Celebrate Good Times, C'mon!

Hoorah! Alito's in. I propose all we XX chromosomers go out, get knocked up, and have abortions while we still can.

Hot Men of the Oral Tradition

"Now I got the gun - you got the brew
You got two choices of what you can do
It's not a tough decision as you can see
I can blow you away or you can ride with me" I said, I'll ride with you if you
can get me to the border
The sheriff's after me for what I did to his daughter
I did it like this - I did it like that
I did it with a whiffleball bat
So I'm on the run - the cop's got my gun
And right about now - it's time to have some fun
The King Adrock - that is my name
And I know the fly spot where they got the champagne."

(It's really all about the guy in the middle.)

Hot Men of Letters

On with the dance!
Let Joy be unconfined,
No sleep till morn,
When youth & pleasure meet
to chase the glowing hour
with flying feet.

-(George Gordon) Lord Byron

Certaines femmes vampires ne se nourrissent pas de sang

'76, such a year for cinema! But then, anything's good with Udo Kier.

Wax On, Wax Off

Pat Morita is alive and well and working at the Hollywood Home Depot. Reports of his death have been greatly exaggerated. I saw Arnold/Mr. Miyagi just this Monday, as I was buying lumber (among other jobs I do some carpentry. We might delve into my apprenticeship as a fine home builder some time in the future. I do have some good construction site stories), and waiting in those interminable lines. I truly abhor that place, though sometimes I'm forced to go. Better to give your money to the mom & pop hardware stores. Unfortunately lumber yards seem only to come in chains.

But anyway, as much as I love hardware stores (though not nearly so much as trains), the point of this is supposed to be that there is still time for a Karate Kid V.

More Groping & Some Griping

Evidently (I'm too fond of that word) I'm at a rather high risk for breast cancer, so my mother informs me after drilling her oncologist. Great.
Primary factors (not necessarily in order of importance):
1) family inheritance (mom and grandma have had it)
2) used The Pill (this one pisses me off, because every time I refilled that prescription I asked those medical bastards what the latest study said, or what the current thinking was. I always got the same response: "You don't smoke, you're fine.)
3) never been married
4) never been pregnant
5) never nursed a baby

Well fuck all y'all, because it is not fair that I should have to live my life with smallish tits and then have to worry about potentially having some or all of it carved away.
Furthermore, I am not knocked up or betrothed because I didn't want to be. I've wanted a passel of little babies since I was old enough to know what one was.

Shit.

Here's the good news:
1) Out of sheer suspiciousness, I took myself off The Pill
2) My granny survived, and mother probably will too
3) I take really good care of my body - my diet is much better than either of the aforementioned ladies, and I exercise regularly.
4) I haven't been on those evil estrogen replacement hormones like they gave my mom when she hit menopause.
5) yoga
6) I rarely drink, and I don't smoke.

HERE'S the REALLY Good News:

I had this conversation with my friend, Scott:

Scott: But you do self-examination regularly, right?
Me: No. I should, but I'm bad about it. Besides, it's just so gay (not sure what I mean there), feeling yourself up like that. (which is an ironic statement coming from me, on so many levels.)
Scott: Well, I'll do that for you.
Me: Really? That's SO generous of you.

(pause)

Me: But that won't work, Scott. Because that requires a COMMITMENT.
Scott: Oh. Well, I can do that, I can feel your tits for you once a month.

(pause)

Scott: I care.

Master and Man

The Drunkenness of Scott

After bowling a strike, and in an exultant gesture of victory, he grabs the girl and her nether-regions.

She: You're acting like a date rapist.

He: I'm sorry.

She: I didn't tell you to stop.

Fighting the Good Fight

This morning over breakfast, my girl Juliet and I were expressing our pleasure that Google has big balls, and is refusing to comply with the Bush Admin.'s demand for their search records.

Juliet: "God, I would hate for them to know what I'm looking up - I look up EVERYTHING. Well, especially since it's all porn."

Me: "Yeah, 'How to make a dirty bomb.' "

(pause)

Me: "I don't mean radiation, I mean DIRTY."

A Better World

Why don't we call people who work in banks, "Fortune Tellers"?

Ithaca

The beloved doesn't
need to live. The beloved
lives in the head. The loom
is for the suitors, strung up
like a harp with white shroud-thread.

He was two people.
He was the body and voice, the easy
magnetism of a living man, and then
the unfolding dream or image
shaped by the woman working the loom,
sitting there in a hall filled
with literal-minded men.

As you pity
the deceived sea that tried
to take him away forever
and took only the first,
the actual husband, you must
pity these men: they don't know
what they're looking at;
they don't know that when loves this way
the shroud becomes a wedding dress.


