Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Dear Peoples Who Broke Into The Object's Car,

I wish that I could see the look on your faces when you open that bag that you stole and realize its sole contents are an air mattress, you fuckwits. I wish I could see that look and then punch you in your stupid face. And neck.

Love and cuddles- and thanks, that's really gonna help the week go more smoothly!!

The Goo

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Wishes DO Come True!

So I lied about my cherry blossom wish, mostly because I thought it would never come true, and if you TELL people your wishes out loud and identify yourself as the wisher, it won't come true. Everyone knows the physics of wishing from countless Disney movies. Plus it's a kind of weird cultural relativism to wish on a Japanese tree to screw the Chinese out of what is technically theirs for the purposes of keeping cuteness immediately on hand.

Oh yes, we're talking about Butterstick, and my wish that he would stay juuuuust a little bit longer. And lest you think I'm overzealous, may I remind you how charming he is?


But my wish has come true; the Stick will probably stay- if not permanently, than at least till he outgrows all of his panda cubby cuteness.

What's that? You'd like another gratuitously cute Stick pic? We're here to serve the needs of the peoples.

Monday, April 23, 2007

Duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh BATMAN!!!!!!


Wow. Here at the Goo, we're swamped this week, what with my co-project manager having gone AWOL for our big week, the huge and yet unwritten report I have due a week from today (I had to spend a little time this weekend figuring out what the difference between an algorithm and a logarithm is, stupid math!), the horse race in Charlottesville this weekend to worry about (I need a hat? Really?), the wishlist of birthday pressies to make (ONLY SEVEN MORE DAYS!), and the sunshine to bask in (I'm pretty sure DC is allergic to 60 and 70 week weather, since we went directly from 50 degrees straight to 80. I'm not complaining, just saying)!

So it's gonna be a fairly light week here at the Goo- I'll try and whip up some fun stuff for you, but there's gonna be a lot of linkage this week. And what better way to start than with the Argyle Academy's Dark Knight serial? Will Batman heed the call of the bat signal? Or will he ask Alfred to go get him yet another pint of New York Super Fudge Chunk so that he can stay in and watch the Colbert report and cry over the mess that has become of humanity? Tune in tomorrow, same bat time, same bat place (the Argyle Academy that is, not the Goo) to find out!

Oh, and if you ARE wondering what to get me for my birthday? Hint, hint!

Friday, April 20, 2007

Where Hearts Were Entertaining June

Hey, you know what would be great to give people with mental health issues? Paranoia!
"Gimme that hat. No, not that one, the shiny one. Yes, the tin foil one. What? Oh, no special reason."

Upon reading that there may exist a federal database of everyone who is on medication for mental health issues, and that a whole host of people I don't want poking around in my personal life are able to do so, I can't sum it up better than the first commenter:

"OK, I've incontrovertibly, clinically got The Creeps. I wonder if that's a reportable offense yet?"

Thursday, April 19, 2007

A Sad Duck Story

The other night, I dreamt that my friend Alex (the brilliant economist Alex) tried to give the Object a bunch of ducklings, but then the Object of My Affection ate them alive. It was a horrible and vivid dream; I shook the Object awake. "Did you eat those poor little ducklings that Alex gave you?" I accused.

"Huh? Wha?" As the Object replied, his breath wafted towards my nose and suddenly I realized where I got the idea that the Object might have rotting flesh in his digestive system.

Oddly enough, on my walk that morning, I saw Alex and told him about the dream. "Oh, I've got a duck story for you!" It's a very sad story:






I cried for a few hours until Alex kindly sent me an e-mail saying, "Don't worry, I'm sure the photographer who saw it happen took care of it. How could someone abandon baby ducks?"

I feel a little better now, I guess. And if any of you try and tell me that the ducks were saved only to get run over by the car in the background, I swear I will hunt you down and make you watch that awful slideshow of the Canucks clubbing the baby seals.

I do what I gotta do.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Jaundiced Journalism

I offer my deepest condolences to the Virginia Tech community. I’m sorry for your loss.

Now, let’s all take a step back. Pundits and journalists, you first.

