Bueller? Bueller?
Turns out actor Jeffrey Jones, the guy who played the cranky dean in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, may be a child molester with a penchant for kiddie porn. Say it ain't so. I keep thinking back to a scene in the movie when the dean, mistakenly believing he found Bueller in a local teen hangout, says, "The game is up. Your ass is mine." Kinda has a whole new meaning now, dontcha think?
And yes, all I did today was blog, thanks for asking.
When An Attack Becomes "Spectacular"
I don't mean to pick on the FBI's choice of words, but warning that al Queda is likely to pull of a "spectacular" attack just seems, I don't know, almost fun. The word "spectacular" is usually reserved for Fourth of July fireworks displays or pictures of Britney Spears naked.
Lousy wording aside, it appears that we, the American public, are being warned yet again that al Queda is up to something. To borrow heavily from Ned Flanders, let me just say, "Well, no diddily ding dong shit."
But White House officials said the warning was based on a summary of intelligence, not new information, and that an attack was not imminent. In addition, the government did not increase its terror alert status, used to notify the public of potential attacks.
Keep in mind, this was the top story on MSNBC.com. In other words, they dedicated #1 billing to a story that tells us that pretty much nothing has changed. Wow, we're being targeted by terrorists? Who knew? I'll let you in on a little secret. I honestly think White House journalists are really, really lazy. I think they just kind of hover around a doughnut platter toward the back of the press briefing room and simply transcribe whatever ends up on their tape recorders later on. This isn't news, this is regurgitation.
IN A BULLETIN circulated to law enforcement officials nationwide, the FBI says, "Sources suggest al-Qaida may favor spectacular attacks that meet several criteria: High symbolic value, mass casualties, severe damage to the U.S. economy and maximum psychological trauma." The FBI posted the alert on its Web site early Friday, after The Associated Press and The New York Times reported its existence.
Wow, way to go AP and New York Times. How long did it take you to copy and paste this tidbit of information? If Nixon were alive today, he'd be asking where these journalists were when he was president. He could have avoided the whole Watergate thing because Woodward and Bernstein would have been surfing the Internet for porn.
NBC's Pete Williams reported that U.S. officials said the warning follows a series of events β topped by the recent release of an audiotaped message believed to be from bin Laden that could contain a message to al-Qaida members β rather than any new intelligence. "It's a building of concern," one official said on condition on anonymity.
Why in the hell would you want to maintain anonymity for an innocuous quote like that? That's like me saying, "Well, I guess I feel fine today, but don't tell anyone I said that."
White House spokesman Scott McClellan cited the lack of any intelligence about specific time, date, location or method of possible attack as the reason for keeping the nation's official terrorist threat level at code yellow, the middle of a five-level scale of risk developed after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
So, in other words, we don't know when, where, how, or generally anything at all when it comes to this all-but-certain attack. It's nice to know the expensive eyes and ears of America's intelligence community are able to stay so well informed.
FBI AGENT: Watch out! There's an attack coming your way!
AMERICAN PUBLIC: Where?
FBI AGENT: I have absolutely no idea! But stay sharp, because one is coming. . . sometime!
The recent nightclub bombing in Bali, Indonesia, the assault on Marines in Kuwait and the attack on a French oil tanker near Yemen β as well as the U.S. strike on a car carrying suspected terrorists, also in Yemen β are described by several law enforcement officials as actions that point to an increased threat.
Let me get this straight: recent attacks point to an increased threat? Hmmmmm. I guess that seems plausible. It's a good thing the folks in the established media are there to point stuff like that out, or I'd be in a world of hurt. That aroma you just whiffed was the smell of insane levels of sarcasm emanating off the preceding sentences.
"If there was any doubt in anybody's mind that al-Qaida remains a dangerous threat to America or the world, I suspect it was dispelled with the string of attacks," Tom Ridge, director of the White House homeland security office, said Thursday.
That's a pretty profound statement there, Ridge. You sure you don't want to maintain anonymity when spewing forth groundbreaking opinions like that?
"I think that as we ratchet up toward Iraq, we have to believe that there will be attempts in this country anywhere, perhaps everywhere, to do us harm," Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, senior Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on CNN.
I remember, when I was little, my older brother would tell me that the bogeyman was watching me and he could see me everywhere. It's nice to know the concept still applies today. Does it just seem that people in Washington are determined to keep everyone as terrified as they possibly can? Can't they just knock it off long enough for me to enjoy an ice cold beer? Yes, I get it, we're in danger. Now shut up! I'm trying to score with this hot chick over here.
