via laura

 i would rather have been the effeminate link. or zaxxon.

I am Centipede. I wander back and forth minding my own business, changing directions only when things get in my way, but I always seem to be persecuted. It's as if people want to hurt me, to cut me in two, to laugh at my confusion. Can't you just leave me alone? Stop shooting me! What Video Game Character Are You?

poor phil...i think those are michael jackson's panties in his pocket.

via the countess

the third annual stupidity awards

stupidest man of the year: u.s. president george bush

stupidest statement of the year: "can you handle my truth?" - britney spears

stupidest woman of the year: paris hilton

stupidest trend of the year: seeing the virgin mary in toast, hamburgers, etc....

media outlet which has best furthered ignorance: cnn....

via dr.b.

via trish

songs that make you cry

1. "no one is to blame" by howard jones - when i was in sixth grade and horribly in love with jason kramer, i was working up the nerve to request a song for couples skate at the skating rink (elementary school night...woohoo!) to ask him, but jodi schwartz beat me to it (as she beat me in the 1100 meter dash the next year). she requested this song for him. so i just stood there in my dopey skates watching them go round and round and round. ohhhhhh the drama.

2. "mr. harris" by aimee mann - she says the old dude she's in love with looks like jimmy stewart. i was in love with jimmy stewart.

3. "have yourself a merry little christmas" by tori amos - came out the winter my grandmother died back in '98, and i never thought i'd have a merry christmas again.

4. "cats in the cradle" by harry chapin - well, duh. makes me feel guilty and i don't even know what i'm guilty for.

5. "annie's song" by john denver - i remember my mom telling me that he wrote this for 'annie' and then 'annie' dumped john for mac davis. i rushed out and bought the tape and played it over and over again in my alarm clock radio. poor john.

6. "back in your own backyard" by al jolson/billy rose/dave dreyer, but as performed ONLY by billie holiday - reminds me of how i used to believe in all the romance horseshit.

7. "nightmare girl" by aimee mann - simply beautiful.

8. "two out of three ain't bad" by meatloaf - i deserve a cheesy one, right?? hey, i could have said "paradise by the dashboard light" and given some horrible prom night story, but the guy i went to the prom with was closeted. sorry, folks.

9. "you never know" by dave matthews - another guilt trip. carpe diem. shoot me.

10. lullaby (goodnight my angel) by billy joel - oh for a ton of reasons. because i never had a dad to sing me lullabies, let alone write me one. because i know we're all going to croak and turn to dust, even the people i love, and i can't do anything about it. because i was in love with ole bug-eyes and he married christy brinkley and then divorced her, then named his boat after some chick and then she was gone, and now he's with some 23 yo. and i offered myself up with i was 15!

here's popculture madness's saddest songs of all time! (which is really lame but amusing) what's YOURS?? you know you want to....

via chandrasutra - come on. you know you want to.

Chandrasutra book meme

Out of frustration with the kinds of questions I find on most book memes I've created my own. It's kind of a mix of all the best questions I've found with a few of my own. My answers appear in the post continuation.

1. Book/books that meant the most to you as a child. why?

• The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum - there were no kalidahs in the movie. which made for a boring movie.
• Behind the Attic Wall author I can't remember - the first kid book that graphically describes a puking scene. then the kid talks to dolls in the attic. which is just plain creepy.
• The Ghost Next Door by W. Folk St. John - terrific book of haunted gardens and ponds. There's always been something romantic about drowning in ponds. Just ask D.H. Lawrence. and N. Hawthorne.
• The Lively Little Rabbit - gave weasels a bad name
• Mother Goose's Nursery Rhymes. Some are pretty %^$&*ed up. especially "solomon grundy". and the one with the cat in the well. and the one...right. you get it.
• The Picture Bible - this was the graphic novel form of the bible. just imagine how it explained david's murdering of bathsheba's husband so that he could get in bed with her, not to mention joseph and potiphar's wife. in living color. all of those hologram texts of the grimm's fairy tales (doctored down disney-style, of course), but still entertaining. especially the covers.
• There's a Hippopotamus Under My Bed - no explanation necessary.
• Creepshow by Stephen King. ditto.
  
  2. Book/books that mean a lot to you now (at this moment in your life).
  why?
• a lot less, since i'm no longer permitted to read for pleasure.
• all of the above books - most of them still make me check under the bed at night
• the three or so books i've written
• Jane Eyre, Flowers in the Attic, Heaven, Aimee Mann/Tori Amos lyrics - because they all propelled how I write today
  
  3. Books you currently have on the go/on the bedside table?
• The Body in Pain by Elaine Scarry
• Writing History, Writing Trauma by Dom LaCapra
• Regarding the Pain of Others by Susan Sontag
• Precarious Life by Judith Butler
• a few Cathy Caruth texts
• a ton of Toni Morrison books i've never gotten around to reading

4. Five (or more) books you would never part with:

• Hollywood Babylon - need an occasional marion davies/fatty arbuckle/rudolph valentino fix
• The Book of Lists 3 - lists dog felons and every anti-sexual device known to man (mostly man)
• all the books listed in question 1
• Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy

5. Favourite literary characters? Why?

• these questions are making me think too much
• probably Cathy in Wuthering Heights - she did whatever she wanted to and everyone else suffered for it
• Rhoda in The Waves - so much suffering and agorophobia/xenophobia, yet so cocky. have to love it.
• Jude - because he was beautiful. and stupid. a great combination for a guy.

