Pet peeve: people who think that “everyone in Southern California” or even more amusingly “Everyone in California” is superficial, obsessed with beauty and wealth, and in shallow pursuit of someone to use.

Ahem.

Dear The Everyone Else:

Southern California is a large place full of many types of people, including but not limited to: Longshoremen, 85-year-old Armenian Ladies, Russian Jewish Immigrants, aerospace engineers, respiratory therapists, Foursquare Gospel deacons, industrial laborers, Mexican-American lesbians, lots and lots of Korean people, and an assortment of shallow, beauty-obsessed twits who moved here because they thought that’s what we were about.

Do not believe your TV. That last group is small and insignificant to the rest of us.

Hugs,

ignatz

P.S. And if you include all of California, please note that Redding, Needles, Salinas, San Bruno, Porterville, Hemet, El Centro, and Auburn have very little to do with the Melrose Place lifestyle either.

http://www.ocweekly.com/ink/04/17/cover-coker.php

Sucks to be you, Richie Rich: Chino wins!

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/news/04-01/07.shtml#story4

We have an “alternative” radio station again. Last time it only lasted 6 months. Any bets?

I finally remembered to get vegemitelover to snap a pic of me wearing the fantabulous early birthday gift you presented me with so unexpectedly:

The crazy solarized light from behind emphasizes the MAD SCIENCE that is already present in the ANTIQUE SAFETY GLASSES. Start the reactor.

Correctional Systems, Inc. (CSI) has a corporate commitment to providing safe, secure and humane correctional services which give our client population an opportunity, perhaps their first and best opportunity, to make positive changes in their lives.”

Please also see their sister company, Sentencing Concepts, Inc.

Remember: mandatory sentences mean full employment for those of us left outside.

Our hero is not a proud man, nor is he polite, so he simply stares at her across the room. She is engrossed in some other conversation and unaware, so it’s almost as though he were watching television. Her face is expressive and alert, and her eyebrows and eyes move quickly and constantly. Occasionally a strand of hair, too short really to be done up, falls and she instantly shoves it up with two fingertips, a tic he finds enthralling.

He sits back in his host’s chair and turns his attention to her shoulder and neck. She is delicately built and the curve of her shoulder, closely fit with a wool coat, attracts him. Frequently one hand will flip up and touch the shoulder as she makes a conversational point, or toy with the collar of the coat, emphasizing her fine bone structure and the line of her neck below her ear.

Finally she takes a break from the conversation and notices him. For a long moment she looks directly at him with a cat’s cool unblinking gaze. Then a tiny quick half smile and she’s up to walk down the hall towards the restroom.

On bare feet as she walks away, her woman’s weight is immediate, real, a touch and not a picture, thumping along to the back of the apartment. He can feel it in his stomach like a little temblor.He knows now that he needs her physically and staring won’t do anymore. By the time she’s settled back in her seat he’s outside, through the screen door with a crash, partygoers watching his back as he bolts off pitched forward and striding down the dark suburban street, fumbling for a cigarette and coughing at the sudden cold.

wearescott reminded me that today is the tenth anniversary of the Tonya Harding/Nancy Kerrigan dustup.

For some reason the only amusing detail I can remember is that two newsgroups instantly appeared:

alt.fan.tonya-harding.bonk.bonk.bonk and
alt.fan.nancy-kerrigan.ow.ow.ow

I remember seeing her house in Clackamas somewhere while visiting Portland and noting the lawn covered with pickup trucks and major appliances, also. Who says we don’t have class war here?

The Anti-Death Project is going well. I’m down to 242 lbs and didn’t gain anything during the usually fat-filled “holidays”. I feel a lot better, too. 20 pounds makes a huge difference in one’s day-to-day health.

And then there’s this good news: YEY!!!

Pull me another double, barista.

I was at the Borders tonight. Since I’ve been struggling with my psyche a bit lately, I strolled down that aisle, only to discover that I must Learn to Live with Asperger’s, Speak the Language of Sadness, Triumph Over my Past, and Travel the Path of Peace Away from Anger. This all seemed like too much work, so I trotted off to the Sex aisle, since that’s another area that’s been causing my tsuris.

I was confronted with the item below and promptly left the store to come home to the more understandable comforts of dinner.