"We can't find bin Laden, we haven't made real progress" in finding key elements of al-Qaida, said Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota. "They continue to be as great a threat today as they were one and a half years ago. So by what measure can we claim to be successful so far?"
Daschle likened bin Laden to the Washington-area sniper, who unleashed a wave of terror around the nation's capital. "Osama Bin Laden is the sniper," he said. "He is terrorizing this country as the sniper terrorized Washington."
It's crap like that that makes me understand why the Democrats lost so horribly during the recent election. If all you can do is come up with lousy analogies, and point figners, without offering up ideas and solutions of your own, yes, you're going to fail miserably come election time. The Bush administration may be pushing forth unpopular legislation and foreign policy, but at least they're doing something. Daschle's a legislator. Perhaps he could try his hand at a little legislation and a little less oration. Hey, that sounded a little like that recent Elvis re-release. "A little less oration, a little more legislation."
Whatever. I'm tired.
Unbridled liberalism is Sometimes Just Plain Stupid
For those not familiar with the work of Jill Nelson, let me just explain that she's MSNBC's contribution to retarded wishful thinking. She has a lot to say, and it's usually dead wrong. Anyway, her latest diatribe actually had be laughing out loud. Here are some excerpts with my own interjected editorializing.
Over the past 14 months, Americans have struggled to figure out how to live with the reality of past terrororism and the possibility of future attacks. It's sad to say that after all this time, the best the Bush administration, most of our elected officials, and too many average citizens have come up with to exorcise our own terror is to wreak it on someone else. Welcome to the tyranny of the terrorized.
Actually, I haven't really been struggling at all. I wake up. I go to work. I bitch. I complain. I go out on the weekends. I enjoy pretty much everything my limited finances have to offer. The thought of future attacks really isn't a huge concern for me. Granted, I don't live in New York, where the towers fell and paranoia must run rampant, but I'm pretty well aware that terror on American soil is sort of a difficult trick to pull off, considering we've been terror-free pretty much since 9/11. But, hey, if Jill wants to feel terrorized, I guess that's her business.
TODAY THE NO. 1 candidates for this terror transference are Saddam Hussein of Iraq and alleged D.C.-area snipers John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo. The president tells us that we can quell our national terror by taking pre-emptive action against Iraq. This is the classic bully mentality: Get them before they even think about getting us. John Ashcroft, the right-wing attorney general, manipulates the system in order to try Malvo, a juvenile, first in Virginia because that state executes minors. Does the state-authorized killing of a profoundly damaged, manipulated, misguided 17-year-old kid β or anyone else for that matter β really wash our collective terror away?
Okay, did everyone catch what Jill is doing here? She's making the argument that prosecuting a demented sniper and making war on Iraq are attempts to take our minds off terrorism and make us feel safer. Riiggghhht <-- insert Dr. Evil inflection here. In actuality, we're prosecuting a 17-year old because he randomly shot innocent people from the trunk of a modified automobile. That has nothing to do with terror and everything to do with common sense.
Of course, Jill's biggest gripe is that the death sentence is being sought for Malvo, as if being 17-years old somehow makes his actions excusable. Oh, wait, I guess he's "profoundly damaged, manipulated, and misguided." Well, hello, so am I. But, you don't see me popping a round into a Ponderosa patron. You see, Malvo is what I refer to as "a coldhearted killer." I don't care that he's 17. When I was 17, you better believe I knew the value of human life. Actually, that realization set in when I was a lot younger, when I dealt with the reality of a neighbor killed by a drunk driver. I was maybe seven or eight, and I knew that I missed him and that his death was wrong. So, don't go telling me that Malvo was damaged, or manipulated, or misguided. He killed people, innocent people, and he knew he was killing innocent people, and I see no reason why we can't extend to him the same courtesy.
Seriously, how much difference is there between being 17 and 18? 365 days? One stinking year? Jill wants to hold up Malvo's age as some sort of shield. Puh-lease. Take note of how she skillfully refers to Malvo as a "child" in the next passage. That's like saying Methusala was "over the hill."
