Pretending to look stressed in the library

but really, I'm watching the onion news network.

oreo cookie falls over

something almost as funny as the bunny with a pancake on its head

it is now 12:14 pm the next day

and i am still not over it. in fact, i am almost completely under it, is how not over it i am.

i am an Onion whore

It is 12:32 am. I read this at about 10:00 PM:

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/staten_island_historians_piece

I am, as yet, not over it. One might think that after convulsing and weeping in mirth, I would have at least exacerbated some latent onion giggle matter floating around in the lower depths of my large intestines. Alas, no.

The real question is, does this better the bunny with a pancake on its head:

http://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=e2724a9862&view=att&th=11dbbcaadff5b425&attid=0.1&disp=inline&realattid=f_fnrww7ug0&zw

which I have conveniently saved as a shortcut. It is a tough call. There is such simplicity to the bunny with a pancake on its head. One might argue that its shitgiggleability is transcendent due to the instantaneous wetting of pants. Life is full of grey areas.

I love the onion like I love my unborn child...with a pancake on its head. I'm going to go cry myself to sleep and count some sheep.

Dog saw me

Tonight, I was driving home and, stopped at a red light, I turned to my left. This is what I saw:


Except that the window was closed, because it was cold outside. Not only did the dog look at me, he looked at the man behind me, back to me, and then turned back to face the front.

At another red light, I saw another dog: a Great Pyrenees. He looked at me and then looked out the other window.

Monty sometimes veers right during our walks. It's usually at this point that he pauses and looks over his right shoulder at me. When I wave to him or say his name, he turns back and keeps walking. I need to learn how to make that expression.

Dream Job 2

I used to have a very primitive jet fighter computer game and I would blow up buildings with my little module knob thing. My jet would always stall at high velocities.

*update to posting! the picture has disappeared into the depths of the internet. apparently, not even my internet fantasies of jet fighterdom can exist material. good thing i am already legally blind, or i would feel pretty bad about this.

Some friends out there

Last week, I was supposed to be writing a paper on medieval femininity. My topic was attraction and repulsion to the eastern aesthetic in the Katherine Group, with focus on mythology of the medieval hybrid. I felt safe, surrounded by my books, reading about monsters and mermaids. Every now and then I read the onion and giggled.

But I was distracted. I kept going back to my last column, rereading it, memorizing it, trying to understand myself through it. I did this for hours. I'm a reserved person. Most people see me at best, stoic. But I feel deeply. I think about life every moment of every day. I have that luxury.

I wanted to be honest. I didn't want to hide behind abstraction. People will think I'm boring or melodramatic. They want Palin/Polar Bear. They don't want just me- they won't understand me. But I tried to be honest. So I read every line painstakingly.

People seemed to understand. I was so surprised and sad, because I won't be able to know these people. It's always been my problem: wanting to know people and not knowing how. I remember someone saying offhand that we all think we are so alone, so different. And that is what makes us all the same. We are collectively lonely and scared. But every now and then a connection is made and endures, anonymous.

Anyway, all I wanted to say was thank you all for giving me that.

Well envoweled

My name in ASCII binary it is... 01001010 01100001 01101110 01100101 01110100 00100000 01010111 0111010

Google Wu

Janet Wu Janet
Wu Janet Wu Google Wu
Wu Janet Wu Wu

Fantasy Job 1

^ I want to be this.

A scruffy man on the street with his half broken guitar.

Groin-head grylles

I want a pet manticore, but not the body-devouring species.

Other mythological creatures I would not want as pets as listed in Williams' Deformed Discourse:

Phallic rooster
Disembodied winged phallus
Grotesque phallus
Plant phallus
Dragon devouring babies

Don't even ask about the Shelah-na-gig.

Ode to Sheep

Fuzzy and fluffy
You make my shoes and coat warm
Thank you sheep and sheep

Progress

1932, Unemployed men search newspaper want ads for jobs while eating their daily ration of bread on a public bench.


Look how far we have come. We have boxes now.

I will sing it for you if you want

Here is a link to my recent column:

Ding-dong the Dow is Down

As you can see, I've decided that writing real quality columns is just not that fun. I would much rather rhyme.

A synonym for clusterfuck

I wrote a ditty based on the Wizard of Oz allegory for my news column this week. Included were the lines:

Someone serve up Bush's lame duck,
Let's get fixin fiscal cluster****

My editor reprimanded me for my naughty ways. But you know what? There really is no other way to describe the world except for big fucking clusterfuck. Well, there's shitfest. But that doesn't rhyme with duck.

