Unchain My P.O. Box!

Ray Charles is getting a post office named after himself. I can hear the irate customers already (because what post office doesn't have irate customers?)

Customer: You couldn't find my package? What are you, blind?!

Postal Worker: Hit the road, Jack.

those "Free Stress Test!" guys could've just stayed at home on the computer

A post on Craigslist reads:

existential vacuum

Alright kids, I got a hole in me that sex drugs and rock and roll can't fill. First cult with a convincing pitch gets a new member. No Xtian.

who says "hound dog" anymore?

A museum in Vienna is letting naked people in free. The Museum of Sex in New York is currently doing an exhibit on objectifying the male body. If they let naked men in free... hmmn.

On a serious note, this article on Salon -- by a black woman author about white men defeminizing her -- is simply heartbreaking. She writes "You have to give racism its props; it's the only force proven to trump what a hound dog the average man is."

Salon provides such a weird panopoly of news and commentary -- it almost seems like it's half detailed, investigative articles about the Iraq War and Karl Rove, and half articles about nannies and internet dating.

comedians can be serious, although it really backfired that one time for Margaret Cho

In Tuesday's Times, Nicholas Kristof wrote a column (requires login) accusing the media of passivity in reporting about genocide in Darfur, Sudan.

More than two years have passed since the beginning of what Mr. Bush acknowledges is the first genocide of the 21st century, yet Mr. Bush barely manages to get the word "Darfur" out of his mouth. Still, it seems hypocritical of me to rage about Mr. Bush's negligence, when my own beloved institution - the American media - has been at least as passive as Mr. Bush.

He also wrote that genocide in Darfur hasn't even received as much coverage by the American media the Armenian genocide did in 1915.

So, I went googling and found DarfurGenocide.org, which takes donations and uses them for advocacy, saying that "aid can only do so much" (i.e., airlifting bags of rice into a war zone is obviously a very temporary form of assistance). It seems cynical to say that the best way for regular people to try to abate a genocide across the world is to hire PR people, but Res Publica, which runs the site, seems to be as successful as anyone -- they were behind getting Bush to declare Darfur a "genocide," and they're using PR to get Sudan advocates into the media.

I always speak cynically of an event that occurred annually at Dartmouth in which a number of Dartmouth students slept outside on the Green to show solidarity with the homeless (of which there are not that many in New Hampshire and Vermont, although there is certainly poverty and hunger; it's simply very cold, the area is sparsely populated, and housing is relatively cheap compared to food and other expenses). Anyway, the students would demonstrate solidarity with the homeless by sleeping on the Green in their L.L. Bean sleeping bags. I may be misremembering some details, but I remember feeling so much distaste in seeing this event; you could certainly help more people by sending the cash value of an LL Bean sleeping bag to any sort of social service organization (or simply donating the sleeping bag), and then going out for pizza. Your "demonstration" doesn't help anyone.

(I feel much the same way about, for instance, radical feminist performance art against Bush, which usually involves someone shaving off their pubic hair in combination with some "No More Bush!" rhetoric. I mean, if it has value for you, cool, but that's the purest form of preaching to the converted. Middle America is likely to find such an action extremely unpersuasive, even if it should somehow happen to be televised).

So, I feel a bit unfortunately similar about the act of blogging on behalf of Darfur, but I suppose that's why there's a donation button, so our online navel-gazing can have some effect outside of our navel regions. I donated and I think the site and organization are eminently worthy of support.

When you "check out" with your donation ("add Darfur to your shopping cart!"), you get an unfortunately worded receipt that says "Donation to Darfur Genocide." But don't let that stop you.

I just want to be connected to Hyderabad

I purchased a rather embarassingly-titled book from a used book seller on Amazon. For purposes of this post, let's just call the book "How to Cure Your Back Pimples."

The book never arrived, probably because my post office never delivers packages to my house, so I have to pick them up at the post office, and I try to consolidate post office trips by waiting until I have other things to mail, and then I wait so long I miss packages.

So, I went to Amazon to report the nonarrival of my book, and was told that I need to contact the seller directly. I would really prefer to deal with an automated system, and/or customer service reps who just don't care about anything, or are in India, or both.

So I just sent off the email. "Hi, I'm Jen, the one who ordered 'How to Cure Your Back Pimples,' and I didn't receive it, and I really need it!"

