I thought it was because her bed is elevated almost to the ceiling where the air is thinner, but then I realized no – it’s because of the massive pea under the mattress.
Straight Punch to the Crotch – Rock & Roll Wrestlers
Last night Onestarwatt.com assigned its roving reporter to the CLAW (Charlottesville Lady Arm Wrestlers) match at the Blue Moon Diner. For the first time the wrestling bouts were held outdoors in the beer garden/parking lot, a location which provided spectators with more room to throw their money around. According to the roving reporter, the highlight of the evening was a rowdy set by the band Straight Punch to the Crotch. Although the band competed against Catholic schoolgirls, Wonder Women, a saucy fairy named Tinkerhell, and Halloween-caliber cleavage for the attention of the crowd, they managed to be just as compelling as the wrestlers. The reporter found it difficult to drink and take notes at the same time, but she did write one word in her notebook during a post-show interview with Punch frontman Gene Osborn. That word was “husky.” But she could not elaborate this morning.
At the June 10 CLAW show, members of Straight Punch to the Crotch wrestled not with their arms (lucky for them, because Tinkerhell would have crushed them), but with their various musical instruments, and the band emerged from the fight victorious. Billy Hunt took out the drums ninja-style. Kathy Compton rearranged the keyboard’s face. Zach Snider whooped the bass guitar’s sorry ass. Marita Delgado crushed the ukulele like a baby worm. And Gene Osborn busted notes on his guitar until it bled. In short, it was a spectacular show worthy of the tasteful spectacle that is CLAW.
Last night Straight Punch to the Crotch debuted the new CLAW theme song. It made a resounding impression on everyone but the roving reporter, who at the time was inside the diner buying another beer. But she did catch “When Animals Attack” which you can hear on MySpace or through the stuffed bear implanted, Teddy Ruxpin-style, with the band’s recordings. You can also attend Punch’s CD release party at Zinc on June 21st. The roving reporter will be there with her notebook, trying to remember that she is a serious journalist and not the queen of the dance.
The perils of drinking until you set the noodles on fire
The last time I made the freshman “cooking while drunk” error was five years ago when I lit spaghetti on fire after an evening of karaoke in Northern Virginia. But last night I really wanted macaroni, and macaroni wanted me. But I only got as far as boiling a pot of water before the house started smelling like burning. So I guess I burned some water. Incidentally, you can’t throw a pot of water on something burning when the water itself is burning, because you’ll just add fuel to the fire. And that, Julia Childs, is how you make Eau Flambe.
”Well, you were a drug addict, but did you kill anybody?”
Kate Ward of Entertainment Weekly compiled a list of recent memoirs organized by subject. The list is hardly exhaustive, but it gives you a good taste of what it means to be human. Being human means accomplishing something that can easily translate into a clever book title.
I’m not going to write a memoir because then I’d be self-conscious about regaling people at dinner parties with the same stories. I’d say, “One time, when I was nine, I saw a coffee cup like this, except it was a little different.” And everyone would say, “That is a riveting story, but you cover it in chapter two.”
Local death by T-Rex
This morning the bbf’s mom sent a mass email saying that BABY RACCOONS were camping out in a TREE in her BACKYARD. Best of all, she included VIDEO DOCUMENTATION.
I immediately wrote back: “Mary, get your raccoon-catching net and bag those things. I want them in a UPS box on my doorstep first thing Monday morning.”
I asked the three-year-old grandchild if she had watched the raccoon video. “Yeah,” she said.
“I told Meemo to mail me the babies,” I said.
“Are you going to kill them?”
I assured her that no, I was not going to kill them. I am not a monster. Then I put on a little snuff film called The Land Before Time.
The queen of all things shiny and expensive
As of yesterday I own an expensive piece of jewelry, and now I feel like the Queen of Sheba. You shouldn’t try to mug me or anything – the bracelet isn’t that expensive – but it cost more than my Claire’s Boutique accoutrements. It cost at least as much as a cell phone bill, and you can really tell in the way it catches the light. I feel so freaking pretty when I wear it. It drapes beautifully over my athlete’s foot of the wrist (a little gift from my wet watchband). I am going to wear the bracelet so often this summer that I will have a gold bracelet tan to counteract my t-shirt tan. I am going to wear the shit out of this thing. No longer will I be mistaken for a goofy young woman; as of yesterday’s epic trip to the jewelry store, I am a lady. So Beyonce can just retire now. She can put her bling away. There’s more than one lady in town who jingles when she walks.
Thank you, Bunny, for my late graduation present.
