media update: September

Asterisks denote something I particularly enjoyed or found especially worthy of my time; your mileage may vary.


FICTION


1. Something Blue by Emily Giffin: The sequel to Something Borrowed, as told from bitchy Darcy's point of view. She redeems herself somewhat by the end, but I still don't like her.

2. Star Struck by Pamela Anderson: Why? Why do I subject myself to utter trash like this? I hated myself in the morning.

3. Transgressions: An anthology of novellas by several acclaimed authors, the best of which are "Corn Maiden" by Joyce Carol Oates, about a teenage girl who kidnaps a younger one, and "The Things They Left Behind" by Stephen King, about a man who suddenly finds remnants from 9/11 in his apartment.

Read so far this year: 46


NON-FICTION


1. Confessions of a Video Vixen by Karrine Steffans: Say cheeeeeese!

2. My Friend Leonard* by James Frey: I have my doubts as to the veracity of some of the events Frey writes about, but this story of his continued recovery and the titular friend who helps him get back on his feet after rehab is still compelling stuff; I cried my freakin' ass off more than once.

3. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Football Like A Pro by Joe Thiesmann: Apparently I need The Utter Fucking Moron's Guide to Understanding Football, because I remain somewhat clueless.

4. Killed: Great Journalism Too Hot to Print: Articles and essays that were squelched by various magazines and newspapers for being too controversial. After reading this, I will never buy from The Body Shop again; allegedly, their many infractions include bullying competitors out of business, treating their employees like shit, promising indigenous people the world and delivering diddly squat, and selling bath and body products that occasionally contain such high levels of bacteria that one chemist said it was like "washing your hair with toilet bowl water".

5. Porn Generation: How Social Liberalism Is Corrupting Our Future by Ben Shapiro: The sluts and the porn stars and the homosexshuls are coming to get us oh noes!!!1!!

6. Between Good and Evil: A Master Profiler's Hunt for Society's Most Violent Predators by Roger L. Depue: Yeah, um...not a great book to read before bed.

7. Pornified by Pamela Paul: A much less hysterical, much less judgmental version of #5; I actually agreed with quite a few of her arguments against pornography, although I still remain a hardcore pervert at heart.

Read so far this year: 42


MANGA/GRAPHIC NOVELS


1. From Eroica with Love by Aoike Yasuko

2. Ice Haven* by Daniel Clowes

3. Love Monster vol. 6 by Riko Miyagi

4. Swan* vol. 2 by Ariyoshi Kyoko

5. Buddha: Deer Park by Osamu Tezuka

6. Bambi and Her Pink Gun by Atsushi Kaneko

7. Just a Girl vol. 2 by Tomoko Taniguchi

8. Death Note vols. 6-9 by Ohba Tsugumi and Obata Takeshi

9. Become a Flower by Riko Miyagi

10. Itadakimasu* vols. 1-3 by Yoshihara Yuki

11. Loved One* vols. 1-2 by Yoshihara Yuki


Read so far this year: 93


MOVIES


1. The Transporter 2*: Nobody will ever replace Jet Li as my beloved martial arts icon of choice, but Jason Statham comes damn close. Improbable, with a flimsy plot, but insanely entertaining. (And on the unbelievably off chance that Jason Statham is reading this: Sir, I will let you touch my boobies as much as you want.)

2. The Ring 2: Not as good or as scary as the original, but it wasn't the steaming pile of dung I had been led to believe it would be either. (But those CGI deer? Oy!)

3. The 40-Year-Old Virgin*: One of the few consistently funny movies I've seen in a long time, and surprisingly sweet too. "Ohhhhhhhhh Kelly Clarkson!"

4. Maria Full of Grace*: Powerful, haunting film about a young Colombian woman who becomes a drug mule.

5. Broken Flowers*: If you're looking for a tidy resolution, you won't find it in this Jim Jarmusch gem about a man (Bill Murray) who sets out to find the author of an anonymous letter from a woman who claims he has a son he's never met. What you will find are a beautifully nuanced performance by Bill Murray and a bittersweet screenplay.

Seen so far this year: 34


ALBUM OF THE MONTH


Demento: The original soundtrack to the game known as Haunting Ground in the US, featuring chilling ambient tracks as well as cool remixes like "Precious Hewie (Neverland Mix)", which combines Hewie's plaintive whine with a sample from "Thriller".

no such thing as a (good) free lunch

My department is having a banner year financially, and after we made over $600,000 in one day (yes, count ‘em, five zeroes), we received word from the head honchos that they were treating us to lunch. Being both a serious grazer and completely broke, this was welcome news indeed.

