June 13, 2006
I'm a tard.
I have effed this blog up beyond all recognition. Must repair ... might load new software!
Posted by eek at 12:14 AM | Comments (0)
June 09, 2006
... but enough about me.
Now that my pesky little party is out of the way, it's time to check out what the cool kids are into this weekend:
Tonight, you can catch everyone's favorite redhead, Brigid Kaelin, with full band at Air Devils Inn at 10pm. Tyrone Cotton duo joins her
Then, the adorable Darcy Thompson joins DJ Suki at The Jazz Factory for a set of Klingon bubblegum pop, Samoan psychedelia, Turkish bluegrass, Nashville gamelan, and Russian pedophile ballads. 11pm - 1am; drinks at happy hour prices.
Afterwards, roll up a few blocks for DJ Chad Krauss spinning a mix of glam/punk/etc at Third Street Dive (428 S. 3rd St.) - come for the moustache, stay for the songs. 10 pm-4am
Whew. Tired yet? But wait, there's more!
Saturday night finds the boys in Dallas Alice over at Wick's on the wide, wide Dixie Highway. Come grab a slice of the South End! They have a new album that rocks (stay tuned for details tomorrow in my Record Release Roundup). Also, they would very much like to give you a light. Ask about the matchbooks!
If you're not completely worn out by Sunday, and not busy helping a certain Canadian celebrate his birthday with the metric system and loonies, Sean Hopkins, Nate Thumas (both of Dallas Alice), and Sebastian Clark go all solo acoustic at ADI around 9 pm.
Posted by eek at 03:29 PM | Comments (0)
Friends are good!
Wednesday night's launch party for The One-Hit Wonders was fab! I am completely honored and humbled that so many lovely people came out to play with me - I am the luckiest girl in town to have such wonderful friends. The boys at Third Street Dive were fabulous hosts - the music (Clash et al) was perfect, the drinks were flowing and so many folks braved apocalyptic weather conditions and a nearby Executive Redneck concert to grab a copy of the book and celebrate. Sean even brought his mustache! Apparently, I have very bad handwriting, so if you cannot decipher the inscription in your book, feel free to send me an approximate rendering and I will translate into English. Ms Hellion tells me that I "write like Keith Richards talks." How appropriate.
Photos of the evening:
Alan, Beth, Eden and Marcy at the merch table
Mitchell hides and reads at the bar
Lovely and talented: John Whitaker and Beth Newberry
Katy Yocom and the Jolly Roger
Posted by eek at 01:15 PM | Comments (0)
June 06, 2006
Take a mix, leave a mix (part 1)
Starter cd for the Take a Mix, Leave a Mix tray:
Folks, this is a great mix, if I do say so myself. Humility is not my strong suit. Some nights, your mixing fingers just make a little magic. If you come to The One-Hit Wonders launch party tomorrow night, you might end up leaving a mix cd and picking up the following cd that flows quite seamlessly from track to track:
Rough Trade / Stiff Little Fingers
Train from Kansas City / Superchunk
He's So Fine / The Angels
Fever / Little Willie John
Hound Dog / Big Mama Thornton
Big Black Mariah / Tom Waits
22 Hours of Darkness / Ike Reilly Assasination
Tony Adams / Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros
The Infanta / The Decemberists
Oh! / Sleater-Kinney
Ça plane pour moi / Plastic Bertrand
Little Girls / Oingo Boingo**
Damaged Goods / Gang Of Four
Wolves, Lower / R.E.M.
Let the Cool Goddess Rust Away / Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
The Girls Want To Be With The Girls / Talking Heads
Friendship Update / The Go! Team
**pour QIR
Posted by eek at 11:42 PM | Comments (0)
Mrs. Cissell doesn't live here.
I swear to Andrew McCarthy, if one more fucking social invitation comes to my house addressed to any of the following people:
• Erin Cissell
• Mrs. Jason Cissell
or for any of the following events to which I am inevitably invited and yet, inexplicably, the Cissell is not:
• baby showers
• wedding showers
I am going to scream.
Who in the fuck is Mrs. Jason Cissell?!
It is one thing when stupid fundraising types ring us and ask for Mrs. Cissell. I can calmly state that she's not here. It's true. Jason's grandmother (whom I think of as the Real Mrs. Cissell) is usually nowhere to be found around here, and it saves me the trouble of asking the Policeman Association (scary!) to take me off their fundraising list. Yes, I'm nonconfrontational like that.
However.
I've been with Jason for over nine years. Don't you think his extended family can learn my goddamned name? I can indulge the Greatest Generation - it did take my grandfather a few months (and sometimes I think he forgets) to realize that I didn't change my name just because I got married. This is the year of Our Andrew McCarthy TWO THOUSAND AND SIX. Women don't just go and change their names as a matter of course, but it's ok if his 80-year-old grandmother missed that bulletin. It really isn't OK, though, when the cousins who are our peers, age-wise, just can't be bothered to learn my name. In fact, it really pisses me off. These are educated folks here, equipped with all modern address bookish technology. There is no excuse.
I've planned a wedding - sure, it's a lot of work. But I remember chasing down friends to get the spelling right of the person they planned on bringing to include those guests by name on the invitation because that is just what you do to be a gracious host, you address the goddamn invitation to its rightful recipient(s). I sure as hell knew the last names of actual partners. Don't get me started on the baby shower I through for my brother and sister-in-law and the double-checking I did of people's names and whatnot - I barely knew any of those people and still managed to get most of it right.
In this day and age, you just don't address a grown-ass woman by her husband's name, I mean what in the fuck, am I stuck in a Margaret Atwood novel? I thought my mother's generation took care of this social detail for us? Don't even start with the etiquette books - the first rule of etiquette is to avoid making people feel uncomfortable. And when I already feel squicked out by the invitations to gift-giving events where my sole purpose is to represent my husband OH MY GOD did I just even type that?! then why alienate me further by sending an invitation allegedly to me but in fact to a totally fictional person? It just makes it easier for me to ignore invitations to all manners of showers. But weddings? If I'm available, I would like to attend. And I would appreciate being invited under my actual name. It's not like I just showed up on the scene ... I've been around for almost ten years!
My name is Erin Keane and darling, I simply must decline.
Posted by eek at 05:30 PM | Comments (0)
New service...
Sorry if you found the site down tonight, I've been switching my hosting service. Now to fix the corruption in the templates so I can actually make changes to the layout... one thing at a time.
Posted by eek at 01:26 AM | Comments (0)
June 04, 2006
Xciting.
So I caught the new X-Men movie on Friday. Let me just say right now that I never read the X-Men comics, so I don't know much about the characters or their various plotlines and relations, just what they showed in the first movie (haven't seen part deux). While I can parse Batman and Green Lantern authenticity with the geekiest of the geeks, all I want from the X-Men movies is a 90-minute action-fest with some decent character development. I liked the first movie. I have no axe to grind, because my Xpectations are quite low.
For those of you who haven't seen it, the movie basically takes place between two locations, Hogwarts and Endor. Hogwarts has less whimsy but better sim-war, and Endor lacks Ewoks (unless, of course, you count the Frasier Fur, who couldn't just be a wolfman, he had to be a bluewolfman. Have they ever established why these mutations are so random? Why one dude turns into the Frasier Blue and another the Birdman of Alcatraz? You know, on second thought, don't tell me. I don't have room in my brain for yet another section of useless comix knowledge) but seems to have gained a throng of gothed-out Braveheard re-enactors. Then there's a bit with a bald kid and the Golden Gate Bridge, but whatever, the Crazy Bitch Express come to town!
Despite the fact that Storm finally went and got herself a cape, she still can't hold a candle to the resurrected Crazy Bitch. Another classic case of the dude taking the Actual Crazy Lady over the sensible schoolteacher. Even though you can't take her home to Hogwarts for Thanksgiving and the only humane thing to do is stab her with your retractable wolf claws or something before she drags you all down in her borderline self- and other-directed destruction. Doesn't matter that the nice schoolteacher is Halle Berry. All she can do is make it rain and shit. Fancy cape aside. On a good day, she might command a tornado. Crazy Lady can destroy the universe and kill her laah-vurrs with a single thought. You lose, Halle, no contest.
