Jenny Miller | Heck's Kitchen Pantry, 2004

01.10.05
Some have suggested I need to write more in this space, rather than making stupid little lists. So, I did some thinking about what I could write about, and I came up with this list:

Well, that's all we have time for today. Maybe I'll write tomorrow. Meanwhile, here's this morning's very lame post:

In the last 10 minutes I've been sent four animal pictures. I am tossing them up here without regard for context or design. Don't let this happen to your blog. Back later. Ah, here's something really boring: The Visual Accommodation of Astronomy in Popular Science Magazines, or what rhetoric grad students get up to, by me.


	Stripes and solids: Lion and tiger cubs at China's Jinan Wildlife World pose for a shot that zoo officials really should consider for their next Christmas card. The zoo put the cubs in the same cage to get them better acquainted. - RT

01.07.05
Geez, I have been really busy today trying to decide which stripclubs to hit tonight. Just kidding, grandma. It was finally determined that we'd try a place where someone was "accidentally" beaten to death by a "literally retarded bouncer" and someone else was stabbed in the head. Ha, I kid again. I kill me. Oops, now we've downgraded to somewhere in Wheaton. And now playing board games in someone's living room. Speaking of HOT TIMES IN THE CITY! Marla delivers next week's weather report:

It's the lighter size of catastrophic climate change. Sign up now for your ride in my new convertible! First time's free.

Um...some big things happened yesterday. On the one hand, Senator Barbara Boxer and other Democrats made some brave and historic stands against our fucked up voting system. On the other hand the shitforbrains Republicans threw a suckfest for their Attorney General prick, Alberto Gonzales, Mr. Torture. I just hate those motherfuckers. Excuse me.

01.06.05
Last night I went out with my roomie and her girlfriend ¹, to Chaos to watch the drag kings, and it'd been a long time since I'd been to a proper dyke bar (which Chaos isn't, just on Wednesdays) - such a long time that everyone had gotten young and cute in my absence. And I guess this is how it will be from now on.

Getting old is a boring topic and therefore a favorite of bloggers, but I'm not crying about it. I've still got my looks. The evidence is building, however, that I'm not getting any younger. In fact, my friend Shauna said just that to me a few months ago. And for Christmas she gave me an old-timey novelty postcard depicting a dancing drunk which read, "Enjoy Yourself. It's Later Than You Think." Yes, I do. Yes, I know. FEMALE PILLS: A VALUABLE SPECIFIC FEMALE TROUBLES NERVE DIFFICULTIES

FEMALE PILLS: A VALUABLE SPECIFIC FEMALE TROUBLES NERVE DIFFICULTIES

And a while back I started taking a medication, a blue pill which I will now apparently take every day for the rest of my life. Being a lesbian of relatively good health, I've never taken any pill every day. Now it seems like just a matter of time until I have one of those MTWTF Pill Reminders.

01.05.05
In my cube yesterday, also known as Day 1,035 of my sentence, while surfing around, trying not to fall asleep or die from stupidity, I came across the new Kittenpants' ACTION! page, and filled in the form letter attached to the headline: STOP SINCLAIR'S ABUSE OF THE AIR. The form letter is sent to advertisers, to protest "the Group's continued misuse of public airwaves to air one-sided politically-charged programming without a counterpoint. Every night, Sinclair Broadcasting vice president Mark Hyman broadcasts a conservative rant -- called 'The Point' -- which most of Sinclair's 62 stations are required to air during their local news. 'The Point 'predictably attacks Democrats and progressives while praising George Bush. No counterpoint is offered. This is an abuse of the public airwaves."

01.04.05
For her birthday I gave my sister a copy of Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, and for Christmas she returned it to me, signed by David Sedaris, who wrote, "To Jenny. Have a happy December." Which I thought was nice, and even though there were only 6 days left in the month, they did turn out to be happy ones. So now I'm finally getting to read the book, and it's hilarious, of course, and more revealing and reflective than the others, and I'm posting the first story here, which I think you'll enjoy if you have the time, and honestly, I doubt you're all that busy.

Us and Them (click to expand)

WHEN MY FAMILY FIRST MOVED to North Carolina, we lived in a rented house three blocks from the school where I would begin the third grade. My mother made friends with one of the neighbors, but one seemed enough for her. Within a year we would move again and, as she explained, there wasn't much point in getting too close to people we would have to say good-bye to. Our next house was less than a mile away, and the short journey would hardly merit tears or even good-byes, for that matter. It was more of a "see you later" situation, but still I adopted my mother's attitude, as it allowed me to pretend that not making friends was a conscious choice. I could if I wanted to. It just wasn't the right time.

Back in New York State, we had lived in the country, with no sidewalks or streetlights; you could leave the house and still be alone. But here, when you looked out the window, you saw other houses, and people inside those houses. I hoped that in walking around after dark I might witness a murder, but for the most part our neighbors just sat in their living rooms, watching TV. The only place that seemed truly different was owned by a man named Mr. Tomkey, who did not believe in television. This was told to us by our mother's friend, who dropped by one afternoon with a basketful of okra. The woman did not editorialize—rather, she just presented her information, leaving her listener to make of it what she might. Had my mother said, "That's the craziest thing I've ever heard in my life," I assume that the friend would have agreed, and had she said, "Three cheers for Mr. Tomkey," the friend likely would have agreed as well. It was a kind of test, as was the okra.

To say that you did not believe in television was different from saying that you did not care for it. Belief implied that television had a master plan and that you were against it. It also suggested that you thought too much. When my mother reported that Mr. Tomkey did not believe in television, my father said, "Well, good for him. I don't know that I believe in it, either."

"That's exactly how I feel," my mother said, and then my parents watched the news, and whatever came on after the news.

Word spread that Mr. Tomkey did not own a television, and you began hearing that while this was all very well and good, it was unfair of him to inflict his beliefs upon others, specifically his innocent wife and children. It was speculated that just as the blind man develops a keener sense of hearing, the family must somehow compensate for their loss. "Maybe they read," my mother's friend said. "Maybe they listen to the radio, but you can bet your boots they're doing something."

I wanted to know what this something was, and so I began peering through the Tomkeys' windows. During the day I'd stand across the street from their house, acting as though I were waiting for someone, and at night, when the view was better and I had less chance of being discovered, I would creep into their yard and hide in the bushes beside their fence.

Because they had no TV, the Tomkeys were forced to talk during dinner. They had no idea how puny their lives were, and so they were not ashamed that a camera would have found them uninteresting. They did not know what attractive was or what dinner was supposed to look like or even what time people were supposed to eat. Sometimes they wouldn't sit down until eight o'clock, long after everyone else had finished doing the dishes. During the meal, Mr. Tomkey would occasionally pound the table and point at his children with a fork, but the moment he finished, everyone would start laughing. I got the idea that he was imitating someone else, and wondered if he spied on us while we were eating.

When fall arrived and school began, I saw the Tomkey children marching up the hill with paper sacks in their hands. The son was one grade lower than me, and the daughter was one grade higher. We never spoke, but I'd pass them in the halls from time to time and attempt to view the world through their eyes. What must it be like to be so ignorant and alone? Could a normal person even imagine it? Staring at an Elmer Fudd lunch box, I tried to divorce myself from everything I already knew: Elmer's inability to pronounce the letter r, his constant pursuit of an intelligent and considerably more famous rabbit. I tried to think of him as just a drawing, but it was impossible to separate him from his celebrity.

One day in class a boy named William began to write the wrong answer on the blackboard, and our teacher flailed her arms, saying, "Warning, Will. Danger, danger." Her voice was synthetic and void of emotion, and we laughed, knowing that she was imitating the robot in a weekly show about a family who lived in outer space. The Tomkeys, though, would have thought she was having a heart attack. It occurred to me that they needed a guide, someone who could accompany them through the course of an average day and point out all the things they were unable to understand. I could have done it on weekends, but friendship would have taken away their mystery and interfered with the good feeling I got from pitying them. So I kept my distance.

