All's Quiet in Whoville

For weeks now, I have been trawling the BPN newsletters in hopes of finding something really outrageous for your reading pleasure. It's been frustrating to not find anything. Okay sure there was some back-and-forth about internet porn, and an almost-good-enough exchange about whether the Berkeley water supply is safe to mix with infant formula. But only one person had this asinine response:

Our water has chloromine in it, which is a mixture of chlorine and ammonia. It kills fish, you have to treat it before replacing aquarium water. I think EBMUD says it's fine to drink, but I have a filter on my tap at home which filters this out (among other things). I wouldn't give it to my baby, child, teenager or friends. I hope that helps.

What about your enemies?

How do people not die from the stress of worrying about all these things?

The next best thing was the person whose mind-warp too-green-to-live problem was that her high efficiency washing machine cannot clean cloth diapers. I wish I had seen the original post so I could say, "go ahead and let your head explode." Finally there's the buzz about the Georgia child who died from her 'vegan' diet (the child was actually starved to death, not fed millet and, you know, wheat germ to death). I am not one to defend vegans, but "murderer" is a bummer of a rap to give people who assiduously avoid killing stuff.

Clean-up

Here's Paris Hilton's dad on parenting.

Question: What is the name of the phenomenon whereby you are more depressed about someone's life than they are? Is there a name for that? Where even the silver linings of their life cause you despair? check out www dot jedavidson dot blogspot dot com. You will have to type it out yourself because I don't want Jan to know my thoughts on her life. That would depress me even more.

Thanks to Ms. Birthday in Paris for the links. Now that you're a member of the blogosphere, though, you should learn to hoard the good links for yourself, the way EOH did with his breastmilk story.

Only the Tiniest of Victories

I have gotten the backlog of emails in my Inbox down to 29. I am so psyched about this.

The Defense Rests

When a friend of mine recently slagged the Aramark staff at the Coliseum (see Executive Orc House. I can't link because I'm "liveblogging" from the beer line), I was half-inspired to defend these off-proud union members 'o mine. But now that I have missed one whole inning and have moved 3 inches ONLY because other outraged consumers have quit the line, I will join the chorus (of one) naysayers in hating the Coliseum crap-slingers.

Negative Wishlist for My Memorial Planner

I went to a funeral today, and it occurred to me that all my last wishes may not be known. Just so its out there:

1. Do not include a reference to the Harry Potter books in my obituary.

2. Do not use the phrase "the romance of a train whistle" in the eulogy.

3. Do not call me a chick magnet.

4. Do not let anyone from my Ham radio club speak.

5. No songs from the soundtrack to Charlotte's Web should be played.

6. Do not let the funeral director speak. Or even attend, frankly.

The Significance of Cultural Memory

I saw a bumper sticker for the Orinda Park Pool today that really drove home for me (no pun intended) the significance, nay, necessity of cultural memory. The Orinda Park Pool acronym suggests that no one in Orinda remembers Naughty by Nature. Alternately, it means that there is a real trickster at play in the Bumper Sticker Department at OPP. Maybe "Sting OPP" was supposed to be moralistic?

Dispatches from Distant Ys

A farflung correspondent writes: “besides doctor's orders for the ymca, there is a whole grand tradition at the worcester branch of the "mens lounge."  you might think you'd catch a few minutes of the red sox there, but you'd need to do it next to overweight guys stark naked who leave bear ass prints in the pleather seats.  its also dank and poorly lit, something from a nightmare.”

 

Wow. That really paints a picture, huh?

Radio Notes

I heard a radio edit version of Kanye West’s All Fall Down today where they blanked out “crack” and “crackhead”. The line is “dealer buy Jordan/crackhead buy crack/white man get paid offa all of that.” I never knew “they” censored “those” words. And who are they? The White Man? Why is “crack” a bad word? It’s a bad thing, but is the word “bad”? My best guess is that they censor words that might cause young children, say three-and-a-half year-olds, ask difficult questions that parents don’t want to answer. For example, I wish I had used better judgment than to show L. this picture,

which immediately resulted in the following questions: Is that pig died? How did he die? Did somebody gun that pig? (and then repeated 6,732 times.)

In other radio thoughts, NPR proved itself a meritocracy today. True talent is the only explanation for how a man named Ira Flay-Toe, with the voice that he has, could be given a radio show. Or extremely effective blackmailing. I didn’t actually listen to the show to confirm his talent, but I will take it on faith that he is excellent at his Science Friday duties.

Hockey. Passive Aggression.

