This Blog Will Eat Itself

2003-09-18T14:06:00.000-04:00

I just received the most amazing email.
Here it is, with my response.
I hope I hear back from them soon!

Good day,
I am Mr.Gerald Obi, Bank Manager of Invertment Banking & Trust Company
(IBTC), Lagos Branch. I have an urgent and very confidential business
proposition for you. On June 6th 1997, a consultant with a Foreign
Petroleum company, Mr. Karl Philip, made a numbered time (Fixed) deposited
for twelve calendar months, valued at US$25,000,000.00 (TWENTY FIVE
Million United States Dollars) in my branch. Upon maturity, I sent a
routine notification to his forwarding address but got no reply. After a
month, we sent a reminder and finally we discovered from his contract
employers that Mr. Karl Philip died from an automobile accident. On further
investigation, I found out that he did not leave a WILL and all attempts to
trace his next of kin were fruitless. I made further investigation and
discovered that Mr. Karl Philip did not declare any next of kin on all his
official documents, including his Bank Deposit paperwork. This sum of
US$25,000,000.00 is still sitting in the Bank and the interest is being
rolled over with the principal sum at the end of each year. No one will
come forward to claim it.
According to our banking Laws, at the expiration of 7 (seven) years, the
money will revert to the ownership of the Government if nobody applies to
claim the funds.
Consequently, my proposal is that I would like you as a foreigner to stand
in as the next of kin to Mr. Karl Philip so that the fruits of this old
man's labor will not get into the hands of some corrupt officials. This is
simple I will like you to provide me immediately with your full names and
address so that the attorney will prepare the necessary documents which
will put you in place as the next of kin. We shall employ the services of
two attorneys for drafting of a letter of probate/administration in your
favor. A bank account in any part of the world, which you provide (it could
have a zero amount in it), will then facilitate the transfer of this money
to you as the beneficiary/next of kin. The money will be paid into your
account for us to share in the ratio of what we would both agree on. There
is no risk at all as all the paperwork for this transaction will be done by
the attorney and my position as the Branch Manager guarantees the
successful execution of this transaction. If you are interested, please
reply immediately via the email address:gobi5@tiscali.co.uk Upon your
response, I shall then provide you with more details and relevant documents
that will help you understand. Please observe utmost confidentiality, and
rest assured that this transaction would be most profitable for both of us
because I shall require your assistance to invest my share in your country.
Awaiting your urgent reply via email
Best regards,
Gerald Obi.

and i said:
Dear Mr. Gerald Obi,

Wow! 25 million dollars!? That sure would pay off my student loans, and then sum!! I was so excited when I got your email, that I could hardly sleep! I do think that you are the answer to all of my prayers! I discussed this prospect with my boyfriend, and he said to make sure that this was legal, or at least a fairly safe venture, becuz "the last thing we need is the cops breathing down our necks!" Boy, I'll say!
I wouldn't mind posing as Mr. Philip's long lost cousin twice removed. I have other doubts, though! Has your bank done a thorough investigation on the kin of Mr. Philip? I would hate to spend all of his money on a new house and furniture that I worked so hard to pick out, and then have to give it all away to some Philip relative that didn't even care enough to notice that poor Karl had died!!
Please let me know about these details,
and tell me what I have to do to help you MAKE US RICH!

Your Soon to Be Business Partner,
A
PS~ Will I have to fake a British accent? Cuz I can! My roommate used to be from Britland!

*sigh*
I'll be on the road by the time I hear back from him, probably.
Follow our trek across the midwest!
www.roadwanderers.com

2003-09-17T21:32:00.000-04:00

I haven't posted in a very long time.
After this, I probably won't post for another long time.
I have reasons (excuses) for that. (see below)
But I've been putting all my time and effort into an ephemeral site that runs it's course in the next three weeks.
http://www.geocities.com/brookedelindsey/Road_Trip_2003
This site is mostly the bloodsweatntears of MissZinny, but I've contributed on a soulful level.
My point is that I've caught the bug.
My wireless card comes in the mail tomorrow,
and when I get home from Wisconsin, I want to build an internet wonderland of parody sites
and ebaygimmicks and photogalleries.
So this is my statement of intent.
I plan to return to you, Internet, my forgiving and frigid mistress.

