Train Wreck Below

2007-02-10T12:52:00.000-06:00

I will now be on thesewerharpy.blogspot.com

Brrr

2007-02-04T10:56:00.000-06:00

There is a frigid, scared, excessively cautious Anglo-Saxon Protestant inside of me that is keeping me locked up in a kind of wintry isolation that nobody can reach, and every time I step out of it, I get hurt. But I'm sick of this cabin fever.

Chicago is so damn cold.

2007-02-03T17:07:00.000-06:00

I love Joann Sfar. Check him out. I mean it. The fact that there exists in the world a graphic novel in French that's about agnostic klezmer musicians and beautiful girls with big asses makes me so happy.

I'm not making sense today

2007-01-25T19:07:00.000-06:00

I think we understand that beauty lies and distorts. I think that's what we like about it. We love anything that can sweep us away from logic and reality and turn us into idealistic idiots for awhile. And idiotic idealism is so underrated.

EDIT: And by idiotic idealism, I mean, for example, little kids who want to grow up to be ballerinas or dolphins. Thanks for pointing that out, Harry. But you and your girlfriend are beautiful!! And I'm really more of a Teddy Roosevelt kinda gal myself.

2007-01-23T16:08:00.000-06:00

I'd like to spend half an hour in a Keith Haring mural.

Sophie?? Sophie?? Are you in there??

2007-01-21T12:42:00.000-06:00

It's only been recently that I've realized that almost everything I do is to distance myself from the immediate world around me. I have made a habit out of fighting reality. It's only recently that I've realized that so many of the things I do are attempts to slip out of the present into a kind of place where time loops and gets sidetracked and is not unlikely to start in the future and end in the past. This blog, for example. My daydreaming and constant CONSTANT fidgeting. My religious watching of travel shows (particularly No Reservations, partly because of my probably not entirely healthy crush on the fifty-year-old host). Weetzie Bat. The fact that I make friends on the internet. Ali Farka Toure and Taraf de Haidouks. The fact that the only person I tell more or less everything to (including my shrink) is hundreds of miles away and usually violently ill. The fact that I've been researching colleges since sophomore year. The fact that I rarely find anyone else as rewarding to talk to as myself. How few people have any idea what I'm like.

And I wonder why high school's been so dissappointing. I'm sure that if I had no fantasy life, I would be some kind of dead.

2007-01-16T15:26:00.000-06:00

I am absolutely brilliant at finding ways not to participate. I've been doing this my entire life.

2007-01-14T14:20:00.000-06:00

2007-01-13T21:29:00.000-06:00

Being shy is like being locked in a lead box while everyone around you levitates and does cartwheels.

Me gustas la comida, me gustas tu

2006-12-24T20:48:00.001-06:00

Mexico!!! Land of white-shirted, Catholic bus-drivers, pudgy little brown children with sweet smiles and wise faces, somebody's abuela marinating pork in chili, impish young men who always look like they're up to something, bright happy colors, and this is only my first real day.

There is also my mother. Whose voice has not gotten any quieter or less shrill. And whose jokes have not gotten an iota funnier.

If I was making a film about this place, Manu Chao would be all over the soundtrack. It's just that kind of place. If you don't know who Manu Chao is, check him out. I love his music, and he seems like such a nice guy.

2006-12-17T20:08:00.003-06:00

I am so so so so bad at getting things done. What am I gonna do?

2006-12-17T20:08:00.001-06:00

I am so so so so bad at getting things done. What am I gonna do?

2006-12-12T20:14:00.000-06:00

High school has carved out my heart like a pumpkin. Its contents may be in a compost heap, or oozing out of a garbage bag.

Mexican food made by real Mexicans

2006-11-29T21:43:00.000-06:00

People who favor the deportation of illegal immigrants in America obviously don't know shit about tacos. They have no idea that we would be damaging a priceless resource so that its slaughter and bastardization can be even more widespread, and soon, nobody will know what a good taco is supposed to taste like. They don't know what collosal tragedy and severe depression tacos can easily curb on a daily basis. A really great taco, with the right ratio of hot and spicy and greasy and meaty, with cilantro and the right resistance in the filling, is not something that we can afford to give up.

To my dear blog:

2006-11-12T21:28:00.001-06:00

I know I've been treating you like the man in every Billie Holiday song. I know that you have no reason to expect me to be faithful. I know I haven't been as considerate of your feelings and attentive as you deserve, blog, and I am sorry. But to be honest, I can't promise fidelity. I'm a sleazebag, and I'll ignore you, and mess around on you, and not give you the attention you deserve. And though physical abuse would be rather absurd and require the kind of technological savoir faire that I really have no desire to have, you have no defense against my verbal abuse, blog. My unprofessionally written sentences and idiotic, poorly developed ideas are going nowhere, it looks like. Hah! Now all I need is a greasy undershirt and a bottle of Jack Daniels.

2006-10-22T19:21:00.000-05:00

I wish that Charles Dickens, Allen Ginsberg, and Frida Kahlo all went to my high school.

2006-10-02T20:11:00.000-05:00

I have always hated morning. With the occasional welcome exception, the mornings in my life have been cold, cruel, and more demanding than I am prepared to handle gracefully at such a clumsy hour. I always feel that the morning itself is watching me the way that cold-hearted passersby watch a drunken homeless man try to tie his shoe. The whole concept of morning is intrusive: it catches you unawares when your hair is at its terrifyingly silliest, when your speech is at its most primitive, and your breath smells like an Eastern-European ogre after eating a herd of goats and the thirteen-year-old boy responsible for watching them.

2006-09-27T15:21:00.000-05:00

What exactly does "hardcore" mean? Is it a good thing?

Three Cheers for Psychopharmaceuticals

2006-09-13T18:57:00.000-05:00

I do heartily apologize for my recent neglect of my dear little clumsily worded blog. I know exactly how frustrating it is to follow a blog that is falling into disuse. But everytime I was faced with the blinking cursor and the dizzy white square, begging to be written on, I froze. I simply could not bring myself to type what I was feeling.

What I was feeling could only be expressed by a great deal of rich imagery of my insides being ripped out with hooks and knives and shredded into a bloody pulp. I'd sit in class, or lie on my bed, and crave nonexistence like a junkie. I'm rather suprised I'm sitting here typing all this. Depression, despite what the pale, superfluously safety-pinned kids and the awful poems that they write might have you believe, is not for sissies.

So yes, I am taking meds. (Yes, they were free, and prescribed by my dad.)

And no, at the moment, I'd rather not die.

But my junior year is not quite going as I'd hoped.

2006-09-01T15:44:00.000-05:00

I'm not doing well.

