Le maudit Mo D.

Maison du That's Not Kingfisher!

My left foot is throbbing with the aches and pains of a glorious day in London! That's right, Paco, the one in ENGLAND! Bloody limey baahstahd!

My lips touched pasty goodness today at the little Cornwall Pasty shack near Liverpool Station. I had a "large traditional" which was a flaky pocket filled with seasoned steak, potato, onion, and swede (rutabega to us yanks) and it warmed my hands. The streets of London were quite deserted when we set out, as today is a BANK HOLIDAY, meaning most people with suitwearing jobs get the day off. However, the mondo touristy districts we passed through were chock full of fellow tourists. Because of this bank holiday bullhonk, I was prevented from viewing the Canada House Douglas Coupland exhibit. There are large Couplandesque flags in front of Canada House advertising this, as well as the 13 flags representing the 13 great provinces and territories of Canada. I only missed two.

I actually had a lousy experience at the Covent Garden LUSH! The place is a tiny rabbit warren of strong soapy smells and tired staff who are sick of cutting soap for assholes. And they were out of my most beloved lip balm, but I did manage to spend £5 on shampoo before setting out to the pub to meet up with my all-male coterie of fellow Londoners.

By far the most entertaining point of our stellar day in London was our Indian meal on Brick Lane. Brick Lane, much like E. 6th St. in Manhattan, is all Indian restaurants, only this one features aggressive dickwads who come up to you and offer you all sorts of discounts and favours if you choose their restaurant. We went with the one with the most aggressive barker, who actually ran a few yards up the street to tell us how great his restaurant is and that we could get 20% off the bill and one round of free drinks. So we said okely-dokely and went in and had food that was good, but not great in my opinion. (Sitar in Springfield, MA, followed by Clay Pit in Austin are my faves)

Dan is a gallant knight who keeps his sword shiny and his tongue sharp. This is a man who could throw a grand piano at you. Dan was there to protect his peeps in the face of sneaky, greedy Indian restaurant owners who try to squeeze a few extra quid out of their customers. Dan combed the check carefully, adding everything up and totalling it out and pointing out that the bill was too much, and that we had been charged for two bottles of water (£3 each--I can't believe we paid $6 for fucking water) and £8.25 for pappadums and a weird conglom of chutneys that were full of vinegar. So Dan laid down the smack and turned that shrill Indian man into his bitch, while that motherfucker demanded that he was being an honest restauranteur. Dan, glorious Daniel, my friend and protector, gave him the verbal slap and left this Indian restuaranteur dickless, whining, and potentially violent. A once pleasant meal became a cause for all-out war. Dan even accused the man of serving subpar beer ("That's not Kingfisher!") and told him he was an artist of bullshit. We paid the check WITH DISGUST and swiftly exited, looking behind ourselves in case he had sent a goon to break our kneecaps.

Daniel should be knighted and his chest should be festooned with medals for his bravery and warrior-like battle against dishonest Indian restaurant dudes.

Kingfisher is apparently the official beer of India.

I am currently trying to figure out how to go to Paris for a reasonable amount of money.

Dogs in the Pub

We walked down to the local pub and lo and behold all the neighborhood gentleman had brought their dogs inside. Bob commented that we were in the dogs and Americans section of the pub. I drank a fizzy Stella Artois, which is apparently the beer for the spousal abuse set, and others had "winter warmers" or bitters. Dog pub!

And the food! D&R provide a zoo of tasty animals for breakfast. There was a ham, a goose for Christmas, a duck in the oven right now for dinner, black pudding (which I partook of--lots of tasty blood and offal!), a dozen bangers. Quack oink oink honk honk! Who knew goose is dark and beefy? Fortunately, Robby was on the scene with a familiar box of Betty Crocker Blueberry Muffin Mix to soothe my inner American.

There is some chat about going to Harrod's later for the Boxing Day sale. Boxing Day sale adverts are out of control here. Every shop is offering mad sales. Everything here still costs lots of £ (£! £!), esp. petrol. We figured out that the 79p per litre comes out to around $6 a gallon. We shall drive nowhere!

Also, toilets are much deeper here than in the US. The distance your waste must fall is greater, resulting in more audible elimination. And everyone here smokes. Don't tell my mom. She'd freak out. We are California people.

