Weather, Food, Simon Cowell, and Liberty and Justice for All?

A recent kind comment from all 1.7 of my viewers (I may actually have TWO now) has convinced me to blog again! So here I am, my pretties!

It is a March windy day (windy March) here in New England. In general, New Englanders are obsessed with weather. That is because the weather here changes faster than you can say, "American Idol Sucks". In my opinion, this latest season does suck. I tuned in last night for about five minutes and I realized that most of the people singing were actually quite bad. I mean, seriously! A few of them can sing, by that I mean the twenty-nine year old guy with the prematurely grey head of hair, the plump twenty-something African-American woman with the nice smile, and the tiny sixteen year old African-American who seems way too young to be singing her way to fame and fortune already. I wonder about this trend in entertainment as the ages skew younger and younger -- I mean what, you get famous at 16, peak at 21, die at 25? I guess it worked for the Jim Morrisons and Kurt Cobains and Janice Joplins (although they were part of the 27 Club -- apparently, one must DIE at the age of 27 if one was a FAMOUS ROCK STAR!! It's some weird numerological rule!).

Ah, well. I have a little crush on Simon Cowell, although he reeks of self-satisfied smugness. Still, the British accent is sexy, and I picture him sitting around Martini lounges that play songs by the Rat Pack in Los Angeles. Los Angeles, our modern-day Babylon.

I have been to Los Angeles twice. I may have mentioned in previous blogs that I went out there under the lame pretext of thinking I would stay. Instead I fled, clutching my guitar and two suitcases and what was left of my sanity. LA is a mighty weird place, although it is also a very seductive one. I was reading in a travel guide that LA is actually a mostly blue-collar town that has been overshadowed by the Film Industry's presence. It's probably very true, as I only saw the nicest parts of it (although I was staying in "workaday" Culver City). What I do remember is immediately feeling that if I lived there, I would have to Be On A Diet Every Day of My Life. And American women are already tyrannized by fashion models exhorting us to greater heights of thinness. Ugh! It's disgusting. I love to eat, personally, and although I am not heavy I am so tired of women who seem to apologize for putting food in their mouth. The Apologetic Salad Eating Women. They always order big salads for lunch! As if they won't be craving Snickers bars a half hour after eating all them greens! Ah, for a Snickers bar. I do like them so.

Because my Landlady is always in the kitchen, I am now reverting back to my college days and microwaving food. It's truly sad. Last night I had a brainstorm and realized that I must get brave again and COOK. I miss COOKING!! I am tired of eating dried soup and microwave ramen noodles. I mean, it's ridiculous, people, I'm a grown person now (how grown I refuse to say -- unmarried women my age are, of course, either physically repulsive or gay! HA!). So last night I dreamed of buying chicken, maybe a little rice, making some veggies and having an ACTUAL MEAL! With a roll! There is something weirdly satisfying about buying a single roll from the grocery store and eating it with your Complete Nuclear Meal, the kind the FDA would approve of! When it's not marketing heart-attack inducing weight loss pills! Can we say, ephedrine??

Enough about food, I'm getting hungry. This morning I stopped at Brueger's Bagels (sp) and had me a nice cup of java and an everything bagel. Two men, maybe a few years younger than early thirty-something me (YES! She admits her age, kind of, at last!), were praying at a table close to mine. It was nice to hear, actually, although it brought me back to my college days when I was a member of an evangelical Christian group, the kind that the president probably belonged to once. Yes, I am implying that this may be a BAD THING. This was the kind of group that believes that God is MALE, women, while OK in general, really do belong (yeah, if we REALLY admitted it) with kids hanging around and a stove close by, and that non-Christians are heading straight to a fiery hell. I guess Dante's version of that was icier, which makes sense to me personally, but fundamentalist Christians like things HOT. Fried HOT, my brethren!!

Still, it was nice to see it anyway, as my spiritual side definitely does its fair share of praying. Plus you just don't see many people praying in a liberal New England town with lots of folks who vote Democrat. Not out loud, anyway! When I lived in the South you'd see that kind of thing a bit more, since Southerners are Religious and the Lord is a Mighty, Mighty Man. Personally I think the Lord is probably pretty tired of this sexist assumption that He has a Penis.
To that end I am recently reading about the feminine divine. Very satisfying stuff. Why can't God be both Male and Female, Mother and Father? Or is that just me??

