Enough With The Waterworks Already

The moons are perpetually aligned wrong, or something, because whenever there is an important moment in my brother’s life, I’m always PMSing – and therefore terribly prone to blubbering at the drop of a hat. At least last night I wasn’t the only one (blubbering, I mean).

My baby (he hates that) brother graduated from high school last night, and for the first time I understood how the phrase ‘bursting with pride’ came to be coined. From the moment we walked in the gates and introduced ourselves as his family, the staff and other students beamed at us and commended us on the “wonderful man that he is.” My mind boggled, and I swear, the words were on the tip of my tongue – he’s not a man, he’s a little boy! But he didn’t look it last night, in his cap and gown, with his degree in one hand and the prize for ‘Highest Academic Distinction’ in the other.

I know this is like flogging a dead horse, and just re-iterates everything I’ve said here, but I can’t help it. He’s grown up too fast, he can’t be 18 already, he was just heading off to ‘big boy school’ yesterday, just crawling backwards last week! WTF? And in September he’ll be headed off into the wilds of…well, God knows where, but still…away. He’ll be away. From me. Oh crap, let me go get the Kleenex.

Honestly, I don’t know how parents deal with their kids growing up. Kudos to my mom and dad – they’re running through less tissue than I am.

Beautiful Dangerous

Is it just me, or is Slash & Fergie's "Beautiful Dangerous" the ultimate stripper song? Very 80's nostalgia (G'n'R, of course) or Coyote Ugly-ish. Undeniable gorgeous guitar riffs, though. Of course, that goes without saying when it's Slash. Deep, it ain't. But definitely a fun song!

I don't know who you are now:
Mystery drenches my brain.
I wanna jump deep into your mouth,
Cuz something tell's me it's gonna rain.
.
I hear the drum rolls thumping,
And my heart starts jumping,
And that's when I spit on the floor...
Now my head's exploding,
And your gun is dirty,
So I'm guessing I'm on a roll.
Well it's a fine time,
Looking for a wine time, man,
And you said "baby you ready to play?"
Well come right on this rollercoaster,
Cuz it aint over, it aint over.
.
Now we're on this planet,
I'm in love with all your dangers (dangers)
We can live foreverI can be your favorite angel (angel)
Beautiful dangerous....
.
We acted smooth like rain...
Save all flame that we'll light.
You can be sick, I'll be nasty...
Cuz sometimes it's more fun to fight.
.
I hear the drum rolls thumping,

And my heart starts jumping,

And that's when I spit on the floor...

Now my head's exploding,

And your gun is dirty,

So I'm guessing I'm on a roll.

Well it's a fine time,

Looking for a wine time, man,

And you said "baby you ready to play?"

Well come right on this rollercoaster,

Cuz it aint over, it aint over.

.

Now we're on this planet,

I'm in love with all your dangers (dangers)

We can live foreverI can be your favorite angel (angel)

Beautiful dangerous....

Would You, Really?

Want to be immortal, I mean?

This isn't anything to do with my aeons-old vampire fetish, but rather a book R lent me to peruse while I was sick and recuperating at home last week: The Book of Skulls by Robert Silverberg. I'm not a die-hard science fiction enthusiast, but despite being tagged under Sci-Fi Masterworks, I'd classify this book as more occult and mysticism, with a lot of study-of-human-nature thrown in.

The premise is this: 4 boys in their final year of college set out on a cross-country trip to Arizona to locate a sect shrouded in secrecy and mystery: The Brotherhood of the Skulls. According to ancient but reliable texts discovered by one of the boys, the Brotherhood offers the gift of immortality to those who seek it, but with a few catches: those questing immortality must present themselves in groups of 4; they must stay the course of the initiation without informing the outside world; and of the 4 only 2 will survive "for the price of life is always a life". Sinister stuff, no? Half the book is comprised of their journey there, and the thoughts of each one - I loved how the author alternated between each boy and allowed us a detailed (and often disturbing) travel through each one's psyche.

The book had me alternating my views on whom I wanted to live or die, and I think that disturbed me more than anything - playing God even in that small measure, judging and weighing each of those fictional characters' lives and decisions and flaws and failures. Stupid, I know, but the tone of the book is such that it makes you question so many, many things - including yourself. Brilliantly written. Any book that gets me to question beyond who, what, where, when and why deserves all the awards and accolades out there.

The end lived up to my expectations, but all through the book, I kept asking myself: would I? Given the chance, would I WANT immortality? For me, the answer is no: simply because I wouldn't want to live out forever without the people I love by my side. The book (and R) expostulates the myriad possibilities : discovering new things, learning every day, mastering new crafts, greeting the dawn of new centuries - new millennia even! To which my simple answer is: what is the point of all that if you don't have people to share it with you? Give me a few good decades with everyone I love and I'll gladly forego forever.

What about you? What if you could choose to live forever? Would you?

