smarty pants.

my confidence in my intellect was given a boost a few weeks ago. i'll tell you a little story.

we were driving to antigonish from the city for thanksgiving. my mother the driver, myself the passenger, my brother asleep in the back seat, my poor cat whining from her carrier in the back seat.
my mother and i were discussing my work ethic during high school. i had barely scraped by. i had stopped going to math class, at my teacher's request. i was passing because i spouted bullshit in entrepreneurship, took art classes and core french classes, and had a pervert for a biology teacher. i think my highest mark was an 80, and that was in art class. everything else was between 50 and 60 (except math, i got a 29%)
at my graduation ceremony, we were given cards with our names and accomplishments on them to hand to the guidance counsellor when we went up onto the stage. there were basically two groups of card holders. one group had a card full of scholarships and awards, and the other group had nothing but their names written on the cards. i was part of the latter (well, i had written 'great achievements in mediocrity' on my card. the guidance counsellor was ABOUT to read it, until she realized what it said and closed her mouth)
anyway, when i was talking about it with my mother, i was pretty much laughing at my terrible high school career. she was getting very irritated. she said 'wait until we get home, i have something to show you.'
when we got to the house, she went into her room and produced a paper that she gave to me to read. apparently i had received the highest mark in all of nova scotia in the past 2 years on my grade 12 english provincial exam. i thought 'that's strange, didn't i get like, a 60 in english?' THEN i remembered i got a 60 because i did absolutely NOTHING in english class except read the books i wanted to read, then not write any papers about them.

it was a nice boost to my dying ego. someone's gonna have to pop my head with a pin sometime soon

'weegee- a.k.a. arthur felling...'

'...felling won the nickname 'weegee' from new york homicide detectives, because he was always on a crime scene before the other news photogrophers, and occasionally the police themselves. they joked that he must be using a ouji board to get scoops from the spirit world.'

i just finished reading a book called 'illustrated true crime: a photographic record'
and boy, was it ever photographic. some of those pictures are going to haunt me longer than what i saw at my recent viewing of 'texas chainsaw massacre-the beginning.' (the movie wasn't scary, just gory as fuck. i had to take a break to have a cigarette before continuing to watch the mindless dismemberment of a few unlucky individuals at the hands of leatherface)

anyway, weegee was a successful crime photographer in the 40s. most photo journalists could only get pictures of the dead bodies after the police had covered them with the white sheet. or they only got photos of the chalk outlines and blood stains. not weegee, he got the full deal. and newspapers actually printed these horrific pictures.

this book was mesmerizing. but, that might be because my childhood was spent listening to stories my dad told me and watching crime television with him, instead of dawson's creek. if you don't enjoy graphic pictures of dead people or stories about deadly murders, i wouldn't recommend it.
ask me anything about crime between 1864 and 2000, and i will be able to answer your questions sans difficulty.


oh, and by the way, weegee was not some wizard who talked to dead people about future murders. he lived in a van and listened, illegally, to a police line on his radio. he would drive to the crime scene as quick as possible and shoot.

we are the champions, my friend

right now, i feel like john cusack in high fidelity after he leaves lisa bonet's apartment and the song 'we are the champions' is playing.
i don't want to go to work. i want to lie in bed and read my book on crime. i want to lie in bed and go 'sigh' all day

fuck this and fuck that

fuck it all and fuck the fucking brat

i'm going to do a cover of 'bodies' by the sex pistols.
why?

