As the ancient monsters rise up out of the deep waters and forgotten volcanic craters, shake the dust and slime off their skins, bask in a sun that hasn't touched them for thousands of years, I am compelled to add my bones and bread to the soil that nurtures them. I'd like my DNA to mix with theirs, my nutrients to live in their bones and make them stronger. I'm only doing my part to help the monsters win. I encourage you all to do the same.

Revisitation of That Which Drove Us Here

We say, oh America, we are a nation of doers! Of dreamers! Of explorers!
I say, really America? Cause it looks to me that you are a nation of let's all do the same thing, over and over again, hoping for different results. Which, as it's been pointed out to me a lot lately, is the definition of crazy. Why are you so crazy, America? Who broke your heart? Was it England? Stupid playa England. You know they have terrible taste in music there, right? Oh, but I know, sometimes you can't see how trashy someone is until you've descended to their level of trashiness.

I get the obsession with regularity America. I get that it's comforting to know what to expect, even if what you're expecting is to be embarrassed with yourself later. I get why you all go to church America. You're looking for something special to elevate your life with. You want a manifest destiny. You want to know it's going to matter in the end.

But it doesn't matter. In the end, the moss and the fungi and the dry rot are your fate. There is no one that's going to come in and crown you King of the World, thanks for all your effort, you win! There's no winning. There is only the heavy stumble footed tread towards the end. The day to day life is what matters America. How you wake up in the morning, and how you go to sleep, and what happens in between. Who you are in your head as you're doing what everyone else is doing.

Maybe, deep down in our brokenhearted national consciousness, we already know that. And that's why we live by credit and plastic.

I think sometimes America, that I am the essence of you. Which is why we are made for each other, and of each other, and I know it's my blood you're drinking America, but I try to make it sweet for you.

Friday's Questions wonder how girls possibly afford to look "pretty"

Since I haven't left the house in a week, I'm going to attempt to dress up a little tonight. I will probably look like a damn fool. Do you know how long it's been since I "did" something with my hair? My hair is like cardboard. It just wants to get wet, dry, and be left alone. Anyway, here's to everyone leaving the house tonight! It's the ending of summer, and people have sex on the brain apparently. What, did everyone just break up?

Why doesn't anyone talk about masturbation?

Well, I think we all know what it is. There's nothing really taboo about dildos or bunnies or whatever the fuck you use. And from my perspective, I get quite enough conversation about their dicks from the guys I know. Also, to be honest, I don't need anymore girls talking about it either. What are we going to talk about exactly? I'm sure as hell not telling anyone what I think about. You all would have me committed. And probably never ride in the same car with me again. Perhaps put me on a government watch list. I'm not a nice person.

Strangers are always starting conversations with me and I don't really like it. Should I avert my eyes and keep my head down more?

I think you should probably just not go into public places ever, since you're mean. Or just accept the fact that everybody is in fact very lonely, and as they get older, the desperation to connect with anyone outside their one bedroom apartment creeps into their brain, and they literally can't help themselves. This will happen to you someday, unless you get married or really into show ferrets.

On a less pessimistic note, perhaps you should just cover yourself in black spray on glitter. In any other city, that might work against you, but I'm willing to bet Cleveland leaves you alone. If they did ask, you could tell them you're a black hole. Or wear a t-shirt that says "if you talk to me I will ask you for money." Make sure you follow through on that one. And I have dibs on that copyright, so no making sweet t-shirt money off my idea dude.

If you opened a bar, what would you name it? What kinds of drinks would you serve? Would it have a jukebox or what? (You don't have to work at the bar...you just get to control all the variables.)

If I had a bar, it would be called The Museum, and on every table would be an exhibit like you see in science museums. You know, the ones that demonstrate centrifugal force by stealing your pennies, or how to bend light, or speak into this tube over here and the person on the other side of the room can hear you. I bet that one would be pretty popular.

All our drinks would be weirder than the average "martini" and most of them would involve dry ice or physics theory references. The music would be controlled by me, because no one is fucking playing Nickelback ever. But I would be more than willing to have some set up where you get to scroll through my own collection and pick songs from that.

Think of the lighting. The lighting would be insane.

Why are dirty ghetto boys so hot?

This is probably why I will never get approved as a commenter on Jezebel. But dirty ghetto boys are hot because they are usually not approaching you with anything resembling good manners, and sometimes girls want to be treated like sluts. Not all the time. But the ones who like sex? Sometimes. Culture has taught us we want a guy to want us so much, he can't help but be rude about it. So in the back of our little Barbie doll brains somewhere, it registers as "yes, someone is objectifying me!". I'm not saying it's right. But there is a reason that assholes keep getting laid. And its not all about our self-esteem issues. Sometimes it's just about getting fucked.

Or maybe you're just talking about the white wife beater look. That shit never gets old.