Just Because I Need To Complain....

...doesn't mean I can't do it in rhyme :)

I'd give all the money I have to just take a nap;
I think I'm coming down with the flu, I feel like crap.
There's rivers of snot pouring out of my nose,
And I feel sick from my head right down to my toes.


Phlegm has clogged up my throat and deepened my voice,
And every cough makes a tremendous thunderous noise.
My trumpet-like sneezes evoke no sympathy, no pity:
They’re so loud they make elephants seem dainty and pretty.


But worst of all is the look on my face:
Part stoner, part loner, part alien from space.
I’m blotchy and red and look like I’m holding in my pee,
Oh this cold really will be the death of poor little me.

Et tu, Shashi Tharoor?

Honestly, I don't know whether I'm more disappointed that he's been accused of being a crooked politician or an unfaithful man.

Like it wasn't bad enough reading about David Letterman, Tiger Woods, John Edwards, Jesse James, Steven Seagal....

What is wrong with men? Why can't they keep it in their pants??

Apparently I Repel The Undead Too...

How a conversation would go between my best friend and me if he was a vampire:

Me (terrified): “AAAAAAAaaaaaa……”

Him (holding head in pain): “Stop that screaming! I have super-sensitive hearing as a result of being an undead sex god.”

Me (terror subsiding, replaced by curiosity): “….aaahhhh!!!!....Wait. What does the hearing have to do with being a sex god?”

Him (trying to look superior, but a little uncertain): “UNDEAD sex god. And it’s one of the perks.”

Me (in full-fledged nerd-mode): “How would you even know you’re a sex god? You just came back from the dead an hour ago. Scaring the crap out of me, I might add, since I was mourning your supposed death and whatnot.”

Him (annoyed): “Gee. Thanks. That’s touching. And it’s a given. Vampires have undead sexual magnetism. We HAVE to be sex gods.”

Me (logically): “Uh-huh. Or vampires could just use their hypno-crap to CONVINCE people that they’re sex gods.”

Him (completely abandoning all pretence at logic): “Oh for…! I FEEL sexier!”

Me (moving into super-geek mode): “That’s another thing. Vampires don’t cry. Don’t pee. Don’t poop. Don’t bleed. No bodily functions, basically. So how can they …you know, get it up? To do stuff?”

Him (looking heavenward for patience): “We just can! We don’t ask questions about it!”

Me (skeptical): “Riiiiiight. Oh, wait, so if you do it with a live person, then would that person be a necrophiliac?”

Him (rolling eyes): “That’s not very original, I’m sure others have asked that question.”

Me (not giving up): “Yes, but have they gotten an answer?”

Him (grinning hopefully): “Probably not a verbal one. Maybe a practical demonstration.”

Me (rolling MY eyes): “Hmm. Yeah, that’s not going to work.”

Him (whining): “Not even with the hypno-crap?”

Me (my turn to be annoyed): “I can’t believe you’re dead and still trying get in my pants!”

Him (aggrieved): “It’s UNdead!”

Me (curious again): “And that’s another thing. How come you’re not decomposing? Why aren’t your bits and pieces rotting and falling off?”

Him (horrified): “You keep my bits and pieces out of this! Of course I’m not decomposing, I’m not some common zombie!”

Me (even more curious): “So how come zombies decompose but vampires don’t?”

Him (almost crying with annoyance): “ I DON’T KNOW!! I’ve only been back from the dead for an hour!”

Me (oblivious to his mental anguish): “If a vampire and a zombie had to, you know, do it…would something rot and fall off?”

Him (with a mixture of awe and horror): “It’s amazing that you are even more disgusting than the prospect of drinking human blood.”

Me (blushing): “Awww, you’re sweet.”


So in a fit of boredom, my friend and I were talking about my vampire fixation, and went through this hypothetical scenario. The above conversation is actually ours.

End result, he decided that if he DID come back from the dead as a vampire, he’d kill me just to shut me up. And wouldn’t drink my blood, because he’s pretty sure there’s something seriously wrong with me.

Hmph.

The results of boredom at work

Oh the pain, oh the woe!
Oh the sprain in my little big toe!
Oh that I must wear such heels!
Oh that style matters more than how it feels!

But truth be told it is my choice:
For sensible shoes are not so nice;
So my shoes are pretty and dainty and jewel laden -
And stab me more than an iron maiden!

Oh that I choose to eschew
Ugly, but comfortable, flat-heeled shoes;
Ah, that beauteous straps and laces adorn
Shoes that are leaving me bleeding and torn.

So my beautiful and deadly stilettos
Are forcing me to walk on my tippy-toes,
And adding to my strained arch’s woes:
So the price of beauty goes.

Alright, so I'll never be Dr. Seuss, but it helped pass the time...well, the 5 minutes it took me to come up with that.

Now I'm bored again!