INANE MUSINGS

Sat, 07 Mar 2009 06:44:56 GMT

~It All Stays~

the beauty of all of me is in it
the beauty of all of it is in me
saline from my eyes drips in it
the softness of your skin stays with me

the blue of the sky lies for it
the blue of the sky cries for me
loose strands of my hair fly to it
the blondness of your head falls on me

you were to be mine and things changed
this world was to be mine but things change
the beauty of all of it stays with me
the beauty of all of me stays in it

the sadness of everyday speaks in it
the sadness of everyday screams to me
best hopes of the best of them transcend it
the hopelessness that you left stays with me

you were to be mine and things changed
this world was to be mine but things change
the sadness of all of it stays with me
the sadness of all of me stays in it

we were to be ours and things changed
this world was to be ours but things change
the beauty of all of you stays with me
the beauty of all of you stays in it

BOOK TITLES

Mon, 06 Oct 2008 22:38:45 GMT

ARE YOU GOING TO EAT THAT? A History of Food Sharing

The Atlantic Ocean: It's Really Very Large

Dressing as a Mermaid for Fun and Profit

WMD's for Dummies

The Hunter, The Hunted, and The Activist in Between

How to Start a Riot: A Guide to Making the Shit Hit the Fan

Trolls, Noobs, and Flamers: A Message Board Love Story

Dressing as a Highway Patrol Officer for Fun and Profit

Creative Vocabulizing: The Art of Making Up Words

The Beginner's Douchebaggery and Bitchcraft

Dressing as a Supreme Court Justice for Fun and Profit

The Sloth's Guide to Hanging Around

Jury Tampering for Dummies

Carpentry and Woodworking for Girls

Dressing as a Prostitute for Fun and Profit (This One is a Little More Involved!)

The Mortician and the Zombie Stole St. Patrick's Day

How to Avoid Relatives 99% of the Time Without Severing Ties

I HAVE A THING: Saying No and Weaseling Out for the Rest of Us

Dressing as a Shrubbery for Fun and Profit

It's All About Me: Making the Most of Your Online Journal

CREATUREBLOG

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 18:37:37 GMT

I have started a blog at which to write about animals. You should read it. It is here:

http://creatureblog.wordpress.com

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 18:36:28 GMT

[seconds and thirds]

i sat at the bar
all by myself
i waited for him
he showed up

we started to talk
he was boring as hell
then he went home
i stayed and got drunk

tell me why is it so easy to find a man
but so hard to find one i like who also likes me

everybody wants
to give you a chance
but seconds and thirds don't come so easily

i met a guy
he liked my face
we had one good date
he ended it there

i asked what it was
i self-deprecate
i'm too insecure
and am i aware

tell me why is it so easy to find a man
but so hard to find one i like who also likes me

everybody wants
to give you a chance
but seconds and thirds don't come so easily

he came to my place
we watched dvds
we got along well
things were keen

he held me real nice
it shoulda been sweet
i gazed in his eyes
didn't feel a fucking thing

tell me whys it so easy to find a man
but so hard to find one i like
who also likes me

i wanna give
everybody a chance
but seconds and thirds don't come so easily

i sat at the bar
all alone
i shot him a smile
he looked kinda scared

i tried to look cool
i got really sad
i sat there a while
nobody cared

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 18:34:06 GMT

~*Adventures in People Watching*~

We're wearing the same shirt
And I just want you to notice
So we can share a laugh
Is that so much to ask?

I just want a stranger to smile back
I just want a stranger to smile back

I got my iPod case open
Turned the brightness up
Got my back straight hopin'
That you'll like my stuff

I just want a stranger to smile back
I just want a stranger to smile back
(At me one of these days)

I get so lonely
Am I the only
Girl
Looking to make a friend
In this cold cold world?

I get so lonely
Am I the only
Kid
Looking for a friend
In this hipster city?

Fri, 02 May 2008 18:16:40 GMT

Murder the Day

feed the fish
feed the rats
gather the blankets
take a nap
alarm goes off
i hit snooze
alarm goes off
i hit snooze
alarm goes off
i hit snooze...

eventually i do get up
realize you never called
realize that no one called
curse my life
curse them all

all my so-called friends
and the boys in my pants
everything comes to an end
for me nothing ever begins

pick up the laptop
open it up
refresh gmail
nothin' but junk
books and cds
i cant afford
read my webcomics
and now i'm bored

kill some more time with online crap
realize you never called
realize that no one called
curse my life
curse them all
all my so-called friends
and the boys in my pants
everything comes to an end
for me nothing even begins

have some breakfast at 4pm
i've wasted another day off again

Sun, 27 Apr 2008 05:11:37 GMT

i felt like a different girl yesterday
my hair bounced in the breeze
i looked good i think i was normal
maybe i was a hipster then
for a moment
still the same boring weirdo underneath the trendy outfit though
was anyone watching did anyone see?
i was smiling!
i was smiling in the sunshine like a pretty girl
that kind of happiness only money buys
but i spent it