It's also been declared irrelevant to point out that Lee Boyd Malvo is a child who was clearly inappropriately influenced by his 41-year-old "pretend father" John Muhammad. Forced exercise, a diet of crackers and honey, months spent homeless and on the road β this is how this kid lived during the months leading up to the killing spree. And yet we show him no mercy or compassion. Instead, the attorney general, the man who's supposed to impartially uphold the laws of the land, publicly shops for the state most likely to convict and sentence to death a screwed-up teen-ager. In fact, Ashcroft leads us in the disturbing national chant of kill, kill, kill.
I didn't hear that chant. Did you? It has a good beat, and I can dance to it. "And a one, and a two, and a kill, kill, kill." I love how Ms. Nelson provides a laundry list of how Malvo was "abused" -- a diet of crackers and honey, months spent homeless and on the road, exercise. Oh, the shame of it all! We should all pitch in and give this young man a house! Oh, wait, he shot and killed people at gas stations. Never mind.
I am ashamed by the glee with which government officials and talking heads virtually lick their lips over the prospect of executing a 17-year-old while they simultaneously fight gun control and embrace the rabid NRA. But more than ashamed, I'm saddened to realize that the dream of a Democratic America doesn't stand a chance against the tyranny of the terrorized. We've become a nation of people who, like children playing a game of hot potato, seem to believe we can escape terror by passing it on to others. In this country, whose leaders are so fond of praising the teachings of Jesus, whatever happened to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"?
It's tough to poke holes in a good Jesus quote, but let's reverse the equation a tad. Do you think the golden rule was bouncing around in Malvo's head when he pulled the trigger that utimately snuffed out the life of an unwary FBI agent? I say do unto Malvo as he did unto the FBI agent.
Tyra Banks. Tyra Banks. Tyra Banks. Tyra Banks. Tyra Banks. females/tyra_banks/tyra_banks_01.jpg">Tyra Banks. Tyra Banks nude.
Simultaneous Solar Flares Could Be Al Queda Signal, Officials Say
Rhodes Media Services--WASHINGTON D.C., Nov. 14, 2002 -- Two simulataneous massive solar flares observed by researchers at the National Solar Observatory in southern New Mexico may, in fact, be secret encoded messages to al Qaeda operatives, U.S. officials said today.
"Time and time again, we're surprised at the resiliancy and resourcefulness of terrorists," said Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. "When you think about it, two giant solar flares appearing on opporsite sides of the sun simultaneously can't just be coincidence. They have to be a signal to terrorists to resume their strikes."
The flares, witnessed on the morning of Oct. 31, have been dismissed by scientists as naturally occuring phenomenon. Observatory researchers believe that magnetic fields may have primed the flares to erupt seconds apart. However, they admitted that there simply wasn't enough data to posit a working theory.
"You want a theory? I'll give you a theory," said President George W. Bush. "Those flares were obviously manipulated by al Qaeda to encourage more attacks. Magnootic, er, megnantic, er, metallica. . . whatever. . . those fields had nothing to do with it. I can assure you, we'll be carefully monitoring the sun from now on looking for more of those flare thingees, and we'll have top decoders working to decipher them to figure out where the next attack may occur. Bush then looked up at the sun, only to recoil due to severe retinal pain.
"Damn you, bin Laden!" yelled Bush. "I'll get you for that one, too!"
UPDATE: Jesse Jane is hot. Jesse Jane is really hot. So is Tera Patrick. Jesse Jane.
Don't Forget: We're At War
Maybe it's the sweeping recent Republican victory, or maybe it's the revelation that our old buddy, Osama bin Laden, may still be skulking around a cave somewhere still breathing, but I find myself more and more supporting the overall war on terror. Not so much the impending attack on Iraq, mind you, which is a thinly-veiled grab for oil no matter how much Washington spins it. But the war on terror, the covert war meant to expose and dispose of those cancerous terrorist cells, is a necessary part of today's world.
The war on terrorism will be won, not on a traditional battlefield, but through the sustained efforts of information gathering experts worldwide and the use of search and destroy tactics meant to wreak havoc with terror's command and supply structure. I fully support it, no matter how distasteful it may seem at first. I just kind of assumed that Americans understood that.
Alas, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune letters to the editor section has sported two opinions over the past couple of days that show just how mistaken I was.
The day justice died
Is anyone else appalled by the missile attack on the car full of suspected terrorists in Yemen last week? Even though the Bush administration calls it a military action, it was an assassination, plain and simple.
One of the basic tenets of our legal system is the belief in innocence until proven guilty. We just blew that principle out of the sky with a couple of well-aimed Hellfire missiles. So much for due process. Sept. 11 was a terrible day for our country, but we are certainly losing the moral high ground in our fight against Al-Qaida. We simply cannot execute people at will, no matter what we think they may have done. We cannot go down that road.
