Oh Holy Crap

Note to self: Do not eat potatoes, noodles, or tomatoes while pregnant.




BARNAUL, Russia - A Siberian woman who gave birth to her 12th child — doing more than her fair share to stem Russia’s population decline — was stunned to find that little Nadia weighed in at a massive 17 pounds, 1 ounce.


“We were all simply in shock,” said Nadia’s mother, Tatyana Barabanova, 43. “What did the father say? He couldn’t say a thing — he just stood there blinking.”


“I ate everything, we don’t have the money for special foods so I just ate potatoes, noodles and tomatoes,” she told the reporter, adding that all her previous babies had weighed more than 11 pounds.

Stay Classy, San Diego

I grew up in San Diego and don't have a lot of compliments to pay the place. I'm pretty proud of it recently, though. Republican Mayor Jerry Sanders had been expected (and expecting) to veto a resolution in support of same sex marriage but could not go through with it at the last minute. Great quotes include:

"As I reflected on the choices I had before me last night, I just could not bring myself to tell an entire group of people in our community they were less important, less worthy or less deserving of the rights and responsibilities of marriage -- than anyone else -- simply because of their sexual orientation."

"The concept of a 'separate but equal' institution is not something I can support."

"I want for them the same thing that we all want for our loved ones -- for each of them to find a mate whom they love deeply and who loves them back; someone with whom they can grow old together and share life's experiences."

"And I want their relationships to be protected equally under the law. In the end, I couldn't look any of them in the face and tell them that their relationship -- their very lives -- were any less meaningful than the marriage I share with my wife Rana."

Beautiful.

Short Skirt, Long Jacket

In contrast to yesterday's Ain't No Fun, which made me feel kinda helpless and bad, today my iPod played Short Skirt, Long Jacket, which made me feel powerful and sexy. Thank you Cake.

I want a girl with a mind like a diamond
I want a girl who knows what's best
I want a girl with shoes that cut
And eyes that burn like cigarettes
I want a girl with the right allocation
Who's fast, and thorough, and sharp as a tack
She's playing with her jewelry, she's putting up her hair
She's touring the facility and picking up slack
I want a girl with a short skirt,
And a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong jacket

I want a girl who gets up early
I want a girl who stays up late
I want a girl with uninterrupted prosperity
Who uses a machetti to cut through red tape
With fingernails that shine like justice
And a voice that is dark like tinted glass
She is fast, thorough, and sharp as a tack
Shes touring the facility and picking up slack
I want a girl with a short skirt,
And a long, long jacket

Nanananananananananananananananananananananananananananana

I want a girl with a smooth liquidation
I want a girl with good dividends
At citi bank we will meet accidentally
We'll start to talk when she borrows my pen
She wants a car with a cup holder arm rest
She wants a car that will get her there
She's changing her name from Kitty to Karen
Shes trading her mg for a white chrysler le barron
I want a girl with a short skirt,
And a
Loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong
Jacket

Ain't No Fun

Unsettling iPod shuffle experience this morning:

(1) The Mendoza Line "Love on Parade", into
(2) Patton Oswalt "Sterling, Virginia", into
(3) Celine Dion "Where Does My Heart Beat Now", into
(4) Snoop Dogg & Co. "Ain't No Fun."

I actually paid attention to the Aint No Fun lyrics for once. Whoa. So insulting to women. Makes me regret all those nights freshman year of college I spent in some humid fraternity drunk on Olympia singing "So back up bitch cuz I'm STRUG-A-GLIN, so get on your knees and start JUGG-A-LIN." I'm pretty sure I pointed at my friends for them to get down on their knees and sang with a big blonde smile on my face. Gross.

Verse One: Nate Dogg

When I met you last night baby
Before you opened up your gap
I had respect for ya lady
But now I take it all back
Cause you gave me all your pussy
And ya even licked my balls
Leave your number on the cabinet
And I promise baby, I'll give ya a call
Next time I'm feelin kinda horny
You can come on over, and I'll break you off
And if you can't fuck, that day, baby
Just lay back, and open your mouth
Cause I have never met a girl
That I love in the whole wide world

Verse Two: Kurupt

Well, if Kurupt gave a fuck about a bitch I'd always be broke
I'd never have no motherfuckin indo to smoke
I gets loced and looney, bitch you can't do me
Do we like BBD, you hoochie groupie?
I have no love for hoes
That's somethin I learned in the pound
So how the fuck am I supposed
To pay this hoe, just to lay this hoe
I know the pussy's mine, I'm a fuck a couple more times
And then I'm through with it, there's nothing else to do with it
Pass it to the homie, now you hit it
Cause she ain't nuthin but a bitch to me
And y'all know, that bitches ain't shit to me
I gives a fuck, why don't y'all pay attention
Approach it with a different proposition, I'm Kurupt
Hoe you'll never be my only one, trick ass beeeitch!