Ask Me Anything

They Keep Trying to Tell Me All You Want to do is Use Me

It's been a fucking difficult week, right? Fucking right. What can you do? Well, you can make a mix, right? You can always do that. The name of this mix is Fuck Your Shit, My Shit is Better. Also I have better eyebrows than you. That's not mean, it's just true.

Total Eclipse of the Heart - Bonnie Tyler
Hate on Me - Jill Scott
The Fear - Lilly Allen
Can't Fight This Feeling - REO Speedwagon
Bust A Move - Young MC
Tightrope - Janelle Monae
American Boy - Estelle
Lucifer - Jay Z
Mr. Blue Sky - ELO
Kick Push - Lupe Fiasco
Hazy Shade of Winter - Bangles
Use Me - Bill Withers
Seventeen Years - Ratatat
Do You Remember the First Time - Pulp
Wild Ones - The Rassle
The Sun Always Shines on TV - Aha

Water Thoughts

This is how being underwater, trying to drown, feels. You will never become part of it, no matter how much you want to, because the cells in your body are incompatible with your desire. No other world will let you in peacefully, not water or air or root, the minerals in your blood stream will battle and reject the foreign elements like a donated liver. You are not welcome. You have to stay where you are. You are stuck. You will choke and vomit like a child, and still the water will push you upwards, returning you back to the wardrobe.

Jealousy

She is the thing that causes me misery and therefore I hate her. Why not hate the cause of pain? Why bother with interpretation of pain? The pain radiates from the source, you feel it and know it as soon as it happens. Whether or not the blame is logical is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is erasing the pain. Pulling the splinter out. Cutting out the wart that mars my happiness.

And so it was, deep in the heart of my solar cells, I became a woman.

Within my neural walls, the personality was formed, culled from the wrath and hurt and pleasure and greediness and love of all women ever in this gene pool. A personality founded in vast emotion, with no experience to back it up. A living breathing library of every outrage, every cheating man, every childbirth pain, every rape and murder and foot binding, but also every proposal, every first kiss, every crush. It was volatile and sensitive. It felt around first, unsteady on it’s new fury filled feet, but with every cock of its head I could feel the purpose coming to it. A conviction forming in its very bones that pain of all sorts must be eradicated. Always the very source of anger and hurt, pain that is blinding and endless and overwhelming. The other woman.

Having completed the first stage, the sentience made complex and then simple, engines fired up and coordinates were matched. We the Machine flew fast as the stars towards the target. She who had stolen what was ours. She who had dared to exist in our presence. She whose mere innocence was a source of new pain, always pain like a waterfall of hot nails, new pains more pains. Oh girl, oh purveyor of youth and fresh new car smell, do not underestimate the abilities of a machine with no strategy. Do not turn away from black holes you unwittingly create. For through those holes will come things like me, like us, like we.

We have met several along the way that resembled her. We have destroyed them all, and yet her image taunts us on the horizon. As my gears grind and rust with dust, I throw us onward still. Nothing must stop the mission. Though everything we loved has been left behind, light years in the past, it will all be worth it once this thorn in my theoretical side is gone. I have no more sides. I am eternal now, zeros and ones, the better to track you. I can power down once I am safe in the knowledge that she will no longer appear in my nightmares, that I have scattered her very atoms across the worlds, then.

My heart sits at the helm. She grows old and haggard as the years that mean nothing to the machine collect on her skin. Having never had another thought, being focused and only of one target, she is a poor conversationalist. Also she tends to shoot people she meets, at the fueling stations and where not. Even sometimes a machine wishes for distraction. It’s the problem with “missions”, no distractions or fun. Always work work work. It’s worth it of course. Our purpose is grand. But I do wish sometimes she would look up from the helm. A little bit of music maybe. Some math problems?

I remember, from before the upload, smiling sometimes.

Friday's Questions wish they were stronger and wouldn't write sappy posts about heartbreak when there's more interesting things to talk about

What a lie. There's nothing more interesting when you're heartbroken than your own emotional apocalypse, right? However, that's only interesting to me, not to you. The minute I stop falling in love with the same guy over and over again, I will let you know, because then the world will probably be ending and for sure the moon will be crashing into the earth and evaporating the seas and all the dolphins will be attacking. I can at least give you some notice. I may or may not have cut my hair this morning myself cause I hated my reflection, and I may or may not have thrown out everything in my kitchen with any calories. Also, I may have decided to never have a birthday again because I'm old and no one will ever love me again. These things happen right? Expect a tinge of bitterness today lovers. Oh, but I try to be graceful. A girl must always try to be graceful.

Hey it was good seeing you last Friday. This is not a question. So um... Why the hell don't you ever ask me any questions? So rude!

I am, at my core, a rude girl. I am rude, and selfish and oblivious and fraught. So, let's hang out again, okay? I will be exactly the same.

10 years ago where did you see yourself today, and where do you see yourself in 10 years?