In early October the Tomkeys bought a boat, and everyone seemed greatly relieved, especially my mother's friend, who noted that the motor was definitely secondhand. It was reported that Mr. Tomkey's father-in-law owned a house on the lake and had invited the family to use it whenever they liked. This explained why they were gone all weekend, but it did not make their absences any easier to bear. I felt as if my favorite show had been canceled.

Halloween fell on a Saturday that year, and by the time my mother took us to the store, all the good costumes were gone. My sisters dressed as witches and I went as a hobo. I'd looked forward to going in disguise to the Tomkeys' door, but they were off at the lake, and their house was dark. Before leaving, they had left a coffee can full of gumdrops on the front porch, alongside a sign reading DON'T BE GREEDY. In terms of Halloween candy, individual gumdrops were just about as low as you could get. This was evidenced by the large number of them floating in an adjacent dog bowl. It was disgusting to think that this was what a gumdrop might look like in your stomach, and it was insulting to be told not to take too much of something you didn't really want in the first place. "Who do these Tomkeys think they are?" my sister Lisa said.

The night after Halloween, we were sitting around watching TV when the doorbell rang. Visitors were infrequent at our house, so while my father stayed behind, my mother, sisters, and I ran downstairs in a group, opening the door to discover the entire Tomkey family on our front stoop. The parents looked as they always had, but the son and daughter were dressed in costumes—she as a ballerina and he as some kind of a rodent with terry-cloth ears and a tail made from what looked to be an extension cord. It seemed they had spent the previous evening isolated at the lake and had missed the opportunity to observe Halloween. "So, well, I guess we're trick-or-treating now, if that's okay," Mr. Tomkey said.

I attributed their behavior to the fact that they didn't have a TV, but television didn't teach you everything. Asking for candy on Halloween was called trick-or-treating, but asking for candy on November first was called begging, and it made people uncomfortable. This was one of the things you were supposed to learn simply by being alive, and it angered me that the Tomkeys did not understand it.

"Why of course it's not too late," my mother said. "Kids, why don't you . . . run and get . . . the candy."

"But the candy is gone," my sister Gretchen said. "You gave it away last night."

"Not that candy," my mother said. "The other candy. Why don't you run and go get it?"

"You mean our candy?" Lisa said. "The candy that we earned?"

This was exactly what our mother was talking about, but she didn't want to say this in front of the Tomkeys. In order to spare their feelings, she wanted them to believe that we always kept a bucket of candy lying around the house, just waiting for someone to knock on the door and ask for it. "Go on, now," she said. "Hurry up."

My room was situated right off the foyer, and if the Tomkeys had looked in that direction, they could have seen my bed and the brown paper bag marked MY CANDY. KEEP OUT. I didn't want them to know how much I had, and so I went into my room and shut the door behind me. Then I closed the curtains and emptied my bag onto the bed, searching for whatever was the crummiest. All my life chocolate has made me ill. I don't know if I'm allergic or what, but even the smallest amount leaves me with a blinding headache. Eventually, I learned to stay away from it, but as a child I refused to be left out. The brownies were eaten, and when the pounding began I would blame the grape juice or my mother's cigarette smoke or the tightness of my glasses—anything but the chocolate. My candy bars were poison but they were brand-name, and so I put them in pile no. 1, which definitely would not go to the Tomkeys.

Out in the hallway I could hear my mother straining for something to talk about. "A boat!" she said. "That sounds marvelous. Can you just drive it right into the water?"

"Actually, we have a trailer," Mr. Tomkey said. "So what we do is back it into the lake."

"Oh, a trailer. What kind is it?"

"Well, it's a boat trailer," Mr. Tomkey said.

"Right, but is it wooden or, you know . . . I guess what I'm asking is what style trailer do you have?"

Behind my mother's words were two messages. The first and most obvious was "Yes, I am talking about boat trailers, but also I am dying." The second, meant only for my sisters and me, was "If you do not immediately step forward with that candy, you will never again experience freedom, happiness, or the possibility of my warm embrace."

I knew that it was just a matter of time before she came into my room and started collecting the candy herself, grabbing indiscriminately, with no regard to my rating system. Had I been thinking straight, I would have hidden the most valuable items in my dresser drawer, but instead, panicked by the thought of her hand on my doorknob, I tore off the wrappers and began cramming the candy bars into my mouth, desperately, like someone in a contest. Most were miniature, which made them easier to accommodate, but still there was only so much room, and it was hard to chew and fit more in at the same time. The headache began immediately, and I chalked it up to tension.

My mother told the Tomkeys she needed to check on something, and then she opened the door and stuck her head inside my room. "What the hell are you doing?" she whispered, but my mouth was too full to answer. "I'll just be a moment," she called, and as she closed the door behind her and moved toward my bed, I began breaking the wax lips and candy necklaces pulled from pile no. 2. These were the second-best things I had received, and while it hurt to destroy them, it would have hurt even more to give them away. I had just started to mutilate a miniature box of Red Hots when my mother pried them from my hands, accidentally finishing the job for me. BB-size pellets clattered onto the floor, and as I followed them with my eyes, she snatched up a roll of Necco wafers.

"Not those," I pleaded, but rather than words, my mouth expelled chocolate, chewed chocolate, which fell onto the sleeve of her sweater. "Not those. Not those."

She shook her arm, and the mound of chocolate dropped like a horrible turd upon my bedspread. "You should look at yourself," she said. "I mean, really look at yourself."

Along with the Necco wafers she took several Tootsie Pops and half a dozen caramels wrapped in cellophane. I heard her apologize to the Tomkeys for her absence, and then I heard my candy hitting the bottom of their bags.

"What do you say?" Mrs. Tomkey asked.

And the children answered, "Thank you."

While I was in trouble for not bringing my candy sooner, my sisters were in more trouble for not bringing theirs at all. We spent the early part of the evening in our rooms, then one by one we eased our way back upstairs, and joined our parents in front of the TV. I was the last to arrive, and took a seat on the floor beside the sofa. The show was a Western, and even if my head had not been throbbing, I doubt I would have had the wherewithal to follow it. A posse of outlaws crested a rocky hilltop, squinting at a flurry of dust advancing from the horizon, and I thought again of the Tomkeys and of how alone and out of place they had looked in their dopey costumes. "What was up with that kid's tail?" I asked.

"Shhhh," my family said.

For months I had protected and watched over these people, but now, with one stupid act, they had turned my pity into something hard and ugly. The shift wasn't gradual, but immediate, and it provoked an uncomfortable feeling of loss. We hadn't been friends, the Tomkeys and I, but still I had given them the gift of my curiosity. Wondering about the Tomkey family had made me feel generous, but now I would have to shift gears and find pleasure in hating them. The only alternative was to do as my mother had instructed and take a good look at myself. This was an old trick, designed to turn one's hatred inward, and while I was determined not to fall for it, it was hard to shake the mental picture snapped by her suggestion: here is a boy sitting on a bed, his mouth smeared with chocolate. He's a human being, but also he's a pig, surrounded by trash and gorging himself so that others may be denied. Were this the only image in the world, you'd be forced to give it your full attention, but fortunately there were others. This stagecoach, for instance, coming round the bend with a cargo of gold. This shiny new Mustang convertible. This teenage girl, her hair a beautiful mane, sipping Pepsi through a straw, one picture after another, on and on until the news, and whatever came on after the news.

01.02.05
Another damn Year End list.
Jenny's INs and OUTs, 2005.

IN: Edward catching his head on fire	OUT: Flaming shots of Everclear
IN: Novels	OUT: jennymiller.com
IN: Moresomes	OUT: Threesomes
IN: Pipes and Cigars	OUT: Cancer
IN: Your new ringtone	OUT: Incest
IN: Taco Night	OUT: People who don't come to Taco Night
IN: Kittens	OUT: Mars
IN: Television	OUT: Caring/Trying
IN: Preppy cars	OUT: Stolen wigs
IN: Your mama	OUT: Your second cousin once removed
IN: Frenching, shaking that ass	OUT: Youth, cynicism, optimism
IN: Jews	OUT: Catholics

Speaking of stupid lists, I dug up my high school paper's INs and OUTs of 1991, brought to you by my senior class, and one intrepid reporter. Click the image for big:

A mystery contributor sent this from the New York Review of Books. It's good, and upsetting. Read at your own risk.