Why I am an asshole

So, I am a big asshole for not keeping up with this blog. So, what have I been doing with my life? I lived in New Zealand for 6 months, South Africa for 2 months, traveled to Australia, Mozambique, Swaziland somewhere in the midst of it all. And I had a jolly good time, which is why I stopped writing on this blog. But now that I am back to mundane life here in Durham, North Carolina, I decided to start up the blog again. This may in fact defeat the original intent of the blog, which was to write about my adventures. Thus, I am an asshole. To make up for being lazy and blissful, here is a haiku:

I am sorry blog
For ignoring you this long
Five syllables is*

*not fucking enough

Gone tramping

Yes, so I've been deliciously swamped with life the past few days- plenty of photos and tall tales to come. But I'm leaving for Abel Tasman on a ferry tonight with a pack of Europeans and my nice shiny green backpack...

Why I can't be on reality TV

And now for an analogy: International Orientation:Janet:Quartering Machine:Medieval Prisoner. Truly, horrifying. I felt like a Duke froshie in purgatorious loop, and this time around it was longer, more redundant, and somehow still flooded with unattractive Americans. I balk at the idea of worthwhile academics. If I wanted that, I'd stay at Duke and write more environmental policy memos. After popping up at 6:30 AM (still haven't quite adjusted), I shoved some oatmeal and fruit down and HIKED UP A BLOODY MOUNTAIN to get to main campus. No joke- fifteen minutes up a continuous flight of stairs and hills and winding uphill dirt paths (because, you see, in New Zealand people hike to the bathroom). Anyhow, skip the drudgery and cut to the truly miraculous: I somehow convinced myself to join the orientation scavenger hunt "V Race". Good excercise, no? Why in fact, it was a twilight zone of nerd-dom, the Amazing Race for the awkward (thus I fit in), and profoundly exhausting. I tugged my lowriders up and around and across the entire city (in the same ballet flats recorded yesterday- tough little things, Jeffrey Campbell!) After offending local Kiwis with my yelping American accent, waving sheets of riddles in their face ("Excuse me- where is the strongest, unwatered plant between the triangle of fast food joints, which reveals a secret road unmarked?!"), I was quite ready to sidle away from the assigned team and lounge by the harbor with a sandwich. But enter _______ [I forget name], a genuine marvel of a crazy. ________ was a hardcore treasure hunt viper, ripping through the crowds and buses in pursuit of- what? I have no idea. In truth, I don't even know where she materialized from (not an undergraduate orientation byproduct), and seemed to bop out of some alternate universe of perpetual treasure hunter psychopaths. Anyhow, mildly entertaining day but no LOTR trip. Sheep sightings: 0. Crazy treasure hunter: 1

Elf: 1, Sheep: 0, Penguins: 2!!!

Yesterday, I saw a sign that said "Little Blue Penguin Crossing." Eh? What? Later in the day I was brooding by the harbor, perched on this carved granite sign and I SAW LITTLE BLUE PENGUINS.

A note about nomad-ness:

I walked all day and I'm still itching to keep walking. Just keep on walking. In New Zealand, everything is built for walking. People walk and bike and sail and throw themselves off land formations- it's wonderful. I had human contact with an American who joined me for Kaori and Botanicals, but I quickly escaped the torturous habits of the civilized and went about my mountain walk alone after mumbling an excuse about pharmacy and bath towels. Much better.

Elf: 1, Sheep: 0

And now traveling back in time: The Lord of the Rings full day tour! Big announcement: I met an elf. A genuine elf. His name was Nathan and he was banner holder number 2! He schmoozed with hobbits and orcs and Viggo! He was my tour guide 1 of the day and I stupidly failed to snap an awkwardian picture, which I could later subtitle nerdily with " Me and an elf!!!" Sigh. I should have proposed marriage then and there. I did, however, take pictures of everything else in all of Wellington and once my luggage finds me with my connector cord, I will commence the arduous upload. Back to morning tour: only one other person, an ignoramous from Canada who I found irritating for only watching the film twice and calling gollum "that little weird dude." I wanted to be on a tour with authentic, unrefined, LOTR nerds! Quote lines nerds! Wear elf ear nerds! Run around reenacting scenes nerds! I had to make up for everyone else's lack of nerddom (pictures to prove this later). We hit up basic Wellington bits, saw Peter Jackson's local house and a few studios (reverse Hollywood- small, nondescript, tucked into the landscape), went to a cafe where WETA workers frequent (I wonder if I loitered there everyday puttering with some clay and paints, I could get hired?) The best part of the day was picking through this rocky coastline with abalone and salty air and wind. I had a flashback to Olympic Park, Washington, rocky coast with abalone and salty air and wind. Nathan dropped me off at Nomads and I wandered along with my pet Canon Billy. I bought a sandwich and beer, the latter just to giggle that I could. It was gross, as expected, so I bought an orange juice. Old habits die hard and I am old. Later, Laura the monotone chick tour guide 2 picked me up. She, unfortunately, was no elf. But she was quite quick to inform us of her use as Orc grunt during the Rugby game wherein Peter Jackson instructed the spectators to supply mass sounds effects. Note: not as cool. On this afternoon tour were more despicably normal human beings, legit stick up the arse regulars and one Danish who jabbed at Elvish speakers and called them "freaks." I was quite truly bristled. Travel all the way yonder here, take a full day $100 tour, and you're not an obsessive Ringer who has memorized every extended DVD fact and outtake? BAH! BAH I SAY! I was also bristled by Laura whose job I could easily and more charismatically take over. Hmm...anyhow, we went to Rivendell and I jumped on a swinging bridge, then we tottered to a few more locations, took some nerdy pictures (could have been nerdier, no dent on my nerd scale today) and finally got back around 6:00 PM.
I believe I may have seen a sheep. However, the sighting was not conclusive so the count remains at a dismal 0. But Elf: 1, Sheep: 0 is not bad.