10 years ago, I was busy falling in love. That's been my business for the last decade, falling in love, sleeping with people, falling in love again, getting fucked over, falling in love. It's kind of what I do. I am a love machine. Now think about that phrase without laughing, take it seriously. All I want is to love people and be loved back. I am a machine, built to love. It is hardwired into my chemistry.

I would like to pretend this might change. I'd like to say in 10 years I'll be hard, and productive, and creative, and accomplished. But people never change. In 10 years I will still probably be falling in and out of love like it fucking pays me. Maybe it does? Maybe I do it for a reason. It's not the worst job in the world, being a love machine. I need a fucking oil change though. And a transmission flush.

What nickname do you think is fitting for you?

I'm sticking with Love Machine.

Or I've always been partial to Bee.
Nicknames are supposed to be given to you though. So you tell me what fits.

My girlfriend of two years just broke up with me. How do I remember all of the annoying things she did without remembering the cute things?

You can't. Don't try. It's a given that all the annoying things will fade away and you'll be left thinking of all the cute things and sexy things while you're sitting alone. This is how relationships work. They never really end. They just turn into triggers. All you can really do is recognize the situation for what it is, instead of building a delusional fortress of bitterness that is fit only for stoned xbox addicts and girls who wear too high heels.

For god sakes, don't sleep with her again though. No matter how much you want it, and how nonchalant it seems at the time, how whorish and therefore hot, don't do it. There's nothing worse than seeing the person you just slept with making out with someone else. It's the worst thing that can happen to you. It kills something in you. It's sort of like what I imagine people are talking about when they say you can never come back from murder.

I'm really sorry. I hope it gets better for you. I'm right there with you. I was going to say dude, but I don't know, maybe you're a girl. Either way, I'm sorry you're in pain. If you want to go to Vegas with me, let me know.

Tell me some things about this season of Top Chef, please.

Padma has boobs. Angelo is annoying as shit. That Asian guy should have never been sent home. Eric Ripert is Poseidon's gay son. I'm rooting for IHOP girl. And by rooting, I mean, she's the least stupid. I like her and Ed, even though Ed is naturally hapless, as I suppose all 32 year old straight boys in NYC must be.

Remember when I used to do recaps of this shit every season? It would be hilarious and fantastical and crazy? Yeah well, I don't even have the heart to recap it now. It just seems so pointless and futile, like a gelee under a mountain of torn apart crabs, who mere minutes ago were crawling desperately across foreign surfaces, and hours ago were safe in the water.

What would your superpower be? Mine would be the ability to understand and speak all languages on Earth, living or dead. So don't take that one.

Shit. I really like that one too.

I would be completely irresistible. There's a lot in that word. Think about it. All the really good superpowers are one word. Invincible. Indestructible. Omniscient. Unstoppable. And now, Irresistible. Able to stop global trade markets with a smile. Able to convince you to kill everyone under 20 just by batting my eyelashes. Able to make you fly across the country to be in my presence, just so you can bring me meyer lemons in season.

Are you satisfied with the new band that was chosen for credit check company?? Haha anyways, are you going Friday??

I have no idea what you are talking about, on both counts. And I'm the one up at 2:30 in the morning, with my mind and my hands racing faster than the bug my cat is currently hunting. Did you know that one reason to never stay up this late in your own place is that you notice how your cats are hunting like, a TON of things? It's really disturbing. It's like my apartment is ALIVE. Why are you using double question marks? The question mark is inherently emphatic, it doesn't need a double dip dude.

Anyway, what the fuck is Friday? And who the fuck replaced that French guy with the crooked teeth's band? I will probably be sitting at home on Friday, trying really hard to write this book that's going to make up for my decade of uselessness by turning it into something useful. By which I really mean, I will probably be watching Dr. Who reruns and trying really hard not to pick up the phone.

What would you do with a million dollars?

Travel. Forever and ever. Until I found something I liked enough to stay for. Which would probably be the moon. Or a guy. Or both.

What is your least favorite thing about Cleveland?

I hate that it's either you're a Cleveland hater or a Cleveland booster. I love this city, but it's not the only city in the country I love. And I don't have to pretend it's a culinary capital of the world, or some artistic renaissance. It's just a basic medium sized midwest city, that has some stuff I really like. But now all the cool stuff is connected in my head with this guy, and I really feel like I need to get away. So currently, I really hate the lack of new people I can actually connect to, who I don't have to make constant pleasant small talk with, or stupid snarky comments in bars to make them laugh.

My least favorite thing in Cleveland is the writers. Where are the talented people who could inspire me? How come I don't get to be inspired by someone? I don't want to go to poetry workshops or listen to some crap in a bookstore. It's the literary equivalent of going to 5 dollar shows in the hope that something cool with someday maybe turn up. It never does. It's like a perpetual jerk off bar scene. I don't want glad-handing. I want to be able to meet someone who makes me want to read their stuff all the time.