-Louise Glück

The Trouble with Boys

Is that we think so much of you and you give so little evidence of thought to us.

(with a soft and a sweet faerie's blessing kiss, I blow in your direction)

Not Very Zen of Me

I admit it - I want to key Henry's new car.

You might remember Henry, he was my very first posting, as in, "Getting over Henry." In fact, I almost named the entire weblog that. The blog was created entirely BECAUSE of that. Then I thought it was stupid to color the future course of my life with an ending. So Henry was relegated to a mere posting, instead of an entire domain. He would be simultaneously mortified and entirely thrilled all at the same time if he knew about any of this. But he loves the drama, loves the ego stroking.

Anyway. I officially hate him (but not really). I stepped away when he refused me. I did it graciously. I was friendly. I didn't bother him with melodrama. Maybe that was the problem. He wanted me to continue to chase the dream so he would feel important. Stupid boy, he was important.

Why I am pissed is that for the last two and a half months, I have been living with the appalling information that he thinks I have been slandering him, that I hate him (which I didn't, but now I should), that I have somehow wronged him. If I had done something ignoble I would feel sorry for him. But I haven't, and this is nothing but an assault on my character.

I haven't uttered a peep.

He swore we'd always be friends, but he's barely extended a little finger in my direction since the Halloween party.
The party which he practically begged me to attend, sniped at me for leaving, despite my assurances to return, and then made out in the hallway with some girl. I found this out just as soon as I returned to his house. And again the next morning when the self-appointed town crier visited me on my front stoop. Yet again, when he made sure my friend Michael knew he had a date with her. Because he knew it would get back to me. It's not nice. It's really kind of cruel.

So I wrote him a little letter over the Holidays. Extended an olive branch, though I haven't had a hand in the war. I said I'd heard that he thought I'd done him wrong. I told him I hadn't, that if he'd paid attention to who I actually am, that would seem an impossibility. I'm not a mean person. I've only ever wanted the best for him. Etc.

Nothing. No reply.

Then this week, as I walked to my driveway, I heard a car pull up beside me. I look over, and Henry is peering out the window, looking at me. Just as I barely registered the who and the what of it, he drove off. No hello, no wave, no nothing. A year and a half as friends, five months of US, one month of us as just friends again, and then nothing.

There's nothing I hate more than nothing.

What the fuck?

1) Don't sleep with your neighbors (actually, I'm sure I'd do it all over again.)
2) He's insane. (I'd still do it all over again.)

In his driveway sit a 60s muscle car, a Range Rover, and a brand new Audi of some sporty sort.

The question is, which one?

Where's Waldo?

Being stalked by Matt Damon, of course. Don't let the fact that he's in the foreground fool you.

Yeah, right.

In reaction to the Supreme Court's decision to uphold Oregon's assisted suicide law, the Bush administration said they were "disappointed," especially as they were "trying to create a culture of life."

You're funny guys.

GOT MLK?

"We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing oriented society to a person oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, militarism, and economic exploitation are incapable of being conquered. A nation can flounder as readily in the face of a moral and spiritual bankruptcy as it can through financial bankruptcy."

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1967

The Lord's Day - A Day of Rest

Did we really bomb Pakistan this morning? Poor Damadola. Really?
Has everyone completely taken leave of HIS senses? (That means you, too, Condi.)
Next stop on the crazy train... Iran.

No wonder I had such fractured sleep.

Funny Yet Upsetting Things Said on a Date

He: We need to get you a burka.

The Classified Ads

Combing the employment section I ask, "Where are the posts for ex-pats? Is no more "help wanted"? You know what I mean, the literary types who roam about Europe, mostly, living off other people's trust funds if they haven't any of their own. Their only means of remuneration is their insight and wit. That, and the deft use of the cocktail shaker or swizzle, depending on the tippler. Their collars and cuffs might be a little frayed, but they have dash, they are spiffing, winsome even. Those days are gone, I suppose, like Chesterfields and lip rouge and the cloche.

And porcelain and chrome.

It's a terrible thing to find your life's calling, then realize you live in the wrong era.

Everything Gives You Cancer

It's official - my mother has breast cancer. I knew it was going to be true from the first whisper of a bad mammogram. So did she. The women in my family are cursed with alarming prescience. If only I knew how to tap that source when I wanna. I could kick Miss Cleo's robust arse.

We are quite hopeful she will be fine. My mother is nothing if not tenacious. Her energy is unstoppable. She is one of the hardest working people I know, and therein lies part of the problem - she can't rest.