Embarassing. I am embarassed by nearly everything.

more on this topic later, perhaps

You know, I'm pro-choice and all, but a male comedian's routine last week reminded me that I am a little creeped out (or at least turned off) by men who are too pro-choice. They're like "Oh my God, a pregnant woman is the most horrifying thing I can imagine! God forbid I EVER have to take responsibility for another person! Back, woman, back!"

Victorian pinup tarts

Molly Crabapple, illustrator of "Gibson Girls gone bad," has t-shirts for sale as well as hotpants. This is me wearing one of the shirts (also in Leonard Cohen's room at the Chelsea Hotel, as per previous posts). Those are my lips in the corner. Molly's web store is located here.

"It's like you're a zitty, chubby rock star." - Jessi Klein

Rachel Kramer Bussel has written for the Village Voice about the sex lives of comedians.

the one-liner of the day

With John Roberts on the Supreme Court, abortion might become illegal soon. I'm not worried, though -- there will still be alternatives, like the morning-after punch in the stomach.

we're molting, we're molting!!!

You know I clean my bathtub nearly every day? It seems everyone is exfoliating the fuck out of themselves. At one point, I think there were three people (including me) living here all using St. Ives Apricot Scrub, which contains crushed walnut shells as a "natural" means of scrubbing off all your unnecessary skin cells.

When did the top layer of our skin become unaccceptable?

My tub is full of sand. And, presumably, skin.

never, ever in a bathroom

Two alert readers have now sent in this item from the popular Overheard in New York blog:

Guy #1: She's the one that gave me a hummer in the bathroom. That one over there.
Guy #2: Doesn't she run that NY website? Jen something.
Guy #1: She's famous? Well I can assure you it's not because of her BJ skills.

--McNally Robinson, Prince Street

Now, when I first saw this, I knew it wasn't me because I am highly against any kind of sex in public bathrooms (as well as in a majority of privately-held bathrooms). Oh, and also because I've never been to McNally Robinson. Also, notably, the item began with "I Guarantee This Quote is False," which makes me wonder who thought of it, and why post it?

If I had just read this item on my own, I wouldn't really have been presumptuous enough to assume it was me, but then readers Sylvia and Fox put "jen" and "famous" together, so I went to the site and emailed creator Michael Malice, and he told me the item is really about Jen from Gothamist, which kind of brings the puppets singing "It's a Small World After All" to a sort of incestuous, full-circle kind of place, as I was not long ago featured in Gothamist regarding the spelling bee. In an article by Jen Carlson, but I think Michael Malice meant Jen Chung.

Too many Jens. And one of them is still at large, giving sub-par BJs.

It's so hot my eyelids are sweating

I sold three t-shirts last night at Chicks & Giggles. Very exciting! Pics coming soon.

If you sign up now for my mail list, you'll get all this stuff first. Update: I think I'm gonna call my newsletter "Premium Jen," like "Premium Blend," because that's kind of rhymey.

In trying to think what extra perks and pleasures I can offer to my (all very sexy) readers, I came up with:

• downloadable comedy MP3s (put me on your iPod!) and new photos
  
• first crack at the t-shirts (I have a limited edition of 36 and it seems like everyone wants the exact same scoop-neck girly one)
  
• a top-secret report on my adventures in LA ... where I am selling my eggs to a wealthy gay man (really)
  

And ... here's the signup box again:

Join the jen is famous dot com mailing list for your city! Subscribers get access to secret comedy clips and posts.

Email:

At least you have an excuse to be lazy. And asthmatic.

From amNewYork, about yesterday: "New York became a 96 degree mixture of humdity and air pollution."

Charming. The article went on to talk about "dangerous levels of particle matter and ozone in the air, making even outdoor exercise unhealthy."

what is the exchange rate between cows and goats and, say, wombats?

This is at least pretending to be real. An African foreign minister has offered 40 goats and 20 cows to Bill Clinton for his daughter Chelsea's hand in marriage.

they Photoshopped out my "f**k the world" tattoo

This is my posterior, wearing Molly Crabapple hotshorts, in Leonard Cohen's room at the Chelsea Hotel.

Of course, you can choose to believe none of that, except the hotshorts part. It could be someone else's butt, and it could be anywhere. (Well, anywhere really well lit).

The hotshorts are available for sale on Molly's site. (No, not this particular pair). Photo by Surfinbird.

