That's entertainment.

Hey kids! Tonight's the next installment of How to Kick People. I'm sure they'll be doing lots of loveable and funny things, which is why I plan on going.

Also, Levin owes me money.

Every Good Boy Deserves Free Beer

PowerHouse Books is celebrating the release of Charles Peterson's* "Touch Me I'm Sick" with a big-ass reception on Thursday night. RSVP this afternoon so you can get free beer and see who's flyin' the flannel.

*Thank you Science Girl for correcting me.

Life during wartime

Thanks to the Great Leader for sending along this photo. This is the view from my living room (and bathroom, and bedroom...). Not to brag, but it's pretty damned spectacular. It completely makes up for the fact that my bathroom looks like the Grozny Holiday Inn.

(N.B.: Those orange-yellow spots are not, in fact, refinery explosions but rather reflecting light, I think.)

We recruit

Bless her heart. In a selfless attempt to supply me with designer underwear, my mother had inadvertently bought me the gayest underwear on the market. From the moment I put these on I would cross the line and become a Tommy Boy.

How I Became a Tommy Boy, over at Languor Management.

Tragedy narrowly averted at Junior League Luncheon

Please DO NOT USE the Icebox Rolls recipe that appeared on p. 154 of the April 2004 issue of Southern Living. Combining the water and shortening as described in the recipe may cause the mixture to ignite, is extremely dangerous, and could result in fire and safety hazards.

Via Poynter.

Anecdotally, Maud Newton, a Southern lady to the core, has indeed served some flamable foodstuffs, but those were intentional, and mostly bourbon-based.

I gotcher Mister Softee right here

Couple injured in ice cream truck turf war:

A years-long battle over a Harlem ice cream truck route exploded into a violent turf war when one couple assaulted another couple, leaving them in critical condition, police said Monday.

No, wait. It's still pretty funny.

Back to life, back to reality

My blogging muscles have atrophied. I need a regimen to get them back into shape.

Of course, DreamHost was tits up for most of yesterday. But when they finally fixed their router, I realized I had nothing to say.

So the move went really well. If I may shill for a moment, if you need to move, and you live in Brooklyn, you should call Moving Your Way. They were truly fabulous and moved my entire apartment (35 boxes, two dressers, a bed, and eighty-seven chairs) in an hour and a half.

I'm in LIC now. If I could find the charger for my digital camera battery, I'd post pictures of the view from my living room. It's just amazing. I can't wait for the next terrorist attacks! It'll be like having front-row seats.

Maybe the Great Leader can email me some--he came by to drop off the royal vacuum the other night.

So, more later.

Grant, call me.

Go read Grant Stoddard's latest "I Did It for Science" column, in which he casts a dildo from his own cock and allows an exgirlfriend to roger him with it.

It's pretty hot, actually.

Da nuh NAH nuh, Da nuh NAH NAH NAH

The countdown to moving has begun. I am 9/10ths packed. I think I underestimated how many boxes I would have--it's looking to be more like 30 than 20. Ah well.

I am positively manic. I cannot clean the apartment for the sublettors until the boxes are out, and lemme tell you something: It is FILTHY. Historically I only clean my apartments twice: when I move in and when I move out. If a dish gets washed or the floor gets swept in between those two times, it's gravy. If I wipe dust off a surface that's NOT the TV screen with a cloth that is NOT the shirt I'm wearing, that's a major fucking triumph.

So I went out to Sunnyside to sign my lease last night and arrived at my management company's office to discover that their power had gone out. My landlord suggested that I use the fast-fading sunlight to look over my lease while he broke into the building next door, which he believed to be the culprit of the outage. Meanwhile, I sat in relative darkness, using my keychain penlight to peruse the lease, and chatted as amiably as I could with one of the neurotic realtors.

"So, ah, you're a realtor?"

"Yup. But also I'm an illustrator." He pointed to a framed drawing on his desk, right next to the unicorn pencil cup. "That's a children's book I drew."

"Really? How...neat," I replied, losing steam as I examined the picture closely. It was the "cover" for his "book," a lovely little tale about anthropomorphic pizza toppings and the pizza on which they live. One of the characters was broccoli. This would not have been *my* first- or even eighth-choice topping. "They, ah, live on a pizza?" I asked.

"Yeah."

