

2005-02-06T17:36:00.000-05:00

i want levity in all matters. death, disease, loneliness- what's plaguing you? whatever it is, cheer up! you are going to get very upset if you try to view things realistically. and that, my friend, is the height of realism- and the conundrum that is the beauty of "levity girl".
there is only one major flaw in the quest to take everything lightly. it becomes a way of life. this gets in the way mainly when one watches moving feature films. it's very, very embarrassing for the "levity girl" to let others know she has real emotions. flaws in her pseudo-armor.
now, you might think that someone who tries to downplay the horrors around her would not be so bothered by the ubiquitous sound plaguing our airways. the sound of bands like train and matchbox twenty. well, never fear! "levity girl" takes a very, very lax view toward assasination. or rather, the lack thereof. cheesey rock bands are causing a far more pervasive terror than most world leaders could hope to produce. so where, i ask, are the assasination attempts? where is the revolution? don't tell me that we already had it and that this is the resulting synthesis! that would make "levity girl" very aggressivelty un-lighthearted. then she would have to take off her levity suit. then she would feel naked and lack the levity needed to deal with situation. it just creates a whole heap of trouble.
the end

2005-01-31T21:10:00.000-05:00

***sigh***

Gilbert O'Sulllivan's tribute to my pillow-

2005-01-31T08:19:00.000-05:00

unless you are familiar with the Gilbert O'Sullivan song "Alone Again, Naturally", this particular post is going to seem a bit stupid. But allow me to assure you from the outset that it's brilliant. Please remember to sing the post. not this part. it will be self-evident.

Oh pillow of buckwheat
where did first we meet?
at a k-mart display of items seen on tv by me
little did i know
that i would love you so
i'd be whisked away
to another day
on your grainy midnight O-cean
asleep again, naturally

if you need me to sing it for you, i can. email me. i'll give you the number.
"you give me yer number, i call you up, you act like a p****, don't interrupt..."

adored by pot smokers world wide

2005-01-30T18:45:00.000-05:00

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

my culture's active- like in yogurt

2005-01-30T16:37:00.000-05:00

yeah. that was pretty much it. i always have loved the idea of there being active little creatures in yogurt that fight the evil yeasties. too bad they put so much sugar in yogurt. seems so counter-productive. i've been very lackluster feeling lately and that's why i haven't posted. sometimes i feel like a leah in a world of rachels.
occasionally i wonder if some of my friends think i drink too much- like when they say, "hey, maybe you have a problem." but then they will haul off and buy me a forty! what's that about? are they part of the problem or part of the solution? i don't like the idea that you can't be part of both.
i'm still in the land of ice and snow. in the past two weeks we've gotten probably over two feet of snow. i kind of miss my cat. i've had lots of headaches because the doctor did something goofy to me.
i feel like listening to comfort music. i love eating macaroni and cheese and chili. listening to the carpenters is kind of like eating macaroni and cheese and chili. it makes me feel a little ashamed but kind of comfortable on the inside.
do you guys believe in parallel universes? do you think that everything that has ever happened is still going on somewhere? i used to think that, but i don't anymore. so why do i still sort of believe in time travel? it doesn't make sense. i wish i made sense and i wish i didn't have to worry about making sense to others. these things drain my essence and make me down. spinal meningitis got me down. i recommend ween to everyone. everyone. i also recommend Hurricane as a suitable and cheaper substitute to Olde E.

Must've Been the Kraftwerk Question

2005-01-24T09:16:00.000-05:00

Which David Bowie are you?

I stole this from the SmashistPanties girls page. I hope she doesn't beat me up. I am only Berlin Era Bowie. She could probably take me out.