Update: The more I look at this photo, the more inhumanly airbrushed it looks. Personally, I love looking at those trashy tabloids that do a periodic "Stars with no makeup!" issue where you can see celebs with all their zits and wrinkles. So, I have no problem reporting here that, like most people, I have normal human skin texture (and an occasional freckle) on all parts of my body. Surfinbird is an amazing photographer (and Photoshop artist).

regarding actual cowboys, not my cowboy, who has the hat but is from Boston

I've got this stack of newspapers here from Saturday to today (although I never received Sunday's, as per my previously-blogged newspaper delivery problems), and there's an article about farmers in South Dakota protesting protective regulations on prarie dogs, which devour the vegetation the farmers need for grazing cattle, but which are protected because they are a food source for endangered ferrets. One rancher, Charles Kruse, said:

"I like ferrets, but I like people, too. It'd be like a bunch of cowboys coming to New York and saying 'Let's save the rats.'"

I actually have a comedy bit about the pet store near my house selling pigeons (basically flying rats) for $5. ("It'd be like if Bed Bath and Beyond started selling kitchen roaches.")

Germans do not have spelling bees (insert joke about how long they'd be up there spelling)

Julian, the photographer from Monday's spelling bee, has blogged about me in German. I fed the page into Google's translator to get this shaky English version.

As far as I can figure out, he has said I remind him of is this person, a writer who has created an online gallery of rejection letters she has received.

Julian also wondered about the relationship between the "bee" in "spelling bee" and the insect variety. No one had been able to properly explain it to him, which is unsurprising, as it's a quite obscure explanation. From Random House:

The sense of the word bee meaning 'a social gathering to perfom some task or engage in a contest' was coined right here in the good ol' U.S.A., and dates from the 18th century. The meaning emerged from the social nature of the insect, and came to be used more commonly than match for such activities.

Originally, there were spinning bees, husking bees, apple bees, and even raising bees for house raising. Bees involve a group of people in a community taking on a task that would be too hard to accomplish alone, or that is more pleasant to accomplish in the company of others. A friendly competitive atmosphere also helps work get done faster--who can nail the most planks on the barn roof? who can husk the largest number of ears of corn?--from which the competition we know of as a spelling bee emerged.

Update: My German friend Tilmann verifies the lack of spelling bees. "Nope," he writes, "after sixth grade, spelling and such no longer influence the grading process. You either have it or you don't -- most don't."

dating suicide bombers is dy-no-mite!

I did a (quite!) well-received set at the Chicks and Giggles all-female comedy show this evening.

I even have a recording of my set, which will make its way to being an exclusive MP3 download in the next few days -- sign up for my newsletter (like, in that annoying signup box located approximately everywhere on this site) to hear why I want to date a suicide bomber.... (Come now, I'm a comedian. I'm allowed to say that).

Today I picked up my new Jenisfamous.com t-shirts and sold three at the show! Pics and purchasing info tomorrow -- I'm presently exhausted. The cowboy is also exhausted; I had to send him home to Brooklyn.

My CD is sold out at CDBaby. Um ... you could buy a t-shirt instead?

On the way home, I sat on the train next to a woman with a tattoo of a hand with its middle finger up, followed by the words "THE WORLD." A tattoo! And, fortunately, I had my camera. Also fortunately, she wasn't paying attention, because she could totally have kicked my ass.


Update: Comedian Shaun Eli has pointed out that the hand has FIVE REGULAR FINGERS AND NO THUMB!!!

it's my special day! no, not THAT special day; that happened when I was thirteen.

Today was my special day at Oren's, which means that after purchasing twelve coffee beverages over some punch-card-weathering period of time, I finally get my thirteenth beverage free! So, of course, I ordered the most expensive beverage on the menu, a great big iced mocha.

When I first ordered it, the guy behind the counter (who probably makes 1.5 large iced mochas an hour in current coffee-shop exchange rates) may have been thinking I was yet another yuppie white girl who orders $4.75 coffee beverages, but when I surrendered my disintegrating punch card, I think he saw me for the system-gamer I really am.

Incidentally, I think it's kind of funny that, even though there are people for whom I would happily buy a coffee beverage for the slightest of reasons (my friend is broke or got broken up with; I'm on a date and it's my turn; my Mom is nice), I would NEVER give anyone my punch card. I don't care that its cash value is under five dollars, that fucker is MINE. I EARNED it. Through capitalism. Shut up.

