As you well know, I'm many things to many people. Every day, I hear people telling me that I'm a mix of Charlton Heston and Cameron Diaz. Which, of course, is totally true. But, before you cover me in turtle wax and ask Jesus to eat all my non-meatloaf stop and think about who's the real villain in all this. The real villain is peer pressure. ( Read more... )

Yesterday, I got some good news. I entered a one-act contest about a month ago, and I took third place, which means they'll do a staged reading of it. Which is fairly cool, but having another play credit for the resume is quite cool. In a totally unrelated story, my girlfriend is moving across town, and I'm always glad to help someone else move ( Read more... )

The conference in Chicago was great. I saw a couple of former professors and got a few compliments on my panel. Plus, I went to four open bars in three days. Although, I kind of regretted the final open bar the next morning. Still, best AWP ever!

Sadly, I don't have a scanner to put the picture up on here, but the highlight of Diana's portrait of me in drag is definitely the incorporation of armpit hair. It's the little things that make life good.

Remember that German exam I thought I bombed? Well, I passed! The best thing about pass/fail exams is that it doesn't matter if you barely scraped by ( Read more... )

If you ever have a chance to volunteer for something, don't do it. Remember, free labor is an early step to communism. Make sure that you at least get some free food in return. Bartering is a lost art, and if you use the term "fair market value" enough, you can probably strong arm your way into an extra slice of pizza (or glass of juice) by ( Read more... )

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/LAW/03/03/sex.defense.ap/index.html

Today, I took the foreign language translation exam that all Ph. D. students have to pass at some point. I took mine in German, and I think I bombed it. All this despite the lucky brownies Connie baked for me. The whole idea is ludicrous anyway; if I wanted to be interested in foreign languages and cultures, I wouldn't live in America, damn it ( Read more... )

Back in the old days, we used to sit around the fire and swig booze straight from the bottle, passing it around from brother to sister to momma to poppa to cousin, and so forth. We'd roast potatoes and marshmallows and squirrels. Those were the old days. Now, you kids have all the damn unicorns to take care of all that, and I'm sick of it. ( Read more... )

Hello. Today I realized something important. The phrase "take a whiz" is clearly a male phrase. When's the last time you've heard it used by or applied to a woman? And it's just not right. Women should be able to take whizzes too. So, you ladies of the world, I'd appreciate it if you start incorporating the phrase "take a whiz" in to your day ( Read more... )