Sun, 27 Apr 2008 05:10:36 GMT

i don't have

i have sex but i don't have love
i have work but i don't got money
i have friends but i don't got many
i have fun but then i get sad

i've got the talent but not the skill
the drive but not the energy
high hopes but pessimistic dreams

i have boys but i got no man
i have folks but i don't have heroes
i have vague thoughts but i don't have theories
i have drugs but not the good kind

he's got the face but not the heart
the desire but not the follow-through
hot nights but ice cold conversations

we have sex but we don't have love
i have eyes but i got no vision
he has smiles but makes no decisions
we have fun but then we get sad

he's got the words but not the body
the effort without the substance
humility but great expectations

we have dates but we don't have names
he has cash but he's none too careful
i have respect but i'm not regretful
i have ethics but not the good kind

i've got the talent but not the skill
the drive but not the energy
high hopes but pessimistic dreams

if he likes me he can buy me dinner
if i like him he can buy me dinner again
if we're still in like he can buy me dinner again
if all goes well he gets something in return
but it's all for me
cause i have nothing of my own
its all for me

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 06:31:06 GMT

Kevin McDonald

i'd always been craving to meet you
to shake your hand or maybe get a hug
and there was so much i was to tell you
so much i needed you to know about yourself and me

i shook your hand but i felt nothing
just the giddiness and dizziness and shaking
we spoke briefly and sweetly but we said nothing
the opportunities were there but i never got to say what i'd planned

and that is you
have inspired me from day one
what you dealt with and how you dealt
how you put yourself out there like i do everyday
how you made beautiful and universal from private pain
they can say you sold out but your soul is still the same
and i hope some day to be so successful
at being so true to myself

after all these years no one can do what you do

from what i'd read and what i'd seen of you
i could never claim to know you but you do exist
i don't need to be your friend to feel akin to you
there's so much i still don't know about myself besides

you shook my hand but it was nothing
hundreds of hands always beg for shaking
we spoke briefly and sweetly but we said nothing
the opportunities were there but i never got to say what i'd planned

and that is you
have inspired me from day one
what you dealt with and how you dealt
how you put yourself out there like i do everyday
how you make beautiful and universal from private pain
and you mock your insecurities like laughing at the rain
and i hope some day to be so successful
at being so true to myself

i wanted to tell you that you're still my favorite kid
you're older and wiser but you're still my favorite kid
you're more and you're greater but you're still my favorite kid
you're a real human being now but you're still my favorite kid

slipped my mind

Sat, 15 Mar 2008 07:13:44 GMT

flashback memories

These moments break you
Like those songs that make you cry
Just because
Because some feeling comes and takes you
You don’t know why
Just because

When the streetlight changes with the key on your headphones
Flashback memories stored in your bones
Distract you on the crosswalk
And if you get hit, you’ll be hit, and that’s it, that’s it
“Whatever,”
You say,
“Let it come what may.”

At work on the bathroom floor
When you can’t go back outside
Just because
Fear of what you can’t be sure
You need to hide
Just because

When their voices are so shrill they’re nightmare sounds
You don’t want to be too far from the ground
You could hit it very hard
And if you die there, you’ll be dead, and the end, the end
“It’s better,”
You say,
“Than living this way.”

The song stuck in your head reminds you of a time when things were easier
If you could drown out everyone and everything you could go back there
But no matter how you turn it up nothing changes but a new association
The music and the pain of being aware

And when the streetlight changes with the key on your headphones
Flashback memories stored in your bones
Distract you on the crosswalk
And if you get hit, you’ll be hit, and that’s it, that’s it

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 21:39:47 GMT

Me: poor [roommate] is cursing at the toilet and the plunger
Me: she's ready to kill someone
Me: im staying out of there
Dean: yes.. just take a dust shower
Me: aww, would that i were a chinchilla
Dean: haha
Me: i would be so FLUFFY!
Me: *smiles*
Dean: yes you would be
Me: why do you come here
Me: and why yyy yyyy yyyy why do you hang around
Me: iiiim soooo sorry iiiiiiiiii iiimm sooo sorrorrrooorry
Me: this song makes me happy
Me: a morrissey song, but it makes me happy
Me: and im thinking about being a chinchilla
Me: a chinchilla that listens to morrissey
Dean: i was getting ready to answer the first question
Me: oh, then please do

Tue, 29 Jan 2008 05:00:35 GMT

do you weep?

do you think of how the world's in disarray
turn the volume up
drown out the train
look beyond the tunnels
to the jobless and the hate
does it make you cry?