-- Melly Ailabouni, Farmington.
Okay, class, does anyone see the flaw in Melly's argument? Well, let me tell you what I think. In short, I think Melly needs a good beating with a reality club. Lacking that option, I guess I'll just spout off.
One reason that the car happened to explode so totally was because it was loaded with weapons, weapons to be used against Western interests. Myself, I'm pretty glad we fired those well-aimed Hellfire missiles. If it were up to Melly, she would have had the "suspected terrorists" detained and given a good talking to. Then, once the corrupt Yemeni system ensured that they would be set free in 24 hours on a "legal technicality," they would have hopped back in their car for a good, old-fashioned dance club bombing.
We reserve our American legal system for pukes that go on a Washington D.C. sniping spree, not for a carload of terrorists in Yemen. In fact, let's not call them terrorists, let's call them soldiers, enemy soldiers, who just happened to poke their heads out of the trench long enough for our trusty drone to atomize their worthless carcasses. So Melly want to call it an assassination? Fine, whatever. Just so long as we keep the assasinations coming.
I particularly like the line, Sept. 11 was a terrible day for our country, but we are certainly losing the moral high ground in our fight against Al-Qaida. Yes, I'm sure Osama bin Laden right now is sipping tea with his pinky up, saying, in a British accent, "Well, that drone attack was just bad form. We'd never do something so low. Now get out there, guys, and blow up a school."
Hey, Melly, just for the record, Al-Qaida targets everyone. You. Me. Rush Limbaugh (which isn't so bad, actually). They don't care if you're a soldier or a Peace Corps volunteer. They kill anyone and everyone. We targeted a carload of terrorist operatives (enemy soldiers) about to make a delivery, probably saving the lives of countless innocents. You want due process? Fine. Go tell that to every family member who lost a loved one during the Bali bombing and then come back and make the argument that terrorists should get their day in court.
A death march?
Last week KARE-TV (Ch. 11) showed Afghan prisoners being transported to Cuba -- bound, hooded and crowded into the hold of a transport plane. The image recalled the death marches and train transports of Jews during World War II. I write this on Veterans Day, thinking of the human-rights violations perpetrated on innocent people at that time.
Now it is our administration that may be responsible for such terrible deeds. Are we above all international laws? There have been no trials, but I suspect much abuse and torture in the cages.
-- Avis Allmaras CSJ, St. Paul.
You're right Avis, next time we'll be sure to buy first class tickets on United Airlines and keep the champagne flowing. Sheesh! How can one even equate Jewish persecution to the transport of prisoners of war? Jews were sent to be gassed, while Afghani fighters were sent to Cuba, where they were even allowed to pray daily. Oh, no, but they're hooded and bound! What are they? Animals? Well, yes. These are soldiers who, just days before, had sworn that their sole purpose in life was to kill Americans. I'd want to keep them bound and hooded too.
But, apparently Avis thinks it would be better to have them free to roam around the plane and make small talk with each other, and then maybe organize themselves and perhaps kill the American soldiers and take over the plane. Avis and Melly really need to get together and maybe, just maybe, they'll see how totally dumb they are.
Perhaps this fact is lost on Avis, but the folks crowded onto the cargo plane were actually the lucky ones. Chances are, they were pleased as punch to be bound and hooded and flown to Cuba. Why? Because, our allies, the Northern Alliance, weren't exactly interested in taking prisoners. No, they were more likely to stake the enemy to the ground, cut off their eyelids, and face them toward the sun. I'm betting they were pretty much screaming to have a hood at that point.
As a nation, I would have to say we're probably in the upper class when it comes to the treatment of our prisoners of war. Were the Afghani soldiers interrogated? Almost certainly, although I doubt they had their fingernails removed with a pliers. You'd be amazed at what can be drawn out of people through a little sleep deprivation, maybe a skipped meal here and there, and the possibility of never seeing home and family again. All three of those combined would have me singing like a canary.
In the end, these were men that shot at and schemed against American troops, and more than a few of them probably had a hand in helping get 9/11 off the ground, so to speak. You may want to make their lives all nice and cozy, but I certainly don't.
We're at war.