Excuses for being another jackass to abandon a blog after a month or so:
1) I moved. It's a big deal. Everything changed. I even wear more eyeliner now.
2) I had no internet. This isn't really a valid excuse, because if I spared one small fraction of the time that I spent selling the contents of my closet on ebay, I'd have a novel. Regardless, blogging wasn't as lucrative, and I was unemployed and eating cocktail onions.
3) No material. Not to say nothing has happened.
Every moment is a damned episode, minus the laughtrak.
But I tend to operate without my left hand knowing what my right's up to.
Which is tricky when using dvorak and I have to describe the night without any vowel cooperation. My right hand sounds like dehydrated eastern european. Bah. . . . In short, I don't know who reads this. I wake up at night with the thought of my grandmother running a search for "homo prison", and before I know it I've alienated my token gay uncle.
I've moved on from that paranoia, or at least willing to suppress it.
If anything I write ever gets big enough to land on my family's pc by sheer dumb luck,
I would be pseudo-celebrity enough to sell t-shirts depicting the violent fallout
and use the proceedings to buy new parents.

And to prove my new spirit of intrepidation towards the internet:
I like Mom more than you, Dad.
Seriously. The quickest way to my heart is through your banking account.

Oh God.
You know I didn't mean that, right?
I like you both just the same!
You understand this is a weird pseudo-parody blog where I'm hardened by the anonomity of it all, right? Dad...you were never meant to find this site.
Dad...
...I'm starving.
Please send cash.
Love, Me.

2003-08-25T12:05:00.000-04:00

Called the local community college.
No admissions this late in the game, save for the kind of sexual favors that would compromise my soul.
I'm still your uneducated local waitress.

2003-08-25T11:50:00.000-04:00

Settling into the lovely town of Sarasota, and woke up this morning with an insatiable thirst for ginger ale and the internet. I am hijacking a roommate's computer until I find the motivation to unpack the knot of computer wires.
It's been four days, and I promised myself I'd be awake four hours ago finding a job. I wasn't. Unemployment has a lure I can't quite put my finger on. It might have something to do with sleeping ten hours a day.
Things are pretty self-centric under this rock, and I am going to scour the world wide web for impertinent bits of pop culture until my roommate wakes up and asks who the hell I think I am.

2003-08-19T11:56:00.000-04:00

What's with the weird punked out duck mascot for BubbleYum?

I don't want to come off as misanthropic with this question,
because I love BubbleYum as much as the next gum chewer...
but isn't a DUCK with pink hair, a spiked collar and nose ring unsettling to anyone else?

I tried to look into it, and all I could find out was that his name was Floyd.
Pink Floyd. Oh, I get it. He's a rock n roller.
On the bright side, they have a variety of Floyd downloads for you to stare at
while you try to figure out this enigmatic duck.

2003-08-19T11:45:00.000-04:00

Children, sleep well.
At long last, The Search is over.

2003-08-18T11:13:00.000-04:00

Since the popularization of the -core suffix, musical genres are becoming too varied and meaningless to be worth keeping track of. I think a new musical credo should simplify my life and cd selections: If it's not Talking Heads, I'm not listening to it.

2003-08-15T13:43:00.000-04:00

Grandparents will inevitably make the obligatory comments about how tall you are, and where on earth in the gene pool did you get your height from...nonetheless, I was still taken aback when my Grandmother pops out with, "Strange that every other woman in the family has larger breasts, isn't it?"

Whatwut?

"Well, what God's forgotten we replace with cotton, I always say."

My grandmother just suggested I stuff,
and used the most ridiculous rhyme I think I've ever heard.
Poll: Do I laugh or cry?

"Aw jeez, Gramma, just leave money in your will for me to get implants."

2003-08-15T10:47:00.000-04:00

Movin' On Up In a Pseudo-Intellectual Melee
My new flatmates in Sarasota are a much more cultured crew than the Orlando kids. Instead of sitting around all day playing Smash Bros 'Meh-Lee' tournaments, my new household plays Smash Bros 'May-Lay'.

And I am a wolf among lambs, because they don't know how volatile I am with Pikkachu.

2003-08-14T13:49:00.000-04:00

Fear and loathing in Orlando for two days straight now;
I've been twitchier than Michael J. Fox on an ephedrine binge.
Two nights ago I got pulled over at 4 ayem.
My license has been suspended for unpaid tickets for about a year,
and the natural law of the universe dictated that I should spend the night in jail.
I was brought a minute away from having my forehead smashed into the hood of my car,
and then it was all over with a curt, 'Get along home, Ma'am.'
In a beautiful and timely burst of static on the walkietalkie,
the officer was unable to hear the rap sheet on me
and sent me on my way.
Finding my way home was a miracle
from behind my eerie mix of frantic sobbing and maniacal laughter,
and I never felt so grateful to be sleeping on my parents' couch.
I didn't even mind when my mother's dog laid down on me and tried to make me her bitch.
It could have been a lot worse.
Alright;
obviously, I'm getting messages from a higher power,
but I still have questions:
Is the point that I should learn my lesson and pay off my tickets,
or that I am invincible and couldn't even get arrested if I started burning cute puppies in the streets?
I won't be able to test this, because I can't afford a cute puppy.