Doo-Doo Retreats and Dirty Little Secrets

2005-01-22T20:20:00.000-05:00

I talk to a lot of people everyday and to my great surprise, a lot of them actually seem to enjoy talking to me. Or at the very least, despise it enough to tell me gross things. I recently had a very nice man describe to me (in a public place, mind you) a recent trip he took that I can only refer to as a doo-doo retreat. He is in his fifties, I would say, and trying to turn over a new leaf in the health department. Apparently turning over new leaves in ones life involves a hearty amount of colon flushing. Being the rabid fecalphiliac that I am, I was chomping at the bit to hear the details. So he proceeded to tell me that he spent thousands of dollars to gently place a hose up his own rectum. The hose releases water, preferably warm water, says he, that flushes out your large intestine. Now I for one would give my right eye for the clean feeling that I'm sure only flushed out intestines can give you. Two or three thousand dollars to insert the hose up my own ass? I don't think so. That kind of cash means that someone else should be doing the dirty work here. Strange. We consider cleaning toilets to be the most hideous of cliched hideous jobs, but we'll pay a couple grand to have the exquisite pleasure of sparkling clean intestines. I don't want waste matter sticking to the walls of my intestines and gradually poisoning my body. Do you? I bet you really feel high and mighty after that sort of operation. (Once you get over the shame, naturally.) But I guess part of the two thousand dollars is so that you CAN insert the hose yourself. You see, the beauty of this whole doo-doo retreat set up is this: I'm not exactly sure what your paying for. That sounds like capitalism at it's finest! I would open up a colon cleansing business here in Rochester, but from what I gather, that sort of thing is best done on an exotic island.
I would like to introduce a new feature to this blog entitled:
What the Statistics Show
You may sort of consider this the first installment. The other night I had a splitting headache and I was talking to my friend Tesia, who lives in Arizona. I said that I supposed my head probably wouldn't explode, judging from past experience with divers and sundry headaches. She said, yes, that the statistics showed that it was unlikely that my head would explode. We also discussed what was keeping me here in Rochester. She said quite platonically that I could come stay with her- that she had a large bed. We decided that the statistics also showed that there was no reason for me to stay here...
I like the statistics. I for one feel that they are a pretty encouraging lot. Nice to know you've got numbers on your side against such things as exploding heads.

Boohbah

2005-01-20T20:41:00.000-05:00

The most fascinating and addictive site known to man or infant. I could spend hours without blinking or even thinking of blinking. Strap on yer huggies and check it out if you have a few hours to be hyp-mo-tized! Please. I beg of you. Click the title link. Enter Boohbah land. Move your mouse around. Click on bubbles and horns and boxes and circles. It makes me lightheaded and weak. Colours circles green box spiral road of bubbles everything hangs in air pure colour air look there's mommy click click floating falling floating poopie poopie

Don't Make a Speculum of Yourself!

2005-01-17T14:49:00.000-05:00

so i haven't been to the gynecologist in three years. i went this morning. i was getting ready to go and i put on red lipstick because i thought it was the obvious choice for the sweater i would promptly be taking off when i got to the doctors office. then i realized that red lipstick is a little too come-hither for a gynecological exam. so i swapped to brown. i looked infinitely less excited and gussied up at that point. does that make sense at all?
ps: the doctor had a visible booger in her nose throughout the entire procedure.
ps#2: about 8 inches of snow since last night and counting. yay! one needs to be surrounded by something pristine after vaginal violation.

You Filthy Jorge!

2005-01-16T21:26:00.000-05:00

all this talk of pedestrians and the ensuing jeanne worship made me casually begin thinking of actual pedestrians. when i am in a car, i take on the following role/attitude:
get out of my way, puny mr. puny walking head!
I am in a car! you are still doing the archaic upright biped thing.
your puny skeleton- granted, a marvel of design- could be crushed easily under the wheels of this isuzu, modern wonder of japanese design. yes. i am talking to you, silly mr. headphone man.

then i promptly feel ashamed of myself and decide to slow down and be nice to someone.
when i myself am a pedestrian, i take on a similarly cocky/invincible attitude. during winter months, i am rarely à pied. however, in the spring and summer i frequently walk to work. i take a devil may care attitude toward pedestrianship, also known as a foolhardy one. i figure that if a car hits me, they will get in a ridiculous amount of trouble. it's as though i believe that a car will run me down and i will peel myself off the pavement and immediately begin litigation.

