Thank you for this

Thank you Christopher Nolan, Christian Bale, and Warner Brothers for Batman.* More precisely, for a Batman that finally acts like the obsessive creep who made me fall in love with comic books that second time. If it takes five more movies to get to Ron Perleman or some other old large person to play my favorite old large curmudgeon, I'll be happy.

Yes, I am always asking for more.

Thank you Angelfantab, and David Foster Wallace, for:

the funniest footnote I've ever read. And the only time I've read something that has made me laugh so hard I squeezed water out of my eyes.

"Table 64's beloved and extemely cool Hungarian waiter, whose contract forces him on Tex-Mex Night to wear a serape and a straw sombrero with a 17" radius^53a and to dispense Four Alarm chili from a steam tanle place right underneath an ice sculpture (of Pancho Villa) and whose pink and birdlike face on occasions like this expressed a combination of mortification and dignity that seem somehow to sum up the whole plight of postwar Eastern Europe."
53a (he let me measure it when the reptillian maitre d' wasn't looking)**

an opening that made me think again and again "the horror, the horror" and that maybe Wallace was doing something with the Heart of Darkness on the open ocean.
Examples include, but are not limited to:

-"I have smelled what suntan lotion smells like spread over 21000 pounds of hot flesh."***
-"Imagine the day after the Berlin Wall came down if everybody in East Germany was plump and comfortable-looking and dressed in Caribbean pastels, and you'll have a pretty good idea what FT.Laud. looks like today."
-"Apparently FTL.A. is always just your sleepy midsize airport six days a week and then every Saturday resembles the fall of Saigon."
-"A second Celeberity crowd-control lady has a megaphone and repeats over and over not to worry about our luggage, that it will follow us later, which I am apparently alone in finding chilling in its unwitting echo of the Auschwitz-embarkation scene in Schindler's List."

It's good. I shudder to think what his fiction's like.

Thank you advising office and lady of the three degrees for your quick response time, and making me feel like my graduation is a priority.****

Thank you bald dude on the bus for answering my rhetorical question about why, exactly, there are so many news vans outside of the Wex. (John McCain is leaching off of Lance Armstrong. Meanwhile crowds in the hundreds of thousands are flocking to see the considerably less Transylvanian, slightly more Obfuscating Canidate in Europe.)

Thank you Columbus for the metal plates that make it sound like there is roadwork going on even when there isn't.

Thank you every experimental magazine, (half of them) that accepts online submissions.*****

Thank you humans for building and populating libraries.

- "Knowledge is power," right? The existance of a library always strikes me as hugely philanthropic at some point when I visit one. I visited the ColPubLib yesterday. Aside from a barren referance section, they have a shitload of stuff. Close to a hundred computers with JSTOR access, all sorts of audiobooks, cds, and dvds, comic books, and books. My god what books. Eat your heart out half-price. A copy of morphology of the folktale I had to special order from a certain full-price retailer who will always go unnamed barring some sort of three-digit compensation, a four copies of IV, three copies of "Consider the Lobster and other essays." Way to go CPL.

*I guess I should thank W.B. or the producers or someone. Creative bias...
**Yup, it's a footnoted footnote. Also, the parenthetical is mine.
***Second paragraph line. Definitely going into my rolodex of examples for lines to use when you want to tell the reader "you know, I may have to write this but you don't have to read it."
****This is the beginning of a series of completely insincere thank yous. It will be ugly. You can skip them.
*****Okay, I'm over it. Incidentally, fuck online submissions if you just publish online. Call yourself something other than a magazine. Like a website.

Strange Homonid/What you did

So I'm sitting in this lady's office and she has three degrees on the wall while she tells me that I can't get either of the two I'm due.* You see, it's really important that you tell the advisor scheduling office (it has a real name, but I don't know it) that you want to meet with your advisor not an advisor and what a fool I am for meeting with, like, every advisor in the advising office. (probably also has a real official name that I don't know) My perspective on the matter is shouldn't one of the six advisors I met with suggested this?** Or suggested that there was something wonky with my language requirement before I was auditing my degree? That sounds fair to me. Regardless, now I have to contact two advisors and make sure they have e-mails from five months ago because I don't have them anymore.***

*My new advisor hoards an Associates and a Bachelors in the Arts, and a Masters in Education.

