So, I saw this picture today, on the box of one of our page-a-day calendars, and I tried to recreate it in paint, because I found it hilarious, but it's literally impossible to draw a dog with a laptop mouse. But it was these two dogs, standing next to each other, and one of them said to the other, "Yeah, I used to have a blog, but I decided to go back to barking and yapping incessantly."
In retrospect I don't find it quite as funny as I did earlier today, but maybe you will?

A lovely, peppy day, otherwise. I didn't think it would be; I awoke in a foul mood because apparently eight hours is not enough time to shake off Nyquil-sleep. I felt all tingy still - pretty rested, but entirely like I should still be in bed, at the least completely still and quiet and warm, if not asleep. But there was much to be done, so I had to summon the peppiness from deep, deep within.
And a BEAR came into work today! It was terrible; people screaming and running and tearing their hair out with fear. I personally found him to be beautiful and was so glad he found his way into my store... But everyone ELSE, I'll tell ya - not impressed.

A shout-out to Illustrious D. Love ya man.

Another bath and consequent trip to Narnia? Sir, your ideas are crazy and wonderful.

"My head is killing me. I feel so fat." Suddenly the woman pushed the magazine off her lap. "Sally, I need you to take care of me, OK baby?"
"Shh, not here, Lauren. Come on. Why now with this? All day you've been..."
The woman grasped both his hands, her eyes emphatic with tears. "Sally, really, I mean it!"
"Laur, what is it, huh? The kids are OK, right?"
"They're fine. I don't know what's the matter with me. I don't know why we came out here to the boonies. I just want to go home."
"So we'll go home. We'll leave tonight if you want."
"No, the hotel's booked through Monday. We'll loose the deposit."
"When we get back to our room we'll watch Top Gun, grab a salad, aromatherapy, whatever you want."
The woman looked at him but made no reply. She stared out the care window, past her own ghostly reflection, at the bare trees rushing by in a blur and at the motionless gray sky above, like the absence of sky. She could feel the weight of each tear on her mascara-stiffened lashes, and the way her lashes seemed to spring back as each drop fell. She was aware of the cold air rising off the glass, and the cool lines on her cheeks left by her tears. Her breath passed deep into her lungs and swept through her body like wind through a canyon. She wanted Sal to comfort her but hoped even more that he wouldn't speak. Probably there were medications for this sort of thing.
They drove on in silence, the driver guiding the van with two fingers of each hand through a series of swaying turns. The hotel was an old restored mansion with a semi-circular gravel driveway out front. The driver pulled up beneath the awning and got out to retrieve their bags from the back of the van.
"Laur, you OK?" whispered the man, tilting his head to look at her face, "What's going on, Laur?"
"I don't know." Her tears had left tracks in her makeup, and the new ones ran down the same paths to form cloudy drops at the point of her chin. "I don't know," she repeated, "I just feel so weird. I need you to be here for me."
He studied her, his heavy brow knit in puzzlement. (His was a face that displayed every thought.) Then, slowly, his brows lifted, his eyes took on a light, and his lower lip was drawn up over the upper. "I'll do even better than that," he said, "We'll go back to Outlet Village. Right now. We'll get those Diesels. You can have anything you want." He grinned and pinched her cheek and then wiped his hand on his pants. "Huh, how's that?"
She sat there, sniffling, scrutinizing the car seat.
"We'll get the Diesels, Laur, and whatever else, huh?"
"You think I'll be able to fit into them?"
"Sure you will."
"Two pairs? Can we get two pairs?"
"Three, four, whatever."
A shiver went through her, and she pulled her jacket up around her shoulders. Then, as if waking from a dream, she looked at him, and a smile formed on her waxy lips.
"That's a girl," said the man, "Anything yuou want. Driver, what do you say you take us back there? Yeah, back to the outlets. There'll be a good tip in it if you wait for us."

_Peter Herman is a freelance writer and editor based in New York City.



I enjoy that little story. I'm pretty picky when it comes to fiction, though, and I definitely have to go on record and say that I don't think it reads particularly well. I don't want to drop the "P" Bomb, but it's kinda that, and it's also kinda... well, dressy. In the sense that it seems to me like the author kinda dressed up the narrative for aesthetics' sake or something; but I have no idea if that makes sense to anyone but me.

Aaanyhow, it was a lovely Day of Rest for me today. Perhaps I won't die. Immediately, that is. Bear was in lots of pain though, and it made Bear edgy, and when Bear is edgy, and I is sick (and thusly, edgy) it makes for lots of growling and teeth baring and hissing and swiping. But we survived, with minimal blood loss. AND I got to watch Labyrinth and half of Spirited Away, since I was in a Dayquil-induced coma (non-drowsy my FAT DROWSY ASS) for the other half. Bear had never seen that last one before! He liked it.
I'm also thinking I'd like a Labyrinth tattoo. Something elaborate. HOLY SHIT, like I could get the poster image of Jareth at the top holding a crystal, the castle and the labyrinth underneath him, with Sarah in her White Dress underneath that, and Hoggle and the Fire Gang and goblins and Ludo and Sir Didymus and the and the Old Man In The Hat and everyone else on the sides! Good god... I wants it! I could get it on my back... It'd take a million years and dollars but I'll tell ya. It'd be worth it.
Except in twenty years when I realize I was young and foolish and terribly idealistic to think that permanantely imprinting a movie poster (albeit the most influential, meaningful, and wonderful movie of my entire life) onto my skin was a good and sound idea.