Review: On War, By Chris Hedges
Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War by Evan Wright
The Fall of Baghdad, by Jon Lee Anderson

1.
The vanquished know war. They see through the empty jingoism of those who use the abstract words of glory, honor, and patriotism to mask the cries of the wounded, the senseless killing, war profiteering, and chest-pounding grief. They know the lies the victors often do not acknowledge, the lies covered up in stately war memorials and mythic war narratives, filled with stories of courage and comradeship. They know the lies that permeate the thick, self-important memoirs by amoral statesmen who make wars but do not know war. The vanquished know the essence of war—death. They grasp that war is necrophilia. They see that war is a state of almost pure sin with its goals of hatred and destruction. They know how war fosters alienation, leads inevitably to nihilism, and is a turning away from the sanctity and preservation of life. All other narratives about war too easily fall prey to the allure and seductiveness of violence, as well as the attraction of the godlike power that comes with the license to kill with impunity. But the words of the vanquished come later, sometimes long after the war, when grown men and women unpack the suffering they endured as children, what it was like to see their mother or father killed or taken away, or what it was like to lose their homes, their community, their security, and be discarded as human refuse. But by then few listen. The truth about war comes out, but usually too late. We are assured by the war-makers that these stories have no bearing on the glorious violent enterprise the nation is about to inaugurate. And, lapping up the myth of war and its sense of empowerment, we prefer not to look.

The current books about the war in Iraq do not uncover the pathology of war. We see the war from the perspective of the troops who fight the war or the equally skewed perspective of the foreign reporters, holed up in hotels, hemmed in by drivers and translators and official minders. There are moments when war's face appears to these voyeurs and killers, perhaps from the back seat of a car where a small child, her brains oozing out of her head, lies dying, but mostly it remains hidden. And the books on the war in Iraq have to be viewed, through no fault of the reporters, as lacking the sweep and depth that will come one day, perhaps years from now, when a small Iraqi boy or girl reaches adulthood and unfolds for us the sad and tragic story of the invasion and bloody occupation of their nation. War is presented primarily through the distorted prism of the occupiers. The embedded reporters, dependent on the military for food and transportation as well as security, have a natural and understandable tendency, one I have myself felt, to protect those who are protecting them. They are not allowed to report outside of the unit and are, in effect, captives. They have no relationships with the victims, essential to all balanced reporting of conflicts, but only with the Marines and soldiers who drive through desolate mud-walled towns and pump grenades and machine-gun bullets into houses, leaving scores of nameless dead and wounded in their wake. The reporters admire and laud these fighters for their physical courage. They feel protected as well by the jet fighters and heavy artillery and throaty rattle of machine guns. And the reporting, even among those who struggle to keep some distance, usually descends into a shameful cheerleading. Those who cover war dine out on the myth about war and the myth about themselves as war correspondents. Yes, they say, it is horrible, and dirty and ugly; for many of them it is also glamorous and exciting and empowering. They look out from the windows of Humvees for a few seconds at Iraqi families, cowering in fear, and only rarely see the effects of the firepower. When they are forced to examine what bullets, grenades, and shells do to human bodies they turn away in disgust or resort to black humor to dehumanize the corpses. They cannot stay long, in any event, since they must leave the depressing scene behind for the next mission. The tragedy is replaced, as it is for us at home who watch it on television screens, by a light moment or another story. It becomes easier to forget that another human life has been ruined beyond repair, that what is unfolding is not only tragic for tens of thousands of Iraqis but for the United States.

The other distorted prism into this war came to us, until the occupation, courtesy of the oily functionaries at the Iraqi Ministry of Information. The regime of Saddam Hussein controlled journalists as tightly as the US military does. The reporting from the bowels of the regime was often characterized by innuendo and inference. This reporting of the war, because reporters were so heavily circumscribed, turned their attention onto their own minor privations and the lives of their drivers, translators, and the narrow circles within the ruling elite that were permitted to speak with them. There is uniformity about journalistic war memoirs reaching all the way back to Evelyn Waugh's Scoop, although I confess I enjoy reading them. But they violate every rule of serious reporting. It is an unwritten rule, for example, among foreign correspondents that no matter how good the quote, you do not interview taxi drivers, translators, or bartenders. You leave these interviews to the hacks who parachute into a war zone, ride nervously to the hotel, sit at the bar, go to the embassy or UN background briefing, and fly swiftly home. But in a world where it is impossible to do much more than get on the official bus for the official tour and go to the official briefing, taxi drivers and bartenders offer in places like Saddam Hussein's Iraq refresh-ing and candid perspectives when set against the absurdity of official prop- aganda. At a certain point, as Waugh realized, these experiences can only be written as farce. Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War by Evan Wright is an account of the invasion by a reporter embedded with the Marines. It is a much better book than the title would indicate—not to mention the cover art of a grim solder in desert camouflage with an assault rifle, and the ridiculous excerpt on the back, a near parody of me-as-hero war reporting: Wright gave up his satellite phone, unlike his colleagues in the electronic media, who replaced reporting with a breathless play-by-play description of what their cameras were showing viewers from the battlefield. He followed a Marine battalion for six weeks from Kuwait to Baghdad. As he admits himself, his book suffers from his rarely having been around long enough to find out what the tremendous and by his own observation often indiscriminate firepower did to the hapless Iraqi families within the range of the guns, artillery, and fighter jets. But the anecdotal evidence, including the obliteration of villages where there was no serious resistance, along with isolated incidents where the unit had to stop and tend the children and civilians they wounded or killed, mounts by the end of the book to present a withering indictment of the needless brutality of the invasion. He writes toward the conclusion of his narrative:

In the past six weeks, I have been on hand while this comparatively small unit of Marines has killed quite a few people. I personally saw three civilians shot, one of them fatally with a bullet in the eye. These were just the tip of the iceberg. The Marines killed dozens, if not hundreds, in combat through direct fire and through repeated, at times almost indiscriminate, artillery strikes. And no one will probably ever know how many died from the approximately 30,000 pounds of bombs First Recon ordered dropped from aircraft. The reason wars should always be covered from the perspective of the common soldier or Marine, as Wright does, is that these foot soldiers are largely pawns. Their lives, despite the protestations of the generals and politicians, mean little to the war planners. Officers who put the safety of their men before the efficiency of the war machine are usually viewed as compromised. Wright, by writing about one conscientious officer, Lieutenant Nathaniel Fick, who at times defies orders that he believes will get his men killed needlessly, shows us the raw meat grinder at the core of the military, how it pushes aside all those who do not offer up the soldiers under their command to the god of war. Physical courage is common on a battlefield. Moral courage is not. Those who defy the machine usually become its victim. And Lieutenant Fick, who we find in the epilogue has left the Marines to go back to school, wonders if he was a good officer or if his concern for his men colored his judgment. Those who make war betray those who fight it. This is something most enlisted combat veterans soon understand. They have little love for officers, tolerating the good ones and hoping the bad ones are replaced or injured before they get them killed. Those on the bottom rung of the military pay the price for their commanders' vanity, ego, and thirst for recognition. These motives are hardly exclusive to the neocons and the ambitious generals in the Bush administration. They are a staple of war. Homer wrote about all of them in The Iliad as did Norman Mailer in The Naked and the Dead. Stupidity and callousness cause senseless death and wanton destruction. That being a good human being—that possessing not only physical courage but moral courage—is detrimental in a commander says much about the industrial slaughter that is war.

