Upside-down Hippopotamus

2004-06-05T12:29:00.000-04:00

If you are not redirected in 10 seconds, please click here.

Goblin Ran Away from Home

2004-06-04T22:29:00.000-04:00

She was last seen here.

You better bookmark that. I'm running away from home, too.

Don't come back here no more.

It's Raining Men

2004-06-03T17:37:00.000-04:00

Today, I refilled the windshield washer fluid in my car, a process that would have made me feel infinitely more masculine if it had not taken me forty-five minutes to figure out how to open the hood.

Tales of Woe and Cheese

2004-06-03T00:43:00.000-04:00

I have spent too much time in the proximity of the disaster-prone Jwer: shattering a bottle of my favorite wine on the sidewalk and puncturing my arm on the back fence were just the beginning.

Yesterday, I was dive-bombed by cicadas, Goblin peed on the new mattress, and perhaps most distressingly, I ran out of cheese.

Today, my car was rear-ended, and the supermarket cashier who three years ago had a tongue-tied crush on me didn’t seem to know I was alive and didn’t ask me whether I would like paper or plastic.

He gave me paper when I wanted plastic.

I can’t help but think that this is the direct result of all those black cats.

Required Reading

2004-05-30T15:13:00.000-04:00

An eloquent letter on hating vs. thinking. Via Atrios.

A treatise on the politics of terror. By Orcinus.

Some interesting job statistics. Via Kos.

On the nature of Goblin Foo Uvula. (Scroll down to the post entitled "a little ditty, as requested.") By Zenchick.

Goblin and Hippoo

2004-05-29T22:53:00.000-04:00

If You Prick Me, Do I Not Bleed? Actually, No.

2004-05-28T11:54:00.000-04:00

It’s the strangest phenomenon: wings, thousands of them, disembodied, fluttering around my neighborhood. From cicadas or fairies, anyone’s guess; they manifest a potent and malicious magic.

Last night, wrestling bags from the grocery and wine stores out of my trunk, I beheld a terrible and purple explosion. My beloved (but, thankfully, not very expensive) shiraz had fallen to the sidewalk and was seeping into the cracks. The bloody horror! Nothing left for me but the jagged glass shards.

Much later, wrestling boxes of recycling over my back gate (stuck shut for the moment because we were never given a key), I felt a blinding and purple pain in my forearm, which, I discovered, had become punctured on a spike. It was a hideously deep wound that strangely enough did not seep a drop of blood.

I am much accursed.

Goblin's Life, in Song

2004-05-26T16:23:00.001-04:00

My Name Is Goblin (to the tune of Suzanne Vega’s “My Name Is Luca”)

My name is Goblin.
I now live in Baltimore.
I live next door to you.
Yes, I think you’ve seen me before.
If you hear the scrabbling of some feet,
Don’t let your ticker skip a beat.
It’s just me chasing my Hippoo.
It’s just me chasing my Hippoo.
It’s just me chasing my Hippoo.

I only chase
Until it’s caught.
Daddy throws it again:
It’s all for naught.
But it’s the main pastime of my life.
It’s the main pastime of my life.
It’s the main pastime of my life.

Goblin the Boston Terrier (to the tune of Rob Hartmann’s “Adventure, Spectacle, Mystery")

I’m Goblin Foo Uvula,
Queen of the Universe.
I take my walk.
I chew my bone.
I like to stalk
The squirrels’ homes.

People love my pointy earlobes,
Bat-like, alert, and erect.
People love my sloppy kisses.
People love my poops and pisses.
People love . . .
People love . . .
People love . . .

Goblin
The Boston terrier!
Goblin
The Boston terrier!
Goblin
The Boston terrier!
Terrier . . .

Shall I Wear the Bottoms of My Trousers Rolled?

2004-05-25T15:29:00.000-04:00

My former (and much beloved) business partner had a theory that after a certain age, people should forget about current fashion and adopt a classic look. Never mind that “certain age” is not specific, and what constitutes “classic” is open to debate. The idea that, at thirty, we are all supposed to start wearing oxford shirts and penny loafers calls to mind the “Star Trek” episode featuring a planet run by children who drop dead as they reach maturity.

I am not a student of fashion, and most of my “expertise” in that area comes by virtue of being a gay graphic designer with an eye for good lines and a horror of anything originating in the nineteen eighties; attempting to categorize my own style invokes the image of a slightly trendy hobo. Nevertheless, I keep my eyes and mind open and respond appropriately.

Today, emerging from a CVS, I held the door open for an old woman who, I suspect, was not as old as she looked. Her white hair was in a tight permanent, her glasses covered half her face, and her sturdy figure sported a Walmart tank top and polyester shorts (not a natural fiber to be found anywhere on her person would be my guess). This is truly a “classic” look: my grandmother dressed exactly the same way thirty years ago, except she dyed her hair ash blonde.

I suppose my question is, at what age does someone decide do this to himself or herself, and is it even a bad thing to disassociate from the vagaries of what other people think we should be wearing in favor of practicality and function? When that woman turned fifty, did she sit down and decide, “Today, I shall begin dressing like an old woman”? Which meant, of course, that she would also begin acting like and being treated like an old woman.

I suppose all of this implies there is something wrong with being an old woman, and there most certainly isn’t. Nor do I believe that being fifty constitutes being “old.” There is almost no way to even frame the debate without implying insult where none is meant. As usual, I am not so much concerned with that old woman as I am with the connotations for my own life. Will there ever come a time when I abandon my personal style (such as it is) for a polyester bargain? Or (and this is more likely) will I cling to the fashions from the era I came of age and comfort myself by redefining these as “classic”?

I really don’t know why I equate both of these possibilities with the idea of giving up on something. I place absolutely no weight, especially these days, on the opinions of the public; I don’t crave the approval of society. I suppose I’m worried that I will all of a sudden hit some sort of wall, after which I won’t strive to meet my own expectations for myself.

That’s the day I will be old.

Butterflies of the Soul

2004-05-24T15:54:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, driving from Baltimore to New York with my dear friend Martin, I stopped for gas at a Sunoco station. While I pumped, Martin went inside to get us drinks; I requested chocolate milk, but he emerged after a few moments to report a tragic lack of chocolate milk on the premises. Upon reflection, I don’t even know why I asked for chocolate milk. It is yummy but would (1) not do much to quench my thirst, and (2) spend a lifetime on the hips. Perhaps the God of Reduced Body Fat had arranged for the leche chocolate shortage, but I whirled around and spat in His (or Her) eye by going inside and getting carb- and sugar-laden orange juice, when I had already had orange juice with breakfast.

The cashier was a burly and disheveled grease monkey with a deeply gruff speaking voice. “That all?” he demanded of me and Martin as we put our drinks on the counter.

“Yes,” we said.

He squinted at us. “You sure?”

“Yes,” we said.

This manly fellow rang us up and returned to what he was doing when we had entered: coloring in, with felt-tip markers, a line drawing of a pretty butterfly fluttering over a field of flowers. Awaiting its turn to the side was a drawing of a girl wearing a bonnet and carrying a basket.

He seemed proud of his work.

Last night, I went with Faustus and his boyfriend, E.S., to see a very powerful film called The Mudge Boy. It’s the coming-of-age story of an awkward (and adorable) farm boy who copes with the recent death of his mother by secretly wearing her fur coat and carrying her pet chicken around wherever he goes. It would not be giving too much away to reveal that he falls in love with a handsome, slightly older neighbor, who protects him from ridicule by the local band of ne’er-do-wells. Various antics ensue, but the theme of the movie is that the people in the boy’s life encourage him to murder the best and most endearing part of himself in order to fit in with the masculine expectations society places on him.

All I could think of later was that I was glad nobody had done that to the gas station cashier.

Googlestalking Judge Judy

2004-05-22T12:29:00.000-04:00

Perhaps because it is on at a different time and conflicts with fewer other programs, TiVo in Baltimore has been taping more episodes of “Judge Judy” than TiVo in New York.

I have been watching them. As one of the only half-hour shows I record, it is the perfect thing to turn on when I’m eating lunch, unpacking, cleaning, or vacuuming up a hundred thousand million billion ants. And since I have been alone and unloved these past few weeks, I have started to look at the litigants on “Judge Judy” in a new light. I am fascinated by them: the petty ones, the sly ones, the dignified ones, the cute ones, the indignant ones, the idiotic ones.

Sometimes, when enough information is given about a person, I try to look them up on the Internet and find out more about their lives. Who are you? I wonder. What are you up to? What possessed you to make a fool of yourself on national television? Did you spend that thirty-eight dollars you won on the unpaid electric bill all in one place? Key any good cars lately

Inquiring minds want to know.

Update: What if I changed Goblin’s name to Pickles Squintacular, Starfleet Commander?

Update Two: Jwer, whose numerous and embittered comments here are the stuff of legend, has started his own blog. Check it out if you dare.

I have WoMAD, hear me roar!

2004-05-21T12:02:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I went into my living room and found a hundred thousand million billion ants crawling by the back door. “How did they get in?” you may be wondering. “Why did they come in? What were they doing?”

Who do I look like, the Ant Whisperer? How the hell should I know? I was far more concerned about how I was going to get them out.

“How did you get them out?” you may be wondering.

Good question. Luckily, I had brand-new vacuum cleaner gathering dust in its box. Or, rather, the box was gathering dust. I put it together post haste, and soon there were a hundred thousand million billion very dizzy ants whirling around in its cyclonic suction.

I hate to kill living creatures. The only things I hate more are the Bush administration and the sight of insects lurking where they shouldn’t be (but I repeat myself). For all I knew, the ants in the vacuum weren’t dead, but rather concocting a hundred thousand million billion revenge fantasies as they scoured the vacuum chamber for an escape route. So I ran out to the store to buy ant poison (now with new springtime scent!) and hardwood floor cleaner.

When I got home, there were a hundred thousand million billion ants crawling on the living room floor. I was pretty sure these were different ants, but I couldn’t tell where they were coming from. Once they joined their compatriots in the vacuum cleaner, I scoured the floor and spritzed the cracks with deadly springtime-fresh poison.

I’m not sure I’ve taken care of the problem. These battles tend to escalate, and two hundred thousand million billion ants have had all night to plot their next move. Luckily, I blew my defense budget on Weapons of Mass Ant Destruction (WoMAD).

Bring it on.

Me, Myself, and Foo

2004-05-20T12:36:00.000-04:00

I am alone most of the time these days. Rob is away for a month, working on a production of his play. Goblin ignores me unless she’s hungry. She divides her days between wrapping herself in the blankets on my bed and watching the squirrel feeder in the backyard as if it were a riveting soap opera.

Matt Damon drops in occasionally, but mostly I’m not in the mood.

I am alone but not lonely; I am decompressing. In the all-encompassing stress of the past few months, everyone wanted someone from me, and no one was happy when they got it. Now I’m not even answering the phone. If there’s an emergency, I don’t want to hear about it. Instead, I’m using my time to develop some healthy habits, such as exercising and eating right, and some unhealthy habits, such as leaving the dirty dishes in the sink and letting the recycling pile up.

It will all balance out in the end.

Update: Today is my dear friend Viki’s birthday. Whether you know her or not, drop her a line. You get bonus points if you refer to her tusks, tentacles, antlers, or stink lines.

Update Two: A word to the wise . . . if you suspect that people think you’re bizarre, and not in a good way, it may behoove you not to compound matters by wandering around looking as if you’ve been struck by lightning. Really.

You Can Have My Intestines When You Pry Them from My Cold, Dead Fingers!

2004-05-19T00:16:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I went to the Motor Vehicle Administration in Glen Burnie to get my driver’s license renewed. ("Glen Burnie" is not a gay couple, as some may assume; it is a wasteland of trashy strip malls just outside the Baltimore Beltway.) The process was so quick, smooth, and pleasant that I died of shock on the spot—so I suppose it was fortunate for someone that I had just signed up for organ donation.

Really, why are hard-working people such as myself constantly fending off requests for donations of one thing or another?

“Please, sir, might I have fifty cents for some food? I haven’t eaten in seventeen days.”

“Please, sir, might I have a few dollars for my political campaign so we can get the Nazis out of the White House?”

“Please, sir, might I have your heart since mine doesn’t seem to be working anymore?”

Why am I so gullible?

OK, sure, I will give up my organs. But I hereby swear to return spectacularly from the grave and torment whoever receives them.

Or perhaps the curse of having to make due with my organs will be punishment enough.

Update: In other news, I discovered a more stylish filing cabinet at Staples than could be found at Target. I died of shock on the spot.

Update Two: For the third day this week, a black cat and a cicada crossed my path in the same instant. Is the omen mitigated by the fact that this black cat had white feet, or were the solidly black cats merely busy somewhere else?

Update Three: Come to think of it, the cicada was looking somewhat peaked itself.

Time to Make the Tea (I Made the Tea)

2004-05-18T10:34:00.000-04:00

Last night, I went to Dunkin’ Donuts and ordered a green tea. Ordinarily, it wouldn't have occurred to me to order a green tea at that establishment, except there was a large display of Dunkin’ Donuts-branded teas on the counter, with the green variety prominently featured.

So I ordered a cup.

And despite the prominently displayed rack featuring at least two boxes of Dunkin’ Donuts-branded green tea, the man behind the counter insisted that they were out of what I wanted; no amount of scientific or philosophic evidence could persuade him otherwise.

So, quite in a snit, I ordered black tea instead. Blah.

Update: Today I am wearing very subtly mismatched socks.