Until I heard that the food was coming from a place I shall call Crapstone Bakery.

Well, I figured maybe they wouldn’t disappoint me this time, and at least they have good desserts…the highlight of which is their marble cheesecake squares.

Mmmm…marble cheesecake squares…luscious little bites of cheesecake, veined with chocolate and resting on a delectable cookie crumb crust…my salivary glands went into overdrive at the thought.

So noon rolled around, and I regarded the sandwich trays with sheer horror. Pumpernickel bread! VEGETABLE MATTER. Anemic-looking cheeses sprawled across glistening pink meats of indeterminate origin. And, worst of all, every single sandwich was spread with Satan’s semen, the horrific condiment better known as mayonnaise.

I grabbed a can of Coke and frantically surveyed the table for the dessert trays.

Where the frell were my damn dessert trays?

I went up to my boss and asked “Hey, T, where are the dessert trays?”

“Oh, desserts were $50 extra, so we didn’t get them,” he replied.

Um…

Er…

Let me get this straight. We can make SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS for these fuckers in ONE DAY, and they won’t shell out fifty friggin’ bucks for a couple of dessert trays?

Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

she don't use jelly (no more)

9:24AM.

Ravenous.

I went to the printer to pick up some arbitration decisions, and I noticed that someone had brought in a plastic orange pumpkin filled to the brim with Halloween candy. A sign taped to the pumpkin said "Please help yourself!"

Well, who am I to question the plastic pumpkin?

My fingers, already twitching in anticipation of the sugar buzz, reached inside and began sifting through the candy in hopes of finding a treasured Tootsie Roll or four. No such luck. I decided to supplement my handful of bite-size Milky Ways with a Reese's peanut butter cup, and I had just extricated my hand when

"BOO!!"

"Kyaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!" I shrieked, flinging the candy into the air.

My boss burst into laughter, clutching his sides. "Jeez, I'm sorry! You okay?"

"Don't kill her, I need her to photocopy for me!" Helga bellowed from the end of the aisle.

Memo to self: lay off sugar. Lay off caffeine for good measure.

---

11:02AM.

Sugar buzz gone.

Already hungry, I guiltily slunk into the break room, where a grease-stained box of Krispy Kremes left over from a meeting sat on the counter, beckoning me. I grabbed one and returned to my cube, where I devoured the treat in two bites and got back to work. I had been at it for about five minutes when I had to take a whiz, so I stood up, putting my hands on the side of the chair.

Stickiness...what?

I looked down at my hand, where something that looked for all the world like a blood clot was stuck to my pinky.

"I'm bleeding," I whispered. "I have ebola, and I'm going to crap out my own guts like a zombie in a Fulci film."

I looked down at my skirt, decorated with similar blobs.

Death smells like...strawberries?

Tentatively, I raised my hand to my nose and took a whiff.

Apparently, while I was eating the donut, jelly pooped out the other side and onto my chair and lap.

Lovely.

Shout wipes activate!

lewd awakening

Yesterday, I went to the mailbox and was astounded to find unimaginable pornography nestled among the flyers and bills. Quickly, I looked around to make sure no one was looking, and then---with no small amount of shame---I rolled it up and tucked it under my shoulder.

“Anything interesting?” K asked when I came inside.

“Not…not really,” I mumbled, hoping she wouldn’t notice what I was trying so desperately to conceal. I scurried to my room and began flipping through the glossy pages.

It’s almost beyond description, what I saw there. Spread shots revealing glistening centers. A “beef log”, as the juvenile description put it, lasciviously displayed. Adjectives like “sweet”, “spicy”, “delicious”, and “irresistible” pandered to the reader’s basest instincts.

I’m only human. I was unable to look away. To my horror, I found myself physically reacting to it. I salivated like Pavlov’s dogs, wanting to bite and suck and nibble and lick. I wanted to dip my tongue into creamy centers. I wanted to take that “beef log” (oh, such a crude name for a beautiful thing!) and devour it. I wanted to have my way with each and every one of them, stopping only when I was so overwhelmed with pleasure that even the tiniest bit more would cause me to explode.

Damn you, Swiss Colony. Damn you and your Christmas catalog to hell!

neti entertain you

I overheard someone in the break room talking about neti pots, and I shuddered involuntarily as I remembered a horrific incident from my past.