This week’s New Yorker is kicking my ass
I want to read every article. I want to read all the “Faith and Doubt” stories, because I basically majored in doubt in college. I want to read the Sex and the City movie review wherein Anthony Lane compares the actresses to thoroughbred horses. I want to read the new Nabokov short story! I want to read the Annie Proulx short story that she awesomely named “Tits-up in a Ditch”! I want to read about how Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami found his road legs and his book-writing arm. I want to read about rapper Lil Wayne nailing his perfect pitch with Auto-Tune. I want to read the funny captions for the photo of an orca in a courtroom.
But here is the problem. And this is embarrassing for a writer to admit. In fact, admitting this will probably destroy my nascent writing career. The New Yorker has too many words. And, as a corollary, I only have one week to read it. And when you consider the pile of half-finished books on my bed-stand and my day job and my television set and my sleeping and my eating and my checking my email 100 times a day, I am actually a very busy girl.
So I’ll get through this exciting issue, but it might not be today, or tomorrow, or even the next time I am early to my therapy appointment. I might have to wait until I am strapped to an ambulance gurney or sent to solitary confinement. But mark my words, I will conquer this New Yorker of June 9 & 16, 2008. Okay, so I honestly just realized it’s a double issue. I feel way better now. Talk to me in two weeks and we can exchange orca lawyer jokes.
This heat is so oppressive
Good thing I was invited to a birthday party serving ice cream cake. We all gathered at my parents’ house to watch two brothers and a grandmother blow out the candles in 100-degree weather. My sister’s dog was all like, “I’m from the mountains. I can’t deal with this heat index. Someone shave my long, furry legs.” And my little brother was like, “A fleece jacket is not a very seasonal birthday present,” and we were like, “It’s a bathing suit. It will go with your swimming jeans.” And I was like, “Family parties are fun and all, but I wonder if I received any important Facebook messages in the past two hours.” And my dad wrapped a Ziplock bag of jelly beans in fancy paper and was like, “Happy birthday, Mom.”
Last week’s news for today’s young Americans
David Sedaris wrote a new book of essays. In the days before bloggers got book deals, Dave Secretary told funny stories on the internet. What are the rest of us doing? According to the Times, we’re eating gay fruit. Too bad J.D. Salinger’s girlfriend was only allowed one berry a day. Salman Rushdie let his girlfriend eat all she wanted, then she dumped him and made a career out of food. But I’ll still be the meat in a Rushdie/Martin Amis sandwich.
Libertarian paternalism is the doctrine of mildly manipulating people to make wise decisions. So if you paint a fly in a urinal, men will improve their aim. If you narrow the space between the yellow lines, people will slow their cars around bends in the road. So far it seems that Thaler and Sunstein (the philosophy’s authors) are using their powers for good and not evil. But this could all change with the right influential touches. See Richard Ross’s photos from “The Architecture of Authority.” Just throw some blankets over the windows and pave over the carpet, and you’ve got yourself a prison riot.
Everyone take a moment to appreciate Cabinet Magazine online. See “Days I’ve Been Alive Represented by Dots” by Ron Lent. I want to see inside those dots! See “Vasectomania, and Other Cures for Sloth.” As long as we’re curing sloth, here’s “The Web Habits of Highly Effective People,” featuring the ultra-productive Maud Newton.
Did you know that “less than 5% of the artists in the modern art sections are women, but 85% of the nudes are female“? So ladies, it might be easier to get your bare butt into the Met than into Playboy. This is no time to give up on getting naked. Speaking of art, artists and art critics at Minnesota’s The Rake have teamed up to form The Vicious Circle. The Circle’s blog seeks to bridge the acrimonious divide between creators and creative critics. This will be especially interesting if you happen to live in Minneapolis, and I know that some of you do. What’s the weather doing over there? How’s the local sports team?
Old people: what are they good for? This geriatric MD believes “older people are the healthiest people on the planet.” Plus they’re far more adaptable than young people. Plus their legs grow back when you cut them off! Or at least that’s what my grandmother has been telling us since the surgery.
Lastly, watch how negative space can create poetry. Ponder what this means for art, and for the world, and for the cereal box on your kitchen counter. “whole grain/sun-sweetened/high blood pressure/www.kashi.com.” This is harder than it looks.
Sometimes we wake up to good news
I’m going to take a momentary break from cruising Facebook in order to acknowledge the elephant in the room.
God bless you, Barack Obama. This is a happy day.
I heard a great idea last week, via my boss. HILLARY CLINTON ON THE SUPREME COURT. She’s obviously a smart cookie; she just needs to be outside of politics. So let’s make Hillary a Supreme Court justice, and I will be Barack’s VP. I bet he smells so good.