spy the headlines in the metro someone left
on a yellow seat
ponder the defeat
of liberalism
enlightenment's death
does it make you cry?

above ground do you read the graffiti
and trace it to crimes
that robbed the innocent
poor of this city
the evening news
does it make you cry?

all that shit you learned in college didn't prepare you
for impending recession
world war
anti-revolution
remember how they taught you to swim
but not how to stay afloat
do you wish they'd taught you how to drown
before the waves come
and knock the infrastructure down
the tracks will be underwater
the bridges laid to waste
does it make you cry?

turn up the volume
drown out the train
beyond the elevated
the hopeless and the pain
does it hurt that post-idealism and post-cynicism
dissolve into something you can't name anymore

post-fear
you are still afraid
does it make you cry?

Sat, 05 Jan 2008 04:24:30 GMT

JANET! Chapter Two: Why spend time on Earth.

JANET

When I found out I had a guardian angel, I thought things were gonna change. And, I mean, they did. But not like I hoped. Lola is nothing like people think angels are. She was a woman, she died, she got into Heaven, got the wings, and continued where she'd left off, in journalism. She got noticed, she got auditions, and she ended up taking over at a morning talk show. Now, I certainly never thought there were TV shows in Heaven. I never even believed in Heaven. Apparently it's a lot like Earth, but there are no evil people, no pollution, no crime, no natural disasters or foul weather... kind of a controlled environment. Angels are little and cute and have wings. Obviously humans have seen angels before, because we know what they look like, but Lola says like almost no one does most of the time. And that's because most angels don't want to bother with us. Why spend time on Earth when you've got it made up there? Lola's kind of weird. She went to god and she asked if there was any way she could keep tabs on Earth stuff. She felt people up there ought to know what's going on down here. He liked the idea, but he said she couldn't spend time on Earth without doing good works. He thought it over, and they talked about it, and they decided the only thing she could really do is the guardian angel thing. Anything more would be too impactful; it'd get too much attention and cause trouble. She was sent to me randomly. Dropped in front of me, literally. Fate? Supposedly not, but I still wonder.

Only me and Abe and his aunt Lynda can see her. I met Abe in school shortly after I met Lola. That's where that fate stuff comes in. Abe's aunt Lynda is kind of the Devil. Okay, not kind of-- she is the Earthly manifestation of Evil. I still don't completely comprehend how Abe is her nephew, but he doesn't know either. His mom seems to be oblivious. How you could not know your sister is Satan is a mystery, but, you know, there are a lot of mysteries out there. Abe told me he figured it out when he was around 10, when he saw some shit he wasn't supposed to see. His mom didn't believe him. His dad did, and within a couple of years his dad died in a car accident. A mysterious one? Yes, actually. A mysterious one. Abe's a weird guy though, and he just kind of got used to being the Devil's nephew. And I've kind of gotten used to having a guardian angel who also hosts the number 1 morning talk show in Heaven.

Oh, anyway, Abe and me, right? I was really unpopular in high school, and in freshman year of college I had literally no friends. Abe struck me right away. He was so weird, and awkward, and hot. He called himself Super Abe and wore a mask to school. "When your aunt's the Devil, you can't really not be fucked up." That was his explanation to me. He came right out and told me. And I would never have believed that! But I'd already met Lola, so nothing was too weird after that. So, to make a long story short, Abe and I were together for like 3 years, and Lynda and Lola kind of duked it out for our souls behind our backs... It was really stressful. I couldn't keep it up. We were on-again off-again, and eventually I just didn't feel like I was all that in love anymore, and it wasn't worth it for me. We're still good friends. And obviously Lynda didn't get our souls. Although I'm not sure what would have happened if she did. I really have no clue, to be honest.

But I finished college, and I'm in the same boat as so many other 20-somethings, with a low-paying job, living with my parents, worried that I'm not growing up fast enough, feeling like a loser. And I only have 3 friends in the world. The ex-boyfriend, the angel, and then there's Ralf. Ralf is a whole 'nother story.

RALF

Live fast, die young. Damn right. That's why I decided to be a super-hero. Like in the comics. Except in comfortable shoes. When my friend Abe and me were kids, we played super-hero all the time. He was the only kid who knew my secrets, and I was the only kid who knew his. We adopted our personas for different reasons. Abe was Super Abe at school for the same reason some kids were goths. He felt so different from everybody that he figured he had to dress it up and be something theatrical and eccentric. He was just a sad kid on the inside. On the outside, he came off like he was really confident and obviously so much cooler than you that you just wouldn't get it. He didn't really ever have any other friends though. Girls liked him, but they never told him. They'd tell me. He never liked me like that, though. We were friends since the 1st grade. So I got kinda jealous. But that's just my shit. I'll never have a boyfriend. So I get jealous of everybody.