By the time I heard about the story late yesterday morning, pundits were already asking if the university and police responded appropriately. Today, the Post asks, “Would more students be alive if the university had stopped them from going to class after a fatal shooting occurred in a dorm?” It’s an unfair question. Imagine you're a physician: a kid comes in with a fever and vomiting. It looks like the flu, and the last couple of kids you treated had the same thing. You treat it, inform his parents, and work to make the kid better. Two hours later, the kid dies of some vicious new flesh-eating disease, the likes of which has never been seen before and will quite likely never be seen again. Did you do everything you could have to save that child's life? Well, no, you didn't - you made a judgment call based on the circumstances and your expertise, and didn't take into account the one-in-a-billion chance that the child might have a flesh-eating virus. But I’d cast doubt on any claims that you were negligent.

Based on the info we have right now, that's a pretty fair analogy to what happened on the Virginia Tech campus yesterday. The police and university had credible reason to believe that this was an isolated incident, and responded appropriately - how could they ever have seen the worst massacre by a single gunman in U.S. history coming? What if they’d sent out a massive campus-wide email and set up a phone tree calling people, only to have widespread panic ensue- people trampling each other in an effort to flee? We're misplacing our focus by scrutinizing the actions of the university and police. Yes, we should investigate and find facts, but until further information comes out to prove otherwise, it's only fair to acknowledge that those parties made tough judgment calls with a limited amount of information. Let's hold off on the media indictments.

There are a million different possibilities of what could have happened, and we could – and unfortunately probably will - obsess for days and weeks over what might have been. But it’s preposterous to ask if this could have been prevented. Given a time machine and Tucker Carlson, anything can be prevented. The same news reports that trumpet the unprecedented nature and scope of this atrocity ask if the university could have responded better and saved precious lives. How can you predict what is unknown? Do we need to get Donald Rumsfeld back out here to talk about unk unks again?

As more facts come out, we’ll be forced to listen to a cacophony of analysis, examining the perpetrator’s psyche and figuring out newer and better ways to make sure this never happens again, twisting facts to forward our own agendas. It’s not terribly difficult to do; I tried out a few of my own: "[Cho Seung Hui, the perpetrator’s] parents are reported to live in Centerville, officials in Fairfax County said." Pshaw, this just proves what I've been saying all along about the growing problem that is Northern Virginia suburbs. Would the banning of the entire northern portion of the state have prevented this catastrophe? Probably. "School president says it was a student living in dorm." A student? In a dorm? AT A UNIVERSITY?! We need to take action and prevent students from living in dorms so that this massacre will never be allowed to happen again. Bear witness; ban dorms! Ugh, it’s going to be worse than listening to a tweenybopper obsess ad nauseum over Billy saying hi to her in study hall. We’ll keep going over it again and again, drawing grand conclusions about society in general based on the actions of a clearly unhinged person - not the best survey sample. We’ll talk until we’re hoarse and raw, sick of the story and ready to move on.

Consider this editorial from the Washington Post, which asks, "And why are gunmen so apt to carry out their lethal rampages at American schools?" Now, I'm no statistician, but of the thousands of gun-related deaths in the U.S. that happen every year, very few of them happen in schools. That's why we’re all shocked- it's just something we don't expect.

Keep reading the editorial; I'll give you a dollar if you can tell me the point. I'm hardpressed to find its purpose - did they have column inches they needed to fill? How is this "America's tragedy?" Is it supposed to be a statement of solidarity? Or is it simply that the Washington Post doesn't condone horrific massacres? Thanks for keeping me posted!

I know the noise of blame is comforting and distracting. On my first break freshman year of college, my mother picked me up and we spent the long car ride in comfortable silence, nothing out of the ordinary. Before we got all the way home, she stopped at a pie shop, the place of my childhood where our family had gone to celebrate after piano competitions or a good report card. We sat down in a booth, ordered pie, and then my mother explained that my father had been diagnosed with cancer and the prognosis was not good. His longtime physician had overlooked the symptoms for what had been probably years, and the cancer had metastasized to most of his body. When the news sank in, I started talking, demanding answers, information, faulting the doctors and their diagnosis. I demanded we sue, that we blame someone and make them pay. I blabbered on, hoping that my words would fill any empty spaces up before the brand-new reality that my father might die could govern that space.