2006-08-06T16:15:00.000-05:00

Today, I saw a huge, rusted, ugly train car, the kind that transports timber, soybeans, steel, or whatever the hell it is that they send across the horifically boring excess space that we all know and love in North America. The thing about this otherwise commonplace object, dear readers, was stamped on the side in solemn, official-looking, factory-issued letters, not surrounded by any pictoral declaration of some bored Manitoban teenager's unquenchable rebellion on the side of the car. It said, "Do not hump".

Had they had problems with this in the past? Do people find seven ton freight cars so irresistibly erotic that they just can't control themselves when the new shipment of iron rolls into their sleepy little town? More likely, this is a term for this kind particular brand of big, ugly mass transport, perhaps when they unhook that bone-crushingly heavy thing from the rest of the train and put it somewhere else for a bit. (Why? God knows. Canadians are weird.) The latter is probably it. But,I would imagine that there's seldom any attractive strangers showing up in places in those nearly empty little hamlets between Saskawhat and Wherethehellisthat Perhaps this is the lonely, isolated Canuk's idea of hot new action...

Ew. When did I become such a perverted teenager. Somebody shoot me with a maturity gun.

2006-08-05T16:20:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow I'm off to go see my pregnant Canadian pseudo-cousin and have fun for a few days in the coolest, swingingest city in the province of Ontario before being hurled back into the gaping pit of despair that is my hometown. A gaping pit of tree-lined, blue ribbon winning school district-located, absurdly safe, aesthetically pleasing despair.

This summer has made me exponentially more stupid. Don't be fooled by the fact that I used the word "exponentially". The more I feel my thoughts turn into insipid regurgitations of something else, and the mushier my head starts to feel, the more multisyllabic my daily vocabulary becomes. Jesus, why does everyone think I'm so smart? I do know my asshole from my elbow for the time being, but tomorrow, that doesn't look so good.

I wish that I was the type to spontaneously roar in frustration.

Colm Feore can go suck it

2006-08-04T12:55:00.000-05:00

Stratford is basically what Flossmoor would become if it was run soley by an oligarchy of the most irritating members of the H-F theatre department.

2006-07-25T22:23:00.000-05:00

I came to several conclusions in the past month, which was spent in France:

I am totally useless with my peers.

Basic human behavior genetically tatooed to our psyches makes running an honest, efficient government like going to war with toothpicks and hoping that the people with all the tanks and shit are nice enough to let you win anyway.

Being rich, beautiful, and popular does not equate happiness if you're a cranky bitch. Even if your abode looks like this:

. Yes, I did stay there for a week. But I would have rather stayed in a crowded, cockroach-infested apartment with a noisy, demonstratively affectionate family. Because:

Hugs are more important than money.

Also

People from the Balkans know how to party in a way the average American hedonist could never understand.

Speaking and understanding foreign languages is much easier if you're a little drunk.

I could never go to a small liberal arts school.

People as a whole are hypocritical, selfish, racist motherfuckers. There is no avoiding this.

Though my virginity is still clinging to me like a leech, and I may decide in a few years to retract the following, when I have some idea what the hell I'm talking about, I'm convinced that food and sex are the same thing, with different organs, textures, and frequencies.

I will never be able to stop playing with my hair. Get over it.

Postage from abroad

2006-06-30T14:04:00.000-05:00

Paris is kind of a weird compromise between the stereotype it is trying near successfully to live up to, hobos with dirty feet, and all the minorities that seem to be represented only in restaurants. I swear I've had dreams about the architecture involving princesses falling in love with unwashed revolutionaries. The men are a shockingly sultry genetic blend, and are always behind on their shaving. My feet hurt constantly, and I don't think they've been clean yet.
Joe is getting constantly more exasperated at my ineptitude, lack of meaningful social skills,and tendency to trip.

Everyone in our group fucking loves Joe, and his Mr. Osman chimney sweep hat and his ugly-ass shoes that everybody's dad has worn at some point. The kids are nice. I have to go, and pay the nice internet cafe man. More later.

2006-06-25T20:20:00.000-05:00

I've been away, and am soon to go away again. I'm liking this almost gyspyish nomadism (my feet smell bad enough to warrant the gypsy comparison) and not being in fucking Flossmoor. I'm off tomorrow to go improve my skills in the language that I shouldn't have taken in the first place. And drink espressos and complain about how much America sucks. The more travel shows that I watch, and more Midwestern car trips I take, the firmer this conclusion becomes. I'll come back and share with y'all the hilarity that will ensue when ten southerners and ten Yanks all under the age of nineteen take off to Europe for a month. And detailed descriptions of what I'm putting in my mouth. (The food, not that! Ew! Is that the kind of girl you think I am?) (Actually, my mom approached me with the "Just be safe, ok honey? Venereal diseases aren't fun at any age. The word for condom is the same in French, they'll know what you're talking about.")
I hope your summers are going well, and that Krissy finds a queen for her Enchanted Forest. Buy stuff from black Tori, yo.

Manhole

2006-06-13T23:11:00.000-05:00

Good place to think. Wonderful name for a gay bar. There is one in my front lawn. That is all.

Whiny White Women Wallowing

2006-06-09T17:57:00.000-05:00

There are few things on this earth as shrill, irritating, bafflingly popular, and wasteful of pop culture space as Meg Ryan. As it is summer, and I am an American, I have been watching a slightly immoderate amount of TV in the last couple of days. French Kiss was on some mostly neglected movie channel that we get, one of those channels designed for chubby divorcees, middle-aged gay men and twenty six year old women who still wear mostly pink and worship people like Madonna . ELOVE, maybe?
French Kiss, for those of you who haven't seen it, features Kevin Kline as this horny, scuzzy, mustachioed French thief, and Meg Ryan, who, as always, has this ridiculous Tinkerbell hair and continuously makes really bizarre assumptions about the opposite sex. Kevin ends up following Meggie, the neurotic (God no! Meg Ryan?) history teacher, because of things he leaves in her bag, and must then chase her and retrieve. (A vine! So he can grow grapes! In a vineyard! Gee, maybe he's got hopes and aspirations! Maybe he's not such a shitbag after all!) Which means putting up with Meg Ryan, who is chasing her cheating fiancee, because when said fiancee sees her, he will realize the error of his ways and return home to Canada, and they will get married and become a boring Ontario couple with Christmas trees and high-achieving kids,and who are kept on a disturbingly short leash by their inlaws.
I didn't end up seeing the end, but is there ever any doubt to how a Meg Ryan movie is going to end?

I'm blogging about Meg Ryan. I think this is a pretty good indicator as to how stimulating this summer has been so far.

EDIT: Kevin Kline was totally hot.

EDIT EDIT: I saw the end. I confess, I was seduced. I mean, they ended up together! And they kissed! They FRENCH kissed! They lived happily ever after! In France! What on Earth made me think that I could defeat the Romantic Comedy? That superiority complex that Krissy shedded all over me ain't worth shit. I'm a lost cause.