I fucking hated Janet at first, you have no idea. She was dating my only friend, and he was crazy about her. But then I became crazy about her! And before I knew it she was my second friend. And when things were rocky between them, we got really close. She's my best friend now. Abe kind of... I still love him but I found out how great it is to have a gal friend. So now 5 people know my secrets. My mom, my dad (wherever he is), Jan, Abe, and Lola, Janet's guardian angel. Janet tells Lola everything. I can't see her, but since Abe and her both swear she exists, I gotta believe it. I mean, Abe's aunt is the Devil--seriously--and I'm... I'm a whole 'nother story.

That's the story I should be telling, right? How I became Ralf by day and Red Panda by night. Why I hang out in trees. Why I have to shave so much more often than other girls. Why I'll never have a boyfriend. Or reproduce.

My dad is from India. He was a bigshot scientist, a pioneer of bio-engineering and gene splicing and that kinda thing. He took my mom to India when they'd been dating a long time, and one of the places he took her was a nature preserve. Her favorite animal was--you guessed it--red pandas. So he spent a lot of money and pulled strings and they got to see red pandas up close in their habitat, and he proposed to her there; it basically made my mom's life.

I want to cut to the chase, but that's not so easy to do. They had trouble conceiving, and decided to do in-vetro. This is where it gets fucking nuts, let me warn you. They'd been trying for years, and it was my dad who had the problem. He thought she didn't love him anymore. And he was under crazy pressure. He'd been doing weird things in the lab, and people were talking... mom says he was losing it, but she had no idea. He somehow (wish I fucking knew) combined his and mom's DNA with red panda DNA. He was an incredible genius before he went completely insane. He had secret methods. He used family money to do his experiments, so he didn't publish a lot of what he did, and he kept his secrets that way.

The ultra-sounds started looking really wrong really soon. The doctors were baffled. My dad delivered me himself, to keep me a secret. After I was born and cleaned off and my mom was holding me, terrified and confused and bawling, my dad told her what he'd done. He said it was a present to her. So she'd love him forever like she loved him when he proposed. The story goes that she blacked out at that point. And she dropped me. I don't blame her for a second.

My dad mostly took care of me for the first year or so. My mom had severe postpartum depression, naturally. Eventually, miraculously, she got herself together. When he saw that she was able to care for me, he left her. He said he'd made a huge mistake, that he knew she'd only hate him now. And she didn't love him anymore. She'd come to love me, even though I was kind of furry and not quite human, but she couldn't forgive him. He used to send a lot of letters. Now he only sends money most of the time. We do get a letter once in a while. Barely coherent, asking for forgiveness, saying he misses us, hoping we're well. He always says he's working on some kind of cure or fix, but we know there isn't one. I have a little tail I hide in baggy jeans. Luckily the fur spared most of my face and hands, but it's most everywhere else. My nails are long and sharp. My thumbs are stumpy and my handwriting is terrible. I barely have breasts. I am a freak in the truest sense of the word.

So when Abe and I played super-heroes as little kids, I figured I was gonna be one for real. When I was in high school and had no friends and no boys and shit, I thought about it again. Abe was doing the Super Abe thing, and I was fucked up emotionally, and I started staying out late alone in the park, climbing trees. I put together a costume over time, to be the real deal. I don't fight any crime though. I've never witnessed any. If I ever do, I dunno if I can really fight it anyway. Sometimes I wonder if I'm really a super-villain. Maybe I just don't know it yet. Or maybe I'm nothing but a lonely, hairy graduate student living with her lonely mom, who dresses up like a weirdo to sit in trees at night and watch guys and write this chicken-scratch in her stupid journal.

Thu, 03 Jan 2008 01:58:21 GMT

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 23:57:35 GMT

JANET

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 01:30:30 GMT

Some of my friends might remember I tried my hand at webcomicry back in college with a weird series, illustrated crudely in AppleWorks Paint, called Janet. Most of the originals can still be seen at http://laurasub.freeservers.com/ in the old directory there (but there are spoilers in the comics! Read this first if you haven't seen them, and maybe you'll want to wait and find out everyone's secrets as I get to them!). Oddly, I never forgot those characters. I think they've grown up with me over the last few years. I don't know if I can do the art, but I decided to let myself go back to writing for them.

It's a weird first-person inner monologue style, more suited maybe to a graphic novel than to plain text, but I hope you like it and I hope I keep it up.

JANET! Chapter One: "No One Would Believe Me."

JANET

Do you ever do that thing where you start narrating your life story in your head, as if someone were reading it in a novel? Sure you do. Of course you do, Janet, you're doing it right now. You talk to yourself way more than a healthy--just stop it. Go to sleep.
...

