Those of you who don’t live in a big city should know that bike messengers are cooler than you. They don’t care about getting hurt, they don’t care about getting dead, and they don’t make eye contact with anyone but the brethren. Their style is a sort of studied rejection of trends: Frayed jeans hacked off at the knee, old T-shirts, gravel-conditioned helmets, and the standard tattoos and piercings.
Imagine my surprise then, when I saw vanilla-collegiate guy sporting a Timbuktu bag with several messenger tubes protruding, and the identifying walkie-talkie attached to its strap. He was wearing a navy blue polo shirt, a pair of short-leg Gap khakis with cargo pockets, and some Van-like biking shoes. Beh? I had to resist approaching him. “Excuse me sir, do you have a tattoo on the inside of your lower lip? No? Perhaps a tongue stud? Some faint facial scars? No… Sweet mother of God. Is that gel in your hair?”
12:13 p.m.
Month: March 2001
We just launched Web Techniques Daily (ie: the Web Tech Blog). I’ll be posting there pretty frequently, so if you want to see what I look like in semi-professional mode, head on over.
2:45 p.m.
This has been around for awhile, but have you seen Heavy Metal Parking Lot? This guy took a video camera into the parking lot of a Judas Priest concert in the ’80s and interviewed concert goers. The best part is when a girl tells the camera that she’s 13, the guy standing next to her says he’s 21, then he gives her a deep, tongue-intensive kiss for the camera. I’ve rarely experienced something so simultaneously chilling and hilarious. Well, maybe that “Making of Growing Pains” thing I watched a few days ago, but still.
10:39 a.m.
Astute observation from Strangebrew:
“If I can only give you one piece of advice, it’s this: don’t put a unicorn lover in charge of the decorations.”2:52 p.m.
There are good people and there are bad people: Thief steals man’s $15,000 artificial leg out of car. Also, teachers are citing 6 year olds for sexual harassment now. Ow. Someone make it stop.
9:55 a.m.
EMAIL MOMENT!
From: A guy who reads my blog
Subject: Bloggers say the darndest things
qt_freak:
Damn, I like your site, it’s pretty funny. If only you had more substance to it. A better lay out would be cool too, but yeah, just saying you have a fan.
Me:
Hi, thanks for the note. I clicked around your site a
little bit. Just like you, I’m a big Slurpee fan.
Jesus, we’re like the same person. Well, except that
I’m not big into “dressing up like a ninja and tagging
your mother’s bearded biscuit from the back.” But I’m
funny that way.[Now he’s plugged me, and I’ve plugged him. I’m sitting back and saying a little prayer to the absurdity gods that I get audience overlap with a site that has a “Bitch of the Week” feature. Rad.]
2:14 p.m.
My knee is knee shaped again. When I stand, I no longer feel extraneous fluid rush down my leg. These are good things. For those of you who don’t care, here’s some Etch-a-sketch art. Callous bastards.
9:18 a.m.
“I’m a sensitive guy. Some guys drink beer and write their name in the snow, I drink herbal tea and write haiku poetry in the snow.”
(The Very Strange World of John Saleeby)12:46 p.m.
Mark’s friend had just interviewed Michael Cunningham, author of The Hours. Mark was kind enough to send me the interview, soon to be published in Abercrombie and Fitch Quarterly (Beh?), and it had one line that particularly struck me: “I still find myself walking on a street I walk every day, looking around and
thinking, ‘My god, it’s like this.'”9:20 a.m.
EMAIL MOMENT!
Subject: On distaff and my bony ass.
Me:
What is it with men and baked goods? A man may be
impressed by your brain, or your body, or whatever, but if you walk into
the room with an apple pie, his eyes roll up into his
head and his mouth starts frothing. It’s like,
“Well I knew you were hot, but I didn’t know you
baked..”Him:
It speaks to our lizard brain. It is hard to starve with a woman who
bakes. A woman who bakes can compensate for myriad detrimental
evolutionary traits, such as narrow hips, an waistline that suggests
infertility, and a brain that is too smart or too dumb for her prospective
mate. Baking is tantamount to survival. Additionally, very few men have
the moxie, time, or inclination to bake. Baking is a place that is solidly
in the woman’s world. Women bake, lap dance, look pretty on game shows,
heal, and mediate. Men bust broncs, and philosophize. Just the way it is.Me:
You have such an odd, offensive little take on things.
Remind me never to bring you cupcakes lest you request
a lap dance.Him:
Your butt would poke holes in my jeans.
4:28 p.m.
Nyotaimori — The practice of eating sushi off of the body of a naked woman.
3:14 p.m.
PEOPLE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD
Dan Bistline is self-appointed mayor of Church St. I know this because there’s a sign in his window:
Church Street
Pop. ?
Dan Bistline, Mayor
Dan Bistline has also printed up a quotation for each pane of his three-sided window:
“You are a good and kind person.”
“Jump and a net will appear.”
“There are no truths, only stories.”
Dan Bistline annoys me.
10:39 a.m.
Nothing screams invalid like an hour spent watching “Growing Pains, Behind the Scenes.” Yeah. Should I perchance ask for Jell-O or a good book of crossword puzzles, please just pretend like you didn’t hear me.
10:25 p.m.
I just returned from knee surgery. I am currently doped up enough that if we were in a bar, all of you would look very attractive to me. Wheee.
1:42 p.m.
I hesitate to post this so soon after the bumper dumper link, but who am I to let good taste override your entertainment? I hereby present stuff people have crammed up their bums. The site comes complete with x-rays and medical reports. There are the standard bottles and phallic vegetables, and then there’s the guy who made a cement cast of his anus and the person who crammed a kangaroo tumor.
3:13 p.m.
Litotes — understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by the
negative of the contrary (as in “not a bad blog” or “not
unhappy”)9:57 a.m.
So I got an electric toothbrush, which is charmingly efficient. You push a button, it brushes your teeth for exactly two minutes and beeps at intervals that indicate when it’s time to change sectors. My teeth are shiny and new–they do the little lens flare thing when I smile. The only problem is, my new toothbrush sounds very much like a vibrator. My roommate has begun to avoid eye contact with me when I leave the bathroom.
2:37 p.m.
Mighty Girl 