Brook works all the time, and I just assumed that he was doing legal work. Turns out he got called up to the NHL, and is playing in the Stanley Cup or something as I write. Well, that explains his long absences better than "The Henderson Matter" does.

Which raises the question: WHY is hockey still being played, as June arrives? Does this season ever end? Don't the rookies need to get back to the farm to help their folks plant the fields or something? And by "farm", I don't mean the farm system the NHL uses, I mean the actual farms that these Minnesotan/Canuck boys come off of, and thus return to, during the only month when they don't have hockey.

I think hockey would be much more popular if it happened less often. Let the hunger build a little. Of course, I think all sports' seasons are too long. The NBA season is interminable, but more so at the beginning of the season than the end. In reality, football is the only one that used to get it right, and with all the weekday games being played, plus college, plus Pro Bowls and the draft, football now seems too long as well*. Baseball is too long, but it operates on a different principle. There are so many games that no one pretends they will see them all or care about them all, so they don't go to the buffet table too often, only when they're hungry. At least, that's my approach, helping me not hate baseball. NASCAR: too long. And so forth.

Thanks to Rangelife for tipping me off to Passive-Aggressive Notes from Roommates, Neighbors, Coworkers and Strangers. It is awesome. It also triggers a confession. And another memory.

First the memory. One time I was parked outside of Reckless Records on the North Side of Chicago, and when I came out to the car, there was a note on it that said, "Nice parking job! Oh wait, I forgot: Toyota!" I was seriously freaked out. Not sure why, except that the parking job was fine, and there were no other cars around, and I thought possibly I was being accidentally Asian-race-baited or something. I thought for sure that someone was in the shadows, ready to jump me. I found out later that my boyfriend's roommate had driven by, seen the car, and left the note. She thought it was hilarious, and for awhile I was mad (not sure why) but now if I see a car that's poorly parked, I think: "Oh wait, I forgot: Toyota!"

Confession: I used to live in this house called the Plutoschloss, and it was supposed to be a very temporary arrangement but I ended up living there, mentally in a liminal state, for 22 months. My roommates were a day trader and a "rocker". I went away for the weekend and returned to find a pair of my underwear and a bra of mine stashed behind the toilet on the second floor. They were clean. This freaked me. Wierder still was the combination. It was a thong and jogging bra (neither of which I ever wore, for different reasons) that must have been found only in the deepest recesses of my underwear drawer. Although I had known these guys for years, I didn't feel like this was something we could discuss face-to-face. So I wrote a note that said something like, "while I was gone, someone took my underwear from my dresser and hid it in the bathroom. Do NOT let your friends in my room. I don't want to talk about this ever, I just don't want it to happen again!" I posted it on the stairs where neither could miss it and hid in my room.

The day trader did something that lives in my memory as the only stand-up thing he has ever done: he confronted me and told me I was being passive-aggressive. Kudos. The rocker waited two weeks and then mumbled that his girlfriend got her period and needed some clothes and cleaned them but then didn't want to go back into my room to return them. [Whu? Why get a sense of propriety at this late date?] and he was sorry, geez, mumble mumble, (walk away).

Those are my two passive-aggressive stories. I feel so much better now.

*Really, I think the football season is too long even with only 32 games per season per team. I hate football, and would be fine with skipping the whole season and enduring only the Super Bowl. One game every year, and I would still only watch the commercials.

Why?

Sorry to be all judgey and shit, but why does someone think this is a good idea? Note: This woman already has a 33-year old. This is like if my mom decided to have another kid. Or twins. Only my mom is not even 62-years old yet! So its more like my mom having twins when I am, what? Well, in order to not divulge my mother's age, I'll just say "older". Like my own kids will be in elementary school. Probably getting sex ed talks of their own in this hippie-dippie, drown-them-in-TMI-so-they-still-think-a-girl-can-get-pregnant-in-a-hot-tub town.

Awright, I'm babbling.

Different Kinds of Revelations

It is impossible to me that today is Thursday. This week has dragged on interminably. Each hour seems twice as long as the one before, and the week seems as though it is a whole month long.

Of course, time is a construct. Mere mortals defined time to help them control and understand the natural world. As Saint Peter notes: "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day." 2 Peter 3:8-9. That does not mean, necessarily, that the dinosaurs lived millions of years ago. No, Peter just meant that metaphorically; the dinosaurs coexisted peacefully with humans just 6,000 years ago. You can learn all about it at The Creation Museum.

Hipsters, start your engines and let the ironic road trips BEGIN!