2006-05-30T20:08:00.000-05:00

My homework is being a large, unforgiving, German dominatrix this week. And S&M is definetly not my thing.

2006-05-23T23:16:00.000-05:00

"What are your interests, Sophie?"
"What do you like to do?"
"What are your talents and/or passions?"
"What do you want out of life?"
"What can you tell us about yourself?"

I don't know. After sixteen years, I truly have no motherfucking idea. I wouldn't even know where to begin, because I don't know if there is a place to begin. I've spent more or less this entire year realizing what a spoiled, spineless, talentless waste of relatively fortunate birth I've been. How utterly I've squandered every opportunity. How everyone seems to see me with their unique combination of pity, confusion, and revulsion. Sophie, Sophie. What are we going to do with you? You had such promise. You've been such a collosal disappointment. We've been too polite to say so, but you've read our thoughts beautifully. We're saddened and embarrassed, make no mistake, we've also enjoyed all the schaudenfreude tremendously. Thank you ever so much for making a fool of yourself so consistently and reliably.

I have this awful feeling that this will only get worse.

I genuinely feel that I owe someone an apology.

Uh huh.

2006-05-12T21:33:00.000-05:00

It seems necessary that I should point out what a smoldering hot piece of meat Manolo Cardona is. Those South Americans got the scruffy ration down to the gorgeously accidental science it should be. Mmm mm mmm mm mm (said with the blackest inflection I'm capable of. Aw hell, since you can't hear me, I can be as black as I wanna, foo'.)

The cold reality of dairy (as narrated by the occasionally lactose intolerant)

2006-05-12T20:56:00.001-05:00

"Chrissy, you're still so young! You should be trying DIFFERENT flavors of ice cream! You should be experimenting! You should be open-minded! The world is your oyster!", said Joel, an astoundingly cool and with-it kind of hombre, to Angie's xenophobic younger sister who refused to eat any ice cream that she hadn't pre-approved. (I don't actually know if he said the part about the oyster, since I wasn't actually present, but it would have been perfect if he had, for reasons not entirely unrelated to her loathing for the lesbian couple down the block.)

Since then, we have not let him forget it. He blushes in his awkward Joel kind of way, whines that he wishes he hadn't said that, but it's become an indispensible Joel-ism whether he likes it or not.

When I was at Krissy's tonight, out of some tangent of conversation that I don't really remember, we wondered aloud what flavors of ice cream we would be. (Incidentally, Joel refers to anyone he considers a hottie with a certain flavor that I won't disclose.) "We should call him and ask!", I suggested naively.

So we did call him. Somehow it was me that ended up doing it, on Angie's phone. I was first confused by the new cell phone (as cell phones are hardly my area of expertise.) Then I assumed the male voice at the other end of the line was his dad, and I waited for him to go get Joel. During which time I inevitably got distracted, this time by my reflection, because there is hardly a motherfucking surface in Krissy's house that doesn't have a mirror. ("Sophie!" you groan to yourself, smacking your forehead.) After some yelling, confusion, and impatience on his part, I asked him. "I'll need some time to think this over." he said.

"Fine" I said. "Call us back when you've figured it out."

And what was the verdict, ladies and gentlemen?

Coffee-flavored imitation Haagen-Dasz.

So basically, I'm a pretentious, hipper-than-thou asshole, that really can't compare to the thick, sexy, no-bullshit real thing. I guess I could have told you that. All this diagnosis tells me is that I really am as obnoxious as I feared. Maybe I'll be upgraded when I'm no longer in high school, or no longer obnoxious. And I can tell you for damn sure which one will happen first.

2006-05-10T22:09:00.000-05:00

I just finished The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. I think I have to retract my statement.

Murakami is the kind of author who frustrates and humiliates you,and makes you earn your keep. He tries your patience in such a strange, attractive way, and then after hours of perplexing and fascinating characters and plotlines, it ends. It's not terribly different from having all the excess in your brain set on fire and then perfumed.

I think I need to read this book again.

Sophie the Sadist

2006-05-08T18:34:00.000-05:00

(from a quiz on okcupid.com)

The Wild Rose
Random Brutal Love Dreamer (RBLDf)

Colorful, but unpicked. You are The Wild Rose.

Prone to bouts of cynicism, sarcasm, and thorns, you excite a certain kind of man. Hoping to gather you up, he flirts and winks and asks you out, ultimately professing his love. Then you make him bleed. Why? Because you're the rare, independent, self-sufficient kind of woman who does want love, but not from a weakling.

You don't seem to take yourself too seriously, and that's refreshing. You aren't uptight; you don't over-plan. Romance-wise, sex isn't a top priority--a true relationship would be preferable. For your age, you haven't had a lot of bonafide love experience, though, and this kind of gets to core of the issue. You're very selective.

The problem is them, not you, right? You have lofty standards that few measure up to. You're out there all right, but not to be picked up by just anyone.

Blas for you

2006-05-07T19:58:00.000-05:00

I have debated and guilted myself for months, (maybe only two) and decided that I really prefer Tom Robbins to Murakami. Is the reason for this ignorance, blasphemy, or the things in America that genuninely don't suck? (Like, road food, Ben Franklin, N'awlins and the fact that there are bathrooms everywhere.) Well, see, I really really like pie. And Franklin is pretty high on my list of baddest motherfuckers ever. Ignorance and blasphemy probably play a pretty big role in many of my decisions, but in the end, I think what gets me is the pie.

Lunch, Wednesday May 3

2006-05-03T20:56:00.000-05:00

Krissy: (somewhat whiny) Why are there no black people in Russia, Sophie?
Sophie: Because it's Russia. What you're doing is like complaining that there are no Mexicans in the Congo.
Krissy: Harumph. There should be Mexicans in the Congo. Seriously, how do they find food to eat without Mexicans around to make it?
(Pause)
Sophie: They don't.
(Eruption of guilty laughter)

Time elapses, Sophie and Angie tell funny stories about schizophrenics.

Joel, in a moment of hysterics, spits at least two peanuts out at Sophie. His melanin-less face turns bright red. He apologizes as profusely as his WASPiness allows him.

Hearty laughs are shared at Joel's expense.

Let's see, politically incorrect jokes, jabs at the effects of homeschooling, dysfunctional family stories...I hope my lunches with friends are like this when we have paychecks and babies (or the painful or smug lack thereof). I do so hope.

Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out...

2006-05-01T16:52:00.001-05:00

In Euro, several months ago, we were watching some documentary narrated by either Morgan Freeman or Liam Neeson. (Because who the hell else are you going to hire to narrate your doccumentary? What do either of these people have to do with the Soviet Union, you may ask? Well, what does Morgan Freeman have to do with penguins? What does Liam Neeson have to do with Tibet? Exactly.) Being about the Soveit Union, of course, there were the beleagured, prematurely humpbacked women in the de facto babushkas waiting in lines. The lines were hopeless, and whatever was at the end of the line was always something I could find sitting unused in some closet in my house.