**Aside from this one, who is telling me so far along it may as well be hind-sight.

***Of course I should still have them. But I don't. I am so happy with this situation.

In other news, I have the beginnings of a story. It seems like this is the best place to post it's origin:

My handle for everything but antiquing forums is "Strange Hominid." I started using it for a blog on the human body, innovation, and presentation. When I started writing I was entirely focused on unfortunate design features and workarounds. Angie had been living with varicose veins for three years and was trying everything short of invasive surgery to make them go away along with pain relievers (pleasantly and with no fuss) went to get for her.

She found this cream that was reducing the swelling. When she raved to a doctor friend about how effective it was he said she could just take more aspirin or use Iceyhot. Her legs were abusing her veins, and the aspirin and Iceyhot-like cream were reducing the swelling, albeit temporarily, that her legs were inducing to compensate for gravity's effect on a relatively new design.

I started researching every other punishment visited upon humans in return for their defiance of gravity and form: hernias, hemorrhoids, slipped discs, and pretty much everything else that can happen to a spine that doesn't involve an automobile or a shower. Over five million year ago, our pelvis flared out and our femurs bent in to put all our weight on our knees and shins. What a fool I'd been to get excited about Angie's wide hips and round ass. I was just dooming our child to shin splints. Catholic guilt, you have a new friend.

In order to avoid a spiral of self-loathing, I started looking into other human innovations.

Culture as a tool. While sexual dimorphism was comparatively minimal, sexual difashionization was wildly divergent. The flow chart for a man's morning dress routine was simple. I drew it up in a night without referencing a single history book, cultural anthropology journal, or issue of Vogue. Then I started the women's chart.

I thought of a woman I had seen walking in a simple green dress. Perhaps the wind was very high or it was too hot to wear a slip, but her skirt was catching right in her crotch. I had no idea what she was doing wrong. I realized then I was on the cusp of an investigation that I was completely unprepared for, and would take me deep into a dark silken heart that I could not return from as myself. I thought of that, looked at my chart for men,* and scrapped "fashion as a iteration of culture" project.

*The chart was very direct. It's first question was whether or not it was hot. If it wasn't it asked if you preferred boxers or boxer-briefs, then referred you to the question asked if it was hot: what pants are appropriate for the days activities? jeans or dress pants? I couldn't break down women's underwear choices into binaries. It was maddening. Angie suggested "Are you worried about pantie lines?"

A constant stream of expletives and spit.

I am reading The Silence now.* The Silence was written by Julian Barnes. It's from a collection of short stories called The Lemon Table. Julian Barnes also wrote Flaubert's Parrot, which is on a long list of things to do when I have "the time."

"When music is literature, it is bad literature. Music begins when words cease. What happens when music ceases? Silence. All the other arts aspire to the condition of music. What does music aspire to? Silence. In that case, I have succeeded. I am now as famous for my long silence as I have been for my music."

Et cetera.

So now I'm going to not get any schoolwork done.** I'm going to "aspire to the condition of music" for the rest of the night, even if it means beating my head through my keyboard and into the floor.

Shit Piss Fuck.

* Not at this very instant. I'm blogging now. Stop being silly.
**Schoolwork is for suckers and asskissers anyway.

Why I Prefer Complete Creative Control

Why I Demand Complete Creative Control
(or Further Proof I have No Friends that are Men)

I brought my bed up from Pittsburgh today. I did it myself. Seriously. Threw a box-spring and a mattress on my back and moved them from Pittsburgh to Columbus.* I realize this entry is just text so you can take me on my word that I am totally flexing right now.

Maybe I wouldn't have to do this if I had a friend with external genitalia. It occurs to me that this isn't the kind of thing you ask of ambiguosly-gendered-friends-who-will-help-me-because-they-love-me, or man-friends-who-I-can-extort-help-out-of-through-extensive-use-of-the-word-"Should," but casual-acquaintances-who-will-accept-token-rewards.** Incidentally, that brings me nicely to my point. I like doing things by myself. I didn't ask for help moving my stuff because it makes me feel good.***

Even if I were in a rewarding business relationship,**** I'd probably demand some sort exclusive project.***** Maybe putting together a series of shorts would be neat. I don't think I can be trusted to stick to an outline/make an outline. I'd definitely end up telling a penciller/set designer/prop designer that "this is wrong, all wrong" several times. And then I'd get stabbed with a pencil/chisel/clay knife. And I don't think I could fault them for it. So I write, and write in genres that will never require working with other human beings, because it's better that wa-- because I demand complete creative control.