It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none

Verse Three: Snoop Doggy Dogg

Guess who back in the motherfuckin house
With a fat dick for your motherfuckin mouth
Hoes recognize, niggaz do too
Cuz when bitches get scandalous and pull a voodoo
What you gon do? You really don't know
So I'd advise you not to trust that hoe
Silly of me to fall in love with a bitch
Knowin damn well, I'm too caught up with my grip
Now as the sun rotates and my game grows bigger
How many bitches wanna fuck this nigga named Snoop
Doggy, I'm all the above
I'm too swift on my toes to get caught up with you hoes
But see, it ain't no fun, if my homies can't get a taste of it
Cause you know I don't love em

Verse Four: Warren G

Whoa! Hey, now ya know, inhale, exhale with my flow
One for the money, two for the bitches
Three to get ready, and four to hit the switches
In my Chevy, six-fo' red to be exact
With bitches on my side, and bitches on back
So back up bitch cuz I'm strugglin, so get on your knees and then start jugglin
These motherfuckin nuts in your mouth
It's me, Warren G the nigga with the clout. Whoo!

It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none
It ain't no fun, if the homies can't have none

Mom's Corner

Classic telephone conversation with Mom:

Linda: Hi...you said you wanted to touch base about XYZ so I'm just calling you back. I'm walking home.

Mom: Oh you're not at the office? You're done with work?

Linda: Yes. I'm walking home. I just picked up groceries at the market.

Mom: How many blocks until you are home?

Linda: Uh....several...to a dozen? I don't know. Ten minutes.

Mom: Okay. Okay. What are you making for dinner?

Linda: Pasta.

Mom: What kind?

Linda: Cheese tortellini and puttanesca sauce I think, the kind with all the olives and capers and salt. I don't know. I was in a rush and I'm tired from work, sorry, can we just talk about XYZ really quick?

Mom: [XYZ]

Linda: [XYZ] Okay thanks.

Mom: How many blocks do you have left?

Linda: Two.

Mom: Two?

Linda: I don't know. Maybe three.

Mom: Three....okay.

Linda: Would you like me to alert you to the end of each block?

Mom: Don't be a shit!

Linda: Sorry. I had a long day and you wanted to talk about XYZ really quickly and we did and now I'm just really tired and I need to get off the phone and not be snippy because I am really tired and irritable.

Mom: Okay, okay. Let me just think about the questions I had to ask you...

Linda: ......

Mom: Oh! Brother went to the doctor for a routine checkup yesterday. His doctor told him he was okay generally but he should get some of his moles checked out because they were irregular. For melanoma. But he's fine.

Linda: (Bratty snide chuckle). Okay, thanks. Good to know.

Mom: You should also get yourself checked. You said you got sunburned hiking in Calistoga the other weekend! You should not get sunburned.

Linda: I shouldn't?

Mom: No! You should wea- Stop being a shit!

Linda: I don't get burned on purpose. I wear sunscreen. Why are we talking about this? I need to go.

Mom: Okay, I know. I can tell you're irritable I'm sorry I bothered you. YOUR BROTHER DOES NOT HAVE MELANOMA. DON'T WORRY.

Linda: I wasn't worried. I won't worry.

Mom: Okay good.

THE END.

Magda's Corner

"And you would never try to make me go to Saddle Ranch Chop House. Sound familiar to you as a SFer? Probably because it's been featured on countless reality shows, including Blind Date, The Bachelor, and most recently, last week on Rock of Love (which is THE BEST SHOW EVER, btw). I'm all for kitschy fun, but not the kind of fun that involves tourist traps, Hollywood douchebags and bachelorette parties. My friend thinks it will be the most fun ever to go for a girls night. And I'm like, if I'm paying $50+ for dinner, there WILL NOT be a mechanical bull and whores from USC riding it in front of me while I try to eat."

It was unpleasing.

My friend Kristen ("KC") and I are planning a weekend in Memphis. I live in San Francisco and she lives in Brooklyn and we never see each other so we pictured a few days of bourbon- and blues-fueled fun. But with a classy streak. Like staying on Beale Street in an old Southern inn with breakfast china.