Speaking of killing laaah-vurrs, just who in the hell's the chippie going after Rogue's man? I sense a bald-headed snatching coming her way. Rogue wants to get all cured so she can sex up BrrrBobby, but he's making time with some utterly forgettable Disney ingenue behind her back. Touch her, Rogue! Do the "you got a little something" move and just wipe that little speck from the corner of her ice-skating back-stabbing mouth ... orrrrr, let her have Chilly Willie and take up with Wolverine and his muttonchops like we all know you want to. Because if there's anything that can take a guy's mind off his deranged girlfriend he just had to mercykill, it's a chick who can destroy him with a single bare-fingered touch.
And that, Reader, is a Friday night at the movies.
Posted by eek at 10:33 PM | Comments (0)
May 18, 2006
My So-Called Life.
I just saw two members of the Bottle Rockets de-tourbussing downtown on my walk back from the post office. Were they staring at me to see if I recognized them? I did but the barest back-glance. The light was red, what else would I look at? The highlight of my day, sadly.
Posted by eek at 01:06 PM | Comments (0)
May 17, 2006
All we need is just a little patience.
Switching services and it might take a day or two to get sorted. Might result in whole new blog system, might not. Thanks for waiting!
Posted by eek at 03:09 PM | Comments (0)
She called herself the human trampoline.
Updated update: so now my blog is broken? iPowerWeb SUCKS. My database is always screwed up. I am switching this account to GoDaddy post-haste.
Update: I think the email situation is resolved. If you emailed me at my sensilla account and it bounced back to you, try again now. Thanks!
Posted by eek at 09:58 AM | Comments (0)
May 16, 2006
Her claddagh ring was pointed at the people.
Some odd thoughts from today:
I have a new Not at Work rule. Along with crying, lying about your entire identity, and leaving poop bombs outside of the financial offices during times of organizational distress, you mustn't hum loudly in the communal office toilet stall. Simply avoid this habit, if you're inclined to vocalize (jauntily, I might add!) during elimination. There are others in the restroom, and we are cringing, because you are making us wonder what you're so darn breezy about.
I voted in our state primary today. At my polling place? The two loudest poll workers had the same speech impediment. Sadly, their discussion of Verleen who had recently retired sounded more like an indictment of the old girl's cognitive skills. Though I am usually an informed voter, I cannot be held responsible for the constabulary race. We have a constable? Am I in a Washington Irving story?
Queen of the Damned is on the cable right now. I feel like I'm trapped in a Hot Topic breakroom. I say this as someone who's read more Anne Rice novels than she should admit in polite company, but wow, this is the bad kind of camp. Which, I guess, means it's not even camp. It's just terrible. Lots of swishy vampires sassing each other, which in and of itself can be kind of hot if they'd just gum each other once in a while, but the tacky Korn soundtrack plus Aaliyah (I know she's dead! don't email me!) plus the freshman auteur effects equal I can't believe someone made a movie about a vampire's one-off rock concert. I mean a vampire's desire to be a real person again. Stuart Townsend gave us that much authenticity at least. This might be the worst movie ever made. Ooh, Aaaaliyaaah is writhing. Oh SWEET GOD she just ripped some dopey mesh-shirted vampire's heart out of his chest cavity!! I take it back, this movie is fucking AWESOME. And Aayaayayaleejahh's clothes! I dreamt I set the undead on fire wearing my steel-plated Maidenform bra!
Tomorrow night's Top Chef better be something else to top this. I'm talking Harold Dieterle in a mesh shirt, drinking the blood of twinkie pastry chefs.
Posted by eek at 05:38 PM | Comments (0)
May 15, 2006
Kid, you're gonna be large!
I finally threw myself a website. Update your bookmarks!
I should have the first copies of my chapbook soon. Look for details on the release party...!
Posted by eek at 05:40 PM | Comments (0)
May 12, 2006
Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that.
Apparently, this Saturday, May 13, if you rise and shine early (like 8am), and come to the Cinderblock Gallery (931 E. Main in Louisville), you will find yourself at a "hipster yard sale."
Reader, I am there. I've noticed that my hipster collection is looking a little worn these days, and I'm hoping to score some real finds. For example, I could definitely use a skinny-jeaned flat-ass PBR swiller to stand on my front porch, warning all who enter that my scene is so over (bonus points for '70s aviator shades). I am reasonably sure that I can find one for less than a dollar, so I might get two. They can argue over desert island Guided By Voices b-sides while stenciling my sidewalk. Just don't let them inside, or I'll have to bait my steel-jaw traps with rare Pumas and ski jackets.
I hear there'll be a whole crate of fired Pitchfork writers, three for a buck!
If you get there before me and find a collectible discontinued hipster, like maybe Adam Brody or that guy from the Strokes, will you grab it for me? I'll owe you a quarter, thanks!
update: Speaking of hipsters, adorable Matt Anthony has finally updated his blog. There's nothing hipper than singing '70s pimps.
Posted by eek at 01:23 PM | Comments (0)
May 07, 2006
On Harold, Derby, and New Orleans.
So I still have a job. Wooo! Or, um, a slightly less than enthusiastic wooo!, since they put my scheduled salary parity situation on el holdo for the forseeable future, yet I'm not supposed to complain since I still have a job I mean dang, you know?
So what does Louisville do when we're not thinking about being hung out to dry? Over Derby Week, the answer is: Get Drunk. I have had the beers at the brand-spanking new Third Street Dive (cute and happy owners Steve and Kenny, great BBC beers on tap, nice ambience), at the Red Lounge, at Air Devils Inn and Jenicca's (cute-ass downtown wine bar) at Brigid and Nate's party, and finally at Cafe Lou Lou (amidst many seersuckered doofuses and their attendant womens) and Beth's apartment.
All hail the Derby drunk! Today, at Brigid and Nate's party, I placed my first ad hoc bet on a horse, well, like, ever. I bet one dollar to win on AP Warrior. I bet you're thinking that we Kentuckians know a helluva lot about handicapping these here horse races. Why, we just totally depend on the mint in our celebratory juleps for our daily RDA of vitamin A! The truth is we don't know an exacta from a perfecta, or whatever, and those $1,000 juleps are just $75 silver cups full of Woodford and ice from the Arctic Circle (you believe that if you need to).
You know how it is. Of course I lost my Derby bet, but I thought I had a chance based on its name. AP Warrior sounded like the hardest-core journalist horsey, though he ended up at #18. In my perfect scenario, AP Warrior is checking his sources and filing a story with the Associated Press while the bugle dork blows the call to the post and our guy misses the scene because he's busy tearing off his geek glasses and revealing his sexy self to the long-suffering smart-mouthed ingenue.
Over Cafe Lou Lou's Derby night eats, I found out that a couple we know socially also loves to visit New Orleans, and I'm even more excited about heading back to the French Quarter this fall. My stylist just returned with tales of a healthy and vibrant Quarter, and though I know my tourist dollars won't exactly bring a town in crisis back from the brink, I do want to do what I can do, which means drinking lots of cocktails with the off-duty service kids at Molly's on Toulouse, and engaging in other vacationy shenangians.
What does this have to do with Harold Dieterle of Top Chef fame? Nothing, except that folks keep stopping in to say "hi" and I am ever more convinced that Harold will take the whole competition, no contest. I'd love to chat with Harold over a flight of good bourbons, but I'll settle for him not wearing a totally ugly sweater on the reunion show come this Wednesday. It's kinda humiliating to be so into a reality program, but I've decided to take it in stride. TEAM HAROLD!
Posted by eek at 01:47 AM | Comments (0)
May 01, 2006
This/that.
I might lose my job today.
I might not.
Let's go to work and find out, shall we?
*cues trolley music*
update: still employed. friends packing offices. sucky day.
Posted by eek at 07:56 AM | Comments (0)
April 26, 2006
Copy/paste.
Who in the hell gives a 17-year-old a book deal, anyway?
Compare/contrast the original with the rip-off. (PDF)
Posted by eek at 06:22 PM | Comments (0)
April 25, 2006
The week in EEK!
