she's ajar

2001-09-17T10:33:00.000-04:00

hello to all in blogland, i have been shaken from my CNN-induced stupor by, as usual, a good shake delivered by Marky, he of the West Coast insatiable-media-diet. i think we could all use a little levity these days....but it's hard to come by, and for good reason. i went to a movie on Friday night, but i felt guilty about it. in the movie, there were scenes of police cars and ambulances, and the audience visibly cringed. (on a more comical note, the guy who plays Dr. Kovach on "E.R.", Goran Vijsnic, total hottie, is in the movie, "The Deep End", and he actually performs CPR on someone, and everyone was tittering because he was shouting, "No! Let me do it! One! Two! Three! Again!" ... hee hee hee, "I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV...") i have turned off the TV indefinitely...i cannot wait until the Red Sox play again tomorrow night, but I'm sure there will be nonstop disturbing commentary, not to mention what will probably be the most rousing national anthem sing-along of our lifetimes...and on and on. trying to focus on the little or bizarre details of "these events" sometimes works, sometimes doesn't. to wit, a company in Canada send several thousand pairs of protective dog shoes to NYC, for the rescue dogs, so they didn't hurt their feet in the rubble...a noble effort to be sure, but i mean, they must have a LOT of backordered stock, don't you think? dog shoes?

in oddly more poignant news, here in Boston the small thing that drove home the dislocation the most was that on the front page of the Globe a subtle change appeared. normally in the upper right hand corner there is a short weather summary, headed by a very dopey little pun, which changes every day, something like "SUNNY SIDE UP" on a nice day, or "RAIN AND BOUQUETS" on a showery May day (get it?). but since Tuesday, the little blurb just says "THE WEATHER." how gloomy.

and in slightly hilarious small news, our valiant heroes at The Onion have decided to post the same issue as last week, this Wednesday. there's not a lot of desire, they think, for pointed black humor these days. oh, sadly, not true...the fact that this whole series of events sounds like something cooked up by The Onion just makes me want a fresh dose even more...but until then, stick with The Obscure Store. there's still plenty of Obscure News...as I've just demonstrated.

2001-09-06T15:22:00.000-04:00

good afternoon to all my readers, particularly the one, the only, the singular Yuval. my, he's a good egg.

2001-09-06T10:24:00.000-04:00

as many of you remember, a while back i spent some blogtime ranting about the Levi's super-low-rise jeans ad with the headless woman whose navels sang "I'm Coming Out." well, for some strange reason, today is the day to revisit that dark time. don't ask me why, i started looking at book reviews for Naomi Wolf's new book about pregnancy and childbirth (which apparently is not so terrific anyway), and i wound up at a slightly flaky yet heart-warming site called loveyourbelly.com. ahhhh, props. so read that and then contrast it to the evil empire of Levi's, and then get a slightly more balanced view on this hilarious lowrise jeans bulletin board. all i have to say is, BRING BACK THE 80's! and by that i mean big layered pastel knits, stirrup pants, thigh-length sweaters, and all, not this Debbie Harry spike-heeled dealie they're on about these days. that's my fashion $0.02, i suppose.

2001-08-22T16:31:00.000-04:00

here's a soothing little verse for us all to think over this afternoon, shall we?

"There was once a little girl
who had a little curl
right in the middle of her forehead.
And when she was good,
she was very very good,
and when she was bad, she was horrid."

art imitating life, yet again...

2001-08-22T16:00:00.000-04:00

i apoligize once again to my blog-adoring public for my lapse in posting...things have been a little hectic lately. i seem to have been befriended, kidnapped, courted, cajoled, wined, dined, amused, seduced and generally wooed by this man here. i'll try to get back into my blogging when i get the feeling back in my legs.

2001-08-16T10:05:00.000-04:00

from the X-Files of food science comes the Monsanto Roundup Ready soybean. this tasty little bean is genetically engineered to resist the weed-killer spray, Roundup, that Monsanto makes for use in soybean fields. only problem is, scientists discovered some unidentifiable DNA in the beans. doesn't that make you want to bite into a big juicy tofuburger right about now?

2001-08-08T15:20:00.000-04:00

just had to post the funniest thing i've ever seen. file this under "if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a vibrator." note the fact that the copy only touts it's ability to massage one's neck, feet and back, yet there are "related product" links to better sex videos, and you have to be 18 to buy one. and best of all, the wacky Japanese rotating jelly-rabbit vibe is photographed with it, along with a super-70s daisy, a la SUmmer's Eve douche ads, which i guess is supposed to (wait for it...) dull the effect.

2001-08-08T15:02:00.000-04:00

true to my word, i am back this afternoon to tend my bloggy little garden some more. here is a great essay from Salon about one guy who left his broken heart in San Francisco, a town he loved -- and who doesn't? -- that was overrun and depsoiled by soulless zombie ravenous yuppie dotcommers. and speaking of Volkswagen-driving go-getters, check out this quote of the decade from a recently laid-off techie:

"Now I'm 30 years old, I have no job, I haven't had a date in months; I mean, who'd want to date me? I'm living at my aunt and uncle's house, sleeping in my cousin's old bedroom under a Laura Ashley bedspread. I mean, my relatives have been great, but--look, I had my own apartment. I'll probably have to sell my Passat next."

everybody together now: boo. hoo. hoo.

2001-08-08T09:02:00.000-04:00

"Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to dedicate this next song to a young man who doesn't think he's seen anything good today. Cameron Frye, this one's for you..."

my dearest Marky has shaken me out of my bloglapse stupor. i promise to do better, for all you readers who dutifully click over to my unbelievably obscure little realm. *sniff* how could i fail you like this? yeah, well, that's all gonna change. we have Mark Schwartz to thank. yup, Mark Schwartz deserves to be recognized for his efforts. Mark Schwartz is a man who cares about this blog. He cares about many other things too, don't get me wrong, but Mark Schwartz always makes time for the little bloggers in his life. He is one smooth guy, that Mark Schwartz, but he is also a big, friendly geek. That's why he's online so much, and so diligently, that cunning Mark Schwartz. Mark Schwartz is, i would say, a renaissance man. We can all learn a lot from Mark Schwartz. You might even say that Mark Schwartz is an inspiration to ordinary mortals like you and me. Of course, maybe you feel Mark Schwartz still has a lot to learn about life, and that may be, who's to say? all i know is, i just can't say enough things about Mark Schwartz, god love him. that Mark Schwartz, what a character! i say, Mark Schwartzes of the world, unite!

thank you, danke soen, and goodnight...

2001-07-26T16:10:00.000-04:00

ok, just as an aside, it *would* be kinda cool to be named Target. but only if you were my dog.

2001-07-26T16:07:00.000-04:00

i promise that next week i will post nothing but cheerful, optimistic musings on the essential goodness of humanity and the multifarious joys of being alive in this world, but lately there is just so much good garbage to rant about i cannot resist. so, here's something for the WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?!?!?! file - a couple from Mt. Kisco NY has posted an auction on EBay for the naming rights to their newborn son. we now pause for your primal scream moment here.

they are starting the bidding at $500,000 (at least), and in exchange they will name their child after whichever corporate entity steps up to the plate. could be they name him Starbucks, Cocacola, Visa, Rolex, Mitsubishi, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, Citibank, Adidas, Intel, Compaq, Tetley, Nabisco, Kodak, who the hell knows? what a great way to let your kid know just how much he's worth to you - by naming him Viacom! i've heard of pompous names (brothers named Harvard and Penn, after their parents' alma maters), cruel names (a girl named Monday Morning Mail after some Dylan song or something), and just plain dopey names (the couple who named their fifth kid ESPN because the dad watches it so much). but this, friends, really grazes the very bottom of the scummy fishtank of consumer capitalism. somewhere, George Orwell is chuckling over this. welcome to the world, Baby Gap.

2001-07-26T09:42:00.000-04:00

to match the gloomy, though cool, Boston weather this morning, here's a cold cup of coffee for ya: in today's NYTimes, Bob Herbert writes about the World Bank's report on the global plague that is tobacco. according to this, tobacco will soon be the #1 cause of death in the developing world, bigger than AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, car crashes, homicides, etc. AIDS and tobacco illnesses are the most rapidly growing health crises in the world. 4 times as many children in the third world take up smoking every day as in the West - that's about 68,000 or so. as i suggested to Mandy yesterday, the government should bust the tobacco companies and make nictoine available free, but only in injection and suppository form. it's so addictive people would still use it, but maybe some social stigma would finally arise around it. rather than looking cool, you would look like a real junkie freak shooting up outside your building on a smoke break, or constantly running to the ladies room to insert something in your rear to "calm your nerves." hmmmmm, i see a real future for myself in social engineering, don't you?

in other news, what the hell is wrong with Derek Lowe? once again he fritters away the Red Sox lead in the final inning, getting blown out with a big fat Toronto homer. i say switch him with Garces. let him screw things up and give Beck and Garces a chance to really warm up before they close. hmmm, could it be that i detest Lowe because of his resemblance to my cruel high school crush? nah, it's just because he just rots.

