100% Rhetoric. Machine Wash Warm, Tumble Dry.

Last night I encountered an African-American homeless woman in a wheelchair wearing a T-shirt with an American flag that said "United We Stand." Does that strike anyone else as ironic? I kind of hope it was intentionally so.

The Matrix

Pardon me a little vent, if you would please. Why does my mother have to be so fucking crazy? Why is it that Jesus wants her so very bonkers?

I was raised by people who seem suspicious of happiness and of anyone who wants it. In fact, I have a deeply ingrained reaction against desire. Wanting must somehow be wicked, my subconscious tells me.

When I talk to my mother, somehow I repeatedly forget that I can't ever tell her anything without her weeping, infuriating me, and talking about Jesus before disclaiming responsibility for any thought whatsoever. Today I attempted foolishly to relate how I've been feeling, which is, as you know if you read this, NOT GOOD. To boil down the conversation:

ME: I hurt worse than I ever have, having lost the most important thing in my life and being consumed with grief. [RETURN]

MOM: Jesus doesn't want us to be selfish. [RETURN]

ME: Argh! Why do I tell you anything, you insane ignorant martyr!

[Pause]

ME: [DELETE DELETE DELETE DELETE DELETE DELETE DELETE]

ME: Thanks for the advice, Mom. Gotta go. Love you. [RETURN]

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

Thank goodness for Yahoo Messenger. It's like life with a rewind button.

Why, how did YOU spend the 100th Bloomsday?

I'm thinking of joining some fellows at the Irish Pub (at's actually called that) on the next block, to lift a crystal goblet of the sacred black brew to the honour of Jimmy Joyce on this 100th anniversary of his first gratis handjob.

But today I had no inner organs of beast nor fowl for breakfast, I didn't wear an eyepatch, I practiced no seaside onanism, and indeed I read no Joyce, though I do have an original Plumtree's Potted Meat container on my desk with which I am well pleased. Yesternight I went out with some friends, including my dear buddy GB, who after an entire adult life in the marines finds himself a civilian and required me to take his cannabis virginity. Which I did, much to everyone's delight. This morning we had breakfast and then moved a bunch of stuff up to L'Ecole, enjoying the back roads of Wisconsin, good music, better conversation, and Stewart's Key Lime Soda. He's going off to Virginia tomorrow to be with his baby. Everyone good leaves you eventually, I guess.

Happy Bloomsday, everyone. Hoopsa boyoboy hoopsa.

Troy in Fifteen Minutes

This is hilarious. But only if you've seen Troy.

The changing of the pedants

Yesterday I spent the day moving my puny grad student office up to my spacious new professional digs at l'ecole. I am amazed at how much kitsch a nostalgic 30-year-old wannabe hipster like me can accumulate. I don't know where the New Kids on the Block action figures even came from. I think they were there when I moved in. But that's neither here nor there.

KW, the woman I'm suceeding, had to drive up from Madison to get all her crap out of the office--which apparently used to be Spencer Tracy's dorm room; he's our main big alum--and she let me come and bring up my crap so there'd be an even crap swap. KW is the kind of woman you'd be in love with forever if you found one day that you were her three-year-old son. Smiling and glowing and very momlike. We had her 6-week-old bundle of sleeping, sucking fun with us. She showed me the cool zippy back roads that one can 90 mph on, and we enjoyed good conversation and beautiful countryside.

The little symbolic stuff was pretty cool. Taking her nameplate off my office door, putting my Shakespeare on the shelves. (Finally I'll have more shelves than I can fill! (for now)). Getting the keys to the building and the copy room and the mail room. Getting a faculty parking tag that I will put in my car if ever I get a car.

Here's a question: do the printing houses that keep pumping out books like "Arguing for the 21st Century" and "Culture and Critical Thinking: a college reader" think they're doing anyone a service or making a profit? As far as I can tell these books are only distributed free to professors who feel too ashamed to throw them out, or keep them because they might be useful. This office has accrued at least five inhabitants' hand me down copies of such books, not to mention all seven editions (mostly untouched) of the Norton Anthology of English Literature.

I'm going to find a way to get rid of them by spreading them around. I'll manure the student body with them, I think. I'll give them out as prizes for unofficial pop quizzes or something.

Heat

I've been trying to put off putting in the air conditioner for weeks now, but I think this morning might indicate that it's time. I am sticking to my desk and repeating the word "eugh." Moreover I blame the wet heat (and maybe the cocktails) on my fitful dream wherein I was fleeing from the police after employing the back-alley services of a pre-op MTF prostitute cum human rights activist who then proceeded to be shot to death in my apartment by someone who was obviously waiting to kill me. Sort of The Fugitive meets Barton Fink meets The Crying Game. I do NOT want to have dreams like this again. Usually this sort of thing only happens after bad curry. It's time for the AC. Also, it'd be nice to be able to write without every third word coming out "eugh."

Opinion

I'm aware that what I'm about to say may step on a few toes, fly in the face of received wisdom, etc. But I've never been one to shirk from heterodoxy, and I'll take this opinion to the stake. For my money, the best Dr. Seuss book is The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. There, I've said it.