today my back hurts. i am old. i helped take a two year old to some traveling petting zoo yesterday and assisted in changing my first diaper. the young child was frightened by most of the animals. i can't say that i blame her. childrens books are illustrated with pictures of brightly coloured animals that show a complete lack of matted hair, gnarly brown animal teeth, or puddled urine. surprisingly, elephants aren't just smooth and grey. they are giant leathery things with wiry hair and wet, oozy trunks and they smell of nasty elephant doo doo. plus, the gluttonous, lazy american lifestyle definitely spills over into the petting zoo arena. these animals stay cooped up in a 10 x 10 area and get food stuffed in their mouths all day. i think this petting zoo was a harsh wake up call to this two year old. she is sure to become a rigorous carnivore now. **sigh**

no. i think i decidedly disaggree. you can't worry too little about pedestrians. strictly nonmetaphysically speaking, of course...har

2005-01-14T22:06:00.000-05:00

POTENTATER IS LORD OF THE TUBERS!!!

Dear Martians,

2005-01-11T18:49:00.000-05:00

Please see the 7th comment on the preceding blog. It relates to you particularly.
You too, Sweden. La fille is not fickle, just remiss.

Here, Here

2005-01-10T20:07:00.000-05:00

I FINALLY buckled down and figured out how to add links to others blogs on the sidebar. I should have done it a long time ago. I am retarded. My current favourite link is the Edit-me link. I just keep clicking the "Refresh" button and hope for a miracle.
Unless I am sorely mistaken- and I hope I am- I believe the currently evil bird has biten my earring in two. I must away to a mirror and look further into this matter. I think a certain Roman ruler is in serious trouble, mister.

Where are my socks?

2005-01-09T20:18:00.000-05:00

Where are my socks?

the canadian talk cracks me up!

Mon Coeur en Hiver

2005-01-09T19:02:00.000-05:00

there is nothing cuter than birdie anger. when tiberius gets mad at his toys and pushes them around, it is the purest form of cuteness known to man.
yesterday was a beautiful snowy day that had to be ruined by an employee "Winter Party". in each previous year, i managed to get out of attending. sadly, i was suckered by a technicality this year. after quite a bit of necessary drinking, things were okay i suppose. why do people feel constantly bound by tradition? i don't think they honestly want to have a winter party every year. i don't think half the population enjoys holidays and such. people entertain the most ridiculous of traditional, romantic notions. i have decided to place arbitrary blame on the movie, "a miracle on 42nd street". is that the name of it? i have never celebrated christmas, but it seems like horribly tedious business. "celebration" could be carried out in a far less stressful way than spending every dime you have. i want purity in celebration. let's celebrate snow instead! with unblighted chastity, it floats from one imaginary foothold in the air to another in the most ethereal way. with a beauty and power paralleled only by other natural theatrical productions, it makes me ache for reasons i can't quite pinpoint exactly but that have to do with my cells being so staunchly human and vulgar. snow makes me feel weightless in time- like i'm floating in time rather than space and the normal gravitational pull on the hands of the clock is no longer a constant. i love snow.
i made the mistake of sitting in the "hand holding" section at the meeting today. i was going to sit by myself, but this nice group of black ladies kept asking me to sit with them. i usually sit by myself. i knew they were hand-holders. oh well. the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the amber. so i buckled down and braced myself for the onslaught of affection. heh. my family never hugged or touched. so when we all stood up for the opening and closing prayer, i felt like i was playing 'red rover' or something. red rover, red rover, send jesus right over. hee hee.
i feel like i haven't done anything really interesting on this blog lately. i'll try to get something nice and interactive or visually stimulating out here soon.
as a quick note, i did indeed sucessfully knit a hat. it's lovely. if anyone knows of any easy to knit sock or booty/bootie(???i will knit up pirate spoil???) patterns, please send them my way. if you send me your address and fifty dollars i will knit something splendid for you. perhaps out of feathers.
i hear nick drake upstairs.
i think rasputina is perfect snow music.
ok. au revoir, mes amies. un hiver heureux partout et à tout, une bonne nuit!!!
la fille du fromage

ah...the scintillation of her diadems

2005-01-04T20:52:00.000-05:00

fodder for the queen
she wants to be fodder
scarlet and mean
a duplicitous nature and rancid smell
"aha!"-she points her finger
for she reads hearts ever so well
manipulative judge
pitied and adored
your grudges still suckle
on the breast of a whore

...sorry.
i'll be a good girl now. actually, i have been all along.