See, when I lived in Crackwood, I had horrible allergies...no doubt due to the mold on the bathroom ceiling and meth residue in the carpets from the previous tenants. My friend Chuck, a crunchy-granola type, recommended that I get a neti pot, which is a tiny ceramic pot with a long spout. You fill it with warm saltwater, tip your head back, and pour the liquid into your nose. "I swear to god, you'll feel a hundred times better!" he insisted.

So I went to a local health food store and purchased a neti pot, and then, being a big fan of irony, I got a hamburger kiddie meal from Carl's Jr. After I got home, I ate and then decided it was time to try out my new toy. I filled it with warm saltwater as instructed, and toddled to the bathroom sink to try it out. Tilting my head to the right like the RCA dog, I gently inserted the spout into my left nostril and began pouring. Instantly, water began streaming out of my right nostril into the sink. The sensation was not unlike snorting a snoutful of sea water. I coughed a couple of times and then tilted my head to the left to repeat the process.

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of looking in the mirror and saw myself in pajamas and mismatched hair clips, with my head tilted to the side and water gushing from my nose. I began laughing, which caused the saltwater to start going down my gullet.

This led to choking.

Choking led to swallowing saltwater.

Swallowing saltwater led to vomiting profusely…and let me tell you, if there’s anything that tastes AND smells worse than a regurgitated Carl’s Jr. Happy Star hamburger with extra pickles, french fries, a Coke, and about five gallons of snot-filtered saltwater, I really, really, REALLY don’t want to know what it is.

But did it work? Well, I didn’t notice any difference last night, and this morning, I actually seemed stuffier than usual. But to my perverse fascination, when I blew my nose, a small, hard, brown clump of some unidentifiable substance popped out. I don’t know if it was a clot of pollen and allergens that had bonded together like some nasty pearl, or petrified boogers; for all I know, it was a piece of last night’s hamburger.

Again, I really, really, REALLY don’t want to know.

Really.

quotes for, like, the century

Denis Leary: "God. 'I'm just not happy, I'm just not happy! I'm just not happy because my life didn't turn out the way I thought it would.' Hey! Join the fucking club, okay? I thought I was going to be the starting center fielder for the Boston Red Sox. Life sucks, get a fucking helmet, all right? 'I'm not happy, I'm not happy.' Nobody's happy, okay? Happiness comes in small doses, folks. It's a cigarette, or a chocolate cookie, or a five-second orgasm. That's it! You cum, you eat the cookie, you smoke the butt, you go to sleep, you get up in the morning and you fucking go to work! That is it! End of fucking list! "

---

From The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon: "I do not like strangers because I do not like people I have never met before. It takes me a long time to get used to people I do not know. I just watch them until I know that they are safe. Then I don't mind if I am in the same room as them and don't have to watch them all the time."

thinkin' about my doorbell

When you gonna ring it, when you gonna ring it?

Dizzam. I love the White Stripes, but that is the most persistent earworm ever.

Oh, and Christ on a cracker, this week’s episode of “Rescue Me” was just a Russian nesting doll of brutality and tragedy. I love the show, but man…more shirtless shots of Franco and snide banter, less lesbian domestic violence and fewer dead children and slit throats, please.

But on a much cheerier note, ponies! Icelandic ponies, to be exact:





Again, I must direct you to gaze upon that magnificent beast and its Farrah-like mane! I love horses (though not in the same way as that poor dead pervert in Enumclaw, Washington), and I can’t wait for the sunrise horseback lava tour.

Five quirks I have:

QUIRK NUMERO UNO: I have to eat all of one item before continuing to the next, and I’ll usually save the entrée for last.

QUIRK #2, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO: When a song I like comes on, I’ll point at the radio.

LE TROISIEME QUIRK: If I’m walking with someone and we’re separated momentarily by someone coming in the opposite direction, a lightpole, or whatnot, I have to say or think “Bread and butter”. I have absolutely no idea how or why this quirk came about.

FOUR ON THE FLOOR: I will always look at the clock at exactly 3:33PM (or AM, if I happen to be up). I don’t even try to do it; it just happens.

HAPPY QUIRK 5 GO GO!: When I go to Borders and select my ginormous stack of magazines to read, I have to read them in alphabetical order.

Uh…yeah. Rereading my quirks, I think it’s safe to say that I’m more than a little OCD.

And rereading this whole entry, I retract the “poor” adjective referring to the dead dude in Enumclaw. I hate to sound unsympathetic and all, but if you let a horse screw you in the ass, I find it a little hard to feel sorry for you when you, like, die. Did you learn NOTHING from Catherine the Great?