Big and Important News I Can't Keep Quiet About Any More
I routinely surf the Web looking for news items and quaint bits of idiocy that I can write about in my weekly column when I can't mine my own personal experience. However, because I've been able to write about myself for the past couple of weeks, my cache of odd news items has reached critical mass and I simply have to spout out about them or I fear I'll explode.
Okay, I won't explode, but wouldn't it be disconcerting if people could actually explode at will without hurting others? You could be walking down a mall, when suddenly the person next to you realizes they bought the wrong size shoes and, in a fit of anger, detonate in a spray of crimson and sinew that soaks everyone in a 20 foot radius. Sure, it's a gross thought, but it certainly would add a whole new dimension to the human equation, i.e. watch your stress, or you'll explode. Where was I? Oh, yes, odd news items.
We begin with a doozy. According to a Nov. 6, Reuters new report, Workers to Donate Sperm to Pay Plant debts. Excuse me for just a second. . . HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! There, I'm back.
BUCHAREST (Reuters) - Workers at a Romanian car factory have decided to donate sperm to get the debt-ridden plant out of the red, private television ProTv reported on Tuesday.
Myself, I'd probably start scanning the want ads before I volunteer my little swimmers to save my job. Don't get me wrong, I actually enjoy my current work environment, and I'm pretty good at my job, but doing the five finger knuckle shuffle in the name of job security just seems a little severe.
WORKER: Hi, honey! I'm home!
WIFE: How was work today?
WORKER: Oh, good, I guess. Seems the plant has some sort of financial concerns, so I may seem a little less than "interested" in you for awhile. But, don't take it personally. I'm simply going to be masturbating to save my job.
WIFE: Oh, okay. Would you like a sandwich?
"Our feasibility study shows that if 1,000 workers donate their sperm for several months, we can get enough funds to pay part of the plant's debts," Ion Cotescu, trade union leader at ARO Campulung, told ProTv.
Feasibility study? Here's a thought. Rather than conducting expensive feasibility studies on worker sperm donation, perhaps the union could have dedicated the money to something a tad more productive like, say, keeping its members fed for a couple of weeks.
I'd actually like to see that feasibility study, you know, provided the pages aren't stuck together. Two other things strike me in that totally rich sentence. First, the union isn't asking for a one-time "donation." No, they want workers to donate sperm for several months! Second, with 1,000 workers donating sperm for several months, they can only garner enough money to pay part of the plant's debts. Facing that kind of bankruptcy, you'd think they would throw in the towel. Er, I guess they are kind of throwing in the towel. Ewwwwwwwwwwwww.
Cotescu said the decision came after reports in the local media said a fertility clinic in the western city of Timisoara offered donors the equivalent of $50 a visit. The monthly average wage in Romania is around $150.
Now we're talking! Fifty bucks a pop?! And here I've been tossing off all these years for free! I'm such a fool. I could have been a millionaire by now, or at least really, really, really well off! Seriously, with that type of money, um, up for grabs, I'd quit my job at the factory and just "donate" for a living, and I'd probably skip to work each day while whistling a jaunty tune.
Cotescu told Reuters the sperm donation scheme also amounted to a protest against the government's privatization authority APAPS which had failed to find a strategic investor for the plant.
"They always told us to come up with a solution. Now, we have found one that even the best economists have never thought of. I hope APAPS will like it," he said.
Sheesh. Here in America we've been wasting out time with strikes and picket lines.
Okay, it's tough to follow up a good sperm donation news story, but there are a couple of other nuggets that I need to share.
According to another Reuters article from Oct. 31, Bed Forces Sleepyheads To Rise In the Morning.
NUREMBERG, Germany (Reuters) - A German schoolgirl has invented a "merciless bed" to ensure that sleepyheads get up in the morning.
The bed gradually raises the mattress after an alarm rings. After five minutes, the sleepyhead is rolled onto the floor.
"I constructed it myself," Iris Koser, 16, said at an exhibition of inventions this week.
Believe it or not, that's the entire news article. But, I guess it pretty much explains the important details. Now, I have to admit, when it comes to alarm clocks, I'm a chronic snooze button pusher. My fastest movement of the day is when I shoot forth my sleep-heavy paw and slap the snooze button. Total elapsed time -- .3 seconds. Given my love affair with the snooze button, I'd probably get pretty pissed at a bed that tumbles me to the floor. Besides, considering my stubborn sleep nature, I'd simply curl up on the floor and sleep for an additional four hours.