The drawing made me nervous. It reminded me of schizophrenic art. There was nothing comforting or educational or cheerful about a story in which talking edibles live in a bubbling and hot cheese-encrusted world.

Meanwhile my landlord came back in and called the contractor for the building next door. "Yes, hi.....yeah, the power's out....ok, so you're sending over the....hmmm.....does the electrician speak English?"

The neurotic realtor put his head in his hands. "That's never a good sign."

Let's hope that wasn't an omen, shall we?

I smell a TV pilot!

Four Free Dogs, One Monkee.

They all get along great except for the monkey and the larger small dog. But I'd hate to spilt them up. Serious inquiries only.

It's a nuclear show and the stars are gone

If, unlike ME, you aren't packing up your apartment for the eighteenth night in a row, you should go to the Coral Room and see Stars, who are supposedly performing there tonite.

And I'm your host, Mary Fucking Sunshine.

Not to continue with the mordant stuff, but today is the 93rd anniversary of the Triangle Factory Fire. Go read up, it's important.

Long black veil

You can debate the merits of the writing or the irreverence of the color scheme and design--secondhand suicide: an entirely true story is an amazing, heart-wrenching, engrossing read.

dook dook dook dook!

Drinky Crow Gets a Job

[this is bad]

I'm only just getting around to reading The Height of Disrespect now, and in some ways I wish I hadn't read it at all:

The most telling attitudinal change from the "movement" years is the absence of any influence of feminism and the open disdain for black women. As the authors put it, "Black females are valued by no one."... In the survey of 2,000 teens, who were contacted through 80 community-based groups in nine urban areas, the "play or get played" ethos is equally influential among males and females, along with this disrespect for black women.

When people ask, "Why publicize black kids' problems when many suburban kids behave similarly?" she tells them, "Those kids have many more resources. . . . When our kids mess up, they don't bounce back or go to Europe. . . . When they get caught up in the criminal justice system, nobody says, 'Oh, just give him probation.' These issues are going to have to be dealt with from the inside out."...And dealt with quickly. "Even if, say, just 5 percent of black American kids are represented in that study, are we willing to write off that 5 percent?"

Alright, you asked for it

Hey, while some of us packed for endless hours without any help while nursing the worst headcold of its generation, OTHER PEOPLE ran around at the protest on Saturday throwing soundbites at any Reuters journalist who would listen:

"The thing they all object to is Bush," said demonstrator Reeves [REDACTED], 30. "It doesn't make sense to bomb countries that have nothing to do with Sept. 11."

We come to take you home

You walkin' outta here breathin' is insane*

Man, am I cranky. I'm cranky in new and special ways. I mean, shit like this that would normally just irk me has me shrieking and throwing my stapler. I'm saddled with a number of ill-timed maladies (as opposed to the illnesses I plan for weeks in advance) that are making my already unmotivated self completely torpid. And Moving Day is one week away now. (You'll all be pleased to note that I've hired movers, as one of my coworkers pointed out to me that I am too old to ask my friends for moving help--which is a pisser, seeing as I managed to help, oh, 7 or 8 of my closest friends move before I aged out of that bracket.) I think that I'll return to blogging in earnest after next weekend, but in the meantime, it'll be sporadic.

Unless you all want to hear about the other night when I loudly told a friend, in a bar full of strangers, "Why don't you tell her to take that money she owes you and get an abortion--she shouldn't be breeding."

Yeah, that kinda cranky.

*I AM the muchacha mala.

Prepare to have the worst margarita of its generation

Dale Peck's doing the One Story Reading next Monday. At Arlene Grocery. The drink special? Margaritas.

That's like the trifecta of unpleasantness.

Begorrah!

I would like to note how pleased I am that I come up number ten in a Google search for Drunk Irishmen. My grandmother would be so proud.

I belittle others to compensate for my own insecurities

Something Awful weighs in on The Foundation for Awakening & Enlightenment, whose mission "is to provide useful, up-to-date, pertinent information on rediscovering and living your core non-human mystical soul, finding your own path, furthering one’s mystic and occult knowledge to aid in enlightenment and understanding of one's own path and connecting with others of similar beliefs."

In other words, metaphorical swirlies and melvins all around.

Fuck it

I'm leaving town and buying Merle Haggard's houseboat.