The Strangest Music

2004-05-17T11:49:00.000-04:00

The other day, I saw a very silly movie called The Saddest Music in the World. Let me see if I can explain this. Set in the Great Depression, it is the story a Winnipeg beer heiress who sponsors a worldwide tournament to discover which country’s music is the saddest of all. She is sad all the time because her legs had previously been amputated by mistake by a drunken doctor, who loved her, and one of his sons, whom she loved. The father (representing Canada), son (representing, for some reason, the United States), and son’s brother (who has run off to become the saddest cellist in Serbia) all enter the musical tournament. I can’t remember anyone’s names, so this will be difficult, but what has apparently happened is that the brother’s son has died, and the brother’s wife developed amnesia from the grief and ran away to become the lover of the first son. The first son has also taken up his affair with the beer heiress sponsoring the contest, who has rigged it so that he will win and get rich on the prize money. Perhaps most importantly, the father, no longer a drunk, has spent years crafting a pair of glass prosthetic legs for the beer heiress, whom he still loves. He has the brother present them to her. They are filled with beer. Also, the winner of each round of the tournament gets to slide down a chute into a beer vat and splash around for a while. Beer might just be a symbol here, but of what, I’m not sure.

The Important Life Lesson I took away from the movie is simply this: “If you are sponsoring a tournament to find the saddest music in the world, keep it legitimate. If you play favorites, and if, even though you’re the judge, you turn up in the entry for your secret lover so you can show off your beer-filled glass prosthetic legs, you are going to anger your secret lover’s Serbian brother, who will play a note so piercing on his sad, Serbian cello that your beer-filled glass prosthetic legs will shatter, and not only will you be humiliated in front of everyone, you will set into motion a murderous chain of events that will burn your beer factory to the ground.”

I hope that didn’t spoil it for anyone.

Update: What if I changed Goblin’s name to Spottie O’Snubtail, Lady Pilot?

Update Two: For the second day in a row, a black cat and a cicada crossed my path in the same instant. Whatever this is an omen of, I am apparently in for a double dose.

Cicada Watch 2004!

2004-05-16T12:43:00.000-04:00

I saw my second “Brood X” cicada today, lurking in the alley behind my house. Goblin tried to eat the first one, but she was distracted from the second by a black cat that apparently looked tastier.

A cicada and a black cat both crossed my path in the same instant.

I’m a little rusty on my omens, but surely this is significant.

Dental Neurosis Number Two

2004-05-14T23:54:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, I went to Ikea with Jwer, who felt compelled to show me his bank account balance while we were in line at the cashier. He was simultaneously happy because he had a healthy amount of money and dreading the inevitable rapid decline of that sum.

I was of course reminded of my Listerine fixation.

For some reason, whenever I open a new bottle of Listerine, I become manifestly anxious of the day I run out. Each day, my spirits slowly sink along with the level of mouthwash in the container, and when it’s finally gone, I’m inconsolable.

No other product, not even ice cream bars, affects me in the same way. For a while, I stopped buying Listerine altogether because it simply wasn’t worth the heartache, but then they came out with the new citrus flavor, and I couldn’t help myself.

The obvious solution is to buy two bottles at once, but I get the idea that this will merely postpone the inevitable.

The Poop Runs on Time

2004-05-14T12:39:00.000-04:00

As a proponent of the “Lord of the Flies” school, I have never been a fan of human nature, but at least I understand it. The same cannot be said of some of the curmudgeons who wish to run my Baltimore neighborhood like junior Mussolinis. “No dog poop on the sidewalks!” they proclaim, and yet they close the parks and grassy areas to dogs and refuse to provide public trashcans for waste. “No posting notices on trees and telephone poles!” they decree, and yet the alternatives they provide are fancifully insufficient. They demand a vibrant, clean, and safe neighborhood and simultaneously choke out the forces that might lead to that result.

They already run the Executive, Legislative, and Judiciary branches of the government; have Republicans taken over my neighborhood, as well?

A Question for the Ages: Answered

2004-05-13T11:13:00.000-04:00

Old Mrs. Witch,
Old Mrs. Witch,
Tell me how you fly!
Tell me how you fly!
I fly on a broomstick,
High in the sky.

Mmmm Mmmm Good!

2004-05-12T11:44:00.000-04:00

Have you ever tasted aloe vera juice? It tastes like it smells; it smells like minty cat pee. However, as a health tonic, it is supposed to work wonders in small doses. (In larger doses, it is a laxative.)

I had a nice, new bottle of aloe vera juice. I had only taken one dose from it (a small one, thank you). It was in a box of things I was moving from Manhattan to Baltimore. At two-thirty this morning, I was carrying that box into my new house when the bottom fell out of it (the box, not the house).

The vestibule is now a minefield of menacing glass shards I was too tired to clean up, and doused with the acrid aroma of minty cat pee.

Welcome, welcome, welcome to my home.

Ta-da!

2004-05-10T17:28:00.000-04:00

Here is a little refresher of my good old Blogger template. Everything should be the same, except I've switched comment providers. Comments made in the past few hours unfortunately did not make the transition. Posting new comments is slightly different now, too, but you're all smart people: you will figure it out. Just be sure, if you are forced to post anonymoustly because of the settings, that you sign your name so I know to whom to respond.

(But post some soon so I don't get lonely. If we don't like these comments, I'll switch back to Haloscan soon.)

Career Gal

2004-05-10T13:19:00.000-04:00

Last night, I casually mentioned to my sister-in-law, the mother of my adorable baby niece, that her daughter could grow up to be a prostitute. It was not any sort of prediction or warning; I was just noting that she had an infinite array of options, that being one of them. I suppose I had sex workers on the brain after yesterday's musings about blue-collar careers.

That’s the last time I try to be encouraging. Mothers are so sensitive.

Sheesh.

Confronting Fears thorough Laziness

2004-05-09T09:52:00.000-04:00

The truth is, I’m afraid of movers. Watching someone pick up the boxes I have ineptly packed or the furniture on which I spent too much money makes my heart palpitate like a mariachi band. But since I have an increasingly bad shoulder and no physical strength whatsoever, movers have become a necessary indulgence.

My friend Lauri commented last week over coffee at Starbucks that blue-collar workers of any sort who do labor on her behalf make her anxious. I suppose that’s the core of it for me, as well: liberal, white-collar guilt. When I lived in Chicago skyscraper, I always went in and out the back door because I was too terrified to face the doorman. Even today, when I have people in to clean my apartment, I can’t disappear from the scene quickly enough, and I often over-tip taxi drivers, hair stylists, and restaurant servers to the point of embarrassment for everyone concerned. (Once a taxi driver tried to return some of the tip I gave him, and I ran and hid in a building lobby until he drove away.) Luckily, I have never hired a prostitute: I just know I would end up being the one who does all the work.

Yesterday, Rob and I moved our things from Manhattan to Baltimore. Since he is the best boyfriend in the world and understands my erratic neuroses better than anyone else, he offered to stay in Manhattan to supervise the loading while giving me the comparatively easy job of supervising the unloading on the other end.* This meant that I was not in New York to help him with the last-minute packing of his own apartment, which lasted until four o’clock in the morning. I feel wildly guilty about this, but it’s nowhere near the level of agitation I would have experienced if I had had been there when the movers showed up.

I must confess that, despite my fears, everything went rather smoothly. Could it be that I am now desensitized? Perhaps I ought to hire movers more often. Or electricians or painters or doormen or hair stylists or housecleaners or prostitutes.

Um. Yeah.

* I spent most of the time hiding in the kitchen.

Big Things

2004-05-08T10:48:00.000-04:00

The other day, on the subway, I overheard a conversation between a scruffy man leaning on a walker and two attractive young men who appeared to be brothers. (It was actually more “maniacal monologue” than “conversation,” and it was of sufficient volume for me to have overheard without leaving my apartment, but I like to paint these encounters with as civilized a brush as possible.)

What got my attention was when the scruffy man declared, “Everyone knows that it a guy’s got big feet, he’s got a big thing. I mean, in the changing room or something, you can’t help looking around and being, like, whoa! So now I can pretty much tell if a guy’s got a big thing. You just gotta look at his feet and then look him in the eye. And if he meets your eye, you know, yep.”

The young men to whom he was speaking nodded sagely at this point. I wondered if they even spoke English (they looked German), or if they were just trying to meet his eye to influence his evaluation.

The conversation (or maniacal monologue, if you prefer) shifted then to travel. The scruffy man had apparently been to the Bahamas and Miami, locales that, if one puts any credence in his report, featured beautiful women forming lines to service him in a particular way, one after another.

The woman sitting across from me on the subway bit her palm to keep from laughing.

At Forty-second Street, the three men departed the train. On the subway platform, the young men thanked their scruffy companion for the insightful discussion. For me, this was the best part of the encounter: they were serious, and the scruffy man knew it. He received the appreciation with a regal inclination of his head, as if he were a tribal elder imparting great wisdom to the next generation. Then they were out of sight as the train departed and everyone remaining in the car furtively met each other’s laughing eyes, a thin crack in the veneer of New York indifference.

Friendless

2004-05-07T12:31:00.000-04:00

When I first moved from Chicago back to Baltimore in 1997, I had never seen “Friends.” I also did not get any television reception in my new apartment, so I spent two more Friendless years. The closest I came was when I briefly dated a man who, so astonished at this hole in my experience, dragged out his personal stash of video tape recordings with the idea of forcing me to watch the entire series to date. “I want to introduce you to my friends,” he announced smugly, an approach that saw me fleeing into the night before the first episode was over.

Not until I moved in with Michael (who had cable) and absorbed his viewing habits did I make any effort to watch the program, and I eventually came to feel rather warmly toward it. The writing was consistently amusing, and the characters were not as much of the caricatures that they might have been (and eventually became). I developed a little crush on Ross, of all people, who was passionately goofy in the way I wanted to be (and in the way Rob actually is, although he for some reason identifies more with the icky Chandler).

Anyway, I watched the series finale last night, uncomfortably conscious of a country full of people out there beating their breasts over the loss of their dear imaginary friends.

I, on the other hand, New Yorker that I have become, spent the whole episode bemoaning the loss of an imaginary rent-controlled apartment.

Brother, Can You Spare Some Pudding?

2004-05-06T00:21:00.000-04:00

Tonight, Goblin and I accompanied Rob to the grocery store and waited outside while he went in to buy yummy pudding. Goblin started shivering in the cool and damp night air, so I crouched down, positioned her little body between my knees, wrapped my arms around her, and quietly sang the “Goblin Is a Good Girl” song. The only thing visible to passers-by was an unshaven man kneeling on the pavement, crooning tunelessly.

As one might imagine, I got a rather wide berth.

Now Hippopotamusier!

2004-05-04T11:14:00.000-04:00

My guess is that everyone is secretly bored to tears. This is why advertising works. We buy things because we think that some of the glamour or excitement of the product’s marketing will infuse our dreary lives. Thus, every razor and toothbrush we use is as gleaming and aerodynamic as the space shuttle, and the automobiles we drive can transport us with ease to jagged mountaintops. Whether the Enterprise beams me up during my morning toilet or my boyfriend is captured by the yeti, I’ll be ready. (I just have to call in sick from work, board the dog, make sure the mortgage is paid and the floors are swept, put the mail on hold, make the bed, pack an overnight bag, and not forget to grab my vitamins, my glasses, my dental night guard, my prescriptions, and a change of underpants. Here I come to save the day, honey! Don't leave without me, Captain Kirk!)

I’m a designer, so good industrial design and clever advertising give me a quiet joy, but these days, there is desperation in the air. If a product can’t claim to be “New and Improved!” every six months, it might as well not exist. It will be bypassed on the shelves by the hordes of jaded zombies who need their next fix of excitement, and it will languish in consumer purgatory until some wiseguy comes up with a way of revitalizing the brand.

We don’t buy things because they’re actually new and improved. Who cares if our no-wax tile is two percent brighter, or if our electric toothbrushes have four speeds instead of three? We buy things because for one brief, sparkling moment, we have in our very own grocery bag a package depicting a shiny burst of color and too many exclamation points. The exhilaration lasts until we get home, throw the packaging away, and sink back into the routine tedium of our existence.

A Dirty Secret

2004-05-03T11:02:00.000-04:00

Though I once pretended to be a sadomasochist to get out of dating a man who looked like a snaggletoothed George Costanza, I am not really a sadist or a masochist. Still, I have occasional insights into those mindsets, most notably in the bathroom. Yes, it’s what you think:

Flossing.

My guilty secret is that I tend to go months or even years without flossing, not because I dislike it, but because I like it too much. The searing pain of the floss cutting into my gums is exquisite and accompanied by geysers of hot, sticky blood. When I finish, my mouth feels raw but immaculate: through suffering comes redemption. Because I don’t subscribe to a religion, I can’t get it any other way . . . and yet, I crave it. (Hairshirts and self-flagellation actually start making sense in the CVS dental care aisle.) At first, flossing once a day does the trick, but as my gums get tougher, I need more and more to get the same high. Two, three, four times or more; once I did it six times in one afternoon.

Pressing the floss deeper and deeper into the soft tissue between my teeth reminds me of a side stairway in the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry. There, on display, is a corpse encased in glass, sliced into one-inch segments so perfect, it might have been done by a laser beam. Gawkers who stumble upon this macabre exhibition can see everything, inside and out, of this poor, unsuspecting creature. I have recently begun to imagine, however, that the slices are less uniform, that they taper as they move up from the feet, toward the dead man’s jaw, and terminate between his teeth. I used to be horrified by this dead man, cut up like a salami. He haunted my dreams. But now I see that he is just me, preoccupied with flossing, with digging, cutting, slicing, bleeding, cleansing . . .

. . . oh yes, yes, YES!

(I recently purchased a vibrating flossing machine. Y'all may not be hearing from me for a while.)

The Great Divide

2004-04-30T14:13:00.000-04:00

When John Edwards was running for President, he was wont to discuss his idea of two Americas*, which boiled down to the eternal dichotomy of the haves and the have-nots. While Rob’s family was in town, we decided that there are indeed two American nations, but these are not divided exactly along class lines or even political affiliation (although the preferences of each group are clear). Instead, we have:

Those who solve problems using reason vs. the primitive reactionaries.

Or:

Evolutionary Darwinists vs. social Darwinists.

Or:

The intellectually curious vs. the willfully ignorant.

Or:

Free thinkers who encourage spirited debate vs. followers who prefer fascist compliance or dogmatic submission.

Or:

Those who use their power for the common good vs. those who use their power to help only themselves.