2001-07-25T12:09:00.000-04:00

to continue with my ranting about socio-racial news, Boston.com has posted an article about the sole Latino mayoral candidate, which begins this way: "Boston is more than 50% minority." um, can anybody count anymore? or use proper grammar, for that matter?

for advice, i suggest we all turn to Bonita, the wonderful Latina talkshow host and advice columnist from our perennial favorite periodical, L'Oignon. Se amo!

2001-07-19T10:16:00.000-04:00

Media Crisis Alert: Ani Difranco was supposed to perform on Dave Letterman, but the producers CANCELLED her performance and REPLACED HER with another act. Why? Ani was going to sing "Subdivision," a song about racism in America. The producers asked her at the last minute to "sing something more UPBEAT" and she refused - good for her! Dave's staff says the choice wasn not about the CONTENT of the song, but about what was more "preferable musically." what a lie. the opening line of "Subdivision" goes like this:

"White people are so scared of black people, they bulldoze out to the country and put up houses on little loopy-loop streets."

gee, i wonder why they wouldn't want that playing on David Letterman's show - because those streets are their core demographic?? Now, as for the upbeat part, let's note that the chorus of the song goes:

"And I'm wonderin' what it would take for my city to rise, first we admit our mistakes, and then we open our eyes."

what a concept. like the song says, "America the beautiful is one big subdivision." read all about it here. boycott Dave, watch The Daily Show instead.

2001-07-18T09:56:00.000-04:00

today is a day for juicy celebrity gossip. Amy Reiter's column on Salon contains, to my mind, three delicious bombshells: Minne Driver is marrying Josh "Goonies"/"Flirting With Disaster" Brolin, thus soon her stepmother-in-law will be Barbra Streisand, yikes. even better, Tom Cruise and Penelope Cruz are aparently dating, a power couple in the facial bone structure dept., but isn't he a little old for her? but best of all, and this truly boggles my mind, Laura Dern is pregnant, with BEN HARPER's baby! where have i been? that sounds like a pretty good way to get back at Billy Bob, though, doesn't it?

2001-07-16T12:48:00.000-04:00

ok people, for once, Chris Schueler has stumped me. well, not him exactly, this bizarre website he forwarded to me did. i can't explain it, but this thing can read my thoughts. yours too. just think of a dictator or a sitcom character and it will guess who it is. i had in mind Idi Amin and Nellie Olson from 'Little House on the Prairie,' and it got both. ah, the gifts of technology!

2001-07-12T17:45:00.000-04:00

i knew i went to law school for a reason. it was so i could learn about things like the patent for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. what a great country we live in!

2001-07-12T10:54:00.000-04:00

ok, just a little headsup, this is a real idiotbox-fest kinda day here in PQWorld, so if you're feeling a little *over* my pop rantings you might want to just tune back in when i have a chance to get to something more highfalutin and intellectual and all. just a thought.

true story: when i was a kid, i had four goldfish named Emmy, Tony, Oscar and Grammy. this explains a great deal, doesn't it? somehow that relates to the fact that the Emmy nominations were announced this morning, and a few little shout-outs need to be made, i think. first off, of course The Sopranos leads the pack, with 20+ nominations. so whaddyagonnado? let's talk about the capicola. next, true sitcom genius has finally been recognized with Malcolm in the Middle, with noms for the show and for Mom/Lois/Jane Kaczmarek and Malcolm/Frankie Muniz. the only drawback there is that Dad/Hal/Bryan Cranston didn't get one, he is my favorite. and it must be a red letter day in the Kaczmarek/Whitford household, where Bradley Whitford, Josh on West Wing, lives with Jane K. - he was nominated too. they have come a long way from co-starring on Touched By An Angel, thank god. and finally, on an appropriately acidic, bitchy note, let's pause to imagine the first day back on the set of Will & Grace this fall, which was nominated for best comedy: the only cast memeber who was not nominated for an acting award is, need we even say it, Debra Messing/Grace, who we just can't seem to like in the least, even after all this time. i guess it's not her fault they keep dressing her up like a Boogie Nights Barbie, but still, it must be some kind of sign.

2001-07-11T15:16:00.000-04:00

hmmmm, does this seem troubling to anyone? American Airlines is introducing a service to frequent flyers: you can "check in " for your flight over the phone. you call a number, answer those "Has anyone asked you to carry a bag for them?" questions to an *automated attendant* and then you whisk right onto your flight, carry-on bags only. lovely.

i thought it couldn't sink lower than the very suspect E-Ticket system; when i went to LA in May i bought my ticket online, went to the airport, went right to the gate, slid my ticket into a little machine and whisked right onto the plane, thinking the whole time, "I could've used a fake name, fake credit card, fake ID, etc. and could have a Thermos full of anthrax in my bag, and there'd be no way to trace it." this on top of the fact that most airport security counters are staffed by half-wit teenagers, or at least the ones in Newark Airport are. i once had my backpack searched by an indolent young lass who unzipped it, rooted her hand around inside for a second, said to me, 'you know, i don't even know what i'm lookin' for - here you go!" eeeeeep. between terrorphobia and those shots in "Cast Away" of the plane nosediving towards the ocean, i'm about ready to Amtrak it from now on. i'm sure Marky appreciates this.

2001-07-10T16:30:00.000-04:00

oh Ben Affleck, we harldy knew ye. that's right folks, he of the incongruously attractive potato-shaped head, local Cantabridgian boy made good, and portrayer of the world's first dyslexic action hero (in Pearl Harbor), is doing something very naughty for Diet Coke, my own sweet opiate of choice. sip sip sip...aaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!

2001-07-10T11:02:00.000-04:00

just when you thought she had signed off forever...

this is what a few days of "new job" yields - a fine urban legend in the making, involving a hit movie, an ice cream conglomerate, and of course, some Pop Rocks. long story short, don't let your five-year-old eat that 'Shrek'-flavored ice cream, she might swallow the Pop Rocks in it whole, and swell up rather painfully.

as usual, i promise more for later...i leave you with yet another tip o'the tiara to Steve Carrell of The Daily Show, who pointed out to us last night, "As you may or may not be aware, sex can, in fact, sell!"

2001-06-20T14:46:00.000-04:00

what a happy baby! Brit toddler swallows an Ecstasy tablet, lives to tell the tale - and drink several baby bottles of water.

2001-06-20T11:37:00.000-04:00

Good afternoon, ticketholders!

first off, i must give the shout out to SuperJustin, for he hath delivered unto me this day a fine and glorious link, yea, verily. check out the Interactive Ralph Wiggum. what a cute little twerp he is. ralph, i mean, not Justin. well, maybe him too.

in other news, join me in a cathode-ray-tube-smashing rampage as i methodically destroy every TV in the universe for showing that ludicrous new Levi's ad with the headless women whose navels are singing 'I'm Coming Out.' further comment on this offal would be superfluous and would also probably jumpstart my facial tic again, so let's leave that alone. someone will pay for this, and pay big.

the other frightening TV moment of the week so far came, of course, from K-Tel. or some such musical nostalgia repackaging company. right before The Daily Show the other night, we clicked over an ad for a NINETIES ROCK COMPLATION. jesusmaryandjoseph, the decade is not yet cold in the ground at they are spining out crappy compilations of such equally memorable bands as Stone Temple Pilots, Hootie, and Nirvana. just as my jaw started to drop at this very notion, they reached out and hammered a stake right into my cold little Gen11 heart - "Brick" by Ben Fold Five is on there! they even showed a clip of the video! NIHILO SANCTUM ESTNE? i screamed and dropped the remote...have not yet fully recovered. i once again start a refrain of my soothing late-20's mantra: "Still hip....still hip!...still hip...."

yeah, just keep telling yourself that...

2001-06-15T11:34:00.000-04:00

looks like i might as well pack it in, i will no longer be a productive member of society (*snort snort*) now that i have discovered uselessknowledge.com. trivia overdose commencing...

2001-06-13T15:07:00.000-04:00

oh yay, a couple with prom outfits made entirely out of duct tape! apparently there is a contest for the best design, but the vest and patterned skirt get my vote. man, i was lame in high school.

2001-06-13T15:00:00.000-04:00

leave it to The Onion to ferret out another real live pop queen for us. am i this girl? possibly. do i have a crush on her, or at least her Newbury Comics equivalent with the Allston bangs, cats-eye glasses, and nice round bum? probably. am i also interested in her passel of "slim-hipped good-looking hipster guys'? oh yeah. it's that bedhead-fanboy-squareglasses thing, it's a real problem for me.

2001-06-13T10:56:00.000-04:00

thank you, Paul, i will try to be a good wife from now on. even though i'm a jaded single bi social-democrat slacker attorney, i will try, o yes i will.

2001-06-13T10:34:00.000-04:00

hey, look at this, G Love has a new record! have i mentioned that my new job is located directly above the Newbury Comics in Government Center? they should just pay me in gift certificate form.

2001-06-13T10:18:00.000-04:00

like the song says, 'To hell with love.' new study from good old Rutgers, the state u. of NJ at which i narrowly avoided spending the best years of my adolescence, shows that American 20somethings have an unrealistically idealistic view of marriage. there's some research dollars well spent. probing insights like 'They expect their spouse to provide for their every emotional need" and "They think there are too many divorces, and that their own marriages will not end in divorce" would go undiscovered were it not for people like this. hey, isn't "unrealistically idealistic" redundant?