Looks like classy ain't gonna happen. Kristen did some research and it turns out all of Memphis is booked that Saturday night. There are Fall Out Boy and Bill Cosby shows that night, apparently that is too much eyeliner and sweaters for the tourist infrastructure to handle. What follows is an email exchange:

Kristen 2:43 PM: I dunno about you, but when I'm stumbling home with a belly fulla So-Co, I ain't gonna wanna go 20 min into the suburbs, so ... the first thing that came up near the downtown area was ... drumroll.... the MOTEL 6!!! 2 double beds, non-smoking and an elevator! Also, it's like $9.49 a night or some such thing. Also, I went ahead and got us a car - it's also like $4.63 or something because apparently, the whole damn city's on sale! Anyhow, we can totally cancel, and we probably will ... but at least I know we won't be sleeping in the streets. I'll keep looking, and lemme know what you come up with. In the meantime, "we left the light on for you" (or whatever the ads say).

Kristen 2:57 PM: Okay, I upgraded us to the Red Roof Inn - still only like $8.52, and 1.5 mi from the hotness of Beale St. and the Peabody (which for some reason, I've defined as the nexus of Memphis). Think I'll cancel the Motel 6er.

Linda 3:00 PM: Oh Cosby rolls deep. That explains it. PS I blogged about your trundle bed the other day. It's buried within the Berenstain Bears post.

Kristen 3:03 PM: To get you extra excited, a review by "Tim" on February 18, 2007: "Was awakened through the night from loud drunkin guest 12:30 am and 4:30am. went to lobby at 7:45, coffee was all over counter ... tops. cereal the only thing avaliable was all over counter and floor. it was unpleasing! two young men with rags and caps on behind desk watched as i tried to find something for two cups of coffee. so i asked from across the lobby do you have lids for coffee. his reply was, has he leans up against the wall naw we aint got nunthere was a young lady behind desk helping customers is the only thing that made me think the place wasn't being robbed."

Linda 3:06 PM: It was unpleasing.

Linda 3:12 PM: Oh and also, this is tonight's blog post.

Hightailing it.

The phrase "high tail it" cracks me up. I picture a cat with its tail upright.


But where did this phrase come from? The Word Detective explains:

Oddly enough, the first printed occurrence of "hightail" as a verb meaning "to run away quickly" that anyone has yet found dates only back to 1919, a bit later than the setting of most cowboy dramas, but that's not necessarily an anachronism, because the term may have been in use for quite a while in the American West before anyone wrote it down. "To hightail" does indeed come from the behavior of animals in flight, many of which raise their tails in alarm as they flee. A citation from the journal American Speech in 1925 explains the phrase thus: "High-tail" comes straight from the plains where a mustang, when startled, erects his tail in a sudden, quick gesture and runs like the wind. So to make a sudden departure is to "high-tail."

Boxing Kangaroos

This amuses me greatly.

The Berenstain Bears and the Slumber Party

I confuse Richard Scarry with the Berenstain Bears [FN1]. They dominate powerful yet vague preschool memories.

My friend Susie had a large plastic version of that tree in which all the Berenstain Bears lived. One day we were playing all Swiss Family Robinson-style in her garage and then she bit me? I'm pretty sure she bit me. My mom picked me up shortly thereafter.


My friend Cari and I read tons of Berenstain Bears and Richard Scarry books. We especially liked Richard Scarry because each page contained that little hidden bug or spider. To preschool Linda that was pretty much the coolest thing ever.


Cari's house was also the site of my first attempted sleepover. I say "attempted" because she and her older brother told me some story about vampires and showed me teeth he had in his room. In retrospect, I think it was a plaster mold of human teeth, probably for his orthdonics. Whatever. It freaked me the fuck out. I had to get outta there. If memory serves, I told Cari's mom and I needed my mom to bring over the blankie I'd left at home. I planned to stowaway in my mom's trunk when she delivered the blankie, thereby avoiding any nights with vampires. Despite my foolproof plan, Cari's mom realized I was scared and wanted to go home. My mom picked me up shortly thereafter.

Kristen I think you were my first successful sleepover? A little trundle bed action on Primrose Drive? Miss Vicki put books out for me to read if I woke up before you, and I believe one was a Scarry. My mom didn't pick me up that night, yo, that's fo shizzle.
[FN1] I thought it was Berenstein. Guess they're goyim.