Or:

Those who live and let live vs. those who impose their own choices on others.

In other words, we have:

America vs. Murrica.

Like Israel and Palestine, America and Murrica are different spirits inhabiting the same land. (Americans are aware, of course, that the land once belonged to others; Murricans are prone to defending their small patches of terrain with vast arsenals, and worse luck if the injuns want it back.) Unlike in the Middle East, there is no acceptable way to divide the two into distinct entities. Cities, neighborhoods, and even families would be rather roughly hewn.

There used to be no easy way to distinguish between Americans and Murricans at a glance, but the Murricans have decided that they would rather not be mistaken for freedom-loving, kind-hearted, or remotely civilized individuals and have taken steps to ensure this cannot possibly happen. Thus, on our drive from Baltimore to Manhattan on Sunday night, Rob, Barb, Rindy, Goblin, and I witnessed a shocking array of vindictive bumper stickers and confederate flags and were nearly forced off the road by a Humvee whose driver (by virtue of his own inflated sense of importance or the immense size of his vehicle) felt entitled to bypass a miles of slow traffic on the shoulder. Had we turned on the radio, we would have heard station after station of bellicose white male millionaires bleating about their eternal persecution and strategizing ways of converting every last creature on earth into slaves of their lusty but chaste Murrican hungers.

And indeed, these are never sated.

Americans, I think, are basically decent, and although we don’t always get everything right, there’s no denying that we mean well. Because we are the fruit of social evolution and revolution, we often feel invincible. But this is merely an illusion, because no matter what progress we make, the Murricans—our abominable alter egos—are always there, ready to drag us back into the primordial muck.

* This is not the obvious reference to the continents of North and South America; he was referring to the United States of America alone. It is, however, difficult to pluralize “United States” unless one resorts to “United Stateses.”

Recovered Memories

2004-04-28T16:08:00.000-04:00

Oh dear. Logistics and rather traumatic events have conspired to keep me from the rather inspired post I was going to write today. Instead, I shall steal this idea from my dear friend Crash, who posted it on his web log yesterday:

“Latest meme: Invent a memory of me and post it in the comments. It can be anything you want, so long as it's something that's never happened. The universe failed to cooperate in making it happen so you have to make it up instead.”

Red Carpet

2004-04-27T14:16:00.000-04:00

And we’re back.

Obviously, last night’s reading of Rob’s latest musical was a tour de force with its all-star cast and blogger-studded audience. Aside from myself, Crash was there, and Faustus, and Accidental New Yorker, and even Hipster Librarian. (Notable in his absence was MAK, who promised months ago to attend. He will be severely punished.) Rob’s mother and sister came from Wisconsin, my father and brother and brother’s fiancé came from Baltimore, and producers came from all over.

Phenomenal.

IMPORTANT ALERT

2004-04-22T01:33:00.000-04:00

Today, April 22, is my boyfriend Rob's birthday. He is many years older than I am, but he looks many years younger.

I love him, but my skin is green with envy.

Or maybe it's just green.

ALSO:

Please note that on this coming Monday, April 26, at eight o'clock, is a very special event. Rob's play, "Vanishing Point" is having a staged reading starring Tony Award nominees Alison Fraser, Emily Skinner, and Barbara Walsh. This is an amazing show, and I would love to see each and every one of you there.

Performances will take place at the elegant Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theatre at Peter Norton Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway at 95th Street in Manhattan.

Tickets are only $25 and may be purchased at the Symphony Space box office, 212 864 5400, or at www.SymphonySpace.org.

In other news, scroll down to read more about what happened this week.

A Week of Firsts

2004-04-22T01:30:00.000-04:00

Last night, my father’s lawyer invited our family to be guests in his firm’s skybox at Oriole Park, so I attended my first baseball game in twenty years. I went along as a gesture of family harmony, not expecting to enjoy myself, but it turned out to be fabulous.

As it happens, baseball is an intriguing and graceful sport played by eighteen handsome men in tight pants. The stadium authorities, however, appear to be of the opinion that there is something inherently dull about it. Every five seconds, the scoreboards would flash something the audience was supposed to yell, or canned music would instigate shouts and rapid foot stomping, or an enormous bird would dance by and promulgate various hijinks, or everyone in the stadium would stand up and sit down in a carefully orchestrated pattern called, I believe, a “wave.” They seemed to be taking their cues from the Chimperor’s Repugnant Administration: use all of the flash and glitz at your disposal to make the population chant in unison and distract them from what’s really going on.

The Orioles won, nine to one.

Today, I went to settlement on my first house. It was a Byzantine, three-hour entanglement made worse when the other side, a relocation company, forgot to show up. They now insist that I sign a document that my lawyer has forbidden me to sign, so I feel a bit as if I am in lodging limbo, but in the end, I don’t care because I got the keys. Goblin bravely weathered the ordeal from her carrying bag in the corner, and after the last i was dotted, she and I drove over to our new home and wandered around it in a daze. Then we sped up I-95 to New York, where we intend to spend less than a day. Ah, bi-location.

Our real estate agent bought us a gift: a squirrel feeder for the back yard. Goblin strikes again!

Creeping

2004-04-20T12:53:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day, to the last syllable of recorded time . . .

We all know that Shakespeare was really referring to settlement on Glamis Castle. But your good wishes paid off: I have just received news that my own closing will occur on perhaps the penultimate syllable of recorded time, otherwise known as lunchtime tomorrow.

After which, I will not have time to enjoy my house. Either I will have to make a mad dash up to New York, or the world will end.

Anyone care to lay odds?

Fog

2004-04-19T20:09:00.000-04:00

When, oh when will I close on my house? I don’t know. Rob doesn’t know. The realtors don’t know. The lawyers don’t know. The sellers don’t know. The title company doesn’t know. This last is most important because they are the ones holding up the deal. I don’t even know what a title company is, but there is one standing between me and my own home. All of this is because Mercury is in retrograde, I just know it.

This morning, as I twirled around in residential limbo, I went to court with my friend Viki, who received a citation months ago for disturbing the peace. Actually, she committed the unspeakable crime of using a megaphone at a rally protesting cuts in public transportation, eight minutes after the permit to demonstrate expired. (Apparently, one must petition the government to protest against the actions of the government these days. As a primer for all of the “brown-skinned” people in the world whom Ann Coulter and the Chimperor feel are not quite capable of democracy, this is called free speech.) But I was a little late because I had to stop for gas, and in the short duration of the fill-up, the charges were dropped.

So we went to the mall.

And Ikea.

And then back to the mall.

And then I came home.

Now, if you will pardon me, I must go and eat an ice cream bar. Uh, I mean, wallow in dreary uncertainty.

Briefs

2004-04-18T09:59:00.000-04:00

One. I am not yet a homeowner. Our settlement was postponed for murky and inexplicable reasons. Although I appreciate everyone’s good wishes, it is clear that those wishes were not good enough. Please try again . . . and see if you can make it happen by Wednesday. I don’t have all the time in the world, people.

Two. Instead of sleeping in our own house, Rob and I have extended our stay at my parents’. As I have mentioned a few times, they are in the process of a major renovation, the latest project of which has been to install a skylight directly over the toilet in the once-dank upstairs bathroom. Now, during the day, a squatter is bathed in a celestial glow; at night, one may contemplate the infinity of the cosmos. Either way, a transcendent experience.

Three. It having occurred to me that it would be nearly impossible for me to exist in Baltimore without a car, I went out and bought one. I am now officially in debt for a billion dollars, a fact I might once have felt squeamish about before I was shown the light by a Republican administration that does not feel “deficit spending” is such a big deal.* The car salesman’s name was “Big” Andy. Those words are written on his card (penciled in, actually). “Big” Andy had a book on his desk, half hidden behind the telephone: How to Win Friends and Influence People. Clearly, this tome does not cover all of the bases in an automobile transaction, or perhaps he didn’t read far enough yet. “Big” Andy didn’t bat an eye when Viki said I was a male prostitute, or when I offered to trade in Viki for an upgrade on wheel rims. It also did not phase him when I told him I don’t have a job, was between addresses, and forgot my driver’s license at home. But his jaw hit the table when I revealed I had not already purchased insurance for a car I had until that point been only considering buying.

Anyway, he must have been too flustered to put two and two together: being a male prostitute is a job.

Four. The other night, I attended a grand opening party for the store in Georgetown I designed. It was filled to the brim with skinny young women trying on clothes, and one hateful woman who looked like a young Linda Tripp. Nobody paid any attention to me, but I was proud of my work.

Five. Recently, in Starbucks, a disheveled older man in a half-tucked tee-shirt advertising bail bonds entered, put his cooler jug on a table, sat down, looked around, then stood up and began meticulously adjusting all of the empty chairs in the room until their backs were perfectly parallel with the tables.

Thank god he did it. They had been wearing on my patience the whole time.

Six. An enormous thanks to Matthew for his delightful guest post a couple of days ago. Don’t let him mislead you, though: he does put out. Heh heh.

* They, of course, are doing it in order to fund their bloody agenda, heap further wealth upon their rich supporters, and bankrupt the public safety net; my own motives are more self-involved.

Just Dropped By To Say Hello

2004-04-16T13:06:00.000-04:00

Good afternoon. Matthew here, from ‘Til The Cows Come Home. David sent a frantic S.O.S., asking a few guests to fill in for him during his absence. Despite the fact that David never wants to see me in person anymore (“Oh, I thought that e-mail invitation to drinks was spam, so I deleted it” or “We could get together, but what’s the point if you don’t put out?” or “I’m so busy looking for a house in Baltimore, blah blah blah”), he has done a wonderful job of guest blogging for me in the past. I’m all too happy to return the favor.

David’s imminent move inspired me to write about my relocation to New York City, nearly five years ago to the day. A fresh-faced young actor from Ohio, I had planned on subletting from a college friend for the first few months. I shall call her Ivy. She was the star of our musical theater program during her time at school, and moved to the city two years before me to pursue the life of a star.

Ivy had a basement apartment in Astoria with a spare bedroom. Little did I know at the time that the move to New York traumatized her and she developed umpteen social phobias. Apparently, she rarely left her apartment except to go to work (and by “work” I mean dressing up as a cowgirl, standing in front of a Broadway theater and distributing leaflets for the revival of an Irving Berlin classic, all the while stalking its star) and to church.

On her way to and from work, Ivy would stop at Blockbuster, rent a stack of Harrison Ford or Audrey Hepburn movies, pick up some Doritos, and rush back to her apartment to lock herself in. Once in a while she would treat herself and re-enact Ally McBeal episodes in her bedroom. I only wish I were joking. Unfortunately, being new to the city and very poor, I usually ended up being locked in with her. Newspapers were forbidden in her home, as were television news broadcasts. “The world is full of evil and sad news,” Ivy would say. “I just can’t face it. I pray very hard for peace and joy for everybody.”

One of our other college classmates, whom I shall call Helena Bonham Carter, lived nearby and would often spend time with us (mostly so that I wouldn’t have to be alone with Ivy). One fateful evening, we managed to actually drag Ivy out to the Village to see a cabaret performance at the Duplex. Afterwards, we sat at the bar and had a few drinks while listening to performers sing during the open mike session. The next thing we knew, Ivy was up at the piano, cocktail in one hand and microphone in the other, crooning out “My Heart Will Go On” in a performance that fluctuated between Alanis Morissette and one of those recordings that subliminally coaches you to stop smoking.

Inexplicably, Ivy’s drunken crooning appealed to one of the three and a half straight men in the joint, and he tried to get Ivy to go on a date with him. Somehow Ivy snapped back from her vodka-induced daze, decided that the end of the world was, in fact, upon us, and ran out of the bar. Helena Bonham Carter and I raced after her, where we witnessed Ivy fall to the ground in the middle of Seventh Avenue, sobbing, and crying out “Why, God, why?” And after that night, we didn’t get Ivy to leave her apartment again, and I moved out of her place as quickly as possible.

For a while, Helena Bonham Carter and I tried to be supportive friends and find ways to help Ivy out of her internal prison. We didn’t understand how she had transformed from outgoing and fun-loving undergrad to psycho city girl. After our initial attempts failed, however, we soon lost patience…and interest. We did devise one final plan to get Ivy out of her apartment. Project Armageddon Drill involved setting off cherry bombs and strobe lights outside of Ivy's only window, and using the microphone from the action figure set of He-Man’s Snake Mountain to imitate the voice of God. The goal was to see if Ivy would try to make a run for the door or kneel down and accept her fate. Much to our dismay, Ivy packed up and moved to Idaho before we had a chance to implement the plan.

Word on the streets is that Ivy has moved from the hills of Idaho (does Idaho even have hills?) to Los Angeles, where her fear of being in seen in public and being mistaken for Bette Midler must have let up enough to allow her to live a semi-normal life. Rumor has it that she was involved in a local production of Godspell where she tried to trip the actor playing Jesus so that she could go on in his place. But we may never really know the truth.

On Model Behavior

2004-04-14T00:34:00.000-04:00

When I was young, my family got into the habit of driving around on Sundays and looking at model homes. We did this frequently and (some might argue) futilely, as we had no plans to move. I have banished most of the nineteen seventies and eighties from my fragile memory, but perhaps it was a common pastime of that era.

The only remaining impression I have from those excursions is the way my four brothers and I would fight over the model bedrooms. We would each seize the one we believed should be ours and then defend our imaginary territory with the ferocity of rabid raccoons.

Of course, we all wanted the biggest bedroom. I, being the oldest, was so shocked and dismayed by my brothers’ imperial claims that I made extensive lists as to why I deserved the most space, one of which I actually presented to my parents with the air of an aggrieved ambassador seeking restitution from the United Nations. They were naturally bewildered by this since, again, we were not actually moving into a new house, and I already had the biggest bedroom in our old one.*

Tomorrow, I am going to Baltimore for a series of events that will culminate in Rob’s and my closing on the new house. On Friday, it will be ours. We will share the biggest bedroom, and I gave Rob the second-biggest for his office and music room.

Somehow, home ownership has inspired in me a generosity previously untapped.

