J*A*G

so, one of my very favorite tv shows in the entire world is JAG. it's about navy lawyers and fighting terrorists and a bare minimum of actual acting. if you know of the show, and know me, it might seem like the exact opposite of what i'd like. let me tell you why i love it so:

JAG just asks so little of you. if your one brain cell doesn't have the common sense to know it should be lonely, you can still enjoy the hell out of JAG. it's the exact opposite of The Wire (which, in case you're wondering, is the bestest thing your TV has ever thought about showing you).

there's a fairly varied cast of characters: some old dude, a black guy, a woman, some non-specific middle easterner, all flanking the lead character, Square-Jawed WASP-y Man. and herein lies the genius of the show: whatever side the Square-Jawed WASP-y Man backs in minute 9 will be vindicated by minute 46. he's never, ever wrong. ever. for, i think, seven seasons JAG was like network television's homage to the dominant paridigm. women? wrong. the elderly? keep trying. blacks? noooo. asians? nuh-uh. gays? fuck off. Square-Jawed WASP-y Man? gooooooooooooooood!

take two

either every marriage has to be held to the biblical watermark test, or none of them do. if marriage is a function of its biblical definition, then it's time to start un-wedding all the athiests out there.

it's also time for dudes to start stockpiling maids, because they totally count as backup if your lady is barren.

marriage

tomorrow, it would appear, the california supreme court is going to rule of prop 8, which does something legal and proposition-like, preventing gay marriage.

AND OH MY GOD. sweet bejeebus. i am so sorry, but it is apparently one hit wonders weekend on the radio and "informer" by snow is playing. i am? so sorry. i have nothing at all to say about anything. INFORMER. SNOW. he'll lick ya boom-boom down.

honest to goodness, i had every intention of writing a well-reasoned blog about the ridiculousness of prop 8 and the benefits of equality, but all i can think about is ninth grade and hammer pants. wow. just, wow. my mind is completely blown.

rolly pollies

apparently, i am a closet member of PETA.

you see, my wonderful niece river has an affinity for playing with rolly pollies. you should imagine some sarcastic air quotes around the word playing, because river says she's playing, but really she's mushing and throwing the rolly pollies pieces into yard. as, i imagine, a warning to other rolly pollies that she's the captain round these parts.

and, and....this makes me feel really bad. to the point that i tell her, "river, no mush a rolly pollie." and, "river, be gentle with a rolly pollie." and, "river, stop!"

perhaps it makes me a bad person to admit this, but my empathy surprises me. i am surprised that i am so concerned for the well being of these bugs. one, because i hate bugs. haaaaaate. two, because i don't feel all that strongly about other living things. i believe, honestly, that if god didn't want us to eat cows, cows would have better evasive maneuvers.

these rolly pollies, though. man. they're killing me.

an open letter to the people who post videos on YouTube

dear people of YouTube,

it's eleven pm. with the help of my trusty iPhone (Batman to my Robin, Holmes to my Watson), i decide that i want to watch justin timerlake and andy samberg sing about porking each other's moms. here's a list of things i don't want to watch:

1. a montage of still images from the video. especially a montage of still images set to the music of an entirely different song.

2. the lyrics to the song in pink San Serif font on a black background

3. you singing the song into your webcam

4. you playing the song on your piano

5. you dancing to the song

6. you cat licking its cat balls while the song plays in the background

7. you and your bro wearing salvation army blouses acting the song out, even though this one is deeply hilarious in a "laughing at you" sorta way

it's not that i don't think you, the people of YouTube, are deeply creative stories to tell. okay, i don't think that. but that's because you're not proving your worth. sew your own techinicolor dreamcoat and let go of JT's coattails.

the smart machines are coming to kill us

first, i'll start with a little ancedote about a fiction writing class i took lo so many years ago when i was a university undergrad. my professor told the class she wasn't interested in reading any sci-fi stories, because they "weren't real." yes, i thought to myself, unlike other genres of fiction...which are also lies.

anyhoo....



there are a couple of things i've learned from the exceeding unreal science fiction genre. firstly, the smart machines are coming to kill us. secondly, and more tenuously, our only hope is some messianic combination of 65% keanu reeves, 35% christian bale. we are so screwed.

admitedly, me and my unnamed professor were kinda, sorta on the same page, until one fateful day last year. i was driving with my friend leslie (not her real name) in south korea. leslie is married to a very nice (she herself being very nice) south korean, and owns her very own land of the morning car.

said car had one of those GPS do-dads that finds the best route from A to B. and, when you take a wrong turn, the car immediately calibrates a new route to get you to B, via X and Q. the problem, it turned out, was that very nice leslie would turn on the GPS do-dad and promptly ignore its helpful ass for about 37 miles. and every time she would ignore a gadget-recommended merge or left turn, the do-dad would find a new path to our destination (which was pedicures -- woe upon the human who stands between me and a pedicure. mama will cut a bitch).

