Cantaloupes

Cantaloupes.

The bitch must be smuggling cantaloupes. There is absolutely no other explanation—or excuse—for her bosom. I try, I truly do, not to be one of those women who indiscriminately hates on other women. The world in general has plenty of hate for women without my participation. It’s redundant and unnecessary.

That said, though, there is no logical explanation for what was happening under this woman’s low-rent leopard-print blouse. First of all, it’s frighteningly cold in the Lou. It’s five degrees. One, two, three, four, five! motherfucking degrees. You step outside, and you gasp, and you wait for your skin to crack and slide off. I don’t give a damn how hot you are, this time of year no one wants to see your navel, and no one is even ready to believe that yam tan of yours. Please.

I’m buxom, curvy kind of girl. It has taken me years to make peace with my déclassé breasts; they just don’t suit me, and they’ve never been particularly comfortable. However, America is for some reason boob obsessed, so I understand (theoretically) why women want fake ones.

What I don’t understand is why anyone would ever want breasts that would never be mistaken for human. Or mammalian. Or, you know, of Earth. Giant, rock hard silicone orbs perched threateningly on either side of one’s sternum, waiting to leap out and attack an unsuspecting passerby. Hot, very hot.

I had to switch seats with my companion because I could not stand to see the fluff tottering around the bar. I could practically here her flesh groaning under the strain of keeping those children’s playground bouncy balls held in place. I do not for an instant imagine that these particular breast-like things attached to this woman could be remotely pleasant to the touch; I would expect that it would be much like feeling up tetherball. I choose not even to speculate on her discomfort, especially in light of the fact that she was certainly not intended by nature to be built like Malibu Dingbat Barbie.

The doctor who did this . . . thing to her should be fed to wild dogs.

On SotU

I have been sick of late. It began as a mere sore throat and eventually evolved into a full-blown consumptive cough so wet and diseased sounding that I briefly considered going out shopping for a proper outfit to wear while wasting away, complete with shoes. And perhaps a hat. Nothing, it seems, brings out my inner-Victorian like a head cold. After a day home from work and the liberal application of warm, sleeping pets, I am pleased to say that I’m making a full recovery.

I did not, however, watch President Retread’s State of the Union. I was too sick to get drunk, and too smart to sit through it sober.

Because I don’t live under an overpass, though, I have of course heard about many of the . . . things . . . he said. Calling them “policy initiatives” would be a gross insult to the world of ideas. What can you hope to expect from a man roughly as bright as a desiccated firefly ass hours after its brutal amputation by a sticky and undisciplined 6 year old?

Not much, obviously. It seems, though, that no matter how low we set the bar President Retread manages ably to clothesline himself upon it rather than going over. Case in point, his recent suggestion that tax breaks be offered to those Americans with jobs but without insurance, to be financed by taxing as income the employer contributions of employed Americans with insurance.

Now, to be fair. This isn’t a new idea. This turd is one that has been suggested before and is simply being presented to the unsuspecting public with a fresh coating of sparklies. Further, the plan wouldn’t tax all Americans with employer-provided health plans, just those Americans with good health plans. If your insurance sucks, well then, it can continue to suck beneath the radar of new taxation.

Now, in general, I’m a pretty pro-tax kind of girl. We pay less in taxes than any other Western industrialized nation; in we return we expect (and get) far less from our government than other citizens. Because, for reasons large and small, there are really ALL KINDS of things that the free market really sort of sucks at, I think this is a crappy trade for the vast majority of Americans. Including, namely, me and most people I know and love.

President Retread isn’t talking about restructuring the tax code, though. No, he’s talking about paying for a tax break for one group by adding another tax somewhere else. The problem? Dear god, where do I start?

If one finds oneself in the lowest tax bracket, one likely won’t pay enough in taxes to even benefit from the full deduction. Lots of people, like ME for instance, really can’t afford to have my health care taxed as income. Do I benefit from it? Duh. Can I eat it? No. My insurance plan is reasonably good, but it might not be the “gold standard” type of plan that would qualify as taxable. However, how many workers have accepted crappy pay raises or worked at crappy jobs because the benefits were good? Lots. Plus, this friggin’ idea isn’t indexed to the rate of inflation in the health sector. So even if you’re reasonably good insurance isn’t taxable now, it might be in about—say—20 minutes.