Poems written: 1
Basic Algebra questions answered correctly: 14
Restorative phone calls with Very Good Friends: 2
Close encounters with celebrities: 1
Close encounters with celebrities, once removed, details relayed: 1
Mango salsa / lemongrass coconut shrimp wontons made: 24
Parties attended: 2
Happy birthdays: 9
Number of miles driven until Nigel hits 50,000: 49
Fireworks shows attended: 0
Fighter jets spotted overhead: 7
Said Tori Amos instead of Tori Spelling in cocktail conversation before being corrected: 4
Considered viability of Tori Amos faux-reality tv show: 5
Muumuus worn: 0
Polydactyl cats wooed: 1
Dollars spent on lawn care: 20 (still owed)
iTunes bill: $15.93 (paid)
Encounters with asshole writers: 4
Beers shared with Kathleen: 2
Vintage Star Trek-inspired dreams: 1
List conventions ripped off of respected periodicals: 1
Posted by eek at 11:22 PM | Comments (0)
April 05, 2006
Too many choices.
I have several things I would like to blog about, but I can't decide which to talk about first. Gah! On a purely superficial note, it's finally spring here in sunny Louisville, and I wore so many different sherbet colors today that it wasn't even funny. I need sandals to show off the first pedicure of the season (the only thing that keeps my talonesque feet from scaring local children), but I do have some new bags that are truly spectacular (some from Paris, some from Yak Pak), and I just don't even know what to write first so I will tell you, Reader, that I discovered a new condiment in Paris, and crème de marrons is absolute sugary vanilla chestnut heaven in a cute little tube.
Posted by eek at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)
April 02, 2006
Twist & Shout.
....let a woman keep up her good looks and she ready to face any emergency.
Every year, usually around late spring/early summer when the tornados start flaring up, I swear I'm going to put together an emergency kit for the house. Have I done this? Oh ho ho, Reader, you know me better than that. Even after the great graduation tornados of Aught Four, I have not packed any large-scale plastic tub full of water purification tabs and flashlights. Tonight we had a nice 80 mph wind to accompany our thunderstorm, and while Beth and I would have been stuck with all the sugary caffeinated drinks we could stand had disaster struck, tonight's deluge does beg the question: what should I stash in our handy dandy (totally theoretical, sadly enough) disaster box?
The above (and completely nutso) link suggests I get some friends together for a Disaster Party (so strangers fuck on my bed and my mother passes out on the front lawn after flashing the neighbors?) and live like there's been a Big Honkin Nature Fuckup for 72 hours, take notes, and tweak your supplies accordingly. Little do these people know what I (and my friends) can comfortably live off of for three days:
corkscrew (x2)
red wine, many (room temps good)
three-gallon drum of Chex™ Mix
crank generator for iPods and speakers
Santos candles, the more lurid the better (light + ad hoc shrine), incense, matches
Lucky magazine Mad Libs, pens
tequila
salt shaker
squeezy lime juice thingie (non-perishable? check on that)
carrier pigeon
camp stove
Ramen in a cup (x infinity)
Cheese Nips (x 12 boxes)
green tea
vitamins
Woodford Reserve (x3)
air mattresses
sleeping bags
toothpaste
earplugs
condoms
Handee-Wipes
I think that covers the basics. What's in your kit?
Posted by eek at 10:45 PM | Comments (0)
You've got your fantasy in my literary fiction.
Check out delightful smartie Gwenda Bond's article, "Fantasy Goes Literary" in the newest Publisher's Weekly.
Topical, and intriguing to me because I'm wondering if the same genre-twisting will start happening in the poetry world. Without ever intending to, really, every now and then I write a piece that's deemed too (imagine me making wiggly fingers) weeeird for many mainstream magazines, which is usually when the dear Mark Rudolph (or other sympathetic friend-editors) snaps it up for one of his publications. It's not like I write lurid vampire sex poems (not that there's anything wrong with that), but I often write persona poems, and it's interesting and rewarding to speak from the perspective of someone a little otherworldly, or someone who has witnessed something very, very strange. Because in my world, there's nothing more boring than poems about writing poetry (gah!), and often that's hyper-realism for serious writers. But wouldn't you rather hear from monster sewer alligators and giant squids? Me too.
Posted by eek at 12:46 PM | Comments (0)
March 15, 2006
A haiku for the velvet Elvis.
Today's reading: a haiku by Basho:
Sad beauty?
the morning glory—
even when it's painted badly
Posted by eek at 01:17 AM | Comments (0)
March 14, 2006
A lovely haiku by Issa.
Don't worry, spiders,
I keep house
casually.
Especially true in my world as JC and I are the most lax housekeepers that ever kept house. How were we ever issued our Adult Merit Badges? I fear the critters we share house with will take over any second, mouseblogging from their secret corners.
Posted by eek at 01:36 AM | Comments (0)
Some readings, if you want to catch up.
I've been terribly remiss at updating the day's Lenten readings, but the Mister vanished into the revolutionary sunset and took the laptop with him. Blogging, let alone writing, at the squatty iMac, is just not as comfortable as writing in my library from the futon with all my books spread out around me. So I am trying to get caught up on my daily Lenten writing (snort!), which is the reason for the daily readings in the first place. I've started to focus on a series of poems about a group of people on an island for a long weekend. May it never see the light of day.
March 10: From Lu Chi's Wen Fu
Calm the heart's dark waters;
collect from deep thoughts
the proper names for things.
March 11: a haiku from Buson
White blossoms of the pear
and a woman in moonlight
reading a letter.
March 12: "Spur of the Moment" by Li Po
Facing wine, I missed night coming on
and falling blossoms filling my robes.
Drunk, I rise and wade the midstream moon,
birds soon gone, and people scarcer still.
March 13: "Together, We All Go Out Under the Cypress Trees in the Chou Family Burial Grounds" by T'ao Ch'ien
Today's skies are perfect for a clear
flute and singing koto. And touched
this deeply by those laid under these
cypress trees, how could we neglect joy?
Clear songs drift away anew. Emerald wine
starts pious faces smiling. Not knowing
what tomorrow brings, it's exquisite
exhausting whatever I feel here and now.
Posted by eek at 12:16 AM | Comments (0)
March 09, 2006
We have our answer.
While definitely representing the best cooking magazine ever, Test Kitchener Christopher Kimball is not any kind of replacement for Twinkie Chef Lieberman or Easy Like Your Mom Chiarello. Simply not hot(t).
Posted by eek at 11:28 AM | Comments (0)
Today's reading: when you're pulled in at least two directions.
A haiku from Buson:
Cover my head
or my feet?
The winter quilt.
Posted by eek at 09:44 AM | Comments (0)
March 08, 2006
A haiku by Issa.
Blossoms at night,
and the faces of people
moved by music.
Posted by eek at 08:30 AM | Comments (0)
March 07, 2006
I didn't even plan it this way, but here's today's reading.
A rather timely haiku by our old buddy Basho:
A cool fall night—
getting dinner, we peeled
eggplants, cucumbers.
Posted by eek at 04:18 PM | Comments (0)
March 06, 2006
Today's reading, etc.
I did get caught up on my Lenten writing yesterday, before noon even! Do know, reader, that I don't get out of bed before noon for free on a normal day. But Saturday night's plans of Brigid and Bryan and rock music and what-have-you were thwarted by a serious case of the I-Might-Barfs, brought on by your favorite arbitrary rule enforcing restaurant and mine, El Mundo. Do Alan and I really need to be chided for mentioning that Jason might show up to join us? Does the "no late joiners" rule apply to dining room as well as patio? Perhaps they can post an off-putting sign? Sigh. I do have crazy hearts for their burritos, or else I'd never go back to the place where your lamp catches on fire and three-quarters of their staff on duty come over to watch, including the waiter who looks like Drama David from The Real World: Seattle. So I had plenty of rest Saturday evening, in which I snuggled on the loveseat watching a marathon of Law & Order: SVU and muttering every thirty minutes or so, "Maybe I'll feel better in a half hour or so." Pathetic!
