Overheard at Work

"So, what was wrong with people in the eighties? This isn't music. . . . It must be Reagan's fault."

--Jeff the cook, in reference to some crappy Flock-of-Seagulls-esque eighties song playing on the radio

Fireworks

The Day after Thanksgiving is a fine day to set off fireworks. Or so think the people that live in the apartments down the street.

Alone

Everyone is gone for Thanksgiving Break. Now, it's just me and Cody (Stellar's cat). I'm taking care of him for while Stellar and her roommate, Nic-O-Bob, are gone for the break.

Update: Cody and I have been chillin' most of the day, hanging out watching TV, and attacking my hand. Well, Cody attacks my hand, I attack his face with my hand.

He was kind of a spaz when I first visited this morning. He just kept running in an out of the living room, then when I fed him, he would take a couple bites and then come to me and purr and then go back. I think I'm going to spend the night with him, so he doesn't spaz out again tomorrow morning.

Formal

My fraternity's formal dance/dinner is coming up in less than two weeks. There's nothing more fun than getting dressed up and getting drunk.

More Like Student Death Center

I went to the Student Health Center today looking for someone to heal my aching swollen throat and they turned me away. Apparently even on "walk-in" days you have to have an appointment.

I would be all for nationalizing health care, like Canada, but I'm afraid that it would end up like the "health care" at my university: Less-skilled physicians and more patients clogging up the system (I've got a papercut; I'll go to the hospital. Because, hey, why not? It's free!).

The Porter and the Stone of Andor

Julian found a magic stone, but he did not realize it at the time because, of course, it looked just like any other stone. It was a small, flat, and smooth oval about half the size of Julian’s six-year-old fist, and had a black stripe down the middle on both sides, dividing the stone into two nearly equal hemispheres. After flipping it over in his hand several times closely inspecting it, Julian smiled and put the stone in his pocket, along with the other rocks he had found in the dried-up creek bed: the one shaped like a heart, the dark blue one, and the one that looked like a quarter made out of granite.

* * *

Somewhere deep in the woods, miles away from Julian, something stirred. The birds flew off from their perches high in the trees, some abandoning their nests. A rabbit froze for a moment and scurried off into the underbrush. Two squirrels stopped their chattering and fled. In a circle seven feet across worms struggled to evacuate the ground.

As if time had been sped up, the grass on this spot began to wither and turn brown. The ground dried up and turned dusty grey. A tree standing halfway inside the circle began to turn black from the trunk up. Its mid-summer green leaves quickly turned autumn red and brittle and fell off their branches.

Something evil was awake.

Read on -->

Hell

"Hell is a Wallace Stevens poem on an autumn afternoon."

--Dr. Monica Barron

It Pains Me

I've had a sore throat for the past few days, and it's really killing me today, so I think I'm finally going to call the Student Health Center.

I think the thing that hurts worse than the pain every time I speak, cough, swallow, yawn, and just sit there, is that it physically hurts to make a sarcastic comment.

Translucent Night

Cameras flash like foghorns
Signaling the approach of two photographers.
They meet in the haze
And take photos of amorphous human figures,
Distant and barely visible in the translucent night.
The two stand in the ambient fog together,
Illuminated by nebulous lamp post light,
Silently reveling in the “bad weather.”

Josh

Stellarmel's dad called me 'Josh' over the weekend.

Bad Day

Today was a bad day for tests. I took a Basic Stats test earlier today that I'm sure I failed, and I just got back an American Nat'l Gov't test that I nearly did fail. I hate Gen. Ed. classes. I should have taken all of them back when I actually cared about college . . . which was never.

Sounds Familiar

Mom Finds Out About Blog

MINNEAPOLIS, MN—In a turn of events the 30-year-old characterized as "horrifying," Kevin Widmar announced Tuesday that his mother Lillian has discovered his weblog.

"Apparently, Mom typed [Widmar's employer] Dean Healthcare into Google along with my name and, lo and behold, PlanetKevin popped up," Widmar said. "I'm so fucked."

Read whole article -->

First Kiss

In those often awkward pre-adolescent years, young people do strange things when learning to cope with their developing bodies, increasingly independent minds, and the pressures of their social environment -- when they must quickly make the transition from child to youth. I am no exception.

I -- we -- regretted it almost before it happened. But when two young friends get it in their heads that they know somthing, something about being in love, something about being lonely, it is hard to change their minds. We pretended it didn't happen, smiling as we passed. But soon our relationship became just smiling and passing, and we eventually stopped talking. And then, it seemed as though she'd vanished from reality.