The Proof is in the God Pudding

2004-12-29T18:46:00.000-05:00

i was just showering and wondering if god pudding really would contain proof. some say that proof and faith cannot coexist and i think that is stupid and riduculous. however, the idea that proof and belief go hand in hand is misleading as well. two people can take the same happening or thing and view it as proof of entirely different things. it's all so subjective. it's like the chicken and the egg. do people believe what has been proven to them and prove whatever they believe? naturally, it is an annoying cocktail of both. one definition of proof is as follows:
3 : something that induces certainty or establishes validity
(that was the third definition. hee hee)
anyway. it's a lie. i submit that the word should be removed from language as it is rather pointless. math, on the other hand- you've really got something there. noone denies that 2 and 2 are 4. you'd be a fool! i love numbers.
if the bible were written in numerica, would it be universally incontrovertable?

Holy Crap! Visit This Website Immediately

2004-12-25T16:05:00.000-05:00

I'm serious. It makes me want to crap my pants.

www.thebricktestament.com

Please. Does everyone else already know about this site? If so, why didn't someone tell me sooner!?

She named her daughter Relief out of respite

2004-12-23T22:49:00.000-05:00

For days I've been trying to come up with something that might sound like a category on "Win Ben Stein's Money" that was a play on words using the word 'respite'. I'm dry. I've lost all literary talent or originality. I used to come up with such good ones...."The english teacher wore dipthong underwear" being my alltime favourite. "I pasteur on the way to the dairy farm" being another I rather liked. Oh well. My glory days are gone.
I live in my own special world. And in my world, one day I will read a headline in a paper that reads something along these lines: Normal Child Proves To Be An Inspiration To Retards and Underpriveleged. I am tired of handicapped people and retards providing inspiration to the rest of us. Why can't all the retards be inspired by those with properly functioning faculties and strive to improve?
I also want to be an unequal opportunity employer. Almost everyone in customer service these days is intolerably lazy. I want people to have to pass unfair tests that I administer to them before they get hired. I will continue the wanton distribution of unfair testing throughout the duration of their employment under my secular regime.
Christmas turns everyone into a bastard. Today, this man asked me for a savings bond application at work. When I told him I couldn't take it without a full mailing address, he got indignant. Now, I have been sick for about a week now- coughing uncontrollably and whatnot on the job for several days. I am starting to lose my tolerance for sour-pusses and morons. The idea that the Federal Reserve couldn't just guess the address to send his bond to was ridiculous to him. I told him I was sorry and he irritably said, "Just give it back to me." So I did. Then he wads it up in front of my face. I can be pretty childish when I want to, so I said, "Whatever." And he said, "Yeah, whatever is right." And I said, "Yeah! Whatever." And then I almost couldn't stop smiling at the absurdity of the exchange. I was being childish and I knew it and it was fun. That guy was a moron. I'm done with morons. I'm done with people who aren't nice. I'm done with lazy people. I'm done with people who don't like me and aren't nice to me. And I'm happier for the lot of it.
PS: I am knitting a hat and I hope I know how to knit hats. It's exciting. If it works, I'm moving straight on to socks and not even looking back. EVERYONE wants handknitted socks. Handknat. Handgnat. Order socks from me. I'll make you proud.

New Studies Show That Everyone Is The Same

2004-12-22T15:45:00.000-05:00

According to recent studies overseas, men are becoming more like women, women are becoming more like men, and both children and adults are becoming more like teenagers.
Apparently this trend isn't limited to humans. As the title link shows, male fish are bearing eggs in the Potomac. I want all males to bear eggs, not just the aquatic, Maryland types.
I really like the following excerpt from the article:

Many scientists are concerned that people, as well as other animals, might be affected. "It's not good news that there's something that feminizes male fish in your water," said Gina Solomon, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

That cracks me up. I want to be a senior scientist.

2004-12-22T15:14:00.000-05:00

Maxx. At the end of Star Trek II:The Wrath of Khan, McCoy tells Kirk: You know, he's not really dead as long as we remember him.

2004-12-22T15:07:00.000-05:00

Yep. Pastels and everything.

2004-12-22T14:55:00.000-05:00

Tesia and Amber at the Grand Canyon.

