"I thought it would be dirtier."

Low Culture reveals the punchline of the infamous "Aristocrats" joke.

Don't make me sic King Wenclas on your ass, Ayelet

I happened to read the article on mom blogs* in the Sunday Styles section only because I was at the coffee shop and the only other section of paper available was Automobiles.

As soon as I saw the title of the article, I muttered under my breath, "Mrs. Kennedy better be in here."

Because not only is she extremely entertaining, but she's also...well, she's also one of the few bloggers with child that I "know" and hence I just thought she deserved to be featured in the article.**

Ayelet Waldman, who happens to be Michael Chabon's wife, is also featured in the article. Ayelet Waldman goes on to dis Mrs. Kennedy in her blog, wondering, "Why was she included?"

Ayelet, perhaps Mrs. Kennedy was featured in the article because she's been blogging for over three years. You've been blogging since November. Ease up there, sparky.

[Caveat: I don't speak for Mrs. K. I just happen to like the woman. She did a bang-up job as a guest blogger. A message to those who malign anyone who's guest-blogged for me (except Reeves, because he enjoys the abuse): I will punch you in the mouth.]

*Hey, who can find the egregious grammatical error in the article? I know someone who can't: The Times' copy editor!
**Kinda like when you're stuck talking to your neighbor during some flight out of East Jabipp and he says, "You're from NYC? My cousin lives in NYC! Do you know Frank?"

Maximum Stretch Capacity as measured by the Flux Capacitor

A good friend of mine who cares about my vaginal well-being sent me a link to The Vagina Institute, a helpful organization that allows you to determine whether or not your womanhood more closely resembles a lotus flower or the Super Deluxe Extra Fatty Corned Beef Sandwich from the 2nd Avenue Deli. If this site is to be believed, a lot of men prefer ladies to resemble those plastic models used in Hygiene class. There's even a test on the site to see if you measure up. [WARNING: NSFW--any of it.]

Now, my chocha is closer to this than this, but there are those who will tell you otherwise.

True story about my gigantic pudendum: When I was in college, a friend--one to whom I was not even remotely attracted, sadly--and I had sex one night, probably because we were bored. This was in his apartment, which was in this Melrose Place-style warren of converted nun-apartments where a mutual friend of ours also lived. After it was over, we each told our mutual friend all about how lousy the sex was. Separately, of course. I remember complaining that he had a micropenis. "I could have told you that," mutual friend said.

Anyhow, the Tiny Man moved out of his apartment and another friend of ours moved in. A polite Southern boy, he admitted that he found something written in his closet-- an inscription (poem? Haiku? Something.) that he refused to disclose. He insisted I come see it myself.

It read:

Her first name is Dana
Her last name begins with an R
She has a huge pussy
May she be fucked by donkeys.

I still think fondly about that.

Caitlin Flanagan: How can I libel you this week?

Well, I just noticed that this site has slipped off the first page of returns if you google "Caitlin Flanagan." Time to do something about that!

Lately WNYC's been airing a gratuitous Caitlin Flanagan soundbite, presumably in order to pimp the station to the untapped Dittohead demographic. She appeared on someone's show, around the time her article slamming women who hire nannies came out, and I'll be damned if that perky yet smug voice of hers doesn't add a whole new dimension to her despicableness. When she describes what is CLEARLY AN EXAMPLE OF THE HYPOCRISY OF THE LIBRULS she has the same self-satisfied tone, the same deliberate pauses in delivery, as a Westchester housewife bragging about what sailing camp her children are going to this summer. (Just out of curiosity, who on the WASP steering committee decided that Caitlin passed their paper-bag test anyhow? 40 years ago she'd be mopping Hendrik Hertzberg's floors.) Caitlin also went on to argue with Barbara Ehrenreich and Sara Mosle. Ms has a good take on the whole kerfuffle. (Who here can find the egregious editing error in that piece? Soft-headed feminists!)

Anyhow, last night I couldn't sleep. As I listened to the discomfortingly loud wind, it occurred to me that Caitlin Flanagan would be well-equipped to expand her empire as America's Leading Journalistic Comfort Woman to reach beyond the jejune pages of The New Yorker.