But what if someone asked you a really broad question about yourself, and you were compelled to actually tell them all about your life. Do you know what you would say? If somebody asks me if I have a best friend, I don't even know what to say. I mean, I just say yes. Yes I know what I mean damnit. I wish I could just blurt it out. But who is my best friend? Ralf? Lola? Abe? What would somebody believe? How would I talk about my friends, and my life?
...

"Yeah, I guess. I mean, it's not official like when I had a best friend as a kid, right? We're grownups now, you know. Uhhh... but I guess it'd be Lola. She's an angel. Oh, literally. Yeah, um... She's a talk show host too. Yeah she came to me one day in freshman year. Oh that? Yeah it's called Good Morning Heaven. Yeah it's been on for years. Okay you don't believe me. I figured you wouldn't."

No wonder it's so hard to make new friends since college.

Or, "My best girlfriend is named Ralf, isn't that a weird name? Yeah I know! But she's totally awesome. We're super close. She was my ex-boyfriend's best friend, and I got to know her. Haha, yeah really weird, I know. But it gets weirder! She's--" No, see? That's as far as I could get. How did I get through college? My friends. Abe... *sigh* Abe got me through the toughest parts, until the toughest part was breaking up with him. I can get laid, yeah, but I'll never have love like that again. Even if it was just stupid kid love. Cuz I can't share my life with anybody. Cuz no one would believe me. And Abe's stupid aunt, she wouldn't let me be happy anyway. The woman holds grudges, believe me. Buh, "believe me"? It's like you forget you're talking to yourself, you stupid girl. Nobody's hearing this.

RALF

You don't see me, but I see you, Mr. Late-Night Jogging Yuppie guy. And I'm not buying it. I bet you told your wife you're going to the park to work out, gotta stay fit to keep your investors' confidence or some shit. But you're power-walking straight to the men's room. This is the third night this week. You must have a good thing going, dude. Whatever. I don't really know who you are. But if you saw me, you wouldn't know who I am either.
...

There you go, up the same path as last night. You're looking forward to something, and I'm sure it's not relieving yourself, right buddy? And here I am, with my own sick routine, up in a tree, watching the perverts and the night owls and the junkies and passing judgment, silently. What if I could just come down and talk to some of the kids my age one of these nights? Just be like a normal 20-something hanging out on a bench after last call at Starbucks? Sometimes I get to do that, with Janet or Abe, but without them I'm just a freak. And I can't go home this early. I just can't. I don't wanna see her. She needs me. But I need the darkness. Alone, after sunset, I need to be up here, watching, writing this ridiculous drama. The story of my life is probably going to make for a best-seller when I'm dead. But while I'm alive, I have two friends, a Masters in progress, and a lot of secrets.

ABE

Can't sleep. I'm too mad. What else is new. Stupid aunt Lynda. Stupid bitch. My life would be so different if not for her. I could be normal. I could be happy.

I could still be with Janet.

LOLA

Dear Lord, tonight I ask, as I do every night, that You watch over my dear Janet and her friends, and protect them from the Devil. And I hope You enjoyed today's show. I know how much You love Project Runway, so I really thought You'd like that behind-the-scenes piece we got to do. Amen.

Tue, 25 Dec 2007 18:38:39 GMT

Christmas, Chanukkah, and Pets: A Rant by Laura.

If all the years you've been alive haven't provided you enough reason to hate Christmas time, try working at a pet store on Christmas Eve Day. I'm sure it's just almost as bad working at any other retail store, even. Just try it, and then if you can still say this is a magical time of love and wonder and joy, I will stand up and applaud you, for I would know that you are truly dead and numb to reality; I would envy you with all my heart. I exaggerate. Christmas is probably a pretty joyous holiday to many nice, sane people. But particularly to those scary people who buy Santa costumes for their dogs, "Kitten's First Christmas" blankets for their cats, or gnomes for their gardens. (I imagine these segments of the population overlap.) And if we sold housewares, I know these people would also be buying an extended family's worth of seasonal dishes and flatware and glasses and tableware and couch covers and throws and pillows. All for a couple of days their parents taught them to look forward to all craptastic year.

I don't know what it's like, myself. I know what it's like to look forward to the winter holiday for presents. But for me, it wasn't unlike looking forward to my birthday for presents. Chanukkah and my birthday, both equaled gifts. Chanukkah also had some great food to go with the presents, back when the family was closer. As I got older, my birthday gained the great advantage of not involving my family. I only have a nostalgic attachment to the two feast holidays of my calendar-- Passover and Thanksgiving, which I equate as Jewish and American versions of pretty much the same thing-- a time to thank the lord or the economy that we have a bounty of tastyfoods. Whether you believe the myths or not, both holidays commemorate the survival of a people against incredible odds. The stories I learned growing up left an impression on me, as did the meals, and I never needed presents or cards to make those holidays feel exciting. They're also the two days of the year on which I actually miss my relatives. By extension, on those days I miss my childhood. But I can't relive my childhood on Thanksgiving or on Passover. I can eat, I can see family, but I'll not be treated the same, and much of the magic will be gone.