Ah well. It is time for me to skedaddle. Soon I must wait in line at the bank with other tired Americans. The paper today said Bush may be subjected to censure, with a small intimation of impeachment (now I'm thinking about peaches, which goes back to food). I think impeachment would work nicely. This administration not only seems to have forgotten the Constitution, it seems to be operating according to principles it makes up as it goes along. They've tarnished our global reputation, committed an aggressive act of war, made people more afraid, and made us look like fucking idiots who believe that John Wayne is a Lifestyle. Americans are more complex than this. And this administration has no doubt grown richer personally as other Americans seem to grow poorer.

But that's just me! You've got your own opinion and should be able to express it! That's why it's AMERICA!!!! Remember America????

Yeesh. Later on, duckies.

Jane Eyre, Timothy Dalton, and Up, Up, and Away

The saga of the Endlessly Scary and Brutally Strange Landlady continues. But, I won't bore you. I'd rather look at pictures of Gerald Butler and think ah, what if! That man could chase away the darkest nightmare, no doubt about it. However, I would not be surprised if he was gay. In my experience, incredibly good looking men often are. At the very least, gay men tend to be very attractive.
Nevermind. I lied. Here is part 99 of this gripping saga, my little ferrets! My landlady went off her considerable rocker a few days ago and blocked my leaving the house. Let me explain! The garbage, as you know (well, you soon will), must be wrapped in PLASTIC. I failed to wrap the garbage in PLASTIC. So, she took the time and trouble to take the garbage can and place it INSIDE the house, put it IN FRONT OF THE SIDE DOOR (the one I usually take to leave the house) then REMOVED my TRASH, and left it and the can for me to find. This reeks of hostility, insanity, and just plain acute mental problems. Which I guess is covered under the reasonably broad umbrella of insanity.
So, someday the evil bitch from hell will die, and one can only hope that she is sent to a hell in which EVERYTHING is covered in dirt. I mean, everything. That would be the best torture for her that I could possibly imagine, my lovelies!
Ah, I feel better now. It's either that or I take up drinking again. Or, for the first time. Not sure which.
In other news, it is still incredibly cold here in Ye Olde New England. The wind whips through our bones, our bones whip through the wind (I know, there you have it, what an image), and my book has still not been recovered. This is a project I continue to work on in the hope that someday, I will have my book back where it belongs, pulsating like stars on my computer screen. Maybe that's an overblown image, but I'm not responsible for what I do now that I've taken up drinking! Hyuck, hyuck! Actually, I am not much of a drinker, my preferred vices being caffeine, chocolate, Whose Line is it Anyway?, and demented fantasies starring UK actors I will never meet (see Gerald Butler, above). It's an Irish thing, I guess. We are so prone to lyrical fantasies, we are.
Anywho. In world news George Bush is still the president, things still look rather bad, and I saw an incredibly depressing special on Sixty Minutes wherein the reporter and his $300 haircut visited the Artic Circle and took a look at undernourished polar bears. All due to the warming of the ice caps. We basically live in a Disaster Zone everyday, and I'm just another feckless idiot who does nothing but whine about it and blog like the post-modern person I am. This is according to a guy named Peter I was once friends with at a job I once had long, long ago. He used words like "post-modern" impressively well. I drank a lot of coffee and listened. I'm not as bright as people who use big words like that!
What else is there to say, now that I've excavated what is left inside my teeming psyche? All psyches teem, I guess. They do something important, anyway. That's their job, I reckon.
I have not watched much of the Olympics. There's a topic for you! I did get the DVD of Jane Eyre out of the library, the BBC one I once watched in my high school honors English class. It starred Timothy Dalton (my friend Beth said he looked like a gargoyle -- for some reason this comment has never left me) and was so good it almost made me cry. I watched all three hours of it or so last night and almost cried (again). It's just a really good version of my all-time favorite book, although Mr. Rochester is a moody bastard with a syphillitic wife living in his attic. Must tend to make a person cranky! Dalton nails the character on the head, and looks really handsome. Not too gargoylish, really (did I spell that right?). The actress who plays Jane is so tiny she looks like she should be performing in a circus with the other midgets (OK, that was wanton cruelty, right there!). But she did a good job, and again, it made so happy that I almost cried.
That's all! I am over, out, and up, up and away.
May all your flying lessons be happy.

