Tag Archives: Favorite People

Darren Hoyt is getting famous on the internet, and I have insider info with which to capitalize on his fame

Tonight I found this website, which informed me that Darren Hoyt is “a name we all should know!” I totally agree, and that is why I have decided to publish my highly-anticipated interview with Darren Hoyt, captain of the web design blogosphere and my own buttered bun.

THE Q&A:

W- How did you get interested in web design?

D – I used to visit my Dad’s house in 1995 and play around with his Compuserve account. At the time there was a buzz about “alien autopsy” photos from Roswell that someone claimed to have published online. I was on Christmas break from college with nothing else to do, so I made a point of tracking down these photos. I finally met someone in a chat room who said he’d send me copies using whatever transfer protocol was around at the time. All I know is that it killed my dad’s 14.4 modem connection for the better part of a day. I finally found an actual web domain that promised the photos. This time it took three hours to load in the browser, and it was obvious no thinking person would mistake them for authentic. But I still stayed up til 3:00am anyway, watching a black-and-white JPG load one fragment at a time.

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Inauguration of Noelle’s Niche blog feature

me: i am out of blogging ideas. write me something for the Noelle Niche
Noelle: oooh
Noelle: k
Noelle: so
Noelle: hmm
Noelle: how much more self-absorbed men are than women
Noelle: and what would happen
Noelle: if they had to do womenly things
Noelle: like if my brother got a period
Noelle: he’d probaly just let himself bleed
Noelle: everywhere
Noelle: cause h’d forget
Noelle: stuff like that

Hooray for houseguests!

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A ram is also a sheep.

Thanksgiving Avenger

I should have followed the man with the dead deer in the bed of his pick-up truck on Thanksgiving morning. I should have seen what became of the body. I was behind him at the stoplight near Fashion Square Mall, but he turned right and I went straight. We were both heading toward the country. Did he shoot the deer in the city and then drive it out to Earlysville to dump it? Had he killed it in the country but then driven it around town for a few hours in order to show it off? I don’t think people should be allowed to transport deer carcasses in their cars like that, especially on holidays. ESPECIALLY near Sbarro’s, Dip-n-Dots, and Chick-Fil-A.

The family doctor came to Thanksgiving. When my grandmothers heard that he had arrived, they propped their feet up on the coffee table so he would see that they were following orders. The doctor’s four-year-old son ran onto the pool cover like it was a trampoline. At the time I was chasing him with a lacrosse ball that had been slimed by a pit bull. The boy sunk down to the water level but didn’t get wet. I held him in my arms like he was my own son who had survived. Then I quickly distracted him from the near-death experience. “My grandmother has a toilet beside her bed. Do you want to see it?” “Yes,” he said.

Percocet the cat disappeared when the Thanksgiving dogs arrived. My sister found her crouched in the upstairs heating vent. My sister shot more clay pigeons than my brother from the mountains. He bought Jager Bombs for all his city cousins but forgot to pay his bar tab.

My Georgia grandmother thought my petite Virginia cousin was a midget. “I love little people,” she said.

Did you know that Budweiser makes a beer flavored like shrimp cocktail sauce? Neither did I.

My brothers’ girlfriends from oldest to youngest: a) baked chocolate pecan pie for my mom; b) baked peanut butter cookies for my mom; c) danced with the Rockettes in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

I think I found the source of my family’s sweet tooth. My mother’s Coca-Cola consumption was not regulated when she was a child. Five bottles a day back in Georgia, then one ultimate bottle after she brushed her teeth and climbed into bed.

I think I found the source of my family’s alcohol consumption. Beer is delicious and it feels good in our bellies. Except when the beer contains clam juice. I will also leave the bourbon & beef stock drinking to Nick Murray.

Did you know that J.C. Penney’s opened at 4 a.m. on Friday? Refrigerator jelly time!

I watched a documentary today about the 1993 child murders in West Memphis, Arkansas. The documentary (Paradise Lost) moved too slowly for me (I wanted to see what happened in the end), so I paused the movie and got on the internet to read about the case. The most recent appeal on behalf of the Memphis 3 defendants was filed just last month. There have been forensic breakthroughs since 1993 that suggest one of the parents actually killed the children as opposed to the three teenagers given life sentences for the crime. After reading about this theory, I had to watch the documentary over again to see if the father looked guilty. He did! I don’t know why I have never been summoned for jury duty. Anyway this has nothing to do with Thanksgiving; it’s just a random Netflix queue decision I made months ago and forgot about.

I’ve also watched a few too many Sex & the City episodes today. What’s up with Samantha? Before today I’d never watched back to back episodes of that show and now I think I hate it. Clothes, edgy vagina jokes, clothes, gay best friends, oral sex, clothes, blah.

Turkey+mashed potatoes+gravy+beer+a certain someone’s lactose intolerance=a long weekend of holiday farts. Good thing I love farts so much. Thank you, big city house guests, for passing your gas in my direction.

Holiday Party with an Emphasis on Christmas

The time has come to plan my (and that other guy’s) holiday party! I have a few preliminary ideas for entertainment:

1) Famous local musicians will lead my guests in a Christmas carol sing-a-long. I will pay them in merriment.

2) The two principals of the Charlottesville Womens’ Arm Wrestling League will give a pre-season exhibition.

3) We will paint cookies with dyed confectioner’s sugar that will not be tainted with lead.

4) Someone will dress up like Santa Claus and promise your children expensive gifts.