Combat has an undeniable attraction. It is seductive and exciting, and it is ultimately addictive. The young soldiers, trained well enough to be disciplined but encouraged to maintain their naive adolescent belief in invulnerability, have in wartime more power at their fingertips than they will ever have again. From being minimum-wage employees at places like Burger King, looking forward to a life of dead-end jobs, they catapult to being part of, in the words of the Marines, "the greatest fighting force on the face of the earth." The disparity between what they were and what they have become is breathtaking, intoxicating. Their intoxication is only heightened in wartime when all taboos are broken. Murder goes unpunished and is often rewarded. The thrill of destruction fills their days with wild adrenaline highs, strange grotesque landscapes that are almost hallucinogenic, and a sense of purpose and belonging that overpowers the feeling of alienation many left behind. They become accustomed to killing, carrying out acts of slaughter with no more forethought than they take to relieve themselves. Wright describes the end of a day of battle:
By five o'clock in the afternoon, the Iraqis who had earlier put up determined-though-inept resistance have either fled or been slaughtered. Colbert's team, along with the rest of the platoon, speeds up the road toward the outskirts of Baqubah. Headless corpses—indicating well-aimed shots from high-caliber weapons —are sprawled out in trenches by the road. Others are charred beyond recognition, still sitting at the wheels of burned, skeletized trucks. Some of the smoking wreckage emits the odor of barbecuing chicken—the smell of slow-roasting human corpses inside. An LAV rolling a few meters in front of us stops by a shot-up Toyota pickup truck. A man inside appears to be moving. A Marine jumps out of the LAV, walks over to the pickup truck, sticks his rifle through the passenger window and sprays the inside of the vehicle with machine-gun fire. Those who carry out this killing will pay a terrible price. As the unit approaches Baghdad they become weary with the indiscriminate shooting of unarmed Iraqis, including families that drive too close to roadblocks. Wright notes that "...the enlisted Marines, tired of shooting unarmed civilians, fought to be allowed to use smoke grenades." Many of these young men will never sleep well for the rest of their lives. Most will harbor within themselves corrosive feelings of self-loathing and regret. They will struggle with an unbridgeable alienation when they return home, something Evans sees glimpses of in the final pages of the book.

These Marines have learned the awful truth about our civil religion. They have learned that our nation is not righteous. They have understood that there are no transcendent goals at the heart of our political process. The Sunday School God that blesses our nation above all others vanishes in war zones like Iraq. These young troops disdain the teachers, religious authorities, and government officials who feed them these lies. This is why so many combat veterans hate military shrinks and chaplains, whose task is largely to patch them up with the old clichés and ship them back to the battlefield. It is why they feel distance and anger with those at home who drink in the dark elixir of blind patriotism, and absorb mythology about themselves and war. One of the Marines in the book returns to California and is invited to be the guest of honor in a gated community in Malibu, a place where he could never afford to live. The residents want to toast him as a war hero. "I'm not a hero," he tells the guests. "Guys like me are just a necessary part of things. To maintain this way of life in a fine community like this, you need psychos like us to go out and drop a bomb on somebody's house." But these veterans will also miss war. They will miss it because at the height of the killing they can ignore the consequences. They will miss having comrades, whom they mistake for friends, comrades who at the time seem closer to them than their families. They will miss the brief, unfettered moment when they were killer gods and everyone around them fighting a common enemy, and facing death as a group, seemed fused into one body. "They like this part of war," Wright correctly writes of the comradeship, "being a small band out here alone in enemy territory, everyone focused on the common purpose of staying alive and killing, if necessary." The end of war is cruel, for these comrades again become strangers. Those who return are forced to face their demons. They must fall back onto the difficult terrain of life on their own. Wartime comradeship is about the suppression of self-awareness, self-possession, and self-understanding. This is part of its allure, the reason people miss it and seek years later, often with the aid of alcohol, to recreate it. But outside of war the camaraderie does not return. These young men and women are sent home to a nation they see in a new light. They struggle with the awful memories and trauma and are shunted aside unless they are willing to read from the patriotic script handed to them by the mythmakers. Some do this, but most cannot. Wright, because he reports from the perspective of the enlisted Marines, sees the bizarre subculture of the military. He watches the chaos of war, the way it never turns out as planned and how it opens up a Pandora's box that gives war a life and power beyond anyone's control. He notes the incompetence and callousness of many senior officers who send their men into minefields at night or up against superior forces to burnish their own reputations as warriors. He understands the way killing in war, which always includes murder, slowly eats away at soldiers and Marines. Given the severe limitations of seeing war through the eyes of the killers, his book is nevertheless sensitive, thoughtful, nuanced, and he is able, because of his honesty, to capture the sickness and perversion of the battlefield. Generation Kill reminds me of Jarhead by Anthony Swofford, although Swofford was able to add a crucial layer of distance, allowing us to see how the enterprise of killing had over time maimed him and those he served with in the 1991 Gulf War. But as war memoirs go this one is first-rate, as long as we remember that it is a portrait of warriors, not war.

2.
While Wright was making his way toward Baghdad from southern Iraq with the Marines, Jon Lee Anderson was in the Iraqi capital for The New Yorker. Anderson spent his days trying to free himself, if only for a few minutes, from the iron Iraqi control. He was hampered in his work by government minders, constant surveillance, restrictions on where he could go, whom he could see, and what he could write. This kind of reporting swiftly becomes a reporting of nuance, a reporting where truth is seen in shadows and reflections, in hasty whispers and wayward looks. Reporters and photographers pay a heavy price for this control. They must accept becoming reluctant tools of those in power. Indeed, when, in Anderson's book The Fall of Baghdad, someone asks the Iraqi official Muhammad al-Sahaf how his Information Ministry will continue to function after it has been destroyed by American warheads, he replies: "You are the Ministry of Information." The difficult conditions under which Anderson worked meant that the usual standards of reporting had to be relaxed. Reporters were in many ways hostages of the Iraqi regime, trotted out when the regime wanted to get across a message and locked up the remainder of the time. The best reporters, such as Anderson or the New York Times correspondent John Burns, were masters at slipping in enough details and writing with enough irony to remind us where they were reporting from. But I am not sure their work can be considered great reporting.

"A crowd of journalists milled around confusedly and began piling on board a couple of buses," Anderson writes of his reporting experience during the invasion. I hopped on one of them. Invariably these trips, laid on by the ministry, were inspection tours of freshly bombed sites involving civilian targets; it had become a daily ritual since the war began. We were never shown any damage done to military installations or to buildings in the presidential complex. Anderson had to struggle, as did all who reported from Saddam Hussein's repressive state, with the usual mouthing of clichés by frightened citizens and functionaries who memorized opinions to ensure their self-preservation. He clutters up some of his book, especially the beginning when he allows people to speculate about a looming war, with a tiring recitation of official government lines and disinformation. But once the narrative gets underway with the first night of the bombing of Baghdad, he writes movingly about a defenseless country that is rapidly overpowered by a superior and technologically advanced military giant.

He reminds us of the lopsidedness of the war, something painfully apparent to Iraqis and perhaps not always appreciated by those who were embedded with the invading force. American and British fighter jets had total control of the skies and carried out air strikes with few losses and little more than desultory antiaircraft fire. Anderson, through his own blunders, quickly uncovers the humiliation Iraqis feel, a humiliation that, even though they hate the dictator, sees them rejoice in the supposed downing of an American jet or the crippling of an American tank. The abject humiliation endured at the hands of the invading Americans goes a long way toward explaining the virulence of the current armed resistance to the occupation. Anderson has a sensitivity that saves his book from being, like so many war memoirs, voyeurism. He keeps to a minimum the pornographic images of violence and deprivation. He manages to write with empathy about ordinary Iraqis, who deserved neither Saddam Hussein nor the Americans. Although the Iraqis he follows are confined largely to the elite or the small staff who work for him, he nevertheless puts a human face on the suffering endured by those on the other end of our weapons systems. The privations of the Iraqis, of whom as many as 100,000 may by now have been killed in the invasion and occupation, is something that few of us saw during the war, although horrifying images were disseminated through the Arab networks such as al-Jazeera. Such images make it hard to sell the enterprise of war or boost the circulation of newspapers or the ratings of cable news channels that use the myth of war to attract viewers or readers. This mythic narrative of war is what most at home desire to see and hear. The reality of war is so revolting and horrifying that if we did see war it would be hard for us to wage it.