Landladies Like Bad Cottage Cheese

Ah yes, how I have missed you all. And the saga continues...
Speaking of, the one-man "Star Wars" show (don't know exact title) will be making its way into the area in a week or so. I've heard it's brilliantly amusing, so amusing in fact that Conan O'Brien proclaimed it "great". If it's good enough for Conan, it's good enough for me.
Here in windy New England, New Englanders continue not to speak to one another. If you want to live in a place where no one will ever approach you, bother you, and will let you die in peace (your body discovered weeks later when the smell bothers your next door neighbor enough to stir them from their woodcarving or Democratic political activities), then come here, my gentle friends. I lived in the Southland once upon a wee time, and sometimes miss the fact that people there ACTUALLY SPEAK TO YOU. I know, it's amazing! Say what you like about the South, but the people are damned nice for the most part. And they know how to have fun.

Anyway, now that I've plugged the Land o'Dixie, I will continue to update you on the Landlady of Mentally Skewed Proportions. We had a blow-out last night, and I am FINALLY going to MOVE from her HELLISH CREEPY HOUSE. From hell, needless to say. The woman is controlling, dominating, critical, paranoid, mean, moody, and that's on a good day. I sincerely hope that the next person who moves into her haunted house (haunted more by past inhabitants, methinks!) is A. Male and B. A masochist. You'd have to be to live with this woman, because she hates women. I figured that one out awhile ago. Whoever knew it would be so complex simply to Rent a Room. But then again, life in the 21st century is anything but easy. Ah, for simpler times, wagon wheels, warm nights spent nodding off in front of fires after a long day of chopping wood out underneath God's Great Blue Sky. I almost said Green -- excuse me, I need to stop popping Acid Tablets! Kerchoo.

Speaking of Kerchoo, I made the mistake of buying Cottage Cheese with Onion and Chives. Not only does it look like something left in the back of the refrigerator too long, it made my stomach curdle. Cottage cheese does have that effect sometime! Ah, to be a rube for the dairy industry!
Kerblam!

That's about it from here. Today is a Sad Day, by which I mean no hunky Scottish man has come to carry me off to his lair, wearing only a kilt, his long, muscular legs on display for my visual pleasure. I have not won the Lottery, Saved the Children, or Even Voted in Recent Elections, and yet they say God loves me. I think She just might! Down with patriarchy, my wild, free kittens!

May you have a blessed day, out underneath them stars.

Snorting Coke, PMS, and How Not to Write a Book

Ah, yes! Here I am again! All 1.3 of you, up from my last positive estimate of 0.5 or thereabouts, be sad no more! Weep no more, my ladies! (or gents...but you get the callow picture).
I am going stark raving mad because the novel I was working on is trapped inside a hard drive of epically ancient proportions. This is tantamount to having your first born child trapped inside a cave somewhere with absolutely no way to get at them. The lack of writing is killing me, as is the entire situation. If I do not write, I slowly go insane. I am working on a screenplay, which is only helping marginally, and have enlisted a variety of help. Thus far, it appears that much more work will be needed, but I am confident that the book will be retrieved and months of hard work saved. Otherwise, I may be tempted to throw myself off the top of the Sears building. My, it's so high up here, Auntie.
I am also PMSing. The landlady of Bipolar Proportions is back from the hospital, which does not help with the PMS. I had a wee hope that she might stay there, or perhaps be escorted personally to the psychiatric wing, but alas, no such luck. She is back, and being more snarky. For awhile she was being kind, thus prompting me to hope that she might have adjusted her medication, but now we are back to My Angry Aura Needs to be Radically Adjusted Like Now but Gee, I'll Just Never Admit It 'Cause I'm Too Old To Admit I'm Seriously Whacked. I can feel this woman's vicious vibrations from a mile away. Yes, it's time to move, my wee, fairy folk!
As Oprah would say, we are not victims! Of course, this makes me look callow AND callous, but I was actually concerned she was feeling dizzy and had to go to the hospital. The cruel side of my nature simply wished she would decide to move in. Hey, I never said I was perfect.
In the meantime, cheese, chocolate, and reading everything under the sun is also helping somewhat. Last night I took out from the library's pretty nifty video collection Saint Elmo's Fire. Don't ask me why -- what a cheesy slice of strangeness! -- but not a bad little flick overall. Ridiculous, of course -- I cite the "Demi Moore calls up Judd Nelson and tells him that she's being forced to do coke lines with Arabs who won't let her leave their hotel room" bit -- such a typical problem for most post-college grads -- but the film is endearing nonetheless. But how weird to see these 80's films in the 21st century and to wonder God, do people really wear those clothes? Apparently so, my little octopuses!
I can feel my biorhythms failing to biorhythm, but that's OK. I feel like I am going to shoot myself out of a cannon if I can't write soon, although soon I will have far less time on my hands, thank God. Work = good. Unemployment = slow, sad, torturous hell. Especially if you are Type A. According to Women's World magazine, I am Type A! Gee, I never woulda guessed!
I wish you all stars to wish upon, suns to warn you, moons to howl at, and plentiful chocolate to munch on before a toasty fire. Bring the marshmallows, lose the guilt, and contemplate simpler times.
God bless.