I think it might just be a cosmic sweeps week,
and the fates are working overtime
bringing the stars to the edges of their seats.

I promised my grandmother I would drive over there this afternoon
and help her make 200 blondie brownies for my mother's MaryKay party.
This is the better end of the deal...
my sister has to clean the bathrooms.

2003-08-12T14:59:00.000-04:00

If all of life can be distilled into mathematics,
then I'm tackling the age old question,
"Aren't you even going to shower first, Andrea?"
Observe:

S = 2xM - C

That is to say, your importance to me on a scale of one to ten (M) can be multiplied by two, and from that, subtract how comfortable I am around you on a scale of one to ten (C) to get a rough estimation of how nice I will smell around you, on a scale of post-marathon to chanel 5 (S).
So don't ask me why I smell like cigarettes and sweat;
do the math and ask yourself
why you're not even deodorant-worthy.

2003-08-11T12:28:00.000-04:00

I have a travel recommendation.
After driving around in circles for about an hour on Saturday, it occured to me that I need to visit the town of Cassadaga before I move out west.
For those not hip with this hickland oddity of spiritual realms, Cassadaga is a very tiny town about 30 miles east of Orlando where all the psychics and mediums of Florida have gathered to make a zoo of themselves. Yes, the entire town is populated by psychics. You can go there and eat at the Lost in Time Cafe (I recommend the Other Wordly Brownie Sundae.), walk around the half mile loop that makes up the whole of the city and stop in at one of the many houses with signs out front for a
computer printout of your aura ($25),
a palm reading ($30),
handwriting analysis($45),
tarot prediction($50), or
a complete past life regression ($300).
High-priced metaphysical whores.
I can't judge; I didn't indulge in their satan-craft.
I'm not going to fork over half a days' pay for some vague drunken conclusions that I could probably come to after $10 worth of cheap liquor.
But it's fun to point fingers, and you can't help but notice that there is a creepy feel to the entire place. Everything seems almost normal, only with ghosts. Even the trees seem creepier. This is probably because the town is five miles from the joke of a city that is Deland, which is different from Cassadaga in that the only spirits Delanders regularly channel are Dale Earnhardt's and Southern Comfort.
(I have so much animosity towards the entire population of Deland after buying my lemon car there. Had to junk it three months later; bastards. And yes, it came with a number 3 sticker.)
So! Cassadaga: portal to the mystic realms, or a nutjob atmostphere for eating ice cream and wasting a Saturday afternoon?
Either way, moving to Cassadaga
and investing in bangled earrings, a flowing hemp gown
and a sign announcing Tea Leaf readings
would probably be a lucrative forfeiting of your privacy.

2003-08-08T14:46:00.000-04:00

~The Fun with Book-end Symbols Entry~

"G'devening, kids."

[ Insert gratuitous opening joke about California's Governor race. ]

*acknowledging the disdainful chuckles with a disinterested smirk*

< tired> And so it ends. < /tired>

::applause::

(I'm firing my team of writers.)

2003-08-07T10:35:00.000-04:00

Worst alarm clock ever:

"Are you awake yet?"
"No."
"Would you like to pack the car full of a few thousand dollars worth of product and go on a giant road trip up the east coast and back? We'd schedule different Mary Kay parties along the way, and try to sell to everyone we met along the way! We'll wear our pink suits and even ask gas station attendants if they'd like to buy something for their wives! I'll call everyone I know along the way and see if they'll host parties! My second cousin has a salon, and we could go in there and give pedicures to all the ladies! We'll take a week and just sell as much as we can, to Maine and back! Would you like that!?"
"Would I ever!?"
"Seriously!?"
"No."

2003-08-07T01:29:00.000-04:00

Sticky goal:
I want to be as witty and charming as Wil Wheaton one day.
Reality:
It makes me sad that I wasn't wittier and more charming than Wil Wheaton at age 12.

Ses same HT ni at retnell I wemord nilapre velcas pahre perhaps a clever palindrome will entertain the masses.

2003-08-06T11:22:00.000-04:00

Moving day... days. Daze.
My computer is the last and hardest thing to unplug,
and i might just wait until seconds to inspection.