I look so ... thirty.

In case you were wondering what the spelling bee looked like, here are some photos by Julian Voloj, who was shooting for The Brooklynite magazine. More of Julian's photos will soon be added to the Williamsburg Spelling Blog.





Related posts:

e-u-o-n-y-m
maybe a rumor, maybe not
bobby and I are, ephemerally, one square inch of major news media
well, i'll bet THOSE spelling bees don't have beer specials

Also see: German Public Radio, The Williamsburg Spelling Blog

I can't keep track of each fallen robin

I just did a photoshoot in the Chelsea Hotel, in the room (222) in which Leonard Cohen was famously serviced by Janis Joplin.

The room isn't visible in the photos at all, so you'll just have to trust me that I was there. The photographer I worked with today has lived there for eleven years, and periodically, European tourists knock on his door and ask to look around.

I'm off to do a show at Chicks & Giggles tonight! (8:30pm, Raga, E. 6th between 1st and A).

announcing: the Williamsburg Spelling Blog!

Ha! I did good! We all win! The world is a better place!

I've been co-running the Williamsburg Spelling Bee since 2004, and sometime in the last few months, I noticed that our venue, Pete's Candy Store, has free wireless internet. Sometime after that, I had the brilliant idea that I could blog about the spelling bee as it was happening. Then I realized that, being but one person, I could not both read the words to the spellers and blog about it. The idea finally hit its third trimester and developed into the Williamsburg Spelling Blog, in which guest bloggers (generally a previous bee winner) will do the blogging, in some cases blogging about what I am doing, which is weird, but does not evermuch disrupt my personal metaphysics.

Previous winner Megan Rudesill was this bee's guest blogger, and boy does she type fast. She blogged a sort of stream-of-consciousness play-by-play. Here's a cute excerpt:

Darn it, I missed Second Speller's name. He's a guy who is dressed for the beach in a light blue t-shirt, shorts, and brown flip-flops. Oops-- he just misspelled millennium. I hope I haven't just made the same mistake.

Oh, and possibly even cuter:

Betsey, number 5 must spell "cirrhosis." She has misspelled it, I feel so bad! But on the other hand, I guess she probably has never been close to someone suffering from it, which is awesome.

Next bee's live blogging will be done by this bee's winner, Jonathan Lill. I expect it will be somewhat less cute, but nevertheless entertaining.

At some point, I shall arrange for the blog to have a better URL than spellingblog.blogspot.com.

I was a short-story podcaster before there was such a thing (and I walked to school uphill, both ways!)

I've been audio-published on Monkeybicycle! They don't generally publish audio, but somehow we all made this work out.

I have previously posted about how Monkeybicycle gets me all hot and bothered; you can pre-order their print edition (which, incidentally, contains fiction from my ex-roommate Todd Zuniga) here.

how comedians pay the bills (in good weeks)

Today I had the best job I've ever had. My previous best job ever was back when I was art modeling, I had this artist who wanted to draw sleeping girls, so I got paid $15 an hour to nap (without moving).

Today I was supposed to be in a focus group about perfume -- $100 for two hours. I arrived a few minutes late and was afraid I wouldn't be let in and wouldn't get paid. It turns out, though, that the focus group needed exactly eight people, so they booked ten just to make sure they'd get the requisite eight. I was number nine (number ten never showed), so they told me I wasn't needed, but I was still getting paid, and that I'd need to wait around for half an hour or so for them to get the money worked out.

I sat in the waiting room, read the new New Yorker, had a cup of coffee, went to the ladies room and brushed my hair in a leisurely fashion, and eventually collected a $100 bill.

If only one could make a career of this sort of thing.

Perfume! It's ... awesome.

Incidentally, I was at a comedy open mic the other day, lugging around some work materials, and the surprised emcee asked me if I taught SAT classes, which I do. He said it was a surprising discovery "after seeing your website." Hmmn.

By the way -- if you're rich and have a tanned, polo-shirt-wearing, half-retarded kid, I can still get them into college. And you can buy me a pony.

No, really.

also speaking of class markers, I actually saw a teenage girl in the "dame mas gasolina, papi" t-shirt about which I previously blogged

I've posted here numerous times about class in America; the Times' recent series on class tended to stick to quantifiable class markers among the people they profiled -- education, profession, access to health care.... But there was little note of the cultural cues we use to determine someone's class -- for instance, whether they had braces as a kid. (Young guy with bad teeth, in a suit? Usually also has the wrong shoes on with the suit).

