I’m reading Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri, a short story collection flavored with lots of details about Indian life. I don’t usually like short stories, but Lahiri is an uncommon writer. My favorite passage so far is a child’s description of what “sexy” means:

“It means loving someone you don’t know.”

4:43 p.m.

EMAIL MOMENT!

Subject: Friend tells me to use his car while he’s gone.

Excerpt:

You are perfectly welcome to drive my car around. Just remember to turn the lights off and you should be fine. Oh, and I’d probably prefer it if I could say that I’ve had sex in it more than you have, so try to keep the numbers down.

2:04 p.m.

My dentist supplies headphones for her patients. When you’ve got some quality tunes playing, you hardly notice the smell of burning tooth enamel while she drills. I selected Louis Armstrong.

Two masked dentists leaned over me, backed by a glaring, operating-table light, while I tried not to gag on the spit collecting at the back of my throat. At the peak of my discomfort, Louis sang, “AND I THINK TO MAHSELF, WHUTTA WONDERFUHL WAHHHLD� (cue strings).” I swear, it was like stepping into a Quentin Tarantino movie. I found it so absurd that I had to control the urge to laugh (funeralsbreakupsthethingsIwishI’dknown). But the more depressing things I thought about, the worse the juxtaposition became. When “Life is a Cabaret” came on, I lost it. With my mouth stretched open like a gasping trout, I started to guffaw.

They, mercifully, assumed I was choking. I tried to cover my lunacy with a few well-placed coughs, and hit stop on the CD player while I was sitting up. I shoulda gone with Korn.

10:55 a.m.

Tantara– The blare of a trumpet or horn.

3:13 p.m.

Best responses from a magazine blurb about what women call their knockers:

• The Pointer Sisters,
• Laverne and Shirley,
• and, my personal favorite, MacNeil and Lehrer.

Still can’t believe no one suggested the Olson Twins.

11:34 a.m.

MARKETING WORKS!

I recently bought some lipstick because it was named Jezebel. I mean it’s a good color, but mostly the name cracked me up; also, it came in a container that looked like a bullet cartridge. Somewhere in New York, a marketing team is slapping fives. They changed the name from Crimson Punch to Jezebel, took it out of the tortoise-shell tube and packed it in a form of weaponry, and sales rocketed among urban twentysomethings. I am yet another unwitting victim of their plan to dominate the red-lipstick market. Anyway, it was totally worth it. Tomorrow night a bunch of us are getting together to run off a cliff, and I want to look hot.

8:39 a.m.

This is a calendar featuring women with beards. Friends, family members: if you have a birthday in January, you know what you’ll be getting from me.

2:15 p.m.

I’m wearing a new lemon perfume, and a friend told me I “smell like dish soap.” In guy-speak that means, “I want to rip your clothes off with my teeth.”

12:21 p.m.

I booked tickets to Indonesia yesterday because my life is rad. The only problem is, I’m terrified of the vaccinations. I know no one likes needles, but I don’t like them more. One of the most embarrassing things I’ve ever done involved a blood test when I was 14.

In the waiting room I swallowed repeatedly trying to conquer the excessive panic-saliva. When they tried to take me into the room, I grabbed either side of the doorjamb. It took three men to pry me off and hold me down while they drew my blood. My mom was stunned and mortified. “I can’t believe this, you’re practically a grown woman! What are you doing? This is really out of character, I’m so sorry. This is really out of character.” To this day, I have no idea what I was thinking, I guess it hadn’t occurred to me that they’d fight me.

So, yeah. The vaccinations will be a highlight.

10:45 a.m.

It’s time for my very own personalized action figure. For $250 I could have a mini Mighty Girl with a tiny little cape and tiny white go-go boots. That’s some serious first-world livin’.

3:51 p.m.

As I was rummaging for breakfast this morning, the cupcakes on my counter started to look suspiciously muffinlike. I had an internal debate: Muffin? Oatmeal? Muffin? Oatmeal? Then the inevitable self-reprimand: “MAGGIE. Muffins do not have sprinkles.”

9:52 a.m.

I took an Italian art history course in college. The whole class could be described by something the professor said absently one day, “Today we’re going to talk about another… big church.”

My second favorite art-history moment was when my modern art professor spent half an hour talking about a Mondrian painting before realizing that the slide was in upside down.

6:15 p.m.

EMAIL MOMENT!

Subject: A reporter’s post-holiday laments.

Excerpt:

I am sick at work and awaiting an excruciating article
assignment, which will probably be a New Year’s
resolution, man-on-the-street story. I will have
to go to gyms and ask people why they decided to get
slim for the New Year or track down smokers who may
be willing to quit for the New Year. This is akin to
the day after Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping
stories I’ve had to do the last two years.
If we still used pencils or pens, I would commit
Hari-Kari with one as we speak…maybe this keyboard is
sharp enough. Nope.

11:29 a.m.

Going through old magazines, I came across the stupidest headline of 1999: Are Your Nails Ready for Y2K?

“Yeah Bob, I’m out on that Y2K nail compliancy call, and we’ve got a few problems over here. Looks like she’s got on a little Revlon Wine With Everything, but she used an incompatible top coat so it’s chipping. Yeah, and her cuticles are all messed up…”

10:25 a.m.