Breathe, girl, breathe.

This idea is so stupid in so many ways that it is easy to miss the bigger issue: this plan fails to address the fact health care ought to be a basic right. Instead, it is slowly becoming a precious commodity that is increasingly hard to afford for vast numbers of Americans.

"HONETY"

That's what the sign in front of the elementary school read.

*pause*

I think that says about everything, don't you?

Retread O'Reilly

St. Louis, in its ongoing effort to drive me completely batshit insane, has plunged us into wretched, windy, winter cold. 20 is not a temperature; it is an age, or a type of currency. Because of the bone crushing cold, I have been too much of a wienie to walk the Vector. Consequently, like any ginormous goat puppy, she’s been acting like a crazed hell-beast.

Last night I decided to deal with the beastie’s excess energy by taking a quick walk over to Mom’s so she could play with Uncle Elliot, Mom’s long-suffering border collie. Long-suffering because even though he’s an older dog has had, over the past year, to tolerate a stream of puppies through house, all of which demanded that he play! with! them! I figure that since, like my dogs, he won’t get an actual job—entertaining the puppers is one small way he can earn his keep. So there.

Plus, Mom can be counted on to feed me when I’m too lazy to go to the grocery store.

So I’m over there chatting with Mom while she does her aerobics, and activity that consists of watching Bill O’Reilly and bits of the president speaking—she figures that her heart rate is sufficiently elevated just by watching the talking heads talk. I’m not in that kind of shape, as evidenced by the fact that I threatened repeatedly to jab my mother’s cheese knife into my jugular.

It. Was. Terrifying.

Bill O’Reilly had on two Conservative Legal Vixens, one of whom had obviously found a sink full of Botox and then soaked her whole head in it. The other had one eyebrow that, like a wooly-bear caterpillar, was making a slow march up her forehead. The look on her face clearly said, “Everyone who is watching this must be retarded.” All I can assume is that the physical appearance of the CLVs was intended to distract from the warm, frothy shit coming out of their mouths. Alas, it did not work.

Bill and the CLVs were discussing how a recent decision of a three judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals was indisputable evidence that all terror cases should be tried in military tribunals rather than civilian courts. You can read briefly about the decision here :

http://www.topix.net/content/ap/0428992685141555206338764810430622521206?threadid=9JEJ874UP46K5991

The 9th Circuit Court vacated a lower court sentence and referred the case back for reconsideration. Ergo, liberal activist judges cannot be trusted to try terrorists and all future terror cases should be handled in President Retread’s tribunals. There is no possibility that, say, this case in particular was poorly handled by the trial court. Or that, I don’t know, maybe appeals courts make decisions based on their desire to halt the brutal raping of the Constitution. Whatever. I haven’t read the court transcript; maybe the 9th Circuit judges were, in fact, being idiots. That does not, however, serve as sufficient support for scrapping a few hundred years of legal practice and letting Joe Army handle it from here.

After that segment, Mom finally responded to my antagonized mewling and consented to change the channel. Next thing I know, I’m faced with film of President Retread being interviewed on 60 Minutes.

Now, I’m not a news junkie, but I’m reasonably well informed. I do not, however, get my news from television. Consequently, it had been a long time since I had actually seen the president speak.

Why didn’t someone tell me he had completely lost his fucking mind?

I mean, I thought all along he was a megalomaniacal douchebag of marginal intelligence. No shock there. I did not, however, realize that we had progressed to the point where Retread looked like a glassy eyed lunatic with feces caked under his nails. Watching him talk, without even listening to the substance to the drivel, was truly frightening.

I need the weather to break so I can go back to walking the dog. I don't think I can sit through another evening like that.

Extreme Elimination Challenge: Dining Edition

There were a disturbing number of suckers on my friends plate. And one of the side dishes was looking at me with surprise.

Such is my lasting impression of my first experience with Korean food on Thursday night.

I have, over the years, become a reasonably well-rounded diner, after a fashion. For a mid-America dweller, I have a reasonable sense of dining adventure. Prior to Thursday, I had eaten what I think of as a tolerably decent sample of the cuisines of Asia. Chinese, Thai, Vietnamese, Indian--I figured, Korean? What could happen?