2001-06-12T15:17:00.000-04:00

i will never wash my Yahoo email account again! i sent Paul Lukas an email about the Godzilla meat thing and he *replied*, in timely and witty fashion. siiiiiigh.

i hereby order all my subjects to order all the back issues of Beer Frame and his book, "Inconspicous Consumption," and keep them next to your bed, like me --- the "Enemy Wind" review will slay you every time. he is a golden god!

2001-06-12T14:21:00.000-04:00

dear god, maybe i can scoop Paul Lukas on this one!!! ok, i can't even believe i'm writing this, but someone is going to start selling canned Godzilla meat from Japan. where else? as they say, break me off a piece of that! mmmmmmm, beastie.

2001-06-12T14:05:00.000-04:00

this is the quote of the day, from Garrison Keillor:

"Boston is a charming city that I associate with a sort of fusty and pointless eccentricity that drives
me nuts. A city of crazy aunts."

yes, yes it is. i think the first demi-blog i split off will be all about this town, i will change my name to the Bean Queen, ehhhxcellent.

is that new Guided By Voices song good or what? it's good. so is the new Radiohead, what are they, reading that '7 Habits of Highly Effective People' book? they are so prolific. it's good.

in unrelated musical news, if you want to buy my extra Dave Matthews ticket for this Saturday night in Foxboro, MA, plead your case to yourpopqueen@hotmail.com. if you want to make fun of me for going to Dave Matthews, do the same, and i will respond in kind. i'm good like that.

2001-06-11T15:39:00.000-04:00

i have a hot tip for everyone this afternoon: buy stock in Band-Aids because i bought enough of them last night to clothe myself from head to foot. what a messy proposition that would be.

but i digress, that was a little prelude to sketching out the details of my Jet-Setter Weekend: she's here, she's there, she's in NJ doing magic tricks for Ellis Paul, she's in Boston embarrassing Mary Lou Lord, she's nearly falling off a ferry into Boston Harbor, she's at the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, NJ soaking up the crappy ambience . . . you name it, the popqueen was in effect. my most effectual moment is the one that has to do with Band-Aids, thus i will relate it forthwith (already practicing that jargon, baby).

i sustained my most spectacular frisbee-related injury to date yesterday, bumping into the #2 slot the time i got clipped in the ear and i couldn't hear for 2 days. what with the lovely weather, sweeping harbor views, and surfeit of rolling green lawns out on George's Island yesterday, we all decided to toss around the old disc, which starts out innocent and then quickly gets cutthroat when you're dealing with wizened ex-college ultimate players. so i took off after a long throw, down a little hill, foolishly, foolishly, and promptly bit it on some asphalt, drawing stupefied yet admiring responses from my fellows and shredding large expanses of skin in a very 'ESPN Extreme Sports' kind of way. oooooooouch. since there was no first aid on the island, i toughed it out, thinking how lucky i was that i didn't break my arm or worse, and feeling the numbing effect of homemade adrenaline. this all came crashing to a halt at about 10pm, when i got in the shower at home. ooooooooooouch. and now i am coated with Neosporin and looking at a hideous week or so of fancy Band-Aids and dull throbbing pain. not even i am that much of a masochist, o well. too bad i'm not in second grade anymore, i could let my peers inspect the damage for kicks. these days, i just sound like a jackass: 'Yeah, i fell down yesterday, uh, playing frisbee.'

ok, i was going to regale you all further, but i just got an email from the Ghost of Christmas Past. i love temporally-sensitive blogging. more later, she teased.

2001-06-06T15:35:00.000-04:00

people, people, settle, people, settle...ahem...i'm here to tell you, the rumors are true, i got a job today. comment upon this would be somewhat superfluous, other than to say W-O-O-O-O-H-O-O-O-O-O!!!!

even better than this, in a way, is this incredibly brilliant site i found today, thanks to none other than Maureen Dowd, NYTimes columnist and all-around shrew: jumptheshark.com, devoted to ascertaining the very moment when a TV series goes bad, either by adding a stupid new character, having a flashback episode or an unnecessary wedding, or otherwise going to seed. the guy who came up with this deserves to be knighted Sir Pop by me, the PQ, don't you agree. you will...

2001-06-04T11:09:00.000-04:00

oh yeah, and i'm a famous art collector now, i've got Chris' original "Starbucks: A Defense" right here, baby.

2001-06-04T11:02:00.000-04:00

Monday is Cocoa Day in the frigid wastelands of my office. i should open a chain of cafes that look just like office kitchens, it will be all self-serve and will consist only of amalgamated powdered beverages, just like you whip up at work. for example, what i'm drinking right now will be called the Choco-Cardigan, for those days when the air conditioning is cranked up and you left your sweater on the kitchen table at home: two packets Swiss Miss Instant Cocoa (one sugarfree, one w/sugar), two Mini-Moo hideously synthetic non-dairy creamers, hot water from the water cooler, and one Hershey's Kiss. A similar treat is the Mint Mock Mocha my friend from Reebok invented one slow afternoon: half a cup of industrial coffee, one cocoa packet, assorted dairy from the various carafes at the condiment station, and a couple Altoids for a zingy mint shot. Also, there's the Deep Throat: one teabag, 50 squeezes-worth of honey from the Honey Bear, 1/4 cup hot water, and three quarters of lemon purloined from the salad bar in the cafeteria. man, this will be like the Microsoft of beverage joints! i'm a cheap and evil genius!

all of which brings me to Salon's Worst Summer Movies That Never Were, which is pretty accurate, for a spoof. having seen the lumbering 'Pearl Harbor' and the more-than-decent 'Shrek' in LA last weekend, i am not looking forward to the cinematic harvest with any great anticipation, except for Harry Potter, but that's not until Thanksgiving. can i get any more geeked out? highly likely.

2001-06-01T15:29:00.000-04:00

fear not, blogophiles, the PQ has not abandoned ye. after returning from the foggiest weekend in LA ever, i was attacked by allergies, beset by insomnia, and had a wee car accident. a lot to deal with in the space of three days. so i am slowly getting around to my usual prolific self, i promise.

maybe i need one of these things, so i can live forever.

oh and let me put in a plug for chris' inadvertently brilliant site (and social movement) shovelchick. shovelchick is dead. long live shovelchick.

2001-05-27T19:02:00.000-04:00

yes, in fact, the BLOG rises again. . . just a little test there below.

hello, all you listeners out there in blogland, as most of you know i am in Los Angeles right now, here at Chez Schwartz, where darling Marky and I have been waiting out the fog. that's right, fog, here in LA, not in San Fran. it has been Attack of the Marine Layer here in SoCal, or as Mark would probably say, 'The weather has been just total fucking scheisse for weeks now. God hates me.' sunny as his disposition may be, Mark is an excellent guide to the environs hereabouts, leading us on many high speed adventures in his would-be AssholeMobile. the power of Christ compels him!

i will have many more detes later on, for now just take a moment to recognize that in fact, yes, it is a whole different scene out here on the proverbial left coast. this was driven home most pointedly by several things, possibly the most by the hordes of young women wearing a bizarre combination of camouflage and beach attire, and the overwhelming preference for silicone over plain old flesh on just about everybody. but i digress. . . must return to the Lakers game, too see if Tim 'Shrek' Duncan does in fact off himself in despair after the Spurs get utterly spanked. see how easy it is?

2001-05-27T18:52:00.000-04:00

apparently the BLOG is BACK! sweet Jesus, give me green lights!

2001-05-24T14:09:00.000-04:00

i am writing my blog, even though my blog is broken, that's blog devotion, yeah yeah yeah...

i think those are some lyrics i just wrote...maybe Jonathan Richman will sing them. woohoo!

it is Thursday, i am going to Los Angeles in 18 hours and i have not packed, have no cash, no ticket (well it's an e-ticket), and dinner plans tonight. mmmmmm, Tibetan food. mmmmmm, Aldus. As Big Pun might say, "I don't wanna be a playa no more." Though, he also might say, "I'm not a playa, I just crush a lot." you decide!

i know i've been waxing lyrical a lot lately, but since Marky and I seem to be having a mind-meld over the very appropriate song 'Screenwriter's Blues' by Soul Coughing, i will quote away:

"It is 5am, and you are listening, to Los Angeles . . . you are going to Reseda to make love to a model from Ohio whose real name you don't know . . . and the radio man says it is a beautiful night out there, and the radio man says women were a curse, and so men built Paramount Studios, men built Columbia Studios . . . we are all in some way or another going to Reseda, some day, to die . . and the radio man laughs, because the radio man fucks a model too . . . "

i think that works better if you can hear the 'wee-ee wee-ee wee-ee wee-ee' synth effect that goes with the song in your head. but then again, maybe you can.

more later --- dear god, fix my blog...