2004-12-22T14:44:00.000-05:00

I REALLY like this picture of Tesia. It's like she can't find her way out of a tree- her hand is held to her brow in bewilderment and a clear, poetic shadow is cast across her face.

2004-12-22T14:41:00.000-05:00

That Olde English goes down like a whore!

2004-12-22T14:39:00.000-05:00

People make strange faces when they talk. People buy strange shirts when they visit the desert. People visit the London Bridge in Lake Havasu City. There is a fountain guarded by lions and cowgirls near the London Bridge.

2004-12-22T14:34:00.000-05:00

The burial place for the worlds tiniest antlered creature.

2004-12-22T14:29:00.000-05:00

Some of the view of Lake Havasu City from atop the big rock mountain we climbed. You know the one. It's shy one spider. Tesia said the desert was far greener than usual right now. They've had lots of rain.

2004-12-22T14:20:00.000-05:00

I abort struggling desert life. Hire me for your gardening needs.

2004-12-22T14:18:00.000-05:00

"Is this the train to desert moon?", was all she said. (remember that song?)

hefeweizen means white cow. i swear.

2004-12-13T13:33:00.000-05:00

so i haven't been writing because i'm surrounded by barren rocks that can't have children much less houses near them containing computers. hee hee. it's beautiful. the desert is one part florida, three parts mars served dry. the other day, we climbed a big rock called tabletop mountain. when we got to the top, there were a couple of cute spiders. i let one of them crawl on me and toby smashed it with a rock. he looked at me like i was the height of childish stupidity and said, "don't you know these spiders could be poisonous?" i could've explained that i don't know about the deadly tabletop mountain spiders of arizona. it was cute. poor spider. i think it had a baby. to change the subject, we have great pictures that i will post when i get back home.
in sad news, sue came to our house to feed and water our cat and plants and found maxx the cat dead in the dining room with head up against the wall. it makes me sad that his head was up against something cold, hard and lifeless. he probably wondered where the hell we were and why we weren't petting him in his final hours on earth. we're not sure what happened to him. probably that stupid stone in his bladder got lodged in his urethra and his bladder burst spilling toxins that poisoned his poor kitty body. i had never had a house cat before him and we've had him since....1998, i think. i had only just started REALLY liking him since we had started shaving him. he was a maine coon- a very large cat. so we had to call and find someone to go into our house and bury our large, dead cat while we were vacationing on mars. after a few carefully placed calls, a friend of ours dug a hole in our backyard in the cold, rochester rain and buried our dearly departed for us. that's friendship. they all (because actually it seems like half the city of rochester was involved in burying maxx- i probably overestimate though) acted like they were a little afraid of him- they peered at him from around the corner and said his name like they were afraid he was going to junp up suddenly and attack them and say aha! but maxx was never even mean in real life, much less posthumously mean. strange. poor kitty. i'll stop talking about him now. maybe i'll post a picture up of him when i get home.
there are lots of nice people in arizona. lots of nice rocks. lots of nice cacti. lots of dead spiders.
okay. i'm off to lake havasu to find pretty rocks to put in a fish tank. my new "best friend" and i are going to get goldfish. hee hee. more on that later.
ps: there are all kinds of rules to best friendship. at least forty or something.
pps: i also learned how to play poker.
ppps: i met a deaf japanese woman who speaks asl but can only read lips in japanese. she was nice.
pppps: i bought 3, count them, 3!!! new books.
ppppps: i think people are waiting on me. i have to go.

when i think back on all the crap i learned in high school

2004-12-04T16:44:00.000-05:00

curt was asking if anyone reads my blog. there isn't really a way to tell unless they comment. i told him that a couple of people stop by occasionally that i know of for sure. when i told him their usernames, he asked me if i was sure they weren't martians. hee hee. you know who you are- gar and brendar. have you guys thought about how your names sound martianlike? it hadn't crossed my mind, but it's pretty funny.
i like reading the blogs of others. it's interesting to see all the various styles. you can almost tell immediately whether someone is a crashing, vapid bore.
i definitely think that the music you hear as a child shapes your personality. curt listened to lionel richie and paul simon. he is overall a fairly happy go lucky creature. who am i to blow against the wind? i listened to johnny cash and pink floyd. i am like the creature that crawled out of the druggies swamp only to freeze to death while picking cotton.
i dropped tiberius off at birds unlimited an hour or so ago. they are going to keep him while we vacation in the desert. i feel sad that tiberius doesn't understand that we are coming back for him. the owner of that store intimidates me big time. and i am not easily intimidated.
i also bought a dinosaur village playset today for $3.99. an excellent find. i will transport photos of the carnivores in their natural plastic setting forthwith.
your friend,
la fille du fromage

2004-12-03T19:15:00.000-05:00

Tragic Invasion of the Guatemalan Worry Doll Village.

