King of Etruria

31 October 2004

Sara sent me an e-mail in which her sister apparently remembered something funny I had said. I guess this was long before the historic genesis of my blog, so it hasn't been posted. While driving down 15-501 one day, I saw a car with the license place ANUSTART. I think it means the driver got "a new start." But that's not what I read.

 

Posted at 1236.

29 October 2004

Pumpkin carving party tonight! This is the shape into which I horrifically mutilated a gourd. Mwahahahaha!

 

Posted at 0034.

26 October 2004

I gotst me a job! Yeeeeah, boooooyyyy. No mo' mama drama, 'cuz I sho' can buy some nice bling-bling fo' ma shorteez.

 

Posted at 1859.

I also got an interesting letter in the mail from Air France's Fréquence Plus program. Ahhhh. Je t'aime, Air France. Je t'aime. Nous can sure souhaitons me an excellent voyage sur le lignes of Air France, but that don't make it so. Oh, and je voudrais un sandwich à jambon et fromage... s'il vous plait.

 

Posted at 2014.

24 October 2004

Today was the last day of the State Fahr! Patrick, Andy, and I headed over to Raleigh to see how much crappy food we could consume while standing up and walking around such lovely places as the cow pen. Andy managed to eat the entire giant turkey leg, Patrick wolfed down an Italian sausage, and I found a nice guy screaming, "Falafelfalafelfalafel" at the top of his lungs and therefore bought some. We also ate: deep-fried Snickers bar, chocolate-dipped cheesecake on a stick, breaded and deepfried cinnamon apples, apple pie, cotton candy, BBQ peanuts, chocolate-covered peanuts, and Cheerwine.

There's always one thing each year that keeps me coming back to the Fair purely because it makes me say, "What the fuuuuuuck?" 750lb pumpkin? Seen it. Woman on stilts? Eh. World's largest horse? Whatever. This year's candidate comes from the arts-and-crafts contest, and its division, I can only assume, is fantasy taxidermy...

 

Posted at 2256.

23 October 2004

We stayed in a bed and breakfast in Maggie Valley this weekend whose owner's name was actually Cletis. There's nothing like a trip to western North Carolina (especially in a rental car with California plates) to make you feel like "y'all ain't from around here, are y'all?" The B&B was lovely, though, with amazing food, even if our foray over into Gatlinburg sucked monkey butt.

 

Posted at 1236.

21 October 2004

I was studying for my Anatolian archaeology midterm and came across a site plan that was labelled in German, since it was excavated by the Germans. Instead of calling it a sphinx gate, they called it a sphinx tor. On this plan, though, there wasn't much of a space between the two words, making it look like sphinxtor. Huh huh huh. Huh huh huh huh.

 

Posted at 2218.

14 October 2004

Bryan made up a joke about the death of Jacques Derrida. I like to call it Derri-sion. Enjoy.

Q: How do four deconstructionists write the epitaph of Jacques Derrida?

A: The first one argues that any epitaph would only have meaning inside its own text, and would not have a connection to any truth about Derrida.

The second one argues that the first one's statement is only meaningful inside its own text, and does not have a connection to any truth about epitaphs for Derrida.

The third one argues that the second one's statement is only meaningful inside its own text, and does not have a connection to any truth about the first one's statement.

The fourth one actually writes an epitaph, but no one can understand it.

 

Posted at 1653.

12 October 2004

And now it's time for... Spam Haiku!

Nascar, Shakespeare as
Miss World. That's wrong image...
follows Tomb Raider.

Really turns me on:
Scented candles, bath for two
Sex toys, a threesome.

Strong androgenic
Enormous buildup of strength
Weight gain of two pounds.

Paris Love Stories
To go there, Amazon, let
me... will be all right.

Demoniac sky
Lovelorn cow breaks ileum
Upstairs, cyprus fly.

These all came from actual spam that I received between October 9 and 12. All are slightly modified from their original word-order except for Paris Love Stories.

After I did this all by hand, I found a blog in which some guy wrote a simple perl program to make haiku out of his spam. That's kind of cheating, and his haiku are far less interesting than mine. But I'm pissed that he thought of it a few months before I did. Curses! Memed again.

 

Posted at 1653.

11 October 2004

I saw a bunch of pre-tweens standing on the corner of Franklin Street near Whole Foods this weekend holding hand-painted Bush for President signs with no adult anywhere nearby. It's not too far from The Onion's satirical picture this week, Baby Takes Political Stance. You can tell that baby isn't from North Carolina.

 

Posted at 1233.

10 October 2004

Jacques Derrida
Requiescat in pace.

Washington Post story
CNN story
NY Times obit

If you haven't seen Derrida, a 2002 documentary about him, I urge you to do so. It's awesome.

 

Posted at 1433.

9 October 2004

I saw an Altima today on 15-501 with the license plate DURMITE. I'm pissed. I totally coined that word when we moved here 5 years ago. The only NC reference I can find on google for Durmite is a company called Durmite Entertainment. Bastards. Hmmmm. Perhaps I should e-mail them and ask if they stole the name from me. Although I wouldn't really want D.J. Sabir to come after me.

 

Posted at 2345.

7 October 2004

The 10 Commandments of the Gym

1. Thou shalt not "accidentally" unplug a treadmill whilst another is a-running.
2. Thou shalt not run like a platypus, thereby throwing off others' running rhythms.
3. Thou shalt not do calisthenics while on the treadmill lest ye bash the exercisor on yon mill.
4. Thou shalt not wear bootilicious shorts with the name of thine school, thine sports team, thine last name, or thine dog emblazoned across thine ass. Thou art not, forsooth, hot.
5. Thou shalt not wear a strategically ripped t-shirt, even if thou hast a six-pack.
6. Thou shalt not dropeth thine iPod while running on the treadmill, lest one snickerest with mirth as it flies gaily across yon room.
7. Thou shalt not pickest thine wedgie unless thou art truly discrete.
8. Thou shalt not hit on 20-something women if thou art either old as Croesus or fat as a miser's wallet.
9. Thou shalt not allow vittles of any sort in yon gymnasium lest the exercisors revolt, swarm the second floor, and kill thine fatted calf.
10. Thou shalt not flatulate excessively, lest thou art murdered most gruesomely by olfactorily-sensitive be-muscled women.

 

Posted at 2124.

6 October 2004

So the bus driver of the FCX this morning was really weird. As we were getting on, he said, "Rack 'em and stack 'em. All smaller passengers can be stowed in the overhead bins." Of course, I've thought for months that these buses should come equipped with overhead racks for bookbags; it would mean more people could get on the bus if people didn't have ginormous backpacks taking up the space another person could occupy in the aisle.

 

Posted at 1413.

4 October 2004

This came in the mail today. It's an advertisement to make me want to subscribe to Science magazine; their catch phrase is "Sign me up, baby!" I dunno. Something about facial hair on a baby just freaked me out.

 

Posted at 2029.

3 October 2004

I'm convinced one of my legs is shorter than the other. Whenever I run, my left knee, calf, ankle, and hamstring hurt like a mutha. It seems that lots of people have one short leg, including David Beckham. But this causes back or hip problems, not leg problems. Hmmmm. Maybe I'm just a freak.

 

Posted at 2029.