So I come back to pondering Christmas. How do songs, cartoons, lights, and Santa Claus allow so many Christian adults to regress to a more innocent, whimsical state? Why do they get so happy? Some of them, that is. Others, why do they go to such great lengths and such great expense this time of year if Christmas actually doesn't make them merry? Do they ever say to themselves or their older children, "We're getting old enough to stop spending a fortune on inflatable snowmen and video games and sneakers and lights and giant tins of popcorn and trees and parties every single year. This year, why don't we just have a nice meal and everyone can get one or two gifts and we can throw away that giant lit-up NOEL sign your father bitches about putting up and taking down every year anyway."

But I must digress. I set out to write about working at a pet store on Christmas Eve Day. It's all related, of course. Because I wasn't brought up to see December as a magical month in which normal rules don't apply, I never expected miracles to happen for me, even while Santa brought luxury upon luxury to the Christmas-celebrating kids. Because my parents were brought up much the same way, they only went as far as to sometimes spend a lot more money on my Chanukkah presents than on anything they'd buy me during the rest of the year, save for my birthday. My aunt spoiled me rotten predictably, but I think I always saw her as unique that way. I believe my first non-goldfish pet was the turtle my aunt bought me without my parents' permission, and I believe it may have been a Chanukkah gift. My parents, however, knowing they would have to take care of any living thing I might bring into our house, would never have given me a pet as a mere holiday gift, unless I was old enough to be responsible for it. Even my aunt didn't just go to the store without me and get it herself.

I do not mean to criticize nor to generalize Christian people. I am upset with the minority who lose all good sense frantically trying to create holiday magic for themselves, their families, and their pets. So many people bought animals from my store today. This time of year, some parents are so obsessed with pleasing their kids (or getting them to stop begging) that no logic can sway them from taking an innocent hamster into a completely unequipped household. "A hamster is a relatively cheap pet, but it's still a big investment. I need to tell you, you're going to have to keep buying it stuff, and it's going to add up." Not to mention the cleaning, the attention, the care. As much as I hate how we devalue fish, a hamster is simply not a goldfish. It should not be considered expendable, nor easy, nor cheap. But it's Christmas, and the hamster is just a present. "It's not for me" was the excuse I heard from every adult today when I lightly and politely lectured on the needs of the desired pet. "That wheel's gonna be way too small for him" was met with, "My daughter's only 9." "You should definitely get some treats and some chew sticks," met with, "This is all I'm buying today. Just the pet, for Christmas." I wanted to yell. I wanted to shout, "Well this hamster, god willing, is going to be with you next Christmas and the Christmas after that! And you'd better not wait til next Christmas to get it some fucking treats, or a fucking hideout, or better food, or whatever the fuck you can't afford today because you spent the rest of your Christmas bonus already and you didn't budget for it."

But maybe there are Christmas miracles. I hope so, for the kittens and the puppies people just bought without having any idea how much they cost to keep (I mean not even ballpark). For the snakes that mothers bought their sons and intend to feed only crickets (true story). For the goldfish and the bettas whose water is going to get mighty cloudy. And for the hamsters (whose only crime was being adorable and easy to breed) who are going to be screamed at and neglected for biting out of fear, or lost in the house, or die of wet tail from overdosing on carrots and lettuce. I don't look forward to the returns, but I do hope those who figure out their children really wanted the latest Elmo toy or whatever have the good sense to bring the animals back to us.

Tue, 25 Dec 2007 18:36:41 GMT

so like me

my life has fallen to disrepair
hope has dissolved into despair
as far ahead as i can see
this is so like me

i gave away my favorite toy
turned my back with scorn and spurned joy
how lame can one girl be
this is so like me

work all day and sleep all night
feed the pets and fight the fight
clean up the messes when i'm not too tired
meet up with friends before time's expired
try to ignore the pain
tablets meant to comfort and sooth the brain
watch the water twirl into the drain
next week, do it again
lay around and watch tv
this is so like me

i gave away my favorite toy
turned my back with scorn and spurned joy
how lame can one girl be
oh this is so like me

Thu, 06 Dec 2007 04:53:30 GMT

IM snippets.

me: entertain me?
collin: what are you paying?
me: attention?

dan: http://www.jonessodastore.com/shop/product.php?productid=16283
me: i dont know how i feel about the new hip, youthful packaging of our ancient faith
me: oooh but it comes with a dreidel!
dan: And she's sold