But instead of feeling the obligatorily awkward I'm sorry you're not fortunate well I'd really like to share your pain, but we middle-class white people don't really understand suffering , I just thought, "Sistah, ain't it the truth." I'm always standing in line for something. When I get to the front, the person in charge absentmindedly informs me that they've run out. Same thing happens in the next line. I force a smile when somebody else, tearful with relief, finally gets their eggs, beer, or soap, or whatever the hell is at the end of those lines, but all I can think about is how protein-deficient and dirty I am, and how much kinder everything would seem after a few of those beers. (Well, according to this obnoxious metaphor, I am Russian, correct?)

I really want to read Gary Shteyngart's new book. I imagine that this is the reason for my Slavic colored glasses today.

2006-04-27T14:50:00.000-05:00

It seems that all of a sudden, everyone has become fascinated with my sex life. Yes, the one that doesn't exist. It's very odd to feel like a thirty-year-old virgin at the age of sixteen. (Yes, I'm an arrogant jerk who's never happy where I am. Get over it.) My dubious getting laid has dominated almost every conversation I've had in the last week.

If I had a covert affair with a married man, I'm sure this wouldn't happen. But then I'd be the other woman, and whatever interchangable, spoiled children he had would want me dead, plus I'm not crazy about hotel rooms. On the other hand, I'd wear really cool lingerie and get lots of expensive jewelry. Though come to think of it, I've always found expensive jewelry incredibly overrated.

I wish that I had more badass secrets.

I wish I could make up my mind.

I wish this high school thing would lapse into college. Now would be nice.

2006-04-21T18:34:00.000-05:00

A few days ago, our basement flooded. Since my mother insists on having cats who live soley to eat, vomite, defecate, and urinate, and their shit box is down there, and after a number of years things just kind of get pushed in corners to multiply and grow bacteria, it was very disgusting and third-world-meets-a-bewildered-first-world. I spent 2 afternoons throwing things out and getting fifteen years of uncleaned basement all over me.

The basement is the haven for crap we never use, have forgotten about, could care less about. Jump ropes, excess dishware, 25 cent cookbooks, ugly dresses, cheap Chinese party favors that serve absolutely no purpose except to break, be forgotten about, then be stepped on with your bare feet three weeks later. What is also in the basement are the photo albums. These got wet like everthing else.

My mother has spent the last 4 days or so peeling them apart and leaving the photos out to dry. Our living room has become paved with all the different Sophies that every few years would show up and covertly wipe out the previous Sophie. So many of these Sophies have no idea what to do with curly hair. Most of them are chubby, at some point they seem to realize this. The very small ones are my favorite; if they scowl at the camera, they only become more appealing. The older ones that can't be bothered to smile I have a strong urge to smack. Joe shows up occassionally, but he has no sideburns and a chubby round little boy face that I don't remember, and he doesn't seem to be too fond of women. I remember almost every one of my outfits. I don't feel that I have anything in common with most of these Sophies. Some of them I want to hug, I want to make some of them cry. But they're all lost. They disappeared into the various stages of puberty. To be honest, I don't really miss the ones I lost to puberty. The ones I miss are mostly the ones I barely remember.

My parents are also featured in this. You can see my dad's hair fading and disappearing almost chronologically. My mom looks young and happy, and there are all these people drinking, laughing, and being silly who I've only seen much later, when they seemed much more tired and didn't smile so easily. I don't recognize the places or outfits. These pictures really create more questions than they answer.

Spent last night with a really strange combination of people, some of whom obviously weren't used to hanging out with girls. It was fun. And Tori's dad is getting married. Huzzah.

2006-04-21T16:45:00.000-05:00

I came here and realized how neglected and half-assed this blog has been, but I'm just feeling so uninspired right now, and I'm sure you don't want to hear tedious, self-absorbed ranting about what an idiotic failure I am, so I'm taking a rain check. This is, essentially, a non-post.

2006-04-16T21:30:00.000-05:00

Hooray for the dubious exodus from Egypt and a week of constipation!! (Me, abstain from baked goods for a week? Ha.)
And good hair days. Those too.

Gypsy punk and Gruyere.

2006-04-09T19:09:00.000-05:00

Last night I saw Gogol Bordello for the second time. If you haven't seen them, do yourself the favor. I realized that there are very few situations in the world where you can do the above.

Also, Krissy and I have developed a game where we compare people to cheeses. Like a very forward, aggressive cheese would be a very forward, aggressive person, while a soft and feminine cheese would be a soft, feminine individual, and really bland cheese would be a really boring person. If any of you can think of a cheese for me, I would be delighted, and I will have you all in mind next time I am eating cheese. The only one that Krissy and I were able to come up with is an unexpectedly sharp cheddar for Asian Tori. I think that I will keep a log of this on this blog, everybody is welcome to contribute

2006-04-04T21:15:00.001-05:00

When thinking of France, the following kind of chase each other around in my head, making for a kind of fragmented confusion that anyone who has glanced over my blog should be somewhat familiar with; some combination of sex, death, existentialism, slenderness, delicious food with lots of duck fat, the word "stroll", very stylish outfits that when evaluated carefully are really very silly, tastefully shabby clothing stinking of nicotine and inferior deoderant, wine and mustard, cafes, and arrogance. Enter an occasional maligned Algerian. And that slutty dead singer who my 56-year-old gay cousin is obsessed with. And Thibault ::sighs involuntarily:: I am not ignorant of the gaps or oversimplifications, but this is is what it is.

Maybe an academic program headquartered in Minnesota with an anti-alchohol policy isn't the best way to do France when you're sixteen. (You should have heard the woman's accent on the phone, she sounded like something out of Fargo.) (Wait, I've still never seen Fargo.) Having not been to France since I was too young to appreciate much beyond the ubiquitous chocolate and dogs, I really have no idea what I'm getting myself into. I hope I don't fall in love. I hope I do.

2006-04-04T16:57:00.000-05:00

My little sister is a quarter inch taller than me. It can only go downhill from here. Or should I say, in two opposite directions at an alarming rate.

Another disturbing piece of news: the Brokeback Mountain remixes. What did Gustavo Santolalla and Wyoming and all those sheep do to deserve this? Is music only acceptable if you can dance shirtless (or get sodomized) to it while high on crystal meth? Sorry, mainstream gay yuppie community, you're on my shitlist.

2006-03-16T22:06:00.000-05:00

Tonight I had Mexican food made by real Mexicans. Life is good. Without Mexico, the world would be a much sadder place. I am also totally fascinated by Rasputin, despite how exorbitantly creepy he was. I hope Anastasia escaped, and I hope she was happy wherever she ended up. I wish I was a Romanov. I think I'm taking AP Euro a bit too personally.

