High Chair

I mean...I laughed. Pretty hard actually. Cuz it's funny. Probably likes to go see movies in 3D and eat whoppers and hot tamales....or something.
(from Shoeboxblog.com which you still need to check out)

Dodge These Bullets

• With the addition of the queen sized bed (thank you Leslie) I bought two new pillows. In other news, I'm still domesticated and mildly boring.

• Our Quizzo team finally won a pitcher for the best team name. This only took 7 months. And before you ask, yes, yes I do have friends. That I don't pay. Much.

• What ever happened to that cute girl from “Northern Exposure” with the mole and who could do that eye brow lift thing? The one opposite Aidan (I'm sorry even 5 years before “Sex and the City” John Corbett was Aidan. He still is. Always will be. That Aidan gets around) up in Alaska? Where the heck has she gone?

• Riding high on the lazy river-like tsunami of confidence from the McSweeney's print, Easter afternoon I got to seriously delve into some writings and I actually finished a short story. “Story” is a loose description, it's really a very stylized monologue from an old woman living on the coast in Maine. I like it, but I'm the only person who has ever read it. Time will tell whether it is any good or just adjective-heavy word vomit. Sometimes I feel like a Chimp playing with his own poop. Some may call it art, others call it “Hey, that monkey is playing with his poop,” while the monkey is thinking, “Wheeee!”. How's that for an artist's statement of purpose.

• Lately I've been stuck on the song “Sons and Daughters” by the Decemberists. I've had this song for over a year, but it's got new life. I heart Colin Meloy. He go wit his nerd self. Only person I know that can use words like “dirigible”, “Legionnaire”, “indolent” and “colonnade” in songs and still sound earnest.

• Friday night I had a very vivid dream that I was thrown into running a trail race that I hadn't trained for. In the dream it was a 7 mile race and I was three miles in and breathing hard. That's when I woke up having an asthma attack. I don't know if the attack spawned the dream or vice versa, but while I wasn't breathing I marveled at my subconscious' imagination. If I'm ever not breathing ask me where my inhaler is and I'll try to tell you. Or just yell “Does anyone have an albuterol inhaler!?” and maybe someone will throw one at you.

• Murphy and Romano: two days. Bad Idea Girls take on the Dirty South. Look for highlights. There will be many I'm sure.

• I got an email from Nat the other detailing how her drive back to her house was interrupted by a cow giving birth on her road. It got out of the fence and was giving birth, right there in the road. That is the part of my hometown that I truly miss. That sort of thing isn't exactly abnormal and part of some of my most fond memories. Being stuck behind cows was a normal excuse for being late to school.

• I don't think I've loved my family more than I do right now. After the McSweeney's thing, I got a voicemail from my mom that said, “It's mom, I just wanted to let you know that I'm thinking of you and I'm proud of you. I love you, bye bye.” I cried a little bit, saved the message and now look forward to having it come up every few weeks. This message is a miracle. A true, heaven sent, blind man can see, deaf man can hear sort of miracle. I am so thankful for it.

• So the question about the obligation of citizenship that you all did a fine job of not answering is becoming an essay on its own. And if its any good and it goes anywhere, I'll make a point to not reference you. No no don't feel like you need to thank me. I know I'm gracious.

• Still don't get the obsession over fancy handbags. Don't get it. It must be how gay men feel about women. Sure they are nice and all but nope, not feeling anything either way.

It is a Good Friday

And...

I GOT A LIST PUBLISHED IN MCSWEENEY'S.

MC-FREAKIN-SWEENEY'S.

Awesome.

Citizenship

Josh and I are having a strongly-worded email discussion on politics and, more specifically, citizenship. He is a Libertarian who is strongly against most social programs and income taxation; I'm a liberal who believes social programs benefit the society as a whole. The emails are just flying back and forth. It's like the Matalin-Carville household sometimes.
The discussion really centers around these two questions:

What do you think are the obligations of citizenship, if they indeed exist?
What is a citizen to give to its country in exchange for structure, peace, safety, etc?

My thinking is this country gave us the opportunity to live somewhere where electricity, heat and water are subsidized and available, where schools are open and free to any kid around, where roads are maintained and safe, crime is dealt with, fires are put out, hospitals are open, political power is checked and rechecked and jobs are plentiful. This country gave us standards to keep our air and our water at levels where they won't slowly kill us (well...maybe they will), parks and museums to see the wonders of creation and beauty of life, standards to keep our investments safe, places to go when there isn't anywhere else. Your country will most likely ask you for nothing more than your vote and some money in return. I don't see this as a moralistic standard but a civic one.