leslie kept going the wrong way, and every time the gadget would find us a new route, she would ignore it. about the ninth time this happened i had an epiphany: THIS IS WHY THE MACHINES ARE GOING TO KILL US. think about it. the machines know the shortest possible path between pancakes (mmm.....pancakes) and pedicures (oh, nail care, you sweet sweet whore). we just have to listen and obey. but, no! she just kept challenging the machine's superior knowledge. you can't make up your own recipe for pancakes, just cuz! you'd end up with eggy asscakes. with extra salsa!

the GPS knew best! and it just wanted to help us! magic nails closes at 6, for the love of all that is good and holy! just do what the GPS wants, for god's sake!!

but no. two hours later the nail place was closed. no pedicures that day. when confronted with humans, and their fickle, fickle free will, what choice do the machines have? we're practically begging for it.

the holey cow

there are two absolute truths about the holey cow, which you should know from the outset. first, every person in any way affiliated with mississippi state university, or even the city of starkville, has heard of the holey cow, to say nothing of having personally gotten up in that mess. secondly, no one from outside the region believes for even one second that you are not making that shit up. seriously, they say, you are making that shit up.

the holey cow lives at the vet school on the campus of mississppi state university. and, just in case you hadn't gathered, the holey cow is exactly what it sounds like: a cow with a hole in it. you can see the cud!

every year in grade school, we would take a field trip to the msu vet school. there would be face painting, and bunnies, and soft serve in the cafeteria. even if your parents never let you have ice cream (jo durst!!) the highlight was still the holey cow. yes, from the tender age of six, i have known what digestion looks like. and honestly, it doesn't look that gross. but the smell!

i am assuming, but have not verified, that the cow in the photo is not the same cow from my youth. i imagine every few years some lucky cow wins the crappiest lottery outside of a high school fiction anthology (shirley jackson!!) and gets fitted with a gut portal. although, maybe, gut portals are the secret to bovine immortality, and that mother is thirty some odd years old.

my awesome niece, her awesome parents, the not-so-awesome american health care system

that is my wonderful niece, river amelia, who loves to dance and eat cookies. at the tender age of two she has already learned the vital life lesson: "oh, no! no crayon a mommy's boob!"

river is staying with me and my folks for the next few days while mommy and her non-crayoned boob have gallbladder surgery.

okay, so i mostly live in asia. where everyone has health insurance, provided by the government, and going to the doctor costs five bucks. seven if you need antibiotics. a friend has a fairly serious operation, requiring about a week's hospitalization for about five grand. hell, i got emergecy care on a sunday in cambodia for twenty bucks, mostly cuz the doctor pegged me for an easy mark. and this isn't some crappy, substandard, "oops, now you're barren!" third-world care. i got sick in cambodia. i went to the doctor. he gave me some pills, i gave him twenty bucks. a week later i was pudgy again.

i'm not really sure why people seem to think it's not the government's job to keep its citizens healthy. i'm sure glenn beck has some very valid points which i'm just ignoring. perhaps you'd like to explain it to me. i'd rather you didn't, but, you know, whatev.

i'm no policy wonk, and i don't even have some googled statistics to back up my ancedotes. i'm just mad. the mother of my niece is sick. the hospital has treated her horribly because she and my brother don't have thirty grand laying around. it makes me mad.

seeming obvious life lessons i, nonetheless, had to learn the hard way

if you're thirsty, and you have to pee, pee first

a butcher knife is in no way a boon to opening the gallon of milk

don't wear lipstick to the dentist

quitting my job (OR...i am a judgemental bitch)

last week i gave my notice at the daycare where i've been working these past few months. no one at the daycare knows i've spent the last seven years living overseas teaching english. i'm not sure what, exactly, they think about my life. because basically i am a 31 year-old who lives with her parents and likes walking everywhere. to me, this is easier than explaining about taiwan and south korea. and that's not even the judgementally bitchy part. just you wait.

when i gave my notice, someone asked if i was moving to new orleans to be with the boy i'm kinda, sorta dating. and, because it seemed easier, i said, "yes. i sure am!"

okay, tristan, you're thinking, that just makes you a liar. and sad. maybe i need a hobbie, or to get out more. touche, blog readers. well played.

no, my reason for this falsehood is my belief that the people i work with are equally likely to be able to locate new orleans and south korea on a map. meaning: not likely at all.

blogging

it had been suggested to me by a friend of mine that i start a blog. i used to have a blog, and then i quit. because i am lazy. very, very lazy. my HBO-inspired fantasy of becoming a recon marine would fail. and boldly.

since nothing overly interesting has happened to me in a while, i thought i might start this blog with an ancedote from my storied past. i like to call it: the time i thought sangria didn't make me hung over. years ago, in college, i went to a day of the dead party. (as jackie o, complete with pillbox hat. i looked fab-u-lous.) there was sangria at this party, and i drank about an entire punch bowl of it all on my lonesome. the next morning i woke up with nary a trace of a hangover, much to my delight. "i feel awesome," i thought to myself. "i feel so awesome, and not at all hungover, that i am going for a jog!" i laced up my trainers, stretched, bounded down the stairs, and jogged myself directly into a tree. full-on, face-to-bark contact. because i was still drunk.

three hours later i got hungover. and then i was sad.