2006-03-11T22:54:00.000-05:00

My parents really should have anticipated panic attacks and not entirely unvain self-loathing when they had me. Two shrinks having a child. What a thoroughly shitty idea. Look what happened to Brenda Chenowith.

From J-Pan to the Yucatan

2006-03-07T21:59:00.000-05:00

Bulgarian choral music is so cool it makes my brain hurt, a bit like what I imagine the polar opposite of a seizure would be. It has this eerie dullness, this impending doom, like the women with unpronouncable names standing nonchalantly in the face of hell. It has the sneer of the "I dare you", the cyclical sadness and superhuman strength that comes out of rape, oppression and the heartbreaking quagmire that is the Balkans. I think in the technological bath that we are submerged in, we don't get enough that is really creepy, dark, and fascinating, not enough attractive strangers who truly look like strangers in dark clothing, the magic and the unexplainable left when we killed the Indians, all we are left with is the confusing, and the noisy dissonance of the electrically powered things that never ever goes away.

I've realized that the whatthefuckisthis genre of music is quickly becoming my favorite. Everything else sounds exactly like something else I've heard, that I'm sick of hearing. The way that music is marketed to Americans is so narrow and provincial, white people for white people, black people for black people, uhh, oh yeah, Asians, you'll be with the whites, Latinos, you're with the blacks. I guess at this point I'm not really talking about music anymore. But I have more to say than that racism in its various subtle forms generally sucks. It just seems like all of what is supposed to be our art (in terms of music, film, television, books,etc.) is so processed and insincere, like they know whatever they churn out will be eaten up if they make it more and more decadent and slim down and fatten up where they know we want it slimmed down and fattened up. In short, I am glad to be leaving the country relatively soon, and Eugene Hutz basically saved my life.

Has it occured to many of you that I often make no sense? Is it annoying?

2006-03-04T23:12:00.000-05:00

Do you ever have days where your life feels like Africa?

I mean, in the sense of being incomprehensively complex, absolutely crawling with problems, and whenever anyone tries to help they make the difficult problems completely hopeless? Also, at any given time you might be ethnically cleansed, mutilated or forcibly infected with an incurable virus?

Well, I can't really say that's been me lately.

But something tells me I really need a man. My feminist guardian angels might be shaking their heads in dissappointment, but I do need one. God knows where he's going to come from, and I'm not expecting perfection, love, or even similar taste in movies. Just someone with decent arm muscles who for some reason, opts to like me.

Does my mom not realize how her voice echoes throughout our house, and that I can hear every unflattering thing she says about me, every catty remark on the phone, that she mangles the details of every story she tells? Why do moms never catch on to things? I hope I never become one.

2006-02-27T22:34:00.000-05:00

I went somewhat begrudgingly, not unironically, to Turnabout, with no date (at least no nonSapphic one) and no drunken hookupfull afterparty planned. Why, I'm still not exactly sure. Some combination of cultural/social obligation, curiosity and homemade Chinese food, made by real Chinese people. (Taiwanese, whatever) And to end the barrage of "Do you ever straighten your hair? How often? How long does it take? What does it look like?", I straightened my hair and for a couple hours abandoned my frizzy heritage. It was quite well-received, with the obvious exception being the only other Jew who was available for comment.
There is something about a specific combination of sudden vanity after weeks of cosmetic neglect and really bad rap music that turns me into something that can only be described as not-Sophie, or dirty-ass ho, if you so prefer. Blame it on the integrated community, MTV, the Internet, Save the Last Dance, but I enjoy being somebody who my friends don't recognize for a few hours. This might prove problematic when I turn eighteen. Or even more so before then.
By the end of the night, my two best friends were dating each other.

I know, right?

I guess it had been kind of naive to expect a straight boy who spends most of his free time with the same few girls to remain neutral forever. Certainly to expect that my straight male friend would never hook up with one of my friends, given the parallels in our personalities, and the likelihood that we would get along well with each other's friends. But I was always really hoping this wouldn't happen. Given the circumstances (her moving to Maryland in June, with the obvious termination of the relationship and less opportunity for an ugly breakup), its not as bad as it could be.
There haven't been enough situations for me to really evaluate how awkward this whole thing is going to turn out to be. I'm not quite as weirded out as initially, but still not quite comfortable. I always had this fantasy that he would date one of my friends, have some kind of horrible breakup that for the rest of high school we would have to tiptoe around, and my social circle would become even more incestuous than usual, and long story short, my fun for the rest of high school would have been obliterated. This is one of the reasons that, yes, roll your eyes, become so exasperated that you punch a hole in your monitor, that it would be preferable for him to be gay. But he isn't. And we love him anyway. I'll get over this, things will become normal, and I really am happy for them. My reasons for not being are totally selfish, and I accept this. Joe really did need to date somebody.

2006-02-20T11:13:00.000-05:00

I don't even like Harvey Fierstein. How many creepy, gay, self-absorbed Heebs does the world need to fill its quota? I was creeped out by him when I was little, and still am to some extent. I could not sit through the Torch Song Trilogy, and even Celluloid Closet got irritating when he showed up, and I am as much of a sucker for queer cinema as the next lonely, liberal straight chick. He is the kind of Jew I really can't stand ( or one of the myriad), one of those lapsed Jewish types who exists soley on the labels that birth and chromosomes have slapped on him. So talking like Harvey Fierstein all weekend through no choice of my own, but of a virus that seems to be limited to my throat, has not been ideal. Any of my own laughter creeps me out.
But I did find a dress for turnabout that doesn't make me look like a pillow from Pottery Barn Teens. And I always have John Leguizamo to be my Sugar Daddy, my Sugar Pimp. Sugar Daddy, by Yerba Buena is a worthy iTunes purchase.

2006-02-13T20:43:00.000-05:00

http://kevan.org/johari?name=Sophie Kern

2006-02-08T21:26:00.000-05:00

After what has been since about Christmas or so, a throroughly apathetic winter, the downy Midwest flakes have come back to cover our streets and and make us smile and think, yes, maybe the American dream hasn't been threatened into silence and inaction, maybe it's time to go sledding. Then your dad tells you that it's just lake effect and won't last. You try not to let this burst your warm-mittens and hot cocoa high, but then you realize how many times you have pulled yourself with the weak chains of optomism that you still don't have the heart to break, despite how abysmal the facts surrounding your life might look.
Sometimes I understand those emo boys. It is pretty clear that this age sucks, and a very small percentage of the people i have encountered have been really skilled with irony and unique self-expression. Despair, hopelessness, I get. Catchy songs from a cool new misfit band that everyone else likes, even having to have the t-shirt, I get. Apathy, check. Desire and confusion surrounding sex, check, check. But those pants? The ones that make their legs look like fabricky cigarrettes, the ones where swear you can see each sperm being crushed into oblivion, on the boys who are too depressed and/or sexually confused to eat, with frightening haircuts, which somehow make them irresistable, i totally don't get.