Anderson visits Iraqi hospitals as the war goes on. These visits were required trips on the staple Iraqi propaganda tour ever since the sanctions were imposed after the first Gulf War. Nevertheless, the scenes in the hospital corridors in The Fall of Baghdad are a reminder that this war, despite the assurances of the Bush administration, was neither clean nor precise. Tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis have been wounded and killed. Anderson, by focusing on a few victims, including two children, helps to counter the glib excuses for the war. He stands in a hospital looking at the body of a small child killed by American bombs, and the image alone mocks all those who promoted the war on humanitarian grounds: Before the cloth covered her, I saw that the girl was covered in blood. Her brother looked as though he were sleeping. But they both were dead. Their mother was there, beside herself with grief. She was the woman I had heard wailing and hitting the walls. Then almost all the onlookers around the mother, including the doctors and nurses, broke down and cried. I was overcome and went outside and sat down. I wept. The children's father was sitting a few feet away from me, disconsolately sobbing into his arms.

Reporters who accept being herded around by minders, Iraqi or American, and are spoonfed stories are a necessary part of the landscape in war. They give us a feel, however circumscribed, for minute acts of folly and brutality. But these reporters are often the least equipped to deal with the broader moral and political questions about war. They are swallowed up by systems, whether of dictatorships or of the military. They must write stories that do not antagonize their handlers and get them expelled from the unit or the country they cover. They become masters at self-censorship, knowing how far they can inch forward their reporting. But these skills cripple them. They have spent too long being compromised. Wright and Anderson have given us a diary-like reporting of the war that illustrates day to day what a few of the elite units, whether American or Iraqi, endured. They do this well. They are intelligent and sensitive. Some of the passages in their books are moving. They resist the narcissism that often infects such accounts of war. But at the same time the books, given the moral and political morass gripping the United States, have a frightening moral neutrality. The writers do not grasp, because they cannot feel it, the red-hot rage, the utter humiliation and indignation that have pushed Iraqis to turn their country into an inferno. Wright backs away from the utter perversion that grips the life of heavily armed Marines allowed to blast their way through Iraqi villages. These writers can, at times, evoke pity and compassion for some of the people who suffer from the effects of the war, but they do not confront what war does to societies and individuals, what it has done to Iraq and to us. War, after all, is not a natural disaster like earthquakes or typhoons. It is a devastating and violent attempt at large-scale social engineering. It changes the landscape and the lives of the occupiers and the occupied. We face a seismic political and moral upheaval. These books tell stories, often powerful stories, but in the end the writers cannot say what they mean.

We are losing the war in Iraq. There has been a steady increase in the assaults carried out by the insurgents against coalition forces. The attacks over the past year have risen from about twenty a day to approximately 120. We are an isolated and reviled nation. We are tyrants to others weaker than ourselves. We have lost sight of our democratic ideals. Thucydides wrote of Athens' expanding empire and how this empire led it to become a tyrant abroad and then a tyrant at home. The tyranny Athens imposed on others it finally imposed on itself. If we do not confront our hubris and the lies told to justify the killing and mask the destruction carried out in our name in Iraq, if we do not grasp the moral corrosiveness of empire and occupation, if we continue to allow force and violence to be our primary form of communication, we will not so much defeat dictators like Saddam Hussein as become them. —November 17, 2004

I'm headed to Florida tonight, so updates may be spotty through New Year's. Have yourselves merry little Christmases, or whatever you celebrate. Don't forget to make the yuletide gay. Love, JM.

12.21.04
So far this has been a good Christmas season, material-wise. My collection of new things includes underwear, a feather bed, books, records, orignal lightswitch art, space cards, glassware, gloves, and not one but two Be Naturally Monogamous Fast Working Fidelity Sprays.

But there's more to the holidays than gifts - there's also food and drink, and right now, up in the kitchen, my company's worker bees are throwing a potluck, complete with wine and beer. So, I'll be back in a bit. Meanwhile, here's something fun to read: The Frequency: Solving the riddle of the Dan Rather beating, Harpers.

Also, we weren't alone in being wrong about Linda Cropp, and Ms. Sally Jenkins takes us to task: Baseball's Sense of Fair Game. Hello, 'Nats!

12.20.04 (links fixed, 1:40pm)
Winter doesn't start 'til tomorrow, see, but it is friggin' cold today. Luckily HK, your source for celebrity lesbian news, has this hot report from senior correspondent Shauna: ROSEANNE'S TV DAUGHTER HAS BABY WITH GIRLFRIEND. Yay, Darlene! Shauna adds, "the enquirer is oddly behind on the ellen thing [see story]. and man, some really bad grammar here: 'allie gave birth, via a sperm donor...' it's nice that women can get dudes to birth their babies now. so much easier on the body, and less mess."

We've already experienced one Christmas miracle. My grandma, who'd never even been introduced to a typewriter, much less Windows, a year or so ago, managed to locate my Amazon Wish List, print it out, take it to the mall, and locate CDs I wanted! Good grief, Charlie Brown. That is really something.

As a result, today YOU get to hear selections from The Beatles' Let It Be...Naked, the interesting little stripped-down re-do with the silly name. Let's see, how about Get Back, and uh, Let It Be. And why not Across the Universe. They really do sound cool and different. Warm and analoggy. Bonus from Mr. Underblog: I've Just Seen a Face. I imagine whoever now owns these tunes (Michael Jackson? Sony?) might have a couple lawyers, so get 'em today.

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup,
They slither while they pass, they slip away across the universe (2)
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my open mind,
Possessing and caressing me.
Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world,
Nothing's gonna change my world.

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes,
That call me on and on across the universe,
Thoughts meander like a restless wind inside a letter box they
Tumble blindly as they make their way
Across the universe (3)
Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world,
Nothing's gonna change my world.

Sounds of laughter shades of earth are ringing
Through my open views inviting and inciting me
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a
Million suns, it calls me on and on
Across the universe (4)
Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world,
Nothing's gonna change my world.

12.16.04
Wendy heard on the radio that Alexandra Hedison is suing Ellen over their breakup. We thought a little Sappho might be appropriate.

a great deal; she said to
me, "This parting must be
endured, Sappho. I go unwillingly."

I said, "Go, and be happy
but remember (you know
well) whom you leave shackled by love

"If you forget me, think
of our gifts to Aphrodite
and all the loveliness that we shared

"all the violet tiaras,
braided rosebuds, dill and
crocus twined around your young neck

"myrrh poured on your head
and on soft mats girls with
all that they most wished for beside them

"while no voices chanted
choruses without ours,
no woodlot bloomed in spring without song..."

I never knew the miniature bottle-opener on my keychain could be a deadly weapon. After you rudely (very rudely) made me leave the DMV, I walked slowly (very slowly) down the cold and sunny sidewalk, rubbing the pointy top of the offending keychain in my pocket. At first I was angry (and somewhat embarrassed, in that way you get not for doing something, but for being defeated), and then I stayed angry. And then I looked around for somewhere to hide my keychain, but there were a lot of people around, people who looked like they might steal my keychain. Finally I decided to put it in a free newspaper box. I opened the door, tossed it beneath the (3) remaining papers, grabbed one (so as not to look suspicious), and returned to the DMV, where I again had to deal with you, who said, "Ah, I see you finally read my sign." Your sign which did NOT mention bottle-openers.

At any rate, I wouldn't travel down any dark alleys for a while, Mr. Security Man, because I am armed (and very dangerous). When I at last finished my business at the DMV, my keychain was still there (under the last paper). Keep that in mind.

Veteran contributor Rebenga writes, "I read this blog a lot. Today's entry is especially good. It's about Linda Hesh's "Art Ads" - they ran in the Post and were about gay and mixed-race couples. For a short entry, this digs pretty deeply into the Post's advert/editorial hypocrisy - and this BothSides magazine business, which I hadn't even heard of. Holy crapola." Thanks!

From veteran contributor Deb D: Clinton repels park snark. "Bill Clinton fought back when he ran into a verbal mugging in Central Park." In related news, Bob saw a guy get physically mugged this morning. The story at 11.

We have more (and more parentheticals) but this massive goverment website can't code itself (yet). One last word: Linda Cropp, I'm not sure what you were thinking, but I'd recommend you move far (very far) away. We know where you live, and we have bottle-openers.