I'm going to take a bath now, and take a quick visit to Narnia. Then, it's a Nyquil-induced coma!! God DAMN I'm set.

I forgot to bring the damn magazine with me to Bear's house. So I'll put some more of the story up, but I won't finish, because I have to leave for work in a half hour.


The man surveyed her with distaste out of the corner of his eye. He was tall and solid of build, bronze-skinned, with a wedge of pomaded black hair sprouting from close upon his thick brow. His lower lip was heavy and slack, and he wore a shiny red and white tracksuit with the sleeves pushed up over hairy forearms, one of which sported a gold Rolex, his pride and joy.l Looking down at his cell phone, he began to press some buttons. His wife took out hers as well.
"Carson!" she cried into the cell, "It's mommy. Yeah, it's all right. There's nothing here but trees. We bought you something. No, I can't tell you. It's a surprise. OK, it's a jacket. You're gonna love it. It's suede, made out of lambs or something. It's so soft. Sara will love you in it. She will. Absolutely. Right. Right. Uh-huh. That's nice, honey. You're not drinking too much Diet Coke, are you? You know it makes you fat, right? There's a new study. It fools your body into thinking it's skinny. All right. Take care of your little brother and sister. Kisses for mommy. Mmmm. Mmm." The woman snapped her cell phone shut and stowed it in her coat pocket. "Carson's good," she said, "He says Tommy got a Lexus."
"The white and gold?"
"Of course."
"Now Carson's gonna want one."
"Why shouldn't he? What are we, poor?"
As she said this she spread her colour-tipped fingers and rolled her eyes toward heaven or Saks Fifth Avenue. "Oh, my head. Maybe I'll go work out. It's cause I haven't had any fresh air. When we get back I want you to call down and tell them to change the water in our humidifier."
"What, call them just to change the water? So I'll change the water."
"Just call them. It's better that way. Get my magazine from my bag, will you? It's right there, in my Coach."
She flopped the glossy magazine open on her lap,licked her fingertips, and began leafing through it without looking at the pages. The man nodded toward the driver, who met his eyes in the rear view mirror.
"So, what do you people do out here?"
"Oh,k this and that. Watch the clouds go by."
"What, so do you have county fairs and what not?"
"Every year."
"Don't you even have a movie theater around?" asked the woman.
"Yup, we've got the cinemaplex out at the mall, ten theaters."
"That's good," sniffed the woman.
"Probably lots of berry picking, too,"? said the man, grinning at his wife as if he'd made a joke. She looked back down at her magazine, licked her finger and flipped a page. The man reached into the back and dug into one of the shopping bags. "These Baccos are fantastic. I should've bought them in black, too. I mean, why not? With shoes like these, you can use brown and black. Shoes make the man, like they say."
"Clothes."
"What?"
"Clothes make the man."
"Shoes aren't clothes?"
"No, they're shoes."
"They cover your body, so they're clothes. What, so you want to stop for a salad somewhere?"

To Be Continued...


I'll be able to finish it next time, whenever that is. Hopefully tonight. We'll see. I'm deathly ill, you realize. Sick as a dog. Can barely remain upright for extended periods of time. Mucus leaking out of every orifice. Terrible sight, I am. Do pray for me, if you wouldn't mind. I'm too young to die. *sigh* What a world we live in...

Oh, hey, look! A bowl of mini chocolate bars! *runs away*

Does anyone else find Adbusters pretentious?

I mean I like it, I think it's a good publication... The cover art is generally provocative, or at the very least interesting. Like this month's - I can't fucking believe how much I love this month's cover. A beautiful young woman: golden tresses, crimson lips, smokey eyes, wearing just the most *divine* little red dress, with killer fuckin gams, lemme tell ya, tipped off at the end with smart black stiletto pumps... And bitch is on the receiving end of a finely tuned restraint, being administered by an exceptionally angry officer of the law. We're talkin face-down, hands behind the back, legs spread, the whole shuhbang. And like, the dude is really angry. So's the other officer dude, in the background. She's been pulled out of what I can only assume is some kind of Sports Utility Vehicle, and laying next to her on the asphalt is a Grande Starbucks cup, in a splattered pool of it's milky sugarfreelowfat ex-contents.

"A model getting her just desserts," said the gentleman who bought the magazine today, after I commented on how much I enjoyed the imagery.