2006-02-08T16:47:00.000-05:00

Today was one of those days where I wished I had stayed in South America. I think I'm better suited to the laissez-faire, all-night-long highly carnivorous pseudoEuropean way of life. Other than that, I'm just feeling thoroughly uninspired, will post again when the iron is hot, whatever the hell that means.

Sophnomuzon

2006-01-28T20:20:00.000-05:00

My playlist tonight:
Sol Da Liberdade 4:35 Daniela Mercury 2000-Sol Da Liberdade Latin
Bulgarian Chicks 5:52 Balkan Beat Box featuring Vlada Tomova & M. Alexiava Balkan Beat Box Electronic
O Estrangeiro 6:14 Caetano Veloso Beleza Tropical 2: Novo! Mais! Melhor! Latin
Madagascar - Roumania (Tu jesty fata) 6:32 Gogol Bordello East Infection - EP Rock
Life During Wartime 3:41 Talking Heads Fear of Music Rock
Rebellion (Lies) 5:10 Arcade Fire Funeral Alternative
Bourbon & Division 3:23 Firewater Get Off The Cross...We Need The Wood For The Fire Alternative
Hungry for You (J'Aurais Toujours Faim de Toi) 2:52 The Police Ghost in the Machine Rock
I Know What I Know 3:13 Paul Simon Graceland Rock
Sit Down, Stand Up (Snakes & Ladders) 4:19 Radiohead Hail To The Thief Alternative & Punk
River 4:03 Joni Mitchell Hits Folk
Got My Own Thing Now 2:30 Squirrel Nut Zippers Hot Jazz
Dogs Were Barking 4:53 Gogol Bordello Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike Alternative & Punk
Country Feedback (Live) 6:16 R.E.M. In Time: The Best Of R.E.M. 1988-2003 [Bonus Disc] Rock
When I Was a Little Spy 4:53 Gogol Bordello vs. Tamir Muskat J.U.F. Alternative
Rock 'n' Roll Nigger 3:23 Patti Smith Land (1975-2002) (Disc 1) Alternative & Punk
Spanish Bombs 3:18 The Clash London Calling Alternative & Punk
Occurrence On the Border (Hopping On a Pogo-Gypsy Stick) 3:26 Gogol Bordello Multi Kontra Culti Rock
Too Drunk to F**k 2:16 Nouvelle Vague Nouvelle Vague Alternative
Ida 6:22 Rachid Taha Rachid Taha Live Rock
Breathe Me 4:32 Sia Six Feet Under - Everything Ends Soundtrack
Me And Julio Down By The School Yard 2:42 Paul Simon The Paul Simon Anthology (Disc 1) Rock
I Am Trying To Break Your Heart 6:58 Wilco Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Country
Something tells me I'm turning into my dad.

2006-01-28T17:46:00.001-05:00

http://www.gogolbordello.com/chronicles/video/60rev/
The guy who made this video approached me and invited me to someplace called the Tequila Roadhouse. I still have his number, incidentally.

2006-01-28T17:38:00.000-05:00

I am hooked up to a machine, with every brain wave being encoded, no evil thought (or evil peak in those meaningless lines that are supposed to be related to my thought process. My head is wrapped in very sterile-looking gauze, and at first glance I appear to be dying. Actually, at every braced glance at the mirror, there is something desperate and horrific about my appearance. I look absolutely terrifying, even by my standards. This has been the dullest Saturday I've had in months. The glue in my hair is about as disgusting as you would imagine, especially given that I'm not six years old and/or apathetic about the hair that took forgodammever to grow. I've been told it comes out, but the woman's expression the entire time looked somewhat shell-shocked and her laugh was too flat for me to be content that she was the one hooking me up to a seizure machine. For some reason, my friends really liked the idea of me having electrodes attached to my head; the idea of an impromptu indie sci-fi flick came up several times. Yeah, understandable, they aren't spending their Saturdays at the whim of a machine often used for autistic kids. I really hope I never get cancer.

2006-01-27T20:06:00.000-05:00

Sophie's random George Bush quote:

"I'm also not very analytical. You know I don't spend a lot of time thinking about myself, about why I do things."

Take this quiz at QuizGalaxy.com

This might make you despise me

2006-01-26T22:46:00.000-05:00

My superiority complex, as of late, has probably gotten out of hand. I'm not as alarmed by this as I would be if I were sweet, honest, kind-hearted kinda gal friends of my parents would swear I was. To so many people, I seem so benevolent and harmless, if somewhat strange, and even though I can make certain people very uncomfortable.
I am so sick of hearing the Mean Girls thesis picked apart and analyzed. "Why are girls so mean? How can they possibly be this soulless and cruel? What could possibly be their motive for such despicable behavior? It can't really be this bad, can it?" Oh yes it can. This is a really exasperatingly clueless reaction. Nobody is truly shocked when a bus in Israel gets blown up, or some third world politician uses the exhaustively collected charity donations to buy a BMW. Or several. So why would a teenage girl saying less than flattering things about another teenage girl be so deeply shocking? Everybody has an evil self, some are just better at keeping their evil self squashed under fat piles of goodness.
It seems that recently I have had much more ease talking about people behind their backs. The people in my high school are becoming something like cartoon characters, silly, predictable, somewhat one dimensional beings making more of less the exact same mistakes in every episode. Some I feel sorry for, some I just hate, which I should feel worse about. I pick people apart for my own amusement. I know full well how this violates so many laws of decency, but it is too much damn fun to stop. I don't manipulate or confront anyone about their faults. I realize that I am a horrible snob about almost everything. But up to this date, I don't think I've destroyed anybody. But the collective self-mutilation I could be responsible for if people heard what I thought could kill an ogre.
Whoa. I am horrible. I feel despicable being so brutally honest. I don't think I'm a mean spirited person, but there is that little c-word inside of me that high school is just exacerbating. At least I know I'm not alone.

The title of this entry is the unheard sound in your throat that is deafening on a bad day

2006-01-25T22:09:00.000-05:00

Disclaimer: Sophie has been posessed by the obnoxious, self-absorbed demons she likes to consider herself immune to.
My teenage soul is stinging. The chemicals in my brain do not seem to be sloshing in my favor. I will blog again when I am more inspired and less fat and irritating. I will return soon and be fanatically irritated with myself for writing this entry. And for talking too loud and spitting too much and not having a fucking clue.

2006-01-18T21:00:00.000-05:00

And here we are, stuck on Flossmoor, untouched by joy, Sharpies, only false proclamations of identity that aren't anywhere near as much fun as this one.