Please help. A certain famous friend of mine, we'll call her Helen LeGenerous, has dumped her longtime famous girlfriend, Halexandra Edison, for another certain famous friend of mine, Di Portia LaRossi, who also dumped HER famous girlfriend, Ringo Starr's step-daughter. The problem is, each of the four has a standing invitation to our legendary Emerson Street Taco Night. I can't UN-invite two of them, can I? What would you do if TV stars Ellen DeGeneres and Portia De Rossi reportedly have fallen in love after leaving their long-term girlfriends and are all invited to Taco Night?

Luckily for you, no famous people ever accept your invitations to Taco Night. You're lucky when your real friends show!

Great lineup today folks. Here are 100 pages of ethos, logos, and pathos, all directed to the search for Hopkin Green Frog: ps. i'll find my frog. Keep clicking. From RT. Brawl Erupts At Pompom Event in D.C. from Shauna. KRANKS CALLED, at kittenpants. Well, that wasn't that great.

I'm perilously close to finishing this book, and when it's over I don't know what I'll do with myself. You should read it, too, so we can suffer together when it's gone. *sniff* Thanks to Lekkner for the gift.

Finally, the six stages of watching Secretary: Bemusement. Worry. Amusment. Shock! Phew, is it getting hot in here? Ah, satisfaction. Good ending. Thank you. Now I'm going to spend some time in my room. Hold my calls.

12.13.04
Good morning little debtors. Twelve days 'til Christmas. Are we broke yet?

Accidental Poetry Edition

No. 1: What are the people searching for?

how to get laid
labatt blue advertising actress girlfriend bear ketchup girl
which skool is going to be attacked next by the paki panthers
bad parent duck
pantry of the gymnastics world
nude video of jenny miller
meaning of the name djimon
nfl groupie pictures parties
superman gay gallery hero illustration insult
lampshade award
adult children of hippies
dairy farm sluts
determinism in tess
strippers who travel to vincennes
short stories on assassins
pitchers of a spinning jenny
pics of hot girls with duty coming out of tush
posterior analysis horse racing game
craigs moms tush
game of towel bed baby kitchen throw with christmas reasons
tremendous silicone tits world record
recipes for moonshine boozes
bush heart attack pet goat devil clinton monica
ahead of its time fucking pans

Also, someone's got it real bad for his aunt. You are a dirty, dirty little nephew.

No. 2: Today's Spam

evolute liberators locked forks handshake
structure subunit reprograms pauses
rapture waist researcher
considering coffees joystick bagels clothing
deservingly sampled nitty Afghans perpetrating
languishes participant coating rawness
inconvenience detente speculator Californians Burnside
Clifford technically solutions
resonate Shepard lacquer

No. 3: Email from Grandma

YUK it is rainghere and getting cold never seen any black in those brands size 6 Mom was sleeping all the time I was there this morning will be going back soon I am in deep shit withcooper with my I.R. A. So I have to have help which I am doing but I do not know how long it will take time is running out. Love Me

12.10.04
We have a thief in the office. Someone is sneaking around at night, stealing iPods, laptops, PDAs, cellphones, and cameras. The big boss's response:

Geez. MY idea is to gather up all the employees (the tall and the small), and we'll sing! Without any presents at all!

He HADN'T stopped Christmas from coming! IT CAME! Somehow or other, it came just the same!

And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow,

Stood puzzling and puzzling: "How could it be so?
It came without ribbons! It came without tags!
"It came without packages, boxes or bags!"
And he puzzled three hours, 'till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before!
"Maybe Christmas," he thought, "doesn't come from a store.
"Maybe Christmas...perhaps...means a little bit more!"

And what happened then...?
Well...in Who-ville they say
That the Grinch's small heart
Grew three sizes that day!
And the minute his heart didn't feel quite so tight,
He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light
And he brought back the toys! And the food for the feast!
And he...

12.09.04 - Central Ohio/criminals/prisoner edition.
Last night in Columbus, at this old club (30 years old, easily) called The Alrosa Villa, some guy jumped on stage and shot to death former Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell and then opened fire on the crowd, killing four more before being shot to death by a cop. Dave says, "andy called me and said it was the craziest news story of his life. check this message board."

Speaking of prisoners, last night, while having coffee with my shut-in law school friend Connie, we realized that neither of us had ever read The Gift the Magi. As a child she'd read a bunny-protagonist version (in which one bunny, horrifyingly, lopped off his own tail), but not the real one. And speaking of prisoners yet again, The Gift of the Maji was written by O. Henry. O. Henry, the old drunk, was probably the most famous prisoner (of many famous prisoners) ever imprisoned at the old Ohio Penitentiary, which I broke into many times during my young adulthood. There was a cell in there which had been identified as Mr. Henry's (I sat on the cot once, while my friends slammed the door shut, haha, I could have been locked in there, assholes), though no one could've known which cell was his, so it probably wasn't. Anyway. Without further ado, a Christmas story from the inside (click to expand):

* THE GIFT OF THE MAGI *

by O. Henry

One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty- seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.

There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.

While the mistress of the home is gradually subsiding from the first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the lookout for the mendicancy squad.

In the vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger could coax a ring. Also appertaining thereunto was a card bearing the name "Mr. James Dillingham Young."

The "Dillingham" had been flung to the breeze during a former period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, though, they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever Mr. James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat above he was called "Jim" and greatly hugged by Mrs. James Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Della. Which is all very good.

Della finished her cry and attended to her cheeks with the powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a gray cat walking a gray fence in a gray backyard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn't go far. Expenses had been greater than she had calculated. They always are. Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. Her Jim. Many a happy hour she had spent planning for something nice for him. Something fine and rare and sterling--something just a little bit near to being worthy of the honor of being owned by Jim.

There was a pier-glass between the windows of the room. Perhaps you have seen a pier-glass in an $8 flat. A very thin and very agile person may, by observing his reflection in a rapid sequence of longitudinal strips, obtain a fairly accurate conception of his looks. Della, being slender, had mastered the art.

Suddenly she whirled from the window and stood before the glass. her eyes were shining brilliantly, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Rapidly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.

Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair. Had the queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out the window some day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy.

So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and made itself almost a garment for her. And then she did it up again nervously and quickly. Once she faltered for a minute and stood still while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.

On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat. With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her eyes, she fluttered out the door and down the stairs to the street.

Where she stopped the sign read: "Mne. Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds." One flight up Della ran, and collected herself, panting. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the "Sofronie."

"Will you buy my hair?" asked Della.

"I buy hair," said Madame. "Take yer hat off and let's have a sight at the looks of it."

Down rippled the brown cascade.

"Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised hand.

"Give it to me quick," said Della.

Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings. Forget the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim's present.

She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain simple and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not by meretricious ornamentation--as all good things should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim's. It was like him. Quietness and value--the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it, and she hurried home with the 87 cents. With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he used in place of a chain.

When Della reached home her intoxication gave way a little to prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love. Which is always a tremendous task, dear friends--a mammoth task.

Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, close-lying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy. She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically.

"If Jim doesn't kill me," she said to herself, "before he takes a second look at me, he'll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl. But what could I do--oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty- seven cents?"

At 7 o'clock the coffee was made and the frying-pan was on the back of the stove hot and ready to cook the chops.

Jim was never late. Della doubled the fob chain in her hand and sat on the corner of the table near the door that he always entered. Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight, and she turned white for just a moment. She had a habit for saying little silent prayer about the simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: "Please God, make him think I am still pretty."

The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked thin and very serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two--and to be burdened with a family! He needed a new overcoat and he was without gloves.

Jim stopped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the scent of quail. His eyes were fixed upon Della, and there was an expression in them that she could not read, and it terrified her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any of the sentiments that she had been prepared for. He simply stared at her fixedly with that peculiar expression on his face.

Della wriggled off the table and went for him.

"Jim, darling," she cried, "don't look at me that way. I had my hair cut off and sold because I couldn't have lived through Christmas without giving you a present. It'll grow out again--you won't mind, will you? I just had to do it. My hair grows awfully fast. Say 'Merry Christmas!' Jim, and let's be happy. You don't know what a nice-- what a beautiful, nice gift I've got for you."