* And when we did move, years later, I got the largest room then, too.

Note: I am not going to write here for a few days, but I will see if I can scare up anyone to keep you entertained while I am gone. Wish me luck.

Something's Fishy

2004-04-13T11:04:00.000-04:00

Tuna Girl, who is one of my favorite web loggers, wrote a touching message yesterday about the death of her daughter’s pet fish.

It all came rushing back.

I was about ten when, for some insane reason, my parents allowed me to add to the menagerie of creatures that already inhabited our house and adopt five goldfish, which I immediately named after Star Wars characters. Never having owned fish before, I was both inexperienced in their care and unprepared for their intense reaction to the slightest change in conditions. No sooner did Luke Skywalker emerge from his plastic bag than he began floating on his side, wagging his listless fins.

Devastated, I followed fish protocol and separated him from the rest of the school, lest he prove contagious. My mother put him on a pot on the stove along with (for some reason) an aspirin, and my father forced me to go to my catechism class when I wanted nothing more than to sit by Luke Skywalker’s sickbed (sickpot?) and restore his health through constant watchfulness and sheer force of will. That, I reasoned, is what Jesus would have wanted. But apparently, Jesus’s affinity for fishes extended only as far as loaves, because by the next morning, the first Jedi fish had gone to that big Ocean in the Sky.*

An unwatched pot never cures an ailing fish.

I buried Luke with much fanfare in an aspirin bottle and secretly planted a tulip bulb in his grave with the idea that its blooming would be viewed as miraculous testament to his aquatically sainted nature.

But by the time it sprouted, I had forgotten all about him, and as Princess Leia, Darth Vader, and the rest went belly up, they got flushed down the toilet.

This was the story of one fish and how he did not do much to hinder the loss of innocence of the boy who loved him.

* Incidentally, I realize now how adorably ignorant I was: goldfish are fresh-water fish and cannot tolerate the salinity of an ocean, heavenly or otherwise. But at least we can hope it found a bigger tank and all the flakes it could eat.

The City that Reads

2004-04-12T18:26:00.000-04:00

It did not escape Rob’s or my attention that we are moving from a clean, tranquil, and perfectly safe city to a hotbed of crime, grime, and rubbish. That is to say, we are moving from Manhattan to Baltimore. And while we will certainly do our best to cope with the lower standard of living, there is another factor that may introduce a monkey wrench into the works.

I often say that the chief difference between New York City and Baltimore is that that in New York everyone is crazy and knows it, and in Baltimore everyone is crazy and thinks he or she is perfectly normal. In theory, this may seem like the slimmest distinction, but in practice, it is night and day.

In New York, all but the most raving of lunatics leave you alone (and you can see the most raving of lunatics coming, so in the event of a conflict, you have no one to blame but yourself). This is because everyone knows that, in this city, each person is crazier than the last, and the one who looks innocuous may actually be an axe murderer. Why chance it?

In Baltimore, however, all bets are off: I have had the most bizarre encounters of anyplace I have been in the world in that city. It is there that, walking down the street with my friend Viki, a woman approached, introduced herself, and said to Viki, “Would you go home and change your dress? It’s very indecent, and you’re showing too much skin.” (It would have been even wackier if she had said that to me, but the one thing I can never be accused of, even by the most deranged of people, is showing too much skin.)

Viki and I were also together when we were cornered by an ancient man named Sal, who spent thirty minutes explaining that the surest way to a woman’s heart is to lick a cinder out of her eye.

It is also there that I was followed home one time by a male prostitute on his night off, a young African-American guy who claimed that I was the most handsome man he had ever seen and would give up his licentious career if only I would become his boyfriend. (I told you Baltimoreans were crazy.) I graciously, but persistently, refused, but he would not let me go inside without giving him a parting kiss, which I did, much to the horror of the church group that was letting out across the street (but they were Episcopalians, so it didn’t matter). That same young gentleman would escort me safely home whenever we encountered each other after dark, but he always respected my decision and would have to be satisfied with the memory of our single moment of passion.

And then there was the time I was carjacked by a man without a weapon, who only wanted a ride to buy drugs in the next neighborhood over. When we reached the prescribed corner, he got out of the car and made me to promise to wait for him, a promise I kept for all of two seconds before I zipped away with a squeal of tires and a puff of smoke. (Now I feel guilty for being so untrustworthy, but I am working it out in therapy.)

Ah, Baltimore.

I can’t wait.

Meanwhile . . .

2004-04-10T01:36:00.000-04:00

This has got to be one of the more disquieting things I have seen. (Thanks to Rob for pointing it out. You may need a high-speed connection to view it.)

Sacrilege!

2004-04-09T18:46:00.000-04:00

Today, I had lunch with my friend Mark and went to visit my friend Lauri for the first time since her daughter, Ruby, was born a few weeks ago. Ruby is an adorable child with an intelligent gaze, who nevertheless burst into tears when presented with the gift Rob and I had picked out for her: a fashion-forward cow doll dressed in a pillbox hat and faux fur coat. (Let us hope that her agitation stemmed from her inexperienced eye for discerning fake fur from the real thing, and that her displeasure was merely an aversion to the implication of animal cruelty.)

Later, walking home, I became distracted from my route by the song from the new Revlon advertising campaign. I was not hearing it at that exact moment; I was attempting to determine how I might obtain a copy because it is quite lovely.* And I was distracted from that by an elderly woman walking a foxy-looking little dog, who kept saying to it, “No, you behave yourself,” as if the foxy-looking little dog had just suggested that the elderly woman behave herself. And I was distracted from that because I suddenly found myself surrounded by a procession of priests and laypeople bearing crosses and a large, realistic statue of a bloody corpse.

This crowd, two or three hundred strong and chanting, appeared out of nowhere and surged around me. They were accompanied on the street by several police cars, lights flashing, and for a moment I felt as if I had materialized in a lynch mob before I realized that they were re-enacting the Stations of the Cross on Amsterdam Avenue.

To escape this horrifying mania, I ducked into the Door Store, the furniture shop at which Rob and I bought two chairs last week for our new house. The lovely woman who helped us before was there again, and before I knew it, she succeeded in selling me a feng shui fountain to accompany the order. (Apparently, anyone can offer to sell me anything, and I will jump at the chance, but it was a very handsome fountain—and quite a bargain!—so I did not feel too bad.)

Back on the street, several blocks away, I whipped out my cell phone to return a call to my friend Viki, when from around a corner came . . . the procession! Clearly, they had ducked behind some parked cars while I bought my fountain and were following me home for god-knows-what nefarious purposes. This time, they were singing “Amazing Grace,” so I am afraid my phone message to Viki was comprised entirely of that hymn. While running for my life, I was struck again by the statue of the bloody corpse they held aloft over them. What is it about Christians and their reverence for violent masochism? I thought the point of this particular corpse was that it came back to life: in which case, should they not be walking around with some sort of realistic animatronic robot?

Probably not, because if it had any sense, it would tell them to go home and stop holding up traffic and overwhelming the pedestrians. “And by the way,” it would say, “why don’t you mind your own business and stop bothering gay people who want to get married?”

They should probably keep it away from water, though, in case it gets any perambulatory ideas. I hear that is hell on the circuits.

* If you know, please drop me a line, but do not drop me a line** only to suggest that I look on the Revlon web site for a clue, because I did already, and there was nary a clue to be found.

** What is a line, anyway?

Revenge of the Physic

2004-04-08T13:22:00.000-04:00

Yesterday afternoon, I went to the Starbucks on Broadway and Ninety-eighth with Faustus. While I ordered a yummy-looking piece of pound cake, a plumber was behind the counter wrestling with a broken dishwasher. He finally succeeded in pulling it away from the wall, at which point a dozen cockroaches burst out from underneath of it and skittered in all directions.

The cake was as yummy as it appeared.

Later, on my way home, a woman handing out pamphlets singled me out of a crowd of pedestrians and offered me a psychic reading.

“Oh, how sweet,” I said. “But I really must go.”

She gave me a look that indicated she knew all about my “Physic Shop” anecdote from the other day and was not amused. “You let me give you a free sample,” she said in accented English, “and if it’s good, you come inside with me and get a card reading.”

“Uh, OK,” I said.

She stared at me. “Your career is about to change,” she predicted.

“Yup,” I said, looking distractedly down the street.*

“Your financial situation is about to change,” she said.

“Yup,” I said, looking distractedly down the street.*

“You are about to move,” she said.

“Yup,” I said, looking distractedly down the street.*

“Your lover has unfaithful thoughts,” she said.

“Let’s go inside and look at those cards,” I said.

We went into her one-room apartment, which had almost no furniture but was crammed with people, including several rowdy toddlers and one of the most stunning men I have seen in my life (except for Rob, of course). The psychic set up two flimsy folding chairs behind a bookcase and dragged over a third to lay her cards on.

From what I could comprehend of it, the rest of my reading was equally dramatic. Apparently, an old flame wants to get back together with me, one of my friends is very jealous of me and is sending me negative energy, and I have erected a barrier around myself that has thus far deflected any hope of material success. The former two of these prophecies are standard fortuneteller fare, as they are apparently all addicted to soap operas. The last is something I have heard from every psychic I ever visited, and it happens to be quite true, but I was distracted from following up on either this or my lover’s unfaithful thoughts** by the chaos on the other side of the bookcase and some decidedly anomalous noises from the adjacent bathroom.

So instead of finding out how I could once and for all change my life for the better, I went home and ate an ice cream bar.

* It was Eighty-sixth Street, near Amsterdam.

** He claims he does not have unfaithful thoughts. Which of them should I believe?

Dum Dum Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuum

2004-04-07T13:03:00.000-04:00

Last night, I received an email with the tantalizing subject line “EARTH SHATTERING COINCIDENCE.” And while the planet appears largely intact,* I must admit that the email went on to detail a spellbinding twist of fate.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about Rob’s and my search for a house in Baltimore, mentioning that we had found one (a former funeral parlor in Little Italy) that we loved but were subsequently outbid.

The earth-shattering email was from the people who outbid us. They had stumbled across my web log entry and wrote to apologize (although I suspect their regrets extend only so far, as they got a gorgeous home out of the deal).

I had written before about the omens I received from on high that our bid would not be successful: two black cats and a swooping seagull with menacing eyes. My correspondent wrote that his omens were more encouraging: “‘fat cat on windowsill purring contentedly and licking one paw’ and ‘white dove carrying sprig of mistletoe’ (well it might have been a particularly clean seagull with a weed, but the effect was there).”

If nothing else, it is clear that this structure is a vortex of supernatural forces, a battleground of good and evil seagulls.

But the coinkydinks do not end there, oh no indeed. The outbidding letter-writer’s name is David. His email address begins with Faustus. His romantic partner’s name is Natalie.

As the super-sleuths among you know, my name is also David! Further, the online name of one of my dearest friends is Faustus! Further, Natalie was the name of my favorite character on “The Facts of Life”!

The spooky organ music should begin shortly.

* Although my boyfriend claims there is evidence of large holes in the polar regions, these are most likely unrelated.

Can They Contact Einstein?

2004-04-06T14:08:00.000-04:00

I am in a terrible rush today, so I only have enough time to post the following brief statement:

In Laurel, Maryland, along Route 1, there is a store that from its otherworldly aura appears to be offering psychic services. Except the bold lettering on the sign reads, counterintuitively, “THE PHYSIC SHOP.”

Discuss.

Hope Is a Four-Letter Word

2004-04-05T14:33:00.000-04:00

Running on about three hours’ sleep, I showed up at the train station early Saturday morning in a bemused stupor. The only concrete fact I could establish was that my train was on time; confident of that, I stood under the departure sign with my eyes rolled up into my skull until an older man approached and asked me where to find the New Jersey Transit counter.

We were standing a mere ten feet a way from the New Jersey Transit counter, but since I somehow interpreted his question as a search for the Long Island Railroad counter, I sent him on a wild goose chase to the other side of Penn Station. When I realized this, I was so horrified that I went and hid behind a crowd of people on the other side of the waiting area. Which is why I was not at the front of the line to get on the unreserved train, which is why I did not get a seat and had to stand between cars.

I blame all of this on New Jersey, but at least I now know that, like a flamingo, I can balance on my feet while sleeping.

The return trip the next day was more comfortable. I took the seat next to a wide-eyed young man who sat primly with his perfectly manicured hands folded in his lap. I took note of this because my own fingertips look as if they have been devoured by weasels (in fact, they have been). He did not move or even blink the entire time, but that was fine because I was thinking about something else.

On that fateful train ride, I came to the conclusion that there is hope for humanity after all. It was touch and go for a while, and certainly there is no end of problems that we cause for ourselves and each other, but all of that is habitual, and we can change habits. This is illustrated twice a year, when Daylight Savings Time begins and ends: on those occasions, our entire society* does something different. Can you imagine? Maybe a day will come when we all decide to stop voting for Republicans. I might even stop letting the weasels chew on my fingertips.

It could happen.

* I know there are a few holdout backwaters that do not acknowledge Daylight Savings Time. Perhaps if we ignore them, they'll go away.

The Poop on Democracy

2004-04-02T16:31:00.000-05:00

Some people wonder why democracy is failing in the United States, but I do not. Democracy, built upon the premise that individual voices may make a difference when employed collectively, assumes that these individuals will speak out for the common good. The fundamental flaw is that “common good” is more often interpreted as “my own best interests imposed upon everyone else.”

Here, readers familiar with my routine will expect me to evoke the Republican Party, the de facto motto of which is “the best interests of one percent of the population camouflaged by the narrow-minded agenda of a demographic too ignorant to know any better.” What, after all, could be worse for democracy than the Republican manifesto?

(That was a rhetorical question, but forced to speculate, I think the answer must be on the level of “collision with planet-killing meteor.”)

No, you sillies. Today, I am more interested in poop.

The neighborhood to which Rob and I are moving has an active online bulletin board where one might post questions, comments, or suggestions. Naturally, we both bookmarked the site instantly upon discovering it and check it obsessively throughout the day for new postings. (There is, after all, a reason why we are boyfriends: complimentary obsessions.)

