i have one chest hair. i've had it for about 15 years. this hair is three inches long. and it grows right out of the dark border of my nipple, not next to it like you'd expect. and, it's squirrley, shooting out all hurly-burly, not straight or ordinary at all. every few months it falls out but regenerates in just days if not just hours.

this somehow came up in conversation at work and the guy i was talking to was saying things like "what in the hell are you talking about?" and "stop talking. just stop talking."

then, thinking he wasn't getting it or wasn't believing me, i stuck two fingers into the gap between the buttons on my shirt and started fishing around for it.

him: what are you doing?

me: i'm going to show it to you?

him: i don't want to see it.

me: no, it's ok. i can pull it out between the buttons.

him: stop doing that.

me: it'll just take a second.

him: don't do that.

me: wait. i almost got it.

him: no. stop. i don't want to see that thing.

me: (i stop) oh i'm sorry. but, it's really quite a thing.

him: don't ever do that again. i'm serious man. don't ever do that again.

last thursday after first getting up and passing bella in the hall she stopped and held her hand up to me as if a cop instructing traffic to halt and said the following in a doctor-serious voice. she then turned and headed towards the tv room. the body of the teddy bear she had in a serious headlock bobbing behind her. if i could express a thought in the office using half her conviction and firmness, i might actually make something happen. which i think may have worked out had i not been watching the prescribed episodes of big bird and company all morning.

howard stern

as per usual buddy james takes what is already good and makes it better as seen in this email excerpt referring to yesterday's post. we best not get into how buddy james has such carnal knowledge of this little known fact about myself.

Mary Estes Peters, former slave

i've often heard people comment on the 'misdirected' hate of our oppressed towards the living ancestors of these evil-doers saying things like "i didn't do it" or "you can't hold me accountable for what someone did a 100 years ago". i may have even uttered this a time or two myself. that said, if this happened to my mother or grandmother, etc i think i may harbor some ill-will, however ill-logical it may seem to someone who doesn't have this as part of their family tree.

the un-correctable nature of this history totally sucks. but the even sadder fact is that this history is still being written.

there is this popular video tape for babies that we have. i'm not going to say which one, no point. at the end of the tape the video's creator comes on to say something or another about the merits of the program and why you should buy more of them. i've come into the habit of uttering a particular phrase whenever she graces the screen. what i say each and every time is "stripper gone good."

the reason is quite simple. this woman simply looks the part. she looks as though she once may have felt comfortable walking around on tables in skimpy garments until marrying a wealthy patron where she's now doing that whole mom in the burbs thing, only with an entrepreneurial bent.

marty typically just rolls her eyes, employing her often used troy-annoyance-defense-mechanism. bella typically just looks at me momentarily and then returns to her task of beating her blocks against some valuable. the other day after saying my little quip, bella quite unmistakably uttered the phonetics of the same phrase. marty did not roll her eyes this time. they did something else, the description of which i will spare you.

my defense; "well, at least they weren't her first words".

and for the record "oh suck" which i say every time the wood bin is empty weren't her first words either. close to the first, but not her first.

marty while watching the bachlorette.

excerpt from garrison keillor's Lake Wobegon Summer 1956

i wish that i could just once get an email from buddy james that didn't make me smile, laugh and hate him for his unending wit and charm. hate the buddy james.

excerpt from The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

for those sending money and thoughts in the name of the tv-cart family (08.07.02), here's a follow-up. not tell me about the particulars of his marriage? perhaps not in an email and maybe not even today but unless he intends on severing all personal ties to me and never looking me in the eye again, this is a story that will be told.

Hillary Clinton after the hillbilly confessed to his monica transgression, as heard by some staffers

while i'm going to respect his request for anonymity at this time, buddy james recently found a home on the web doing that whole bloggy thing. on a recent update he was kind enough to recognize your humble host. i'm sure glad michael's name was also in this short list else it would read: influenced by troy and a litany of girl weblogs.



while i personally do not take issue of the noted company in any negative vein and while i'm fine with the amount of grunting and scratching i do, buddy's choice of wording would not serve me well among some of my more testosterone ridden mates. case in point, the other day bookguy and i were going to play tennis and he was displeased with the amount of doddering (his word) i was doing before getting out the door. when i, finally, slid into the seat next to him he looked at me and said: i'd love to know who messed up on the human assembly line and gave you a penis.

what can i write ... reliable help is hard to find.

excerpt from The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe

carrie fisher (actress, writer)

bookguy
(and no one thought you would really do it. enjoy your faux retirement brother.)

and, oh yeah, happy birthday B.

e-love on the complexities of his sexuality

george carlin on things he has learned

i sent an email to a buddy, Intentionally Disheveled Guy, the other day thanking him for a favor he did for me. in part of my letter, i wrote:

thanks again and i owe you a solid.

his, unexpected, response read:

ugh. What's that? It doesn't sound too good.

the really sad and scary thing is, he?s right. sorry Disheveled Guy. i will keep my solids to myself.

I have recently been told I have a responsibility to my readers. This disclosure closely paralleled my discovery that I had readers. All very exciting.

I was recently telling someone of a recent trip I took to north carolina to surprise my best bud Bookpimp on his 30th birthday. The person I was speaking to turned on me and in a highly exasperated manner proclaimed, "But you said (on your website) you couldn't go and that you were sending him a present, which was going to be late might I add." (12.28.01 entry)

Well yes but all that was a ploy to make pimp think I wasn't going when I really was.

And, just when in the hell were you going to tell us?

Hmm. Soon. I swear. I was just about to. The fact of the matter is on my way there in the airport I overheard this great exchange in the bathroom between a small boy and his father. At that moment I decided to make a photo essay of sorts where I would combine photos from the trip with things I overheard on the trip. My initial plan was to get 30 of each in honor of bookpimp's special day, but alas my friends aren't as stimulating as I initially thought and so we have 15 photos coupled with 15 quotes for a cumulative 30. There is no order or credits given. The order is irrelevant and the orators know who they were which should be enough so Bookpimp is 30 is just a lean collection of images and words which I hope you enjoy at some level.

And, pimp has his present now. And, he seems to like it. although instead I think for a present I could have simply told him that I wouldn't ask him if it feels different being 30, because a lot of people ask that, and there really is no answer, I guess because there really is no question but I guess it does feel different in a sense in that you get asked a lot more inane questions than when you were 29. See you at 40 to see if it's any different than 39.

just in case you call a cave your home, computers changed again yesterday thanks to our friends at apple.

get yours now here.

and i actually listened to a geek slap fight yesterday regarding this product. i personally felt the death blow came when the guy defending the new model said the following to the guy who wanted to keep his beige rectangle because it looked normal.

As far as the design, well, I understand. Some people just can't let go of their Members Only jackets neither.

i so love verbal warfare.

excerpt from Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris

I have often said that I would return to college in a second, making a lifelong commitment and resolution to grow my mind and assist others in doing the same. Then chavez sent me this snippet from a text he is studying in his graduate program at chapel hill.

"The demystifying potential in this latter argument has been recognized by no less a deconstructionist than Derrida, who has t...

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Apollo Creed to Rocky Balboa in Rocky III

excerpt from Concrete Blonde's 'Tomorrow Wendy'
off the Bloodletting album