The one thing I want to take home from this trip is a passion for being an American. This past year was especially troubling, and I think that being apart from my culture and being a slight outsider (not really a full outsider here, loves, as everyone speaks English and there's tons of American shit on the telly) should put some things in perspective and inspire me to love being just who I am, which is an American. I talk funny here and my gut has loved thousands of burritos and even though European soda pop is so much sweeter, so is familiarity. Home is sweet, and sweet is home. I prefer paper currency to coins, and I love driving my car with $1.69/gallon gasoline. And burritos. Sweet sweet burritos.

I want to be a food writer.

Loo Roll! Kitchen Roll! Vauxhalls!

Blimey! It's true! They really DO drive on the opposite side of the road and after nearly three decades of training to look left before crossing the street, I must now look right. This is strangely difficult.

London is grand, though I haven't seen much of it yet. I am eating quite a bit of sweet things. Today, Christmas, wine is being drunk continuously. There is a market run by Muslims up the street that is open that sold me loo roll, kitchen roll, and a bag of ham-flavoured crisps. I bought an Aero bar, thinking of how Swilkes and I used to deify them, and now that they are everywhere and you can acquire them in the states easily, the charm is gone. Bollocks.

Fun Facts:
1) I survived our long flight and after a dizzyingly tired day and 10 hours of sleep, I am un-jetlagged. Thanks to Enzo, our BA flight attendant who had a nice political conversation with us aboard the plane.
2) I want to kick the shit out of the asshole in front of me on the plane who kept body-checking his seat (reclined all the way) into my face the whole time.
3) Climbing a staircase on a moving bus takes some practice.
4) Hackney looks like Brooklyn with different-looking phone numbers on the buildings.
5) They have French automobiles here (Renault! Citroen!)
6) Being reunited with Dan, Ryan, and Robby has been fun and fabulous. So quickly you forget being apart for so long.
7) There is lemon taste in this mince pie I'm munching on.
8) We saw the saddest bottle of Old El Paso salsa in the market. It was very small and cost £2 or something tragic.

Dear Continent

Dear North American Continent,

We will be apart for 11 days starting tomorrow. I will be over in your pal Europe for awhile. I know that you and Europe have had your differences over the years, but in fact, you allowed Europeans to ravage you centuries ago. Don't frown at me.

You have quite a diverse population, N.A.! I love your Canada, I feel deeply for your United States, and without your Mexico, I'd be hungry and grumpy all the time. I depend on you for so much, I just wanted to say thank you and let you know that I look forward to my return, and to keeping you as my permanent home/continent of choice for my whole life. Your beauty, your wide open spaces, and your convenient highways make you the best place on the planet to live.

I love you, North America!

Happy Holidays to you and your 500 million+ residents.

--Mo

Man?

Am I starting to look like an unattractive old man? Maybe if I smoke this entire carton of Camels?

I thought it would be amusing to take a picture of me standing in front of Ryan's old place of employ with Ryan's carton o' cigs and send it to him ahead of my in-person arrival with coveted low-cost American cigs. This is only a few steps from the 37th St light show, so I thought, hell, it's funny. But after seeing this picture, I am wondering if perhaps rhinoplasty might be a good idea after all.

I think my nose is getting bigger. No really. Apparently your nose keeps growing throughout your adulthood. It's always been large, but now, I am noticing it in head-on shots, although not in my gorgeous touched-up Sears photos.

Maybe smoking will stunt the growth of my nose?

If only I had a nose like a camel. Camel noses are flush with the rest of their faces. Of course, the one human being whose nose is nearly flush with his face, Mr. Michael Jackson, is not considered good-looking by modern American standards. So perhaps this is not something to strive for.

thirtyseventhstreet

Every year, I am reminded that Austin is a unique and wonderful place to live by the 37th Street Xmas Light Fest. This year, it was totally amped up with live music, really good carolers, and even (gasp!) the sale of goods (kettle corn and sparkly jewelry). Rather than garish and reverent displays of yuletide cheer, these folks get seriously Austin on your ass and create cool and funny scenes on their lawn. Above is the "Camp Cupcake" paean to Martha S.