For the past few days, the main topic of conversation on the bulletin board has been the closing of a favorite neighborhood park to dogs because a few vocal citizens decided there was a surplus of dog poop on the grounds. They justified this maneuver partly because dog poop creates an “unsafe” environment for children. This generated dozens of postings, my favorite of which called for banning of children from the park instead. Meanwhile, discussions regarding rapists and burglars in the area went virtually ignored.

And so we have people who are concerned about their rights as parents of human children squaring off against the people who are concerned about their rights as parents of dogs, each side doing its best to legislate its own worldview. Finding nothing whatsoever appealing about children in general, I myself come down on the side of the dogs, but in the larger scheme of things, I embrace the idea that a person whose habits cause an inconvenience, disruption, or hazard for another person is the one who should curtail those habits. This is why dog owners should pick up after their dogs, smokers should not light up when in an enclosed area with nonsmokers, and religious evangelists should be imprisoned until they have seen the error of their ways.

But let’s once and for all put an end to the idea that people who have children are somehow immune from this or somehow have more rights because they have gotten more use out of their reproductive organs than everyone else. They may be producing a new generation of voters, but that is still undemocratic.

A Funny Post . . . April Fool!

2004-04-01T11:21:00.000-05:00

It is rarely a delight when something that has been an abstract concept suddenly looms imminent. Terrorism, for example, or turning thirty (or so I have heard).

Yesterday, it occurred to me and Rob that we are moving in a few weeks and have not lifted so much as a pinky toe in preparation. We spent the afternoon darting to every furniture store on the Upper West Side (and eating pastries). We spent the evening pondering elaborate systems for disposing of Goblin’s poop in our new neighborhood (and eating ice-cream bars).

Really, when the time comes, the movers are going to have to carry us down the stairs.

The Squirrel Lady

2004-03-31T16:16:00.000-05:00

The Squirrel Lady’s name is Judy. That somehow escaped my attention, though I have known her for a year: we chat in Central Park while my dog chases the squirrels she lures near. I have learned snippets about her life away from the park, but these are not details I associate with her persona.

The Squirrel Lady pushes a creaky baby carriage full of peanuts to the park every weekend to feed the squirrels. She has a gray crewcut and once entertained the idea of adopting a ferret or a hamster before reading a book of Patricia Highsmith short stories about pets that kill their owners (among which, apparently, ferrets and hamsters loom prominently).

Judy is a typist at a law firm who is recovering from carpal tunnel syndrome.

This invites contemplation of how the essence of a thing may differ from its classification. To me, I am the boring guy who arranges his life around his dog’s digestive and excretory habits . . . and, of course, TiVo. To others, I am that crazy guy who takes his dog to the park to chase squirrels every morning, or a bon vivant who is about to divide his life between two major cities, or a hell-bound pinko commie intellectual liberal faggot.

I used to wonder about the Squirrel Lady. She captured my imagination; I pictured where she lived and what she ate for dinner and what her romantic life was like.

Judy, I can take or leave.

If you like what you've read here, please consider donating to the Democratic National Committee via the above link.

D.N.C.

2004-03-30T21:23:00.000-05:00

I started a special page with the Democratic National Committee called ePatriots. Readers of this site are asked to give generously to help defeat George W. Bush in November. Clicking on the following banner link will take you directly to my personalized donation site. Thanks for your generous contribution.

Time for Timer

2004-03-26T19:27:00.000-05:00

Does anyone besides me remember a cartoon creature called Timer that sang in Saturday morning commercial breaks about good nutrition? Timer looked like a half-masticated chicken wing with spindly legs and a top hat. He had a song about beans and rice, and he may have been the Cassandra of “drowning your food” by covering it in too many sauces and condiments.

Either some television executive in the nineteen seventies thought this was a good idea, or I got a hold of a box of Cracker Jacks with the wrong kind of tattoo prize inside.

Seesaw

2004-03-25T17:18:00.000-05:00

Whichever pair I am wearing—old or new, boot or sneaker—my left shoe always comes untied while I’m walking, and my right one never does.

Whichever pair I am wearing—old or new, clear or tinted or sun—my spectacles always end up lopsided on my face, with the right eye higher than the left.

Apparently, I am unbalanced from head to toe.

(And I am not going to delve into the eternal struggle between the hemispheres of my brain.)

I Was Robbed!

2004-03-24T18:11:00.000-05:00

Today, I gave sixty-seven cents to a homeless man whose first name was Marty and whose middle name was either Oscar or Usher (he did not remember). In exchange, he told me the following joke:

“A German doctor moved to this city and hung out his shingle. It said on the sign that his office hours were ‘T.V.’ Nobody knew what to make of this ‘T.V.’ All the ladies would pass by and nobody knew. Finally, this one lady, she went in, and she says, ‘Hey, what’s this mean, T.V., for your office hours? Are you crazy?’ So the guy says, ‘I am from Germany. My office hours are Tuesday and Vednesday.’”

Did I get my money’s worth?

Hello? Is this Mr. Batory?

2004-03-23T16:24:00.000-05:00

When I was in college, I somehow wrangled my way into the position of Features editor of the student newspaper. This dubious triumph was accomplished without any previous experience or strategy for moving forward. As was the case with most of my rises to power, I was in the right place at the right time, and no one else wanted to do it. Once on the job, I simply made things up as I went along (my editorial responsibilities, not the news stories, as so many journalists appear to be doing these days).

I readily admit that I was a terrible Features editor, both in arranging the scope of my section’s coverage and in getting anyone to do the work. My scant staff was so unreliable that I ended up writing everything myself in the hour before we went to press, and those of you who are witness to my love affair with grammar today would be flabbergasted to learn that I did not proofread a single one of the slipshod articles and columns that I published. I was too busy writing the horoscopes that extrapolated my dire predictions about my friends’ convoluted lives to all of the unlucky souls who shared their birth signs.

In fact, I wrote several regular columns under bizarre pseudonyms; it was lucky I was schizophrenic or it would have been difficult to keep track of so many different personalities and points of view. My favorite of these was called “The Campus Curmudgeon,” by “Mr. Misanthropy.” A precursor to this very web log, that column gave voice to the facet of my psyche that loves to complain but is continually mystified by the vagaries of human nature. Everyone found this so depressing, however, that I was forced to invent an alter ego named “Señor Sunshine,” who would merrily swoop in before things got too far out of hand. (Goblin Foo Uvula fulfills quite the same function today.)

My dreary tenure lasted a semester; subsequent embellishments about my responsibilities and the prestige of the newspaper danced across my résumé, but I was quick to put the actual experience behind me. Lingering questions remain, however, from that bygone era. These are psychologically intricate but boil down to the familiar (and somewhat huffy) demand: Who the hell do I think I am, anyway?

The Nasty

2004-03-21T12:24:00.000-05:00

In the 34th Street subway station, scrawled across a poster for a new Bruce Willis movie, or perhaps it was for Steve Madden shoes, I encountered the following graffito:

“Sex without love is an addiction!!!”

My first thought was that the huggybear crowd had unearthed a box of marker pens, but upon further contemplation, I had to concede that the anonymous vandal had a point, if only in the unstated corollary:

Sex with love is not an addiction.

The combination of these aphorisms explains a great deal of the angst I suffered over the past fifteen years.

Civics 101

2004-03-20T11:59:00.000-05:00

According to sources that years ago lost their tenuous link to real life—textbooks, for example, and Fox News—we North Americans live in a democracy. So I am confused about the escalating insurgencies of totalitarianism. George W. Bush, our National Embarrassment, famously (and publicly) revealed his yearning for the position of dictator, a post to which, like the Presidency, he could never ascend on his own dubious merits. Closer to home, merchants in my city have claimed titles such as Sturgeon King and Smoothie King. There is a Burger King on every corner. Elsewhere in the line of succession, we have dairy queens, dancing queens, drag queens, drama queens, the prince of tides, and the emperor of ice cream.

I confess to being closet monarchist, myself. Give the hoi polloi the right to vote, and some of them will invariably do so, and these will invariably be the ones who should not be allowed a say in how we live our lives. This is how we get Republicans in office. This is how Richard Hatch won the first “Survivor.”

But with all of these emerging kingdoms (and queendoms), highly specialized or no, I am worried about war. What if the Burger King were to encroach on the territory of the Sturgeon King with a new kind of maritime Whopper? Can you imagine the outcome of that epic battle? And if these realms were to adopt Baby Doc Bush’s “Doctrine of Preemption,” then that would be all she wrote. The Burger King would only need the flimsiest fabricated evidence that the Smoothie King was hoarding Strawberries of Mass Destruction, and we would all get caught in the fallout.

New York Tales

2004-03-18T16:41:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, I squeezed onto a crowded subway train. Though there was barely enough room to maneuver, I did get a spectacular view of an immense, unusually gender-free individual lurching to his or her feet, shoving his or her way across the aisle, and vomiting spectacularly against the far door. In a flash, we passengers on my end of the car shoved our way over to the other end, where we huddled and listened in horror to the gastrointestinal pyrotechnics that seemed to go on for some minutes.

If we had been on a plane or a boat or even a donkey cart, it would have tipped over.

At the next station, we all burst out of the car and gasped for breath. Everyone seemed annoyed, but not in the least bit surprised.

***

Several weeks ago, in an attempt to prepare for this year’s return and find out the status of previous work, I began trying to contact the man who had reviewed my taxes last year. We will call him Arthur. Arthur is a spooky, middle-aged man of a sort that only exists in New York City, usually in one of the outer boroughs. He is pale and puffy with thick glasses, shifty eyes, perpetually greasy hair, and not a single natural fiber in his wardrobe.

He is, however, oddly endearing in a disheveled sort of way, and he works very cheaply. The best thing about him was that he discovered I had overpaid my state taxes by almost two thousand dollars and immediately began a campaign to get me a refund. A campaign that he promptly abandoned when he disappeared without a trace. My email was bounced back, his phone was disconnected, and his office said that he no longer worked there. I would have become convinced that he had stolen my identity and run off to Mexico, except it stands to reason that anyone who is intelligent enough to decipher my taxes must also be savvy enough to realize that adopting my identity would bring more bad fortune than good.

So I accepted the mystery and made an appointment for today with another accountant.

And guess who I heard from yesterday.

Arthur apologized for being out of touch. He explained that, in January, he had been run over by a car and had spent much of the intervening time in a coma. He is to be released from the hospital in early April and wanted to make an appointment to go over my taxes with me then.

A coma.

If a hussy five years my junior shows up, seduces my boyfriend, and then reveals herself to be my long-lost daughter, I shall endeavor to determine which soap opera I am currently inhabiting.

There's No Place Like . . .

2004-03-17T15:30:00.000-05:00

So the secret is revealed. I had expected a good deal of discussion over whether Baltimore or Manhattan were gaining or losing in this deal, and depending upon their positions in this debate, gasps of horror from people who live in either of those fine cities. I suppose the jury is still out on that topic.

In case anyone is wondering, searching for a house is not an easy task. It starts out with the amusing challenge of imagining the potential of every space you invade, but it quickly transforms into a terrifying spreadsheet of comparing budgets, taxes, neighborhoods, and the myriad benefits and drawbacks of every building. Our wish list was for a house that contained at least three bedrooms (we each have home offices) and, ideally, a friendly ghost. Proximity to the train station, offstreet parking, and places to walk Goblin were other considerations.

Many of our needs were met in a gorgeous, newly converted building in Little Italy. There was no place to walk the dog, but the establishment it had been converted from was a funeral parlor, thus increasing the chances of supernatural encounters. Naturally, we put in a bid, which was seriously entertained before being blown out of the water by someone who was willing to pay more than the asking price. It was a crushing blow, augured by two path-crossing black cats and a swooping seagull with menacing black eyes.

So many properties we looked at had either been funeral parlors or were directly adjacent to one that even we were beginning to get the creeps. We also looked at an abandoned church (cool, but too costly to renovate, and too much bad energy from Christians) and an abandoned bank (huge, but falling to pieces, and too much bad energy from capitalists). Finally, the second-to-last property we were scheduled to see was paydirt: a Victorian rowhouse in a beautiful neighborhood, currently owned by a gay couple who had transformed it into a showplace. They accepted our first offer without negotiating, and the deal was blessed by a friendly squirrel we saw in the back yard.

No funeral parlors, though.

THE YEAR EVERYTHING CHANGES, Part One

2004-03-16T19:42:00.000-05:00

Don’t you hate it when after endlessly planning, then moving heaven and earth to get what you want more than anything, you come to within a millimeter of your goal . . . and then time stops.

Welcome to my world.

The past few weeks have been an emotional roller coaster of colossal proportions. The origin of every hill and loop is not necessarily in the secret I am about to reveal, but in that context, they are made all the more perilous. The truth is, I am wiped out. Wiped. Out. If one more person wants one more thing from me, I am simply going to evaporate into the atmosphere. “Where did David go?” someone will say. “He evaporated into the atmosphere,” someone else will say. “Can I have his computer?” the first person will say.

Luckily, a good thing has happened. This is what has lately been going on behind the scenes:

Rob and I are buying a house. It is in Baltimore, in a neighborhood called Bolton Hill. It also happens to be the most beautiful house ever. We put a bid in last week, it was verbally accepted, and we got the signed contract back today. If all goes well with the inspections, we close on 16 April and will probably move by the end of that month.

Whew.

This may seem to be a outlandish turn of events given that most of Rob’s work requires him to be in Manhattan, but he has to be here only on certain days. It is also true that, despite my initial indifference to this city, I have fallen madly in love with New York and would hate to leave it for good.

And thus we have Step Two:

Rob and I are also looking for a small apartment in Manhattan. Rob will commute up for a day or two weekly, and I will join him every two or three weeks. We are going to bi-locate. The Metroliner will be our home away from home, as well as our home away from home away from home, and it will all be very glamorous.

Now, if you will pardon me, I need to take a moment for a little affirmation: Nothing will go wrong. Nothing will go wrong. Nothing will go wrong. Nothing will go wrong. Nothing will go wrong . . . .

