Happy Birthday, Roger!

Today’s Roger Abramson’s birthday.  I got him a purse, a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird, and some yellow cake uranium.

What did you get him?

Qdoba

I was back at Qdoba again today.  Don’t ask me why.  I don’t even really like it that much and yet, I’m drawn to it.  I would not be surprised to find that the lime rice was laced with heroin. 

But this is not a post about Qdoba.  This is a post about the nine men at the front of the line while I was at the back of it.  All young, broad-shouldered, trying to order and pay and help the ones who spoke less English get what they wanted.  Some of the staff at Qdoba speaks Spanish–the little woman with the bright smile and the cute guy and the bald guy with the freckled arms with the fading gang tattoos–and between them and the guys in line was a light, fun chaos. 

The one guy who didn’t speak Spanish asked the kid with the coal black eyes, “Queso?”

And the kid with the coal black eyes looked around for his friends or for anyone who spoke Spanish to make eye contact with him.  Finally, a buddy came over.

“Queso?” again asked the guy who didn’t speak Spanish and the buddy turned to the coal black eyed guy and said, “Queso.”

And the kid with the coal black eyes said, “Oh, si, si.”

And I swear to god, it sounded like the exact same word to me and I was looking at the guy who didn’t speak Spanish and he was looking at me and we were both like, “What the fuck?” and the guy with the freckles on his arms looks at us and starts to laugh.

Apparently, the kid with the coal black eyes was having a little fun with the guy who didn’t speak Spanish.

And we were all in agreement that it was funny.

I wonder what they were–young construction workers?  A gang?  A baseball team?

Anyway, behind them were two women who were dressed much younger than they were, who were convinced that sour cream might be a bit too exotic for their tastes and the woman with the high and tight pony tail, who seemed to be taking the lead in the ordering, was carrying a purse made of a print fabric of Confederate flags*.

And she and I were in agreement that you rarely see that many hot men all horsing around in one place, but that we appreciated it.  Her friend wanted to squeeze one of their butts.

So, there you go.  Who can understand the South and yet, I can’t help but love a place that makes you go “What the fuck is going on here?” at least once a day.

 

 

 

*Sadly, the internet has failed me in my efforts to find you an example of this purse, but if you click here and scroll down to the bikini worn by the woman with the armband tattoo, that’s the fabric.  Imagine it as a purse. 

The Play and Other Things

I think I’ve got my pentultimate draft of my play done.  I want to go through and clean it up and make sure that all the new pieces fit with the old pieces, but last night, I was feeling bad about it, like it sucked and there were obvious things about it that I could fix to make it better, if only I had more talent and could figure it out.

And that really pissed me off, because, as challenging as this has been up until now, I never have not liked it.  And so, I feel like, if I’m at the point where I’m not enjoying it any more, I may be at the point where I’m done with it.  I’ve tried my best and if it’s not what they’re looking for, it was still good to get this far, because, genuinely, I’ve learned a lot from it.

Still, I hope they take it and I hope Plimco plays the lead, because I would pay one gazillion dollars to hear her yodel on stage.  If they accept it, I’m making her a mix CD with yodeling songs so that she can practice.  I’ve got in mind Jimmie Rodgers’s "Waiting on an Train" (which blue yodel that is, if any, I can’t recall), "My Morphine" by Gillian Welch, and "I Asked Him for Water (He Gave Me Gasoline)" by Lucinda Williams, which might be the other way around–"(I Asked Him for Water) He Gave Me Gasoline" but my internet connection is down, so I can’t look.  I’m just hoping it comes back up in time for me to publish this.

I may also throw some Joan Osborne on there.  "Don’t feel sorry for me.  I hate that look on your face."  It’s funny.  I love that album so much and I never have bought another one of hers.  I’m such a shitty fan.

Speaking of things I’m a fan of, I really miss the Animaniacs.  I hadn’t thought of them in a long time, until Mack told me that his daughter’s name was "Angelina Contessa Louisa Francesca Banana Fanna Bo Besca the Third."  You can best believe I will indeed be asking Mack if his kids are "zany to the max" the next time I talk to him.

And yes, I do wish that my name was also Princess Angelina Contessa Louisa Francesca Banana Fanna Bo Besca the Third, but I would let you call me Besca for short.

Just Wondering

If a loved one has a name that rhymes with a bodily function, do you suppose that ever becomes unfunny?

I’m just saying, do you ever think Doc Holliday got tired of calling his friend Wyatt Burp?

I Explain Things to the Deliberately Obtuse

1.  If you call it "Blogger Day on the Hill" but only invite conservative bloggers, you look like an asshole.  There’s no two ways about it.  If you hurry, you can still change the name of it to "Conservative Blogger Day on the Hill" but the bad taste will linger.

2.  Terry Frank, analogies work like algebra.  a+b=c+d  If a is "liberal bloggers" and b is "dog Campfield (R)" and d is "dog Hackworth (D)," then what is c?

I’ll give you a hint, it’s not "liberal bloggers."  See, because b doesn’t equal d, there’s no way a and c can be the same and still have both sides of the equation actually, you know, equal.

I know you’re trying to shift the terms of the debate, to say that liberal bloggers are just upset about Campfield’s legislation because it’s "stupid" and a "waste of time" and therefore, if we aren’t upset about all stupid, waste of time legislation, we’re hypocrites.

But we both know, because people said repeatedly, that our problems with Campfield’s legislation have to do with the violation of women’s autonomy, the threat to patient/doctor privilege, his handling of opposition, and the fact that it was stupid and a waste of time.

I realize that you’re trying to create a smoke-screen big enough to cover the egregiousness of Campfield’s position, but please.

3.  Wes Comer, you say, "Because it’s now on this side of 2-3" of skin and womb we suddenly deem it worthy of receiving a birth certificate."  You do realize that’s because that’s what being born means, don’t you?  You are on one side of a uterus, you are not yet born.  You are on the other side of a uterus, you are born.

Then you go on:

Let the self-celebrating, snarky-comment-making abortion defenders get as sanctimonious as they want about it. Let the wailing and gnashing of teeth begin — I can already hear the dissenting, idiotic utterances before they’ve escaped the mouths of the mentally numb among us. But let me say this before the venomous grievances are vomited my way — this debate has little to do with Mr. Campfield. The fact is, and I would dare anyone to prove otherwise, that the voices being raised against Campfield have little or nothing to do with his specific legislation and everything to do with the spirit and message of the bill.

Damn straight.  It does have everything to do with the sprit and message of the bill, which is "Stacey Campfield doesn’t think women have the same rights he does."  Stacey Campfield doesn’t have any state legislators trying to violate his doctor/patient privilege.  Stacey Campfield doesn’t have any state legislators trying to compel him to do something that is all the time painful, often dangerous, and sometimes deadly against his will.  Stacey Campfield doesn’t have any state legislators making his medical records public so that any nut with a grudge can collect his name and post it on the internet or track him down or turn him over to the Army of God.  Stacey Campfield doesn’t have any state legislators arguing that another person has a right to his body and that the state ought to be able to compel him to give his sovereignty to that other person against his will.

I think the spirit and the message come through loud and clear.

Listen, there’s not a person in this debate that doesn’t think that babies ought to be celebrated and the women who choose to have them commended.

But let’s be honest about what this is about: you’re angry that you can’t figure out a way to compel women to have babies.  You think that, if you can argue that an unborn life is a legal person from the moment of conception–and a cute and helpless legal person to boot–you can obscure the fact that what you’re talking about is compromising the rights of women and making an end run around the fourteenth amendment which prevents you from depriving me of my liberty without the due process of law.