The one house that goes all out is the one where you walk through the backyard. There they have lights in all sorts of household items hanging from everything. They put lights in prescription bottles, hairspray can lids, mini liquor bottles, plastic toys, Tic-Tac containers, and other usually tossed plastic items.

Notes from a wanna-be humanist chaplain

I've been an atheist my whole life. I was raised to be one by my father, who famously informed me that there is no higher being the last time I saw him, lying in a hospital bed hooked up to a mad lot of tubes. If a frail, dying man tells you there is no god, then there isn't one. My father lived a decent, honest life, worked hard, had his share of joys and disappointments, and believe me, he was a hell of a lot more convincing about religion than televangelists, the Armenian church, or just about anyone.

Atheism doesn't exactly sell itself to the tired, hungry populace. Too many people take no comfort in the idea that when you're dead, you're just dead. The idea of an afterlife and reunification with passed loved ones is far more appealing than your dad or kid or whoever rotting away in a grave. The unstructured moral code--mine is loosely based on--"as long as it doesn't hurt anyone and you learn something from it"--is apparently too loosey-goosey for the lot of folks who need structure and rules, much like kindergarteners. Shades of gray, attempts at understanding complexity, do not sell to a crowd who likes firms yesses and nos. A lot of people like swift, exacting punishments dealt to those who have committed crimes or behave in ways they find unseemly. Well, atheists can only offer the US Constitution, The Bill of Rights, volumes of court cases, and civil law. We cannot offer a higher being that will smote down the guy who smashed your pick-up truck or the dude that ran away with your daughter.

Unfortunately, we can only offer you a life of personal responsibility. Owning up to your actions and facing all consequences thereof, without a god to wipe your slate clean, a savior to die for your sins, or even karma to bite you in the ass down the road. Good people starve everyday. The rich become richer. Loved ones die. And there is no order or scheme to this all. None of this happens because one earns it or deserves it. It is the chaos of life. Questioning it serves no purpose.

Atheists can and do embrace the miracle of human creation, of thousands of years of progress. We thank the architect and the construction worker when we behold a beautiful piece of architecture. We thank the pilot and the mechanic when we arrive safely to our destination on an airplane. We thank the cook and the farmer when we sit down to a meal. Is it jealousy that human religion demands that we divert our thanks to a god for the rich bounty that our fellow humans provide?

Is it too much to demand from my fellow human beings the spirit of kinship that derives from just being here? A fallible human who wants to live and love and create and explore, and to do it unaided, fully experiencing success and failure, stumbling and then standing up. Can we look to ourselves and to those around us for fulfilment? Heaven is now. The change we dream of is within us. Our time is finite and there is so much left to do.

Finally! Quality photos!

If anyone wants a cheap piece-of-shit digital camera that takes either dark or blue photos, let me know, because I just got me a NEW DIGITAL CAMERA that does not suck. Now my European vacation will be captured in beautiful digital images and posted to my flickr website for all to see. Zing! I am spending way too much money! I must remind myself that I am to be unemployed in one year's time and that I was planning on not getting another job right away. Zounds.

I'd like to thank Swilkes for simultaneously taking me on a trip down memory lane AND reminding me that I am turning into an old, centrist fart by forwarding me snippets from the Wesleyan newspaper. Apparently a gaggle of outraged privileged young people trapped the university's president in his office for four hours while intimidating him with their "list of demands," which include "gender-neutral dorms" (a concept I don't quite understand at a coed school with coed dorms and coed bathrooms), the selling out of the campus radio station to NPR (I support the students on this one--college radio rules), and other sundry things that have turned campus activism into a shameful joke. I was particularly appalled that members of this faction took to interrupting classes to announce that they were sitting in and trapping Bennet in his office. That is incredibly disrespectful to faculty and students who are THERE TO LEARN.

The common rallying cry is that their voices are "silenced," when it seems that trapping a man in his office for four hours while yelling demands at the door and not letting him come out is silencing another's voice. Of course, all extremism comes with hypocrisy. Perhaps they were taking a cue from our current administration?

Oh, college. The world is so much bigger and when you're out in it, you feel so much smaller. You go from ruling a small fiefdom to counting paper clips for some moron just so you can afford to eat. I miss college so much and yet I find myself repelled by UT's undergrads and their carefree, youthful lifestyle. I especially am repelled by the ones who wear shorts and flipflops on cold days.