Tue, 23 Oct 2007 16:57:15 GMT

On the Meaning of Life

I've heard a lot lately from close friends about the meaning of life, or the absence thereof, really. For all my depression and all my years of dark thoughts, I never pondered this too much. I'm fascinated by how we create meanings for life, and I've pondered that a lot, and I've got some wacky theories. But as for the real meaning and purpose of being alive, I just always believed there aren't. Meaning and purpose are concepts we invented in our complex brains, like gods. If you're not religious, you subscribe to the idea that god didn't make man but rather man made god. That's how I see this issue of meaning. Humans weren't created with a purpose but rather humans created purpose, because there's some fucked up bunch of neurons in our heads that demands everything have a reason and a goal behind it. A side effect of the way our brains solve problems "rationally" is that our brains make up or find problems when a rational explanation is lacking for some phenomenon. So we wonder why we're alive, because that's a tough question. "Just because" doesn't cut it. And while evolutionary theory can show us how we got here and why we're so complex, it still doesn't satisfy our need to know why and how we're each supposed to live. So we've wondered by what rules nature designed or desires us to live, and we've created codes of conduct based on these Natural Laws we've perceived. But we still don't have a satisfying answer when we look for the meaning of life.

So I reiterate, there isn't one. You have to make it up for yourself. If that's too hard, let someone make it up for you (i.e. religion, nationalism, cults). You can make up a really awesome, noble purpose, like world peace or saving the world's wildlife or caring for the sick. You can follow a traditional purpose like love and family and passing on your genes and lifeways. You can come up with a wild new purpose like perfecting and spreading a technology. You can be in it for the money, or not, and it really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things because there is no Natural Law, there is no inherent right and wrong. And if you can't think of a purpose, then why not make the purpose finding a purpose. If that's too stressful, I see nothing wrong with making your purpose just living the best you can. However artificial, maybe the meaning of life for some of us is just learning to live, learning to see the beauty in it, learning to relax and enjoy, or even just learning to cope with a seemingly meaningless existence.

Fri, 31 Aug 2007 19:44:45 GMT

I just need to hear those four little words:
"When can you start?"

Won't you tell me those four little words
and mend my heart?

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 23:15:17 GMT

here are a couple of pieces of things I found in sticky notes (the fake computer kind)

I thought theyd gasp and stare at the woman I've become
pictured them just standing there holding out their tongues
I thought theyd recognize how desirable I am now
there was no fanfare when I walked in through the door
not a single head turned when I came out on the floor
I thought theyd recognize how desirable I am now

-------------------------------

On such a lovely night
I wish the whole world would break into song for me
Sing and dance me out of this lonesome misery
Against the backdrop of the city lights across the shore
He'd hold my hand real tight as we waltz to my front door

PAPER POST

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 23:02:59 GMT

For intro to women's studies, my unqualified review of Against Empire: Feminisms, Racism, and the West by Zillah Eisenstein.

When Zillah Eisenstein writes of “Empire,” she writes of European colonization of, exploitation of, and power over non-Western/ non-White peoples. When she discusses “the West,” she imbues the term with these same themes. While she rejects hegemonic definitions of West and East, or of West and “the rest,” she makes little effort to unpack the terms. In a book entitled, Against Empire: Feminisms, Racism, and the West (Zed Books, 2004), Eisenstein neglects to provide a working definition of either “Empire” or “the West.” Instead, it would seem, she expects the reader to follow her through chapter after chapter of anti-Western, anti-White, anti-globalist, anti-capitalist, and anti-U.S. rhetoric built on the unstated and incorrect thesis that White Western Europe invented Empire with all its accompanying atrocities and injustices.

Eisenstein brings up again and again that for every knowledge we have of our world, there is a “before.” But in her dichotomizing of the West and non-Western civilizations (while she refutes that such dichotomies exist[1]), she shows a selective memory. For example, she begins her history of chattel slavery of Africans by Whites conveniently after the slave trade begins[2]. What about before? The history of slavery began before the first European slave ships began trading in human bondage. Eisenstein does not mention that African individuals were traded, sold, and enslaved by non-Europeans before the Euro-American slave trade began as such, only stating in passing that some African individuals were slaves of other Africans[3], and she does not really discuss systems of slavery that still exist today around the world, transcending the White-master Black-slave typology[4]. Slavery as a broad phenomenon does not have to be associated exclusively with Western imperialism; it can be seen as a global-historical reality that requires deeper cross-cultural analysis.