Hanging out with some friends at the cowboy's house the other day, we were discussing favorite restaurants (or something), and it occurred to me that another big class marker -- and one of those points of urban snobbery -- is that upper-middle-class and urban people are supposed to know the phonetic systems of various foreign languages, even languages they do not speak. As in, a "cocina" is likely a Mexican restaurant, whereas a "cucina" is an Italian one, and we're all supposed to be able to pronounce "La Poule au Dents" in order to meet there, and we're all supposed to know enough Latin roots to sort of vaguely figure out what Romance-language restaurant names (and dishes, and occasionally band names -- Les Sans Culottes?) mean.

A high school friend from way down in the Carolinas (I forget which Carolina, but his family had a county named after them) told me about the county getting its first Mexican restaurant, and his grandmother mortifying him by ordering the fadge-itas.

Megan and I thought about wearing matching shirts and just saying we're fraternal twins; it would be better if one of us were Japanese

I am going to Coney Island today to gawk at the twins!*

XXXXX SUNDAY, JULY 24 XXXXX

Twins and Multiples Day

This will be the largest gathering of twins and multiples ever to convene in the Big Apple. Talent show, rides, group photo.

Astroland Amusement Park, Coney Island
noon-4; $6.

*(No, I am in no way ashamed of my lurid interest).

Update: There was a twin talent competition! Megan and I saw dancing child twins, singing child twins, step-dancing child twins, and thirty-year-old-woman twins who sang a really sappy song which might have been a romantic song and might have been a Jesus song; we couldn't tell. We ate ice cream cones and got back on the train. It was scorchingly hot and we are pale.

dear friends, please consider committing hit-and-run accidents directly in front of the hospital

Publicist Shari Kurzrok needs a liver and she needs it now (it was reported yesterday that she needed it "preferably today"). Since she is a publicist, she sent out a press release. Yes, fine. When you're near death, you pull out all the stops ("there are no atheists in foxholes," etc.)

Shari's fiance put an ad in the Times yesterday, with Shari's picture (she's pretty), and a heartbreaking "We're supposed to get married in October. Please help Shari be there." Gawker is even covering the story in as neutral and non-snarky a way as possible.

The boyfriend's ad and the press release both end with a phone number and email address for "anyone wanting to help Shari with a liver transplant referral."

But ... this isn't a kidney, where you can donate one to your mother and still have one left for yourself. This women needs a complete liver. You only have one, and everybody needs theirs, and my understanding is that the donor organs that are available are already distributed via a sophisticated system that takes into consideration blood type, location, urgency of the need for an organ, seniority on the list, liklihood of success, etc. It's not like this hasn't been thought out.

So what on earth are the public entreaties asking us to do? Buy a liver on the black market and drop it off anonymously? Forge organ donor cards for recently-deceased emergency room patients? Kill someone less worthy (type A or O only!) so she can have their liver?

Update: She's been hanging on for ten days now, and has a website that finally explains what we're supposed to do on Shari's behalf. The site reminds us that Shari cannot accept a partial transplant from a living donor, but that "families who have experienced an immediate tragedy or have a loved one on life support can designate a liver to save Shari's life."

Finally, that makes more sense. And, of course -- if you are in such a situation and are willing to help, please call (877) 223-3386 or email: liverforalife@yahoo.com.

And, dear gosh, if you need an organ transplant, it certainly does help to be both adorable and employed in the public relations industry.

stare deep into my eyes ... you are getting sleepy ... and buying jenisfamous t-shirts

JenIsFamous t-shirts will be available soon. Actually funny ones, not ones that just have my name on them or something.

And here is a new picture by Aeric Meredith-Goujon...


this is the face of seriously fucking funny. maybe.
and if i am a total failure, maybe I could sell lipstick at the mall.

Helter Swelter

It is so hot you don't even realize how thirsty you are, until you die.

the shadow-boxing of pool sports

A copy of am New York reports that synchronized swimmers are upset that they are not taken seriously as athletes, and that the sport is divided into four events: solos, duets, teams of eight, and combination.