Suckers and fish peepers. That's what.

I should, before I go on, confess that until last June I had not eaten meat in any identifiable form in almost 15 years. There is fish sauce in Thai food, I know that. And I'm sure that over the years I'd consumed various sauces and soups that undoubtedly contained stocks and meat leavings, but otherwise I was a lacto-ovo vegetarian for a long damn time. Ultimately, my foodie leanings and hedonistic nature led me to have a shrimp risotto, and since then I've eaten seafood here and there. Crawfish, shrimp, strange square Filet'o Fish sammich, and a truly exquisite scallop--I'm still rather new to this whole seafood thing, and although I have liked it thus far, it's a constant decision to eat it or not to eat it--touch and go all the time.

So. Thursday night. Dinner with a friend, and we decide to go for Korean. Him? He LOVES Korean food, and when that's what we decided to do he responded like a kid who has just been told that OF COURSE he could have the extra-large banana split with extra chocolate sauce and sprinkles.

I take this as a good sign, as any time someone whom I respect is that enthusiastic about a thing I assume that it bodes well for that thing. So, cool.

Now, to leap ahead a bit, what I had was quite good. It was some sort of spicy soup with seafood and tofu and green onions and egg. Quite tasty, with a clearness of flavors that belied the incredible richness that I can only assume was a result of all the soft tofu and what had to have been an outrageous fish-stock base.

That wasn't the problem. The problem, if you can call it that, was one of side dishes. Apparently, everything comes with a variety of sides. Kimchee. Lotus root. Something that I assumed was a fried tofu, but in retrospect might have been something quite different (a fact upon which I choose not to dwell). A dish of whole, cooked minnows.

Yes. You read that right. Okay, I don't know that they were minnows. I don't know what species of fish they were exactly, but really, does it matter? Think small feeder goldish, or large guppies without the fancy tails.

So. The waiter brings this all out, sets it down, walks off. My dining companion explains to me what everything is. He gestures to the dish o' fish, and says he thinks it's seaweed.

I peek at it.

It peeks back.

"Nope. Those are fish," I respond.

"Really?" he says, digging in his chopsticks.

I actually felt myself blanche.

The little fishes didn't like my outfit; they questioned the way I held chopsticks. They wanted to be eaten, quickly, because I bored them. "We are so happy to be your dinner," they said.

I tried not to giggle. Or make eye contact. I glanced over at my friend's plate. Or should I say, I glanced at the giant pile of tentacles in chile sauce sitting in a fajita skillet in front of him. The visible proliferation of suckers was . . . distracting. I looked at my own food. There was something floating in it, mostly submerged. I was very, very afraid to know what it was. I pushed it under with my spoon, Scarlett O'Hara style . "I'll think about you later when I can stand it better," I thought. I focused unwavering attention on my rice. I’m sure that my friend thought I had finally gone round the bend because to all appearances I was talking to the table throughout dinner.

As dinner progressed, my soup dwindled, and it was increasingly impossible to ignore whatever it was that was floating there. I applied my chopsticks and was relieved to see that it was merely a shrimp. At first I was somewhat flummoxed by its head; its eyes; its antennae; its whiskers; and its many, many legs. I found that it did turn out to be quite tasty once I removed its exoskeleton and hid it behind my teacup.

Because I had been a vegetarian for so long, and because of the reasons why I had been a vegetarian, I am very conscious of the idea that meat is made of animals. I don't do a very good job of separating what is on my fork or in my hand from what it used to be. I think that is a good thing, I think that it is part of what makes me who I am. In future, though, I think I would prefer to leave a tad more mystery to my meals. Either that, or I can return life as a vegetarian.

As for Korean food more generally, I would certainly eat it again. It was tasty, and it no longer has the advantage of surprise. Also, I am going to begin recommending it to my male friends as the perfect means by which to screen the humorless princesses from the women they date. Fuck’em if they can’t take a joke.

Ineffectual, to the Nth Degree

You know your life has taken a turn for the ineffectual when you can’t even properly handle puppy poop.