My, I'm large

World's Largest Collection of World's Smallest Versions of World's Largest Things Traveling Roadside Attraction, via Vidiot.

Queens makes, I takes

Sunday seemed as good as any to go to PS1 and see the Lee Lozano show. It was the first time I've seen her work in person, and it was an impressive study in insanity. Her larger pieces were mostly richly textured studies of tools. Her smaller pieces--cartoonish sketches, ample neurotic notebooks--were a cross between Phillip Guston and R. Crumb. There were many penis-heads and vagina dentatae and breasts with, like, eyes.

The lipstick on my shirt says we're too sweet to die

Apologies for the silence. (Or, conversely, enjoy the silence while you can.) I'll be around this afternoon, after I hit up my doc for some "back pain" medication. ~wink~

I come down I come down like a monkey*

Hey, are you too broke to see the Mekons tonite? (Actually, only the Catholic Workers are more broke than I am, but follow me here.) You should come down to Hank's tonight and see The Live Ones! Starts 10-ish. I'll be there.

Duet for French Horn and Head Gasket

I accidentally happened upon this odd, strangely calming flash video for a company called Nova Clutch. I've watched it repeatedly and feel much more serene now, thanks.

Moles locked in a blind stare

There's nothing to talk about here. I sat watching the news last night, looking at the carnage in Madrid, and it occurred to me that the US is kinda like your big, garrulous drunk friend who picks fights at the bar and expects you to back him up. Then you end up getting kicked out of the bar too.

Terrible analogy. I guess it only applies if, in fact, Al Qaeda are responsible. I hope not.

Why would you want to bring a child into a world

...where slender lorises are run down in the street is hard to understand. Why you'd post on Craigslist looking for anyone with a steakknife and a strong stomach to remove your Norplant just defies explanation.

La la la la la

Today is such an awful day, news-wise, that I am forced to sit at the dog run and invent the internal commentaries of all the dogs and post pictures of babies and monkeys.

Herewith: Driver oblivious as monkey hitches a ride. Here's to the slender lorises of the world.

This isn't what it looks like

I'm actually preparing to eat this baby.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Study Finds That Teenage Virginity Pledges Are Rarely Kept:

Among teenagers who pledged not to have sex before marriage, a majority did not live up to their vows, according to a national study reported here on Tuesday. The teenagers also developed sexually transmitted diseases at about the same rate as adolescents who had not made such pledges.

Me and Calvin Trillin against the world

I heard about ParkingTicket.com on NPR this morning. Apparently they're a service that helps you fight your parking tickets. I know that's not particularly exciting, but I got nothin', folks.

Bananagram!

"Pretty much, the guy had six monkeys in his place," said John Reyes, an animal control officer. "We had to go in an get the monkeys out."

Seeing those squirrel monkeys being taken away all frightened completely broke my heart-unit in a way I cannot explain.

You can't thread a moving needle

How deliciously ironic that Negative/Charge, the man with enough hate in his heart to power a, um, giant hate-powered turbine, would *mistakenly* be added to a fraternity's mailing list:

For instance: Over this past weekend major man points were awarded to me for driving to Atlantic City piss drunk from Philly at 7:00 am in the morning. Then after dropping my companion back off at Club Trey (my house) and started driving back to AC because I was so drunk I forgot I had already driven to AC.

Clearly his humours are maladjusted

Wow, how bilious *are* you if your own gall bladder rejects you?

(Yes, pitiful Python reference.)

Please read nothing into the Joy Division connection

All things Peter Saville. (Via Pixelsurgeon.)

Bodies

Waiting for the mortal wound/This fascination with the moribund*

Have been giving a lot of thought to bodies.

Spurred by the sad death of Spalding Gray, then hearing this on the news:

The individuals were allegedly benefiting financially from anatomical donations made to the UCLA Willed Body Program, which makes human bodies available for medical education and research. Henry Reid, 54, director of the UCLA Willed Body Program, was arrested on March 6 for investigation of grand theft. Ernest Nelson, 46, a non-UCLA employee, was arrested on March 7 for investigation of receiving known stolen property.

It reminded me of Camden Sylvia and Michael Sullivan and Kristine Kupka, all of whom have been missing for years now and are presumed dead.