So if dinosaurs* lived six thousand years ago, why does it seem like this week also started this long ago?

Another revelation, this one gustatory: There are Oreo Pop-Tarts. Have these been intentionally kept from me? Okay, they are not technically branded as Oreo, but that is a minor licensing issue that is no doubt being hammered out by the armies of senior associates at various NY law firms. Keep up the good work, colleagues in the Trademark department!

* If you are older than 25, and you have any interactions with small children, you already know this: The six dinosaurs of our youth are gone, replaced by multitudes of dinosaurs with unpronounceable names. Remember the brontosaurus? Gone, replaced by the diplodocus and bracheasaur. T. Rex, Triceratops are still clinging to dear . . . extinction, but they are being crowded out by other, bigger dinosaurs. Pteradactyl? Try Archeopteryx, Eoraptor or one of their cousins. Who are all these beasts? Alas, the Stegosaur is no more.

Questions, Answered.

First, here's a link to Pants-Off Dance-Off, for those of you whose google button is broken.

Second, there is one question that haunts me every time I am out of my office on a weekday. Okay, two questions: Who are these people at the cafes and restaurants? And why aren't they working? I have obtained some satisfaction from this man-on-the-street report, which confirms what I suspected. They are disabled, retired, blogging graduate students. All of them.

The End of Civilization

There is a TV show called Pants-Off Dance-Off.

It is what it sounds like.

Or is that funny enough to give one hope for humanity? I need to think on that one.

So sad

I saw a billboard for a Huey Lewis & the News show at Wente Winery today.* Huey Lewis was the first concert I ever went to - 20 years ago. I am relieved to report that I did not think, upon seeing the poster, "ohmigod! I should go see them." That would thoroughly depress me.

Not so sad: I think changing the color of the blog has reinvigorated me.

A tangent: why is it that I can think up the plots of short stories but I hate reading them? I think its because they all seem so one-note. I'm not going to read any to test the theory, so don't bother offering suggestions for ones that are "complex" or "multi-layered". Okay, talk amongst yourselves.

* Next day edit: Let's be clear, I was on the BART when I saw this poster, not at Wente Winery.

Other thoughts

Why do people sit for hours at Starbucks just staring?

Why do art students wear aggressively ugly eyewear?

Panhandling 203

The Bay Area is sort of famous, in my mind, for panhandlers with "witty" signs along the lines of "I won't lie, I need $ for weed." These annoy me highly. But today I saw a dude outside the SF MOMA with a cup and a sign that said, "give to the United Negro Pizza Fund". And that made me laugh.

Next day update: "Starvin' Like Marvin". That's another good one I've seen around.

Who'da Thunk It?

Out of the corner of my eye I caught a TV news segment on the recently formed Marin County Anti-Hoarding Task Force, and I thought it would be a quick and dirty funny post reliving certain earlier, funnier blog posts about hoarding. I was so wrong. Doing a Google search about the task force yielded such an embarassment of riches that I don't even feel up to the task of blogging about this topic. Did you know that there are professional declutterers? Support groups for the children of hoarders? Hoarders on the anti-hoarding task force? When it's this farcical, it ceases to be funny.

If you're wondering about all the changes around here, don't worry, it's just the color that's different. I won't be funnier or more topical or more interesting. I added tags, but since I have posted more than 300 times in almost 2 years, getting the catalog up to speed may take a little while. I am doing it in a totally scattershot approach, and if there's a topic you feel needs to be represented, well then, get your own blog.

Argh!

Here's the obligatory post-after-the-photo post, so you can read the text below. Someday, when I am retired, I will actually read the Help section of this damn program, and figure out how to solve this photo posting problem, and change the color of the blog, and generally make it so much nicer to visit this website. By then blogging will be so passe, you won't even check to see what it looks like. But it will rock.

Rejecting the Clamor of Weevil

A call went up from the believers, exhorting the blogger to post an image of thy holiest of corporeal maternal mentors. Yay, truly unto thee: here, here, are the godmothers.

I just wanted to be clear on that in case you were thinking: When did the Church start endorsing same sex marriage?

The little guy on the left there isn't Q's godfather, by the way. It's Father Tim.

I Forgot

I meant to post some pix in that prior post, but even I got tired of reading it. So here are some pictures. They were taken a few weeks ago when we hedged our bets. Oops, I mean, got the kids' baptized. Enjoy.

This is what passes for baptismal whites here in NoCal.

Mimi trying to read the creation story from Genesis to Q, while he eats a toy shark.

Godmothers! Gather 'round!