So here's today's reading, a poem about your friend and mine, Tu Fu, by good ol' Li Po:
Teasing Tu Fu
Here on the summit of Fan-k’o Mountain, it’s Tu Fu
under a midday sun sporting his huge farmer’s hat.
How is it you’ve gotten so thin since we parted?
Must be all those poems you’ve been suffering over.
Posted by eek at 05:08 PM | Comments (0)
March 04, 2006
Today's reading.
by Li Po
Farewell to Yin Shu
We drink deeply beneath dragon bamboo,
our lamp faint, the moon cold again.
On the sandbar, startled by drunken song,
a snowy egret lifts away past midnight.
Posted by eek at 01:36 AM | Comments (0)
March 03, 2006
Today's reading.
A haiku by Issa:
Moon, plum blossoms,
this, that,
and the day goes.
Posted by eek at 08:45 AM | Comments (0)
March 02, 2006
Today's reading.
A haiku by Basho:
The clouds
are giving these moon-watchers
a little break.
Posted by eek at 10:22 AM | Comments (0)
March 01, 2006
This oughta get your work filters to ban me straightaway.
It's come to my attention in the comment section that I am not the only person to be scandalized by the name of a certain horseshoes-esque game enjoyed by the Midwestern family reunion set. Filthy as it sounds, kids, cornhole is actually a beanbag toss game played by people from Ohio and parts thereabouts.
I know! I know! Some people will say "cornhole" with nary a concern for its more common, more scatalogical connotation!
Trust me, they don't think it's funny, either. Well, Terri probably does.
Can you imagine being an officer in the American Cornhole Association?
I am giggling up my sleeve just thinking about it.
Posted by eek at 09:11 PM | Comments (0)
In which I become a Godspell hippie.
So today's Ash Wednesday, and though I did not go to Mass (Sister says it's not a holy day of obligation, plus, um, I don't go to church), I am embarking on a daily discipline for Lent. It seems like a bit of an abrupt Ash Wednesday since I had no Mardi Gras/Fasching blowout last night (save the ginger tofu gorge-a-thon at Vietnam Kitchen), but here I am. I'm not down with the deprivation, but when Beth said she planned on writing daily for Lent, I figured it's no prance in the park with the Jesus hippies, so why not?
Oh, who am I kidding? Certainly not you, Reader. You know it is exactly like throwing daisies into the duckponds while humming "Day By Day" and picking out my New Sincerity Girlfro. And to make matters even more hempy, my daily writing discipline involves reading a poem (or excerpt from larger work) by an old Chinese or Japanese master and writing about it. An hour was the time frame kicked around, but I'm not promising that. I will, however, attempt to stretch out of my comfort zone and think about a different poem every day. We'll see what happens.
Today's reading is a snippet from Lu Chi's Wen Fu, a venerable writing text:
Recognizing order
is like opening
a dam in a river.
Posted by eek at 07:42 PM | Comments (0)
February 25, 2006
Slap a clipboard in my hand and call me Muffy.
True life: I'm on the homecoming committee.
Every May, the Spalding University writing program says welcome home! to its alumni with a weekend of activites that runs concurrently with the academic residency. After attending last year, I saw room for improvement, but the fantastic Spalding staff are so overworked as it is, so I cheerfully volunteered to chair the homecoming activities for Aught Six.
Because I need another project?!
Reader, this is my confession: I like to have a clipboard in my hand and a schedule at these kinds of events. I enjoy making sure everyone's taken care of, that they feel included, have enough to eat, a full drink, and plenty of amusement. I am a hostess. I am a Muffy.
So Dott pointed out to me that I am basically the art school equivalent of a Junior League dork.
Sigh.
I accept my designation with all appropriate shame.
Would you like to sign up for a committee? Paint some signs with me? Make some dinner reservations? Reader, would you please help me strike the perfect balance between informal and comfortingly structured? Will you follow me to the opening reception?
Posted by eek at 04:07 PM | Comments (0)
February 08, 2006
Bentofabulous.
Lest you think I'm in this alone, here's a Flickr tag group of Mister Bento meals from all over. I'm most impressed with the colors in some of these lunches. Also, it makes me realize the lighting in my kitchen is positively sickly. Boo!
Anyway, here are some Mister Bento lunches.
Posted by eek at 12:08 AM | Comments (0)
February 03, 2006
Sod's luck.
The day I give this URL to an editor would have to be the day I have a K-Fed video front and center.
Update: James Lipton on K-Fed, via The Superficial.
Posted by eek at 03:13 PM | Comments (0)
January 31, 2006
Ain't easy, but it's necessary.
Of course the Oscar nominees were announced today, and Pop Culture Psychic No True Bill did well as always with his predictions.
All I can say is, if there's any justice at all in the world, Meryl Streep and Sir Ian McKellen will present the award for Music (Song). And the Oscar will go to Hustle & Flow for "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp."
Jon Stewart's face will be priceless.
Posted by eek at 06:55 PM | Comments (0)
January 27, 2006
Year of the Dog.
We're throwing a Lunar New Year potluck on Sunday. Because I've never organized a potluck and have no idea how to do so, I don't know what anyone else is bringing, really. I kind of like it that way - I don't want to stifle anyone's culinary/shopping creativity by declaring assigned dishes, or even courses. What fun is that?
So what if we end up with five different varieties of egg drop soup? That sounds great to me.
I'm going to make some vegetarian gyoza (filling to be determined through trial & error - you've been warned), a Roll Yer Own spring roll station, and possibly this spicy cucumber salad that's pretty tasty.
Really, this party is all about the party favors. Cute chopsticks! Year of the Dog ornaments! Whee!
Actually, it is less about the ridiculous party favors and more about the pledge I made to myself to engage in more community-building activities, both at home and out in the world. Potluck! It reminds me of camp.
Posted by eek at 10:14 AM | Comments (0)
January 18, 2006
Hot dogs and wine.
Japanalust at Jungle Jim's brings us individual pop-tops of Choya Umeshu plum wine with the green plum (ume) inside. According to the label, Choya will satisfy [my] taste buds to the last drop.
My hot dog penguin slicer doesn't so much work on soy pups (or Smart Dogs, which is what I bought for their no-cholesterol-having, low-fat-sporting properties):
I guess if you squint really hard, you can see the penguin? Gah. And man, nothing makes your hands look freaky like a mutilated soy pup.
Posted by eek at 10:39 PM | Comments (0)
Happy new year.
Our New Year's Eve, for once, featured no bars.
No addicts, no hookers, no late night subway rides, no Mag Bar bathroom filth, no 3 a.m. White Castle run, no hungover trip home the next morning.
How is this possible, you ask?
We went to Shreveport!
Amanda engineered the surprise party to end all surprise parties for The Doc's 30th birthday. Ten of us came in from all over the country to shock the Doc right into his fourth decade.
He seems to be in decent cardiovascular health. Mild, bemused shock registered on his face as he walked into the living room, expecting one person. Instead there are ten.
Carmine says one boy.
Here are ten?!
I had the best time. We ate lots of good food, had some drinks (criminal amount of Woodford Reserve for me on NYE, not to be replicated since), a tour of the Doc's very impressive and totally cute campus, three cute babies, two aloof cats, one insane dog, and lots and lots of laughs.
I did learn that I only have so much time to be a good sport at board games before I become insufferable. There's this game? Called Yell Out the Lyric or something? And I can't believe how loud and proud I was, shouting out a full verse of an INXS song. No, I can't remember which one. Yes, I know all of Kick. Wanna rumble?
I'm fortunate to have such good friends. I had so much fun hanging out with The Doc and Jay and their amazing wives Amanda and Julie. The Doc and Jason are two of my oldest friends. That sounds weird to even type, but it's true. I moved around a lot as a kid and didn't make really good friends until high school. Even though the Doc blames me for making him mean, I'm still hard-pressed to think of a better way to pass a holiday weekend than hanging out with the two of them, wondering when Jay's gonna set something on fire. And their kids are adorable. As a bonus, the Doc and Amanda have fantastic college and grad school friends that we've been lucky enough to see at various gatherings over the years. They never make us feel like we're the non-scientists, which we certainly are. That's really cool.
Photos on my flickr, poke around.