How to sneak a motorcycle into an apartment building in NY

For every question, there is a solution.

Of all the things I've lost, I miss my virtue the most

But here in Washington, in 2005, it is still illegal, under a 1909 law, to bring a woman's virtue into question publicly, to call her a hussy or a strumpet. And now, a state senator from Seattle - who is not saying she supports attacking the chastity of Washington women - is, nevertheless, trying to overturn the state's "Slander of a Woman" law.

Apparently there's still a similar law on the books here in NY. (See here, at S. 77.) I wish I had known about this law back when I still might've had a case.

Hunting Tigers out in Indiah

Everyone should pay a visit to Jungle Larry's Safari! Not too far from the dearly departed Tom Gaskins' Cyprus Knee Museum. [Thanks Tizzie!]

FWD: The Abyss Looks Into U!!1!

My aunt, who is on the state payroll, I might add, has been sending me the most banal email forwards all day. They're the equivalent of paintings of wolves on velvet, Franzia, and the Starlight Vocal Band, rolled into one.

Anyhow, I wanted to share one with you.

On level three, you get to swim and buckle

I'm working on it, ok? In the meantime, hop on over to F Train to read Paul Ford's Three Favorite Computer Games of 2004.

Okay, this is a weird RPG. It takes some getting used to. If you are into platformers where you get to blow up space stations this is not for you. But there is something really special and unique about this game. Basically you are the musician Will Oldham, also known as Bonnie "Prince" Billy, and someone has stolen your beard, which makes you very, very sad. You have to go on tour and play concerts and talk to different NPCs about getting different parts of your beard back.

I have no dog in this fight

Well, I had no dog in the original King Wenclas-vs-Tom Bissell fight, mostly because I would be hard pressed to give a shit about either of these malodorous ninnies, but when Ninny Number One starts talking smack about Maud Newton, that's when I start throwin' some 'bows. If he wants to play, I will shock him like a Chinatown cellphone, mark my words.
So now I do have a dog. In the fight. Where was I?

Clearly, King Wenclas displays such truculent behavior because his interaction with women closely mirrors the flower-throwing scene in the original Frankenstein movie, and we all know how that turned out. I'm also going to go out on a limb here and say he probably describes his writing as "Ford Madox Ford meets Raymond Carver, only with BALLS." Given these two purely conjectural, borderline slanderous character flaws I've just outlined, is there any doubt that this man's judgement is, to put it nicely, impaired? He will never successfully besmirtch the name of Ms. Newton, and he better recognize this and back the fuck down.

But on the other hand, I gotta admit, everthing this one has to say is pretty spot on. Baby blood drinker!

I've got to boogie-woogie like a knife in the back

I'm not going to do the Bush Blackout today for a number of reasons. First of all, I think that my small but faithful readership (all of whom could fit comfortably into a standard hatchback) would be disappointed and, in one case, devastated that he can't type harassing phrases into my search engine. Second of all, The Great Leader has an important message. Third of all, I'd like to take the time to encourage you all to say "I've got to boogie-woogie like a knife in the back" to anyone and everyone all day today, in a Situationist/dada sort of way, and also as a commemoration of the great Frankie Ford, who isn't dead or anything, though his website ain't feeling so good. Oh, and fourth, I'm scared of fucking with my index template because when it comes to all things computery I am a pointy-headed cretin.

Remain in Light

I was just discussing light therapy with a friend of mine. Apparently most insurance plans don't cover those expensive light boxes because there's no proof that light therapy is more effective than the placebo.

We both want to know what the placebo for staring at a bright light is.

The Lamb Lays Down in My Stomach

Saturday night we had dinner at Aurora Ristorante, which may be my new favorite restaurant that's not in the all-you-can-eat category.

The antipasti were amazing. Creamy burrata pugliese with roasted veggies and pesto, roasted artichokes with lemon vinaigrette, and (my favorite, which I ordered) warm braised lamb tongue with roasted pear, radicchio salad and lamb jus.

Babbo (and Fannie Farmer) serves something similar, actually. I'd never had lamb tongues before, but they tasted surprisingly un-lamby and were especially tender. No one at the table barfed after tasting them, even.