Failed Adventure

All I seem to write about these days is what I do and what I eat. And I lament that. I think I'm at a creative low again, so please bear with me. In case you didn't already know, I'm going to LONDON this week, so la di da. Thes un is shining here and it is cold. Over there, it will be non-sunny and cold, but I will have the warm arms of D&R, so I suppose it will be okay.

DESTINATION #1: CANADA HOUSE for COUPLAND EXHIBIT!!!! Yay! I've never seen any of Doug's art up close before, so this will surely make me squeal with glee!

Last night, in an an attempt to be adventuresome and open to new things, I ordered a new item at the local underdog Thai restaurant. Receiving a false endorsement from a fellow improviser, I ordered B8, only later to discover that this particular dish could not "B8" due to its unfortunate, unpleasant flavor.

It tasted like someone's vinegary socks, with too much fish sauce poured on them. It also contained raw mushrooms, which I dislike, and cold-ish "sea leg." Fortunately, the fellow improviser who had praised B8 and encouraged me to order it didn't like her dish (red curry w/chicken), so she gamely traded with me and I got to eat. Turns out she didn't like B8 either, and it was not what she had ordered in the past and enjoyed.

This coming at the heels of very successful adventurous ordering at the other, superior Thai restaurant a few steps up the street, where the currylicious glory of P15 will send you reeling into Thai Flavor Country with joy and love in your heart. I was disappointed. Oh, so disappointed!

So anyway. Just marking time until my intimate 12 hours with British Airways deposits me across the pond and I can go broke with the assblow current exchange rate.

Constipated? Not us!

Who doesn't love a rare, juicy burger, a lamb shank, or a dozen freshly roasted quails? Not us! We consistently eat meat 7 days a week, and never miss a trip to the toilet.

You don't believe us? Well, obviously you don't use Aerobic Butt Cleanse! ABC cleans the colon with millions of microscopic undocumented colon workers who scrub your insides with their tiny, folksy brushes! Afterwards, you'll be free to make yourself comfortable in the bathroom with a few magazines and a big plate of fried chicken fingers.

Don't miss our lecture series!

Jan 12--Waukesha, WI Grand Waukesha Lodge (get it? lodge?)
Jan 13--Peoria, IL Heart of Peoria Ballroom
Jan 15--Lincoln, NE Lightheart's Cabaret

The Law Offices of Longarms and Smiley

Injured in an automobile accident?
You are entitled to compensation.
The Law Offices of Longarms and Smiley will FIGHT FOR WHAT'S YOURS!
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Don't Let Romance Pass You By!

We Can Help!
Let Bob and Mo Find Your Special Someone
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Copying Robin

"If, in the works of contemporary authors, different names appear in different editions or versions of the same work or two or more names appear in one edition or version, choose, for all editions or versions, the name most frequently used in editions or versions of the work."

--Describing Archives: A Content Standard (a.k.a. "DACS")

The above is this:
1) Pick up book nearest to you.
2) Turn to page 123.
3) Copy down the fifth sentence on the page.

That one is obviously from work. If I do it here in my room, where I am sitting next to my bookshelf, I get the following:

"So her teachers and counselors had pushed her to go East for school and study medicine."

--Free to Succeed by Barbara Reinhold (the Smith career lady)

Finally, after a calendar year of nagging, I finally got Bob to go to the Sears Portrait Studio for some tacky-tack picky-pics. We were privy to sexist posing practices and chided by our photographer for not being engaged or married. She also asked if we were brother and sister, even though we look NOTHING ALIKE. NOTHING! These pictures prove that our ancestors are from different parts of Europe and we are NOT COUSINS! I am definitely more olive-complected than fair Bob.

I had fun posing with Bob, who was made to stand upon a box so that he'd be taller than me! I'm putting the 8x10 in the living room! Bob wants to put it in the bathroom.

It takes 48 hours for them to put the pics online for viewing. I am biting my nails. We're in soft focus! They're great!

Hungry Hungry Internet

I just wrote a beautiful e-mail to Johnnycakes. I used commas and addressed modern issues relevant to our interests and reminisced about the fun times we've had together and was about to send the bloody thing and then POOF! A wrong move on the mouse and it is GONE, unsent, forever lost, gobbled up by a hungry internet hippo. I am sad.