I've had loves. I've had losses. But I'll never forget my first kiss with my imaginary friend.

The Disillusioned Minister

The Good Book serves to satisfy
The snooping eyes
Of the oft-uninvited deacons' wives
Whose frequent persistence in visiting,
To bring tidings and Tupperware
Brim-full with cookies and gossip,
Heralds more of here-say than heresy.
On the table by the front door,
Being begrudgingly displayed,
The gargantuan tome is
Left out to collect dust
And impress visitors
With visions of pious righteousness.
A thin film of grey
Coates the pages,
Blending the black with the white,
And even the red words of Jesus
Fade.

Shoplifting

"Excuse me, ma'am, may I please look in your purse?"

Elmira looked quizically at the young store clerk. "What? Why do you want to look in my purse?"

"Please, just step back here, ma'am, and hand me your purse," the store clerk gently but sternly insisted. He motioned with his hand and ushered the elderly woman back through the exit door.

"I don't understand this; what is going on?" Elmira asked.

Lowering his voice, the store clerk began, "Please, ma'am . . . ."

"No, don't try to placate me, young man, tell me what it is you want." Elmira's volume grew with her frustration.

The young man looked around and saw the other patrons beginning to glance curiously in his direction. The consternation on his face added twenty years to his youthful appearance. "Let's not make a scene, ma'am. I think there may just be a misunderstanding."

"Who's making a scene? You're making a scene, harassing an old woman," Elmira scolded. Then condescendingly she ordered, "Let me see your manager."

He nervously glanced around the store again and noticed several people staring. "I am the manager." You'd better be right about this, he thought to himself.

This Could Hurt Someone's Feelings

From : ciaran -sakuranoki@lineone.net-
To : "cynicalmcbastard@hotmail.com" -cynicalmcbastard@hotmail.com-
Subject : (no subject)
Date : Thu, 06 Nov 2003 03:04:50 +0000

You, my friend, are a complete and utter CUNT, so why don't you just fuck off.

Animal Rights Activism

If you'd rather see people die than have an "innocent animal" killed, I would like to see what decision you would make when put in a cage alone with a bear and a gun, or put on a desert island with no plants and only one rabbit.

Heat!

Due to copious amounts of whining and an impressive disregard for rules, my fraternity decided to turn on the heat in the house. Not only that, but we replaced the "doors," the flimsy obstructions that once blocked the doorways into our residence with real doors that close all the way and lock! Now it's nice and nearly warm in our uninsulated home.

See, kids, what a negative attitude and liberal amounts of bitching and moaning can accomplish!

I Know I've Said This Before

Pat Freestone cracks my shit up!

November 6, 2003

As a highly advanced race, the Qzzv pride themselves on their understanding of all eighteen dimensions of the universe. They were very surprised to find that our civilization has attempted to create mathematical order out of complex concepts like time, space and gravity. I explained to them, as best I could, Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and the more recent String Theory. They just sort of stared at me, and telepathically suggested that we, as Earthlings, master the more basic concepts like Not Killing Each Other and Not Using the Ocean as a Fucking Toilet before we get to the complicated stuff like How Heavy the Sun Is.

In any case, the Qzzv took pity on me, and explained to me in very simple terms their mathematical formula that solves and explains everything. It is basically this:

a = b

What it comes down to, when you factor it down from the thousands and thousands of pages of calculations from which it is derived, is what we would call:

Same shit, different day.

There you go.

Pat Freestone

The Weatherman Is Predicting the Harshest Winter in 100 Years

As the end of the semester draws ever nearer, I find myself in the library more and more, not because I am studying or writing papers, but because it's a lot warmer in the library than in my unheated house.

My fraternity is really poor (read miserly) and we like to save money any way we can. Several years ago one member came up with the idea to wait until after Thanksgiving break to turn on the heat in the fraternity house. The other brothers liked it so much that they made it a rule and inserted it into the by-laws. So now, despite what temperature it is, despite the apendages that fall off due to frost-bite, we don't turn on the heat until December. This is going to be a long winter.

Ouchies

Canker sores and labret piercings don't mix.

On the Side of the Library Computer on Which I Now Type

Machine Name: PL308013

Serial #: D4WFM11

Truman Tag #: N/A

PC MOdel: Dell Optiplex GX240

[hand-written in pen]
WINNERS GET THEIR HEADS CHOPPED OFF BY NINJA-COMPUTER

Emotion

I don't being sad, lonely, or depressed, but I fucking hate being pissed off.