Posted by eek at 10:10 PM | Comments (0)
January 17, 2006
Welcome to the Jungle.
We visited Jungle Jim's last weekend, which, if you didn't know, is the premiere grocery destination of the Midwest. You should know, reader, that Cincinnati is a mostly hateful, ugly steampipe of a town with very few redeeming qualities. But the Jungle does make it an enticing destination.
Jungle Jim's gave me an opportunity to stock up on some items not readily available at my local markets. I grabbed a bottle of Nori Komi Furikake, a tasty seasoning mix of seaweed and sesame seed. Other scores: a jar of lingonberries (for my great-grandmother's Swedish pancake recipe), Dutch stroopwaffel (fantastic confection of syrup-soaked crunchy compressed waffle cookies), some fabulous sudachi ponzu, and some tapioca bubbles that I might use to experiment with bubble tea.
Speaking of culinary fun, I succumbed to Mister Bento accessory cuteness on ebay last week, picking up heart- and flower-shaped onigiri molds (my first experiments with homemade onigiri to follow), Hello Kitty condiment containers, tiny sauce bottles, and a little mold that trims a Soy Pup into a shape that sort of resembles a penguin.
Check it out: Sunshine and Case Files has a Mister Bento, too.
Because I love you, dear reader, here is hot dog sculpture. Just for you.
Posted by eek at 08:30 PM | Comments (0)
January 10, 2006
Alton Brown is kind of a douchebag.
I scored some great knives for Giftmas from my fabulous in-laws and am re-committed to more home cooking. Mister Bento helps - I always want to fill his little containers (dirty!) with tasty homemade lunch items. And thanks to the annual January Bank Balance Blues, we're eating at home more, which is definitely healthier and cheaper than hitting our usual haunts. Our bar tabs alone can hit pretty hard.
So I had an hour tonight, figured I'd check out the Food network to see what people are making. Usually when I flip by the Food network I see either ludicrous travel shows disguised as food shows or one of those Best Of! shows that catalogue things like the ten best wiener stands in America. Or fucking Emeril, who's just creepy. But hey, turns out that 6:30-7:30 is prime Actual Cooking Show time.
Unfortunately, Food Network's cooking shows kinda suck.
OK, maybe some don't. I only watched two tonight. What?
Rachael Ray's shuffle off to Buffalo accent turns my stomach faster than a rancid bottle of EVOO. What the fuck? Why can't she just say olive oil? I like that she's all cheery and accessible, and I guess this makes me a snob, but I don't think anyone with that kind of harsh accent belongs on television. The upstate New York accent is right up there with thick Chicago, nasal St. Louis, and obscure-but-trust-me-terrifying Northern Kentucky - prime target for a voice coach. And she called sandwiches "sammies" today.
Alton Brown gets on my tits, too. The props, the gimmicks, the cheesy fucking jokes, the contrived anal-retentive mannerisms. Why do people swear by this guy? Sound effects chime in after his bad jokes. He's kind of a dweeb. His recipes seem OK, but not really earth-shattering, either. Right now he's waxing orgasmic about latex gloves. Riveting.
When is Sarah Kramer getting her own show? Over the weekend, I made her vegan black bean and sweet potato burritos. Simple and super. The more I make from La Dolce Vegan!, the more I like her style.
On Sunday, Bryan, Brigid and paid a visit to Bien Phuoc, a Vietnamese market down on 3rd Street near my favorite Vietnamese restaurant, Vietnam Kitchen. I'd heard the conventional wisdom that Asian markets tend to be cheaper than conventional supermarkets and I wanted to check it out. Turns out it's true, though the price marking scheme is more than haphazard so it's a bit of a leap of faith. I bought a big pack of gyoza wrappers, smoked mock duck, vegetarian spring rolls, lotus rice balls, a big bottle of Sriracha, and a package of tamarind soup base for $13.23. Nice. Could have done without the slabs of fish staring at me with their little dead eyes - reminded me of an unpleasant former co-worker.
Rice balls for Mister Bento! I have the coolest lunch in the lunchroom. It's no Vegan LunchBox, but then again, who is?
I also made a raspberry coffeecake (not vegan, though, are you nuts?) on Sunday, just because I could. I've been force-feeding my friends all week. Alisha, you're next, I'm bringing some over tomorrow night. Fucking recipe yielded a whole cake's worth, like a CAKE cake. That's more confection than I need hanging around my kitchen.
Posted by eek at 07:02 PM | Comments (0)
January 05, 2006
All tomorrow's parties.
Reminded by Eden, I have to confess: there is no party tomorrow.
We had thought that we might throw a Twelfth Night party this year, but children, I am tired.
After hosting my mom for a week and throwing a fabulous Xmas Eve party, combined with night after night of holiday cocktail parties and whatnot, followed by a long weekend in Louisiana for New Year and the Doc's birthday surprise, I am just all partied out.
And we're out of snacks.
I could be up for something a little less Choctaw Bingo than usual, though. Low-key evening out? Wine bottle potluck?
I'm not being anti-social, I'm just a little wiped out.
Posted by eek at 04:00 PM | Comments (0)
I think comments are fixed.
For now.
I think the underpants gnomes live in my database now.
Little fuckers!
Comment away on recent entries, darlings.
Posted by eek at 10:46 AM | Comments (0)
December 30, 2005
New car on the D-Train.
Congratulations to Dennis and Kira on their new son, Kai! Born yesterday after over 24 hours of labor - way to go, Kira, for sealing the deal.
In honor of the newest Sheridan, I heard a Blue Goat War song on WFPK this morning. Blue Goat War, the best scifi concept band ever, was the Dennis project prior to Follow the Train. If you don't have a Blue Goat War record, you're a sucker! Go pick one up to secure your let's be honest here already-faltering indie cred.
Comments still broken, don't bother. I'll let you know when they're fixed.
Posted by eek at 09:46 AM | Comments (0)
December 29, 2005
Comments are broken.
Don't know why.
Sigh.
Sorry.
When you enter a comment on a post from the last day or so, it doesn't display, it doesn't show up in my admin tools, it goes nowhere, apparently. I tried to add a comment to the Feats of Strength entry and it wiped out all of the previous comments (though they still exist, somewhere, because I can see them in my edit comments list).
I really can't think of what I did here. I'm getting notify emails and I have that turned off. What the fuck?
Posted by eek at 03:08 PM | Comments (0)
December 28, 2005
Rum goggles.
And bourbon, and wine, and I think a beer when we "had to go see about a friend" after our Christmas Eve Cocktails! with Jason and Erin!
Cute post-cracker photos on Flickr.
Posted by eek at 08:04 PM | Comments (0)
Recent adventures with food.
My Mister Bento arrived, finally. Hooray! I packed a lunch today: white miso soup in the soup bowl, couscous with tofu and vegetables in the rice container, sliced bell peppers with tamari and gomasio in one side dish and a couple of shortbread cookies in the other. I love my Mister Bento! In the future, one or two of the side dishes will be used to pack breakfast, not cookies. See the Mister Bento system in all its tidy glory.
When Jason and I were wandering around the Mission last month, waiting to meet up with QIR and friends, I bought a really cool vegan cookbook, La Dolce Vegan! by kickass Canadian cooking chick Sarah Kramer. Now, I'm not about to go vegan. I love my Happy Hen free-range eggs, and I'm a sucker for a nice hunk of Maytag Blue (vomit references aside). But I am going to go pescoveg in Aught Six, and her book looked so enticing and fun. So I figure I will eat less crap cheeze and filler dairy (and honestly, reserving seafood for tasty meals out, because what do I look like, a squid-cooker over here?), and reserve the ovolacto moments for truly worthwhile treats. Like the killer mini-fritatta I made tonight. Yum, man.
So I made my first intentionally vegan recipe for the Office of Communication potluck earlier this month: a red lentil wild rice dish, that you're supposed to bake but I slow-cooked instead. Because I decided to be a grown-up and buy a crockpot. It's shiny like a holiday and looks a little like a rudimentary robot. I'm looking forward to slowly cooking more tasty dishes, mostly vegan, in the months to come. I mean I can eat the hell out of some lentils.