I am at the point where I do not want to listen to any of my CDs. I have been washing my hands a lot because I am scared that I will get sick before my London trip. Members of the typhoid community need to not attend work or social/artistic events in the Austin area.

Have you seen the blue-nosed, bloated pics of the Ukranian head-o-state whose name escapes me, but definitely looks poisoned? Awful. And I bet all those hypocritical anti-choicers are clandestinely masturbating to a frenzy since S. Peterson got the death penalty. (current events corner)

I am tired and headaching, so I am going to go now.

In a Parisian bed with Rick Steves

I am in the 5e arrondisement, in a hotel room overlooking a busy street below. I roll over in the lumpy, strangely dimensioned bed, and am met with the back of a head I am not familiar with. Wearing nothing but a moneybelt, he turns over and asks if he can have a euro to buy a baguette...

Peter has a new song on his song page. The song is appropriately titled "Everybody Wants to Go Paris." Well, I'm newly equipped with a new Rick Steves Paris 2005 Guide, and you're NOT! Peter's song is equipped with fakey violins...and YOU'RE NOT!

Today's spending spree included a bottle of hair/nail growing supplements, a novel bought off the discount publishing assblow shelf at Bookstop that I intend to read on the plane and then abandon in the UK (replacing it with a shiny UK copy of Eleanor Rigby by DC), and a replacement bottle of facial moisturizer, so I can have a moist face. Rick Steves likes a moist face...I mean...whoa!

Note to Bob: if you find my semi-humorous suggestive statements about travel guru Richard Stevens in any way hurtful or off-putting, I will stop. R.S. poses no threat to my fidelity. Only my bank account.

Today's quandary came with lunch, as the campus eatery I frequent during the hectic and tiresome work week has installed a television and today it was set to FOX NEWS, which means that the eating establishment is attempting to indoctrinate the university community with sick neocon ideas and misinformation. Should I now boycott Thursday Enchilada Day, or just forget it and look the other way when A. Coulter suggests that Americans should hate Canada because "they speak French." Does it get anymore ignorant than that? This place has good fries of the French variety.

This Saturday night is the GGG Rock Opera, which I encourage you to attend if you are in A-town. The Chronic failed to put it in this weeks issue, so spread the word. Please visit our website, linked to your right.

Inflatorant

Okay, before I announce with a tinge of sorrow that I did NOT become eBay victorious this evening and will instead have to meet Katha at a tony cocktail party and not for a large-ish sum of money (bought experiences are so the folly of the bourgeoisie...), I must announce that a house in our 'hood belonging to one of the few who deigned to put a Bush lawn sign in front of their house (appropriately beside all their ghoulish Halloween decorations) is now sporting an INFLATABLE CRECHE SCENE. Inflated, white-skinned Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jeebus were apparently carted over in the SUV from Wal-Mart and inflated for the enjoyment of everyone who lives in this nice, quiet Austin neighborhood. I for one find it to be unbelievably tacky.

TWO WEEKS UNTIL LONDON! WAAAAA!

The house across from us is currently festooned with all manner of lights, candy canes, a reindeer (without mammaries, so no 50% fat content milk)

Bob consented to eating at Casa de Luz tonight for mad macro yums, which made me deliriously happy. Nothing more wonderful than watching Bob eat:

Bowl of raw veggies with requisite macrobiotic condiments!
Miso 'n Squash Soup!
Brown Rice laced with amaranth!
Steamed greens with amazing WALNUT PASTE (tonight's winner!)
Salad coated in lemony stuff!
Cauliflower and leeks cooked together!
and
Black-eyed peas!

He is my bowl of special ice cream!

using money to buy the things that matter

Why am I sitting at my desk on the work floor of an almost deserted world-class repository when I could be riding the venerable #5 with the lice-infested colorful characters of public transpo? I'm currently hovering over eBay trying to win the date with Katha. I figured at one point I was willing to spend five figures to sit around with a bunch of high-strung artiste types under the auspices of an MFA program. For a current high bid of $240, that's a freaking bargain to get the writing feedback of the writer I admire the most.

So no Xmas presents for anyone this year!!! Me me me!

