Death to Jacqueline A.

My dear colleagues,

My maiden entry to this fine forum has been long over due. I too have been intimidated by the excellence of your postings. And while I was pleased to see Jacqueline question the worth of flexitarians, I was disappointed that I was now the last to venture into the friscalating dusklight.

Then I was simply angered (though fascinated and concerned) by Jacqueline's report chronicling the dangers of wearing contacts while sleeping.

I apologize for my tardiness. In penance, I offer to you a haiku describing our beloved Friends of the Library booksale.

Ahem. . .

Box filled blessed hall
Abondoned yarns wordsmiths wove
Spent blissful hour

It's like rain on your rooftop when she calls

Usually, when I post it takes me a good 10-15 minutes to come up with something that is worthwhile to write, but today I buck tradition and orthodoxy and instead take up arms with my temporary compatriots, the postmodernists and attempt a freewrite - my own unhindered consciousness unleashed on this medium of the book blog.

What is consciousness? Is it like a light in a lamp, or is it the lamp itself? Perhaps, being restricted by only being able to think about consciousness within the confines of one's own consciousness will forever restrict us from understanding the nature of our thoughts - but I expect not. Why? You ask. Well, I don't know. But I'm ok with that.

Moving on, what's the deal with male nipples? They provide no precious beverage and they don't even look that great. I wonder, if a male was born without nipples, would we call it a man, or would we kill it, because we are scared of it and its nippleless, skin-covered upper-abdomen and its strange language of clicks and guttural grunts. He , or it would say, "Huruck k k k Kalick Kloop Ghoortee foo," and we would just look at him and wonder, because if it doesn't have nipples, it must not have a soul, but it probably still tastes pretty good.

Can't take it much longer. Fight the beast - eat the rainforest - who's whitey - rabid rapid rhinocerous - fight him! - spears the natives cry for resolution without angst@zulushack_of_ribs.common

Signed,

Runs with Scissors

Sic transit gloria mundi - so passes away the glory of this world

To be creative. To inspire new, non-normative cognitive confections and then revel in the glory that is yours, and theirs. Sweet - like Egyptian cotton.

Nevertheless, my fair comrades, glory fades. It's like Churchill once said.

Glory. Can you eat it? Can you use it to buy cigarettes or drugs? No. And yet it fades like the dew of foothills in summer heat - a vapourous 'dog that returns to its own vomit.'

Here today. Gone tommorrow. A futile cycle - or is it?

Corneal injuries and other misfortunes

I was hesistant to share my story with the members of The book club. I have to say I am quite intimidated by the clever diction that is characteristic of this site but then I thought "Who the hell cares what they think?" Dr. Kleeman said it would be good for me to find a creative outlet for my anger and bitterness, and since he's been a pretty good shrink so far I thought I'd give it a try. This is a narrative of my recent tragedy...
Monday, March 1st 1:17am
I was exhausted from a long day of classes and was on the verge of my dreamland when I glanced across the dark room and noticed definite edges to my closet and that the large red digital numbers on my clock were clear. I was immediately filled with rage..."How could you have been so stupid?!? You're still wearing your contacts!!....Oh well, I've done it before and nothing happened. One night won't hurt." I then allowed myself to slip into slumber, little did I know that this decision would haunt me for weeks.
Sunday, March 13th 8:30am
I awoke with a start. My right eye was burning and leaking as if my water main had broken. I tried to open my eyes, it was no use, my inflamed lid wouldn't budge. I blindly made my way down the ladder of my lofted bed and felt my way to the couch. I sat down defeated. My life was over, I would never be able to see again. I forced my eyes open and proceeded to prepare myself for church. I sat through church sniffling and mopping my ever-watering eye. Everyone thought I was being moved by the holy spirit, but no, all I could think of was how bright the room seemed and how I might as well gouge my eye out.
Sunday, March 13th 12:30pm
I laid on my couch wallowing in my own tears and self-pity. I called my mother who then asked me to call my brother. When my brother arrived we went to the emergency room of Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center. The doctor shined this unbelievably bright light into my eye for what seemed like an eternity. It was official, I had injured my cornea from sleeping with my contacts in. (I am not to wear my contacts for at least a month but they did give me vicodin!)
Monday, March 14th
I sat in my dark room not going out into the sunlight all day. I didn't want anyone to see my wretchedness. " You can't produce your vitamin D without the sun" I say to myself, but that doesn't matter anymore. Different friends stop by throughout the day mostly with good wishes but my favorite visitors came bearing a jr. bacon cheeseburger and a mostly melted frosty. They were delicious, the visitors that is.
Tuesday, March 15th 2:20pm
I am feeling much recovered and have realized that the Royal Tenenbaums DVD has some great extras!
May my story be a lesson to you all. Do what the doctors say they seem to know what they're talking about.

