Hallonelyween

We had 3 trick-or-treaters. 4 if you count the Track Town Pizza guy -- I tipped him in KitKats and Skittles. I thought it was our house-reputation (high turnover of drug addicts and college guys), but there's nary a child on the street for any of the houses. Feckin' ... we used to run out of candy when we were on Jackson.

This 'hood blows.

ween

I'm channeling this message through my Earth contact, l'il hateful.

My name is Varuka Beauvoir-Töricht, late wife of Philip Töricht and heiress to the riches of Madame Beauvoir. Last Saturday I was compelled to attend a dinner party with a group of people I would never been seen with socially ... with the exception perhaps of my husband (poor inept Lippie) and my playboy cousin, Winthrop (the ladies call him Teddy).


It was bad enough sitting at the table with an accountant, the gardener and my late mother's boyfriend, but then to discover that everyone had a secret past! The night just spiraled down like a nightmare.

To think! The cordial Henry Griffin who wooed my dear, elderly mother was an escapee from Alcatraz with a shark tooth tattoo advertising his past!


And Frannie O'Dowdy, mother's trusted housekeeper


was a Las Vegas harlot named Nina!

And that personal assistant, stealing from mother with the help of Mr. Cohen, a communist who pretended to be Jewish, but was really an insane evangelical preacher!

Poor Lippie standing there and not even paying attention, but it didn't matter to him, because poor, inept, hopeless Lippie was the murderer! This is what happens when you don't see your husband for 2 years (and the whole time he's really married to the personal assistant ...).

Darlings, they were all guilty...

Bitter. Isn't. Pretty.

The Best of Eugene edition of the Weekly hit the streets on Thursday, and I got around to reading it today (after drinking, working, pounding out that stupit paper for the 5th time) and they had a Best Blogs section. Who knew?

The winners? Oh yeah --- NOT ME. And that's all you need to know .... but I'll list them anyway:
Mr. Random's Blog of Randomness -- I like his radio show, so ... okay ... maybe he can be thrown a bone n' stuff.
Jeffrey Morgenthaler
The Crema

Here's the Weekly's justification for shutting out l'il hateful, Archival Clothing and other, better, cooler, supremer, super bestest blogs:
Blogs are cool, no matter what you haters say. In Eugene, these blogs are coolest: Mr. Random retains the top spot with his Blog of Randomness, which mostly relates to music one way or the other but also talks about things like Random's vacation from MySpace and his appreciation of LOLcats (oh, we approve!); Jeffrey Morgenthaler comes in second with his fantastic guide to all things bar- and drink-related, which offers recipes for food and cocktails, recommended reading and some lovely photography; and the Wandering Goat staff's The Crema picks up third with their group blog, low on text but full of funky pictures and links.

Yeah, "full of funky pictures" of goats and some junk about how someone stole their sign. pffft ... whatever dude.

Customer comment of the day:

I brought a 25 pk of Maxell CD-RWs today, and can't open the container. Any suggestions?

Yeah, people get on the internet to ask me these things. You'd think they needed a crash helmet just to get through everyday life, but somehow they still manage to use a computer.

in my email this morning

[l'il hateful], Pala is thankful to be open for business.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank the firefighters and their support personnel for all their hard work in keeping Pala guests and Team Members safe.


Who says God doesn't look out for the gambler?

Better throw them in the wat-tah

A co-worker asked me with concern if my family was in one of the fire areas of Southern California. pfft, there's no nature in Huntington Beach -- except for the beach, of course, and you can't burn sand. If there was a tract house fire they'd be in trouble, but there's hardly enough brush at the junior high school across the street to raise any concern.

Although mom is sneezing a lot.

But it made me think of that nutty idea that people have of Southern California being all Los Angeles. Even San Diego! "How close is that to Malibu?" And it's not as though they're idiots or don't know geography; there's just this outsider view of Southern California that puts everything in the same general location. I'm kind of guilty of it too, sure. When people ask where I'm from I say Los Angeles, but it's usually because it's easier than saying Huntington Beach -- and I did live in Los Angeles for a long time, so it counts in a way. If I say Huntington Beach I always have to answer the second question "How close is that to Los Angeles?" People don't say "Oh, you live in Eugene. How close is that to Portland?" Although my brother asked me that once, but it involved directions and a rental car.

Speaking of, I guess the brother wasn't kidding. He really did close down the blog. Why why why?

And speaking of speaking of: Mr. Bascomb, tell me your house isn't on fire. You're in nice, safe tract housing, right? Tell me you're not living in the Qualcomm Stadium ... although if they let you have nachos for dinner, I guess it can't be too bad.

KIMI'S KING OF THE WORLD

http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/071022/2/vv2r.html

Did I mention that I have a piece of his fire suit ...

Yeahbut and Costello

Today I was late to work. It's my own fault. I was goofin' on the moxibustion and lost track of time and then there was some crazy accident that busted a power pole and kept me from stopping at Dutch Brothers on the way, so I had to stop at the Shell Station (which worked out because I had a hankerin' for Pringles after watching them get made on "How It's Made" last night) and while I was spilling their non-dairy creamer I overheard this conversation:

"... and I told him that I was trying to go to classes, but I also had to work, and then I've been sick and I made an appointment to go to the doctor, but I had these things and I don't know what they are, but I couldn't focus on classes and I didn't get to work and now he says he's going to fire me!"