Last year for my birthday I gave myself a new puppy in what has turned out to be a terrifically successful effort to hit the snooze bar on my biological clock. There is, honestly, almost nothing cuter in the world than a puppy. Baby pandas, maybe. Kittens are a tie. Human babies? Somewhere in the middle of the pack along with infant elephants and piglets.

The thing about puppies, though, is that what they really are is a bundle of bad habits and unwelcome biological processes wrapped up in a warm and wiggly fur coat. Bennet is no different. (Yes, I have a female dog named Bennet. Yes, I named her for one of Jane Austen’s characters. Yes, I realize Bennet sounds like a boy’s name. This is an animal that has eaten or attempted to eat all of the following: spiny balls off a maple tree, poop, cheese wrappers, and a condom she found on the street. She likes her name.) Besides the various stinky, leaky, messy, pukey, and all around mischievous things she has done—she’s also been one puppy disease after another. I have thought, more than once, of changing her name to Vector.

A few weeks ago, little Vector’s typical digestion habits went all kerflooey. To make a long and messy story short, I wound up at the all night emergency vet (also known as The Saddest Place Ever) with my little beast, fully expecting them to tell me she had Parvo and that I shouldn’t have bothered to get attached. Fortunately, what she had turned out to be Puppyzuma’s revenge, a tummy bug that was like 1000 times easier to treat than, you know, my carpets.

So, now the beastie is all better. She’s beginning to resemble a goat, all legs and ears and stubborn, and it was time to take a follow up, um, sample to the vet to make sure that whatever nastiness she had is now cured so she can continue to get bigger and put on weight so that she can eventually rule the damned world.

To make a short story long, it got lost. The office wasn’t officially open, but the front door was, so I did just what the woman told me to do and set it down inside. I put it behind the desk, on the floor, because to my mind that was the least disgusting place to place a bag containing a puppy turd. That’s all great and good and everything, but now the puppy poo has gone missing, and I now have to go by there again tomorrow with a new sample. Ick, already. Ick, I say.

Who—I ask you, who—loses poop? Me. That’s who.

*****

One might think that in light of President Retread’s recent speech I would have something more important about which to write. One would be wrong. I didn’t watch it.

Why you ask? Because I’m 30, and I pay my own bills, and you can’t make me.
I am going to find and read the transcript because, unfortunately, his idiotic blathering is important. HOWEVER, I felt I couldn’t spare the brain cells to actually listen to the man talk. I didn’t feel like getting drunk last night, and really, that’s the only way I can sit through more than 5 minutes. I watched all of last year’s SotU, for which I rewarded myself with tequila, and I wasn’t doing it last night.

Every time I hear his voice, it makes me want to eat my own hair. His idiotic rambling will be much more palatable in written form. At least I won’t have to listen to his phony aw-shucks-down-home-one-of-the-little-people accent, complete with “ums” and “huhs.”

Lame

St. Louis is so lame.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baton_Bob

I first encountered this cat, oh, about December 2001 or so. I was working in a coffee shop in St. Louis’s Central West End. It was about 8 in the morning, and I’m leaning against the counter sucking back caffeine and enjoying a good mind-wander when walks by . . . Baton Bob. Dressed as Santa Claus a la the Rockettes.

Quickly, I tried to make sense of what I had just seen. Was I on drugs? No. Should I be? Not for visual hallucinations, anyway. Brain tumor? Probably not. No. There was, in fact, a man walking down Euclid in a dress and twirling a baton.

I pointed him out to my co-worker. “Oh him? Yeah, he’s by all the time.”

Oh. Okay. Wait, what? How can you be nonchalant about a guy twirling a baton? Or anyone twirling a baton on his or her morning walk, really. Freaky. In a good way.

I got used to seeing Baton Bob around the neighborhood. Dressed as bride. Batman. Playboy Bunny. I saw him lead a wedding party from a bar to the nearby ballroom where their reception was to be held. God love him, he could be a bit snarky, and he was known to occasionally block traffic for a second, but HE TWIRLED A BATON ON HIS MORNING WALK. How can you not love that?

If you’re St. Louis, apparently. Because now he’s in Atlanta, and appearing on CNN.com. You can find that link yourself.


St. Louis: The Joy Sinkhole of Middle America