Nomadic Janet

I'd love to blog with a bit more finesse, but just hiked for 9 hours in ballet flats and feel a bit disgruntled in the toe-sies.

These 9 hours included: trek into Kaori Bird Sanctuary, which is essentially a giant, dense tropical forest with heaps of birds fluttering about. I, of course, saw a duck and some pigeons. (Okay, there was an interesting chicklet with a little boppity on its head, but no Kiwi sightings yet. They only come out at night, but are apparently rotund and extremely round. Ask me about the one legged Kiwi story). I then continued on a post-sanctuary wander through botanical gardens, saw a tight playground and enough rhododendrums to make mommy go mad (took pictures of said rhododendrums), rolled down a cable car back into central city and bumbled along the streets with ipod and aviators and giant hair. Feeling like a genuine nomadic hippie, I assumed my hunchback pose and continued on past Embassy Theatre (Lord of the Rings world premiere! Sweet! Too bad they were showing angsty French films for a festival- just missed No Country For Old Men showings. Note: The bathrooms to this theatre were lavish, nice mahogany chaise and gold mirrors, etc.) At this point I got a bit turned about and walked past a cafe three times, finally decided to buy a lemonade, which turned out to be caffeinated and exorbitantly sugary. I then walked up this San Francisco-esque hill surrounded by charming by-the-beach looking houses for a good hour until I huffed and puffed my way onto Mt. Victoria lookout point and a lovely grassy field where I napped for a bit until a black lab came running at me (the owner said, "DON'T YOU DARE WEE ON THE BAG" [my side bag next to me]). Realizing it was a bit cloudy and windy (although it's always sort of cloudy and windy when it's not sunny and windy) I made my way down the mountain but happened onto a tiny path. I like tiny paths. Big paths are okay, but tiny, curious little paths are fantastic. As it turns out, I actually walked into someone's backyard, but quickly found another public path, also tiny with white fencing. I followed an old man sketchily down the path and ended up at another end of the city, a boardwalk/beachtown-ish locale, gorgeous not surprisingly. Let me now note that, in fact, everyone and everywhere in this city is beautiful. BEAUTIFUL. GORGEOUS. STUNNING. PHOTO-WORTHY. RIDICULOUSLY GOOD LOOKING. The people are stylish (although the general trend is a "stepped out of a Roxy" catalogue chic: tan, blonde, board shorts). Note to world: everyone in New Zealand is eye candy. The bum on the road is eye candy. Even the "business men" have hipster hairstyles and funky suits and walk along the beach to and from work with little black backpacks. Yes- a walk by the beach: that's how they all get home. I ran into 5:00 traffic on a pedestian bridge packed with suits. Anyhow, I finally made my way back to central city and am to go collapse somewhere.

No sheep sightings yet

Finally in New Zealand after long travels in which laptop and baggage were casualties. Sat next to no one for 3 flights. 12 hour Air NZ flight was accompanied by polite old couple. In Auckland, a hoochy Canadian chick with her hairy husband also had baggage lost. After husband left to check on cruise details [actually he just wanted a smoke] Canadian chick complained that he was a child. I nodded in empathy, admiring her hoochy silver sequin belt and pink blouse. Over Auckland, I thought I spotted sheep. Turns out they were cows. Nomads Capital is not as seedy as expected. I share a room with 8 people though. It's stuffy and coed- ew. Although nice Russian and Japanese in room. Russian said he got in Wellington 3 days ago, had no room for 1st day, wandered around all night with luggage until 3 gays following him forced him to find refuge near police station. This makes me feel better about my fiasco. Russian says previous boys in room always go to "disco" and come back smelly. Again, ew. Luckily, some of the disco party have moved on. Today I bumbled about listening to my Ricky Gervais podcast. I am slowly becoming British with a New Zealand accent. Crossed a large bridge with hovering orb. Bridge looked like wood carving. I mosied about the harbor until the wind almost blew me over. Saw a few seagulls. Wandered about city. Lots of boutiques and cafes. I read Belle De Jour in a cafe and drank a mango smoothie. Tomorrow I am booked for a full day Lord of the Rings tour! This after much research about the perfect tour (must include props and lots of walking). Decided on Rover Ring Tour. Pictures soon to follow. Also, if I sound illiterate, it's because I've been listening to Karl Pilkington's diary.