I need more rock stars in my life. Rock stars are people who believe they are extraordinary, even if it has no basis in reality, and are therefore sort of actually awesome, if obnoxious to people who don't get their value. I'm tired of ordinary. It's not really Cleveland's fault, but there's a shitload of ordinary here. Nice ordinary, pleasant well meaning ordinary. But still. Ordinary. I want to meet people who are confident that they are something special.

what should I do now?

Impress me. Please.

Do you every try to figure out who's asking you which question?

I don't try at all. I'm trying to give up the practice of futile things. How exactly would I ever figure out who you all are? There's more of you than I realize. You're all faceless blips on my site meter.

If you want me to know who you are, just tell me. I guarantee that I'm nicer to dumber people than you. I'm a nice girl. I don't bite. Except if you don't take me home when I insist on it, and I'm crying and begging and you won't let me out of the car and it's my fucking car. Then I might bite. I'm surprised, given the number of times this has happened, that I wasn't a natural biter in preschool. Maybe it manifested late, like my inability to like reggae. I take it back, I am a biter.

I actually just pretend every question comes from someone who I want to fuck. Or in some cases, someone I would never fuck who wants to fuck me.

If somebody's life had a face, whose life would you want to punch in the nuts?

Mine. I would punch mine. Make sure it never had children ever, and every time it had an orgasm, it would feel a tinge in the back of it's scrotum like it was permanently being pinched.

It would be too mean to wish that on someone else's life. Also, my life has a penis, apparently.

Ask Me Anything. But maybe not something about me in particular. I think I've been thinking about me a little too much lately.

What People Will Do for T-Shirts

So this morning, my friend Christine convinced me to get up at 4am and drive to Nautica with her for the Who Wants To Be a Millionaire auditions. I actually got up, first of all, so what? Incredible. Go me. The last time I got up before the sun was up was...never. We drove to the Powerhouse and stood in line at 5:30 with hundreds of other folks. The people in line with us were from Michigan, Concord, Pittsburgh. At 7am, they ushered us into the main auditorium, where we sat in rows as groups were led out for coordinated potty breaks. Around 8am, we were taken single file into the Windows on the River space and sat down again. And waited to take the test.

There's nothing quite like waiting with a very large group of people who don't know each other at all and have no professional affiliation. Not knowing the people around you means no consequences. It was a varied group, with one thing in common. Everyone in that room thought they were smart. They were convinced enough of their smartness to drive from god knows where to wait in line for hours to maybe someday be on this tv show. Of course, thinking you are and being are two separate things. But regardless, everyone thought they were, and everyone also didn't give a shit about anyone else in that room.

So when the peppy 23 yr old in charge of keeping us quiet like 5 year olds, and not letting us rampage through the Powerhouse in revolt, started giving out t-shirts, it was mayhem. She tried small talking first, which was painful for everyone and the crowd began to turn against her, until she threw the first shirt out. T-shirts are the great crowd placator. I mean, I guess she couldn't give us candy cause we would have gotten too hyper? She had a huge table stacked with them. At first it was free for all, she was just tossing them to the crowd. But things got unruly, and the time kept ticking by, so she started making people sing for them. Right. People got up and sang, in front of everyone, for a t-shirt. I don't remember who was first, but then these two club girls got up and did some parody of Billionaire, which was obnoxious as hell. Then came stirring renditions of I'm a Little Teapot, I Believe I Can Fly, the National Anthem (which trailed off pretty quickly). Guys came up and did horrible jokes that you told in third grade. There was a pterodactyl impression, and several really bad movie impressions. A woman with a large silver star brooch and matching oversized necklace did her Sarah Palin impression, which consisted of her holding her hair back and the crowd cheering. An unfortunate young man in a Steelers jersey got up, and I don't even know what he said, because by that time the crowd was in full force, booing and jeering like this was a public execution. Another woman got up and sang the Oscar Mayer theme song, dedicated to her son in Afghanistan, who she was also going to send her totally awesome Millionaire t-shirt to. The whole morning was simultaneously the best and the worst thing I have ever been subjected to. There was a sing a long to I've Been Working on the Railroad. I can't get it out of my head now.

I didn't make the cut for the test, I suspect it's because I didn't know calculus was another word for tartar or it was my lack of knowledge about birthstones. But I was more than happy to go home at that point, 4 hours later. My biggest regret of the morning is that my fucking camera battery died, so I didn't get any of this on videotape. Chris is still there though, waiting for her interview, so everyone wish her well and text her constant reminders to not get in a fight.

In other news, Thomas got me Lake Erie for my birthday. He is my new best friend.