2006-01-18T20:52:00.000-05:00

Photobucket is more fun than a barrel of homosexuals. Actually, nothing's more fun than a barrel of homosexuals, but it sure beats logarithms. On a less queer note, this is Gabriel.

2006-01-18T20:40:00.000-05:00

So this is what goes on at boarding school

2006-01-18T20:38:00.000-05:00

2006-01-17T22:24:00.000-05:00

For any of you who saw the Check, Please with the adorably awkward, funny Jewish guy, the other kind of strange Jewish guy, and the Botoxed personal trainer, (Fat Willy's) I'm almost positive that this is the same Nathan Rabin.

Brief, Partially True Biography of 50 Cent
by Nathan Rabin

Rapper 50 Cent (real name: 50 Cents) first entered the public's consciousness after he was shot seventeen times while leaving his mother's womb. The incident shocked, horrified and confused a puzzled nation (that nation being, strangely enough, Iceland), and it wasn't long before the rapper/infant was selling crack to other newborns and several very self-destructive fetuses.

By the time he was old enough to walk, 50 had been arrested six times, shot at nine times and dueled publicly with the kid from the Life cereal commercials whose head exploded when he ate Pop Rocks and drank Coca-Cola at the same time. An average student with a gift for being stabbed and shot, 50 soon came to the attention of legendary DJ Jam Master Jay, who was extremely impressed by Mr. Cent's ability to survive multiple stabbings and gunshot wounds and to a much lesser extent, his rapping ability.

Mr. Cent signed a lucrative record deal with Hollywood Records in the early nineties, only to watch his entire label die in a flurry of gunshots meant for him. After mourning their deaths for the better part of an afternoon, Cent rebounded by releasing the single "How To Rob," which explored a subject with universal appeal: how badly Ja Rule sucks. A good sport accustomed to light-hearted ribbing, Rule proved he could take a joke by stabbing 50 repeatedly.

After years of waiting and recuperating, Mr. Cent's big break came when mega-star Eminem announced in a radio interview that 50 Cent was not
only his favorite rapper, but also the father of his unborn child. Cent and
Eminem were married in a small, private ceremony conducted by Little
Richard, after which the two multi-platinum rappers brutally gay-bashed the
rock legend, but not before being shot at by the entire wedding party.

One of the most frequently stabbed rappers of his era, 50 Cent today lives in New York, where he and Eminem are working on new and exciting ways to get stabbed and shot.

Whoredom

2006-01-17T21:01:00.000-05:00

What would my options be if I dropped out of high school? Could I be one of those girls who bangs the shit out of buckets and straddles drums at Gogol Bordello shows? Could I be una puta in Buenos Aires? I remember we suggested at some point that Krissy work at a kinky sex club in Paris, would this work for me as well? I've heard high end hookers in Vegas make 250 grand a year, how hard could that be?
All of these involve me using my body to make a living, and not in a very wholesome, Christian way. (Somehow I don't think my parents would bring Jesus and his pals into the argument if something like this did happen.) But what else is a female high school dropout going to do, other than selling her soul to the bloated corporations of McEvil and such? Men don't even really have the option of selling themselves, unless they're either gay or extremely beefcakey (often both.) Our society assumes that everybody is going to go to college and support themselves and not only put food on the table, but that the food provided is healthy, fresh, balanced and lovingly prepared. All this astonishment at mass obesity and unemployment seems pretty fucking naive coming from those whose job it is to make sure this stuff doesn't happen. So my point is, do they really think every student in the system is going to kill themselves trying to get an education from teachers who should have been weeded out from that occupation much earlier in their education? Do they really expect the druggies and thugs and wannabe thugs and just plain stupid kids to know what the fuck a logarithm is? Conclusion: whoever made up the system was either three sheets to the wind, a lying fetal sac of a Republican, or a junior high teacher (likely all three). So that's my rant for today. I have to go learn how to speak French now. Good luck on all the finals that you aren't studying for.

Update

2006-01-13T00:13:00.000-05:00

A very cute Argentinian boy told me I was beautiful. And tomorrow morning, I will be sleeping with wires attached to my head. George W. Bush is still the president. I'm still a virgin. Elvis is still dead. Masturbation is still healthy, or so I've heard. The colorful characters in AP Euro are still unbelievably foppish and arrogant (with the exception of KANT) but Professor Weber is the coolest guy ever. If you show Krissy your wrist, she will have convulsions and die. Several times. The world hasn't ended, miraculously. And I haven't started studying vectors. Shit. And we're all going to die.

Huzzah!!

2006-01-06T22:07:00.000-05:00

http://homepage.mac.com/jkern2/PhotoAlbum10.html
more to come

Jamon y queso

2005-12-26T13:30:00.000-05:00

I am still in Argentina. (For those who would like an update, check the comments in Krissy and Joe's blogs. For Krissy, update your fucking blog, sweetheart.) If by some bizarre turn of events, you are given the chance to go to Jujuy, Argentina, you would be a drooling, defecating idiot not to go. In `the past couple weeks, I have taken trips to villages that are truly nowhere. Hours and light years from civilization. Huts that are so far away from anything that you can´t begin to imagine how they must live. And it is so so unbelievably beautiful. Suddenly, geology is interesting, as is random Argentinian history. Tomorrow I go to Buenos Aires. But I am almost completely disenchanted with cities by now. I've been trying to figure out how I can learn to speak flawless Spanish and be employed in Tilcara in the next ten or so years. The bad news is that this local water don´t fuck around, if you catch my drift. This all could change in the next few weeks. Who knows. They certainly enjoy their meat around here, I´ve noticed. Ápparently the government is totally broke and corrupt and generally sucks. But this is my favorite family vacation ever. It helps that we've traveled with others, so that I´m not stuck with my immediate family, and my little sister scowling, and my mother squacking her broken Spanish, etc. It's going to be very bizarre coming back to school. Wish you were all here. I hope you are all enjoying your respective vacations. Ciao.

Excruciating nostalgia

2005-12-11T14:04:00.000-05:00

What in Jerry Falwell's green earth was I thinking last year? This, apparently.

