Entries: November 2002

Tentacles

Ahh, a crisp Thursday morning, and the tentacles are out. Tentacles everywhere, hailing from the corners of buildings, flying like high flags, crackling in the crystalline mist. Tentacles from under the sidewalk, jutting up through the tectonic rended chiclet-like squares, tickling the calves of satchel-toting randoms as they walk right into the warm embrace of their betentacled elevators. Small tentacles like flagellae, whispering on currents deep in the ductwork, in the still water of an abandoned tire lying afield, in your left shoe. Can you hear the thrum? Empty, they flap spasmodically, but when they are near enough to gain purchase, they tug at you, wanting you close, to hold you as long as they might, as tentacles will. The rest of this day I dedicate, then, to the tentacle.

archived page comment [1]

Gas

I dreamed that several multinational oil companies had merged specifically to form a fresh new marque under which they could peddle their product. This new venture was called Shambo Gas, and I saw the signs glowing everywhere, blue against the starry black sky. I couldn’t believe how quickly they had erected the stations, nor how densely they’d packed them. But mainly, I thought the name sounded vaguely like some kind of fast food chicken joint. Then again I guess their marketing worked, because I remembered the name even after I awoke.

archived page comment [0]

Welcome to Taisho

Wired featured a product called Iris Neo Cool - a liquid eye freshener that the Japanese Schoolgirls are said to love. But that’s not what I’m writing about. Many of the offerings in Taisho’s catalog feature in their product descriptions a series of accompanying illustrations that describe when the product is best used, and what benefits it provides. This product, whose purpose I cannot begin to divine, seems to cause leering and madness. Maybe that’s purpose enough.

archived page comment [0]

Ride It!

Scientists are so excited about all the extra terrestrial life they’re finding. Seems like they can’t avoid it these days. “Oh, look at these bacterial remnants we found on Mars.” “Oh, look at all that brothy briney liquid beneath the ice caps of that moon.” THAT’S NO MOON! “Oh, look how the sun is pulsating and gesticulating about that hungry hungry black hole at the center of the Universe and saying, ‘Look out! Black hole!’” Whatever. You know, I’m waiting for something a little cooler than fossilized alien rabies. I’m waiting for there to be bigger stuff - stuff we can ride! Because it’s all about riding around and stirring up a commotion. Yeehaw! Spank that tentacled mofo! “You git!” Ride it across the sandy red veldt! At least that’s what I think.

archived page comment [1]

Can I Please Have Some More?

You know when your kid brother slides his pudding onto the floor, and then you laugh and give him another pudding? And then your mom says, “Don’t do that, you’re just going to encourage him!” Well George Bush is your kid brother, and last night you people—and you know who you are—bought another pallet of pudding from the bulk aisle. Friends, you’ve made a lot of old white men very happy. Enjoy! Now, if you’ll pardon me, it’s time that I explored the world of misanthropy.

archived page comment [0]

Little By Little

My hands are dirty with MovingType scripts. That’s how this beast is conquered: from the inside out. I watched a nature show a good while back about a kind of demonic fluke who inserts its parasitic larva within the carapace of a snail. Over time the wee ones, subsisting on the precious bodily fluids of the host snail, burrow their way merrily toward the eyepods, rendering the snail thoroughly insane. As the snail continues to crawl directionlessly, the wee ones lie just beneath the translucent skin of the stalks, and there begin to pulsate: a black and white throbbing strobe. The snail is no longer home. A bird invariably spots the strobing snail and plucks it off its leaf, thus propagating the fluke species… or some such. I don’t know what the snot all that’s about… but I myself feel like a burrowing larva within the deranged body of Movable Type. And I’m beginning to strobe, baby—time to get it on.

archived page comment [0]

Take the Stairs

The reason I jog up four flights of stairs isn’t because it’s good exercise. The reason I jog up four flights of stairs is because I can’t stand being in an elevator with people. After pressing the button, the seconds tick by, and I feel a small crowd approaching me from behind.

“Did you press the button already? Okay, good—we can all ride up together! Say, would you mind breathing the same air that I just expelled from my body?”

In fact I do. And you’re ugly.

Yes, taking the stairs is good for the heart.

archived page comment [2]