George Bush, Anti-Depressants, and My Scary Brain

There is nothing more to say other than my blood sugar levels appear to be crazed these days. Ah, these narcissistic, navel-gazing days from hell here in the 21st century! Everyone runs around amped up on anti-depressants, and everyone looks like hell in these days from hell. Or does everyone feel like hell? Anyway, just days from hell and all that. I can't really stretch this commentary any further without risking some sort of psychic injury to my already feeble brain.
My landlady (The Woman of Paranoid Proportions) is much nicer since we Had It Out. It made me feel a helluva lot better, anyway. I still feel like I need to move, since my hypersensitive nature is generally hypersensitive no matter what I do to tame it. Meaning I put more meaning into events than I should. Ah, to feel like an ass, as well as hell. This is the way the world goes, unless you are Pamela Sue Anderson. She always looks well, but that is the exceptional by-product of looking like a Damned Barbie Doll.
I may go to a comedy improv show tonight. Then again, I may not. I am kicking myself for not asking this woman (with a car) earlier, all because I am TOO GODDAMNED NICE. It's a long story involving not wanting her to have to drive too far. Then, in the privacy of my room with the Horrific Orange Shag Rug, I kick myself. But beating yourself up for being human grows tiresome, and this year I am trying to retire from that, no matter How Bad I Fuck It Up. If we were anything but human, we wouldn't fuck it up, but alas, we are mere homo sapiens. And you know what, kiddies? Maybe that's finally enough for me.
Ah, traumatic insights at the local library. In the "Teen Room", no less. These computers are far easier to access than the ones in the "Adult Area", although I worry about pedophiles lurking around in here preying on thirteen year olds. If you think it doesn't happen, think again, my rare, sanguine lovelies. Now I sound like Craig Ferguson, and I recently decided he's a buffoon. My latest obsession is Brad Sherwood, who looks like he might be easier to hang out with and enjoy a simple cup of coffee. Although God knows lately I am a motor mouth and do not need caffeine. A harness and some Xanax, maybe, but not more caffeine. Kerchoo and Kerblah!
Yes, lately I have been reading the aptly titled Potatoes, not Prozac and getting nifty eating ideas. Nifty eating ideas are so very nice. Protein, avoiding hidden sugars, why antidepressants don't necessarily solve the problem of your lurking depressive state, and how to remember to save a book EVERYTIME you work on it so your twelve year old computer doesn't tank creating multiple problems for you. Another long story.
But I remove the weapons, the ones normally used to beat myself into smithereens and say, along with the Beatles, "It's Alright da da da da da da..." You get the picture. If you think my brain is tiresome, try delving into the mysteries of the entire Republican administration!
Speaking of which they are now subpoenaing records from GOOGLE users. How glad I am I normally YAHOO, not to be confused with OLE, YODEL, or SWISS MISS HOT COCOA. God, can we say, Scary Government, Hard Times And Then Some? Geez, maneeze. What does George Bush do at night, anyway? Stroke his white cat with a long, taloned finger and whisper lovingly into his ear about new ways to screw over innocent Americans, all in the name of G.I. Joe Justice? Puleeze. I mean, seriously. Very scary.
The man needs some serious loving. Or a long night spent disco dancing with what remains of the Bee Gees. I'm sure we can come up with many ideas for how to save him, and all of us, with what Remains of America. America, Can You Hear Me? Papa, Why Don't You Love Me? This must all be an unconscious ploy on his part to Win George Bush Senior's Love. Yes, that sounds about right.
I must go, and thank all 0.3 of you for reading, and that one lonely guy for always winking at me on the bus. You get the picture, people.
God bless you.