"You've cut off your hair?" asked Jim, laboriously, as if he had not arrived at that patent fact yet even after the hardest mental labor.

"Cut it off and sold it," said Della. "Don't you like me just as well, anyhow? I'm me without my hair, ain't I?"

Jim looked about the room curiously.

"You say your hair is gone?" he said, with an air almost of idiocy.

"You needn't look for it," said Della. "It's sold, I tell you--sold and gone, too. It's Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered," she went on with sudden serious sweetness, "but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the chops on, Jim?"

Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week or a million a year--what is the difference? A mathematician or a wit would give you the wrong answer. The magi brought valuable gifts, but that was not among them. This dark assertion will be illuminated later on.

Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon the table.

"Don't make any mistake, Dell," he said, "about me. I don't think there's anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo that could make me like my girl any less. But if you'll unwrap that package you may see why you had me going a while at first."

White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then an ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.

For there lay The Combs--the set of combs, side and back, that Della had worshipped long in a Broadway window. Beautiful combs, pure tortoise shell, with jewelled rims--just the shade to wear in the beautiful vanished hair. They were expensive combs, she knew, and her heart had simply craved and yearned over them without the least hope of possession. And now, they were hers, but the tresses that should have adorned the coveted adornments were gone.

But she hugged them to her bosom, and at length she was able to look up with dim eyes and a smile and say: "My hair grows so fast, Jim!"

And them Della leaped up like a little singed cat and cried, "Oh, oh!"

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him eagerly upon her open palm. The dull precious metal seemed to flash with a reflection of her bright and ardent spirit.

"Isn't it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You'll have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it."

Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.

"Dell," said he, "let's put our Christmas presents away and keep 'em a while. They're too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on."

The magi, as you know, were wise men--wonderfully wise men--who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. O all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.

12.08.04
Happy Immaculate Conception. And Hannukah. There's a lot going on these days. I don't get the Immaculate Conception. Mary was only pregnant for 17 days? We'd better ask our Google. Ah, I see. Christianity never fails to be ridiculous. We'll take the Catholics over the Fundamentalists, though, who are and humorless and dull and seem to have a thing against Mary. Speaking of the fundies, they (Chick.com) just sent me Witness While You Shop. Whee! Let's get thrown out of the mall for Jesus!

DC-AREA EVENTS UPCOMING

When: TONIGHT
Subject: Hump Night
From: Ed

Hi everyone!
Hemal and I and some other guy are DJing Wednesday night at the Galaxy Hut. Come on out if you're free. I think Hemal is starting around 9:30 then I'll take over around 10:30 and then John Rickman will finish up the evening. Hope to see you there! Ed

When: SUNDAY, 9PM
Subject: rock and roll show. ahoy!
From: Brian
How Much: Free, baby. Free.

please make plans to attend a rock show at the nation's galaxy hut this sunday evening. the show is one you will not want to miss, as it features the following stellar lineup:

Always the Runner: A band from Louisiana that I don't know much about, but they seem like nice fellows.

The Debutantes: My friends from New York City, who play no-frills rock and roll, like they used to do back in the day. Also, some of them wear fancy skirts. Visit their presence on the world-wide interweb at http://www.thedebutantesnyc.com/ (ed. note: featuring bwa's "cutest redhead in the world.")

Olivia Mancini and the Red Hot Handsome-Man Haircut Party: One of DC's best-loved rockstars, performing a series of original hot tunes, backed up by her newly-formed band, which features, in addition to myself, the less-handsome but equally-loved Meredith "Double-Deuce" Bragg, Ed "Copperhead" Donohue and Jon "The Cheese" Roth.

Since there are three bands, the show might get underway a little bit early, say 9 pm. Also, it's Sunday, and people got to go to work.

the beer i had for breakfast was a bottle of mad dog
and my 20/20 vision was fifty percent off
you said punch-buggy red and punched me right in my left eye
i said don't you mean pediddle? and i lit his house on fire
he came home on acid i was holding his shotgun
i was dressed like tina turner in beyond thunder dome
he said don't shoot, i said i won't i love you you're my friend
i handed him my wig and shot myself in the head
then i stuffed a box of tissues in the hole in my skull
i got in my mazda and i drove to the mall
i got a big johnson shirt and some silicone tits
when i pulled out the tissues they were covered with shit
and the beer i had for breakfast was a box of cheap white wine
and the boom box on my shoulder was a box of clementines
i ate every single one without noticing the mold
you said you're gross my darling, i said no i'm rock and roll
even though i'd never ever been in a band
i got cool as black ice tattooed on my hand
and the christians gave me comic books as if i would be scared
of burning in hell well i was already there
and the beer i had for breakfast silver bullet in the brain
and the beer i had for lunch was a bottle of night train
and the beer i had for dinner was my crazy neighbor's pills
we had to sit down on skateboards jut to make it down the hill
then i peed my pants and you stole the groom's cigar
and some old man made me watch him masturbate locked in his car
when i got back to the apartment you were face down on the floor
you said don't go to bed yet let's go get a 64
and the beer i had had for breakfast was a pint of jim beam
and a fifth of peach schnapps and some warm sunny d
and you said bottoms up just as i bottomed out
i tried to scream fuck you but blood was pouring out my mouth
evan dando never planned on telling you the truth
and your leonardo i.d. card is your fountain of youth
you can be a teenager for your whole fucking life
just find some pretty sucker and make that bitch your wife
i guess by now you all know my friends danny broke his neck
he was driving home from sirens when he got into a wreck
first i cried for him and then i cried for me
haunted by the ghost of the girl i used to be
but the rocks with holes are warm in my hands
and i buried my toes in the hot hot sand
and the silver pink pony kisses me and says
you've come a long, long way and you deserve to be really happy

12.07.04
Last night I watched Repo Man while finishing a book, Dear First Love. It's sort of a Cuban-magical-lesbian novel, and a good read if you

can get around Zoé Valdés's extreme fascination with all things gross - particularly bodily excrements of all kinds, which are really not my thing. Zoé says: "In Cuba the gathering of more than three people is considered a conspiracy. But the gathering of three or four gays and lesbians is considered an American invasion."

Harper's Weekly is now appearing in my inbox for some reason. From today's offerings, A Hashish-house in New York: The curious adventures of an individual who indulged in a few pipefuls of the narcotic hemp, first published in November 1883. See also ye olde Harper's Index.

Roundup: Deb and The Universe. Shermanilla's been posting regularly. Dooce keeps writing about her baby, and it's still entertaining. Go to RT's for the tale of Uncle Barney's Place, The Little Queen, where busybody journalists could expect a pistol whipping.

Finally, thanks to Mr. Hayton, a Florida middle school English teacher (originally from London, England), for sending me great new romance comic scans from his collection. He wrote:

Yesterday Dave, Ed and I went to Darnestown, MD and cut down our Christmas tree. It's a Concolor Fir. It smells like gin and juice. If you'd like to kill your own tree, this list will help.

For the greyhounds: 50% off Sale at Crafters For Critters. Here's your coupon code: 270224058399653. One of a kind gifts. Cheap.

Thirty today, I saw
The trees flare briefly like
The candles upon a cake
As the sun went down the sky,
A momentary flash
Yet there was time to wish

Before the break light could die
If I had known what to wish
As once I must have known
Bending above the clean candlelit tablecloth
To blow them out with a breath

12.04.04
Congratulations to our friend Michelle Bellici, whose show Transformation Through Perspective just opened at Agora Gallery in Chelsea. Check it out between now and the 28th if you happen be in New York. You can also see her site (by yours truly) here.

WHERE now the huts are empty,
Where never a camp-fire glows,
In an abandoned canyon,
A Gambler's Ghost arose.
He muttered there, "The moon's a sack
Of dust." His voice rose thin:
"I wish I knew the miner-man.
I'd play, and play to win.
In every game in Cripple-creek
Of old, when stakes were high,
I held my own. Now I would play
For that sack in the sky.
The sport would not be ended there.
'Twould rather be begun.
I'd bet my moon against his stars,
And gamble for the sun.