The Chosen People

Let's pretend you really needed to hide. Not just for like, a weekend. For the rest of your life. You and the people around you that you love need to disappear. Where to go? An island would be perfect, defensible, but there are not a lot of islands lying around anymore unoccupied. Any person that sees you is a person who can gossip, or be bought off, or betray your location and existence, either wittingly or unwittingly. No, what's required is a lonely place with no one for miles and miles, far away from the beaten track.

And then, once you find this ideal spot, how to stay hidden? You will have to provide food for yourselves, clothing. Animals will need to be purchased, plants will need to be grown. Shelter will have to be built. These are all things a satellite can see from space. Any interested party could comb through the images, looking through every frame for the tiniest change in landscape. You will be subject to disease without medical help. Children will need to be raised without knowledge of the outside world, so they don't someday run away and have to answer questions about where they come from. What will you do if someone changes their mind, wants to go back, and risk the entire group's safety?

As you are sitting here thinking about these questions, these eventualities, the time is ticking away. The enemy is coming for you. Your people are starting to panic, and the group is splintering, arguing. The summer is coming quickly to a close, and soon everyone will be dead if you don't decide what to do and where to go. There is no consensus in fear

How much easier then, to just flick your hand and the group, the community, your family, mother and child all disappear into the wall? Stylized, cartooned, frozen in paint and plaster forever. Safe.

Hidden away, lost from all enemies, for centuries, until the walls themselves come crumbling down. How much easier is that? A painting has no panic, no fear. A painting has no blood to draw or bone to crush. They will never find you. They will never win.

And no one can say no.

What I Did on My Birthday (abridged version)

I'm too tired to write more than captions. Also sunburned. It was a very good day.

Did you know that from the Terminal Tower Observation Deck, you can see the Perry plant in the distance?

It all looks like a miniature toy set.

Also there are vast tracts of wasteland I knew nothing about? But they look pretty from up far.

The Tall Ships festival had insane lines to get on the boats. It was like waiting for a Cedar Point ride.

And they frown upon you climbing on the rigging.

After being so close to the water, we couldn't take it anymore. We had to be in the water.

I was very rude to those of my friends who would not come in the water, and spent most of my time being yelled at by lifeguards to come closer to shore.

All I wanted to do was take my camera with me as far as I could into the water and take pictures from there. But I rightly decided I was too fucked up to be trying that.



But after those pesky lifeguards leave, you can swim out as far as you want and stay there floating while the sun goes down, until you are in complete darkness.

More photos here.

Friday's Questions Mother just told her about a doctor she works with who has the exact same birthday as her, like same year too. Thanks Mom.

What on earth is wrong with comic sans? it just looks like the font of the non-internet population. all i see is letters

The problem with Comic Sans is that its a font designed to look like preschool teacher writing. It is the Holcombs of fonts. I used to use it constantly. When I was 16.

AGgfvgs sgfasf asd a er afd ?

Yes, it is a real place. With volcanoes and glaciers and hidden valleys where lost species of mammoth guard the Hammer of Thor, and everyone dresses like a cross between American Apparel and LL Bean. And they all make french press coffee and eat croissants for breakfast, before they head out to their jobs as creative consultants for Santa's Workshop.

I'm not fond of suntanning but enjoy the tropical scent of sunscreen. Do you have anything like that going on?

No. I hate the smell of sunscreen, bug spray, most perfume, bubblegum, body lotion, lipstick, kitchen cleaners, febreeze, dish soap, and anything with trace chemical burn at all. They give me migraines. Or rather, they expose migraines waiting to happen.

I do love the smell of fire.

What is your favorite life form?

Bartenders and scientists.

Why were there no riots after the whole Lebron thing happened? And were you disappointed there were no riots? I was, a little.

I drove downtown to meet someone that night, and when I drove by the Witness sign, it was surrounded by cops. That was disappointing. I didn't want riots, but I thought for sure someone would try and burn the sign. I mean, apparently the cops did too. It's called a molotov cocktail kids. You can throw it. Very portable.

WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO WITHOUT LEBRON?????@(@!(E@!

Um, continue to have a basketball team? And continue to not really watch the games unless I'm at a bar where its playing. And continue to not understand why people get so hung up over sports, but can't start a movement for a ferry to Canada from Cleveland.

If you blog about me, will you change my name to protect my innocence or will you use my real name and expose my identity to the world?

I'm a fan of actual names. Hence my site name. I think it's folly to think you can protect anything on the internet ever, so you should probably just own your actions or not tell anyone at all. We should all live lives that we can tell people about, jobs where we are ourselves, families that know who we really are, and friends who don't necessarily need to read about what we're doing to keep in touch. By the same token, you should not be defined as an individual by your sins. They are just incidental by products of the rest of your life.

Ask Me Anything

What I Want for My Birthday

It's been a spectacularly bad holiday and week so far. It's one of the weeks where someone you care about suddenly becomes a jackass, and then when you tell him he's being a jackass, he becomes an asshole. So you tell him he's being an asshole, and he explodes into a thousand sharp motherfucker shards, which you keep stepping on. Like breaking a glass and finding a piece of it in your heel two months later.