The Times They Are a-Interesting

Yes, life is a big fat steaming turd. There is no other way to describe it than this. Currently I live with the Widow of Paranoid Proportions in a semi-haunted Victorian home in a room with a ghastly orange shag rug, the kind last seen in 1973. It is not easy to be me, my kiddies, yet your lament, the soulful one you emit from the depths of that cavernous realm (more void than vid, cupid than cubed), is no different. I don't know what "vid" means either, but hey, it's all just them words, kiddies!
Yes, life is a bitch. I am incredibly anxious because my ancient computer crashed, leaving me without a book to work on. My book is the only thing that gives me purpose, a sense of peace, and the illusion that there is more to life than twisted families, ugly carpets, absolutely no money, and other sad tales best told by an Irishman holding a beer in a pub. Ah yes, where I would like to be! In addition my sister-in-law is possibly the world's coldest and meanest woman -- this specimen of humanity has acted like I am a big fat steaming turd since first we met. I am going to see her on Saturday evening, woe is me, and will promptly imagine that she is really the Reverend Al Sharpton or, more helpfully, one of the TeleFuckingTubbies. The purple one that bounces gently under marshmallow skies laden with rocking horses. You know the one I mean! Irishmen very deep into their cups have sung THAT one, too.
So writing this blog is abating some of my anxiety, although not much. There is nothing good about my life lately. I mean, nada and niente. I am living in a town I can't stand, with a woman who is almost as scary as my parental units, and I have absolutely no money to do absolutely anything whatsoever. To say it sucks is an understatement. It would all be fine (whine whine whine) if I could just write my bloody BOOK, because without that I will, very slowly, yet with complete inward clarity, go completely off my rocker. I mean, nuts and all that. INSANE. You know, BANANAS. How strange that we equate that mental state with fruit, but nothing in life makes any sense if you think about it (and please, for the love of God, do not).
The one good thing is that I have cable TV. Yes, Cable TV! It soothes me so. Also in my house is a strange little butt-kissing Narc of a guy who kisses up to the Landlady from Hell and who last night made a very weird comment to me about my chosen nocturnal hours (i.e., when I finally lay me down to sleep). I was like, hmm...and this is your business because? Yes, I'm hypersensitive, but little Mr. Buttkisser probably thinks that he's doing The Landlady a favor by keeping tabs on me. Paranoid Me, yes! It all goes round in a tidy circle, interlaced with shiny little knives.
Speaking of knives, I accidentally BENT one of the landlady's, who keeps tabs on HER cutlery like the crown jewels of London are embedded in there somewhere. I promptly had an anxiety fit that screamed for Xanax. I do not believe in antidpressants for myself after two scary attempts to try them out, both of which made me feel like I was wading through The Sea of Cotton Wool. Andrew Solomon's interesting and seemingly well-researched book The Noonday Demon depressed me, however, because Solomon is a proponent of drugs. In fact, some of the case studies in his book took so many drugs I wondered if that's what God had in mind. I mean, should human beings be walking medicine chests? Is that really safe? But hey, that's just me, folks.
I must go. This keyboard hurts my fingers, and attempts to write in the library with some disks failed miserably. We pray, we look at our options, we hope for better times. For us all here on Planet Happy.
Yes, let's keep laughing in our sea of miseries. For those of us in 'em. And whatever you do, stay away from poems like Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold. That guy was more depressed than anyone.
God bless, and much redress.