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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
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LINKLICIOUS Self-cleaning clothes, for the laundry-impaired and problem drinkers among us. Turkey testicle festival. This is pretty fun, in a dumb pretentious way. The Two Things you need to know. Museum of Impractical Devices. THE FACT THAT THE FOLLOWING DIARY TIDBITS ARE NUMBERED DOES NOT ACTUALLY IMPLY A HIERARCHY OF THOUGHTS OR INDEED ANY TYPE OF SCHEMA WHATSOEVER 1. I went to a party on Saturday and talked to one of the proprietors of this site for quite a while, and thus his voice and his mannerisms completely soaked into my consciousness, and I ended up that night having a dream where he and I were perusing a huge coffee-table book called "A Mature And Satisfying Sex Life For The Blind, Volume 60." Later the hostess of the party walked into the living room where we were and said, "Help, my dog just ate a scented candle." I woke up with a smile on my face and the phrase "vanilla poop wax" in my head. 2. The cottonwood trees are at it again, and I have also been seeing lots of those twirly helicopter maple seed things, and I was thinking how useless it is for trees to flower and bud and acorn and do their whole cycle of life thing in the city. Trees can release all the seeds they want, but it's not like city planners and city residents are just going to let a giant tree grow right in the middle of a privately (or publicly) owned space, even supposing that the seed did manage to land in actual ground and not on concrete or asphalt. Chicago trees come from tree farms and are planted in a prearranged location, so all this tree-style sexy propagation is futile. Do trees adapt under adverse-for-procreation conditions like animals do? Unless the adaptation is so subtle as to be invisible to humans, it does not seem so, as my neighborhood continues to be covered in cottonwood crud. SO WHAT'S THE MORAL OF THIS STORY (a) Trees is dumb. (b) Never give up! Continue to sow your (metaphorical) seed (meaning like your ideas, your opinions, your art, and not your actual semen), even if it is rejected by an uncaring universe! (c) Not everything has a moral, you stupid jackass. 3. Another thing I did this weekend was go to the zoo. Nora was most interested in the tigers and the cows, and I was most interested in the takin. An excerpt from that link, italics mine: Although takins have no skin glands, their entire body secretes an oily, strong smelling substance that is said to have a burning taste. It is believed that this smelly, thick substance serves as a moisture barrier on the animal's coat, protecting it from moisture caused by fog and rain that frequents its grazing grounds. I am sure it can be boring out there in rural China, but QUIT LICKING THE TAKIN. Although I do like the idea of teenage farmhands hazing each other with takin skin-glop. #1: Here, lick this oxen-like creature. All the cool peasants are doing it. #2: Ahhh! It burns! 4. Two thumbs way down to the Littermaid. LT had the best intentions when he surrendered to his gadget-lust and bought this gadget, but our cat is getting her regular old poop box back as soon as the current box of cat-poop collection containers is finished, and the Littermaid will be consigned to the junk heap where it belongs. What the Littermaid does to the cat poop is sort of crumble it up, and it all gets stuck in the Littermaid rake thing, and falls into the various moving parts of the Littermaid, so instead of having one discrete bundle of cat shit you have many tiny particles of cat shit. And this is no good. I am in fact kind of impressed with the Littermaid for failing so spectacularly, that something advertised as being neat and clean and odor-free could be so messy and foul and a thousand times smellier and more horrible than a plain old cat litter pan. The Littermaid is like a Zen lesson on not believing the hype, and I always knew there was a Zen lesson somewhere in the whole cat-shit gestalt, so even though I am annoyed I am kind of happy too. 5. The building next door to my house is being rehabbed, and crews of contractors are there all day, every day, blasting their polka tunes (of both the Mexican and Polish variety). I always walk up the alley after getting off the bus, and while no one has ever said anything directly to me, I have overheard clicks and whistles and a few muttered foreign-language come-on lines. I do not appreciate this, but sometimes you have to choose your battles, particularly if you live next door to them, so I have been settling for a quick dirty look instead of going all kung-fu feminist commando on their sorry asses. Then one day I walked down the alley with Nora in the stroller and boy did that ever stop. Not one whistle or catcall or even direct eye contact since then. I guess these macho Catholic working-class cultures are really into the Madonna/whore thing, and moms are completely off-limits. It is kind of creepy when the patriarchy works in your favor like that, but I guess I will be pragmatic and enjoy the harassment-free walk down the alley instead of analyzing it further. And maybe leave a few copies of Backlash and The Second Sex lying around the job site. ---mimi smartypants has Pop Rocks in her brain. back/forward |