As it gets warmer out I start to wonder who will be "resurfacing." I was walking in Gantry Park on Sunday, looking out at the East River, peacefully scanning the water for bobbing bodies. Not because I *want* to find one (in fact, it seems odd that I would have been so close to where Spalding Gray was found--but I chose to leave Greenpoint that day to investigate my soon-to-be neighborhood) but because I expect to find one. Because in my mind, that's what's in rivers, you see. Bodies.

I think I first began to believe this when, in 1987, the Thruway Bridge collapsed, taking 8 motorists with it into the Schoharie River. They didn't find some of those people for months.

When I lived in the Low Country I would drive to work over the Dead Racist Memorial Bridge on (I think it was) Route 17. Route 17 wended for miles through low country swamp grass. Every day I would wonder how many dead bodies were hidden in the grass. Because swamps, like rivers, seem a natural repository for bodies. One hot afternoon, I witnessed the tractor trailer in front of me brake and swerve wildly and in the glinting, vaporous air I saw what appeared to be a dead body in the middle of the road. "The bodies are coming out of the swamp," I thought ridiculously, but when I got closer I saw that it was not the undead but a fair-sized gator who'd met his gatormaker while sunning himself.

I fear the humiliation of drowning, because there's a chance that you'll never turn up, and moreso because there's a good chance that if you *do* you'll be half-eaten and unrecognizable. I've committed far too many sins to hope that my body will remain incorrupt in my death (hell, it's disintegrating as I sit here right now), but for the love of God, after I'm gone I just don't want anyone to say of me, "Cats ate her face."

*Don't worry about me, ma. Just doing my late-winter danse macabre.

Things that make me happy

When good friends write good book reviews.

Also, that my little coffee cart guy has apparently saved up enough money to invest in a gleaming, pristine two-man cart with a grill and everything. Yay, Mr. Hussein!

Things that depress me

Or, if we want to put a little snark on it, "People Who Did Not Watch the Sopranos Premiere Last Night:"

Did they find Spalding Gray?

[UPDATE: Yes, unfortunately, they did.]

And over at the Times, College for the Home-Schooled Is Shaping Leaders for the Right:

Membership in the home-school association grew by more than 50 percent a year for most of its first decade, association officials said. From the outset, the association fought state regulations requiring home-schooling parents to have college or high school diplomas, to pass certification tests, or to submit to visits by professional educators or social workers. It won a long series of legislative and court victories culminating in a 1993 decision by the Michigan Supreme Court, which eliminated the final major obstacle to home schooling in any of the 50 states.

A play in one pint

Setting: The bar at St. Dymphna's*
Dramatis personae: Two drunk Irishmen, one lovely Portuguese-speaking bartender

Drunk Irishman One: Speaking to Bartender.You're luurrrrvely.
Bartender: Thank you.
Drunk Irishman One: You should win an award for best Guiness-pourer.
Bartender: ...
Drunk Irishman Two: You know, there's only two emotions in the whole world.
Bartender: Is that so.
Drunk Irishman Two: It's true. Know what they are? Scribbles on cocktail napkin, slides it over for her to inspect. Fear and love!
Bartender: Fear and love. And those are the only two.
Drunk Irishman Two: Indeed.
Drunk Irishman One: Wait! What about hunger?

*You'll all be pleased to know, I'm sure, that I've suspended my four-year boycott of St. Dymphna's, as the Queen of the Underworld no longer works there and I was getting tired of submitting scathing reviews to Zagat.com and calling the INS on one particular undocumented Irish waitress.

Watching the detectives

Why do I have to read elsewhere that my friends Peter and Jenny have a regular gig on McSweeneys with Traig & McGrath, Shut-In Detectives? While I'm busy sending out irate emails, you should go read these.

I am frightened

Until I read this AskMe thread about babygear (strictly out of work-shirking curiosity, mind you), I had no idea that this terrifying contraption existed. Look at the photo! Are those babies or grenades?

The Best Idea Ever

I'm the last person who should give advice about nightlife, but. Tonight you should go check out The Best Idea Ever, which is being held at Volume (99 North 13th Street, at Wythe, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, 9.30p-5a; $10): A massive art party celebrating blind enthusiasm in the face of impending doom. A carnival of good intentions gone bad. Dress up, leap in, and join a dozen Brooklyn collectives for all-new games, bone-crushing rides, shocking video, and grand installations. Sounds like fun, and all proceeds benefit the Hackett Health Trust.