Depsite the negative memories I have drudged up and posted here, I have great love for you, Mom. You taught me to be responsible, honest, hardworking, resourceful, independent, gracious, universally respectful, adaptable, pragmatic, enduring, polite, proper, materially conservative, to value education... oh, and the endless toolbox of skills I have got!

One of my hopes is that when they have carved away at your breast, you won't feel they have taken any of your womanliness. Your body took care of your baby. That, and whatever sexual pleasure you derived there, is all nature required of your breasts.

I will be home, Momma, just as soon as you need me. It's the least I can do.

A Formal Retraction

From the comments:
"Anonymous said...
OMG. I cannot believe you wrote that! I would have felt TERRIBLE if I had clogged the toilet, and would have certainly said something about it. I certainly did not do that, and certainly would not have left without doing something about it.

Another problem with bloggers: no fact checking, no watch dog to prevent unscrupulous and irresponsible libel."

Apparently my research minions have proved unreliable. Worse than my editor, even. As for the watch dog, he watches the morning clock to be sure his walks are timely, his meals are prompt, and not much else.

So, I hereby offer a formal apology, from the blogger to the alleged clogger, for my libelous scribblings of January 4th. I won't apologize for the slander, for that oral communication was rendered by another student. Perhaps she was passing the buck as much as she passed... well, I won't go there.

Thank you for taking it all so well. And for approaching the desk with a smile, instead of twapping me up the side of the head.

I won't rescind the trickster comment, but I hope it's clear I bear you no ill-will. It's all just funny to me.

Feel free to post a comment any time.

One More Reason to Love Trader Joe's & One More Reason Not to Eat Beef

The funny cashier who expressd how much he loves elevator music, even though they were playing Bebop in the store. And he took it lightly and laughed when I told him he was the only one.

Other food related news - apparently I am intent on foundering. I am packing away food like Homer Simpson at the donut factory. Anyone who says yoga isn't serious exercise don't know they ass from they asana.

One More Reason NOT to Eat Beef (which I positively LOVE)-

While watching one of the submissions for the Native American Film Festival (my friend's the programmer, and I get to help!), I learned that the Bureau of Land (Mis)Management has been decimating the supposedly protected wild mustang population, "after a little-noticed provision was added in 2004 to a catchall spending bill. The provision was offered by Sen. Conrad Burns, R-Mont., essentially lifting a 1971 restriction on the sale of wild horses and burros... The government estimates 36,000 wild horses and burros live on public land, all in the Western states -- down from 60,000 counted in 1974." (4/28/2005 The Courrier-Journal, Louisville)

The B.L.M. has been given power to remove as many horses and burros as they deem appropriate, in order to protect the land. Except that what they are really doing, is clearing grazing land for CATTLE. In case you don't know just how exacting raising beef is for the land, try this site(www.mcspotlight.org/media/reports/beyond.html), or just Google it yourself. Furthermore, the wild horses were being sold to slaughterhouses for sale as food in foreign countries. You can read more about the BLM's handling of the ponies here: http://www.igha.org/BLM.html

Fortunately, some conscientious Senators (Byrd, for one) managed to get the sales frozen for the year 2006, but unless those measures are renewed, the animals are likely to suffer the same renewed fate.

What significance these animals are to you is, of course, up to you. For me they are symbols of the American West, of power, spirit, freedom, and hard work. Horses love to play. They are also direct links to memories of my childhood (my daddy foolishly bought me a Mustang pony when I was a little girl - but that's a whole other story). Driving down the east side of Mt. Hood and descending to the high mountain desert of Central Oregon, there were almost always herds of Mustang in the fields along the highway. They are about as beautiful a sight as any I can remember, but the older I grew, the less often you could find them. Once I saw two standing with their necks intertwined - they rested their heads on each other's backs.

Oh, and for you starfuckers - Viggo Mortensen is active (www.percevalpress.com) in working for the protection of the horses. Whatever Viggo wants...

Alanis was right

As many of you may well know, I tend a web log. What you cannot tell, however, is that I often do my postings from behind the desk at a yoga studio (by the way, I am not an instructor, but I am very limber). As I face the computer, behind me is a large double-paned window into the studio, where the classes are held.

One night not so long ago, a student - late every single class until he was forbidden thereafter to do so - emerged from the room about twenty minutes into the ninety minute class. This is his newest habitual ritual. He has shortened the practice again by slicing off the other end. As he walked into the lobby, he said, "So I looked for your 'Charm School' the other night, but I couldn't find it." This startled me for a moment, but then I realized he had been in the last time I worked, and was standing near the window, as is his wont. Clearly, he was not focusing on his yoga as he should, but that's where he's at.