I'm definitely going to put it up somewhere. But cool cover art aside, when one takes the time to actually commit (and it IS a commitment) to reading the offerings of the Journal of Mental Environment... One can't help but feel that they are subjecting themselves to WAY too much fucking jargon, and not nearly enough practicality, which in my opinion is a pretty lethal combination. Sometimes the articles just read like a freakin 4th grader trying as hard as they can to sound like they know what the fuck they're talking about by thesaurus-ah-rizing every god damn word they can, and by making up brand new ones to substitute for which there IS no synonym, until it's gotten to the point where the writing makes absolutely no sense, and yet all the smart and aware kids think it does because... well because it's in Adbusters. And yes, I am WELL AWARE that 'thesaurus-ah-rizing' is in fact not a word, and that I did in fact make it up. But I don't write for a well respected magazine, so it's okay.

And like, my old roommate and best friend, let's call him... JERKFACE - he to me epitomizes the regular Adbusters reader. This is of course a sweeping generality, but aren't those the best kind? He like, totally doesn't eat meat, but don't ask him why, and he can't fucking stand people who wear brand name clothes and shit, like, why can't they find they're OWN style, why do they have to cater to the media's expectations of what they should look like. Oh, yeah, those are Nikes he's wearing, but, he's inked out the label, so it makes it okay. I remember one night when he had a friend over, a guy he was kinda seeing at the time, and I was in bed, trying to sleep, and they were... attempting to have a conversation about politics. It was the most pathetic thing I've ever heard. All Jerkface really talked about was how he was a Communist, because it's such a great method of governing, even though it doesn't really work in practice, but he's a big fan of the important Communists in history, like Marx... ... ...
And basically they just sat there and regurgitated grade ten history class like it was some kind of fucking spectacle, that they knew these things, and it was just really funny to me.

There's tons of people like that out there, so concerned about NOT being stylish that they create a style of their own; so concerned about the state of the world yet not quite willing to find the relative knowledge; so aware and learned, yet so completely and entirely not... And I'll bet you money my friends, that most of them have a subscription to Adbusters.

Seems like I'm talkin a lotta trash about the mag, and I reckon that's pretty unfair, since I do like a lot of it. If you'll give me a moment, I'm going to take a quick gander at my own copy to see if the story I read and loved will take me a million years to type out for you. Stay with me now.


Okay it's not, so here I go.

outlet village
by peterherman

"I need to eat a salad," said the woman, steam rising from her magenta lips. "It's freezing. A person could, like, die out here or something. I should've bought those Diesels, don't you think? I bet I could've fit into them by Christmas. It'd be something to shoot for."
"So you go take a steam and a sauna," said her husband. "You'll come out feeling like a million bucks."
"The steam room makes me retain water."
The man grunted and looked down at his cell phone. They were standing in the Outlet Village parking lot, their legs nearly hidden behind shopping bags. The outlets were designed to resemble a medieval hamlet, sans slop pails and the Plague, and with colourful brand-name logos in place of coats of arms. Beyond the village rose wave upon wave of wooded, snow-covered hills bare of foliage save for the hemlock, spruce and pine sprinkled throughout. Looking up into this wilderness, the woman's mascara-rimmed eyes narrowed; she might have been surveying a wasteland of yellow brimstone.
A red van pulled up, the husband and wife climbed inside with the driver retrieved their bags, and they sped off onto a narrow road that wound between the trees. As the couple watched the outlets disappear from sight a disquiet came over them.
"We'll get a DVD," said the man, brightening, "They've got Top Gun down there at the front desk."
"I really just need to relax, Sal. Maybe I'll get an aromatherapy."
The woman was in her mid-thirties, well put together, with all the right clothes. Her burgundy nails looked fit for killing, her hair was designed by New York City's best and gayest stylists, and a rich scent like furniture polish mixed with cotton candy rose off her pampered skin. Her eyes looked tired, though, and in her abdomen she seemed to carry excess weight and grief.
"You just got aromatherapy. You said it bothered your sinuses."
"Sal, I really need you to support me right now, okay? I think I might have the driver stop for a Diet Coke, or some Tums."
"Tums, I got Tums right here."
"No, I think it's Rolaids. Rolaids are the ones that work for me."
"You want Rolaids? We'll get Rolaids. Driver, where can we find a Duane Reade? You know, a drug store."
"I can take you to a drug store," said the driver, an older gentleman with a lined ruddy face and age-spotted hands, "but it's about ten minutes out of the way."
"Forget it, Sal. Forget it." The woman's voice was a dry monotone. "I just want to get back to the hotel. My head is killing me. They'll have something there."

To Be Continued...

Okay I've been typing for 15 minutes and am only 1/4 of the way through, and like, that's too fuckin long y'all. So I'm going to go and take a bath, then see a movie with my Secret Agent Lover Man, because he had a tooth pulled, and he needz treetz, and theeen I'll put another part up. Sound good?

Yay, I'm back for awhile!