2001-05-23T16:07:00.000-04:00

wednesday is Return to Hilarity Day around here, thanks to the good people at, uh, Todd. he just sent me a truly odd and excellent link, fresh from the net of his webtrawler and flopping about wildly onthe deck: Men Who Look Like Kenny Rogers.com. can we ask for finer fare these days? oh i don't think so, no.

i'll continue the Todd shout-out by sharing with you some of his original poetry, specifically what i call his 'Sig File Haiku Masterpiece':

Windows NT crashed.
I am the Blue Screen of Death.
No one hears your screams.

(somber pause) he's a poet for the ages, our Toddy. outta my way, biped!

for even greater levity, head over to the back-on-the-street Onion, and go directly to that which will slay you mercilessly as it did me, Jim Anchower's Column, "My Weed Connection Is Dried Up." so...brilliant...losing...ability...to...write...without...ellipses...

and speaking of poetry, transcendental drug use, and meandering punctuation, Jack Kerouac's manuscript to 'On The Road' was sold at auction for $2.4 million, to the guy who owns the Indiana Colts. boing! some kind of karmic rubberband just snapped there, i think. note in the article Lawrence Ferlinghetti carping about how J.K. himself would be horrified at the thing becoming an 'object of consumer culture.' hmmmm...i quote the text directly:

"Whither goest thou, America, in thy shiny car in the night?"

2001-05-22T15:22:00.000-04:00

rain shmain.

in iowa, a 9 year old boy was busted for dealing pot. to some 14 year olds. which he stole from his father's stash. comment on this would be redundant, as would ranting and/or shaking fist at sky.

to lighten this 'Traffic'-esque gloom, i propose to deem today Steve Carrell Day, as in Steve Carrell from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, my separated-at-birth twin brother. last night i experienced some kind of comic nirvana, at approximately 11:07 PM EST, when they launched Steve Carrell's Tribute to Steve Carrell Hosted by Steve Carrell with the story about "curry pushers' in the big city. by the time they showed the 'Slimming Down with Steve' clip where he goes to the nutritionist, makes pasta primavera ("Bam!") and then sings that song from "Godspell" as grace i had fallen off the sofa entirely, wheezing for breath and pissing myself. uh, figuratively speaking, that is. and the Brookhaven National Labs bit...brilliant! as if that show isn't funny enough with just the J-man, Steve Carrell is rising to the esteemed level of, 'I just can't even *look* at that guy without cracking up!," which has heretofore been reserved only for only Chris Cattan and Bill Murray. so kudos to you, Steve, wherever you are...(fade up music)

oh and i can't believe i've been remiss for so long, as to have neglected to share one of the best links there is, to Disturbing Search Requests. i won't even explain it, just click it (warning: mature content! *snort*) and you'll thank me later.

gathering up all shreds of ambient luck for job interview, please place in basket on way out...

2001-05-21T16:36:00.000-04:00

Holy alumni, Batman, what a weekend just transpired. I can't decide which was the best moment: realizing that *nobody* has a job that they like (i.e. it's not just me)? heckling the Class of 2001 midnight candlelighting ceremony? finding a taxi and a parent's car smacked up against my poor innocent parked CRV at 8:30 AM Sunday just before graduation whilst i was still very very hungover and clad in my pajamas? my long lost roommate PhaPha disrobing in my kitchen after a long night at The Burren? fleeing the Class of 96 picnic because there were so many strollers and toddlers? eating cold hotdogs in the dark on a South End patio while playing stupid camp games about people we hooked up with in college? discovering that many of the people i always *wanted* to hook up with in college but never actually did are a) still living around here and b) still basically cute and single? what a mishmash...one thing is for sure, i won't be coughing up any big donations to the alma mater any time soon, seing as how the school continues to diss the a cappella group i co-founded when providing entertainment for these dopey events. so there, Jumbo!

but moving on, there can be no news more disturbing than today's announcement by IBM that they have actually fabricated some pixie dust and are using it to dominate the world of stupid computer company TV commercials...'programmers from a parallel universe,' my ass. clearly some R&D guys cloned Tinkerbell and crushed her up into powder for their own nefarious data-compression ends...this is a human rights violation, not a banner day for technology! what next, encryption software written in Harry Potter's blood? where will it end?

like all things, it will end with the tax collector, and if you're lucky you'll just shower him with nuts and keep walking. 'the hell am i on about? yes, my brethren, it's true, a man in Ohio sent 642 peanuts in a box to the tax office to pay his $642 tax bill. the tax office was careful to add that 'Barter is not an acceptable form of payment." i am still chuffing into a paper bag over this. and yes, i pinched this link from darling Jim Romenesko, ObscureStore god. i know he won't mind because i'm funnelling site traffic to him like you wouldn't believe, my new friend Aldus alone will probably generate a slew of bidness for him. hi Aldus - see, i wasn't kidding.

um, by a show of hands, who thinks i need a nap, some more diet coke, and/or some large animal tranquilizer? hmmmm, not a majority, clearly...i can then safely rant on about last night's XFiles season ender. Memo to Chris Carter: GET A LIFE, MAN! who was in the story conference on this one, a Sunday School class of first-graders? chris (guy incognito, not carter) and i were like groaning and beating our heads against the wall as the allegory spun right out of control: the flight from the evil overlord, the humble birthing place, the Star of Alienethlehem, Mulder as Joseph the surrogate father, the freaky baby that will save the planet, the three wise gunmen bearing gifts...uncle! uncle! we get it! even confirmed atheists get it, let it go! i have to say, they missed a real opportunity to have Agent Reyes come on to Scully there...all that time she was skulking around in her little white t-shirt we were waiting for her to say something like, 'Dana, now that we're finally alone...' hee hee hee. i guess there's always next season...though after the tender anticlimactic liplock betwixt Mulder and Scully (or are they Fox and Dana now...bleggggh, that sounds like something out of The Preppy Handbook) looks like they're both off the market. if anyone has alternative theories as to whether or not Mulder did actually get into Scully's pants
last season and the bambino is not in fact an alien-implant insta-pregnancy, dash them off to yourpopqueen@hotmail, i am all ears. i guess time will tell if Erica was right about it being an "Alien Filth Baby" or not...seemed pretty cute so far, but that's no indication, look at E.T. i always hated E.T.

2001-05-18T10:48:00.000-04:00

ever feel like a flake of glitter in a snowglobe? shaken and sloshed and then drifting lazily downward? that, my friends, is my new metaphor of the self...it's a little unsettling, maybe, but i like it. i'm feeling very tiny, peaceful, and shiny lately, what can i say?

alright, enough of that cryptic hooey, what we really want to get into is, was i the only one left slack-jawed with shock at the sheer volume of dramatic conflagrations they managede to pack into 'ER' last night? first i must, of course, digress onto the related topic of how much i love seeing those creme de la creme commercials they put on during that hour, the really really expensive ones, like a minute long, for carefully demographed products like Weekly Prozac (which sounds like a newspaper masthead), Apple computer, and that 'A.I.' movie...which by the way, what is Spielberg after, the Irving Thalberg Lifetime Overachievement Award? it looks cool and all, but come on, it's 'Pinocchio.' 'American Sweethearts,' on the other hand, is like one of those 'Which 3 celebrities would you like to share a hottub with?' questions: that clip of John Cusack and Julia Roberts laughing in the back of a cab like shorted out my TV with its apocalyptic star wattage. but i'm losing the thread here...

ah yes, the pinnacle of melodrama that is 'ER.' i have to say, they know how to do it. especially after the laughably farcical 'Friends' (as *IF* Rachel would let everyone think that Monica was pregnant on her wedding day without saying anything, even for that show it surpasses all shallowness), it was a great episode, like throwing fistfuls of nailpolish remover onto a fire: Adele the social worker might be paralyzed! Cleo might get HIV from the vial of blood that broke in her hand (how the hell did they do that 'oozing blood' effect, anyway?)! Peter gets punched in the face! The nice mom from last week vomits blood and dies! Carter lays his big fat crush on the line for Abby and then just walks away! Dr. Legaspi gets fired! Elizabeth and the baby might be slaughtered by the crazed abusive father gunman! Mark actually hastens this man's death by trapping him in the elevator while he goes into cardiac arrest, and falsifies evidence so that it looks like he was treated! and of course, the piece de resistance, Carrie comes out to Dr. Romano (and herself, by the look of it) in the men's bathroom, while threatening to expose him as a homophobe - and gives the shout-out to Dr. Maggie Doyle, the babealicious Jorja Fox from back in the day! SWEET! i guess there's still something good on TV every now and again.

on that note, i'm off to a weekend of nostalgia, or something, at the ol' 5-year college reunion, which takes place conveniently right down the street from my house at the campus. i remember when i was still in school i thought all the lingering post-grads in the neighborhood were big losers. i am that big loser, apparently. while you're laughing at me, go check out The Obscure Store today, i can't even begin to explain the variety of horrified-children-and-dead-animal stories that are up there...i quote Ralph Wiggum: 'When I grow up, I'm going to Bovine University!'

2001-05-16T16:12:00.000-04:00

i just had to post this stunning bit of online symmetry...not only is there a wickedly amusing website out there named poploser.com dedicated to ranting about pop music, it's featured 'Moment of Shite' for the week involves...you guessed it, Duran Duran. how perfect is that? of course, if you don't know my last name, i guess this makes less sense to you than it could.