I replied that it was on a different URL (that's right, isn't it?), and I'm pretty sure I foolishly blurted out the name. I remarked that it had been really good for me, as it was making me write regularly again. Did he tend a blog, I wondered? He averred from behind the blue dressing-room curtain, "No, I'm not narcissistic enough."

Wow.

Let's be clear that though my next statement was, "That's really a mean thing to say, Steve," I still managed to see what was so deliciously humorous about it. The only time someone has accused me of that was about a year and a half ago, when my girlfriend Juliet phoned me from her car. She left me a voice-mail indicating she had just seen the new poster for "Starsky & Hutch." Now, she knows perfectly well my irrational lust for Owen Wilson, so she said, "The thing is, in this photo, he looks a lot like YOU. So, I guess that makes YOU a narcissist." Vainly, I will tell you that I am relieved Owen is quite airbrushed in that particular poster. We have a long standing joke, Juliet and I, wherein approximately 80% of the population is narcissistic; it's our favorite trashcan diagnosis. We are armchair psychologists.

Wait a minute, it seems I have lied, which is rather more the province of sociopaths, to my understanding. I have suffered this accusation one other time, when engaged in a rather long conversation at a party with a psychiatrist from the Portland V.A. Hospital. Among other things, he told me that three or more tattoos on a patient were something of an indicator for Borderline Personality Disorder (um -instantly I thought of my erstwhile fiancee), but given the overwhelming trend of the 90s to inject dye subcutaneously, I'm sure they've had to rethink that one. Or BPD's just a major generational problem. But, as usual, I digress.

At the time, I had a problem with a form of OCD, manifesting in an uncontrollable need to pick at my face. Since I had been unable to break the habit, I asked him for some information or guidance. Clearly I didn't want to persist in self-destructive behavior, albeit relatively benign. He told me at some point, that it seemed a little narcissistic. This was really shocking, so I asked him why. He replied that it demonstrated excessive attention to self. Well, touche, my good man. You got me there. I would even go so far as to say that there were times that I felt literally "locked" into the mirror until my self-eradication was complete. However, I have to say that his take on it is questionable, as my nervous tic was clearly sourced in personal disatisfaction, whereas one of the primary traits of a narcissist is an inability to be self-critical. Nonetheless, the "mirror" screams out an allusion to the old Greek myth of Narcissus' obsessive gazing at his own reflection in the pool.

When I was in therapy about a year later, I asked my counsellor if she thought I might possibly suffer from such an ailment (this was particularly worrisome, because my high school shrink, felt that a family member was of that persuasion). She replied that I could not be, as no narcissist would be capable of asking such a question of themselves. Phew.

Narcissists lack compassion for others. They fail to look deep within themselves. They fly into rages when challenged or criticized. Narcissists eat their young.

I wouldn't trade the experiences that led me to view my upbringing in a certain way - it taught me to value more important things. It helps me survive all the bullshit and tragedy of failed glamour I see on a daily basis here in Los Angeles. The downside is it left me feeling something less than entitled to things which should naturally be mine. That's a story for another time. So my interpretation of the dynamic with my mother, and the face-picking, and the doctor's comment to me is that I inverted and internalized the narcissism I saw in my parent. I was paying too much attention to myself: I was trying too root out any deficiencies or flaws, thereby mimicking her behavior towards me, which was marked by excessive criticism and perfectionism.

So now I blog, and pay too much attention to myself and my issues in the computer mirror. Interestingly there is an article in the January issue of Glamour (of course), entitled, "Women Who Blog: Are they self-absorbed exhibitionists? Groovy free spirits? Or just plain bored..." We are living in an era of public display. Even our game shows are about self-exposure, sometimes on an intensely personal level. We compete to Survive, go under the knife to "evolve," submit ourselves to torture, disgust, shame, and self-confession. Think Springer, The Swan, The Bachelor, Extreme Makeover. Think Fear Factor. All in the public sphere. These seem to me to be social cleansing rituals.

I maintain a certain level of anonymity, but clearly I am part of a culture which for better or worse seeks to examine, define, purge and transform itself.

I may be vain and self-involved, but I can assure you, I have compassion and interest in others. I can even contemplate the validity of criticism.

The irony of all this is that the same guy who came out of Yoga class that day and amusingly called me names, is the same guy who clogged the studio toilet the next week most foully. It overflowed. He left class early, of course, with no mention of it to anyone who worked there. This doesn't make him entirely a hypocrite, but it does mean he lacks some level of feeling for others. And he likes to stir a little shit from time to time. We'll just assume he's a trickster.

Self-Congratulatory

Evidently I smell like "spicy Turkish apricots."