Werewolves of Springtime

2004-03-13T13:32:00.000-05:00

Saturday the Thirteenth. I never thought I would say this, but I am anxious for spring—itchy, watery eyes and all. I love winter, but this year it has seemed endless and dreary. I am cold all the time, and Goblin has missed her nighttime off-leash romps through Central Park.

Last night, we watched “Wonderfalls,” an irreverent “Joan of Arcardia” knock-off featuring Diana Scarwid of Mommie Dearest fame. Now, twenty years later, it is Scarwid’s turn to play dysfunctional mother; her acting is still as wooden and chilly as a popsicle stick, and, inexplicably, she looks like a werewolf, but the show is enjoyable despite her non-presence.

As I type this, my face is as red as chili pepper (a red one, not a green one) after having treated it with apple cider vinegar. One of my health newsletters recommends this solution as an astringent, promising clear skin and, after three weeks, reduced signs of aging. It seems this is possible through the magic of acidity: in three weeks, there will be no skin left to age, and the vinegar will be pursuing the disintegration of my skull.

Still, I persevere. And await the spring.

Bill Garvey

2004-03-10T23:18:00.000-05:00

The Amtrak train is a merry, merry place. Since the advent of polyphonic ringing on mobile phones, passenger cars have begun erupting in a randomized cacophony of songs from the "Love Boat” theme to “We Will Rock You.” These rings seem to have been specially designed to sound as if they are emanating from mid-air, like messages from the heavens. I am jealous because my own mobile phone has a barely audible ring that sounds like a cheerful canary being strangled, or perhaps merely becoming suddenly less cheerful. And no one ever calls me, whereas my fellow passengers are the most popular people in the world.

I wonder what it would be like to be indispensable.

The man in front of me the other day was named Bill Garvey. I know this because he phoned dozens of citizens and loudly announced, “This is Bill Garvey,” each time. Bill Garvey is an investment banker or stockbroker or some random person who is frequently possessed by the impulse to call people up and mention a lot of numbers and the possibility of “movement” in the “market.” I can only assume he was not discussing the problem of how the carts at my local Gristides are improbably large for the aisles.

At one point, the man across the aisle from us shouted over, “Hey, Bill Garvey! Do you know how annoying you are?” This was not keeping in tone with the merry, merry atmosphere, but Bill Garvey graciously got up and went to stand between the cars as we rocketed through New Jersey. I was so overcome with gratitude that I wanted to go over and kiss the man across the aisle, even though he was old and not particularly attractive. But he looked as if he wanted to be left alone.

'Til the One Day When the Fellow Met This Fellow

2004-03-07T18:47:00.000-05:00

Television theme songs are powerful. Some—“The Brady Bunch,” for example, or “Laverne and Shirley—are my first line of defense against fussy infants. Indeed, few babies are indifferent to my soothing rendition of the story of a lovely lady, or my delicious recitation of schlemiel, schlimazel, and hasenpfeffer, incorporated.

But there are those songs with a more sinister intensity.

Last night, Rob and I discovered that, when we were children, the same three themes induced in us terror and despair. These were “Welcome Back, Kotter,” “Taxi,” and “The Odd Couple.” I am not certain if it is a coincidence that all three of these were set on the streets of the city in which we now live, but we did both overcome our initial aversion to the “M*A*S*H” theme, which was set in South Korea (and filmed near Malibu).

I was not all that thrilled with the “Barney Miller” song, either, but I have not yet had a chance to run that by him.

Clearly, we are a match made in heaven.

Magical Moments, Brought to You by Purina

2004-03-06T19:32:00.000-05:00

Tonight, as I took my dog for her evening walk in Central Park, there was enchantment in the air. The moon hovered round and silver-white over the towers of the Upper East Side, casting an eldritch glow over the clouds and trees. The air was still and fresh with the day’s rain, carrying a faint scent of the approaching spring. Couples walked arm-in-arm, smiling and nodding as they passed.

The atmosphere invited deep thought and joyful contemplation, and indeed, I found myself pondering a transformational milestone for my little family:

What if I changed Goblin’s name to Clementina Snortbox, Surgeon General?

(Her friends would call her “Bippy.”)

Sunrise, Sunset

2004-03-05T17:36:00.000-05:00

Last night, Rob and I saw of the Broadway revival of Fiddler on the Roof. More specifically, we saw the first act and snuck out during intermission. The play was fine, if a bit flat: we were both simply exhausted and unable to focus on what was unfolding before our eyes. At one point, I nodded off, only to be awakened by a clamorous group of men dancing like Cossacks in Luke Skywalker's Tattooine desert outfit. At other points, I was so bleary that I could not differentiate between any of the trio of sisters whose unconventional marriages formed the center of the story. I found myself thinking they were all played by the same actress, even when all three were on stage at the same time.

I have never seen Fiddler on the Roof, even though, according to Rob, it has been on Broadway several times. I would imagine that its themes speak to each era differently. I was quite amused to note the brouhaha over the “sin” of men dancing with women, as men dancing with other men (and kissing each other, and sitting on each other’s lap) was quite the accepted norm in this small town. On the other hand, the anti-Semitism rang about as hollow as George W. Bush’s empty, empty head.

The most engaging thing about the production was the set, which was gorgeous but seemingly fashioned for an altogether different play. It gave me decorating ideas for when I get a room large enough to plant a forest of trees, hang lanterns from the rafters, and host a full orchestra playing “If I Were a Rich Man.”

Fly . . . Be Free!

2004-03-04T15:45:00.000-05:00

I have a plant that is suspended in the twilight between life and death. The annoying thing is that this has been going on for some time. I want to throw it away and rid myself of the bad feng shui generated by its drooping husk. On the other hand, I cannot bring myself to discard something that clings to life with such tenacity.

Besides, it is stuck in its pot.

A few weeks ago, I would have used this as an allegory for my novel, but I have actually been making some progress lately. I suspect I will get through this yet, but I make no guarantees about the plant.

Tomorrow is Another Day

2004-03-03T14:42:00.000-05:00

I spend a lot of time telling my therapist about the valuable life lessons I pick up on television. She never confirms or denies seeing the relevant shows when I ask her. She simply says, “What do you want me to know about that?” I want to tell her my theory that “Sex and the City’s” Carrie Bradshaw is actually “The West Wing’s” Josh Lyman in drag, but I fear the repercussions. Yesterday, we discussed my plans for the future. I had not yet received the bad news, so she let me chatter on. But the writing was on the wall, and I should have whipped out my reading glasses. The path-crossing black cats did their job with wickedly stealthy precision. That morning, the sky was bright with false hope; I took my dog and a bag of peanuts to Central Park, but there was not a squirrel to be seen. Goblin slouched home, her nub of a tail drooping. What do rodents (and people and black cats) think about when they are crushing your dreams?

I am breathing deeply and releasing. Today, at the park, a flock of squirrels swirled around, snatching the peanuts from mid-air. Goblin jumped delightedly from tree to tree, sending them chattering back up to their branches.

Not a black cat in sight.

Live from New York

2004-03-02T17:11:00.000-05:00

My hapless adventures today began when the toilet overflowed for no reason. Well, it overflowed because I flushed it, but (not to get too technical) there was nothing solid in there to cause a blockage. I believe the mechanism inside the tank malfunctioned, because reaching inside and jiggling it had the effect of stopping the waterfall, but I was left standing in a puddle a half inch deep. It took ages to clean up, and, late for my appointments, I ran out of the house looking as if I had just spent the morning cleaning up after an overflowed toilet. Which was nice because, when I went to vote, I found myself in the spotlight of a television camera. A reporter I could barely discern behind the glare asked my opinion on the design of the ballot, which, in fact, had much room for improvement. After sputtering out my comments, I discovered I was being interviewed by Fox News, an organization that has proven itself many times over to be the enemy of both democracy and objective journalism. I am quite certain that, using whatever wizardry they employ to make Bill O’Reilly and Ann Coulter appear of this Earth, they will twist my comments to mean precisely the opposite of what I intended.

Of only they could expend the same effort to make me look as if I had not spent quite so much time scrubbing the bathroom floor.

No Little Pricks

2004-03-01T13:02:00.000-05:00

Why do they call it “pins and needles”? “Tenterhooks” is an equally tame description, as it refers not (as I suspected) to the equipment that holds up massive slabs of beef, but rather to the small clasps that suspend fabric as it dries.

No, I am suspended by a crane from the top of a skyscraper. I am Luke Skywalker, digging my fingernails into a catwalk within inches of Darth Vader’s billowing black cape. My heart stops and my lungs constrict like empty sandwich baggies every hour.

What am I getting into?

Today, though I can barely afford to pay my rent, I had a woman come and clean the apartment. The qi is flowing again, unimpeded by the stacks of unopened mail (which I have hidden under the radiator), the sedimentary layers of pungent laundry, and the insidious coating of grime that advanced during my many absences.

I can breathe (I should breathe). Everything will be okay.

The Omens

2004-02-28T00:25:00.000-05:00

When one has to an important decision to make, exactly how much significance should he place upon (a) two path-crossing black cats, and (b) a swooping seagull with beady, menacing eyes?

Going with the Flo

2004-02-26T23:12:00.000-05:00

The Acela Express train:

Businessman One: The only problem with subscribing to Sports Illustrated is that three days later, I’m looking for another magazine. I’m digging around for catalogs, whatever, anything to read.

Businessman Two: But what about that Swimsuit Issue, eh?

Businessman One: Aw, man, I don’t even read the Swimsuit Issue. I don’t even look at it.

Businessman Two: Wha—?

Businessman One: All those bodies look like they were grown in a . . . hermetically . . . sealed . . . farm . . . somewhere in Texas.

Later, after they disembarked, a woman reminiscent of Florence Jean Castlebury (from “Alice”) and a Filipina woman took their seats. “You have the biggest Asian business association in America,” Flo repeated time and again. The Filipina woman nodded, seemingly not confident of this, but I was in nonetheless in awe to be in the presence of both Florence Jean Castlebury and a representative of what might possibly have been the biggest Asian business association in America.

Teenage Drag Queen

2004-02-26T13:16:00.000-05:00

Last night, Faustus invited Rob and me out to see a movie called Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen, the Valuable Life Lesson of which appeared to be that one can prevail by lying and stealing, as long as it is done with a smile and not a sneer. While the film was enjoyable at the time, it was a narrative disaster that proved so unmemorable that five minutes after we arrived home, we forgot we had left the apartment at all.

By Any Other Name?

2004-02-25T12:32:00.000-05:00

A compendium of labels placed upon Ms. Goblin Foo Uvula in the past week:

Good Girl
G’Foo
Foovula
Fooey
Foo-Boo
Boo-Boo
Bippy
Tooth
Bunny Face
Bag Lady
You Little Weasel
Bat Ears
Bug
Little Bug
Snuggle Butt
Stinky
Little Stink
Career Girl
Snoozer Pantsuit

Update:
Licky McLickerson, Mayoress of Lickyville
Licorice
Tungsten
Pretty, Pretty Princess
Boop

Brilliance and The Rapist

2004-02-24T14:56:00.000-05:00

Of course, Rob was brilliant, as were his friends Jonathan and Lisa, who helped him out by singing some of his songs. As was I for being in the audience. It is always a bit awkward for me to attend things like this because the show-business crowd is so self-involved and insecure that people from outside that realm do not quite show up on their radar, and I am not one to beat people over the head to get into a conversation about things that have nothing to do with me. Jonathan was an angel to recognize my quandary and initiate a discussion about Macromedia Flash, a complicated piece of animation software that we are both trying to teach ourselves. And, of course, hearing Rob sing was a rare delight that transcended any minor discomfiture I might have felt. I was unspeakably proud of him.

You see, I went to the therapist today, and she had me discuss my emotions. Ridiculous things, usually, but I am under doctor’s orders to accept and embrace mine. Nonsensical, but true. I suppose it really is for my own good, but I question the effectiveness of therapy for me when everyone around me is crazier than I am.

Merry-Go-Round

2004-02-23T11:43:00.000-05:00

When I was a kid, I used to go to the playground, get the miniature carousel spinning fast enough to break free from the space-time continuum, and then hop on and lie on my back in the center. The world disappeared into blurry streams of color until the contraption drifted to a stop, and, still enchanted, I staggered off to vomit in the bushes.

That’s how my life has felt for the past few months: an assiduous, all-consuming whirl of activity from which there has been little respite. Now, as things begin to decelerate, and I contemplate my first tentative steps on solid earth, it is time to survey the fallout.

The good news is that the shop I have been working on is gorgeous, and merchandise has been flying off the shelves. And I do not mean flying off the shelves in a spooky psychokinetic way, a detail that begs clarification given that the store is in Georgetown, home of The Exorcist. No, people are enthusiastically picking it up and purchasing it with cash or Visa or American Express. Then are then carrying it home in bags. Bags, I tell you.

The bad news is that I have lost contact with several friends, and every waking moment I am not working is permeated with guilt over not working, as well as whatever I would normally be feeling (which is anxiety about not working, a completely different animal).

But as I said, things are beginning to slow down.

Saturday evening, I showed Crash (who was in Washington for a convention) the fruits of my labor, and then we met Zenchick, who, as it happens, lives in my hometown of Baltimore. I only had time for a quick drink with my fellow bloggers, but it turned out to be time enough to establish a connection. It seems that my former acupuncturist is Zenchick's current acupuncturist. We are siblings in acupuncture, or perhaps step-siblings. We are ships that pass in the night, which occasionally share an alternative health practitioner.

Sunday is notable for what I did not do. That morning, Crash and I (and Goblin) zipped back up to Manhattan on the Metroliner. MAK had off-handedly invited me to a “Sex and the City” party at Bob’s apartment, but he never followed up by sending me any details or directions. So instead of attending a “Sex and the City” party on Sunday night, I stayed home by myself and cried in the dark. Well, actually, the lights were on, and Rob was there, and we had a nice dinner of instant soup and peanut butter sandwiches.