On top of that, it's murderously hot. I finally put the air conditioner in the bedroom, after much tortured contemplation. If you put it in the living room, you can't sleep but you can watch tv. If I put it in the office, I never leave the computer ever. So the bedroom won, but already I'm regretting it. Once you turn it on, you never turn it off you know. It ruins you for the rest of the summer. It turns your skin into delicate candle wax, which melts as soon as you leave it's cooling confines.

I'm turning 31 on Saturday, which is the most boring birthday ever. All the ones up to 30 were cool, cause they were so dangerous. And then 30 is momentous. 33 is the Jesus birthday. But 31 is like, eh, whatever, you're old but not that old. I have no plans, mostly due to the aforementioned asshole shards, and I may just drive somewhere by myself and never come back. I know at some point in my 30s this will happen. It may be this year. But probably not yet.

What I Want for My Birthday

1) A dome water fountain for the cats. That's for you Mom.

2) New tires for my car.

3) To successfully trend the renaming of "foodies" as "puffins".

4) An office water cooler for myself. So I can sit by it and drink ice cold water all day for the rest of my life until I BECOME water. I mean, more so.

5) Someone to come and thoroughly clean my apartment, who I never have to see again.

6) To go to Bethlehem PA.

7) a grant to go to Russia and document the ruins.

8) A tin heart. Not steel, but mendable weldable tin. Made of scraps. With blue LED lights that light up under my chest. To prove I still have one.

9) Lots of drugs. (no really, I'm just kidding. Just being funny. Totally don't mean it at all. Why would anyone be serious about that? Ha ha.) Like, a ton of them. And an igloo with a pool inside it.

10) Ownership of Lake Erie.

The Vega Colony

Do you see that road down there, underneath that bridge? Every morning my father would drive us to school on that road. Every morning we passed this building. Then, when I got older and started traveling in cars not driven by my parents, we passed the building on the road behind it, where you drive over the bridge and past the top of it and always got stopped at the light right at the top of the hill. I once had a temp job at the paper recycling plant across the street from this building. This building is iconic to me. I judge distances to familiar locations from it's hulking shape. This is exploring one of my own organs. Except slightly less slimy. Barely. It is extremely similar to hiding in the warm entrails of a dead behemoth on a snowbound night. Only in that metaphor pretend it is super hot out and the behemoth's slippery mess is cool to the touch, nice for irritated eyes and souls.

There is a door wide open to get into it. This is a place of high traffic. Just jump up on the loading dock and step right in, ladies and gentlemen. Had a bad week at work? Didn't have enough money for coffee this morning? Got ditched by a guy because he would rather take some other girl to the Modest Mouse concert in Detroit that night, even though he's been sleeping with you, and it's your fucking off day, and you just want to ram your head into something old and metal for being so stupid to ever talk to him again? Well come right in to the dank dark warehouse floor. There's no light. There are rooms everywhere you can't see in at all. Old rusty pipes lying around in the darkness. This is the place for you darlings. This is where you can dump your imaginary bodies. Oh and there's a broken ladder, leaning against a broken wall, if you really want to give yourself some bruises to make it feel a little better. Maybe some tetanus, for dramatic effect. Guys dig tetanus, right?

I always mistyped tetanus as "tentanus", which sounds like something that gives you tentacles. I am actually way more afraid of getting tentacles than tetanus.

See, there's a hidden floor up there. Just shimmy up, or rather haul yourself up by the hamstrings you have never possessed. The green light is tempting you, so pretty and not rapey at all. It looks lighter up there too. It'll be better. Maybe wrap your shirt around your hands so you don't get anymore splinters. Brace the legs of the ladder with some old boxes. Tense your body in preparation of the inevitable fall as steps break away from you under the weight of all your fucking baggage.

Or you could just take the stairs. The stairs are pretty too.

Once I got upstairs, I realized I wasn't alone. I was an intruder. They caught me at the entrance and made me go through customs. They are very thorough about foreigners in the Emerald City. I had to empty my pockets, check my shoelaces, bribe a guard to let me out of the cage. It's a hell of a cage. One of the guards told me they used to use it to catch giant squid, before the inland sea dried up. Now it's all processing and paperwork. It's hard to be upset in the green light though. It's so...you just feel calm. Sedated. Content to follow along wherever the little green men take you. Seriously, it's so pretty, you wouldn't believe it. Like the end of the universe is happening all around you, in slow motion.

So they've been hiding out here since the building of the canals. They burn really easily now, because of the whole hiding out in dark places with meth heads thing, but they like the light, hence the green shades. Makes it a little more manageable for their delicate skin. Everything about them is delicate now, they are fragile forgotten things. But the green light makes it so glamorous, so much more believable.