Flexitarians, the bottom dwellers of society

The FDA has recently coined the new term flexitarian, "an individual who mostly eats vegetables with an occassional serving of meat." Being a strict vegetarian myself I am appalled that these aforementioned individuals have come up with a new category for their lack of self-control. I was once a meat addict and I know how tantalizing a T-bone steak can be. It seems as though you will never feel sorry enough for those animals to keep you away from that slice of meatloaf.... the critters have already been killed right? so it'll be okay to just have a bite, right?....WRONG! If we don't stop this wave of hypocrisy our battle against meat will be lost forever. With these "flexitarians" we may never be taken seriously. We've been working so hard for equal rights with the meat-eating population, we can't let these gluttons bring us down! Vegetarians unite and don't stand for excuses such as "nutrient value" or "protein deficiency" we must encourage these flexitarians to finish their transformation or go back where they came from!!

Joel and Chris' list of stuff to do over Spring Break (2005) that will shame everyone and their mother

1) Hike at Smith Rock - all uphill, while fasting (from food, water, and Dan Brown novels)

2) Go to Beach: While at beach, get a suntan, read many leatherbound books, smell of rich mahogany, eat a jellyfish, pour one out for our departed homie Keiko (RIP my big black and white brother...or sister...or gender-neutral whale), eat at Joel's parents' expense (Lobster!).

3) Write best-selling novella (A short prose tale often characterized by moral teaching or satire.) Title = Park Place Treachery: A coming of age tale of boyscouts, moral teaching, and satire.

4) Go to Portland, visit Chris' estranged brother,

5) Become two with nature, because becoming "one" in the biblical sense with a spruce would be downright painful, illegal, and could attract bears.

6) Write Joel's thesis (I'm not kidding. I really do have to write my thesis).

7) Make oodles of noodles and cash (Chris working at Red Horse - drop in and pay a visit, where everyone knows your name, but you wish they didn't, the good ol' Red Horse Coffee Company in historic downtown Corvallis).

8) Get Joel a haircut - actually, first drive out the family of rats that has infested Joel's mane with a cat, and then get a haircut, unless of course that draws a dog, in which case we may have to visit the zoo - you know, to get a panda...or some other ferocious quadriped.

9) Read lots of great literature - first on Chris' list is "Madame Hunchback" (see comment on Christine's previous post. First on Joel's list - Baker's Encyclopedia of Christian Apologetics

10) Kill Harry Potter

To Katie

To Katie: A Poem in Commemoration of Your Completion of Les Miserables.


You completed Les Mis in record time.
Pages turning, turning, turning.
You must have asked yourself, like many an ignorant student in the past,
Will Jean Valjean EVER die?
(Yes, of course he will, but not until he has surpassed the days of Melchizidek).

But no, callous fool, Jean Valjean lives on.
He is in the traces of every convict ever written,
He is in every oppressed person -
In every oppressed person, crushed by the weight of reality
and left reeling in the darkness of utter despair.

Yes, Jean Valjean is the theme of this song -
He inspires awe and wonder, and (dare I say it) incredulity.
How did you do it, Jean?
You maintained upper body strength into your 100's,
You fled from Javier with the nimble tip-toeings of a young beetle,
and with the speed of a cunning she-fox.
You changed your identity multiple times,
You saved lives,
And when I saw you in London you sang opera-style
without skipping a beat.

Oh, Jean, immortal and inextinguishable
(until you eventually died),
How does my banal existence compare
with your heights of joy and pits of depression?
I have saved no prostitutes, I have been no mayor,
I have never stolen silver, and I have never been saved by a clever old bishop with a heart of gold.

And so I resign myself to the monotonous
routine of my shabbily executed life.
But take heart, oh weary soul!
Somewhere, out there, there is an adventure of sorts,
just waiting for my unparalleled, fame-deserving, latent skills.

Suggested Book List

Dearest friends,

In keeping with the spirit of The Book Club (namely, to read so many books that others are intimidated to the point of drooling when they are around us) I would like to take this opportunity to post my reading list for 2005/2006.

Madame Bovary
Huchback of Notre Dame
Tender is the Night
The Complete Oxford Dictionary
The Moon and Sixpence
War and Peace
Old Man and the Sea
The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
Wuthering Heights
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible

This may seem intimidating to the less ambitious of you, but let me remind you of what a sagacious man once said: "Read, you idiot!"

I look to you for encouragement and companionship as I undertake this tedious (but rewarding) journey to the Land of Knowledge and Happiness.

Chris "The Comrade"

City Daze (pt. 1)

Smoke little by little spilled from Maria’s pursed, red lips.

“You’re a fuck-up, John,” was the last thing she spoke before turning to face the door, dropping her cigarette on the parquet floor and leaving John nearly unconscious and as near death as he had ever been. The sheen of Maria’s dusky, brown hair was the last memory she would leave him.

He lay quietly: supine and motionless on the firm couch. His glassy eyes remained frozen under the beads of sweat on his brow, and the scars on his dangling arms told volumes of long, feather-light nights spent happier than this.

John’s thoughts were tangled from the years of abuse, where the control he once retained had been lost in a swirling and ever-receding sensation of paradise, but still, he knew that Maria was right. He was a fuck-up.

With that last conscious thought, sleep, or rather nothingness found John in his upper east side apartment over-looking the city, and with Maria’s departure he slipped from reality’s grasp.

To be continued…

Cormant Macgruder