What about you? What do you think are the obligations of citizenship?

Happy Good Friday. Jesus: Thanks for dying today. I mean that.

Car Talk

Sooo....cleaned out my car yesterday. Like not only cleaned it but vacuumed it, something I haven't done in...well...a very, very long time. I think my car is a few dozen pounds lighter.
Observations:
* I found 14 pens in various places in my car. 13 of them worked fine. I guess my greatest fear is not having a pen when I need one.
* I have something like 9 different maps in my car, and that includes my atlas (yes Robin I own an atlas), and a "Rochester and Vicinity" mapbook. Cuz I need that. Down here in Asheville.
* Even while just vacuuming my car I managed to cut myself. On what I don't know.
* Also: 12 matchboxes/matchbooks. Why?

In other news:
* Broke my old filling on a triscuit last night. I don't know what to do about it. I have no dental apoxy and/or dental insurance, so i guess it'll stay broken for a while.

Anyway, I'm housesitting on the west side til late Friday and that means regular internetting, so woohoo. And such.

Conflict Tub, etc

So my friend Nate has a clawfoot bathtub. We tease him about this being a good pick-up line, to the extent that Margarita filled out the back of a Jack of the Wood coaster with the fictional email address ihaveaclawfoottub@ashevillesingles.com that he should create and use.
Several weeks later this once again came up in conversation and I repeated the fake email address. Nate misheard me and said, "I have a conflict tub? What is a conflict tub?" and we just thought the idea of a bathtub in which people sat and had discussions was hilarious.
Last Friday a bunch of us were over at Nate's and thought, "Ooh! Conflict tub!" and four of us raced up the stairs and climbed in. And proceeded to watch on Nate's laptop the Jimmy Kimmel/Sarah Silverman duel about Matt Damon and Ben Affleck. You know what I'm talking about I hope. Anyway, photos:

As Cool As I Am

I have been going non-stop for about a week and a half and it's taken its toll. I'm not complaining; I love my social events and don't like to miss them but I am currently very tired. Two weeks ago I had back spasms so badly I felt like I could flip a quarter on it without trying. I had muscle spasms in my arm that felt like someone was poking me. They actually woke me up and I turned to make sure there wasn't someone standing there. Very odd sensation. Feeling so keenly a human touch that didn't actually exist.

I'm thinking about the fight or flight instinct currently, as I do believe I've grown so tired of the fight that I've turned to fleeing and doing so in whatever manner I can. I think that is a part of the appeal of perpetual social engagements. Stay distracted, stay moving, keep spinning. There is a line in an old Dar Williams song where she talks about seeing a girl out in a club:

“The whole bar is loud and proud and everybody's trying yeah
You play the artist, saying is it how she moves or how she looks
I say it's loneliness suspended to our own like grappling hooks
And as long as she's got noise she's fine
But I could teach her how I learned to dance
When the music's ended.”

I think that's what it is. I need to learn to dance when the music has ended, to be OK in the stillness, not get crushed underneath the fight when I finally sit out a flight.

(post is called "As Cool As I Am" not because I think I'm cool, but because that's the name of the song I quote. And also maybe cuz I think I'm pretty cool. Maybe not.)

Boys! With Guitars!

Most of the time, I'm a chick with guitar type of girl; that's the music I like, the music I identify with. Lately it's been guys with guitars, insomuch that I actually made a playlist on my iPod of it. Some of the songs:
The Drinking Song--Moxy Fruvous
The Professor & La Fille Danse (live)--Damien Rice
Suicide Medicine--Rocky Votolato
Plasticities--Andrew Bird
Cold Missouri Waters--Cry Cry Cry*
Red Right Ankle--Decemberists
24 turned 25--Denison Whitmer
Love is a Comma--Josh Cole
I Think I Need a New Heart--Magnetic Fields
Jesus, Etc--Wilco
Kathleen (live)--Josh Ritter
The King of Carrot Flowers, Part I--Neutral Milk Hotel
and on and on...
The song on the list that has been most repeated (and thought about) is Heartbeats by Jose Gonzalez. It's just beautiful and apropos. He took a while to grow on me, but I'm loving myself some Jose now. Also on the list is Find the River from R.E.M.'s "Automatic for the People" hands down one of the most memorable and lasting albums I've ever owned. That song, just as most of that album, is time in a bottle. I can't explain how I love it but it both breaks and heals my heart.
Anyway, that's all I got today. Well that and the confirmation that tequila is always a bad idea. I said it before and I'll say it again: No Way Jose (Cuervo).