Fourteen years ago, when my mom got remarried and moved us kit and kaboodle to SD, CA, the evil Satanic moving men who operated the large moving truck took it upon themselves to steal our personal family mementos and a pretty large portion of my mom's bitchin' 1960s vinyl collection. Among these items was a 1953 Singer Sew Handy real sewing machine, which my mother used as a child to sew hankies and aprons. For years my mom kicked herself for not putting it in a special place (i.e. not the moving van) and tried not to think about her shiny black children's sewing machine, used to train girls of her generation proper womanhood.

This past week, she had something of a psychic eBay premonition, and lo and behold, the exact same Sew Handy was available. She, my aunt, and I spent four days lording over that particular auction, as my mother had given us a very high allowance to spend because she had to have it. It was that simple. So my mom has gleefully paid $180 to be reunited with a precious childhood memory item, and she's happy as can be.

Here I shout, LONDON!

People, I am two weeks and two days from my momentous first hop across the pond, and I am pissing my knickers in anticipation. First, I am so very lucky to be back in the loving arms of my boys Dan and Ryan. It has been much too long and I am excited as hell to be catching up with them. I can't believe that I haven't seen Dan in as long as Bob and I have been together. No really. Dan left the USA exactly one week before May 29, 2003, the day Bob and I unified into the bloated, syrupy amalgam you see today.

Dan and/or Ryan keep sending me furtive anonymous e-mails from public kiosks in Islington signed Zadie Smith. They are rad.

MY LIST OF ENGLISH THINGS TO DO:

1) Stonehenge bus tour. For some reason, I am totally gung ho about visiting Stonehenge. I think this is left over from senior year of high school English class when we read Tess of the D'Urbervilles. I really loved Tess, and she dies at Stonehenge at the end of the book.

2) Coupland exhibit at Canada House. I heart Doug. And his art is conveniently in a Canadian-themed edifice in Trafalgar Sq. I will go and salivate. And then I will go to a bookstore and buy Eleanor Rigby, his new book. And I will read it on the plane home.

3) Tate Modern. Modern art rocks. I will probably visit other assorted museums.

Bob has also consented to a side trip to PARIS. My French balls will be put to the wall as I attempt to function in francophone society. I want to go to PERE LACHAISE and say hi to my pals Edith Piaf, Guillaume Apollinaire, and Jim M., and just walk around and BE in Paris. Zing!

Je vais buver beaucoup de the et cafe et alcools.
Je vais marcher dans les rues de Bois de Boulogne et Montmartre, comme Amelie
Je vais s'embrasser mon petit-ami a cote de la tour

Entertainment Bus

As I've mentioned before, I practice the use of public transpo twice a day Monday thru Friday. Rather than pay a crapload of money to park at the university where I work, I ride the venerable #5 (The One True Bus). The #5 wends its way from downtown through the university area, up through tony Hyde Park, and then up to my neighborhood. These are all nice neighborhoods with cared for homes, and the majority of the riders are either the blind folks going to and from the School for the Blind, or Austin's northward-living working populace.

The number 1 is usually the befouled party bus of the local vagrancy, but apparently today's 5:30 numero cinco, the one I was of course on, was generously populated with the unwashed, fatigue-wearing denizens of our streets who often have dogs that wear bandannas who were committed to irritating the nice working folks who had just gotten off work and wanted nothing more than a peaceful ride home.

I had the misfortune of sitting in front of two guys who had a homoerotic innuendo going on who were attempting wholehearted to discombobulate me. Frankly, that is a tall order, and they were approaching it from the wrong angle. Frank discussion of libido and sexual practices is not going to get a rise out of me. Fuck a horse, fuck your grandma, I don't care. It's all theatre to me. Addressing me as "sweetheart" and talking about asking me what my pussy smells like, fine. It's the bus. My lily white ass could be in a car right now. We all make decisions in this life. Asking me if I want to join them for a beer, that's fine. I'm gonna tell you no. They pretty much left me alone after that.

If they REALLY wanted to get my goat, they could have been talking about Bush with all the love of Jesus in their hearts and instead of asking me about the scent of my nethers, they could have been preparing to read me scripture and try to save me the xtian way. THAT would have gotten my goat.

What was most disturbing was that one of the dudes seemed to have two rows of top teeth. Is this normal or does it indicate that his daddy is also his uncle?

