Gourd

I went for a walk a few days ago and found an old gourd that had grown through a wire fence. Odd. So I took a picture of it. After I looked at it a bit, I realized that not only was this gourd very unusual, but it was also not safe for work, nor suitable for children.

Huh?

You ever start poking around your computer files and find something you vaguely remember but don't really know what it is? No? It must just be me. Anyway, I found the following in a folder of other texts:

The Planet that Hates its Name

There once was a planet named Ralph. Planet Ralph hated its name. The other planets had interesting names like Saturn and Jupiter. Why was Ralph burdened with this terrible name? So one day Ralph got an idea. Why not legally change its name? Four days later Ralph went to court and legally changed its name to Linda.

I don't know what it is or even if I wrote it. I don't think I wrote it. Maybe I just took some found text and substituted various words. Or maybe it came from one of those sites that randomly generates stories. I really don't know.

Something else

I'm still on hiatus. I'm just not in a blogging mood these days. For several months now I've wanted to do something else besides a blog, something sort of blog-like, but not a blog. I thought of doing a wiki, but I don't know how I would do it so that it doesn't end up being a blog.

Anyway, these days I'm tired from work and don't have much enthusiasm for sitting in front of a computer for long hours the way I used to.

Scary

Holy crap, my blog-hating sister now has a Live Journal. This is, I believe, one the signs of the apocalypse.

Sort of like a blog

In the years before I had a blog I kept journals. Lots of them. I have several thousand pages of crap in a milk crate under my bed. Twenty-one volumes, actually. I stopped keeping a journal a few months before I started this blog, and I thought the blog would sort of be like a journal, but I quickly realized it wasn't really like a journal or diary at all. Anyway, last month I started keeping a journal again. It's odd sitting at my desk scrawling away in a spiral-bound notebook with a fountain pen and suddenly wishing I could link to a website. It doesn't quite work the same as with HTML.

When will I come back from hiatus? I don't know.

Tired

I don't feel like blogging these days. My job sucks rocks, I'm tired all the time, I'm tired of the internet, and it's too cold where my computer is. So I'm going on hiatus for a little while. I don't know how long.

Feh

Why didn't someone tell me I'd double-posted the spam entry from a few days ago?

Sick

What can make a crappy job even more crappy? Catching a cold. I have the first cold I've had in over three years.

God, I hope I don't have to work Saturday.

Spam

I don't typically pay that much attention to my spam because it's always the same old boring, lame drivel, but once in awhile I'll get one that's worth keeping:

dangle in greenwich is hexane of riggs
comanche your cuprous is cottrell are bat

****************************************************
****************************************************

@re You a quali fied pr0fessional but simply
l@ck the req uested cred entials after your name?

Ti red of being turned down because you do not have a C0llege back gr0und
We can help you Today.

Call n0w and one of our rep resentatives will ass!st you and the l0ved o
nes,
which matter to you!


1.501.632.2606


****************************************************
****************************************************

edifice is assyria of beyond in durkee
deane in safety if amalgam arefather
fluctuate of carboxy and anne in elliptic

I wonder if the diplomas will have the school name spelled something like H@rv@rd.

The 501 country code in the phone number is for Belize, by the way.

I also like the near Dada gibberish at the beginning and ending that's supposed to foil the spam filters.

Groan

I hate my new temp job. I really hate my new temp job. I really really hate my new temp job. Need I go on? My feet are sore and blistered, my left leg hurts, I'm shivering even though I'm not cold, and I keep gritting my teeth. It's almost like it's 1996 all over again.

The only marginally amusing thing I can think of about this job is that it's in a warehouse of a company that sells party supplies. One of the boxes I heaved onto a pallet had the words "UGLY TEETH" on the label. I think that was the only box I encountered that I wanted to open.

We're stacking boxes that have been returned by a big discount department store that shall remain nameless. The boxes have to have their bar codes scanned and if they scan correctly, we hear Homer Simpson scream "WOO-HOO!" And if they aren't scanned correctly we hear Homer Simpson scream "D'OH!" So all frickin' day it was "WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! D'OH! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! WOO-HOO! D'OH!" I'm serious. There were several groups of people scanning these boxes, so I could hear Homer constantly in the background. It was funny at first, then it was hellish.

I have to work tomorrow. I'm not looking forward to waking up.

Employed

Got a temp job this afternoon. I start tomorrow. I'm over-qualified and will be grossly underpaid, but I need the work. I'm not looking forward to it, but at least I get the weekend off.

Grumble...groan.

Housekeeping

Today at the thrift store I found a dual-text English and Japanese book called The American Way of Housekeeping. The English is on the left side pages and the Japanese is on the right. The subtitle of the book is of the Women of the Occupation/by the Women of the Occupation/for the Women of the Occupation. It was published in Tokyo in 1948 and was intended for "women who are maintaining Western households here in the East."

It makes me wonder if an similar book is being prepared in English/Arabic.

Cold

Saturday morning I went to this asinine job fair held by a new company that moved into the area. Apparently every other person in town is unemployed because for at least an hour I stood in the longest line in recorded history. And it was cold. So cold in fact that the guy in front of me arms broke off and shattered on the sidewalk. Darndest thing I ever saw.

OK, that last part didn't happen.

Firbank

Why can't I read Ronald Firbank? I've been trying for years to read his very short novels and have failed every time. After a few pages I don't have the faintest idea what's going on.

(Oddly, inside my Firbank volume, was a notecard with some numbers written on it and the word flagellator. What any of this refers to escapes me.)

Job

I've been reading actual books over the past week or so. I used to read the things all the time, one after another, but eventually I got burned out on them. Then I started spending all my free time online reading those damnable blog things. Well, now I'm back to the volumes made from dead trees. First it was my Oulipo Compendium, then Caradec's Raymond Roussel biography, then Roussel's odd play Dust of Suns, and now I'm reading Apollinare's Amorous Exploits of a Young Rakehell, a very short pornographic novel he wrote for money in 1907 thereabouts.

The thing about the Apollinare book that most struck me is the biographical piece on him printed inside. He wrote this novel while working as "curator of forbidden books at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris". That's my dream job right there: curator of forbidden books.

Vacant

I've been discovering a new world over the past week or so. Or perhaps I should say I've been rediscovering a previously discovered world I'd sort of been neglecting for the past few years. Anyway, this new world has little or no internet access, but it does have satellite TV and a damn good library. Oh, there's also a couch for me to lie on.

Old

Yesterday I went to Goodwill and spent way to much time going through their antique book section. I looked at every single volume until I got dizzy. Naturally the bulk the books were on low shelves, so my knees and lower back took a beating. I'm too tall and too old to be hunkered down for any length of time. And I didn't find what I was looking for either. Feh.

Fried day

Is it Friday already? Weekends are meaningless when you're unemployed and have no life. Bleh.

Feh

Don't feel like writing in blogs or reading them right now. The closest word to describe how I feel is blah. I think I'll spend the day on the couch rereading my Oulipo Compendium.

Happy Gnu Year

The first thing I need to do this year is get a new calendar. Why do I always wait until the last minute to get a damn calendar?