2003-08-04T07:11:00.000-04:00

According to my new COUNTER,
I can say anything I want without fear of offending any progressivist non-racist non-sexist hippies
with my vulgar ideas of segregation and homo-prison.

Homo-prison,
I say it.
Homo-prison.

2003-08-04T06:50:00.000-04:00

Dressed up like a woman of ill repute to attend a pimps&hos party Saturday night,
then spent entire evening coddling the hunch punch and trying to avoid eye contact with anyone
who might potentially say I've had enough to drink.
Went home and fell asleep.

That was my version of the events, anyhow.
Apparently, I'm blocking out the ho dance-off, jello-vomit out the window the entire ride home,
and making a number of phone calls. I doubted I had the capacity to dial,
so I didn't believe the latter until presented with recorded evidence.

Sunday was a day of penance, and my major triumph was holding down a glass of water
so I could take enough tylenol to go back to sleep.
Insert sleep for the remainder of Sunday, which brings me to
Now.
First and only person in the office on Monday morning;
wide-eyed and bushy-tailed at the unnatural hour of 5.

And this is why I am swearing off alcohol.

2003-07-31T08:38:00.000-04:00

What kind of message does it send when you must have at least $5000 in debt before credit counseling services will help you get out of debt? Clearly, the only way for me to start sleeping soundly at night is a giant shopping spree to push me over the quota.

2003-07-30T13:38:00.000-04:00

It's two in the afternoon,
and i still haven't come up with one good reason
not to show up for work this morning.
But that's okay... I'm sure they're getthing the picture by now.
I would like to claim this day in the name of pizza.

In other news,
I heard back from my write-a-prisoner buddy!
His handwriting is better than mine, he seems pretty together...
but the best part is why he's in jail!
First try, and I caught the Big H.
(That's Homicide, baby.)
Today is his birthday, so I spent an hour in line at the
post office trying to mail a brightly wrapped, confetti-stuffed card and present.
To any nay-sayers concerned for my safety,
I also told him I'm moving soon,
please don't respond until I have a PO box set up in Sarasota.
We're cool.
Confuscious would have been right had he said,
"There's open-minded,
and there's telling murderers where you live.
One not so clever."

There's no quicker way into Hell than misquoting adorable and huggable Asians.

2003-07-25T13:34:00.000-04:00

The Mailman:
The mailman from my office building and I have a very unsettling relationship.
Once, I lost the mailbox keys and didn't retrieve the mail for a week. He stormed in, yelling and cursing, asking when we were going to get our mail. This didn't go over well with the powers that be.
I've also managed to catch his ire (did you know it was possible to catch a mailman's ire?) by sending my homemade postcards via the office mailbox. It's a mailbox! There'd be all kinds of contruction paper and cardboard creations I'd tape up, stamp, and send out. And then he puts a sign up in the mailroom announcing that no personal mail may be sent through the mailbox. (I am SURE that he isn't allowed to do that.) So I kept sending my postcards through...until one fateful day I tiptoed into the mailroom and was just slipping a particularly loud and haphazard looking postcard into the slot, only to turn around and see him behind me.
"So, those are YOURS?"
"Um...yeah. I'm putting enough postage on them, right?"
"Did you see the sign?"
"Oh, yeah. Sure," and then I bluffed, "but it was handwritten, and I figured it was a practical joke. Don't worry, I called the post office and they said there's no rule restricting this mailbox to commercial use."
"Oh, is that right? Well I'll be."
And I walked off and we hate eachother forever.

Flash forward to yesterday.
I'm cutting it up around the watercooler, sitcom-style, and the postman bellows from the reception area,
"Helloooooo? Have you decided to stop getting the mail again? I don't have room...hellooooo?"
Mortified, I go up there, and he starts explaining the importance of gathering the mail everyday, with the intent of the whole office hearing him. I'd already retrieved the mail that morning, the man was clearly out to get me.
After walking down with him, and explaining that the ignored mailbox was not ours at all, that we were #46, he gave a gruff, "Oh, is that right? Well I'll be." and walked off.
Flash forward again to today.
I went to drop off a letter ~a corporate letter~ and ran into him. I started to turn around, but he called out to me.
"I sure hope I didn't get you in any trouble, ma'am."
I played it cool.
"Naw~ They think it's a riot when I don't get the mail. It's an office joke."
His eye started twitching. "It's not very funny when I have a job to do, and can't, because no one is picking up their mail!"
Wow. This was a good time to walk away, but not before I finished this beast;
"Dude...don't go postal!"

