touch the floors, man

I was at a friend's barbecue (shake-'n-bake-cue?) tonight and all of a sudden I just wanted to get down and feel the floor. It was a dirty hardwood. But I wanted to get down on its level, look at it with my cheek pressed down to it so that every little piece of dust would have texture, and...like get to know it or something?? I just felt insanely grateful to be alive all of a sudden and so the next obvious thought was, man we don't really feel the floors enough. Chicago makes me crazy. That thought definitely made no sense. I swear to God some wire is missing in my brain. If some bit were in place or some wire a little longer, I could probably solve equations. As it is, I get things like this: JOY = FEEL THE FLOOR.

I still think this is the funniest thing I'll ever see.

home

Why didn't they tell us when we left for college that we'd be coming back? I'd already said my goodbyes.

What does this picture mean?

something missing

I keep getting that feeling that something's missing. Like when you go outside too late, and can tell the day was beautiful, but you've missed it for no good reason and you can't get it back.

Things Overheard at Springfield's Public Library Today

"If she ends up like that Channel 55 show, I'm Pregnant and I Didn't Know It, we're in trouble."

"All she wants, all she wants, is to have a baby. But they told her she can't because she'd set it down somewhere and forget where she'd put it." (this was a separate conversation)

-"They say she has depression- confusion." 

-"Okay..." 

-"And, she also has depression."

Many other things not so fit to print, mostly regarding DNA tests, the bread line, and the ethics of responsible parenting. 

English Dept. Blog!

So far pretty darn boring, but I have high hopes for the future. 

sometimes perfectly satisfactory things happen

My old blog address has been taken over by someone who really, REALLY wants some freakin' sweet rain boots. hahahaha. Wait...did s/he mean for the address to be www.boots-rain.blogspot.com??! Maybe boots-rain was taken so s/he had to settle for roots-rain? Oh, this makes my day. 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

I need to find SUPER cute rain boots!!!?

Ok, so my friends b-day is tomorrow, and well, I%26#039;ve put off getting her present. She wants some really cute rain boots but I dont know where to get any! I%26#039;ve been searching all over online, and I found really cute ones at Target online, but Im not sure if they have them in the store or not. Does anyone know if they do? Or maybe somewhere else they may be? Thanks a bunches!

I need to find SUPER cute rain boots!!!?
OMG....Go to PAYLESS they have these really vute rain boots with like little miss,lady bugs,plain solid...ETC but they are so cute
Reply:give her money to buy boots 


she can pick what she wants
Reply:yeah i seen some at target i even been wanting to buy a pair from their


but my mom wouldnt let me
Reply:http://www.piperlime.com/browse/product....
Reply:There is no such thing as cute rainboots.....



dog skin problem

It's been a strange year.

I don't want to say anything.

from me to you

From now on, I'm going to punch every man who harasses me in the face. Really. I just promised myself. If we are in a coffee shop I will pour steaming coffee on their pathetic heads. If they are on bikes I will definitely push them to the ground. 

Can't wait. 

cool.

I was trying to figure out which dog I looked like today, and it is this one. My hair looks like this today.

Wait, not this.
















This.


















Now you know.

Salinger's still alive, so weird, he must know everything by now

I just finished reading Seymour: An Introduction again (why do I keep re-reading my old favorite books instead of new ones? Is that what happens when you get old and disillusioned? I don't have the energy to read the new ones...I read like I'm channel-surfing and skip ahead to the good parts-which I've never done before-and then don't even find them good).

I have the same questions about it:

Why does Buddy think it's a good idea to spend however many pages he spends describing Seymour's physical characteristics? This is so boring to me-I have to skim. I like my characters fuzzy. All I got out of it is wiry black hair and good hands.

I guess he's just building up an aura around Seymour, which tends to convince me that there's a whole lot of as of yet unpublished Glass family stuff, because something must eventually be done with this aura he's made for us.

I'm also half convinced that the Glass family are Salinger's imaginary friends, for real, like Enoch Robinson's in Winesburg, Ohio.

What, in fact, is the point of Seymour: An Introduction in general? It doesn't introduce half as well as Raise the Roofbeams, or Bananafish, or anything else. The only point I can think of would be either to a) introduce Buddy, b) to send latent messages to English majors not to leave tire tracks in Salinger's rose garden, or c) merely to beam.

And it is a pretty cheap trick to introduce Seymour to us on the day of his death (in "A Perfect Day for Bananafish"), kill him off, and then eulogize him forever after in the rest of your writing. How sad. And enticing. Most of the time we'd all rather remember than live, even in books, and even if they aren't our own memories.

Isn't it interesting that Salinger writes as Buddy, but is still so convincing as Seymour, when Buddy reproduces Seymour's letters and notes? Couldn't ole' Salinger have just realllly concentrated and narrated as the Seymour-Oracle person? Buddy's alright and all, but he's so the extremely self-conscious and hesitating and bombastic writer, he's so... well, everyone I know. Couldn't Salinger have just hit the delete button, deleted all of himself away, and kept only the Seymour-like bits of enlightenment? (I know, the answer is no, then Seymour would get boring, too.)

And: how come I never get to hear anything about Boo Boo? I'm pretty sure she's the cool one.




Side note: Have you ever met anyone over the age of 30 who likes Salinger?

daily poetry.

Maybe I should stop putting dollar bills in my mouth when I'm looking for my keys.

Things We Think We Need That We Don't Need

1. Windshield wipers
2. an inside light for your car
3. a rearview mirror
4. cars
5. soap
6. just kidding, we do need soap
7. wait, no we don't
8. exercise bikes
9. cats

Shake Love Sonnet of the Day

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

 Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

 Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

 That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

 Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

 Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

 But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

 I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Am I the only one who hasn't read this article?