But, leave it to the Germans to come up with inventions that cancel each other out. According to News of the Weird, German inventor Matthias Knigge said he has developed a desk with an inflatable airbag, for office workers looking for a quick nap (Hamburg).
A Place to Call Home, Sort Of
Since I began college in 1993, and in the years following, I've called a total of six different places "home."
Although I'm not a huge fan of uprooting myself and moving to a new apartment or house every year or so, I have resigned myself to the fact that, as a young man trying to
find his niche, I'm destined to shuffle around nomadically for an indefinite stretch of time.
I've learned some very enduring lessons as a result of living in six different places with ten different roommates over a span of only about nine years. The biggest
lesson, I've leaned again and again, is that no place is perfect.
My first year of college at Winona State University saw me living in a former nun's quarters (and, no, I'm not kidding). Lourdes Hall, a recent WSU acquisition, was a
sprawling expanse about a mile or so off campus that was the site of the former College of St. Theresa. Anyway, the building I was assigned to (or imprisoned in) was, according to campus legend, a former nun's quarters. It wasn't hard to believe either. In addition to a concrete floor, concrete walls, a fifteen foot-high concrete ceiling and a steel door that went "clang" when it closed, the room also had an old-fashioned steam grate heater that got so hot that, come winter, it melted my shoes from two feet away.
I did what I could to make my first college room seem non-nunnish, but I just couldn't mask the room's convent appeal. No matter how many Budweiser and "girlie"
posters I put up, I still felt as if I had to kneel and ask forgiveness after every exam that I cheated on or woman I messed around with.
The only entertaining aspect of the room was that I had access to the hot and cold water shut off valves to my wing's bathroom facility. Whenever my neighbors, with
whom I carried on an escalating year-long war, used the shower, I would delight in denying them access to either cold or hot water, depending on my mood. You could hear them screaming practically all the way down the hall when their once-relaxing shower became an inferno, or a cryogenic chamber, all according to my whim.
In the two years following my stint as a male nun, I settled in a fairly nice house, which I shared with a former high school classmate, Troy, and a devil-may-care comedian, Luke. The building's owner, Kevin, also lived in the house and, for the most part, except for the fact there was only one bathroom, it was a pretty pleasant stay.
Eventually, Luke moved out and, after about one week of cleaning up used condoms, and an additional week of airing it out, I moved into his room. It was an ideal situation for two full years, until Kevin decided to get married and we had to leave. Troy and I understood. If there's one thing about married life I've noticed, it's that people don't want two strangers living in the same house.
Troy and I set out on the difficult task of finding a new apartment, and we quickly hooked up with three other acquaintances who were doing the same. When we heard
there was a house for rent for five people, we jumped at the opportunity. After all, it was an entire house with five bedrooms; it had to be simply glorious. As it turned out, that house was, quite possibly, the biggest dump in the entire city of Winona that had not quite yet reached "condemned" status.
When I pulled up to that house for the first time, I was struck by its unique porch. Literally, a small board fell from the roof and struck me in the forehead. In addition to
the rotted middle porch support which rested on rotted porch boards, there was a pair of rotted couches sitting outside, for no particular reason except that they smelled really, really bad.
The inside of the house was, thankfully, much better than the porch indicated. For one thing, the five couches that sat in the huge living room didn't smell nearly as bad as the two on the porch.
Why so many couches? One thing about having five roommates is that everyone has a couch or two they can't bear to part with. If there was one good thing about that dilapidated monstrosity called a house, it was that I was never hurting for somewhere to sit.
Of course, I ended up in the smallest room in the house. My room was so small, it didn't even have it's own closet. Rather, my closet was out in the hall, an unfortunate placement because, since our house was a well-known party shack, my clothes were regularly barfed on by party-goers who couldn't find the bathroom.
Our house was eventually dubbed the "Shark Shack," so named for the plastic life-sized hammer-head shark we mounted on the wall. Despite, the grungy carpet, dirt-streaked walls, filthy ceiling and overall mangled structure, the "Shark Shack" was, without a doubt, the most care-free and fun place I lived throughout my college days. It was amazing how much fun I had living in a house that could only be described as "disgusting."
I've lived in three other places since leaving the "Shark Shack," and I'm sure I'll have just as many, if not more, places I'll call home in the future. But, I've learned a lot from the places I've lived and from the people I've lived with.
I know, for example, that I never want to be a nun, and I'm no longer afraid of sharks. I've also learned that you can never have too many couches.
.jpg){kind=link}
