SAMHAIN!

(She attempted let go the negative energy on this new year's start, and when it remained, she turned to revelry and carved a pumpkin... a drunk one.)

Woohoo.

-Begin Non Sequitur Prophecy-

In the future, an expanded understanding of olfactory senses and molecular decay will have a profound impact on whether or not we choose to leave our toothbrushes sitting in the open air of the bathroom.

Just you watch.

-End Non Sequitur Prophecy-

400 miles away, California burns.
The smoke reached us in the night and left its red tongue to coat the shadows, the sun, and the disquieting haze. There are colors you rarely get to see in the sky. But there's an orange sliver crawling up our wall, because 400 miles away, California burns.

Happy 19th birthday Becky!
As far as little sisters go, you're not such a bad one.
[Cue After-school Special cheeseball smirk.]

Three things to be thankful about this year:

• 19 is a great age, because it means now you can... hm... yeah... okay nevermind.


• Hairstyles have improved dramatically since your 1984 debut.


• I could have given the world any number of far scarier pictures, but much to my dismay, I'm an increasingly nice sibling.

I am off work for three and one half days. Oh, oh, listen to that sound...

I am fantastically under-represented in the big scheme of things.

That doesn't mean a thing.

What I wouldn't give for just one moment of absolute honesty.
What I would not give.

I’m now the proud owner of a bookmark, handmade of leather string and beads, for just $1.50… on clearance. It’s ever so dutifully guarding the last place my eyes started to burn. I’ve never really been a big supporter of bookmarks, per se. I mean, I’d drag out stickers that say, “You’re all sheep” and “Read banned books” and “I Voted!,” and those always performed just fine. But there was something about this particular bookmark… No, there was something about this particular bookmark vendor.

She had to have been eight, ten, twelve (I’ve never been good at guessing ages), slouched on the stone bench at the entrance to the library. As we walked up, I could see her adjusting a row of long strings. I thought she was waiting for someone to pick her up with her art project or something. But instead she pulled a, “Would you like to buy a bookmark?” on us. My gut reaction to any time a person begins a sentence with, “Would you like to buy…” is, and predictably was at the time, “No thanks.” And as she didn’t go any further with it, I thought, “Okay good.”

Tony slipped through the library doors, and I took a seat outside opposite the girl to wait for him. A woman in black pumps walked briskly by.

“Would you like to buy a bookmark?” the ten year-old tossed up to her.
“No.” Not even a “No thanks,” and she clunked her way into the parking lot.

A hefty blonde with a little boy shuffled past.

“Would you like to buy a bookmark?”
“Oh, no thanks, dear.”

And another. And another. The fourth didn’t even take the time to say “no.” At least give the kid the time of day, I thought, scowling from behind my hair. The rejections were getting to even me, and yet, with every passerby, she’d sing her steadfast refrain with the same conviction as when she’d first said it to me. Unwaivered. Undeterred. She was like one of those puppies at the pound who wag their tails at every leering human that passes them by.

“What’s a girl gotta do to get enough money to buy a water?” she said, maybe to me, maybe to herself, from across the paved path, tacking a sigh onto the question’s tail.

I still have no idea what she meant.

“A water?” I asked, with a bit of obvious pity and disbelief in my voice.

“Yeah, well,” she answered, by not answering. “They were originally $2.00, but I had to make them $1.50 because no one was buying them.” She straightened the eight beaded strings sitting next to her and then lifted a small carnation to her nose.

This is far too much pathos for a Saturday, I thought.

Tony reemerged from the doors. At the same time, another middle aged woman passed between the girl and me. The same question. Another no.

“Ahem,” Tony prompted oh-so-subtly. Somehow he had maneuvered his way past me to the edge of the parking lot without my even seeing, a man-sized Speedy Gonzales. But then, I was paying more attention to the girl. “Do we plan on leaving any time soon?”

“Yeah, yeah, just a second,” I said. I fumbled my wallet from my lap, and walked across the path.

“How much did you say they were?”

“$1.50,” she said, happily swinging her feet against the stone bench.

I handed her a bill and fished out two quarters. “The blue one looks nice,” I said with a smile.

She lifted it gingerly and picked up a book that was laying at her side to demonstrate to me that “if you put it just here, it will never slide out.” She guaranteed it, grinning from ear to ear.