I hope he takes those words to heart, because the second that man gets access to a loaded gun, I have no doubt he'll come for me.

2003-07-24T13:07:00.000-04:00

Mad Camping trips planned. I keep promising to go on grand trips. I'm supposed to move to Sarasota next month, San Francisco in Septemeber (believe it or not, I already have my plane ticket.) End of September a roadtrip to Tennessee with MissZinny, and a trip to Amicalola, GA in October. The point is, I'm $600 in debt, don't have a car, and I'm quitting my job in less than a month. I will not admit to anyone that I haven't a hope in the world; maybe I'm one of those magical people that things just seem to unfurl for last minute.
simsim..salabim.

MadMadZinny (12:57:09 PM): I have already saved $1 towards our road trip
maadandrea (12:57:32 PM): i have $1.50!
MadMadZinny (12:57:38 PM): Wow!
MadMadZinny (12:57:43 PM): We are totally kicking ass.
MadMadZinny (12:57:56 PM): I am really banking on my birthday money to fund our trip
MadMadZinny (1:01:14 PM): I cant wait to go camping and rough it a while
maadandrea (1:03:20 PM): i am really banking on prostitution

2003-07-24T12:23:00.000-04:00

One hundred a fifty pages left to go...
Do I have too many lit-major friends, or is the newest Harry Potter a blatant political allegory?
Work with me:
Voldemort is to Hitler is to George W.
Ministry of Magic is to Cornelius Fudge is to Tony Blair.
The Daily Prophet = the media under the thumbs of Blair & Bush.

Everything I know of politics I learned from cult-favorite children's books.

Now to shuffle through papers until I feel like my own intellectual equal again.

2003-07-23T14:51:00.000-04:00

Today is a Wednesday.
As many of you may not know,
I AM Mary Kay, incarnate.

No, I'm not.
In a terrible deal between my mother, Satan, and myself,
I agreed to go against my principles (by the third entry, I will stop pretending this is such a hang-up for me)
and push overpriced makeup to women with low self-esteems.
I get a new car out of this.
Did I sell out? Yes.
You walk two miles to work everyday in the steamy mists of the Florida sun.

So yes, Avon is calling.
Tonight is the meeting.

I can stand the manipulation and wearing too much makeup and convincing housewives that their husbands will love them more if only they spend $35 on a softer hand systerm, but the real reward is the Wednesday pow-wows we have.
All the MK cosmetics consultants in my area meet in this rundown shopping plaza.
(It's the room with the pink walls.)
And then we talk about the new products, try them on,
talk about how many sales we've done... but I haven't gotten to the best part:
The whole time, a herd of 40+ women and me are bouncing around to really bad hit remakes,
such as The Village People's "Buuuy Mary Kay".
It's an odd site; there's enough estrogen being thrown about to make a Summer's Eve commercial.

If you ever have the chance to stumble into a nest of Mary Kay consultants,
just remember:
1. Stay calm.
Keep your chin high. They might be dangerous in these numbers,
but just remember that one on one, you're giving the black eyes.
2. Don't make eye-contact with the leader
As with any pyramid-scheme set up, the bulk of the group will invariably follow the pinnacle of their sect. If she succeeds in staring you into submission (and with that much mascara on, she will), the rest of the herd will close in within seconds.
3. Purse your lips
When they see full, bare lips, they will probably not be able to avoid the instinct to pounce on you and cover them with a shade of lipstick that is appropriate to your skintone, and a matching lipliner. Lipstick is a gateway cosmetic...it will lead to blush, eyeshadow, and sometimes even into foundation.
4. Lull them into safety, and the door into closer proximity
Grab whatever Mary Kay literature you might see lying around, and feint for your checkbook. Keep nodding your head and cooing, all while subtley edging your way to the door.
5. RUN, and don't look back.
Once you're out of the 7ft "leap zone", it should be smoothe sailing. MK consultants wear old fashioned high heels with uncomfortable pinched toes at all times, and can only sprint at about half the speed of a full grown human being.
6. Preventative Measures
Tell everyone in the area that there is a nearby MaryKay nest. Spray the area with clashing colors, and make sure to get the corners. (They tend to wear cooler tones of pink and purple. Oranges and sea-foam greens should effectively repel unwanted MK Unit Meetings.)

2003-07-23T14:20:00.000-04:00

I don't understand online journals.
Nor do I understand the appeal of reality television.
And so enters the beauty of inconsistency:
I am blogging at this very moment,
and I have yet to miss an episode of For Love or Money.
So here it is:
This blog is a joke,
and I am simply....

THE PUNCHLINE