6. Writer you once loved but have totally grown out of? why?

• Stephen King - or maybe he just grew out of me

7. Book/novel you've quoted (or recommended) the most

• She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb - it got me TONS of sales points when I worked at Waldens

8. Novel that totally reconfigured your idea of what literature could be?

• Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner - no one else could ever make incest seem sexy - see scene in Quentin's flashback chapter 2 where he talks of Caddy stretched on the bed in her kimono with apple blossoms above her head. it's hot.

9. What, if anything, is lacking in contemporary literature nowadays?

• what's contemporary literature? is there any contemporary literature?

10. [question of your choice]

• why don't i enjoy reading anymore? why don't i sit under my silly pink quilt with my flashlight anymore, enacting the ultimate forbidden--educating myself? why has reading become a chore?

           good question.

an open pass (going long!) from Lauren: (Pass to: Mary, Tom, Andrew, Laura, and EmGee)

Three things you are wearing right now:

* no socks
* blue jeans
* 30kg chip on my right shoulder (still stuck in that metric system)

Three favorite bands / musical artists:

* Billie Holiday
* Aimee Mann
* Suzanne Vega

Three favorite songs:

* Mr. Harris, Aimee Mann
* Laura, Billy Joel
* Tie: Keep Your Hands to Yourself, Georgia Satellites/Kiss Off, Violent Femmes

Three things you want in a relationship:

* something bigger than a full-size bed
* must....drink...beer
* someone who picks me up at the airport with a bag of socks and a pair of his own jeans for me to change into

Three physical things about the preferred sex that appeals to you:

* do any of us get "preferred sex"?
* a brain (minus the stereotypical lust for Star Wars)
* furrowed brows (that don't meet in the middle)

Three of your favorite hobbies/interests:

* Writing
* Blogging
* Kickboxing

Three things that scare you:

* spiders
* jim neighbors' films
* spiders

Three of your everyday essentials:

* cheese, cheese, cheese
* a full playing of Aimee Mann's new album
* a cuddle with Chester

Three drugs of choice:

* bass ale
* nyquil
* gasoline

Three favorite toys:

* smart-draw
* microsoft word
* my gamecube (patiently awaiting res evil V)

Three careers you have considered / are considering:

* janitor
* veterinarian
* pre-tenure tool

Three places you want to go on vacation:

* New Zealand/Australia
* Isle of Wight (to see Tennyson's house)
* Churchill, Manitoba (to see the polar bears mate)

Three kids’ names you like:

* Joanna (the name of the mean lady who put me through hell to buy her house)
* Jude (I've always liked this one, too)
* Laura (I wrote a 400 page story about this one)

Three things you want to do before you die:

now that shark diving is over???
* shark diving again, but with a proper weight belt and a better $*%#ing camera and/or see those polar bears mount each other in glorious, orgasmic, 3.4 second bliss
* stop missing my grandmother
* somehow forgive the 20 or so exboyfriends who I allowed to make my life a living hell for about a decade, and somehow forgive myself for allowing them

Three celeb crushes:

* Steve Buscemi (any era)
* Jason Varitek (it's all about the thighs)
* Trey Parker (Baseketball era)

Create Your Own!

dr.b. "tagged" me on these questions (almost straight out of 1983's Book of Lists 3!--which is replete with dogs who were executed for killing and anti-sex devices)

You’re stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be? Farenheit 451, of course. Just to mess with their heads. Or the Bible, which might really confuse them and piss off the fundamentalists. Or a Dixie Chicks CD (just for the simple reason that I think they suck).

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character? Um yeah. Too many. Biggest was probably Rochester, but that was shot down by Rhys. Then came Heathcliff (in Olivier fashion...Ralph's was a bit too...greasy). My biggest was probably my own: Jack Seagreaves! Savior Extraordinaire! from the second novel I wrote back when I was 22. When I drove out to Sea Girt, NJ, in the middle of the night, I used to talk to him in the seat beside me. Even fastened his safety belt. I'm a good girlfriend.

The last book you bought is? Ummm I think it was a book on incest the night Bob Dylan visited Purdue. Purely scholarly work.

What are you currently reading? The Pagoda by Patricia Powell; Lionheart Gal by Sistren; any criticism I can find on Shani Mootoo's work.

Five books you would take to a deserted island:

• A blank journal with a trillion blank pages, or else I'd go nuts
• She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb - laughing and crying in the same text
• The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (completely illustrated!) by L. Frank Baum - picshures!
• Jude the Obscure/Tess of the D'Urbervilles double box set by Thomas Hardy, so I don't forget how much society depresses me
• My grandmother's memoirs, that she penned a few months before she died
• (can I pack my cat in a hollowed-out Jamaica Kincaid text?)

Who are you going to pass this stick to (4 persons) and why?  Tom because he needs a break from studying (on the stipulation that Megadeth doesn't count as a "book");  Astarte because she needs a break from fighting off the evil greedy blog oppressors; Laura because she's got an incredible imagination; and Mary because I can't wait to see her theoretical paradigm she creates for making her choices.