Posted by eek at 07:18 PM | Comments (0)
December 22, 2005
And now, the feats of strength.
Last night I told my mother that when you're raised with at least one immigrant parent, you never hurt for funny stories.
I forgot that retired military grandfathers are good for a laugh, too.
My two-month-old niece was baptized today. She's starting to look like a real person, even. We bought her a Flickr pro account for Christmas, so I'll be showing her off soon.
At lunch after the bilingual sprinkling (Padre had the coolest Greek fishing hat, by the way), I sat across from my 71-year-old grandfather (The Colonel), who, on a good day, makes the Great Santini look like a New Age pussy.
Because none of us can ever be fit enough for him, The Colonel wrangles us into a comparison of gyms vs. home gyms, with gyms (no matter how nice, like our swank Y-Dub) firmly in the "not recommended" column because of completely fabricated criteria like "long lines" and "can't listen to your own music." Usually, I am somewhat skilled in avoiding these absurd diatribes disguised as conversations, but I was off my game today. I haven't seen him in a while, which made me vulnerable, and I confess the pre-lunch Bloody Mary dulled my wits.
So blah blah bench press blah blah glutes and I guess he saw my eyes glaze over because suddenly he upped the ante:
"I beat your stepfather in a weight-lifting match on Thanksgiving."
Right, while we were at St. Dorothy's having a quasi-religious, life-changing experience, my family kicked Festivus off a month early.
I've seen this before. The Colonel has a charming habit of taunting unsuspecting family members into bizarre strength challenges that only he can win. Who in the hell even knows what a Chinese Push-Up even is, much less the official regulation stance? Most people come to holiday parties for a little wine, some crudité, maybe have a go at the annual Christmas photo card of our crazy-eyed third cousins with the homegrown haircuts and mismatched outfits, but a push-up competition?
Apparently, after he beat my stepfather handily at the bench press ("he couldn't even lift a 50!" The Colonel crowed), he moved on to more esoteric feats. Now, I'm not sure exactly what he meant when he said "Russian Sit-Ups," but my research shows me something entirely alarming and not really safe for the middle-aged and elderly.
Listen, good people of Louisville! If The Colonel wanders back up the parkway this weekend and crashes your Christmas party, do not, under any circumstances, look him in the eye if he starts muttering names of muscles and faintly exotic-sounding exercises!
You will regret it.
Posted by eek at 06:55 PM | Comments (0)
December 16, 2005
Toys in the attic.
What in the hell happened to Toys 'R' Us? It's been maybe ten years since I visited Geoffrey's jolly-ass home, but wow, TrU, you've gone downhill.
Of course, only the stupid and loving go to TrU during the Giftmas Season. So which was I today? Let's say loving, but not nearly as stupid as I was last year, when, in pursuit of some Corgi Batmobile diecast model car thingies (that, at the time, were expensive and difficult to find in the States), I walked down Regent Street in London on the evening of December 23 to Hamley's, which, like FAO Schwartz and all wonderful poshy toy stores during the Giftmas season, was a complete and total fuckin madhouse.
I did this because I love my brother. He specifically requested these toys for Giftmas, and he still gets as excited about cool toys as he did when he was a kid. After a revolting trip through the Harrod's toy department came up zilcho, I vowed to find these little models and bring them home to John.
To get to the collectible and model floor, we had to allow the crowd to carry us, slowly, shoulder to shoulder, toward the escalators, then ride up at a crawl, front to ass with every harried parent, grandparent, and pedophile in the United Kingdom.
Plus their kids.
What kind of dumb fuck takes their children to a toy store during December Shopping Rush? My parents never did this, because how could they shop for us in secret when we're tearing around the store, tugging their coats every two seconds whining "MOMMY*gasp*MOMMY*wheeze*MOMMYIWANNAMOMMYIWANNA?" The only thing worse than being in a toy store in December is being there with kids in tow.
The collectible floor was a calming oasis free of crowds and desperation. We had time and room to peruse the various Batmobiles and pick out two, buy them, exchange pleasantries with the clerk, and stomp a small child's foot on the way back downstairs.
So this year, apparently, the fucking little toys have made it to TrU. My dear brother asks for a few more. It's not enough that I did battle with every chavtastic babydaddy in London to find them last year ... now I have to go to TrU?
So I did. With sighs, sure, but I love the guy, so there I was. And man alive, are the floor clerks at TrU unbearably stupid. And the inside of one of those things? I remember TrU being a clean, well-lit, happily-decorated toy emporium. Sure, nothing like FAO Schwartz, but outside of Manhattan, it more than sufficed.
TrU now looks like a bombed-out Big Lots.
The toy selection was paltry, and after drawing pictographs for the drooling clerk, he still couldn't do more than point me to the Hot Wheels section. Which is where, he explained, they kept all of their "small cars." Except for the ten thousand other Hot Wheels displays I saw throughout the store on my way out, because they had no Corgi Batmobiles, dear brother, I'm sorry but it's true.
Though the store was crowded, 9/10ths of the people were already in line at the registers. Since I bought a whole lot of nothing, I sailed by them on a smug child-less cloud, went nextdoor to Whole Paycheck and bought lunch.
Never again. Not at Christmas. Maybe for your birthday, dear brother, if you're really, really nice.
Posted by eek at 03:04 PM | Comments (0)
Y'all come!
Local friends, if you've never been to our house, drop me an "email" and I'll send directions.
Faraway friends, we'll miss you!
Posted by eek at 10:17 AM | Comments (0)
December 13, 2005
Through the eyes of looooooove.
Minnesota is wacky! Behold: 100 years of ice castles.
Posted by eek at 12:11 AM | Comments (0)
December 08, 2005
Happy camper.
I went to camp for Thanksgiving and it changed my life.
I can honestly say that staying at St. Dorothy's Rest was a profound experience.
And I don't have profound experiences.
But there I was, on the couch, warming in front of the real-log fire (started by One-Match Nate), feeling like something inside of me had changed for the better. At first, I thought it was indigestion, but no dice: I definitely wanted to start incorporating the feelings of total calm and happiness I felt at camp into my daily life.
This is a struggle for me, reader, because I am not a calm person. I'm easily excited, easily irritated, and tend to ignore the present to focus very heavily on the future and how and why I am failing myself in that area.
Gloria told me at camp that I have "good energy."
I want to believe her.
Living communally at St. Dorothy's, I realized that I kind of miss living closely with a lot of people. Though it does help that we were fairly spread around the camp — I wouldn't want to cram ten people into my little Germantown house and call it a commune. But there's something powerful about eating together around a table, sharing the cooking and cleaning, and laughing over nonsense with people you like.
I can't have that in my daily life, for good reason. Jason's my only housemate, and for now we'll keep it that way. But I could start having people over to dinner more often.
I was most impressed with the St. Dorothy kitchen Sponge System. I like the certainty of it, the clean line between helpful and anarchy. Our current lifestyle tends to lean more toward household anarchy. Perhaps all we need is a sponge system for our house? It's something to strive for.
What I don't want to turn this experience into is a checklist. I have so many items to check off in a week, and I miss many of them which just makes me feel like a loser. I don't want to feel like that anymore. I want to stop obsessing over everything I'm not doing and just go ahead already and do what I can.
Somehow this became very evident in the quiet and dark of the mountain at night.
I want to feel like I felt there more often.
I might invite you over to dinner soon.
Posted by eek at 05:55 PM | Comments (0)
December 07, 2005
Party monster.
Posted by eek at 11:24 AM | Comments (0)
December 02, 2005
Debbie Downer.
Sorry the site was down today, to anyone who tried to view or email me. Your email most likely bounced. Try again! I'm here!
*waves*
Posted by eek at 04:44 PM | Comments (0)
December 01, 2005
testing stupid rss
ignore
Posted by eek at 05:09 PM | Comments (0)
November 28, 2005
St. Dorothy's spoiled me.
Germantown's noisy! I woke up every two hours last night. Believe me when I say it's so very quiet up the mountain in Camp Meeker ... until the musicians wake up.
Must readjust.
Posted by eek at 08:21 AM | Comments (0)
November 10, 2005
The truth about HarperCollins.