2004-12-03T19:12:00.000-05:00

no, me- unawares

fire and sulfer

2004-12-03T14:16:00.001-05:00

there is only one group of people that i would like to slaughter indiscriminately. those are the people that write checks at the grocery store. i know this rather riggs and sets up the elderly to take the brunt of my fury and seems to single them out largely for obsoletion. but seriuosly, to heck with them. i am no mercy on this point. young or old, male or female, widow together with young virgin- get an effing checkcard or something. make your time and mine productive. you will sleep well and satisfied in death. thank you. the end. (clapping)

2004-12-03T14:16:00.000-05:00

the late night work of the honorable "shishini"

"Right on my biscuit"

2004-11-30T18:02:00.000-05:00

the first person to correctly identify who said that and in what movie wins something. the catch being that you can't be a family member of mine or use the internet. you just have to know. i just know. and it's this simple fact that woke me up at four o'clock in the morning about 5 days ago. a conversation i had had before retiring was rambling around in my head. a friend of mine, in casual conversation, had said, "i like to watch." then he got a little smile on his face indicating that the phrase was special to him. in an unexpected blast of the antithesis of pop culture brilliance, i referred to him as Chance the Gardener. i felt a completely unjustified pride swell through my members. anyway. there is no point to this story. but thinking about it woke me up at four a.m.
well, it wasn't the only thing that woke me up. i had this crazy vision of these pirates getting shipwrecked on an island with all their booty. you know, all their useless booty, since it was worth nothing to them on the island and no one there even knew who elvis costello was. so they melted down their gold and silver and made a giant image to the god of desalination- that particular god being of particular importance to them at this particular juncture in their pirate lives. so i was wondering if that made them desalinationalistic. the other two thoughts plaguing my weary brain were that i didn't like the notion of powerful ring-leaders in the spirit realm and that the difference between my company and me was that i would never just lay my toothbrush down on the edge of someone elses sink. it's obviously way easier for bacterium to climb on it there than if it were tidily placed away somewhere out of the beaten germ-infested path or at leasted hoisted up in the air so that those bacterium would have to work for it.
"elevate me" "what, here?now?"

2004-11-19T19:52:00.000-05:00

bird and byrd

Rabid Pigeons and "the Circle of Fifths"

2004-11-18T13:46:00.000-05:00

Is a rabid pigeon one that is wearing a kippa? I'm no pigeon expert (i don't know where they keep their babies either, folks. i know it's a hot topic in certain circles), but I'm pretty sure one rammed into the side of house around 9am with the force of something very forceful and alarming. The kind of loud forcefulness that makes you say shit in bed and stick your head under the covers. Poor pigeon. You want I should teach you how to fly?
Then Michelle came over around noonish and gave me one heck of a piano lesson. I started off feeling sorry that I hadn't practiced just a wee bit more, but she makes me feel like a million bucks! I know deep in her heart she wants to teach me methodically, but when I ask the right questions she jumps ahead and I get a glimple of the secret piano society. I am now in the know on "the circle of fifths". I wish I could say they were elusive because "the elusive circle of fifths" has a nice ring to it, but there isn't too much elusive about notes and mathematics. It's all math, man. Convince me not, for I already am.
Tiberius sat on my hand while I played and she said that was a first for her teaching career. My fecal instincts alerted me to his desire to poop just in time. Aha! The world ain't got nothing on me.

Clap, clap Clap,clap

2004-11-17T08:15:00.000-05:00

I really sort of think that My Valuable Hunting Knife by GBV has pretty much the happiest beat of any song. When I listen to it, I dance and clap my hands. I promise. I've seen me do it. Recently.