* Incidentially, "Cold Missouri Waters" is based on the book "Young Men and Fire" by Norman McCloud. It chronicles a forest fire in August, 1949 that killed 13 of the 16 parajumpers brought in to contain it. The book is extremely well written (McCloud also wrote "A River Runs Through It") and the song is simply heartbreaking. Check it out.

Shouting Stain

Know that Super Bowl commercial with the shouting stain where the guy is in a job interview and all the interviewer can hear is the stain talking over the guy?
How many freaking times do I feel like that, like I'm talking about something but I feel like what I'm saying is something completely different. What I'm actually thinking about is very different than the words coming from my mouth. And yes, usually the thoughts are something salicious. Giggle. And then you meander back into your present conversation and think, "What the heck am I talking about here?"
Anyway, just a thought for the day.

Kathleen

Kathleen Edwards is coming to Grey Eagle on April 16th. I am going to this show if I have to go alone. She's worth it...great alt country. She reminds me of driving around near Geneva when I lived in Rochester. Frozen tundra, buried sky and two dollars to my name. Love her.

Don't Drink the Water

Several years ago I began hearing reports of problems of pharmaceuticals in our water supplies; that is the prescriptions that we take for a myriad of problems--high cholesterol, birth control, anxiety, tranquilizers, chemotherapy, etc--aren't being removed from our water at treatment plants and thus are coming back in our drinking water. I heard these reports from scientist friends but surprisingly hadn't heard anything big in the news (one of the big issues on the science front has been the issue of trans-gendering fish. That is, hormones are causing male fish to become feminized and thus sterile. It's a much bigger deal than it sounds. Things start at the bottom of the food chain and work on up. Think DDT.)

Today the AP had this "Investigation" about it.
It's long, so here's some bits (though please consider reading it):
* "A vast array of pharmaceuticals — including antibiotics, anti-convulsants, mood stabilizers and sex hormones — have been found in the drinking water supplies of at least 41 million Americans, an Associated Press investigation shows.
* But the presence of so many prescription drugs — and over-the-counter medicines like acetaminophen and ibuprofen — in so much of our drinking water is heightening worries among scientists of long-term consequences to human health.
* How? People take pills. Their bodies absorb some of the medication, but the rest of it passes through and is flushed down the toilet. The wastewater is treated before it is discharged into reservoirs, rivers or lakes. Then, some of the water is cleansed again at drinking water treatment plants and piped to consumers. But most treatments do not remove all drug residue.
* The AP's investigation also indicates that watersheds, the natural sources of most of the nation's water supply, also are contaminated. Tests were conducted in the watersheds of 35 of the 62 major providers surveyed by the AP, and pharmaceuticals were detected in 28.
* Rural consumers who draw water from their own wells aren't in the clear either, experts say.
* Even users of bottled water and home filtration systems don't necessarily avoid exposure. Bottlers, some of which simply repackage tap water, do not typically treat or test for pharmaceuticals, according to the industry's main trade group. The same goes for the makers of home filtration systems.
* Another issue: There's evidence that adding chlorine, a common process in conventional drinking water treatment plants, makes some pharmaceuticals more toxic.
* Mary Buzby — director of environmental technology for drug maker Merck & Co. Inc. — said: "There's no doubt about it, pharmaceuticals are being detected in the environment and there is genuine concern that these compounds, in the small concentrations that they're at, could be causing impacts to human health or to aquatic organisms."
*There's growing concern in the scientific community, meanwhile, that certain drugs — or combinations of drugs — may harm humans over decades because water, unlike most specific foods, is consumed in sizable amounts every day.
* "These are chemicals that are designed to have very specific effects at very low concentrations. That's what pharmaceuticals do. So when they get out to the environment, it should not be a shock to people that they have effects," says zoologist John Sumpter at Brunel University in London, who has studied trace hormones, heart medicine and other drugs. "

Bed

So...I need a new bed. Mine is actually is storage in VA (where it's been since I moved for the internship) and the one I've been using is Katherine and Andy's old bed, and they need it back for their guest room. I don't have the time or the money to get to VA and get my stuff, so I'm looking around the 'Vegas. Anyone have an idea where I can get a full size/queen size bed fo' cheap (and un-sketchy)?