I picked as my entree roasted pork belly with broccoli rabe and mashed potatoes. Wow. Pork belly is like the best of both worlds: crackling fat on top, juicy, porkalicious innerworkings underneath. The potatoes were just ~eh~ (admittedly, this is how I feel about most mashed potatoes) but the rabe was perfect.

I'd like to go back there and try the tagliata di manzo...I saw the guy next to me at the bar eating it and it looked absolutely wunnerful. Also it is served on a cutting board, rather than a plate. Food served on giant wooden slabs=good.

Deme una rotura

If translated back into English it reads, “If you see anything, say anything”—i.e., “If you see anything (pink umbrella), say anything (I love peanut-butter sandwiches).”

Wishing in the other

Even though Maud and I don't seem to agree on Sideways, we do both love us some Harry Crews. Thankfully she keeps better track of him than I do, noting that Paul Giamatti's starring in a film adaptation of Crews' immortal (well, not quite, seeing as I've never been able to get my hands on a copy of it) The Hawk Is Dying. The exciting thing is that this movie seems to be happening, unlike other stalled Crews projects. (I can hear Patrick bitching now...."Why don't we ever get any good-looking movie stars down here?")

Brad, the secret is out.

I don't think I had too much to drink last night, but apparently I went to bed and "blurted out something about like 'I'm on the bread again!' then garbled 'bread bed brad bed bread' then laughed and passed out."

Perhaps it is time for me to go back on the wagon. The last time I had to do that was when I was at a bar drinking on someone's expense account and I ended up having something called a Flaming Lamborghini* which at the time seemed to go down well, so well in fact that I went on to have a 3-hour-long conversation (none of which I remember) with the bartender about his much-younger boyfriend troubles and then walk him home "just to make sure he got there safe." I did make it home that night without getting shanked in an alleyway, but I woke up the next morning feeling like death eating a cracker. I was so hungover that I almost couldn't make it to my ultrasound appointment the next day.

[pause for effect]

No, it wasn't one of those ultrasounds, silly! But that's neither here nor there. The way my stomach was jumping up into my mouth, you'd think I had to swallow the damned wand instead of taking it in the business end. As the Russian technician went at me like Bella Loves Jenna, I must admit: I threw up a little in my mouth. "You not want to have children?" she queried after ascertaining that I wasn't there for the same reason as all the Orthodox women in the waiting room.

"Not right now," I said, and silently added Because right now, lady, all I can handle is throwing up after drinking the occasional shot meant for someone half my age.

*One part Cointreau, one part Bailey's, and one part Sambuca, served on fire (duh) in a brandy snifter and consumed with a partner through individual cocktail straws. Yick.

Fighting to be done

Last night I somewhat unwillingly went to see Hotel Rwanda at a private screening in midtown. Who am I to turn down free stuff? A movie about genocide? If the chairs are comfy, I'll take two of that, thank you very much.

This particular screening was done as a promotional gig for the book tie-in. Yes, there's a book, because, according to the Prominent Editor who simperingly helmed an introductory lecture to the movie, "After seeing this movie at a screening party in the Hamptons last fall [I wish I made that up], I was shocked that there wasn't a book about Paul Rusesabagina and the horror of the Rwandan genocide." (Or words to that effect. Anyhow.)

Um, hello. Does Philip Fucking Gourevitch ring any bells?

Hooligans Don't Fall in Love

Goddammit, everyone and their brother has already posted this NYTimes article about lying and secrets.

But psychologists say that most normal adults are well equipped to start a secret life, if not to sustain it. The ability to hold a secret is fundamental to healthy social development, they say, and the desire to sample other identities - to reinvent oneself, to pretend - can last well into adulthood. And in recent years researchers have found that some of the same psychological skills that help many people avoid mental distress can also put them at heightened risk for prolonging covert activities....

Men love secrets.

Women hate secrets.

Women love secrets.

Everyone loves secrets!

Elizabeth, I'm coming to join you

A Presbyterian minister collapsed and died in mid-sentence of a sermon after saying "And when I go to heaven ...," his colleague said Monday.

OK, if this weren't a blog post (and thus by definition a hack piece already), I would say that this is a hack blog post.