No, I’ve never really seen the point of manufactured bookmarks. Just about anything will do the job. But then, the bookmark wasn’t the point when I bought it. That little girl is going to stick to the walls of my brain like chewing gum to stomach lining. And I’m hoping she will, because I’ve never seen a thing so admirable, so… something I wanted myself to be…

Who knows? Maybe this is just the bookmark I’ve needed.

Yes, the RIAA would like to see you chained to the walls of Britney Spears' basement for even thinking of not vomiting money into the AOL-Time-Warner-Disney orgy. But I'm here to tell you, people, that there is still hope. Even in a time when even Oscar contenders can't prematurely strut their proverbial stuff and 12 year-olds and grandmothers live in constant fear of music, there are still those out there who believe that humanity deserves better - that art and knowledge and all the wonders and defeats of human creativity should belong to everyone. Yes, everyone.

It may be hard to believe in this age of the commercial internet of eBay and Amazon, but open source databases and internet libraries still exist. In fact, they may be more important than ever. I was surprised to stumble across Archive.org, for instance, and discover that, yes, all of that information and media - it's free for the taking. Sites like this are more than places to research 10th grade term papers, they're the last bastion of open discourse and free goodness the web has to offer (the burgeoning blog boom excluded, of course). They may, in fact, if I can venture a cliche, be the internet's last hope in the fight between good and evil.

With all that jibber jabber in mind, take a look at these beacons of pedagogical hope in an otherwise buy-buy-buy internet world:

• The Internet Archive
  In particular, check out the Prelinger Archives section. Remember those good old "educational" films you sat through in first grade as you swung your feet impatiently beneath your desk? Well, they're back, in digital form, and even weirder than you remember.
  
• Internet Public Library
  
• Opsound
  An experiment in open collaboration with sound.
  
• OpenPhoto
  
• Creative Commons

"Pure... Liquid.. Fear..."

Thanks to Thomas, I now know exactly why I've always hated Kool Aid.

"It was my weakness,
turned us into angry magi."

Rose Polenzani - Shake Through To Ugly

The presence of chinese takeout makes an open refrigerator 12 to 14 times more inviting. I know, I've measured the invitation vs repulsion factor, and chinese food makes it go through the roof. Like a cat on meth. I also know because at this very moment I have a tantalizing array of little green boxes gracing the top shelf of my fridge - a mini art gallery of culinary brilliance, if you will.

You may be asking, "Why the hell do we need to know this, Jenny?"
And my answer might be something like, "My life's been the mother of all borefests lately, an inert tribute to the gods of ennui, so maybe you should just give me a break when something as simple as chinese food can make me happy. Okay? Yeah, I thought so."

"I have this problem," she whispered.

Looking up from behind his hair, he answered, "We all do."

And her smile gave her away. "Maybe you know what I mean."

"I think I have that problem too."

Deep Dark Confession time:

When I was six or seven, I talked to the johnny-jump-ups and clover on the side of our house. At times, my memories of those bright fall days spent with the green and dirt are cleaner and more shining than the countless times I've been with you and you and you.

At times, I'd give it all to return to the easy relationships of a seven year-old.

Some days, all you want to do is give up.
Give in.
Concede.

I realize, you say, that there's nothing real here. I realize, you know, that nothing will change.

And while you're giving up and giving in, it hits you that you never had a chance at all.

She spat it back at him with an inedible mix of determination and regret. Thirty seconds and counting.

"And that's that," she repeated, wiping her hands clean with an invisible towel. "No more words. No more decisions. Just... no more."

For just a moment, he seemed unfazed. And in that moment, her universe collapsed.

I dreamt last night that New York overthrew the government.
A man in jackboots came to tell us the news.
Now it's 7:10AM, and I have to leave for work.

Only roosters rowing a canoe across my path could make this day complete.

We've done it. The American people (or at least the Californian portion) have proven themselves incapable of handling the job of responsible elections of government representatives.

Arnold Schwarzenegger is a governor.
Go ahead. Say it again.
Unnatural, isn't it?

This recent failure of the populace to make a simple decision casts a bleak light on any hopes of ousting boy wonder Bush come November of next year. Exit polls showed that voters that opted to oust Davis did so in response to specific issues: budget deficits, energy, the licensing of illegals immigrants, etc. And yet, more than half of the same people who demanded that these issues be addressed by a new governor elected a man who never specifically outlined his position on any of them.

His campaign, like every one of his movies, tripped all over itself to be full of flash and light on substance. And the people fell for it.