2001-05-16T14:56:00.000-04:00

Anonymous Man revealed!

it appears that Anonymous Man (see yesterday) is in fact Mark Mulcahy, and he is beloved not just by a slew of NYC fanboys but also by the likes of Elliott Smith, Paula Cole and, no shit, Thom Yorke. which was enough to convince my impoverished but unstoppable self to order both his CD's, reviews to come. don't ever say i never did nothin for my art...though that art appears to be a life-long, real-time performance piece on the dubious value of bankrupting yourself at various obsessive shrines of popculture obscurity...what a crowdpleaser!

do i even need to give voice to my irritation with The Onion's lack of a new edition today? just when i need to chuckle darkly to myself, they go on holiday. damn you, sweet Onion, i will satisfy the dark chuckling need elsewhere! like at ModernHumorist.com, whose Summer Movie Preview makes me want to camp out at the multiplex as soon as possible.

and the greatest tidbit of the day belongs, of course, to those gods among men, those twanging rogues, the very cast-iron frying pan upon which my butter-pat heart melts into nothingness on a regular basis, Wilco. not only are they a) releasing a new album this summer entitled 'Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" (lead single: 'I Am Trying To Break Your Heart.' Like, duh.) and b) getting a documentary made about them, they are having a FREE SHOW Fourth of July weekend! of course, the show is in Chicago and i won't even be in Massachusetts that week, i'll be in Rhode Island at the nuptial extravaganza of Jack and Mary (who met at my house, let's give credit where it's due), but i mean, come on, free Wilco is good for everyone. i quote Jeff Tweedy himself: "Maybe all I need is a shot in the arm..."

oh by the way, Chris is still Guy Incognito, in case you were wondering.

2001-05-15T14:21:00.000-04:00

HOSTES ALIENIGENI ME ABDUXERUNT! QUI ANNUS EST?

for all those who did not take years of Latin, like my sorry pedantic self, that means, 'I was kidnapped by aliens! What year is it?' thus i explain my bloglapse of late. the truth is out there, and it ain't pretty.

working in reverse chronological order, just hitting the highlights, i drove roundtrip to New York City last night (actually i sat on my can't-drive-stick ass whilst sweet sweet Todd drove the whole way and did not kill us, thanks man!) to see Katell Keineg gently but thoroughly rock the Mercury Lounge. we didn't get too lost on the West Side Highway, we only spent $23 on parking, and i had a truly memorable pastrami sandwich for dinner at Katz's deli, where believe it or not Bjork is one of the celebrities with her picture up on the wall. the club itself was no great shakes, though we managed to snag the last two spots to lean up against along the brick wall, which led to a long soliloquy of whining by yours truly about the state of my feet, as Todd remembers only too well. the first opening band was channelling Edie Brickell and Dwight Yoakam in equal parts, and their repertoire included the most unneccessarily lengthy love song about an iguana ever written. next up was a semi-compelling solo artist i can refer to only as Anonymous Man, because he never said what his name was and we didn't have ticket stubs or anything...it was kind of a symbol for all the great foolish understatements of New York. i found exactly half of his songs amazing, the other half somnolent and/or irritating, depending on whether he sang in his head voice (bad) or his chest (bueno!). in regular voice, he sounded a bit like David Gray, but with far better lyrics; in falsetto he was a pale, soft-rock imitation of Thom Yorke, and who needs that? Anonymous Man has quite the fervent fan base, though, ironically; the room filled to bursting with angsty, square-glasses type guys, in their cuffed blue jeans and bedheads, who quivered with recognition at A.M.'s plangent make-a-man-outta-me love songs. it was sweetly comical.

miss katell was not only in tip-top, worth-the-trip shape, she was very friendly to us after the show, considering this is the second time we're turned up at an out of state gig for her and we are not, in fact, stalking her. score one for karmic return, she is playing soon at The Druid in Cambridge, we promised to assemble a full house. we snapped our digital picture and headed off, swilling down big bottles of water and scaring off the denizens of Houston Street. the best part of the night had to be the Hostess Fruit Pies, though, i have to say. who can resist on in the dead of Connecticut night? oh no, not me.

rolling into Boston at 4:30 this morning, i asked myself again, if you can't do foolhardy things when you're 26, when will you do them? that's me, the half-assed Kerouac of Somerville.

before this odyssey, i spent a perversely exciting weekend on the fabled Rollercoaster of Love, the (Quasi)Dating Vortex, the Roulette Wheel of Post-Adolescent Socialization. which is far, far to complicated to get into at this particular sleep-deprived moment, yet is a rich tapestry of anecdotes both joyful and woeful. let's just say for now, you haven't lived until your name comes up as a match to your ex-girlfriend's personal ad. irony, thy name is woman. more later, must continnue swelling up like a parched tick on diet coke...

2001-05-10T13:21:00.000-04:00

people who walk down the street yakking on their cell phones bug me. just a thought. i have two friends who do this, and it it is inexplicably irksome when they call me and the connection is all spotty and breathless because they're trotting along somewhere. on the other hand, last night i was simultaneously speeding along Route 128 while shouting into my cell phone (note thatsoon this might be against the law) about how i just made plans to fly out to LA in a few weeks....who am i?

i am not, surely, any of the fascinating people enshrined in today's Obscure Store, that's for sure. i know i keep cribbing lots of links off this poor man's site, but who could resist? There's an out of control garbage truck, a baby butch lesbian prom king, and a crazy nude plumber back home in NJ, and that's just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. it's a banner weird-news kind of day, i guess.

speaking of obscure, through some fortuitous blip in the mind-numbing monolith of corporate radio the local mid-range pop channel is playing a trio of old skool U2 songs, hurtling me back in a vortex of nostalgia to the early 90's and my days of Eire-o-phile obsession...first 'Angel of Harlem,' which granted is not a total rarity, but then 'All I Want Is You' (the whole 6+ minute version) followed by 'Bad,' to my pleasant surprise. oh, it takes very little...

2001-05-09T14:29:00.000-04:00

it is so lovely outside today i think i will leave this toil and become an itinerant minstrel, though how much success i'll find here in MetroWest i'm not too sure...at least there's plenty of malls with nice fake turf grass upon which to prance around here. Framingham is, i believe, the New Jersey of Massachusetts: one long tangle of highways plastered with strip mall after strip mall, plus a 'real' mall (though that's technically in Natick), and there's positively no 'there' there. but in fact people live here, which is certainly the case with my home state also. duh. driving down Route 9 brings a tear to my eye, it's comforting to know that other stretches of this great nation are as blighted, uh, i mean, blessed with an abundance of mattress stores, leather discounters and Jiffy Lubes.

speaking of which, foolish NJ congresswoman Marge Roukema is introducing a resolution condemning "The Sopranos" as derogatory towards Italian-Americans. now that's a wise use of our federal government's time, it's not like there are more important things to debate on Capitol Hill...that reminds me of a statistic i read once that fully one-third of Congressional floor time is taken up with 'non-essential' business like declaring it National Pickle Week or giving out recommendations to Eagle Scouts and whatnot. yes, i am forming a breakaway republic, please send your resumes to yourpopqueen@hotmail.com to enlist, choice positions in my junta are going fast...

anyway, i propose someone investigate this congresswoman, she clearly does not capably represent her state if she is denial about some basic facts, like for one that there *are in fact people just like Tony Soprano.* sure, some of them live in New York too, but let's not shortchange the NJ-mobster demographic. and of course not all Jersey Italo-Americans are in the mob, but plenty of them like to *front* like they are, and enjoy "The Sopranos" just as much as this Lithuano-PuertoRica-American from the same Garden State. frankly that show has done far more good for Jersey's cultural cachet than harm, and most likely those that are repulsed by it are repulsed by the overwhelming violence and graphic sexual scenes (i like James Gandolfini a lot, but i so do not need to see his 'Tony getting blown by a stripper' face so often), which are just not going to play well if they were enacted by, say, a group of auto mechanics from Tulsa, than by a crew of Jersey mobsters. embrace the cliche, i say, there's really no other way to hold your head up if you're a product of NJ. just in case you were wondering....