There's plenty of fishes out there in the sea

If you're a "girl" whose "interests" are clothing and chocolate, this is what you can expect from your online dating experience.

Please excuse Dana from gym today

I feel terrible that I didn't make it to the party that Rick Bruner organizized in celebration of the Daily News piece.

What happened was this. I had this Bliss gift certificate that was about to expire. So I scheduled an appointment for last night at 6. For a Brazilian. Because I figured, heck, if it's free, why not? All the girl bloggers are doing it.

My aesthetitian was a Polish woman named Dorothy. She was the kindest aesthetitian I've ever encountered, which is an especially meaningful quality to look for if you're having the hairs professionally yanked off your asshole.

Which doesn't hurt nearly as much as you'd expect. I mean, it doesn't feel *great* or anything, but it's better than dumping a motorcycle at 60 mph wearing cut-off jeans. Being bendy helps.

I debated the merits of going for the full-on Jon Benet but decided to have her leave a little V of hair, for decoration. 20 minutes, in and out, easy-peasy.

Thus denuded, I sashayed up Broadway feeling a bit electrified. I went back to Brooklyn to have some dinner. "Then we'll come back to the city for the soiree," I told my chocha.

A bowl of moules frites and a weiss bier later, my chocha said to me, "Let's just have one more drink before we go back to the city." Who was I to argue? It was her night as much as mine.

Somehow, I found myself, three hours later, still at a Brooklyn bar. The bartender gave me a bunch of money to play the jukebox. We wanted to stay and hear all our songs. The chocha wasn't going anywhere until every last Fleetwood Mac song was played.

So it was then 11:30, and I was tipsy, and still in Brooklyn. I couldn't imagine making it back into the city. The chocha said "Fuck it, let's go home and jump on the bed in a thong."

So that's why I didn't make it to the party. I'm sorry.

Actionable items

If any of you are in a shite mood, the kind that makes you crave a beer at, say, 10:30 am, I highly recommend you go read Ten Things You Used to Be Able to Get Away With in Grade School But You Probably Can't Get Away With at Work:

3. Johnson has done it again! He stole your idea and presented it at the meeting before you could get a word in edgewise. Even while he’s reaping the praise of your supervisors, he’s staring at you with a shit-eating and “What are you going to do about it, sucker” grin on his face. So after the meeting, you and Jose from IT confront him in the men’s room. While Jose pins him to the floor, you lift his shirt and begin quickly slapping his bare stomach as hard as you can with the palm of your hand until its good and pink and he’s calling “uncle.” Note: Don’t let the headiness derived from Johnson’s humiliating pink belly fool you into believing that Jose wouldn’t hold you down while Johnson gets his own licks in on you. It is important to note that workplace allegiances are transitory.

The lake is cracking, it hears me quacking

For the record, I am not hung up on going to the prom. The unedited spiel, as I recall (which is not well, as I'd spent the entire afternoon prior to the interview drinking bloody marys. A fragment of said interview appears here), had something to do with the ratio of men to women bloggers, which is by my estimation 5:1. This translates into the fact that in the eyes of male bloggers, the novelty of female bloggers elevates me to the exaggerated level of supermodel-cum-Nobel-prizewinner status. Simply put, there is Real World Hot, and there is Blog Hot. In the blogosphere (written with eyes rolling, for those of you sarcasm-impaired Daily News readers), I am Fran Fucking Lebowitz and Alan Greenspan in the body of Jenna Jameson. The compliments, the linkage, the occasional adoration from my male counterparts: THAT's what's gratifying.

Of course, as hubristic as that sounds, it wasn't said entirely seriously. I mean, I had lots of dates in high school. HereIType can confirm that I did sleep with the whole soccer team at her school.

At the end of the interview, my cell phone battery blinking "LOW", Rick thanked me for my time and mentioned that we'd never met in person and how would he recognize me at the celebratory blogger party. "Oh, look for the gorgeous woman surrounded by dozens of doting men," I replied.

Catherine, you've barely *touched* your millet gruel or your turnips!

TMF,TML managed to be all serious for once and posted a very cool link to an essay/book review by Hilary Mantel.