But inside, I was crying.

Now pardon me while I stagger to the bushes.

Update: If you are in New York, don’t forget to come see Rob’s performance at the Duplex tonight! Scroll down for details.

Come See a Show

2004-02-22T09:37:00.000-05:00

This is the second of at least two posts for today. Scroll down to read about an encounter with my grandfather.

To all of you lucky duckies who will be in New York City on Monday night: now you have something to do. My boyfriend, Rob, is performing in a cabaret at the Duplex. Not only will you be able to hear some of his wonderful songs, he will actually sing one of them himself, something he NEVER does these days.

The information follows. Please come and cheer him on!

"NEW YORK – The Storefront has announced plans for a fourth round of their critically-acclaimed and award-winning NEW MONDAYS series, featuring the works of composers both legendary and up-and-coming. Each Monday, three songwriters will gather to debut three or four of their new compositions in front of a live audience. Some of the composers will perform the material themselves, some will be accompanied by accomplished vocalists from the worlds of theatre and cabaret. The series will run Mondays, February 2 through March 1 at The Duplex Cabaret Theatre (61 Christopher St). There is a $12 cover, and a two-drink minimum. All performances begin at 7pm. For reservations, please call 212.255.5438. The press is invited to all presentations. For press reservations, please call 212.989.3015, or e-mail phil@theduplex.com.

"February 23: Bill Russell (Side Show, Elegies…, Pageant), Clare Cooper, Rob Hartmann"

Laundry Revelations

2004-02-22T09:34:00.000-05:00

Note that this is the first of two or three posts for today. I am not sure to what you owe this web-logging bonanza, but you can thank your lucky stars for it. Ha ha.

I had just gotten some clothes out of the dryer and was folding them on the kitchen table where my grandfather was eating a bowl of Cheerios. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Folding my laundry,” I said.

“That’s women’s work,” he said.

“Find me a woman, and I’ll hand it off,” I said.

“Good boy,” he said. I hate folding laundry, so I would have turned it over to a wild bandicoot if it could correctly match the socks, but I get further with my grandfather if I just play along with whatever is going through his octogenarian head. He stared at me for a few seconds and said, “Who does the cooking, you or your, uh, friend?”

I did not bat an eye, but that was an historic moment: the first time my grandfather alluded to Rob as someone with whom I share a home and familiar domestic chores. “He does,” I said. “I can’t cook.”

“I can’t, either,” he said.

He then spent a half hour telling stories of how he treated his Japanese prisoners of war during World War Two.

Talk to the Paw

2004-02-21T11:30:00.000-05:00

I bought Goblin a stylish carrying bag that is so effective at cloaking her presence that, on Wednesday, I was able to smuggle her aboard the Metroliner. Dogs are not typically allowed on Amtrak, a nonsensical prohibition considering that the typical passengers—overweight businessmen who bellow and howl into cellphones—are far more intrusive than any dog could ever be, even if it were gnawing on my face.

The good news is that am now able to take her everywhere I go. The bad news is that, when I do so, it appears as if I am having earnest conversations with my gym bag.

Speaking of conversation, it has been asserted by some that the advent of television and other modern media are killing that traditional art. It is clear that those people do not listen to morning drive-time radio, every station of which is based upon the model of endless chatter among a group of wacky baboons who are overly impressed with themselves. While trapped in a two-hour morning commute yesterday, I scanned the dial like an obsessive Lieutenant Uhura, looking for actual music. Instead, there was only station after station of moronic giggling; the only thing that appeared to separate them is what the giggling was about. I felt as if I were reenacting the last scene of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, where the woman ran around and around trying to find another normal human.

She failed spectacularly.

At least I have my bag to talk to.

Mortification Made Simple

2004-02-17T23:38:00.000-05:00

Due to lingering illness and the transformation of my work into an inescapable hamster wheel, my writing here will no doubt be light for the next few days.

This is not to say I will leave you high and dry. I am no Marie Antoinette, secure in my fortress, tossing off a flippant Qu'ils mangent de la brioche. (Truth be known, I am more of a Joan Crawford I-can-handle-the-socks kind of boy.)

Today, instead of laboring over something new, I will leave you with something rather old. Recently, the guests at my friend Lauri’s baby shower were asked to contribute a page to a bedtime-story book for her new daughter. I had my mother scrounge up the first story I ever typed on the computer. Generous soul that I was, I did it for my little brother, who for some reason insisted upon referring to himself as “Baby Bear.” I would not normally be one to encourage such a thing, but I suppose that one's resolve is not quite fully developed when one is six years old.

So without further ado, after a quick cut-and-paste, I present it to you here. Mortification has never been so simple. Thank you, Macintosh!

Baby Bear

Written and typed by David M. Buscher

Baby Bear was walking through his house in Feb. one day when out of his room an elf appeared.

Who are you? asked Baby Bear.

I am the Birthday elf. said the elf.

Is it my birthday again? asked Baby Bear.

No, but I was all tied up on your birthday.

Oh.

come with me to birthday land.

O.K.

Poof! they were gone. When they were in a strange place with lollypop trees and koolaid rivers and lakes. Go anywhere you want but be back by 5 o’clock!

O.K. Baby Bear said running into a field of lollypop trees.

He walked round awhile only stopping to lick a lollypop tree. It was 4:30 when he saw that he was lost. Suddenly the elf appeared and took him home and when he got there he saw a hole lot of presents on his bed, he opened them and this is what he got

baseball bats
star wars stiff
matchbox cars
and a flash light.

The END!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sick/Tired

2004-02-15T13:31:00.000-05:00

And we’re back.

Some of you may have speculated that I was lost in a days-long swoon over the discovery that American democracy, increasingly vanishing at the polls, has been reincarnated with gusto in the form of “American Idol.” While it is true that this phenomenon preoccupies me to no end, the truth is that I have spent the past week in a state of both extraordinary activity and extraordinary illness, leaving me in a condition that brings to mind my mother’s notorious self-diagnosis of being simultaneously sick and tired. “I am sick and tired of this!” she would shriek when confronted with the antics of her five raucous sons and the swirl of troublemaking friends, mischievous pets, and other youthful disasters we trailed in our wake. How she survived for so many years without turning to the bottle I cannot even begin to speculate; we took sick days from school as often as it was possible to hoodwink her into it, but there was never a provision for her sick-and-tired days.

“I am sick and tired of this!” As soon as we heard it, my brothers and I would scatter to the winds. Later, we would learn to adapt this declaration to our own nefarious purposes. “I’m tired of him!” became our irreproachable excuse for beating each other to a pulp, and “I’m tired of you!” was either a war cry or a pretext for walking away from a fight without admitting defeat, depending upon the occasion. The “sick” was lost in the shuffle, but it turned out to be infectious among our large family.

Now, lying in the home I came of age in, I am sick and tired once again, although this time the rebellion of my body is the result of productive and valuable work. Here, with the earsplitting sounds of construction, dogs barking, Fox News blaring, babies crying, phones ringing off the hook, flocks of honking geese streaming by, and people screaming to make themselves heard from distant corners of the house, I am amongst pure chaos once again. At least I can recover my nerves through the realization that, this time, I am not the cause of it.

American Idolatry

2004-02-10T23:31:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, I learned about something called “American Idol.” From what I can determine, and correct me if I am wrong, this is a television program on which untalented singers perform for unkind judges. Those who endure that experience move on to compete against each other, the judges in the new round being average Americans who pay money to phone in their vote. The winner gets a record contract.

You could knock me over with a feather. How long has this nonsense been going on?

1000 Words

2004-02-09T22:03:00.000-05:00

This, I am sure, requires no explanation.

Alfred Hitchcock's The Babies

2004-02-08T17:16:00.000-05:00

One of my sisters-in-law had a baby in December, and another delivered hers a few days ago. I just returned from a baby shower for my friend Lauri, which another friend (and former “sister-in-law”), Margaret, attended with her own infant.

What is it about babies? They are suddenly turning up everywhere, like the birds in The Birds, although with considerably more accessories. Lauri received enough supplies to outfit an army, assuming it was an army of toddling girls. Other mothers showed up, like overburdened sherpas, lugging their offspring and bags bulging with diapers, bottles, wardrobe for all seasons, and every toy ever known to occupy the child’s attention, if only for a split second.

At the baby shower, Rob and I befriended another gay couple, Bill and Eric, who were talking adoption. When that topic arises, I always reflect on the thankless task of raising my dog. Inspired by the infant fashion festival, we went home, retrieved our little Boston terrier, and visited the dog clothier. You may recall that the animal psychic we consulted reported that Goblin wanted to pick out her own outfit. She chose a red ensemble: a sleek coat and a pretty collar with flowers on it. The whole thing cost more than my last outfit, but anything for our little bat-eared beauty queen.

I have always maintained that I do not have enough patience for babies, and that they should be neither seen nor heard from until they graduate from high school. Goblin, however, whose obstinate puppyhood transformed my already-traumatized nerves into guitar strings, has been good practice for the breeding instincts of my family and friends.

If I could only remember to stop calling their children by my dog’s name, we’ll be good to go.

In The Church of the Poisoned Mind

2004-02-06T14:00:00.000-05:00

It may be difficult to believe given the embittered old agnostic I have become, but when I was very young, I enjoyed going to church. This had little to do with matters liturgical and much to do with the Freshen Up gum my grandmother distributed when she met us there. My family always sat in one of the front pews, an incomprehensible choice considering how rowdy my brothers and I were—but at least I can boast that all eyes were on me when I whipped out the hand-made guitar my father had fashioned out of plywood, electrical wire, and bright blue paint. In its short-lived heyday, I would accompany the folk group with an apocalyptic twang that rattled the stained-glass windows and made the plaster saints weep with despair. Later, after I learned how to read, I occupied myself by fact-checking the hymnals.

This was not your Mel Gibson Catholicism. Sunday School was a whimsical catechism of art projects and interpretive dance. We were taught that Jesus was our best friend who sometimes disguised himself as a fluffy lamb; I was in seventh grade before I knew what a monk was, and the alerts about priests who might touch you in a bathing-suit place came long after my eighth-grade retreat with the overly huggy deacon who enjoyed walking around naked after a shower.

The result of all this was an engaging but fanciful mythology that began to fade from my mind with the disenfranchisement of Santa Claus, was further eclipsed when we studied the sexier Roman pantheon in school, and finally burst like a soap bubble the first time I saw a “God Hates Fags” counter-demonstration at a gay rights march.

I occasionally miss my naïve youth, before the cynicism filled my mind with an echoing ring that drowned out the church bells, and I would still believe anything I was told. I try to recapture it some nights as I drift off to sleep.

It tastes like Freshen Up gum.

2004-02-05T12:17:00.000-05:00

Things that happened this week:

1. Rob picked out some sugar-free ice cream sandwiches that taste like ice-cream-sandwich-flavored sawdust. The ice cream bars I picked out melted before we got home.

2. My therapist observed that I have feelings of superiority to humanity in general. This is neither news nor strictly true. I do, however, feel vastly more evolved than the fifty percent of Americans who think that President Sanctimonious Chimpanzee is doing a good job. This is significant, considering that I do not often have a high opinion of myself.

3. We watched the “Bewitched” in which it was revealed that the Loch Ness Monster was really a warlock who was transformed by Serena for being too pesty.

4. Goblin chased some squirrels, ripped the stuffing out of her new toy raccoon, and devoured a used popsicle stick she found on the floor.

That is all.

2004-02-04T15:54:00.000-05:00

This is depressing. I used to think I was a man of the world, but it turns out I am a man of eleven countries and approximately twenty-six states, plus the District of Columbia.

create your own visited states map

create your own visited country map
or write about it on the open travel guide

2004-02-03T18:02:00.000-05:00

During the heady days of the New Economy, when I was the art director at an Internet company near Washington, D.C., I was forced to park my car in a garage located about a half mile from my office. Every morning, frazzled from a largely stationary rush hour on the Beltway, I would rollerblade down Wisconsin Avenue to the local Starbucks, where I ordered a hot chocolate (this was before I liked tea; I have never liked coffee). Clutching a steaming cup, I would glide into work, the epitome of a Generation X-er, and begin my day.

A woman named Michelle worked in the programming department across the aisle from me, and she was really cool. She had a gang of friends that she called her peeps, with whom she communicated in an arcane lingo based upon old “Brady Bunch” episodes. I wanted to be one of Michelle’s peeps more than anything, but there was a lot of tetchiness between the programming and art departments because of our bosses’ animosity toward each other. Finally, in a diplomatic triumph that made Otto von Bismarck’s Triple Alliance look like a bunch of kids playing jacks, I was awarded peephood on a provisional basis. The catch: I had to launch an immediate and extended boycott against Starbucks, whose lackadaisical employees had annoyed Michelle one too many times.

Naturally, I complied. And though my badge of peephood was tarnished with my second-class status, I endured the lack of daily hot chocolate with equanimity. It was a personal sacrifice for the good of all the peeps, a cross I was happy to bear.

Until the day, a month later, I saw Michelle and one of her favored peeps come into the building, giggling and sipping Venti Café Mochas. I leapt up to confront them, to make them answer for their lack of resolve. What about the boycott? What about unity among the peeps?

“Oh, I forgot all about that,” said Michelle. “We’ve been going to Starbucks again for weeks.”

“But . . . ,” I stammered, “but . . . but . . . .”

And then, because I dared to question her, Michelle revoked my peepness on the spot. It was a crushing blow, unrivaled by getting laid off from my job the following week. The Tech Bubble was not the only thing that burst that cold November.

And hot chocolate has not tasted the same since.

2004-02-01T16:13:00.000-05:00

I am not going to write about seeing Caroline, or Change again with MAK. I am not going to write again about the honesty of its furious power, about the depths of rage and agony lurking just below the surface of two innocuous Louisiana families united by a washing machine, a clothes dryer, a bleach cup, and the omnipresent moon. I especially will not write about seeing Tim Robbins during intermission while eating a sinfully enormous double-fudge brownie with the mass of a moist cinder block.