1) because it will be perfect
2) i love that song, as much as i love the sex pistols. and that's a fair amount
3) because i can
4) because i think it will be neat.

the state of hollywood, at the moment, is disgusting

today i was reading a star magazine, and i threw it at the wall.
there is always a page about the progressively uninteresting life of lindsay lohan. she got drunk and didn't go to work? old news. she sang sweet child o' mine again at a bar? not interested. she broke up with ANOTHER boyfriend? we've heard it all before. i kind of hope she has a nervous breakdown, like mariah carey or margot kidder and leaves the spotlight for awhile. that would make me happy.
and this anna nicole smith character. besides naming her baby something stupid (daniellyn. yeah, not only is it ugly but it's going to remind her of her dead son for the rest of her little daughter's life) BUT this terrible THING (i wouldn't go so far as to call her a woman) was taking methadone during her pregnancy, she's keeping the ID of the real father a mystery, and 'married' her lawyer while her dead son is still lying in a funeral home. he died like, 2 weeks ago or something. gross gross gross. i hope the real father of the baby is the photographer larry. and i hope he wins custody and never let's this monster see her baby.

ON TOP OF ALL OF THIS
they're accusing jennifer aniston of getting multiple plastic surgeries, including breast implants. jeez.
and there is a four page story on jessica simpson and how pathetic she is. no kidding.

star magazine, and it's copycats (us weekly, in touch weekly, etc): i suggest you set the bar a little higher. i'm going to stop paying my $5 a magazine pretty soon. and that's a big deal.


in other news, i'm chopping all my hair off. all of it will be gone tomorrow. i hope it doesn't look absoloutely terrible. but i just don't have time for hair. and i'm looking a little too 'kelly osbourne' these days. that's about it.

antigonish: land of 2 crosswalks and roadkill

and counting:
1 gigantic thanksgiving meal
1 delicious mcdonalds poutine (an antigonish delicacy)
1 slice of the wheel pizza (also an antigonish delicacy)
8 dead raccoons in an 8 km stretch
5000 middle aged people wearing x rings. working at convenience stores.
12 jay walkers i let cross, while scores of angry drivers beeped at me from behind
1 store open on sunday (needs. thankfully all i needed was cigarettes and a toothbrush)
6 conversations with people i graduated with whose names i couldn't remember
6000000 sightings of birkenstocks worn with socks
antigonish=priceless

ps i stood outside the respect life centre wishing it was open. sigh.

my mind secedes

i hate crying because it makes me feel weaker, when i'm already feeling weak. it makes me feel less mediocre, which is a title i'm starting to deal with, and more useless.
i hate crying because it's better to keep those terrible things that eat your heart inside of you, eating your heart. instead of a salty, liquid secretion from your eyes.

i just had a conversation with lil about cracking under pressure, and having to be bailed out. i've got a lot of weight on my shoulders when it comes to money,school and my parents. he's going to help me get rid of it.

lil is a wonderful man. i'd call him my mentor, but he'd probably be embarrased.

'What will your obituary say?' at QuizGalaxy.com

joe version 2.0: the story of the talentless hack

i want to write a play. i want to write one about a lead singer of a band in los angeles that can't write songs, is physically unappealing and has the charisma of a carrot. lets call him bob.
bob dreams of being famous and having total strangers admire him and want to give him blowjobs. but he's going nowhere. his girlfriend leaves him because his band isn't popular, and his band members do the same.

so poor bob is left all alone. his girlfriend falls in love with this charming, talented bloke. let's call him joe. he writes amazing songs and is lovely in every way. his band members fall in love with joe as well, and they start a fabulous band that all the important people love.

bob is outraged and jealous. he wants to murder joe and steal his life. so he uses a young, crude, love starved plastic surgeon named fran. fran is such a terrible plastic surgeon, she isn't even ranked on the list of the worst plastic surgeons in LA. but she's good enough to do what bob wants. she transforms him into an ironically attractive rock star. with scars and everything. he changes his name to what else: joe.

bob/joe kidnaps joe and keeps him in his basement. with the world thinking joe is dead, bob/joe is set and determined to fill his shoes. he joins the band, he gets his old girlfriend back, and the band becomes famous.

after a long nationwide tour, bob/joe comes home to a dead joe, and a distraught fran.
what will become of joe/bob? what will become of his fabulous band? who knows. i'll have to write the play