Thérèse had been the adored baby of her family, instructed every day by two elder sisters who proceeded her into the Carmelite convent in Lisieux. Gemma had to beg for instruction. If she got high marks in class, a teacher rewarded her by spending an hour explaining some aspect of Christ's passion and death. After one of these sessions, at the age of eight or nine, she fell into a high fever, the first of many such illnesses. Sometimes paralysed, sometimes corpse-like, sometimes bleeding and almost always starving, Gemma, in her ecstasies, talked intimately with Christ and with his mother.

Also related is this essay, The Blood and The Body of Christ: Food as the Signifier of Piety to Female Ascetics of the High Middle Ages:

Vainglory, demonic possession, and mental illness were common diagnoses of abnormal eating practices. Some considered extreme fasting a manifestation of hysteria or delusions...Masculine fear of feminine deception extended beyond false reports of prolonged fasting. Men suspected all aspects of a woman's control over food. They accused women of manipulating them by stealing their food, by poisoning their meals with such things as menstrual blood or semen, or by refusing to eat.

This is all stuff I was pretty obsessed with in college. In fact, these two books featured prominently in my thesis, which is currently under a stack of mid-90s porn in my basement.

Speaking of which, I'm purging (much like Catherine of Siena, you could say) and I've got an assload of stuff to get rid of. No 28-y-o woman needs a collection of ceramic teapots and turrines shaped like vegetables. Or 17 cut-glass bowls. Or THREE Ben Folds Five CDs.

Shut up.

4 parts bourbon, 1 part inspiration

Bear with me. I have had a vision, and it's of a new artform--half performance art, half porn. It's the Porno One Man Band.

Here's how it works: A naked woman, wearing standard one-man-band apparatus, performs sexual acts and music at the same time. Envision blow jobs with cymbals. Double anal with harmonica and washtub bass. The idea is still in its infancy, but I think it's got legs. I've got a couple crumpled cocktail napkins with the specs right in front of me.

List monitors arrive with petition

The Gothamist interview with David Rees made me love him even more than I already do, although I note, with much disappointment, that he appears to be happily married. Our love of The Minutemen will unite us eventually, David!

(And on a peripheral note, I've just received word that *I* too will be the subject of a much-coveted Gothamist interview, but only if they can't get Bernie Goetz or that Superbowl-is-Gay kid to return their calls.)

I see that kiss-me pucker forming

Last night as I sat working late a golem appeared at my office door. He peered in. "May I help you?" I asked. He ducked back into the hallway, where 10 or so of his brethren stood. "Brezny-brezny," they muttered to one another. Poles.

They had tools of an ominous nature with them, and several flats of acoustical tiles. As none of them seemed able to explain to me why they were there, I decided to leave.

As I was getting my coat on, two of the younger ones looked at me. "Who's she?" one muttered to the other in Polish. I couldn't understand what the other's reply was, although judging by the look on his face I think he implied that an impromptu gynecological exam by Dr. Feelgood might be in order. I frowned and got on the elevator.

"Dobranoc!" I called as the doors closed.

This morning my office is tented in tarps and coated in a light layer of sediment. Yay.

Done and done

I started out watching the Oscars last night but decided, after an hour or so, that I should be doing something more rewarding. Like having unprotected anal sex.

I'm Bedazzled

The Graundian has an article on Nudie:

As punk had Westwood, so from the 1940s until his death in 1984, the world of country and western music had Nudie. On the walls of his Nudie's Rodeo Tailors shop on Lankershim Boulevard in North Hollywood, photographs of the man with his clients beamed down celebrity endorsement of the very heaviest kind. John Wayne. Roy Rogers. Elvis Presley, for whom he designed the notorious $10,000 gold lame suit.

Here's the official Nudie website, btw. It's my dream to own a piece of Nudie's work, though even if I could afford it, I'm not sure where I'd wear it.

An acquaintance relayed to me the story of being a young punk in 1984 Hollywood, standing across the street from Nudie's Rodeo Tailor Shop as they liquidated their stock. He and his flannel-and-combat-boot-garbed friend mocked the people who were coming out of the store with armloads of glitzy, ostentatious duds.

"Man, what idiots we were," he admitted, shaking his head sadly. "I guess I always thought I'd be wearing flannel and combat boots."