A few months later, I got a call at school. It was time. My aunt and uncle- my father’s brother- picked me up. On the way to the hospital, they talked nervously about anything that came to mind- Monica Lewinsky, real estate tax, his vacation in Florida- anything to distract us from the fact that we were going to say goodbye to my father. We arrived at the hospital five minutes after he died. My mother took us up to the room where he lay lifeless. While each of us took a moment alone with my father, my mother conferred with the nurses, administering the business of death with quiet dignity. She packed up his robe and dopt kit. We drove home in silence. There was nothing to say; my father was dead; that was the long and short of it. Suing his physician wouldn't bring him back. Going back in time to warn Dad-of-the-past to watch out would have, but I lacked the means and the will; grief is nothing if not exhausting. When we got home, Mom wrapped me up in her arms tightly, kissed me on the forehead, and simply said, “I’m sorry. Go get some sleep; I love you.” In all the months of agony, nothing consoled me more than that moment of compassionate empathy. I had been tryig so hard to distract myself; but in one quiet moment, I found solace.

Amidst the headlines competing for different angles on the devastation, something else newsworthy happened yesterday: Columbia University announced the winners of the Pulitzer Prize. Winners were cited for “skillful and tenacious coverage”, “exposure of cronyism and corruption”, essentially, for speaking out when words were necessary. This is the stuff of good journalism. But to speak just because one can, as the Post and its contemporaries have done over the past twenty-four hours is no more than talking nervously to fill the space. For what purpose? Will the frenzied analysis truly prevent madmen from roaming the earth anymore or bring the victims back?

Does anyone remember that story about the Duke University lacrosse team? Think -I know it's reaching way back to last week. One headline succinctly summed it up: "Prosecutor, Press, University Wrong" We were supposed to learn lessons not to make rash judgments and sensationalize news for the sake of a catchy headline. "The lessons here should be obvious. The media herd, in the early 21st century far too eager to fill air time on shouting-head television and space on tabloidesque front pages, can be dangerous to one’s liberty, especially when swarming a story that fits certain politically correct stereotypes." The media blitz almost destroyed the lives of those lacrosse players.

Tingeing the Virginia Tech tragedy with the jaundiced eye of sensationalism does irreparable harm. In the dissonance of overenthusiastic punditry, the elegy of grief will be stifled, the sound and the fury signifying nothing. And at the end of the day, we’re left still hoping that someone will hold onto us tightly and ease the suffering a little bit.

Monday, April 16, 2007

LAY OFF PERKINS, OK?

-- Show of hands: Who thinks DCU is ill-equipped to play a 3-5-2? Just wondering...

Anyone? Anyone? The bloated midfield? The lonely strikers? Which, anyone? Hindered or helped the defense? ...hindered the defense by leaving it the keeper and defense open. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and DC United sank deeper into depression. Today we have a similar debate over this. Anyone know what this is? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone seen this before? The 3-5-2? Anyone know what this means? It means that at this point on the formation curve, you will get better defensive coverage with less men back. This is very controversial. Does anyone know what Vice President Bush called this in 1980? Anyone? Something-d-o-o defense. Voodoo defense.

What Kind of Fuckery is This?

Oh, what a disgustingly foul excuse for a spring day. On the walk to work this morning, the Object pointed out a droopy yellow tulip that had succumbed to the freezing weather and the north winds. "If you spray-painted that black, that's how I feel about this weather." When he gets so melodramatic, I like to call him out on it, but seeing as the sky staunchly remains the same flat, steely, lifeless landscape it has been for days on end, I can't really argue. Kitty spent the night wide-eyed and awake, meowling at the gale force winds, ready to hiss at the Wicked Witch of the West when she landed on our house. It's ugly out there.

Oh, and there's no water on our block; all employees are asked to refrain from using the restrooms.

And yet, allmusic.com is here to brighten up our day with a little hilarity: "And interestingly enough, one can often hear aspects of each of [Lauryn Hill and Sarah Vaugh's] vocal repertoire in Winehouse's voice despite her strong cockney accent and vernacular."

Her whozawhatnow? Why, I do believe allmusic has been taking Cockney Accent Recognition lessons from Corky St. Clair. "'Ow are 'ou?" Hmmmm, maybe the Nor'easter has them all addlebrained, too. As long as we're railing, how dare they write a musical biography citing her influences without even mentioning Dusty Springfield? At the end of the day, isn't Amy Winehouse pretty much Dusty Version 2.6? And drunker?