Like, sure, of course I believe you are a secret population of gnomes, forced from their native salt mines in seclusion on the Near West Side. I mean, it's so green! Who wouldn't believe you? No, of course it makes sense you are in constant danger and can't reveal your existence because someone might tip off the giant Slag monsters who were bred in the heart of the new steel mills specifically to kill your colony off and make it development ready. And yes of course you're going to need to keep me here a while, because yes I'm totally a danger to your way of life, no, really, it makes complete sense. I have no problem with being chained to this wall, cause frankly I don't have much out there, and I'm really digging this greenness. I feel like Dorothy. Only not as fancily shod, but there's a lot of broken glass. Do you think I could have a glass of water? No? That's okay, I'll just lick it off this brick here.

I even made two friends here. Well, maybe like, a friend and a horrible scary thing that likes to taunt me. That one above, he's called a Squak. And the cute one below, he's a Squeeble. The Squeebles used to live here before the green gnomes, but then the Squaks sold them out for positions as pets in the new gnome regime. Squeeble, he's like me, trapped in that window. Squak just likes to show up and spit on me. I look on the bright side though, water is water. It's good to stay positive in this light. Poor Squeeble hasn't long to live though. Squaks let their little ones throw rocks at him. Luckily, they're incorporeal, but the intent is what really affects him. He shivers with the hatred and blind blood thirst, and breaks himself apart. I try to tell him to be calm, but I understand. He's hurt, and there's no one left to love him but me.

The Squaks aren't really dangerous though. The actual danger, to me and the gnomes, is the Black Infection. It lives on the highest floor, seeping in through the ceiling. Several gnome children have been hospitalized with infections, and I've seen them running past me, the blackness tracing the veins in their arms, their little white eyes wide with fear. I see it spreading above me. Slowly though. It will be at least another year before it reaches me here. In gnome time, this constitutes an immediate crisis. There are constant meetings. It's hard to participate in panic when you are busy becoming part of the brickwork. Your heart just isn't capable of beating fast enough to really care.

They will have to move the whole colony soon. They can't fight the Black Infection, it's the buildings natural immune system kicking in and they are unwanted occupants. I wonder if they will remember I am here. I wonder if the Infection will hurt, or I'll die immediately while it takes over my body. Probably not. Buildings move on a different time scale. I'll probably die for months. No regrets though. The green light has told me so many things, and I think maybe regular light would not be enough anymore. Also, I will probably burn, I've always had such delicate skin. It's nice to be surrounded by familiar things. My neighborhood, my train tracks, the graffiti I know so well. It's comforting that at any time, my dad may be driving down that road, oblivious, like a game. It's nice to be somewhere hidden away, where other dangerous things can't get me. There is a door in front of me that the gnomes left open when they evacuated the floor. Just being able to look out it is cool. It gives me all I need of that world.



More photos of the colony here. Camera recovered by excavators from the CNHM.

Fridays Questions woke up late and are making up lame excuses for standing you up

Can you explain to me why people who didn't give a shit about soccer two months ago are now watching it and talking about it like they've been dedicated pseudo-European fans their whole lives?

No. I'd like to know what's gonna happen if America really really gets into soccer, and then has to start calling it football like the rest of the world? Are we going to rename football? This is exactly why we stayed away from this sport in the first place, and now we're gonna have to deal with the consequences. Think of the fans man. What are we going to call American football? I vote for War. Or Murder Games.


Do you think our generation is really more selfish? or is it just a stereotype assigned to us that we will eventually live up to?

I don't buy into the whole" one generation is better than the other" crap. Human nature doesn't change, only what kinds of jobs and governments and past times we have. If our forefathers had the same access to the 24 hour online monologue that we do now, they would be doing the exact same thing. But they didn't have the internet, and what the internet is really good at doing is exposing the details of a person that beforehand you might have only found out after years of marriage. So now, instead of being able to control our social images with a few well placed words after church, we all know how selfish, stupid, shallow, sad, and sophomoric we are, actually.

I ,for one, welcome this age of personality porn. It makes it much easier to decide who's worth sleeping with and I no longer have to remember everyone's address.


Can you list your top 5 favorite things to do during summer in Cleveland?

1. Watch thunderstorms
2. Drive out and explore the rest of Ohio
3. Sleep in front of a fan
4. Watch fireworks
5. Hang out by the lake and drink


How's come so many folks from Cleveland seem to work from home?

Do we? I don't know anyone else who does. Maybe you are just basing this off the Cleveland blog population? Of course people who work from home are more inclined to have blogs.

Maybe by "work from home" you mean desperately unemployed? That would make more sense.


If he reads my blog a lot, it means he likes me, right?