Hm. I dunno, it's still kinda funny.

I wanna hear the new sound, I wanna see my new girl

(Dammit, I will post something before lunch if it kills me!)

After a weekend spent watching a lot of useless television, last night was redeemed by the amazing Charles Atlas documentary about Leigh Bowery on the sadly terminal Trio Network.

Leigh Bowery, a performance artist/fashion designer/musician/professional nose tweaker (NTM Lucian Freud's best-known model), died in 1994. Watching the documentary made me think about how avant garde he was. I wish he were still alive. He would've been in the fucking Venice Biennale by now. Though given an extra decade on this earth it'd be surprising if he hadn't alienated everyone in the world by now.

The documentary repeats on January 25, so mark your calendars.

Oh, and here's an mp3 of Bowery's band Minty singing "Useless Man."

Speaking of mp3s, I watched Napoleon Dynamite on Friday, partly based on this guy's recommendation. JPo, you have some splainin to do. I will admit going into this movie with extreme prejudice beforehand. I'm actually surprised that I hated it less than I expected to. But I can't help but feel like the movie was a big long rumination on nothing, and also rather heartless mockery of just about everyone.

Kind of like this blog, eh? Oh, except for the fact that I'm not Mormon, which everyone in this movie apparently is. Why do Mormons hate America? WHY? (Neil LaBute, I'm looking in your general direction.)

I will credit this movie with one thing: Reminding me of the totally forgotten pop gem "The Promise" by When in Rome.

And you know what's better than an mp3 of the actual song?

AN MP3 OF THE RINGTONE. w00t.

What he said

In the process of doing some research for some freelance hair and skin care articles, I came across this post in the soc.culture.thai Google group:

Why you say divorce high when bus driver run away ?

He not run Po-lice him loi-per-cent sure.

He a man have to money. She work.

You want see ?

No can.

Ants on you mouth no find honey maybe bite !

Can I swim in your money bin?

Holy crap, Joel interviews Bill Gates. Bill Gates thinks blogging is SUPER-IMPORTANT!

I feel validated.

We're going to try a little experiment

I've been thinking: a) we should sleep in separate beds and b) rather than tossing out yet more vitriolic japes ad nauseam, maybe I should look inward, reflect, shit like that. Y'know, before the abyss, like, looks into me.

So here is something I wrote a while ago. It never went anywhere, but I liked it. It's better than the nonfiction (ha!) I've been producing here. So, without further ado, Jackie and Sergei. Never has the category "Shit from an Old Notebook" been more apropos.

Um.

Um.

I think, I muse over why I didn't just come out and tell you within a few days I was in love with you-completely. Basically, that is what the letter I wrote you stated. You read it. I remember your apartment on Cornelia Street as if it were yesterday, the bathtub in the kitchen, your bed without a headbaord, your Scientology.

I forgot to forget to remember

Hipsters or lesbian couple? You be the judge. (Actually, these belt buckles are collaborating on a novel.)

If you haven't seen the N+1 takedown of Wes Anderson, you're living under a rock. But I wanna say I've adored
N+1 since their Conversation with a Bookseller. Anyhow, if you take nothing else away from the critique of "The Life Aquatic," it should be this:

What will the hipsters be remembered for? ...The most common answer is “Nothing.” New York Rock? So much retread. The hipsters’ championing of vintage clothing? Sorry, you can’t be remembered for remembering. The embrace of white-trash chic--trucker hats and so on? Interesting but evil. Though not authentically evil. The hippies had Charles Manson, one friend noted. “We haven’t even produced a decent serial killer.”

Don't do drugs. Also? Don't get drunk and try to scale a building. I went to high school with this guy. Poor Mike. Tragically, most of the people who didn't leave my hometown seem doomed to a rather undemocratic fate.

When I was one year out of college, my parents called me to say that my neighbor, a classmate, had died in a car crash. "We didn't know how to tell you this," they said. "You must be sad."

"No way," I replied. "This guy poisoned cats. He used to beat me up on the bus in middle school. He said I was a dyke. Where's his grave? I'ma go take a piss on it."

Who knows, though? Maybe he could have been the serial killer of my generation.