Oh, hell yeah:
To get to our booth, Chloe aggressively stomped up the staircase of Mode, a multi-tiered architectural maze with flashing lights and music so loud it felt like it invaded you, like a virus. Just as everyone in L.A. had to climb the social ladder, Chloe and all the rest of us had to climb three flights of stairs to get to the VIP level at Mode.
Do keep reading Chapter One of Nicole Ritchie's so-dreadful-it's-awesome novel, published by now-confirmed whores at HarperCollins.
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November 03, 2005
P.S.
(I'm not at my computer much this week)
(Will return next week with more to say)
(Leaving you with this, for now)
:
"It’s about the states of consciousness and joy and revelation that can’t be photographed or manufactured. That to me is was art is for. A religious sacred calling, and it was as important as any religious or spiritual belief system. To me art is the religion. The fact that god’s first quality is creation, to me that’s everything. Creativity and the creation of something that didn’t exist before is something ineffable and incredible and unlikely, that you can share with other human beings."
—Genesis P-Orridge (read the whole interview)
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October 29, 2005
Shameless.
Happy birthday to me!
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October 26, 2005
Stop me before I...
... go back to school! The humanities PhD at Louisville is so very tempting. I know and adore the head of the department, and I could do a creative thesis! For a PhD! with an emphasis in Aesthetics and Creativity! Lovely!
Annette says to me the other day: "Do you like ideas?"
And I nod.
She says, "I'll send you a brochure."
Dr. EEK...! has a nice ring to it, hm? Of course I wouldn't think about doing this for a few years, but still ... it's nice to know that it's there. And still ... I might take a French class next year and maybe look at German classes as well...
Posted by eek at 06:33 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 25, 2005
Babies come with hats.
Why is it so damn bright in here?!
I, too, get cranky when it's cold and bright and I want to be snuggled down in the warm gooshy comfort of the nearest womb.
My niece Mia was born yesterday morning at 7:45. She weighs in at a petite 6 lbs 12 oz and, when she really stretches, is about 18 inches tall. Already!
Her hobbies include sucking for food and fun, sleeping, and occasionally wailing. Her temperature dropped a bit yesterday so they had to send her to Florida. Nothing like a little heat lamp action to warm you right back up. If gas rates skyrocket this winter as they're predicted to, perhaps we'll just get an adult-warmer installed in our house.
Welcome to the family, Mia! You're awfully cute when you scrunch your face up like that.
Posted by eek at 03:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 17, 2005
The weekend that was.
I've been easing my way through Sunday, doing surprisingly little and not even feeling guilty about it.
Friday's InKY went very well — all of my performers were on and the crowd (a respectable 60+) laughed, cheered, and overall was very responsive.
Zach Bramel had his poetic coming out Friday night, and our little debutante did not disappoint. He had that audience eating out of his hand - nervous schmervous. My favorite trick: he pasted poems inside ludicrous paperbacks, introducing them with gems like "this one is from my eighth book of poems" though the book jacket clearly showed bare-chested heroes romancing lusty wenches with heaving bosoms. Awesome. I think I'll steal that sight gag.
Richard and his girlfriend Kara stayed overnight with us, and we capped our night with Mag Bar drinks, followed by a bigass Lynn's brunch on Saturday.
Christopher Rowe summed up Saturday evening's Indiana reading and after-dinner so well that I won't even bother.
After we drove (fast!) back from the alternate universe that is a former Stop & Rob turned Mexican Salt Palace, Jason and I decided to take in a Dallas Alice show in St. Matthews.
St. Matthews, while being relatively close to neighborhoods we frequent, is yet another alternate universe. There's a fratty sheen that hangs like a theatrical scrim over the entire area. The handful of times I've gone to bars in St. Matthews, I always come away from it reminded of why I love the Mag Bar so much.
Saturday night we actually saw an entire wedding party stroll in. Not so weird, I guess, I mean, J-Bomb and I ended up at a Waffle House with a bunch of friends and family on our wedding night, but for god's sake, I changed my clothes first. And I didn't even have a big old white dress. You know Slippery Nipple shots stain.
And those bridesmaids with the two-piece fug-fits aren't fooling anyone when they wear the dreadful merlot polyester halter top with their tapered jeans and Prom hair. I hope that whatever emotional/nostalgic need they were serving was worth the dry cleaning bill.
Anyway, the good boys in Dallas Alice put on a helluva a show as usual. I think they might be the perfect bar band, mostly because they only play songs I like and they make me want to drink. A lot. Good for me, good for the bar, good for America.
We ate a late lunch at the new Karma Café, then rolled to ear X-tacy to pick up the new My Morning Jacket album. Seems that some band I've never heard (Story of the Year) had an in-store planned that apparently attracted every 13-17 year old in the tri-state area. I haven't felt so old in days, nay, weeks! Had to hustle a couple of kids in full-on make-out clutch out of the way of the local music bin to reach a copy of the Debauchery Records sampler. Kids!
So I've been taking it easy today, though I should be grading essays and preparing for my class on cover songs for Tuesday night. There will be time, there will be time...
Posted by eek at 12:08 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 11, 2005
Naked lunches.
Bento box lunches and the Vegan Lunchbox.
For your lunch porn viewing pleasure.
I think I need a mommy to pack my happy veggie lunches.
Posted by eek at 10:01 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
October 07, 2005
Want-o-Matic
I'm quite the covetous EEK today. I want a goose! I want a GOLDEN GOOSE.
Stack-o-Matic Portable Record Player plays three (3) speeds!
Mister Bento! for all my breakfast and lunch needs.
Katamari Damacy soundtrack - why is the soundtrack more expensive than the game?
Hot laptop case that actually fits a 12" iBook
Coolest journal on the block and brilliant datebook and bungee bag from Buy Olympia!
I need music and books and movies and shoes and ... sigh.
Posted by eek at 10:15 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 26, 2005
Celebrate banned books ... eat a fried worm.
It's Banned Books Week again, and time to do a little naughty reading roll call ... how many of the ALA most frequently challenged books of 1990-2000 have you read?
I've only read 35.
Do you think Stephen King, Toni Morrison, and Robert Cormier get a little jealous of one another every time one of their books is challenged enough to make it onto the list?
And maybe I'm remembering it wrong, but what in the hell was so naughty about How to Eat Fried Worms? Was it because of the bet? Are the morality police trying to keep small children from making innocent, if icky, wagers?
I'm happy to report that Cormier's The Chocolate War was the most challenged book of 2004. I read the hell out of Robert Cormier (and Paul Zindel) as a kid. The Chocolate War taught me that school candy sales are bullshit and that at one point in time, kids hung posters with T.S. Eliot quotes in their lockers. Sadly, I Am the Cheese did not make the cut, because riding your bike to Rutterberg, Vermont, is not nearly as sexy as getting the shit kicked out of you in front of the entire school for daring to refuse to sell crappy, overpriced chocolates to your family and neighbors.
In the spirit of celebrating the ALA, check out the Well-Dressed Librarian.
Posted by eek at 10:32 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 22, 2005
Blurrrrr.
I forgot how hilarious Showgirls is.
And on VH1, they create little bras for the topless scenes made of very obvious bra-shaped blurs.
At least they match them to the bottoms!
I swear I am also working right now.
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I have seen the future of my weekday lunches...
... and its name is Mister Bento.
Posted by eek at 08:37 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
September 11, 2005
Familiar boxes.
Cruelty, manipulation, meaninglessness.
And yet -
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September 08, 2005
How am I not myself? Part deux.
...an investigation by TIME has found discrepancies in [FEMA director Michael Brown's] online legal profile and official bio...
Are resume cheats are just falling out of the trees these days?
Moral of this entry: no sense dicking around the nonprofit little league when there are national jobs within your reach with the help of a lie or two. Aim high, my children.
Aim high.
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September 06, 2005
How am I not myself?
It is inevitable to be drawn back into human drama.
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September 01, 2005
Search and destroy: the list.
Here's the list from Jason's birthday scavenger hunt. All items are found inside the old limits of the city of Louisville. Way to hustle, teams!
