Random remains in rancid repose.

[2/15/05]

Today's 'blog is brought to you by the letter "R!"

[gaily colored poppets - yes, pOppets - writhe about like rainbow trout that have ingested "herbs" procured in a dimly-lit apothecary in Chinatown]

Wait. Poppets don't eat. Let me rephrase. Poppets don't eat herbs. They eat children who make their daddies and mommies drink when they cry. They eat them with a glass of corner-store merlot and shallots and a whisper of cayenne for kick. As they eat them, they laugh in that chilling way that you imagine Stalin laughed when he enslaved almost all of Eastern Europe.

Muahahahahahaha! It vill be borscht and votka for your entire miserable, tundra-living lives!

It's been a strange day. Let me rephrase; today made me wonder things like this:

* What does a mummy taste like?
* How many angels could fit on the top of my clenched fist?
* What is the sound of one hand bitch-slapping the ever-loving shit out of someone?
* Exactly how much lubrication would it take to thrust an oldey-timey [cold!] glass Coke bottle up the goat-hole of one of those rednecks with the little white decals on their cars of "Calvin" urinating on the word "Faggot"? Also, is that too kindly an act?

[medicates self]

[hastens to snuggly]

[2/16/05]

Yesterday at work a young woman came into the office. I recognized her, but I didn't really remember why. Had she shrieked and leveled her pointy East Asian finger of reckoning at me? Had she, as once I beheld, began eating her lunch in the waiting-room antechamber - a lunch that still seemed to be struggling to hold on to life? (Those shrimp were still moving, I say, MOVING!) Then I remembered: she'd been a cryer. Granted, she'd had something to cry about: she'd been a bad, bad international and she was awaiting a meeting with an advisor who was going to plainly tell her she'd been wicked, and she knew it. I get the impression that most international students here feel that their immigration status is, at any given moment, about to fly into ten thousand crystalline shards of remorse, regret and later, resignation. They would live to rue things. (Letter "R"!) But she was OK. She'd only been kinda bad and the advisor who met with her joked with her and made her feel better. As she craned her neck at the Front Desk to see if that advisor was in, I asked if I could help her. She said that she wanted to say goodbye and to see the people who'd helped her out of her situation. Turns out she'd bought 10 $5 giftcards for Starbucks for the people in the office who had, instead of making her cry more, wiped her tears and made things OK again (with a stern warning, of course).

[takes swill from free coffee]

I have to say I'm a little torn at the moment. I mean, I bought this green sweater the other day but CLEARLY I'm an autumn: how will that affect my skintone? No, really, today I have the Dread Romance Language at seven tonight. At the same time, a professor and noted historian from the school I attended in Turkey (Bilkent University) will be giving a lecture entitled {ahem!}

Byzantium: Constantinopolis: Istanbul.

[cue crazy music: Istanbul was Constantinople, now it's Istanbul not Constantiople...]

Try getting THAT out of your head now.

I've already missed a few classes of the Dread Romance Language; this is because I loathe it with the white-hot fire of 1,000 suns. It would seem, therefore, to be a non-issue except for the

CATHOLIC GUILT COMPLEX

Yes. On the one hand, we have the sage words of my mentor and good friend Ms. Mary-Jane Poole (Magistra Poolensis), who, despite being my Latin teacher for three years, told me that I should "never let classes get in the way of my education." On the other hand, I have a chubby-faced, rosy-cheeked altarboy - one of my many previous avatars - telling me that when I skip class that the Infant Jesus in His Sweet-Scented Manger weeps uncontrollably and becomes inconsolable. [Did the Baby Jesus ever have colic, I wonder? Is wondering that even worse, perdition-wise, than skipping class?]

Well, I think you all know how this is going to turn out. At this point, I think there is little to no hope for redemption anyway; I might as well go to the fun Turkish lecture and be awed by the splendors of The Big Meat on a Stick herself. But if I'm to go down, I'm taking someone with me. I think that my Turkish professor, Abbas bey, who is also in French, will skip with me. Turk Contingent! Rebels! Excelsiorrrrr!

I remain, as ever,

Dom