2001-05-08T11:29:00.000-04:00

"Get off my plane!"

that is the quote of the day, owing to the fact that Mandy and I caught most of "Air Force One" on TV last night, and boy was it awful and hilarious. does this explain my immeasurably better mood today? possibly...could also be the Fresh Samantha (Deperately Seeking C flavor) i chugged for breakfast today...how can they make spending $3 on 12 oz. of juice so worthwhile? a mystery. oh yes, this rottern movie: we had both remembered being really into it when we saw it in the theater many eons ago, but apparently it a) wasn't that good to begin with and/or b)just doesn't hold up over time. we were literally rolling on the floor laughing at, for example, the cheesy Russian military music that struck up whenever Gary Oldman's Red cronies appeared onscreen, or the truly poor special effects when the White House staffers are parachuting out the back of the plane, or little minor plot details like, why can't the President of the United States send a simple fax by himself? wouldn't all those stray bullets being fired inside the cabin potentially cause some pressurization problems? how could WIlliam H. Macy possibly pull Harrison Ford into the plane with his bare hands against the combined wind speed, suction factor and g-forces of hanging out the back of a jet in flight? (that one goes right up there with the scene in "Aliens" where Ripley suspends the weight of herself, the Mutha Alien and the metal suit contraption thingy on her *elbow* before they get sucked out of the ship into the vacuum of space....riiiiiiight.) in any event, it was a veritable Mystery Science Theater 3000-level quipfest, not bad for Monday night network television.

in other news, let us take just a moment to all hail ani difranco, touchstone and goddess of my post-adolescence, whose new double-cd 'Reveling and Reckoning' is so so so so great. now, it's not every day that an artist who symbolizes a whole slew of admirable qualities, like do-it-yourself corporate rock subversion and of course limitless talent, who has provided a soundtrack to just about every key interlude of your personal development over the last eight years or so, treats you right after sort of letting you down. which is to say, though i've stuck by her in these past few experimental phases, i haven't truly *dug* anything she's put out since 'Little Plastic Castle' (ironically, since just about everyone hates that one), and the two records before that were relatively shmeh also. (yes, i just said 'shmeh.') all of that was swept under the carpet, however, with this new release, which has one disc of introspective acoustic stuff and one of the more rockin' variety w/Maceo Parker, the free jazz trumpet guy who got introduced to ani by Prince, it's a small world. is it possible that this record sounds so much like the old skool ani that it is in fact the all new ani? i think it might. i can't get the song 'Your Next Bold Move' out of my head, even though it's pretty depressing:

"Coming of age during the plague of Reagan and Bush
watching capitalism gun down democracy
It had this funny effect on me, I guess.
I am cancer, I am HIV
and I'm down at the Blue Jesus Blue Cross Hospital
just lookin' up from my pillow, feelin' blessed."

just a little ditty to hum whilst i toil for corporate dollars here in lovely downtown Framingham...or at least, pretend to toil. off to write reams of email, uh, i mean, increase my productivity.

2001-05-07T13:49:00.000-04:00

ok, lunch is done, and i remembered the other thing i was going to wax about. you know all those Ab-slide-y exercise machines out there? the ones that look like a cross between an Imac and a rolling pin, where you do elaborate mechanized pushups, basically, on your living room rug? well, i saw several different commericals for them over the weekend, and am i utterly naive or are these things total porn? i thought i had clicked into the Spice channel, with all the tight zooming butt-shots and tiny tiny hotpants and clenching of muscles under fake-bake tanned skin. there is a great deal of flesh on display, and *none* of these people looks like they *need* their ab-roly-poly in the least. there's actually one where the camera is shooting upward from underneath a plexiglas floor, on which a particularly steroidal guy is rolling back and forth and, uh, bobbing towards and away from the camera in a terribly, well, coital way, and i thought, 'good god, is this an outtake from 'Sex and the City' or a clip from the Miss Lonelyhearts Film Festival? Or both?' um, not that i'd know anything about that...

2001-05-07T13:09:00.000-04:00

interesting results indeed! i believe i set the land-speed record for BAD KARMA in the last seven days, friends. i've decided to begin waging a campaign of pure malevolence towards the world, which might somehow offset this BAD KARMA stream...since i was (mostly) benevolent before --- and look where *that* got me --- i figure if i become a complete bitch-goddess maybe some undeserved good will float my way. that's right, i'm all about logical. i'm also far too nice (as those of you who have pointed out the "too nice" tattoo above my eyebrows already know) to make much of an evil mastermind, so most likely things will just continue to putter along at this same soul-scuffing pace. lovely.

so, in short, the quasi-date became a non-event when Suitor #1 called up to cancel/postpone/whatever. now, i'm a big girl and it's all good, but damned if i wasn't right in the middle of a pre-date pedicure when he called, and how deeply coincidental (BAD KARMA! BAD KARMA!) is that? note to self, be sure to explore this bizarre new trend in self of reclamation of girly pastimes rejected wholly back in like 11th grade in future blog entry...anyhoo, i would also like to rant about the new capri pants i bought on Saturday which i was planning to wear to said quasi-date also. now, let me first quote my incredulous friend Paul on this topic: "[Popqueen]?! YOU bought these things for a DATE?!" no, i replied, i bought them because i've decided they are in fact here to stay, just like those stupid chunky black slides and bastardized courier bags. they serve a weather purpose, as Judi and i discussed (hi Judi!), midway between pants and shorts, as any fool can see. and my quest encompassed 4 different stores at CamridgeSide Galleria (another note to self: never go to Old Navy on a saturday afternoon again), and a total of 12 different pair of pants. not wanting to look like Rizzo from Grease, it took a while to find the right ones; i mean, there's a reason these things went out of style in the first place, believe me. all of which is to say, new pants + new toenails + sunday afternoon after a week that was a complete shitfest - prearranged companion for said outing = not a happy girl. rrrrr!

on the upside, the red sox won (sweet sweet Pedro!), "Malcolm In The Middle" was bladder-strainingly hilarious, and as one very patient individual (yes, that's you Bil) pointed out to me this morning, there's plenty of fish in the sea --- and he should know, he's one of them. so is all in the end right with the world? sure, yeah, whatever. i quote your show of shows: "Do you want to know the secret to eternal happiness? Just send a dollar to Happy Dude, 742 Evergreen Terrace, Springfield..."

it would take me all day to link all the immensely amusing stuff at The Obscure Store today, particularly the nude screaming man, the out of control Amish teenagers, and the Minnesota legislature's spring cleaning of archaic laws (like the prohibition on all-night dancing), but you'll just have to click over there yourself. god bless jim romenesko.

in slightly less amusing news, a new study finds that "motorists" (oh how i love being a motorist!) spend 36 hours a year sitting in traffic. now, i for one don't spend nearly that much, luckily, but who are they trying to scare with this statistic? people with weak bladders or short tempers who absolutely must avoid traffic snarls? the real scary number is 520 - that's how many hours i spend a year driving to and from the office, almost none of it 'stuck' in traffic but sitting in my car, spewing out exhaust as i rocket along the MassPike nonetheless! note that all the *other* places i drive to add many many hours to that baseline. which all brings up the crucial point: if you're listening to good music in the car, it's all worth it, right? sure, i'll probably get a spot in hell right next to Henry Ford for thinking this, but i'd *still* rather have two hours a day of private thoughts and musical interlude (not to mention loud, brassy singalongs to said music) in my car alone that take the T to work. of course, if someone was picking up the tab for the thousands of extra miles i'm putting on the leased automobile in question, i'd like it even more.

the rambling is reaching fever pitch here, i think it's time to have lunch...

2001-05-04T12:30:00.000-04:00

will this week ever end? all hell breaking loose, big bumblebees everywhere, red sox getting hammered by the mariners, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria! speaking of which, right here in Boston a tortoise, ladies and gentlemen, was selected for jury duty. the best part is, he was added to the voter rolls because his name was on the mailbox of his owners, as a little joke. who knew it was so easy to gain citizenship?

of course, my psycho mailman would have none of that, since he carefully monitors who's listed over the doorbell. you don't want to mess with a guy who writes you notes on your mail, defaces your house, carries the mail in the trunk of his own car, and doesn't wear a uniform (unless postal shorts and a Simpsons t-shirt is an official uniform). he wields total power in my neighborhood - we all loathe him, but nobody wants to complain about him else we get a 'special delivery' and/or stop getting mail altogether. so we live in fear of running into him while he delivers the mail in his own special way, like by *size* depending on what day of the week it is. seriously, we get all letters on Monday, all catalogs and magazines on Wednesday, nothing but circulars on Friday, and then on Saturday a different carrier brings a slew of mail, apparently because Mr. Psycho leaves whatever he doesn't feel like carrying in the bin at the central p.o. in short, on my street the postman doesn't ring at all.

on that note, off to a weekend of household tasks, and possibly some social interaction of the quasi-date-like variety. should yield interesting results...

2001-05-03T14:31:00.000-04:00

oops, i forgot to post yesterday, dang. well, ok, i went home from work early and couldn't be bothered to hook up the maddeningly un-fast NetZero at home. not a whole hell of a lot happened anyway: it was hot, and i didn't get the dream job i've been waiting on. woo. hoo.

in today's news however, there's a reason to live: McDonalds is entering the chain-cafe game with McCafe, a sort of lower key Starbucks alternative. thank god, that's just what this nation needs, more crappy corporate coffee places!

we also need fewer natural resources, which is good because President Cream Cheese seems hell-bent on undermining every environmental policy of the last 10 years as quickly and thoroughly as possible. this man referred to Canada as "our amigos to the north" at the FTAA summit last week; he should quit while he's ahead, go work for MTV and make 'Jackass' into a self-titled talk show, hell i'd watch that.

on a wee bright note, Todd and i (hi todd!) are going to see the lovely and talented Katell Keineg @ the Mercury Lounge in NYC next Monday, as Todd tries to become the first nonthreatening stalker in pop music history. it's sure to lift the spirits, eight hours roundtrip in the car on a school night, but we're devoted groupies, what can ya do? whine about everything in life on your blog, i suppose...i will now eat a chocolate-covered pretzel from Trader Joes to quell said whining. Mnnnrrph blrdicrrrm, yummmm.