The mother godess started to scream
She groaned and moaned and sobbed as nature, in its less compassionate moments, was slowly pushing out between her thighs
Wheras the world and all that was in it spilled out one day when she was reading the paper, the solution was taking its sweet time ripping away at her
The women tried in vain not to stare
The men were nowhere to be found
And their impressionable teenage offspring disappeared into the bathroom and began attacking their forearms
Because they didn't have any better ideas
Her screams began fracturing all the glass surface that everybody had spent their lives in front of or behind
The people were overwhelmed, so they kidnapped her and locked her in a glass house
And disproving a formula they had balanced their fragile, phobic societies on
The mother godess stepped over the shattered walls
Carrying an open mouthed child
Who knew naught but the comfort of sheer dependence

Existential Fantasy

2005-12-11T13:15:00.001-05:00

I've realized that if I ever really truly want to be cool, like all these wonderful,cynical New Yorkers who I webstalk, I've got a long fucking way to go. I also would like to live in a Eugene Hutz dictatorship where everyone is gorgeous in quite a bizarre way, completely fucking insane, and constantly having sex. The outfits would all have lots of bright colors and odd scarves and communist medallions and such. And everyone would realize how pointless life is anyway and explode all the foundations of fear and stress that life implies. And we'd never get tired, hung over, or sad, and the food and booze would all be exceptional. I think if there is a God after all, albeit one who's too lazy to ever call his kids, and there is a heaven, and not one with these homoerotic Aryan angels with no stains on their gorgeous, rippling robes of blinding white, this crazy anarchy of pleasure must be it.

As I watch my weekend disappear before it even comes

2005-12-01T20:47:00.000-05:00

It seems like the American social and educational system is telling us, "You can only really be successful and a worthwhile person someday if you are absolutely sodomized by your scheduele and commitments. You should live your life so that you are so stressed out that you should shatter into pieces should anyone hit you with a stick." But I am becoming more and more of a college admissions whore, it would seem, without even realizing it.

2005-11-28T19:38:00.000-05:00

Why am I here? What specifically do I have that the world needs? Am I doomed to be a tired, prematurely aged face in the masses of reasonably successful or not so successful malcontents? And more importantly, who the hell am I?
Today I realized that my life is completely devoid of passion or direction. I have no great love, it would seem. I am relatively bright, but not Borges, Einstein, Dickens, or Allegra Rosenberg. Is there anything about me that isn't phenomenally mediocre? I have no great skills or talents. My face is more often than not, a dermatological Sarajevo. My friends are infinitely more charming and interesting than myself. Mr. Rogers and almost every adult who has been responsible for me have told me I was special. But what the fuck does that mean? We live in a world where all the children must be above average. Being average, to me, has always been a far more terrifying threat than actual failure. This is why I've spent so much time trying to be as unique as was possible without having to face lynching or therapy. But, where has it gotten me? The percentage of people I can even begin to relate to is some sad, weak, incalculable number. As long as I can remember, I pick away at people's character flaws until they are totally written off, never again to be considered real human beings. Well, this is not quite true. I am more irritating than actually cruel. But in this militant be-true-to-your-inner-self-ness, I have gotten absolutely fucking nowhere. I have no more idea who I really am than somebody I've never met. So there you have it. I haven't escaped angst, predictability, or self-loathing, despite all my deploration of emo and self-mutilation. I hereby declare that I don't know shit.

2005-11-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

All who read this are obligated to answer this question. I know it's quite shallow, but I love these hypothetical things. What celebrity (dead or alive) would you most like to be stuck in an elevator with? My answer: Peter Sarsgaard. I can't really explain why I have such a massive crush on him.

Poetic license

2005-11-17T20:13:00.000-05:00

Awesome idea for halloween: Get a cardboard box. Cut a square hole in it, and draw on it and label it so that it is clear that it is an oven. Wear something blousy and feminine. And loafers. Put the box on your head. Voila! Sylvia Plath! Its almost as good as an abortion table.

Chromosomes on strike

2005-11-15T23:21:00.000-05:00

It has come to my attention how gross and graphic my posts have been. I didn't even realize how much that shit occupies my brain. Hmm... I really am no good at being a girl. But I don't have the gay-man-trapped-in-a-woman's body syndrome, and I've never even really been a tomboy. I'm absolutely straight, but not the super-femme tampon-head that would have been required for me to be truly girly. When I think of girls, I involuntarily shudder. But it's getting late, and my head feels like Chernobyl. So its off to the land of drugged up spin the bottle and plaid couches for me.

When God made the world, he clearly wasn't paying attention

2005-11-15T19:59:00.000-05:00

I don't think people often realize just how weird seals are. No, seriously. Think about it. They are like fish with mammaries that flop around on glaciers, fornicating and eating penguins. Maybe some people's uncles do this. Comments?

I'd like to be a big fat, fucking fly

2005-11-11T18:31:00.000-05:00

Today was so odd. I felt like a really small bug being crushed by corporate America. Except Joe and Krissy and Allie and I were all bugs huddled together, about to be obliterated by the ugly, expensive sneaker of capitalism. Actually, today wasn't bad. It was nice to leave home. But I really do like my house. If my house could be transplanted to East Village or something, that would be fine with me. I always like coming back home. I just don't really like stepping outside my house, or having hordes of smelly junior high kids on my lawn because the sidewalk was too difficult to walk on. I know, I could be living in Zambia, having to contract AIDS just so I could feed the kids who I had already been forced to have, I could be a burn victim, I could be one of those Masai boys who has to get circumcised much too late in life, I could be a certain really fullofit drama cuntbag . (Sorry, I know if you're reading this, you are probably really sick of my ranting about her. I am not going to type her name, in order to avoid having my entrails ripped out if she ever Googles herself.) I could be Alan Keyes' lesbian daughter. Instead, I have food to eat, loving parents, no horrifying initiation ceremony to go through (does AP Calc count?) I'm not even really that ugly. So why do I always feel so fucking hopeless?
Oh, how I loathe the corporations.

The meaning of life, or something

2005-11-10T17:52:00.000-05:00

The fact that humans consider themselves so far above naked mole rats is just appaling. We are just bigger naked mole rats with better cosmetics.

Love, hate, and pharmaceutical contraception

2005-11-09T23:04:00.000-05:00

I can never decide whether I love or hate my English teacher. I think he loves himself enough that any more admiration would be completely superfluous. He seems to take for granted that we all think he is just the coolest guy ever. He loves me, as every English teacher I've had since the beginning of time has. I just pull things out of my ass, and they fall all over themselves. I wrote a poem in about ten minutes than made my mother cry, and that she didn't stop talking about for a week. Which I would publish right here, except it would invariably end up in the wrong hands.
Flossmoor is a self-important, overrated, nauseating place. I can't stand the cute little town I grew up in. On a scale from one to freedom-hating terrorist, how unAmerican does this make me?

Peter the Great just ripped out my bicuspid!

2005-11-08T18:02:00.000-05:00

I have succumbed to the peer pressure, and now have a blog. Now I can talk about how deep and alone in the world I am, and then convieniently name-drop some names that might have impressed some really unimaginative people in junior high, but now just give you a headache to even read. Or I can bore you until you plot to blow up my mom's minivan. Whoa, I have a lot of power. I can subliminaly mold you to become obnoxiously intellectual Midwestern teenage jihad-ers. Thank you blogger, for this source of obscenely unqualified power. I will think of you next time I sacrifice a 500-pound bull.