*I used my truck most of the way.
**Token rewards include beer and buttsex, in that particular order. I love the alphabet.
***Good- tough, accomplished, desirable, et cetera.
****I'm thinking of comic books, but I'm sure the production of any media would work fine here. I'd make a fine partner in a smallish business or something. Focus: Creative.
***** Totally not a metaphor for long-term, committed, blah, blah, blah, romantic relationships. Except the inevitable failure part. While I've only driven two women to point sharp objects at me, I'm positive my child-rearing skills are limited to vehicular assault.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog!

OH MY GOD!
JOSS WHEDON!
OH MY GOD!
NATHAN FILLION
OHMYGOD!
EVIL MUSICAL!

"Wow, Sarcasm. That's original." (Whatever!)

Evil? Love? How does one chose? Funny/Campy

last day of workshop reactions

1. Today was my last day of Creative Non-Fiction

2. I need some sort of coffee negator. Pizza does not pile on top of coffee well. Egg sandwich yesterday did not work so well either. The fruit was good. Maybe I'll buy more fruit.

a.Fruit is expensive.
*so is pizza, but pizza and coffee consumption overlap is rare.
b.FiberOne bars seemed to work well. Were also yummy, though inferior to fruit-yum.
*added bonus of scheduled poo.
c.perhaps a fruit/fiber bar compromise is in order.

3. The date on the manuscript/story/essay/piece I handed in was 08.10.08.

a. clearly not August, according to recent conversations about national holiday/celebrations observing n.h, computer and paper calendars, etc.
*perhaps some obscure reference?
-nothing interesting happened specifically on 08.10.08 in 1008, and even I wouldn't have suggested something more obscure than that (i.e. 1908, 1808, 1708, et cetera).
-and what's the point of a time travel reference when I'm talking about the past?
i. Actually that makes a lot of sense
ii. and I did it on purpose
iii. and will always act like I meant to do it on purpose
iv. and admit that I am a liar.
b. I have no idea what month it is.
*it's a miracle I showed up at CNF at all.
*the numeric date system is archaic/for computers and a pain in the ass/the first sign of their takeover.
-The only reason second star didn't get it's own letter is because I'm afraid of being shipped off to Chiron Beta Prime before Christmas.

4. This is my last writing workshop at tOSU.

a. barring some catastrophe in the "failure to graduate in a timely fashion/communicate the requirements to graduate clearly' department
*it's the "failure to communicate the requirements to graduate clearly" department.
*no, it's the "failure to graduate in a timely fashion" department.
-ass.
b. I've been (over) compensating for this for three months now.
*fictioneers' club
*writing like crazy
*no more video games
*own apartment
c. but I'm still not trying to publish.
*granted, as far as I can tell, this is the doldrums of reading time.
*I should submit to the novella contest in october.
-it'd be nice if writing paid the rent.
i. lol

5. More than anything, this class has taught me to run for humor, rather than grope around blindly for it.

a. if that looks like a metaphor for gender relations, it's probably just because of the word "grope."
*I wouldn't want to reinforce those classic stereotypes like:
-men should pursue women
i. as opposed to "women should pursue men" or "women should pursue men as well."
-sex should happen in the dark.
i. with blindfolds on.
-sexual preference is analogous to sense of humor.
i. acquired mostly over time
ii. somewhat influenced by parents
iii. primarily controlled by media/mitigated by choice of media.

6.and lots of people have lots of different things to talk about.

other things under my skin.

Creepy Neighbot
I have a neighbot that's staring into my window. The gray-haired, gut-hanging-out-the-bottom-of-his-shirt, me-in-fifteen-years type. Maybe future-me is here to spy on present-me and make sure I'm keeping my shit in order and not bleeding out from stupid self-inflicted injuries.* But honestly? I would never stop caring about my appearance so much to walk around with my stomach hanging out. I hope if I ever outgrow my favorite t-shirts, I'll simply give them to goodwill.** And go on a diet. And even if I refused to ship my favorite shirts out, I suspect I'd layer with a longer shirt.
Fat bellied etiquette aside, layering tees lets the bottom shirt catch the sweat in the summer so you don't ruin your nice shirts. Even your nice t-shirts.*** I hope neighbot reads this. I'm only 40% angry that he's violating my privacy. The other 60% of my misdirected disdain is over his repulsiveness.**** That really shoots the future-me theory in the foot. He should know this shit and have it processed and internalized, as I've/he's written about it. Maybe he's beginning to understand my feelings right now. Maybe whenever I yell at him from the stoop to cut the shit I'll violate some time/mind continuum law and the universe will implode.

