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the latest waddle:

good morning, wordpress - 10:36 a.m. , 2009-07-03

elaborate murder attempt - 2:56 p.m. , 2009-07-01

building a tractor in the basement - 10:42 a.m. , 2009-06-19

ask no questions tell just a few lies - 3:17 p.m. , 2009-06-09

my long lasting flavor really lasts long - 1:10 p.m. , 2009-06-04


2003-03-29 ... 10:19 p.m.

God was I bored at work the other day. Bored bored bored. (Right about now is when my mom would chime in with something mom-esque like "go run around the block" or "I have some chores you could do" or even "only boring people get bored," but hey mom? Hey Imaginary Mental Mom Voice? Shush.) I guess I could have worked or something, but all my resident authority figures were out of town, so why waste it? It is like having a substitute teacher; you are obligated to screw around. So screw around I did. I read funny web pages, I stared into space, I played with my new cell phone, which has many horrific ringtone options (since my phone never rings it is somewhat of a moot point, but I am Torn Between Two Lovers in a sense, as I try to decide on the sound I want my phone to make. That is, if the lovers in question were a downloadable A-Team theme or a kind of robot noise. My heart says to go with the A-Team theme; however, I worry that I would be disappointed every time I answered and it was not, in fact, the A-Team on the line ["Mimi Smartypants. We need your help in pitying the fool. We'll pick you up in the van."])

ODD THINGS

1. I was screwing around on Amazon for a bit, looking at baby stuff since I want to get some sort of baby-equipment gift for a ready-to-give-birth-any-minute-now-friend. There are a lot of customer reviews where the username is "a baby enthusiast." Really, check it out. A baby enthusiast? What in the world is a baby enthusiast?

2. The image below is from a freaky religious Jack Chick publication, but I think it is just so much more hilarious out of context.

Check out the graphs! Homosexuality seems to have taken one or two serious dips (hard to say when, exactly, with no x- or y-axis labels in sight), but pornography shows more or less a steady rise to the top! Go porn! And why does the devil's accountant have a chicken-foot insignia on his robe?

IRVING PARK ROAD, ALL INTRIGUING

Recently I walked from the Sheridan El stop west to Ashland to meet a friend for dinner/drinks, not that far really but a nice little urban trek. I was witness to the following things.

1. Spray-painted graffiti that read CLOWN SUGAR. Which of course made me start Mick-Jaggering down the street, singing about clown sugar and why it tastes so good, but I could not come up with very many more circus-related substitute lyrics so I abandoned the exercise pretty quickly.

2. The Billy D. Williams insurance agency. I want to come back with some spray paint of my own and add the double E, so it can be the Billy Dee Williams insurance agency. The sign did not mention auto, home, life, or anything like that, so I am thinking it might actually be a place for taking out a policy on your Billy Dee Williams.

3. A place to have rubber stamps made. How about a self-inking one that says LAME, for commenting on bad band posters and such? Or one that says YOUR CAT WAS TASTY for lost-pet flyers? (Okay, that's just mean. Forgive me, I have a headache.)

4. Walking past the cemetery I saw that someone had left a whole (somewhat shriveled now) eggplant on one of the graves.

5. Lakeview High School is the scariest building ever. It is all gothic and foreboding, and would be a good set for a Buffy episode.

6. There should be a law against barbecue restaurants using pigs as their mascots. Particularly cartoony pigs holding barbecue tongs and wearing chef hats and t-shirts that say I LOVE RIBS!

7. Two guys meet up on the street and one says, "Damn, how do you always get out so quick? You should teach a class! A Gettin' Out Of Jail Class!"

After a severely protein-loaded meal of delicious Thai food (fried-tofu appetizers, tofu-based entrees for both of us), S. and I headed out for beers. (I have been calling her S. in this diary for some time, but since she is my Baking Friend, there is a strong impulse to name her Princess Apple-Pie or something like that. But maybe I should stick with S. since if I do that people may think I have started hanging out with a anthropomorphic pie and we do not want that.) We went to Ten Cat, which is a lovely little neighborhood bar full of retro-goofy vintage furniture,* and it was super-nice although I had a moment of dark depression when I realized it was ONLY THURSDAY and I could not safely have ALL THE BEER I WANTED. It is one of the saddest realizations on the planet, the Thursday realization. (It would also be a good name for an emo band.)

*Although, because retro-goofy furniture stylings have been FOREVER RUINED by stupid hipsters with their stupid smirking irony and bizarre worship of a nostalgia they never experienced, some sort of imaginary cocktail culture that never fully existed,** I feel compelled to explain that Ten Cat has been rocking the thrift-store furniture way before this most recent revival, and it probably has the least attitude of any bar in a ten-mile radius. And why I care what you think of Ten Cat is beyond me.

**Which, hey, I long for nonstop witty banter and bottomless martinis just as you do, as long as we agree that such a wild-groovy-and-swinging lifestyle is largely a fiction created by retro-cool marketers and an overdose of Turner Classic Movies. In fact, might not this trend even signal a disturbing desire to return to more codified gender roles? To formalized courting rituals? To bad girls in seamed stockings who will, when you marry them, become good girls in aprons? I suppose I am too suspicious and some people simply enjoy swing dancing and do not bring any ideological baggage to the big-band dance party.

Anyway, one of the retro-cool vintage couches we tried to sit on had been covered with something that looked like pony skin. I perched there briefly before I decided that although a pony is indeed an animal that is often sat upon, I was not down with the weird organic feeling of this couch covering. It was not something I wanted to subject my ass to, even through the layers of coat and pants and underwear. The coarseness of the pony hair was too icky and dead-feeling, and also the skin seemed oddly cool like the penis of a demon. (I do not have any personal experience with demon penis but, you know, all those horror novels?) I grabbed a table instead while S. was getting beers and explained my pony-skin/ass-contact problems when she returned, and to her credit she didn't laugh at me or run away or anything.

Last night I went to the Fireside to see Xiu Xiu and The Watchers. Xiu Xiu actually had canceled but so what, the smallish crowd and the energy and the Miller High Life and the great drumming I heard all night more than made up for it. I was trying to be all budget-conscious since it is the end of the month and I had this grand plan to catch the last bus home, but then my comrade suggested "one more beer" and of course I don't need any arm-twisting. Beer is more important than cabs, right? Or late-night safety? However, SMILEY FATE SMILED ON ME YET AGAIN and the bus was there ANYWAY. I don't know if I misremembered its stopping time or it was some sort of Phantom Bus, but it got me home just fine regardless, and I sent my comrade a text message (I just realized I can do this---yes, I am slow on the uptake) that said BUS! VICTORY IS MINE!

Today: home improvement projects, the wearing of gigantic oversized sweatshirts (makes me feel safe), a nap with The Cat (all warm and furry on my hip), LT's homemade bread, cheese, wine. And finally, finally, updating.

---mimi smartypants made a hole with the gun perpendicular.

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