Response:
"You don't just disappear for 3 days without telling anyone. You could find a phone."

Right back:
"But I won't have my cell back until next week and I knew I was in trouble already, so I didn't call."

When I was a kid, every time we started up on this kind of story, my pop would chop it at word #2. "I want to hear reasons, not excuses!" He used to mock it when we would start it with "Yeah, but--" "Yeahbut and Costello. Yeahbut and Costello. I don't want to hear any Yeahbutt and Costello."

I walked into work late, punched in late, stayed late to make up for it, and went on with my life.

Thank you, dad.

Я огорченн, Польша

It wasn't the material that tore up poor Bob Kubica. It was a fecking pokey thing in our fecking dryer in this fecking house that is now fecking leaking from the fecking rain.

On a lighter note: cousin/roommate fixed the heater vent to the upstairs YAYYYYYYY!

Still ... how bitter am I? Poor Bob ...

хорошее везение, sucker

My friends recently went over to the former Iron Curtain (and that Germany place for some schnitzengruben) and all they brought me was this REALLY GREAT Robert Kubica shirt.

I loves the Kubica and his battling caterpillar eyebrows. So I put the shirt on and then took it off, because I wanted to save it for the Brazil race, but then I put it on again because my day had been so shitty ... but then I took it off again because it was made from this nutty European polyester which tends to suck in every (I'm sorry to have to tell you all this) weird daily odor from your body and make you smell like someone on the Metro on a hot Thursday afternoon in August.

So I washed it.

Did I know that a triangle with an X through it meant no machine washing? Maybe not ... but the square with the circle in it and the X through that ... okay, yeah, maybe that should have been a clue. I had every intention to photo the shirt for the blog, but then I didn't because it's not really soooooooooooo bad except for the parts where the material frayed on the ... well, most of the areas of the shirt, really, so then I thought pictures tell a story better than I can, but then the camera wasn't charged, but then I have a camera phone ...

But then again, I have no idea how to use it.

lust, caution

Today's Daily Emerald Headline:

News: Giving from the heart

A $74.5 million gift from philanthropist Lorry Lokey, the largest donation to academics in the University's history, was announced Tuesday by President Frohnmayer

Things I would do if I had $74.5 million laying around:
- eat asparagus for dinner every night
- go to every Formula 1 race and gamble in Monaco
- go to the good movie theaters instead of the sticky-foot
- maybe finish school ... ... maybe
- buy fresh fish
- fly my lear jet up to Nova Scotia to see the total eclipse of the Sun

I'm just not sure that I'd give it to the University. Maybe that makes me a selfish jerk, I don't know. But I think I'd rather blow it on slot machines with mom than throw it at what's supposed to be a state-funded school. Unless it means that they finally fix the tampon machines in the student union and the Journalism building. I'd donate enough for that. Every single one of them is broken. You want to know how I know? You don't want to know how I know, but know that I know. They appear to work in the library, but since that's owned by Nike it's the least they can do -- since the books are all pre-1960. Today I was passing the shelves and found a copy of West Point Guidelines from 1911. Thank God that's available somewhere.

howdy pardners!

So, yeah, working at this school shite is stressful. A girl needs to take breaks. As part of the break plan, the cousin/roommate and I have been using Netflix to its fullest potential. This weekend we watched "Westworld", and select - choice - episodes of "Starsky & Hutch" and "Miami Vice".

And since I'm feeling analytical and investigative, I started to notice patterns ... sure, the robots were only in "Westworld" ... but they all have these partner things going on, particularly the TV shows.

http://www.ccwriter.org www.allposters.com

Good looking WASP-ish cop gets the girls and the dramatic stories (Hutch is turned into a junky, the woman he loves is a prostitute who gets killed after hitting Sylvia Sydney; Crockett's cover is blown by Frank Zappa, the woman he sleeps with is an Interpol mole), while the darker guys get the goofy supporting crap to do. Starsky has girls, sure, and so does Rico ... I think ... maybe in a couple of episodes anyway, but they're not the glamorous ones with the iffy past or the ones that turn the plot. Of course Starsky and Rico get to discover the real story on the girls because they've got to protect their partner. Fahhhhh Hutch couldn't even cover Starsky in that street fight and Crockett ... well, he did climb up that bridge and save the day, but the cost ... ohhhhhhh the emotional cost.

But this is what made "Westworld" so truly wonderful -- good looking partner doesn't save the day. The hero is dark, nebbish Richard Benjamin, the guy that wants a vodka martini at the cowboy bar. That reminds me, I need to put "Love at First Bite" on the Netflix queue.

www.movieactors.com

I whinge therefore I am

So, yeah, yesterday sucked. I've been working up the nerve to call people to interview for my stupit paper in stupit Journalism and I finally get hold of the guy that's central to my story and he tells me he doesn't have time to talk to me ("are you a student?") and that I need to read everything he has to say in another newspaper.