2004-11-17T08:14:00.000-05:00

Lookie! It's the family.

Last night I dreamt I went to Manderlay again...

2004-11-16T08:53:00.001-05:00

...only it wasn't Manderlay, it was Taylorsville. Taylorsville is the tiny ville between the mart of rocks and the ville of Carters. I dreamt granny was alive. Again. When she is alive in my dreams, I always know she is really dead and I am always very careful around her. She seems very delicate and I don't want to make her disappear. Last night, I went to the movies with her! This is something that I don't think ever took place in real life. My parents dropped me off at granny and paw's (sic) a couple of times when they went to the movies I think. Or maybe they went to "the movies". Maybe it was code. I wonder if I will ever see her again. I miss her.
In browsing around on the internet, I sometimes see things that make me feel funny in my stomach. I see things written by and to a girl I know. It seems to me that she is surrounded by people that try to make her feel special and basically like she is just the neatest, most original and solid thing since sliced bread. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that and I figure it must be nice to have people kissing your ass all the time and telling you how wonderful you are and otherwise intimating that they appreciate you for what you really are. Heh. I sort of try to imagine what it would be like to be around be who appreciate you for what you are...or who you feel like appreciate you for what you are. I suppose that's what it's really about. I feel like I am only appreciated for sticking around. So, I'm here. Oh well. Feeling sorry for one's self is probably the most unatractive thing a person can do perioid, ever. It has certainly screwed me over. At least now I only feel for sorry for myself about once or twice a month instead of once or twice a minute.
I have to go. I am late for a meeting at a fire department, oddly enough. I want coffee. For those of you who are keeping track, I think I have happily lost the battle both against coffee and alcohol addiction.
Man, I bet some people with no sense of humour will read this and shake their heads in sincere condescending judgement. At least I can still feel sorry for other people too. We are really all in the same giant boat. I don't know why some people have to act like they are watching you from the solid ground.

2004-11-12T21:28:00.000-05:00

TIBERIUS: posing for his big Birdies Quarterly spead

i WILL eat the middle of yer kuchen

2004-11-12T20:58:00.000-05:00

i promise you, i will.
i had a splendid idea today: designer fragrance enemas.
yepperdooper.
i may actually start up a site or blog soon entitled "fecal matters" that will be entirely dedicated to poo in general and mine in specific.
i just had greasy, yummy dim sum.
my parents were resently here and we took them to niagara falls and toronto. lots of cyclists in toronto. my dad would fit in well. i remember riding bikes with him as a teenager and him zooming past me bellowing (or the closest thing he does to a bellow), "the road wasn't made for turtles!". despite the fact that i have been reading since i was 3 or 4, i still forget how to punctuate exactly when quoting. so much for trying to deceive folks into believing i am of above average intelligence- that being, of course, my primary goal in life.
(imagine furrowed eyebrows)
another saying my dad used to taunt me with while we were cycling was this: get those little legs moving like pistons! i really hated that one. for some reason it made me feel dirty and uncomfortable. perhaps it was the "engine talk". my father also once rode his bicycle directly over a dead, swollen possum. his bicycle tire popped the possums body open like a can of Grand's biscuits. (Grand's is naturally paying me heartily for that endorsement of their fine-read: sorely lacking- product)
sigh...
the sue unit is staying the weekend in nyc, i believe. i wonder what adventures she will have there. she is nice and i am grateful for her friendship. i haven't had many female friends in my life. maybe that's my fault. i have always tended to blame it on womankind, though. despite my pseudo-feminist leanings, i get very disgusted with my own gender. however, i know several that have good reason to be disgusted with me. why is life so very confusing? it's like pasta. it's all over the place and hard to follow and leaves you feeling heavy.
i want more friends. friendship is such a simple concept and yet people tend to think you strange when you try to develop one with them out of the blue. what's the big deal? am i creepy? we build houses in a giant world and say, This is mine! Keep out, world! However, you are beautiful, I will put windows in my house. Storm windows, though-so that i am not affected by you, world. And just for good measure, maybe I'll throw up some curtains, because I know everyone else is unnaturally interested in what goes on with ME.
we are all idiots. just read our blogs.

2004-11-11T13:36:00.000-05:00

la fille