List of the Day

American Gladiator or American Car Model?

1. Malibu

2. Nitro
3. Blaze
4. Bronco
5. Laser
6. Thunder
7. Viper
8. Atlas
9. Sabre
10. Storm
11. Spark

Gladiator: 3, 6, 8
Car: 11
Both: 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10

Thought about this the other day when I was stuck behind a Dodge Nitro. Should be noted that Atlas is a car rental company, which is pretty darn close. Hilarious.

In Between Pages

My bible has a whole bunch of crap shoved in it, and I don't mean books like Leviticus or Numbers, I mean actual junk (Robin: that was a bible joke. It's OK.). Tonight as I was flipping through it I started to think about some of the stuff I have in there. One thing is the above sticker. It's from when I worked for the environmental consulting firm during college. We had a whole collection of hazardous waste stickers for shipping soil samples and they let me keep this one. It makes me laugh; I wanted to put it on a t-shirt for quite a while. And yet I found that if I keep it in my bible, it reminds me that though sometimes I'm feeling hazardous and irritant, I'm still known and loved. That even when I'm prickly, I'm still cared for. Well, and when I don't feel like reading I think of the whole task of sitting down and shutting up (which I first accidentally wrote as shitting down and sutting up, which I also do) as one of annoyance and I'm irritated. Oh well. It's a conversation piece at least.

One of the other things in my bible is this film strip. It's from a photo booth in the lobby of the Spaghetti Warehouse (or Whorehouse, thank you Romano) where my sister, brother-in-law, niece and mom joined me for my college graduation dinner. We were waiting for a table and thought, “Why not?” so the five of us piled in the photo booth and this is what came out. It's been in my bible as a bookmark ever since. I simply love it. We look ridiculous and I'm convinced it captures us better than any posed shot ever could.

Woohoo

Murphy and Caroline are visiting in 24 days.
Woohoo Weekend 2k8 with the Bad Idea Girls...Caroline was right when she said, "This won't Suck."
That is buoying me.

Notes on a Monday

* So I actually had Sunday off this week, which I shockingly discovered, so does most of the working world. Like I got to see people...when it was still light out.
* Apparently my church moved. They did not ask permission. For this reason I will continue to not give them any money.
* I've been really absent-minded lately. Today I put shampoo on my loofah and didn't realize I hadn't been washing my hair till I was already done.
* Poor Prince Harry. Why couldn't we just leave him alone in desert? He was doing great--no ladies, booze, Hitler costumes or having to suffer from not being as hot as his brother, just shooting up stuff and walking around--and what did the media do? Point him out like he's Waldo and now he has to take his gun and go back to his castle. Wait, did I just say I felt sorry for a royal? For suffering? I'm sorry I must be high.
* You know what movie was surprisingly good but it took me forever to watch it cuz I didn't think I'd like it? No, not "Gigli". That was as bad as expected. It was "The Departed." There is no part of me that wants to like Leonardo DiCaprio but he is a good actor...dammit. Liking Leo is like me and gaucho pants: other people love 'em but I can't help but feel like I beat up a clown and stole his pants. I can see their perks but they don't work for me. K kind of a bad analogy but I'm still recovering from washing my body with some TRESemme shampoo. Cut me some slack.
* Five of us went out for Leslie's birthday on Saturday night for some tappas and my 3rd visit to the French Broad Chocolate Lounge in a week. I don't even like sweets that much but I can't stop going. That was the most fun night in recent memory. And I didn't even lose my pants (note: I haven't actually, literally lost my pants in about 8 years. That was a quick learning curve.)
* Here is my second favorite blog of recent: Jessi Klein's NotBlog. I kind of want to be her friend.
* I recently heard myself on video. I have to decided to cease all talking forever. I sound like a smartass mouse.
* Currently I have the emotional capacity of a grapefruit. Not the size of a grapefruit, but the actual emotional capacity of one. Like if you were to stare longingly at a grapefruit and then expect reciprocation, that's what I'm like currently in the emotional sector. But less curvy. And not as full of vitamin C. Or from Florida.
* Hey guess what! I still want to be a writer. And I'm still scared of it. Soo...nothing is different.
* That's it, I'm swearing off boys for the rest of the afternoon.