A Promise

I think that I've made it through the last few years of low-cut jeans with nary an exposure of my butt crack. I am not prudish, though I do think that keeping my crack a respectable couple of inches below the waistline of my pants is something to strive for. I am confident that the only persons who have seen my butt crack are authorized to do so, and are not members of the public at large.

The chronic, painful sciatica precludes a lot of general bending over. I try to avoid stooping at all costs and am usually successful. I think the crack, though an important part of human anatomy, is best kept in a locked box known as Pants. Pants keep your butt warm, covered, and away from society's lurking eyes. I respect those who wear pants that do what they were meant to do.

Sadly, the onslaught of low-rise pants has caused a scourge of female butt crack to be exposed. Everyday, women I know and respect are nearly caught with their pants down, victims of the fashion whims of ghastly New York designers whose rail thin physiques rule the day. F them. Cover the crack!

Thank you.

I also promise to prepare tasty loaves of pumpkin bread this week.

Should I call you Electra or Steve?

Last night at the GGG show entitled "Casino: The Musical" I played GEORGE, the pit boss with a heart of stone who miraculously stays in love with lounge act MISS ELECTRA after discovering that she is transsexual. Other characters included STANLEY, 94 year old gambling addict who triumphs over personal bankruptcy through one hand of blackjack, and CLARISSA/CHITA, the pole dancer who strips to make him the money for one last game.

In one song, I used the name Steve, which is the cheapest way to go when you're punning on trans-ness, as in "Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve, ha ha." Ugh. I make seeck!

Barbarism Begins at the Mall

I was brusquely informed today by an airheaded saleschick at EXPRESS, who at one point in time manufactured my most favorite pair of pants ever, that the company no longer produces a size 14. Why they eliminated the most popular size of clothing in America is beyond me, but rather than answer my question about that, and why they're punking down the big girls (big girls have money too, you know), she instead suggested I buy some "cute tops." I aboutfaced and left, never to be seen again. I wanted to pay an obese woman to invade the store and sit on her little pinchy face, but I suppose that would have resulted in arrest.

The Gap played me the same way (I lost a crucial pair of jeans and am going through hell trying to find another pair), informing me that 14 longs are only available through their bloody website. Excuse me, but if I'm not good enough to buy items in your store, which I have taken time out of my day to come to, then you're not good enough to get my money.

This whole money thing get annoying and useless after awhile, because I as withhold it from each stupid store, I am still left with no pants. I really liked the pants at Express, sadly, and would have bought three pairs if they had a size 14, the size Marilyn Monroe wore, the size that I wear.

I also hate Mall People. They were out with their bare midriffs in cold weather, with their screamy brats, their purple eyeshadow, and their credit cards being all lame and annoying today. I ducked in to Bunns and Noodle to pee and was confronted by throngs of these people spending their money on books of meager literary value, slugging back double vente egg nog lattes and going into debt. Freaks.

I hate shopping. It reminds me that nothing on my body adds up to anything that works and am forced to shop at Old Navy because poor people shop there are everyone knows that in America, poor people are often fat. Grrr...

Last night's improv show had the most tasteful pedophilia scene ever. It just grazed the edge of impropriety and then pulled back. Brilliant.

If anyone wants to get me a Christmas pwesent

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2288771765

Oh...Katha!

Upcoming on Mo's Essay Express

Lesbians vs. Mo
A Review of Fire and Ice by Michael Adams
Something about all-female improv vs the kind with boys

Oh...KATHA!

A Canadian called me "weird"

We have a researcher here who hails from Canada, and as we discussed Canada vs. U.S. (Pierre Berton, RIP, etc) I mentioned my predilection to make a beeline for the quotidian candies the minute I hit the border. I explained the whole corn syrup/US economic politics=shitty American chocolate thing, but she said, and I quote, "You go to Canada just for the candy? You are weird."

A Canadian called me weird. My feelings are slightly hurt by that. I'm weird. Sniff.

I guess my interest in Canada, to a Canadian, is weird. It's not like I'm unaccustomed to being seen as weird, but in the past it was easy for me to write off those parties that asserted my weirdness, as they were completely lame, poorly educated, materialistic, drunk, retarded, etc. But a real Canadian scholar? Ouch.