It was a Stratocaster with a whammy bar

OK. Quickly: Squirrels from Hell are playing at Lit Lounge tonight at 9. Have you seen them yet? You should. You really should.

Tomorrow night, Shy Child are playing at the Delancey at 10. Have you seen them yet? You should. You really should.

Finally, this Saturday, THE LIVE ONES are playing at a bar that's so on the edge I can't find a listing for it really: suffice it to say it's called the Orphanage and it's on 383 S. 1st St. in Williamsburg. Anyhow, how long have I been telling you about these guys? Well over 2 years, right? Have you seen them yet? HAVE YOU FUCKING SEEN THEM YET?

Champagne for my real friends

My goodness, just as I was about to pull his little card from my Rolodex, The Minor Fall, The Major Lift pops out of the cave, just like Jesus. Let's hope he doesn't see his shadow; I won't be able to take 6 more weeks of winter.

Garbage in, garbage out

Tizzie just pointed me to this article in her home-ish town newspaper about how Fat-Free Pringles will save the world, or something like that:

In a study published this month by the American Physiological Society and another study accepted for publication in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry, the UC and Western Australia scientists assert that Olestra, the ingredient that makes it possible for Procter & Gamble to produce Fat Free Pringles, can be used to remove a class of 12 toxins, including dioxin, from the body.

How amazing that the much-maligned Olestra--the very substance that catapulted the phrase "anal leakage" onto the nightly news--has sort of, maybe, redeemed itself. Or not, given the "treatment worse than cure" potential.

Eat something sweet and the feeling will pass

I'm just delighted to hear that Fran Lebowitz, my hero and savior, has published a new book, subtitled "An Unreliable Memoir." Only bummer is there's mysteriously little coverage of this book in the US, and the reviews I *can* find seem to confuse the plot of the story with Lebowitz's life. (Unless someone can confirm that she recently got married and had children? Yeah, I didn't think so.)

(Via Maud.)

UPDATE: It turns out, you see, that (as was pointed out in the comments) this is not the Fran Lebowitz, but rather a former literary agent of the same name (check it out, she's listed at Predators and Editors.) Anyhow, I just thought I'd point that out. But the book does exist, however marginally.

But it kind of raises an interesting question, perhaps one for Maud's own Secret Literary Agent: Even if it's legal to use the same name as a well-known author, is it ethical? Being a literary agent herself, Ms. Fran Lebowitz The Other should've realized the confusion that could arise.

Addendum: I forgot to mention this on Monday, but before I was absolutely certain that this book was not written by The One True Fran, I decided to give the William Morris Agency a ringy-ding to ask them if she'd recently published anything longer than a Vanity Fair piece, and was greeted with terse replies in 2 different departments. (They were both men, incidentally, on the other side of the phone, which is something I'm unaccustomed to dealing with when it comes to anything remotely resembling a creative field.) Finally, one of them said to me, "She's not a client." "Really?" I responded. "Because she's featured on your website." "I can't help you." Click.

Has Fran been dumped by WMA? She hasn't published anything in, like, 25 years...what made them decide to shitcan her now?

Things I Like About My Neighborhood

Happy New Year. I'm relieved to begin 2005, aren't you?

Sometimes I hate LIC. Not in a big way, mind you. It's the Wild Wild West feeling the place sometimes has, stemming from its position as the Land That Parking Regulations Forgot. We have no parking rules, which means we have no street sweeping, which means that we have piles of garbage that collect in the gutters. This is not such a big deal, really.

What is a big deal is the abandoned car down the block that has been there since I moved to the neighborhood. It's slowly disintegrating, becoming part of the landscape, like some apocalyptic Andy Goldsworthy sculpture. Bad things happen to it from time to time: a smashed window here, a flat tire there. There are days I'm very tempted to jump up and down on the hood and cave in the windshield with a baseball bat. I loathe whoever abandoned this car, with its Vermont plates and its array of stupid New Englander bumperstickers commemorating visits to places this car will never see again.

But something happened recently that made me happy once again. Because, you see, I've discovered that someone else hates this car as much as I do, and has commemorated it with some lovely graffiti. I present to you: Pimp My Ride. (Photo taken by Adam.)