It'll be worth it.

Brilliant
"By Jove, I've had an idea."
-"Well, spit it out man."
"Well everyone's complaining about the water of death. Their soap won't lather and their shampoo won't really ever come out of their hair and whenever they step out of the shower their skin is so dry it falls off in sheets."
-"Yes, I understand it's a problem in the western territories."
"Instead of calling it 'water of death,' I think we're going to start referring to it as 'hard water.' That way, people won't be sure if they actually have it and it won't sound so intimidating."
-"Capital idea."
"Hmm, yes. I think we could also make some restaurants, and get rid of the service aspect entirely, and call it 'fast food."
-"Brilliant!"

Shopping List
1. Chicken (Miller Chicken Breast, 6.49. Purdue was roughly two dollars cheaper. But the Miller packaging said "Antibiotic-free" so big. And does that mean cage free too? Maybe free range? Happy chicken corpses for two more dollars sounds fair)
2. Can Opener *x5 (8.29!)
3. Hot Sauce (Frank's Red Hot (2.69) 12oz)
4. Elbow Mac (Heartland Rotini (1.50)instead. Rachael Ray said use Elbow Mac, but whatever...)
5. Carrots and Celery ("Mini carrots" -1.00 Celery -1.99)
6. Soup (Chunky is "on sale" at 1.79. I bought three cans (.79)of chicken and rice****** and treated myself to two cans of split pea and ham. Interesting phenomenon: Fully Loaded. I remember whenever Chunky soup was just a non-condensed form of premium cambpell's. What the fuck?)
7. Eggs (half dozen. .99. I have a skillet now. I should make breakfast some day. Still haven't secured a toaster oven...)
8. Veggie Nugs (Morningstar Chicken Nuggets are 4.49. What an extravagance! I guess if I ever go Veggie, I have to go Vegan.)
9. Pizza Rolls (Tostino's Cheese- 1.29 A much fairer price for the luxury of instameals)
10. Sweet, Sweet Coffee (Also, why are Dunkin' Donuts coffee beans expensive now? (8.79) I mean, I'll buy any coffee that's good and not paying tithe to Israel, but if you can do it for six dollars, do it for six dollars...)
11. Shredded Mozzarella (2 bags of Kroger brand Moz.- 5.00)
12. Non-dairy creamer (D'OH!)
13. Diced Tomatoes (2 cans Kb Mexican Style- 1.22)
Unplanned Purchases: Kb Singles (1.67- Skillet means grilled cheese), Kb Black Bean (.61), Kb Vidalia Onion (.72).

State got .56 cents for the can opener, which was very honest of Kroeger.
Kroeger got 55.39.
I got home and cut up the chicken, threw it in the pot with some olive oil and cajun seasoning.******* I chopped up the carrots, onion, and celery, and threw all that into the bottom of the slow cooker...crock. Once the chicken was done I dumped that in there too, along with those two cans of diced tomatoes and a liberal shot *x8 of hot sauce. Heated up the slow cooker and boiled the rotini, mixed them together with a half bag of moz.
Waited twenty minutes.
Got it in me.

And that feels good.

*and superficial
**except for my "scud" shirt. It's a collector's item. holes and all.
***someday I'll look through my various receipts and figure out just how many bicycles I could have bought if I'd opted to buy plain white undershirts and dress shirts instead of a cavalcade of punny Hanes beefy tees. Then I can finally get my "Dumb Ass" tattoo. I'll have earned it.
**** Arbitrary percentages. While I do have an alembic and a calcinator for distilling and measuring the various point of origins in any emotion, Brain Spickets are notoriously difficult to use, and I wouldn't use one without an assistant. I need a Rosenfeld-Chagall.
***** and thank God I remembered that one.
****** Campbell's condensed. Sorry Chunky, a buck is a book of papers/ bottle of soda/ ten sheets of copied paper. And don't tell me it's not all going to the same place. You're just worried about messing up your intercorp competition numbers.
******* Both of which were Kroeger Brand (Kb). They said they'd give me free groceries, what do you want?
******** half the bottle