CLUE: This dapper guy (and his little dog, too!) has overseen years of Louisville culture from his corner, from the creation of the Hot Brown to the arrival of the Alt.
ANSWER: J. Graham Brown Statue in Theatre Square
CLUE: Stand in one place long enough and you’ll hear the sounds of the city, where the lunches are live and the jazz is dead.
ANSWER: HSA Broadband Building, home of Louisville Public Radio
CLUE: Behind every great expedition, there’s a guy who won’t get credit for a few hundred years. Every day, Frank X Walker writes the book in the shadow of this monument to the manpower behind Manifest Destiny.
ANSWER: York statue on the Belvedere
CLUE: Single plastic emblem with magnetic personality seeks polar-opposite partner with cast-iron façade. No fatties, druggies, or femmes.
ANSWER: OK, I fucked up on this one. In the flurry of sending off the teams, I forgot to send people with magnets to get a shot of a magnet on the iron facade of a building on Main Street. Only the two straggling teams got magnets, and only Adrien/Jess/Alan actually took the photo.
CLUE: This patron saint of animals and Animal House stands guard over Jason’s alma mater.
ANSWER: St. Francis statue at Bellarmine University
CLUE: A stately French court dance of the 17th and 18th centuries closely resembling the minuet, or a home to celebrated poetry and short fiction? Your fifteen-year-old self’s identity crisis can’t compare, but they might publish your thinly-veiled roman á clef.
ANSWER: Sarabande Books
CLUE: The goatboy god of sex, creativity, and everything sinful splashes with the turtles at this Cherokee Park landmark.
ANSWER: Hogan’s Fountain (none of the photos were light enough to be helpful if you don't already know where this is)
CLUE: Why is a raven like a writing desk? It’s always time for a mad tea party on Baxter Avenue. “I want a clean cup,” interrupted the Hatter. “Let’s all move one place on.”
ANSWER: Yes, this is clue fuckup #2 from EEK. Indeed, the teacups at Lynn’s Paradise Café are located on Barrett Avenue, not Baxter. Yes, I'm an idiot. But how awesome is it that Dave, Alisha, Heather, and Kim knew what I meant anyway?
CLUE: Ladies love the K behind K Composite, if you can read the writing on the wall. If the barboys ask what’s up, you must answer “Sorority Rush.”
ANSWER: Scott Ritcher graffiti in the Mag Bar ladies' room. Only one team got this - they were the only team to use the lifeline to call for half-credit.
CLUE: If your streetcar named desire is filled with John Y. Brown’s burgers, stop here for your daily dose of rare meat and special sauce.
ANSWER: Ollie’s Trolley
CLUE: A little less conversation, a little more hunka-hunka vegan barbeque sandwich … don’t be cruel—Fat Elvis couldn’t help falling in love with the bleu-cheese pasta.
ANSWER: I can't believe I gave credit for half-assed photos that didn't even include the KING. Jeez, people!
CLUE: This is the city’s smallest park. Pretty much only Jason knows where to find it. Good luck!
ANSWER: Gnadinger Park - only the winning team got this one. Look closely on all sides and you can see the street running around it - it's really that small. Cute, but no dice.
CLUE: I’m gonna live forever … I’m gonna learn how to fly … and until I graduate, I get a discount on rented formalwear.
ANSWER: Tuxedo sign at the Youth Performing Arts School
CLUE: If Loteria Atlas shrugged, would the margaritas still be strong?
ANSWER: Another one I gave credit where credit was not entirely due. Only one team actually got a photo that included (partially) the Atlas mural at El Mundo.
CLUE: I scream, you scream … well, we all scream, because we’re on Shelby Street after dark.
ANSWER: the Dairy Del!
CLUE: At this Butchertown home, the telegraphs are always accurate and the lightbulbs never burn out, stop!
ANSWER: the Thomas Edison House
CLUE: What happens when German immigrants develop an unhealthy obsession with ex-president James Buchanan? What if you built a façade and no building came?
ANSWER: the Heigold Building façade - another one that was hard to photograph in the dark, though all teams made it to this stop.
CLUE: Step by step, heart to heart, left right left, we all fall down on Market Street … like toy soldiers.
ANSWER: Toy Soldiers outside of Joe Ley Antiques
CLUE: But it’s not FAIR! Organize some legislative action on Frankfort Avenue – from marriage equality to ending sexism, racism and oppression, this nerve center is your anti-discrimination hub.
ANSWER: Fairness Campaign office
CLUE: It’ll be a hot time in the old town tonight in the shadow of this bit of Highlands trompe l’oeil.
ANSWER: Mural on the Old Town Liquors building
Here are some of my favorite What the Fuck? photos that related to absolutely no clue:
Dilu, Doug, and Scott find a friend
Dilu, Scott, and Doug lose their heads
Alan has Jess assume the position
Alan and Jess rally before the hunt
There is no way Dave, Alisha, and Heather think they can pass this random-ass house off as the Edison House. Busted!
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August 29, 2005
Fortuna, you slut!
One of our favorite places in New Orleans is Molly's on Toulouse. It's the best bar in the French Quarter, hands down, with a Bloody Mary recipe that's guaranteed to fix you right up in the afternoon and a juke box full of Bowie, Waits, and the Pogues. The bartenders are the best: Danielle even created the famous Nipsey Russell cocktail on (polite) demand. People keep their boobies in their shirts in this bar, and you'll see a lot of tuxedo shirts and ties as wait staff from all over the neighborhood drop in for a pint on their way to work or a game of pool after a shift. I've spent many happy afternoons and evenings here, and I hope Molly's weathers the storm as well as it can. That goes for all of New Orleans, one of my favorite cities in America. Sleep tight, pampered pugs of Dumaine Street.
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August 26, 2005
RIP Monsignor.
Ol' Monsignor Horrigan is dead.
When I was a student, I remember how they'd strap him to a dolly and wheel him across the street from the Old Catholics Rest Home to preside over official university ceremonies and other special occasions. He always sang along with the choir. Sniff.
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August 25, 2005
Patron saint of grade inflation.
Carrie and the Social Workers (they should form a girl group) find St. Francis on Bellarmine's campus.
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The champions.
Robin and Bryan chatting with J. Graham Brown and his dog. Why isn't Dott in any of these photos?
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I don't see any ladies.
Team Second Place in the ladies' room at the Mag Bar, hunting a clue:
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Mystery train.
One of my favorite photos from the scavenger hunt. Alan and Jess communing with the King:
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August 21, 2005
Search and destroy.
Jason's 30th birthday party and scavenger hunt were a hit. I know some folks are waiting for the hunt recap and such, but I'm a bit busy with class preparation. Wish me luck for Tuesday ... if my students are half as enthusiastic as my friends have been, I'll have a great time. Meanwhile, Hunt Update to be posted this week. The photos are priceless.
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August 20, 2005
Only Jimmy Stewart knows for sure.
Last night we saw Vertigo at the Louisville Palace, part of their Hitchcock summer film series. When Scotty, in an attempt to turn Judy (back) into Madeleine, tries to cojole her into dying her hair platinum with the following line:
"Aw, come on, Judy! It can't matter that much to you."
Every woman in the audience cracked up.
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August 19, 2005
Comp day.
Last weekend, I worked on being, not doing, at a conference my office put on for people in similar positions all over the country. While I had a great time playing sparkly hostess to some really cool folks, I was exhausted by the end. Thankfully, our boss gifted us with a comp day, which I am taking today.
Comp days are wonderful.
This morning, I got up with JC because it's his BIRTHDAY! and I needed to order his birthday cake. I will post photos later this weekend, but I'm thinking it's going to be fantastic.
I have munchies for the cocktail hour, prizes for the scavenger hunt, and fantastic plans for tonight. Details to follow, including photos from the scavenger hunt, the complete list of clues and destinations, and a full report from tomorrow's party.
In other news, my class starts on Tuesday. I saw my class list yesterday, complete with photos of my students. They look so excited! Eager to learn! I love sophomores - they're not as unformed as freshmen, but not yet cynical like juniors and seniors.
I think I'll go take a nap now. 'Cause it's comp day!
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