The racialization of slavery, which occurred within the timeframe that Eisenstein discusses, is vital and horrific information needed in order to understand the arbitrary and recently-invented nature of racism in America. However, Eisenstein’s opinion that White supremacist racism stigmatizes the West and all Whites, idealistically glorifying the “colored” societies of the world, is steeped in the usual liberal guilt. In her bleaching of the West (referring to African Americans as “Nonwestern Westerners”[5]), she silences the historical struggles of every group that is only now considered just-plain-White (Jews, pagans, serfs, indentured servants, for just a few of many examples), even though she knows that there was a “before” “White” and that there was a “before” the “West”. She also silences the historical struggles of every “colored” or “non-Western” individual who has ever been oppressed by another “non-Western” or “colored” power-holder. Her hopes for a “polyversal democracy” and “polyversal humanity” will never come to light if she and others fight “othering” by Whites/ Westerners with villainizing of Whites/ Westerners.

Instead of characterizing Empire by its universal-historical patterns, Eisenstein paints it as a uniquely Euro-White-Western project begun during Europe’s Age of Exploration. It is almost as if she believes that Columbus was the first power-hungry explorer. What about before? While she makes a point of explaining that Asia and the Islamic world were the sites of super-powers before the rise of Europe[6], she denies that these super-powers were imperial or colonialist in nature, or that they owned or traded slaves. She misses a fantastic opportunity to bridge a misconceived gap between Western and Eastern history in doing so. She could write about famous Chinese sea voyages. She could write about the Huns, the Mongols, the Moors, the Persians. She could write about systems of tribute and taxation of religious minorities. Instead of seeking to find global parallels of migration, violence, conquest, division, and hierarchy, Eisenstein staunchly reinforces idealized notions of West-as-aggressor and non-West-as-victim.

She relishes pointing out, correctly, that human rights, freedom, and equality can trace their roots to times and places outside Enlightenment Europe or the modern era of the UN[7]. Like many other scholars today, she then rejects Enlightenment theory, because she feels it was bound up in hypocritical racisms and sexisms of its time and place, and simultaneously co-opted or borrowed without credit being given where it was due. Of course, this rejection cannot be complete because she herself is a product of Enlightenment thought. Instead of connecting the dots objectively between her own ideas and Enlightenment, and between Enlightenment and other ways of thinking about freedom and humanity, she devalues Enlightenment and Western-claimed notions as derivative and hypocritical. She emphasizes when West was influenced positively by East (Gandhi to Martin Luther King, Jr. for example), and de-emphasizes when East was influenced positively by West (Enlightenment to Gandhi).

Eisenstein means well, as do many of those she would attack as marketing and manipulating diversity and human rights discourses, assuming that the intent of power-holding activists and community leaders in wielding these catch-words is corrupt or misguided. Her mistrust is warranted, but leaves the reader pessimistic. She offers no practical tools toward building “polyversal” democracy, and she does not explain why the problems that plague poly-ethnic democratic republics today would not plague the governing body(ies) of “polyversal” society(ies). She can find no models for “polyversalism” past or present, but still implies that it is the West which stands in the way of our progress toward this goal.

The wishy-washy post-modern language employed by Zillah Eisenstein in Against Empire is ineffective in conveying hope or optimism toward her dream of “polyversalism.” At the same time that she apologizes for using terms like “the West,” she only encourages all-too-popular anti-Western, vengeful sentiments. De-humanizing and homogenizing so-called Western Whites as the Colonizer[8], she does not achieve her book’s goal of re-humanizing the “othered,” the Colonized. The book’s invisible conclusion that much evil and little good came from the West is overly simplistic and reactionary. At least one can take note of some of her beautiful hopes toward finding “unity” in “difference,” and take to heart her message that all human beings on earth share needs and desires from their very humanity. What she needs to state more clearly is that all people are capable both of great selfishness (and violence) and great compassion (anti-violence), regardless of color, gender, or hemisphere.

1 Eisenstein discusses the problems posed by language regarding geography, race, and slavery on pgs. 29 and 30, and elsewhere in the book.
2 See section “Imperial Democracy and the Slave Trade” beginning pg. 83.
3 On pg. 29, Eisenstein writes of slaves who “became captives, of other Africans, or whites,” while in the very next sentence, she writes, “To survive, they had to come to know the white slavemasters and slavemistresses” (italics mine, added for emphasis).
4 A good, brief history of the enslavement of African peoples can be found at http://slaveryinamerica.org/history/hs_es_overview.htm. Startling information about modern forms of slavery can be found at http://iabolish.org.
5 This is the title of Chapter 6, pg. 114.
6 Pg. 34-35.
7 See, for example, pg. 32.
8 On pg. 29, Eisenstein states that “this colonizing world is white.”

Wed, 23 May 2007 04:24:31 GMT

An experiment in 4/4 upbeat pop (inspired by Sean Nelson and tambourines everywhere), I have composed, and uploaded for your downloading enjoyment, a tiny piece I am calling 44 for now. Please give it a listen!

Wed, 23 May 2007 02:40:29 GMT

I'm just really proud of this one:

http://community.livejournal.com/anachropedia/2119.html