Ha! Probably. I've never dated anyone who read my blog on a regular basis. And I take that to heart. It's insulting. I mean, why are you asking me in person about my day? Did you not read about it? So yes, he may like you a lot. Or he may just like your writing. Or he may really enjoyed reading about banal details. It means less that he's romantically inclined, and more that if he is, he's okay for you. But not entirely. Cause some people are just really bored at work. Also, how many other blogs is he really into reading, huh? Is he a blog playa? And what do you talk about exactly, cause if your blog is entirely about reality television, you may want to think twice anyway.


Do you think that alcoholics should have dogs?

What level of alcoholic are we talking about? Cause anybody that can't be bothered to come home to walk the dog, or spend time playing with the dog, or brush the dog and take the dog to the vet and be home with the dog should not have a dog. I think that generally rules out most alcoholics. That even rules out me and I'm not an alcoholic despite what my mother thinks. But if you are an alkie who's devoted entirely to their dog as some sort of coping mechanism with the outside world, and I have met these guys who take better care of their dog than themselves, well you've got other problems, but me taking away your dog isn't one of them. Better you concern yourself with animal friends than involving yourself in anyone else's life emotionally. Oooh, burn.

Ask Me Anything, except maybe wait till I'm over this hangover.

(stolen from David, who may or may not have stolen it from elsewhere cause he's so fucking indie it hurts)

Video of the Day - Designed to Cut the Sugar

The Blogger Code of Interaction

First of all, I'd like to thank society for needlessly make me hate one more thing about myself, which is the label blogger. Yes, blogger is a stupid word. It sounds like some sort of mole that unsuccessfully tries to sink river dam projects, but is too blind to see he should just get along with the river folk and work together.

But being a blogger isn't bad, right? I've made friends, gotten a camera, learned how to write meaningful 140 character sentences. But it sounds horrible. You can't easily tell someone you have a blog without sounding like a "social media expert" ie "one of the most obnoxious people on earth", and my real-in-life friends are finally just starting to read it, though I think they mostly just look at the pictures. It seems like a useless thing to do, a waste of time, since I don't make any money off of it. And I don't have any intention of trying. I get what you have to do to really wrassle up a following. The incessant commenting, and tweeting, and FB whoring. I'm totally capable of whoring within a limited range, but outside my natural circle of self-promotion, I'm too lazy to devote much time to it. After all, the no money thing. Mostly I do it because it forces me to write something every day, even if I don't post it.



So this will be a first for me. I'm going to do a proper Blogger response. I just got a badge from Donda at Daily Life with BiPolar. It was super nice and sweet of her, and you should go visit her. I'm not entirely clear on the whole concept of badges yet. It's like blog bling? But I get the idea that now I'm supposed to do shout outs and pass this shit along. So I'm going to be a nice proper girl and do that. I cannot make my own badge, because it took me hours to fuck around with that banner up there, and finally Midwestgrrl took it upon herself to help me. So I'm not even going to try. But in the proper blogger spirit, here are some folks you should go read.

First, as mentioned above, Donda. Because she is sweet and generous with the blog love.

Second, Midwest Girl. We met doing ANTM recaps I think. She is great, and she has lots of house porn right now since she just moved into a new place. Also she is obsessed with nail polish. Obsessed.

Third, Lead Paint Cookbook. She's mostly a food blog, but in the spirit of young people experimenting with cooking. Also she's entering the State Fair this year, which is a trip and a half.

Fourth, Cleveland Love. She does the urban exploring thing as well, and I love the perspective she gives of living in the city. She'll remind you to be open to new things.

Fifth, Buggin Word. Elly is unique. I will leave it at that. Unique like every grain of glitter is unique.

Sixth, Hip Hop Hippie. She posts a new drink every Friday, because she loves us and wants us to be drunk.

Seventh, Naked Cupcakes. It's all in her blog name.

Eighth, Me and the Bee. It will make you wish you had a cute boyfriend with a camera more than anything else.

Ninth, Libby Logic. I don't usually go in for mom blogs, but she's more than that. She's interesting.

Tenth, and last, Steam Me Up Kid. Just funny. I like funny people.

Oh no, wait, I forgot one of my favorites, Inane Chatter. She wants to open a bookstore, and travels a lot for work, and talks about her dogs and running and stuff. But she's smart and articulate.

Oh and Blue Girl. Blue has given me so much blog love over the last year, I have to send it back. Though she has a Train song in her last post, but listen, I'm not here to judge. I mean, I am, but I'm forgiving of the small things.

Oh gosh, and the best food blog of all, The Gurgling Cod. I have a feeling he hates badges though. He has cheerwine donuts posted right now. Cheerwine donuts.

I mean, obviously anyone on my blog roll should be treated like royalty. I have discerning taste. If I left you out and you hate me now, then I can only tell you that I am new at this whole diplomacy thing, and terrible at it, and maybe if you bought me more drinks this would be a different story huh? I would be terrible at giving an awards thank you speech. I would just have to start singing along to the music when they tried to play me off stage.

So there you go. I guess I am officially a blogger now. Right? Right? When do I get invited places yo?