2001-05-01T16:55:00.000-04:00

shocking revelation: there's a lot of white guys on TV, according to a legitimiate scientific inquiry. Ooh! Aah!

my brain is like melted brie right now, must go find a baguette...

2001-04-30T14:05:00.000-04:00

and now, the downfall of our civilization, even more deeply cheesy dating/reality gameshows are coming down the pike, like Sex Wars. read it and weep, and note this was in the New York freakin' Times.

on that note, i whine momentarily about not having tickets to Badly Drawn Boy tonight, booo hoo hoo hoo. see, only momentarily.

i also ask a truly rhetorical question: what kind of rock was in Jimy WIlliams' pipe during yesterday's ludicrous Red Sox loss to the Royals? who lets a noname fool with a T-ball-league-level batting average of .059, i.e. Craig "don't pity me, i look like Ray Liotta" Grebeck, hit in a tight last inning when you have Jason Varitek, Jose Offerman and Dante Bichette, whose *average* average is over .300, sitting on the b-e-n-c-h?? oh right, Jimy Williams does. Walt Whitman said baseball will "restore our losses," let's hope someone's got 'Leaves of Grass' on the team plane tomorrow...

2001-04-27T10:53:00.000-04:00

did i in fact go to the gym last night? oh no, i did not. did i see the ridiculous chick-smooch on 'Friends'? also no. did i see more than 2 innings of the sox game? ditto. good gosh, what happened to our popqueen on the hallowed thursday eve? yet another blackout at the homestead, friends, and no, i'm not out in california, it's just a combination of the wind and the fin-de-siecle (the 20th, that is) wiring in my neighborhood. the lights went out, i went out on the porch to check in with the neighbors (quite comical: "are your lights out too?" "yep, i guess yours are then?" "oh yeah"), then lit every candle in the house and settled down, abe lincoln fashion, by their light to read my new book, 'we were the mulvaneys' by joyce carol oates, which is not bad. ahh, a relaxing evening off the grid, or so i thought. unannounced to all and sundry residents of our fair hamlet, at 9pm the street fair two towns over decided to set off the loudest, most windowpane-shaking fireworks display in recent memory. i think the cat has post-traumatic stress disorder now. on the upside, the power came back on right then, hey, who can explain it?

all of which is to say, once the tv was back in business i immediately witnessed yet another entry into our growing file of 'Depressing Sellout Moments' --- friends, Jakob Dylan is shilling for Coke. far worse than if they had just used a Wallflowers song to sell their potent, nutritionally-defunct brew, Son-of-Zimmy himself is right there in the commercial, sipping a cold one and peering off vaguely into the middle distance, endorsing with every fiber of his sensitive-hip-rich-stupid-rockstar being. what next, i rant impotently, Woody Guthrie himself digitally remastered like poor Fred Astaire into a duet with a tartlet like Christina Aguilera?? oh foolish me, just writing those words has probably planted the seed in some creative director's brain. you've been warned...

2001-04-26T11:19:00.000-04:00

is it true that good and bad things happen in threes? i'm going through a series of *pairs* myself...does that mean several big ol' shoes will soon drop? ok, don't want to screw up the karma, i'll just link to The Onion instead, it is as usual cripplingly hilarious but this article describes with eerie accuracy every single woman in my office, um, except for me, whaddyaknow?

and just to pick up that 'woe is me, where have the 80's gone' thread again, i saw somewhere that Peter Buck from R.E.M. got arrested for a drunken air-rage-type incident. i'm not sure why, but that's somehow depressing. in other total has-been news, why oh why is Winona Ryder slumming on 'Friends' tonight? yes, for the faux-lesbo titillation factor so prevalent on Must-Flee-TV these days, but also for some potentially-bad-career-move reasons, no? OTOH, what's the last decent movie she was in? arguably it was 'Lucas,' her first, but seriously, what, "The Crucible'? certainly not the Richard Gere 'Love me, I'll die soon" dreck 'Autumn in New York,' and wasn't there a rotten vampire/apocalypse flick in there recently too? the inexorable downward slide begins.

speaking of which, i got cable tuesday, and i have already a achieved a Homer S.-esque ass-groove in the sofa, from Food Network and 'The Daily Show' viewing alone. plus the Red Sox. plus 'Arthur.' plus the almighty Simpsons, which i can pull in like 5 times a day. plus SportsCenter. plus the Independent Film Channel, which i have already renamed the 'i'm glad i decided not to rent this that time' channel. and more, much more! but tonight i'm going to the gym, oh yes, yes i am.

2001-04-25T15:01:00.000-04:00

clearly, i will be moving to Neptune as soon as possible. you'll come with me when you see *the* wierdest Playmobil toy ever made.

2001-04-25T13:28:00.000-04:00

"Brevity is the soul of something." --- Dan Givelber

On that note, all hail The Page of Anxiety which has finally been updated. Apparently, all our Eiffel Towers are belong to us.

2001-04-24T13:20:00.000-04:00

I say it's Paul Day. So first, hi Paul! that's my friend Paul. if he's reading this.

and for something a little less anticlimactic, check out Paul Pena, the greatest Cape Verdean r&b guitarist and self-taught Tuvan throat-singer from Hyannis, MA you never heard of, who wrote Steve Miller's heretofore unlistenably irritating hit "Jet Airliner" back in the 70's and has been toiling in obscurity since then, but just released an album, which is great, which i successfully hectored most of my male friends into buying. i mean, the guy needs a new pancreas, what was i supposed to do? he's also in the documentary film "Genghis Blues" that was nominated for an Oscar. in short, he rocks:

paulpena.com

finally, Paul Lukas is my hero. also i want his job:

inconspicuous consumption

and now i will wax about the nature of spring, sleep, and my long but pleasant night:

it's getting to be that time of the year where you don't sleep as much. are there wintertime insomniacs? i find that hard to imagine. just looking at my bed in the narcotizing half-light of yet another grey Boston afternoon between, oh, October and May, is enough to put me out. especially on a sunday, and if there's also something baking in the oven just forget it. even when i slept in an unheated room, where in the morning the wall over my head was cold enough to roll out pastry dough on, i slept like a hibernating bear. under several down duvets, in sweatpants, with flannel sheets - it was like a morphine IV. the seasons here in New England don't so much change as abruptly fling around a corner, much like our local motorists, so one day you're in your sixth month of sleepytime winter mode, and then BING! it gets up to 75 one afternoon, you open all the windows, watch the dust bunnies roll through the house, break a weak and annoying sweat. now it's time to sleep with the window open, and you get just warm enough to kick off the minimal spring blankets at 2 a.m., but then by 6 it's chilled back down and you yank them back up off the floor and over your head. you have to turn from a furry den beast into a tentative crocus, soaking up the sun all day and then shivering your leaves all night.

pretty soon it will be hot as all get out in the apartment, so hot you'll eat juice pops for dinner and crawl around on the floor, sit out on the porch until 11 watching the bats and wondering if you'd catch West Nile Virus from a mosquito if you slept out there, and you might, so you sleep the fretful summer halfsleep in your room, in between two or three whirring fans. or you did, until you got an air conditioner, which is great and all but you actually kind of miss the stickier nights, they are right out of childhood, no breeze and no dreams. well, ok, no, you don't really miss waking up testy and damp, utterly unrested. summer nights are hard on the body but push you to make very definitive decisions, such as "That's it! I can't sleep on this futon anymore! I am buying a real bed if it's the last thing I do!" ditto the night you jump up and vow to buy an air conditioner the very moment Bradlee's opens in the morning. you have spectacular arguments in the summer, and also periods of lethargy so intense that you forget to eat or answer the phone. sometimes summer is the moment you get your arms stuck over your head in a dress that doesn't fit; it presses on you.

but these spring evenings, the forty-degree temperature fluctuations between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m., hearing the night out the open window again, and the birds in the dark. you wake up at 3, blocked and coughing from allergies, the invisible pollen falling over everything. one tiny cup of cough syrup resurrected from the cabinet, but it doesn't make you sleep, maybe the night's soft effect is stronger, and you sit propped up in bed with your new book for hours. hours! in the middle of the night! work tomorrow! all that! you listen to the presence of the air in and out the window screen, the thunk of a car door, stirrings in the grass, or maybe just the grass itself, carried up to your pillow on the fine new night. until the birds start up, it's quiet, but a fresh, enlivened quiet, after all the winter like cotton in your ears, and before the summer that drones. so you read and read, and listen, then find a cool pillow place and apparently sleep a little, because you're not tired at all today somehow.

when i was growing up in new jersey, i loathed the summer and didn't much like spring, either. there it's a long slow misty grade out of winter, with gentle rains and a muzzy heat that burns off into early summer by this time. easter can be a scorcher; after memorial day we wore shorts to our air-conditioned school. the summer is longer, hotter, and spring is just a light green harbinger of imminent unpleasantness. and yes, once i moved here i embraced the long chilly fall and even the truculent winters, mostly. but it's spring that draws you out of winter in new england, it appears one day and after a few weeks of tussling, it wins out! i never thought i would be so pleased, even relieved, to see that strange light green of new leaves, and be happy feeling the sun get bolder again. i guess the more frozen your marrow, the deeper your sleep, the better it feels to warm up, to wake.

hmmmm, it was also a Long Blog Day. you know you love it.