My conclusion: Americans are too stupid to handle representative government.
No, no, I take that back. Not all Americans - just the ones that voted for Arnold Freaking Schwarzenegger.

At this rate, Bushie could bomb Iowa and probably still be reelected. I can see it now.

Fox News correspondent: "Yes, Jim. The Bush Administration has uncovered intelligence that suggests that Iowa was developing biochemical weapons and have taken appropriate action to stop this train of evil in its tracks."
Fox News anchor: "And so the delivery of a nuclear warhead to the center of Des Moines has been justified by the White House?"
Fox News correspondent: "That's correct, Jim. And this reporter thinks that we can safely say the remainder of the United States can breathe easier knowing Iowa is no longer a threat."

When you can inspire a love letter like this, you don't need anything else.

"I love you. If you broke up with me, I would be creepy. I would stalk you.
And I would cry in the bushes and bang on the door and circle your house late at night. Several circles.
That's not a threat. Just the truth.
You are wonderful."

This morning I'd like to dispel a myth.

All Canadians are not smiling, "eh"-chucking, paragons of politeness.

Quite the contrary. Every Canadian I've had the nonpleasure of meeting at work has gone out of their way to be rude, even mean, as though they were actively seeking to crush my naive American hope of seeing firsthand the bounty of Canada's niceness. I'm here to tell you, fellow citizens, that our neighbors to the North are not all neighborly.

In fact (she said with a finger shooting into the air as reinforcement), I believe that the facade is a clever ruse. Oh yes, my friends. We are being duped. Bamboozled. Hornswoggled even! They'll come at noon, when we least expect them, tiptoeing over the border with their hockey sticks and abnormally potent beer. And when, at the last second, we see them coming, we'll wave and say to one another, "Oh look, honey, it's a group of those nice nice Canadians . Let's see if we can get them to say 'aboot.'" And then BAM! Down goes America!

Okay, ...so, that's not going to happen... any time soon.
Canadians don't all love hockey, and they don't all swill beer nonstop. And they aren't, much to my dismay, all polite. I just wish the ones that tour my part of the globe were.

No... I'm not intentionally turning this into a "I did this today" blog. Keep your fingers crossed for something intelligent in the near future. In the meantime...
Yes... another personal update.

For those concerned about the drunk penguin household:
We are recovering from the flu, surely and certainly, and are nearing 95% health. Rampant still is the damn annoying cough that neither of us can shake. Jack (AKA EnormoCat) is kittycough free.

And for those about to rock:
We salute you.
School Of Rock is a fun fun movie. Who wants to take me to a concert?

Oh, and I worked 9.5 hours today as I tiptoed along the crevasse of pneumonia.
I'm exhausted and nearly insane.

Thank you. Drive through.

The phone rang impatiently. Ring. Ring ring. Ring ring ring. You could practically hear the nervous tapping of a pencil on the other end of the wire.

I have a very useful talent of ignoring the chatter of phones. Your average Joe/Jane/Bob feels a need, deep down in their belly, to respond reflexively to that high-pitched whine. It's like a baby's cry they itch to squelch. And for this reason, they will always be slaves.

I, on the other hand, am free - to ignore the bastard phones at will. Ring all you want. No one will hear you. Or... at least I won't.

Why, might you ask, am I rambling about phones at this momentous turning point in our galaxy's history?
Because at work, they RING and RING and RING RING RING, and I have to be right there to say, "Hello blah blah blah." With a smile (she added growling). And at home, that's the last thing I want to hear.

If you call me and no one answers, don't take it personally. I'm just enacting my sacred right to not perform work on my time off.

Maybe you should just email me instead.

You know what sounds good right about now?

Maybe if you could reach down my throat and yank the insides out... With a high-powered hose, spray down every flu-infected inch... Throw some soap in there... Maybe some crushed vitamins for good measure... Kick this virus' ass into next Tuesday.

Ahhh. That sounds nice.
God I hate being sick.

In 5,000 years, when they uncover the ruins of LA and dig into the remains of New York, they'll hold aloft a billboard chunk and shout up, "Here! The face of our ancestors!" And from the charred decay of a paper print ad, the glassy eyes of a swimsuit model will sparkle with the lie that we always were.

I've got this itch, you see. It's one of those just-beneath-the-skin annoyances that you can't scratch hard enough, and when you do, you're left red raw.

I've got this feeling. That you're under there, with your sticks and your leaves, dancing around like you own the place.

But I'll cut you out
when I have to.

If only to rest my twitching fingers.