The respectable media finally catches up to HK's spring scoop: Jason Giambi is a big fat cheater. Well, was. Tom Boswell - For Baseball, A Weighty Issue. Marion Jones, on the other hand, truly makes me sad. Say it ain't so, Marion. Oh, never mind. You and Barry Bonds will deny it to your dying days.

For the record, I think Chris Matthews is beyond vile. However, from Mr. Minter:

Dumbass. So, do you like the Pixies? From Kaeri: "Hey, Im trying to find a new home for a couple of Pixies tickets this coming tuesday (dec 7th) at Dar hall. Its a sold out show, but a seated venue. Anyay, you don't happen to know anyone who might want to buy them?" Lemme know.

12.02.04 - How to Raise Children Edition, with Roseanne Rosannadanna (not her real name) and Jenny, adult children of hippies.
From : Roseanne Rosannadanna
Sent : Wednesday, December 1, 2004 2:18 PM
Subject : "this is a used sanitary pad"

well! that little video is graphic! and that child clearly has a little bit of the downs. or she would stop friggin asking if everyone's got a period.

JM: i know. why did they use that kid? she remembered all her lines though. as well as the parents did...

SC: i remember the first time my mother explained it to me. i was 8 or so and we were taking one of our normal communal family showers and suddenly this blood came out of her body and went down the drain and i totally freaked out! omigod mom, you're bleeding! and she was all, "oh, jeez roseanne rosannadanna. that happens all the time." i was perplexed. this was a few years before my dad took me aside and told me i needed to start wearing deodorant and then gave me old spice to use. living with him alone during puberty was hilarious.

JM: yay! i don't supposed i can post that, huh? i also lived with my dad alone during puberty. i got my period at my dad's in 6th grade. he was reasonably cool though. i just yelled through the door that i need pads ("not tampons!") and eventually he returned and tossed them, and more toliet paper, around the door. ah, the good old days.

SC: oh, sure. post away! nothing wrong with household showering together, i always say.

i got the joy of living one year with her, one with him, one with her, and so on for about 4 years. then they moved back in together and i became a bitchy teenager and just didn't speak to her for the next 4.

6th grade? wow, you were one of those early bloomer girls. i didn't get mine until the 8th grade. at which time my mother went to get the special "teen" pads she had been saving for the event, and had used them all herself. thanks, weekend mom. then she gave me this awful book called What's Happening to Me?? which made it sound like i was gonna turn into a werewolf.

figuring tampons out was weird, but then i taught everyone i knew how to use them and they were all soooo grateful. that diagram they give you is zero help.

another fave dad-raising-me moment came when i was 14 or so and we were having a heart-to-heart in his pickup while he smoked pot (the scene of all of his best parenting ideas) and he warned me that sex was overrated, but that once i tried it, i would never be able to stop. you know, i think he was right!

JM: heehee. let's just turn this into a mini-interview. my dad once offered me pot for my cramps.

SC: when i was 15, my mom said she got a sinus infection from this waterpark we went to, but really she had some kind of abscess from doing a bunch of

with this german dude named deiter!

and when i was in college, they broke up again, so i made my dad an elliot smith/lou barlow mixtape and he said it made him want to kill himself. it was weird. he'd show up at my dorm at odd hours and smoke cigarettes with me in front and talk about his crazy woman, who was of course my mother. being an only child rocks in times of crisis.

and then there's the classic dad one, also delivered high in a pickup: "roseanne rosannadanna, how do you know for sure you are a cheerios person if you've never had frosted flakes?"

the moral here is that if my parents can raise a kid, anyone can. so go get someone pregnant, folks!

i didn't have any talks with my parents. but one time, when my mom and i got in out hugest fight ever (it was something akin to a "coming out" fight, except she was just pissed I was always running around with my girlfriend), we made up by writing each other notes, which we left on the table. my dad also did my outing for me. he and julie went to the gay pride parade and bought me a t-shirt. it was ugly, with the old pink triangle emblazoned gaily upon it. anyway, apparently I wasn't fooling anyone.

my family mostly sticks to writing when it comes to expressing emotions. although my dad can get pretty darn earnest when he wants to.

SC: that should be ok. maybe we leave out the

one, though it is still hilarious to me that she sticks to that story to this day.

most of my not getting along with me mum was about me running around. in retrospect, i was pretty bad and she had no clue what we were out there doing. i'd feel bad about it if i wasn't still such a brat.

JM: yeah. he even tossed me the shirt, like in that old Coke ad with Mean Joe Green.

i was very bad, too. i would not put up with my behavior. of course, i kept it together fairly decent, except for the

and

. oop. i'll leave that part out.

SC: no way. i was a lying conniving little shit with a line to their bank account that went right up my nose or to planned parenthood. i am locking my kids in the basement. i turned out reasonably ok, and there was no reason for me to. if you call

ok.

12.01.04

Happy Birthday to Edward -> ->, who turns some age less than 30 today. Edward, here is some mandatory education for you, Periods 101 the film, from Mucho Sucko. We know you don't get enough period talk at home. Thanks to the anonymous caller for contributing. [note - we just learned it's from Les, of course.]

Craftster is a great place for gift ideas. They have a section where you can ask for suggestions about what to do with stuff you have lying around, like Altoid tins and dryer lint. That's why you are all getting stash boxes wrapped in gray cozies this year. If anyone has crafty brainstorms for old muscle mags, tarot cards, Chick tracts, or Beanie Babies, please dial the chairman.

Today, Brian has posted a lengthy questionnaire he completed in hopes of being invited to appear in a Snapple commercial. What a loser.

I guess I don't have much to say today. Maybe I'm grumpy from losing my NBA bets last night, or maybe it's my period. At any rate, Bob sent this from the nytimes.

11.30.04
Good afternoon, fuzzy-headed readers. This morning SP and I went to the funeral of a girl I used to work with, Michelle F. I spent many long hours in an office with Michelle, and often she drove me completely insane, because she was friendly and talkative and always tried hard, whereas I was not and did not. On Friday she died at 25 from leukemia. She'd been in the hospital, getting ready for a bone marrow transplant, and no one expected her to suddenly die, but she did, and it sucks. Her funeral was of the sacharrine/Christian variety, and at a place called, seriously, Borgwardt Funeral Home. The whole thing was quite unlike Michelle, who was sweet and fun. Oh well.

To warm up for the funeral, I spent some hours last night at Iota, and saw a band from Canadia called Tegan and Sara (with The Ditty Bops). I also met about a dozen lesbians, and I tried to convince them all to come to Emerson Street Taco Night. I also asked the band to come. Because I'm a moron. Here is a song by Tegan and Sara: I Bet it Stung.

And now, we proudly present our friend Sandhya's When Tofu Turkey Fails, from NPR's San Francisco affiliate. "Sandhya Somashekhar's family adapts the American Thanksgiving to its South Asian traditions and comes up with ... lasagna."

Host: Sandhya Somashekhar, who provides the usual writers' "DISCLAIMER: The original piece was more than double in length. I cut it down to about 300 words, but when I got to the

This Space for Rent Archive XV: Late Fall - Winter, 2004.

Us and Them (click to expand)

Review: On War, By Chris Hedges
Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War by Evan Wright
The Fall of Baghdad, by Jon Lee Anderson

Accidental Poetry Edition

No. 1: What are the people searching for?

No. 2: Today's Spam

No. 3: Email from Grandma

* THE GIFT OF THE MAGI *

DC-AREA EVENTS UPCOMING

This Space for Rent Archive XV: Late Fall - Winter, 2004.

Us and Them (click to expand)

Review: On War, By Chris Hedges Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War by Evan Wright The Fall of Baghdad, by Jon Lee Anderson

Accidental Poetry Edition

No. 1: What are the people searching for?

No. 2: Today's Spam

No. 3: Email from Grandma

* THE GIFT OF THE MAGI *

DC-AREA EVENTS UPCOMING

Review: On War, By Chris Hedges
Generation Kill: Devil Dogs, Iceman, Captain America and the New Face of American War by Evan Wright
The Fall of Baghdad, by Jon Lee Anderson