Look, if you want dirty words in a cockney accent, you need look no further than the inimitable Jack Black.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

BLORCH

Ugh. Barfing flu. No good. This is why i am not returning calls or emails the last day. Sorry, will have more when the gatorade and triscuits start kicking in.

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Est-ce Que Tu As Peur des Morts-Vivants?

"This article is about the undead. For other meanings, see Zombie (disambiguation)."

It's Zombie Day here at the Goo. Why? In a rare fit of romance, the Object of My Affection called me late yesterday afternoon and told me he wanted to give me a special evening. And of course that meant cooking me delicious dinner even when I said I wasn't hungry and renting me zombie movies. Sigh, l'amour!

He rented 28 Days Later; although it can be plausibly argued that it's not exactly a zombie movie (I'd say it's a war movie), it's still scary enough to give me dreams that the president of Iran was actually a scaly monster who worked with a scary blob lady to kidnap me to their castle in the sky, which looked not unlike the bad guys land in Rainbow Brite. I'm not letting the Object bring Newsweek to bed anymore.

How Stuff Works outlines some very important tenets of what constitutes a zombie movie:
* Newly dead corpses reanimated by radiation, chemicals, viruses, sorcery or acts of God
* Human, although some depictions include zombie animals
* Very strong, but not very fast or agile
* Impervious to pain and able to function after sustaining extreme physical damage
* Invulnerable to injury, except for decapitation or destruction of the brain
* Relentlessly driven to kill and eat
* Afraid of fire and bright lights

I was gonna put a link in here to an article called "Bringing Up Your Spawn of the Dead", but then I read the article, and it didn't discuss zombie procreation and development of the undead young so much as it told how to show zombie movies to your un-undead kids. Booooooooooring.
Instead,I offer you the Zombie Survival Guide, your complete guide to surviving an encounter with the undead.


We must celebrate zombies, since they have always been a part of my life. When my parakeet, Lucky, flew into the toaster, my parents bought my brothers and I a new parakeet that looked pretty much the same as Lucky. So we pretended he was the zombie form of Lucky, and simply called him Lucky the Undead. Oddly enough, he flew into the toaster as well. It was around then we realized we should stop calling our birds "Lucky".

Monday, April 09, 2007

Also, I Wish It Were Spring Again

I forgot to type what may be the AWESOMEST WISH EVER:
  • I wish that when I open my drawer only pretty ballet clothes come out.

Friday, April 06, 2007

If Wishes Were Cherry Trees, Beggars Would Be Tourists

At the Cherry Blossom Festival here in DC, you can write a wish on a piece of paper and attach it to a cherry tree sapling. Since I've been wishing for a horse for nigh onto 27 years now, I figured I would deviate from my standard wish and try a new angle. What do you even wish for, other than a horsey? I browsed through other people's wishes to see what I could find.

There were the standard "no more war", "world peace", "happy family", "better world" wishes. I don't really trust those wishes; they're too nebulous. Think about it- for some people, "a better world" involves zombies, while for others, "a better world" does not involve Michael Chertoff. However, I appreciate the people who make those kinds of wishes. Since they're willing to kiss the fates' collective asses and use up their wish on the standard shit one's supposed to wish for, that frees the rest of us be as earnest as we want in our wishing. And if these actual wishes are any indication, that's a good thing. Tell me these wishes (verbatim!) wouldn't make a better world:
  • I wish people could go the speed of light
  • I wish school was better
  • We wish everyone could see the blossoms
  • I wish for large amounts of peach pie and ice cream. Oh, and not to be so pale and to get a tan. Also, I'm rather hungry.
  • I wish I could play at Carnegie Hall as a world-famous guitarist. I guess I can give the money to charity for the homeless or something.
  • I wish for the Shits and Sunnys [sic] to get along.
  • I wish I was a superhero like Captain America. Except he's dead. So I guess Thor.
  • [in pink pen] I wish for a boyfriend who would treat me like a princess and see that I'm intelligent and prettier than all the other girls in my class specially Trina and that he can buy me lots of things that I want so I don't ever ever have to work.
  • I wish I could get another dog and the old one would rest in peace [Wait, so is the old one still around haunting his family? That's actually kinda cool]
  • I wish not to have a brother
  • I wish I would get my hardshoe dances into a prizewinner
  • I wish I could get my ears pierced
  • I wish we had my mom still and that my dad was happy again and also that my brother would live his life better
  • I wish I could be famous for one day and live in a mansion
  • A new van
  • I wish I could meet Zac Efron
  • I wish I could get a beautiful wife
  • I wish that when I turn 10 I become a movie star
  • I wish I had a Wii
  • I wish not to move every year
  • I wish that the war would end so that we can have a good president
  • I wish I have all the books in the world in English please
  • I wish I could be king of the world
  • I wish www.freelaptop.com is real so that I can get a free laptop.
My wish? Well, since my wish to ride to the festival on a magical sparking bus came true, I'm still going for a horsey. But with wings.