I need to choose a date. Saturday night the 15th of December? Thoughts?

PS The Christmas tree is dead and won’t be accepting presents this year, but I will.

Virginia Safari Park

The Virginia Safari Park in Natural Bridge, VA is the saddest, most wonderful adventure you can take from an Interstate 81 exit. First, a photo essay:

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Hi, furry cow creature. Do you want to wipe your boogers on Darren’s hand?

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Look Harper! Baby piglets! We can just throw them some grain from this bucket and…

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Holy shit! Roll up the window!

This was actually our second trip to the park. The first time, on Gene’s birthday, we thought it was a good idea to safari in the back of a pick-up truck. I still cannot believe this is legal–we must have signed some incredible waiver when we bought our tickets. Darren was gored by a tusked beast while he was trying to feed an ostrich from his bucket. He still has a scar. This time, we took Harper in a tusk-proof Saturn station wagon. Without automatic windows, we had a few close calls, but mostly we just got snotted on. The zebras were isolated this year, which was fortunate. They will bite off your face if you give them a chance. No wonder Jared Diamond said they were immune to domestication.

Attempts have been made to train zebras for riding since they have better resistance than horses to African diseases. However most of these attempts failed, due to the zebra’s more unpredictable nature and tendency to panic under stress. For this reason, zebra-mules or zebroids (crosses between any species of zebra and a horse, pony, donkey or ass) are preferred over pure-bred zebras. (link)

Wow, that was distracting. So anyway we fed giraffes from our hand, pet pygmy goats, saw a kangaroo with an upside-down baby in her pouch, and whispered sweet nothings to an albino tiger cub. Whatever–I’m so over it. Step it up next year, Virginia Safari Park. I need a unicorn or a baby dragon or something. I can fondle llamas at home.

(More pictures…)

I ate burritos with the Governor

Let me preface this story by saying that Barack Obama gives a killer stump speech. If I go to a political rally in the cold, I expect a lot of high falutin’ promises, righteous anger at George W. Bush’s administration, and humorous yet telling anecdotes that will inspire me to clap my hands and hence raise my core body temperature. Last night my fingertips remained numb, but I liked the candidate, and he liked me. At least, I feel that he has faith in people in general (and yes, my emotions will determine the next President). I think that genuine faith in oneself leads to faith in other people which leads to honesty and transparency in the White House.

Obama reminds me of the great college professor who listens carefully to the stupid question you just barely articulated/blurted out in class, then uses his superior wisdom and vocabulary to ask it back to you (“Do you mean ___?” “Yes, sir/ma’am.”), then leads the whole room in a lively and enlightening discussion of the possible answers to the question you actually didn’t ask but in an ideal world where you are smarter and have an extra hour to think in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber before class, you might have. And he gives you credit for the whole thing. Good guy, that Obama. I like his wife too.

After the rally, we went out for Mexican food (thanks Dad). To their credit, the employees of Guadalajara were not overly star struck when I walked into the restaurant, nor when Virginia Governor Tim Kaine walked in moments later with a small entourage. Before Governor Kaine had a chance to sit down and order a beverage, we leapt up to shake his hand. This was sort of a blur. I think I said something like “wonderful job” and then slapped him hard on his heavily trench-coated shoulder. Then I quickly sat down and ordered a beer. He was a swell guy though. I enjoyed his introduction of Senator Obama at the rally. At dinner I kept wanting to stand up and make a speech for Kaine’s benefit, like “This is what America is all about! Eating Mexican food and laughing with my family! I’m fired up!” He stopped at our table and said a nice goodbye before he used the Guad restroom. This made Darren wonder if the Secret Service encouraged him to climb out bathroom windows into waiting limos after he dined in public, but actually he used the restroom like a normal person and probably only said goodbye to us beforehand because he had to walk by our table to get to the facilities and we were all staring at him. Then (of course) we joked about sticking sexy notes or men’s shoes under the door while he was in there. But we didn’t because we were too busy talking about reality TV.

Governor Tim Kaine, please don’t hate me for publicizing your lack of restroom exploits. You do good work and my dad was right – last night Guadalajara missed out on a great opportunity to start a “Wall of Fame.” They totally could have photographed us together.

Wow, some people just do not know how to work the internet

Today my cousin Everett and I were trying to scandalize Big Wis by showing her sexy Facebook photos of one of her grandchildren. Big Wis kept scowling at the little black cursor I was navigating across the computer screen. “I don’t understand how those varmints got into the computer,” she said.

Interviewing the BBF

I’m trying to think of some good questions for the blogging boyfriend when I interview him soon for my website. I don’t want to shy away from the tough questions, like “Am I the prettiest girl in the world?” Most of you just know the bbf as the adorable guy who scores the winning soccer goals for Crutchfield Electronics and who really likes watching TV on DVD late at night, but I want to show my readers the man behind the dorky, web design-obsessed mask. The interview will be an opportunity for me to introduce the blogging boyfriend to my skeptical friends from out of town and to put the Caring, Sweet, and Sensitive back into his CSS.

I open the floor to suggested interview questions.

Head count of naked children

I’m very grateful to Little Babushka for chronicling Sunday’s epic birthday party so I wouldn’t have to. For me, leaving the party was like waking up from a wonderful, but equally intricate and exhausting dream. I could have written down the dream, but I was still in a fugue state and didn’t think I could make any literary sense out of it. So thank you, LB, for putting words to the madcap house of mirrors that was the Insolent Child’s third birthday party.