December 2010
b0dy h3at
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON 1: This is the guy. Nice photos, right?
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON 2: Yeah. But you heard about the Craigslist murderer.
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON 1: No.
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON 2: He told people he was gonna take their picture but instead he went and murdered them.
ME: It’s true!
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON 1: No, look, he’s professional.
GELSONS CHECKOUT PERSON...
atlas sound (ft noah lennox) — walkabout
Back to the Answer Stack
All of the nice notes you sent aren’t going to appear here, I just download them into my pleasure centers to keep them there. Thank you for sending those, because I love them. Anyway!
realisticallypaige asked: Whats your favorite childhood memory??
From little-childhood, I’m going with afternoons spent at the Hudson Diner playing the jukebox and drinking milkshakes. Also the summer I...
November 2010
Oh, home!
You’re not going to cry about it, are you, you freakin sap?
Well, maybe.
I woke up at 4:18 AM and still managed to be late for my flight. I spent the dark morning sitting on my carry-on bag, hoping I would somehow manage to jam the thing shut after stuffing it with two pounds of dog kibble. I locked the door, unlocked the door, went back inside, turned the thermostat to 67, went back outside, locked the door, unlocked the door, retrieved my car key, locked the door,...
Fabian had a dog once but it dug a hole under the fence and ran away. The dog returned after a while, following some adventure or another, and Fabian filled in the hole with the loose dirt and let the dog in the yard again. That time, he left and never came back. Then there was the incident with the cat. The cat slipped out a window one night and was mauled by a neighboring relative’s dog....
It rained yesterday and today as I was driving home from the valley I could see the mountains covered with snow, and then “Nightshift” came on the radio. If you’re a DJ and you play “Nightshift” you really can’t lose: somewhere there’s someone who’s going to make the Ultimate Satisfaction Noise after they recognize the muted percussive intro. Oh boy,...
NEW ORLEANS FOOD HAIKU
I.
Oysters en brochette
Crab maison, shrimp remoulade
Yoink you from a tray.
II.
Redfish hollandaise
Pompano meuniere: butter
Worcestershire and cream.
III.
Bananas foster
over ice cream, bread pudding
Containing butter.
IV.
Where else: fried onions
In such abundance atop
A burger? Butter.
V.
French Seventy Five
A cocktail I enjoy so
Also lots of these.
...
skeetonmischa:
“Midnight Train To Georgia” by...
Nothing Is Liquid
Jet Blue has something called a travel bank wherein you can redeem points for a canceled reservation. But what about an idea bank, where I, and you, can put all of our good ideas? Just there. For the common good. For browsing benefactors. Of society.
For instance, cows are large. I think that the environment and we, people in general, would be better off if there were cows that were the size of...
Book Club
— So, this is a heavy one.
— It sure is, Martha. That Sylvia Plath is something else.
— Entirely. Cookie?
— Oh, don’t mind if I do. Hey, is that — is that wine? Do you mind if I —
— Oh. Sure. Go right ahead. Except…it’s noon.
— I’m sorry. The cookie stuck in my throat.
— Well. Okay.
— Girls, I thought...
the concretes — give a little
Bea Arthur
When I was thirteen I would stay on the phone with my best friend until her mother pried it from her death-grip; we would tune up our CD players so that they started the same song at the same time, an attempt to feel as though we were in the same room instead of twenty minutes apart in different corners of Los Angeles, in different bedrooms surrounded by different posters on our walls. It took a...
Today I read a story about a man who had some trouble at the airport. I encourage you to read the whole thing, which you can find here, and which is complete with Youtube videos he recorded on his phone while this incident unfolded. I found it pretty chilling.
If you don’t already know, many airports are now equipped with backscatter x-ray machines which provide a scan of your naked body...
“A man said to the universe:
“Sir I exist!”
...”
– Stephen Crane
A Small Favor
Ed rolled slowly down the Las Vegas strip, passing the Venetian, Harrah’s, Caesar’s Palace. Two women were standing outside the Tropicana. One wore a pleather minidress, the other cut-off shorts and a halter top.
“Hello, ladies,” said Ed. “Would one of you like to take a ride?”
“Sure would,” responded the woman in the minidress. “Me or my...
— Hi Grandma Denise!
— Hello Berenice. How are you?
— Fine. How are you?
— Fine. Hey, did I ever tell you the story about when I met Carol Channing in the bathroom?
— Yes, many times.
— Is that so? Well, there I was in the bathroom —
— —yeah, you were in the bathroom, and she was in the stall, and you heard her say, “Corn? I...
I needed a health certificate from the vet to bring my dog on a plane, last-minute. A lot of people decided to visit the vet this afternoon: a young man with a giant boxer who had an eye infection (“he looks like he got in a fight and lost,” explained the young man, even though, no, it just looked like he had a really gnarly eye infection. It was not a John Wayne battle scar. It was...
WatchI have been having a real lark over on this video Q&A place, VYou. Does that sound like your grandma explaining a website? Is that what I sound like? That’s what I think I sound like. There’s a bit of a gamble in this kind of experience, obviously: that you could get your feelings hurt by a really nasty question or that you would eventually be consumed with narcissism like the guy...
Today, I read a story about a man who, coming home, saw a dude standing in his driveway wielding a gun, and ran over him. What a smooth move. No matter that this sounds like it might have been revenge for a crime the first guy committed. Haven’t you ever daydreamed, maybe while walking back to your car behind CVS at dusk, about what you would do if you were mugged? I mean the good version:...
nrbq — ridin in my car
…I’ve often caught
The sound and sense of your approaching thought.
And all in you is youth, and you make new,
By quoting them, old things I made for you.
— Nabokov
A brief experiment.
Yesterday I fell victim to my own spitefulness. This has happened before. It happens too often, actually, and I never seem to learn my lesson.
I enjoyed my Halloween weekend until, on Sunday, I woke up sick of costumes and people standing in the middle of the street. I woke up, it could be said, on the wrong side of the bed. The cranky side. And what I saw when I woke up was a man digging through...
The Doubtful Guest
— Hi there, Bobby! Look how tall you are!
— Thank you, Grandma Denise. You look very well.
— No I don’t, Bobby. No I don’t.
— Yes, you do. You have a lot of color in your cheeks.
— That’s rosacea.
— Your hair, though, you changed your hair. I like it.
— No, it’s falling out from worry.
— Oh. Well, your place looks nice....