Then I get to class and my profile topic is shot-down.

I nearly cried in front of the GTF. That's bad.

I was seriously considering dropping the Journalism class because I just don't have the time to do all the stuff that needs to be done. I'm really, really behind and it's making me super manic. I was able to save the profile today, but I'm still kicking up dust on the issue article because no one will friggin' talk to me. But, while yesterday I was feeling bad and low low low, today I'm thinking that I'm going to just have to push the limits, starting with the guy that turned down my interview. I've decided to hound him until he answers at least 2 really big questions, and then I'll lay off ... a little. Just 2 questions, and maybe some follow-up, but Monday and Tuesday I'm going to beat walk door-to-door downtown and find someone, anyone, that will talk to me about this issue. Dammit, man, I hate cold-calling, but I really can't stand failure.

And it helped to have a martini last night at The Moxie. I'm going back there Monday night to get them to chat me up for the article ... and maybe have another martini.

Definitely have another martini

It's been a really bad day

"Freedom, Sancho, is one of the most precious gifts
that heaven has bestowed upon men;
no treasures that the earth holds buried or the sea
conceals can compare with it;
for freedom, as for honour, life may and should be ventured;
and on the other hand, captivity is the greatest evil
that can fall to the lot of man."
- Miguel de Cervantes
Don Quixote, Part II, Chapter LVIII

My Name is Nobody

The cousin/roommate has been transferring my grandfather's biography tapes to CD over the past few weeks, so every now and then when I pass by his room I hear things like "And so I told that fella ... that he could take his job ... and shove it up his ass."

Grandpa was a sailor.

So, last night, while driving out to Costco we were playing one in the car, and he's talking about his days in the Brooklyn Naval Yard before he sailed on the Indianapolis (side note: yesterday afternoon we heard all about how he saw FDR get a bath - ! - grandpa spied him through a neighboring porthole while FDR was on board ship), and he's going on about painting with enamel and some long story about not obeying orders but how it didn't mean anything but that he knew this guy Randall was out to get him but he would never disobey orders again except for that time he didn't ask for permission to leave the ship when he was walking his family down after a visit and he had to come back and the officer of the deck, who didn't want to dress him down in front of his parents, told him to ask for permission to come and go because that's the way they do it in the Navy and he saluted the officer and saluted the flag and then went back down to his parents to tell him how he had gotten in trouble, thereby dressing himself down in front of his parents...

You get it. They're old man stories ("So I tied an onion on my belt, because it was the style at the time"), but with some gems.

One of those gems is the story of Phyllis Petrucelli. Her father didn't like that Luigi, that sailor, so they had to meet on the sly in Jersey and because they walked in the shadows a rumor started that she was pregnant. Now ... Grandpa wasn't a simple man. He was a naive man, in a simple way, and he doesn't quite explain the connection between walking in the shadows and splitting up when they came to the neighborhood (so no one would know they were together) with her being pregnant. And it doesn't seem to be connected with being in the shadows as much as when they separated at the neighborhood -- he knew that hiding their relationship would get them into this kind of trouble ... ? So everyone said they had to get married -- even though she wasn't pregnant -- but just before he shipped out he got drunk at a party and told a friend that he couldn't get married before he shipped out because he was "just too drunk."

So if he hadn't gotten drunk and had married Phyllis in Jersey City (or if an ulcer hadn't kept him out of the war and off of the Indianapolis when it went down), there's a really good chance that I wouldn't be here.

Fascinating.

Student (cell phone) Comment of the Day

"That's cool n' stuff. You can be all about me or whatever."

posting to please my friend Jeff

Up late doing what? Doing what? Picking a flipping ring tone for my phone, that's what.

I wanted it to be something that I liked, but could stand to listen to every time it rang. Aerosmith's Sweet Emotion would fill category A, but I know by call #4 I'd be kicking myself for loading it at $2.50 a pop -- man! that's how they stick it to you. That and the games. Why why why? Sony only charges $.99 and you get the whole song! Virgin is most unfair. And they don't have "Love is Like Oxygen" by Sweet, so what's the point?

Anyway, now that I have a phone I can set up interviews with the mayor of Eugene or one of the dozens of oddly scented folk who people our downtown plaza. Do I care about the outcome of Ballot Measure 20-134? Only in so far as it will rate me a decent grade in J203. Does that make me a bad citizen? Probably. I was actually verbally kicked at last night during the town hall meeting when I dared to raise my hand as "undecided" during the straw poll. Feck me! I'm a journalist, man! I don't take sides. But that's not the Eugene way. Four of us were undecided and I think the 3 others were legitimate members of the press. We're objective, right? No bias, blah blah blah ....

Or I just don't care, which is kind of the same thing.

student comment of the day

"I did really good on my paper."

I suspect not.

once was lost, but now I'm Found

This was the Found.com item of the day and it pleased me:


I feel the same way. I was sooooooo different as a freshman.

To the brother -- you know, you don't have to write every day, and who gives a flip what you say in your blog ... apart from those people who, you know, take you to court n' stuff, but even then, come onnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn.

Never give up.
Never surrender!