At least eight things written here are true. Not least of which is this: stop taking my working class street cred, hipsters! Ha. Really, though. These things weren't quite as meaningless before. Right?

Right??

Oh, I guess they were.


Still, I feel like something has been taken from me! What has been taken from me?? ...the possibility of an anti-conspicuous consumption fashion statement? ...the comforting distance created by class identifiers? You know that scene in Pretty in Pink where the rich girl says "nice pearls..." and that other one where Blaire asks Andy if she's going home to change before they go out and she says, uhhh, I already did? Maybe that's what's been taken from me. People think I'm you guys dressed like me dressed like a grandpa/farmer-gardener/seven-year-old soccer player! Terrible.

I guess I could always go shop at BCBG. Oh wait: no, no I can't.


$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

To make Ellen happy!!!

Great idea of the day:

Someone should make a dance album titled "Appala-cha-cha-cha!"

to drive ellen crazy:

my desktop.


And it thinks the date is Thursday, January 1, 1970.

then again, the 20s were good, too.

your little voice
                  Over the wires came leaping
and i felt suddenly
dizzy
   With the jostling and shouting of merry flowers
wee skipping high-heeled flames
courtesied before my eyes
                           or twinkling over to my side
Looked up
with impertinently exquisite faces
floating hands were laid upon me
I was whirled and tossed into delicious dancing
up
Up
with the pale important
                        stars and the Humorous
                                                moon
dear girl
How i was crazy how i cried when i heard
                                          over time
and tide and death
leaping
Sweetly
        your voice

Sometimes Barbara sees the little people on the street and she takes pity on their little ways.

Every time I accidentally turn to The View I am delighted. For real. The things the younger blonde girl says in this video are also fascinating.

I don't remember either, Jean. Just kidding, I do.

I find the comment on the wall of this facebook group hilarious:






even more so because Jean sounds like a teacher, and in earnest.

The group reminds me of my discussions with Ellen (discussions heavily littered with ageist statements, I'll warrant ye) about techno-phobes. People are still seeing people and people are still reading books, while finding more ways to communicate with each other, and more ways to read, so chill out, old people! Just kidding, older people. Just kidding, matured individuals. Just kidding, your mom.

Suspicions Confirmed.

1. born/lives in California, 2. last name of Grossinger.

Miranda July is for hipsters.

And you so changed your name, which was likely originally Julie Federbrinkerstein. But your short stories sure are funny sometimes.

reppin' shep

We saw a really large exhibit of Shepard Fairey's work at the ICA in Boston. I prefer the portraits, like this one of Biggie-




























to the political posters/ads/painting-collages. The portraits aren't exactly subtle, but they're not exactly obvious either (minus Obama's, which is Shep's one purposely biased portrait). As far as the war/capitalism propaganda art goes, well, on the one hand, it's kind of cool to have, say, some roses shooting out of guns (war/peace, desire for good/evil), and on the other hand...it's not really. I have a pretty limited response to something like that. Some of his stuff is more complicated though, and as annoying as it is to look at branding/propaganda art, probably my favorite thing was in a detail of Shep's (I guess I call him Shep now) blown-up version of a dollar bill: at the top in fine print, instead of "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS, PUBLIC AND PRIVATE," Shep has something to the effect of "WORTH EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE WILLING TO GIVE IN ORDER TO GET IT." Agreed.

Is that what you think happened, Boston?

We saw this in Boston Common. If you look closely you'll see the story of America.

Word.

I am against the One-Man-Show.

Ellen, Melissa and I had tickets to see the play "Line" in the Village this past week (apparently we were in the Village, anyway- I thought we were in Harlem. Either way this sentence makes me seem really cool.) When we got there, though, a 85- to 90-year-old woman, the owner of the establishment, informed us that the lead actor was sick, so "you'll be watching this other one instead." The other one? A one-man-show starring Spatz Donovan. Yeahhhh Spatz. There were seven people in the theatre, so us, and four other people. And it was the saddest, most fascinating and simultaneously boring, bizarre thing I've ever seen. He impersonated all the old comedic geniuses, like Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, and about 18 other dead white men whose names I'd never heard, switching hats in between characters and smearing greasy streaks of clown paint on his face. This obviously meant nothing to us, since we'd never heard of most of these people, and could care less about their comedic legacies. Along with Spatz's impressions of the comedians' particular style of laughing and gesture-making (there is something profane about laughter on a stage), he would sing sad songs ("You're the funny man," he sang, "all alone"), and exhort us to "remember the old clowns, who inspired your sarcastic, mean-spirited comedians of today." He broke character several times throughout the performance, at one point saying "Isn't this sad? This is what happens when old hippies stay in the Village too long...all those drugs" and at another point stopping to ask, "...Are you having fun?" Yes, yes we nodded reassuringly. No, no not at all. Except insofar as knowledge of your existence makes my own seem comparatively new, promising, and as of yet unwasted?


Although, I will say, I find it sort of hilarious that at one point he turned his pants' pocket inside out and said, "Look, a one-eared elephant." Come on, that's kind of funny.

I'm not going to lie to you, I'm a pretty nostalgic person. If you look into the distance and sing a sad song about the past, I'll probably cry. But... no, it just isn't sad, dude. We just don't find this sort of slap-stick comedy funny anymore (for the most part), which is fine.

And anyway, I am against the one-man-show. I don't think that a one-man, or a one-woman, is... showy enough? I feel them to be a spectacle. A pathetic one. It feels vaguely like watching your sister put on a play in the living room, with sock puppets and wearing your mother's old dress. Fun at home, but embarrassing on a public stage.


For more high-quality phone pictures of our roadtrip so far, go to Ellen's blog.