Photo Credit!

If It Were DeVry, That'd Be Another Story

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Put Your Wireless Where Your Poop Goes!

Um, apparently, the internet IS a series of tubes. Specifically, your plumbing tubes.
Shitternet is here!
At least you know what to blame the crappy service on.

Ashes to Ashes (Via the Oflactory System)

So back in 1992, Dennis Leary lambasted Keith Richards for leaving us no more frontiers to explore in the world o' drugs:

I was reading an interview with Keith Richards in a magazine and in the interview Keith Richards intimated that kids should not do drugs. Keith Richards! Says that kids should not do drugs! Keith, we can't do any more drugs because you already fucking did them all, alright! There's none left! We have to wait 'till you die and smoke your ashes! Jesus Christ! Talk about the pot and the fuckin' kettle.

Sigh, now we can't even do that anymore, since Keith Richards has admitted that he has actually snorted ashes, too. Specifically, his father's:

"The strangest thing I've tried to snort? My father. I snorted my father. He was cremated and I couldn't resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow. It went pretty well, and I'm still alive."

The question that no one will ever be answer: Is Keith Richards that much of a cokehead that he would actually snort his father (likely), or is Keith Richards that much of a cokehead that he would concoct such a ridiculous story (ummmmm, just as likely)? Apparently no one has explained how the whole April Fool's thing works, since he's only now trying to pass it off as a joke. I guess it's funny in the same way that Phil Spector was kidding when he put a gun to his assistant's head. Funny funny!

Tuesday, April 03, 2007

This Post is for the Rats

You know where I haven't been in a while? Mixtec, the Mexican restaurant in Adams Morgan with magical hangover-curing tortilla soup that I'm pretty sure Gabriel Garcia Marquez centered a Nobel Prize-winning novel around. They also serve the most delicious mole sauce in the entire universe, including other dimensions and the nefarious dimension X. Also, they have $9 guacamole, which isn't really that great. Mostly because it's nine dollars.

When I went over there the other night, I noticed a sign up that said they're closed for remodeling. Apparently, remodeling is what we're now calling pest control. Maybe the mole was only that delicious because it was made out of actual moles. Oh, and rats.

You know what upsets me most about this? It means that this is going to further delay the opening of the fabled Mixtec grocery store, which has been "coming soon!" since I moved into the neighborhood almost two years ago.

Monday, April 02, 2007

The Magic School Bus Journeys To The Cherry Blossom Festival

So, did YOUR executive director send out a memo first thing on Monday morning? Mine did:

"I’m granting everyone an extra hour for lunch one day this week. Please use the time to enjoy the cherry blossoms or some other spot where you can soak in the beauty of spring!"

Gloating only makes the blossoms smell sweeter. But, how ever do we get to the cherry blossoms on the Tidal Basin? According to the Cherry Blossom Festival brochure, we have two options.

There's the CRAP option:
Take Metrorail to the SMithsonian Station on the Blue or Orange lines (use the Independence Avenue Exit) or Metrobus routes 13, 52, & 53 to 12th street & Independence Avenue, SW. Walk west on Idependence Avenue to 15th Street/Raoul Wallenberg Place. Turn left/head south along 15th street to the Tidal Basin.

BOOOOOOOOOOOORING. For the love of all that is good in the world, why, WHY would you take the smelly old metrobus, probably taking down a few pedestrians on your way, when you could take the Magic Circulator Bus????? Check it:
Alternative Public Transit Choice in 2007
The DC Circulator operates daily service of sparkling red buses with wrap-around windows to Festival destinations, Downtown attractions, restaurants, and shopping. Go to www.nationalcherryblossomfestival.org and click on "Maps" to view Circulator Routes or call 202-962-1423.


It could only be better if Miss Frizzle herself were driving the bus.