Instead, I have a question.

What mobile phone company do you use, and do you like it?

I am going to change providers because I am unhappy with my service, but the problem is that I don’t know anyone who loves their mobile phone company. In fact, just about everyone I know hates their service and cannot wait for their contract to end so they can switch.

One would think that a truly reliable and inexpensive provider could sweep in and dominate the market in an instant, but instead, as always, we are held hostage by a pantheon of squabbling bunglers.

So . . . anyone have a recommendation? A horror story? Let it all out in the comments area below.

2004-01-30T13:49:00.000-05:00

The time has come to talk about . . . “Bewitched.”

If ever a television show made not the slightest amount sense, it is that one. I’m not speaking of people popping in and out and turning into things because those are perfectly logical compared to the idea of a gorgeous witch who could have anything in the world shackling herself to a dull, narrow-minded, imperious twit like Derwood. If I were her mother, I’d be disappointed, too.

Of course, this isn’t anything that hasn’t been endlessly rehashed and debated for forty years. What I’m really concerned with today is the idea that Darrin can be considered an advertising genius, even in the 1960s, when all he does is write insipid jingles to the tunes of “Old MacDonald” and “Pop! Goes the Weasel.” The really funny part is always when Larry and the client du jour come over to the Stephens’ house at the end of every episode and discover Darrin turned into something bizarre, which Samantha invariably explains away by coming up with an entire ad campaign and sales pitch on the spot. And the client invariably loves this more than anything Darrin and Larry came up with earlier.

So isn’t Samantha the real advertising genius in the family? Add that to her other roles of witch, wife, mother, and housekeeper, and why does she need Darrin at all? She should have just had Esmerelda in to watch the kids and opened up her own award-winning agency on Madison Avenue. Instead, she’s worried about her husband coming home to a dusty house. No wonder Darrin wanted to keep her home all the time: if Samantha had ever encountered just one 1960s/1970s Women’s Libber, that would have been all she wrote.

The other thing I wonder about is Larry. How many times did Samantha and Darrin convince him that he was hallucinating when things appeared or disappeared in front of his eyes? And yet, there’s no evidence Larry ever saw a psychiatrist. Mrs. Kravitz was a different story, because everyone knew she was crazy with or without seeing things at the Stephens’ house, but here is Larry, who owns a successful advertising agency and has his run of the town, having hallucinations left and right, and no one has thought to lock him up somewhere for his own good. This is particularly galling when you consider that Larry, with his ruthless greed, was the real villain of the show, not Endora, who was only looking out for her daughter’s well-being.

The funny thing is, thanks to “Bewitched,” if I saw something appear or disappear before my eyes, the first thing I would think is that there was a wise witch around pulling a prank, not that there was something wrong with my brain.

But then again, I suppose that is the chief indicator that there is something wrong with my brain.

2004-01-29T12:39:00.000-05:00

Remember when Lucy was flying back from France and discovered that it would cost a lot of money to ship an enormous piece of cheese in the plane’s cargo hold? She rationalized that, since babies flew free, she could dress the cheese up as an infant and fool everyone. Except, in mid-flight, she learned that babies did not fly for free; they flew for half price, which was much more than it would have cost to ship the cheese to begin with. So, in middle of the night, she and Ethel ate as much of the cheese as they could and stuffed the rest into Ricky’s band’s musical instruments. But in the morning, the baby was missed, and she was accused of disposing of it over the ocean.

Ah, good times.

Ah, cheese.

I am no longer on Phase One of the South Beach Diet, but I am still eating an extraordinarily large amount of string cheese. That does not seem to be doing any harm, but I cannot speak for the two boxes of sugar-free fudge bars and two bags of corn chips I have eaten in the past three days. Rob is in Minneapolis working on his new show, and my eating habits have deteriorated into the Stone Age. Or perhaps they did not invent sugar-free fudge bars until the Bronze Age. Regardless, I am nutritionally screwed. And speaking of screwed, Matt Damon has come sneaking around again. Honestly, the man cannot take no for an answer. Matt Damon, I realize that I am irresistible, but dressing up like a giant piece of string cheese that is additionally costumed as a baby is not going to get you anywhere with me!

Oh, who am I kidding? Get in here.

2004-01-28T14:49:00.000-05:00

So Kerry has won the New Hampshire primary and will probably get the Democratic nomination. I am prepared to support him, but I am not enthused. I recently took an online poll that indicated that both he and Dr. Dean (my preferred candidate) agreed with the exact same percentage of my positions (although they matched me on different issues). My gut feeling, however, is that Kerry is too “establishment,” and he does not seem as passionate about standing up and consistently speaking out against the unmitigated disaster the current administration is making of this country and the world. He must know that he is (and we all are) doomed if he does not appeal to the Dean supporters, so I hope we start to see a little more backbone in the months ahead.

In other news, Goblin has not chased a squirrel in days. Despite the fact that my coat pockets are filled with peanuts, none of the bushy-tailed rodents have appeared to claim them.

Times are tough all around. Surely, no one expects any sort of hope or compassion from the government anymore, but when you cannot even get a squirrel to take a peanut, we are living in dark times indeed.

2004-01-27T15:13:00.000-05:00

I would make a lousy poker player. I can bluff and dissimulate like an AWOL President, but I have no proper sense of revelation. Yesterday, I exposed my Penguin card too soon, and it will therefore pale today’s little tale by comparison. For what is a menacing, twelve-foot rat next to being forced to kiss Dick Cheney?

I suppose more of an explanation is called for, but is that not truly one of life’s great philosophical questions?

Anyway, last week, on my way out to the subway, I noticed something slightly curious about an apartment building on the other side of my block. That is to say, the edifice looked the same as ever, but there was a giant, inflatable rat on the sidewalk, raising its claws and baring its fangs toward the front door. This rat was standing on its back legs, so the people milling around it only came up to its distended stomach.

My, my, I thought. Is there vermin on the premises? Is this (as Rob suggested) some sort of Union symbol? Is this a Trojan Rat sent up by the subterranean tribes who live in tunnels under the city?

Flyers taped to the rat’s stomach revealed the whole, sordid story. An immigration lawyer who had been caught exploiting his clients lives in that building, and the rat was a symbol of public shame.

Shame on you, Scheming Immigration Lawyer! And shame on you, too, Dick Cheney. Wherever you are.

Update: Someone downstairs is cooking steak for lunch, and my apartment is awash in the carnivorous scent. Also, if you have yet to do so, do not forget to stand up for First Amendment rights by scrolling down and click on the MoveOn banner in the previous message.

2004-01-27T13:25:00.000-05:00

2004-01-26T12:33:00.000-05:00

Last night, I had the strangest dream.

I was in a van being driven by Dick Cheney, Vice President of Doom, and it began to careen and skid all over the New Jersey Turnpike. I went up to the front to see what was going on and found him literally falling asleep at the wheel. “Wake up!” I said. “We’re going to crash!” Anyone else would have heeded this warning, but Cheneyboy decided he would get some chuckles by taking his hands off the wheel and doing a little dance in his seat. “Nyah nyah nyah!” he sang.

In a series of surreally impossible events, as can only happen in nightmares and Tennessee, I finally convinced him to pull over and let me drive. He put on that malevolent Penguin face he has and swerved across three lanes of traffic into a service area, where the van lurched to a stop in front of a gas pump.

Then he slid out of his seat, kissed me on the lips with a cold passion that made me desperate to gargle with rubbing alcohol, called me a faggot, jumped out of the van, and vanished into the darkness beyond the atomic glare of the gas station lights.

Oh wonderful, I thought as I spat his saliva onto the pavement. At least we can now arrive safely at our intended destination.

Except he had taken the ignition keys.

2004-01-25T14:14:00.000-05:00

Last night, I had dinner with my ex-boyfriend and his boyfriend. Then we all went to see a cabaret show called “Dearest Mommie.” I can think of at least one person reading this who will gripe about me not calling him on my brief swing through town, but he should feel lucky he did not have to sit through this experience. The two most interesting things about the show were the short film shown beforehand about gracious table manners (produced by the Canadian Film Board in the middle 1970s) and the fact that one of the players in “Dearest Mommie” once menaced someone I knew with a butter knife and slept with the wife of another friend of mine, breaking up their marriage. Throughout his performance, I kept looking for signs of mental unbalance, but since the entire show seemed as if it were staged by escaped mental patients, it was like looking for a hay in a haystack. Or a needle in a big pile of needles. Or a greedy and dishonest Republican.

Mommie Dearest is one of the funniest films ever made; it remains hilarious after all these years because it is so clearly unaware of its own camp value. “Dearest Mommie,” on the other hand, is nothing more than a cynical recycling of the movie’s most over-the-top moments. Joan Crawford (here, of course, a man in drag) becomes a lesbian dominatrix who wields her power in predictable ways over daughter Christina and assistant Carol Ann.

I don’t know. Am I just missing something? To me, the best camp is either innocent of its campiness or injects some sort of clever commentary in the mix. This is why Charles Busch’s work is so often uneven: he gets caught up in what he thinks would be funny as opposed to what would be clever. It is also why John Waters has been all over the map. But camp without wit is usually a one-trick pony, and you might as well not bother for more than a minute. Show us your outfits, do a line reading or two, and pack it in for the night so I can get to bed early.

I don’t think there is anything inherently funny about a man in a dress. Really, you gotta work it, girl.

2004-01-23T22:30:00.000-05:00

The theme of this post is prejudice.

My parents are adding on to their house, and my mother said I could pick out the furniture for the new family room. Only a couple of weeks ago, she sent me an email that said she had just bought all of the furniture for the new family room.

Naturally, I was crushed, but I salvaged a bad situation by making her promise that when she bought a new computer, as she was just about to do, she would buy a Macintosh I picked out for her.

So last night, I took her to the Apple Store, and we emerged with a brand-new, beautiful, gleaming-white iBook.

She was proud of her purchase until we got home and my father and evil brothers started sniping about it. “Apple is a cult,” my brother Steven said. “Why don’t you get a real computer?” my brother Tim said. My father demanded to know who had bought such an abominable thing into the house.

These are people who had never even seen an Apple computer before, much less used one. They know literally nothing about them, but they had already made up their minds that my mother’s new computer was some sort of heretical blunder. “Who will help her when she has problems?” they demanded, as if she were ascending K2 with nothing but a toothbrush.

Meanwhile, she picked it up right out of the box and was able to figure out how to use it instantly, something she never managed in all her years of using my father’s Windows machine.

The moral of this story is that we will never as a species achieve any sort of lasting peace unless we stop making up our minds about things we know nothing about.

Or until we all run out and buy Macintoshes.

2004-01-21T15:18:00.000-05:00

Last night, I avoided the State of the Union speech as delivered by a sanctimonious and astonishingly mendacious chimpanzee in favor of hearing the opinions of an astonishingly opinionated little dog. And frankly, after listening to Goblin’s views on such topics as family and social dynamics, I am convinced that even she could run this country better than the current administration.

But I digress.

The pet psychic reported that Goblin is a happy dog with humanlike intelligence and a confident and quirky personality. In fact, one of her only complaints in life is sartorial: she would like to wear more frilly outfits, in colors such as pink and red. She would also like a flashy collar, perhaps with embedded rhinestones.

Now, I confess that my dog has sported such outfits as devil ears, a sinister black cape, and bat wings. These are just the sorts of things that leapt to mind when it comes to outfitting her, based upon her general appearance. I know now that I was just being prejudiced, assigning her these items based upon her looks alone.

But if I can admit that, I would like her to admit that her longing for frilly pink outfits is gender stereotyping of the worst sort. The fact that she is ten inches tall and has eight nipples does not mean she needs to become a Barbie doll. I know I raised her better than that.

This discussion is not over.

2004-01-20T17:26:00.000-05:00

Tonight, my dog and I are going to speak to a pet psychic. Goblin is perfectly aware of this; she has been oddly withdrawn all day, and I just know she is working on her speech. Meanwhile, I have been too busy to give much thought to my side of the story.

I think that in a few moments I will give her a piece of cheese to remind her of how good she has it.

2004-01-19T13:21:00.000-05:00

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day . . . more on commas.

Several years ago, there was a popular book called Conversations with God. The premise was that the “author” sat down one day with a blank pad of paper, and his hand suddenly started writing messages from god of its own accord. God turned out to be sufficiently prolific to generate a series of bestsellers.

I was reading one of those in my office one day when something struck me with the force of a speeding train—the 3:00 Acela Express, to be precise, which would have been on its way from Washington to New York at that very moment, except this was before the Acela Express existed, so its force at that point was purely theoretical.

Anyway, I do believe I called out, and my business partner came running in from the other room. He may have actually been in the same room, and I may have merely cleared my throat or something. I cannot be bothered with details this late in the day. The point is, I saw fit to call his attention to Conversations with God, which, again, if the conceit is to be believed, was written with the same hand that created the universe in six days and maybe dealt a game of Solitaire on the seventh.

“God uses the serial comma!” I announced, flush with triumph.

Enough said.

In your face, Associated Press!

2004-01-18T18:55:00.000-05:00

Comma Weekend continues:

Commas project truth. You may try to suppress it, but commas will not be denied their connection with the Universal Reality.

Take the following three sentences:

1. My friend Viki has tentacles.

2. My friend, Viki, has tentacles.

3. My friend, Viki has tentacles.

That Viki has tentacles is a given. In case you are wondering, she also has tusks and a distinctively maritime aroma. But what else do we learn from the previous sentences?

The first sentence means what it means: I have a friend named Viki, and she has tentacles. In the second sentence, Viki, set apart by commas, modifies my friend. Therefore, the commas reveal what I might not otherwise choose to: that I have only one friend, her name is Viki, and by the way, she has tentacles. In the third sentence, I am not referring to Viki as a friend, merely reporting that someone named Viki has tentacles. However, the comma reveals that the person I am addressing is my friend. It is a friendly warning about the tentacles, one that might be better heeded had I chosen to employ the immediacy of an exclamation point instead of the matter-of-factness of the period.

Commas matter.