2001-04-23T11:56:00.000-04:00

news flash, it's my sister's birthday! indeed, it is also Shakespeare's birthday, but this is far more relevant. 25 years ago today, the world became a better place...or at least, a different place. ;P let's all give a shout out to TriBecca, Rebitchka, Chewbecca, Becky B, The Bek, Princess Rebecca, Ribsy, whatever --- and yes, becs, this means i didn't get you a gift. >:)

monday, monday, what is it about the beginning of the week that brings out all the bad parenting? went out to dinner last night, seated next to a table of 6 little kids. like under-10 little. apparently no adults in sight. now, this was not Mcdonald's or Chuck E. Cheese, this was your basic nicer local eatery, with a bar and a roaring pizza oven and $15 entrees. as the tots grew shriller, we and our surrounding fellow adults peered around and discovered, aha! off to the side, at a table for four, two sets of parents who were deep in family-life-denial, who actually came off worse that the typical indulgent-parents-of-noisy-kids-in-restaurants. now, i could see if they were all at a big table and the kids are a little nuts, whatever. but the parents were like *pretending* they were out to dinner by themselves! they barely looked over to the kids' table at all, whilst their fellow diners pelted them with dark, evil, piercing looks. once a kid or two actually ran off from the table, the two dads started taking turns jumping up, storming over and wagging their fingers. to little avail. these kids must have ordered $150 worth of food, which they picked at and threw around, and when i say 'the kid's ordered the food i mean these 8-year-olds were saying to the waiter, 'Can i have some more pizza? then can i have some ice cream?' it was interesting watching people struggle with their primal urges: should i jump up and throttle that little boy first, or his father? it was like one huge John-Hughes-movie-level lesson in child neglect in the bourgoisie. had we passed the hat, i'm sure we could have raised the $25 needed for a decent babysitter for these folks, or a couple of good parenting books - sheesh! how geezerly can i get! 'in my day, we never went out with my parents anywhere! we ate our mush in the nursery and went to bed at 7:00 sharp!'

so on that note, some even *badder* mommies and daddies:

24-year-old foster mom hires male strippers for teenage girl's surprise party...many arrests follow:
bad mom

dad 'accidentally' shoots mom after son gets into argument with son's girlfriend for dancing with stripper that mom hired for his party and dad tries to throw girlfriend out...better than a Univision soap opera:
bad dad, questionable mom

and finally, bad in loco parentis: school bans dances, a la 'Footloose,' until they can be guaranteed 'wholesome':

Leave Room For the Holy Spirit H.S.

right. on that note, i couldn't resist this tale of a former pimp/crack-dealer who found religion and is on a mission from god as a giant singing green pepper:

no, i am not making this up

and for further edification, tom tomorrow on the"california" energy crisis:

enter his realm of sweet genius

in parting, am i the only one who is very confused that the red sox lost to the yankees yesterday? was i lulled into a stupor by the unseasonably high temperatures and the open bottle of nailpolish in my hand during the 10th inning? i thought they were showing a *replay* of paul o'neill's home run when david justice hit *his* home run to the exact same spot. . . heyyyy, wait a second! those bastards, whom i admittedly used to hold close to my jersey-bred heart.

2001-04-20T14:40:00.000-04:00

after many fruitless searches, i've found a link to complete my Obscure Reference of the day. if you were watching "ER" last night, you may not have realized it but the actor playing Dr. Elizabeth Corday's father was Paul Freeman. that's right, Paul Freeman! (pause) indeed, as you are remembering right this minute, he was Rene Belloq in "Raiders of the Lost Ark," Indy's snooty French arch-nemesis archaeologist, who steals everything Jones recovers but pays for it in the end when he explodes into tiny bits after unleashing a storm of angry Judeo-wraith-spirits from the Ark o'the Covenant. here's the link to further cement your recollection:

Indy and Belloq at the Hookah Cafe

now, just for the sheer entertainment value, a list of the Durand Kids' Top Ten All-Time Best Belloq Lines (don't probe too deeply into this, just accept that we watched this movie far, far too often):

10. "If only you spoke...Hovitos!"

9. "Please, sit down, before you fall down."

8. "Archaeology is not an exact science!"

7. "It was not to be, cherie..."

6. "I am a shadowy reflection of you. It would take only a nudge to make you like me,
to push you out of the light."

5. "Stay with the ark! Stay with the ark!"

4. "*schxxx!* *schxxx!*" --- neck-slicing noise, with hand-gestures

3. "See this watch? Ten dollars from a vendor in the street. But I take it, bury it in the sand
for a thousand years, and it becomes priceless, like the ark!"

2. "It's my family label!"

1. "Just blow it up, blow it back to God!"

2001-04-20T10:57:00.000-04:00

here's a thought: you know you're not a kid anymore when an INXS song turns up in a Chevy commercial. putting aside the irony of using a song titled "What You Need" to sell a Cavalier, a car which surely nobody needs, let's focus on the debilitating shock of un-hipness that overtakes you when, as you're half-listening to the commercials during "Will & Grace" (which was bad anyway), you start humming along, thinking back to that pinnacle of the 10th grade social scene, the INXS concert at Madison Square Garden, when you and your friends got to take the train in by yourselves (!) and danced your asses off and the next day in homeroom everyone had the same tour t-shirts with the big red X on the back, and generally you're feeling pretty good about it all. then it hits you, wait, this is a crappy car commercial! it might as well be for a minivan, with all these pastel-clad actoroids cavorting about. then you sink even lower, ruminating on how the song doesn't even qualify as 'adult-contemporary,' it's like an *oldie* for god's sake, and how at least when Nike used the Beatles in the sneaker commercial everyone got all pissed off about it, but who's going to complain about a has-been eighties song being used to sell a has-been Chevy? this makes you think of all the irritating commercials you've seen lately, like the Kraft Singles commercial featuring two pre-teens flirting over a cheese sandwich while "Let's Get It On" plays in the background, which made you apoplectic enough to send Kraft a strongly-worded email, to which you have yet to receive a reply. and to top it all off, you then remember that Michael Hutchence, the singer of the song that kicked off this neo-Proustian reverie, is in fact *dead,* having turned up in a hotel closet in Australia after overdosing/choking on his own vomit/auto-erotically asphyxiating or some combination of the three, several years ago. *several years* ago! where, my friends, does the time go? yeah, i don't want to know either.

so it put me in an evil mood. if you would like to follow me down this path, get tips from the good people at

"So You've Decided To Become Evil"

2001-04-19T13:35:00.000-04:00

and now, thursday, the day of old leftover Easter candy, all the stuff you've already passed over once or twice, like these awful malted-milk-ball eggs, ewww.

first, the dumbest man in the universe: he dates a woman back in the 70's, stalks her for 20 years, breaks in to her apartment, tries to kidnap her, gets arrested, acts as his own lawyer at the trial so he can cross-examine this woman, and then whips out an engagement ring and proposes to her *while she's on the stand.* nice going, guy. i love how the article notes "he wept" as the court officers tackled him and hogtied him.

stalker in court

and second, the new david gray cd i bought at lunchtime, a fine acoustic effort, sure to replace the other david gray cd as the default washing-the-dishes cd in my kitchen. want one? here ya go:

dave's amazon.com page

on a more local and somewhat existential note, while i was driving to newbury comics to buy the aforementioned cd, i was caught in a traffic snarl. typical, you say? well, i for one have never seen a convoy of streetcleaners with state trooper escorts cleaning Route 9 at 12:30 on a weekday before. there were at least 6 trucks, rolling along even more slowly than streetcleaners normally do, because there's so much damn sand on the roads from the winter, and there were guys walking along the shoulder with leafblowers and power-brooms making heaping piles of sand for the trucks to suck up. is it just me, or is this whole endeavor a monumental waste of time? why don't they just leave the sand there until next winter, and then sweep it up over the snow? oh yeah, it would probably cost a lot less and not cause a big traffic jam, riiiiight. god save the commonwealth.

ooh, how could i almost forget, the poor-quality-control link o'the day? yes, it's better than the fried-chicken-head in the box of wings, the mouse in the Whopper, the chupacabra photos: it's a dead slug stuck to a rice krispie treat (not the homemade kind, the mylar-encased kind):

canadian slug snack

i leave you to make up your own "snap crackle pop" joke here.

2001-04-18T16:29:00.000-04:00

it's wednesday afternoon, and it's about time for some cookies...as there are no Famous Amos Belgian Style (which in fact are exactly the same as the regular chocolate chip ones, the package giving *no* explanation as to what makes them Belgian at all, though i love and eat them anyway) Cookies lying about, you will have to read this witty, witty, witty column from sfgate instead:

moron-grade (tm) cookies

more, much more, later - m.