There's solo synchronized swimming? Synchronized to what?

bathroom reading and class in America (with footnotes)

Gawker today reported on the Reader's Digest 100th anniversary party that was peopled with twentysomethings and celebs -- people who wouldn't be caught wiping their asses with a Reader's Digest, despite the frequency with which the magazine ends up in bathrooms.

Growing up, I thought Reader's Digest must be a pretty intelligent, adult magazine. Sure, there were items in "That's Outrageous!" that didn't seem that outrageous -- "Public university spends tax dollars on a rape crisis center!" -- but my parents read it, and we didn't really have any other periodicals in the house.

Then, in high school, someone loaned me Paul Fussell's Class : A Guide Through the American Status System, in which I learned that Reader's Digest was tacky and lowbrow, and that, according to the quiz in back, I was -- not lower-middle class, but -- a "high prole."

Thank you, Paul, thank you, Reader's Digest, and thank you, American class system.

Incidentally, the mantra of the modern day liberal university* is something like "We are opposed to racism, classism, sexism, and homophobia, which all intersect, and when one of us is oppressed, we are all oppressed."

Except that no one ever seems to talk about class except as an add-on to discussing the more popular racism, sexism, and homophobia. The academy loves its Rigoberta Menchu (and any indigenous cultures on which they can project their own values), but actual American poor people are apparently too distasteful to discuss. Bisexuals who attend Ivy League universities can be oppressed, but people who shop at Wal-Mart apparently can't be.

*I once tried to be a women's studies major at Dartmouth, then went back to the more satisfyingly logical rigor of the philosophy department. Hey, guess what? Turns out that linear thinking doesn't oppress women! Or anyone. Except dumb people.

jenisfamous one-liner of the evening!

If you stop midway through rimming someone, would you be doing a half-assed job?

Update: A fellow comedian read this and wrote back, "I love this joke as much as I love rimming (a lot)."

if I ever have an internet fan club...

I was looking up domain names again (halfassedjob.com is not available, but GoDaddy helpfully suggested besthalfassedjob.com, myhalfassedjob.com, halfassedjobcentral.com, and officialhalfassedjob.com as alternatives), and noticed that a number of nations' domain extensions (like halfassedjob.ca, for a Canadian half-assed job) are available.

One of these extensions is .jp, for Japan. And -- I almost can't believe I'm the first person to go here, but for the low, low price of $99.95, you could own:

famousin.jp

Famous in Japan! Famous in Japan!!!

Incidentally, I was once dating a Chinese guy whose last name was "To," and I got very excited once it hit me that the nation of Tonga sells that .to extension, allowing him to purchase (for instance, if his name were Victor):

victor.to

Unfortunately, the nation of Dziura has not offered the .dziura domain to the general public.

Gawker didn't comment on this today

The cover of the NY Post today was a photo of Jude Law's nanny/mistress, looking a bit fat but like a normal, rather sunny blonde girl, with the headline "Hey Jude, what were you thinking," the subheading "nanny ain't no movie star," and the very mean photo caption "Daisy Wagner tries to strike a sexy pose."

Beeatches.

Maybe all this just means that Sienna Miller has a miserable personality, or just that Jude Law is a garden-variety asshole, or that maybe Daisy is a charming conversationalist and/or head-giver.

Update: Gawker wrote about it after I did.

American Apparel wants to dress you in unhemmed sacks of jersey

As previously mentioned on the blog, I'm making Jenisfamous t-shirts. American Apparel told me I didn't qualify for a wholesale account, but screw them -- I bought a bunch of t-shirts on the street in East Harlem, retail, for less than AA wants wholesale. I think the "MADE IN JORDAN" tags add a little extra style.

I actually went into an American Apparel store and tried a couple things on yesterday -- like a terrycloth "romper" and a "one-piece halter" and even a "matte jersey unitard." What does a grown woman need with a unitard? I don't know, but I saw something else (a bathing suit) that looked nice, so I grabbed some crazy shit to try on while I was in the dressing room. And, guess what? All of it looks like ass.

Maybe it's my own personal deficiencies -- sure, go for the cheap insults -- but I think AA is perpetuating a particularly vicious brand of women-must-look-like-we-say.

Their prevailing aesthetic (most of the photos on their website look much more normal than the ads they run in New York) is sort of greasy, ethnically ambuiguous junkie-chic. As in, you're supposed to be extremely thin and tanned -- but without caring how you look, or having to tan. Like, see we look great, even though we are unwashed, which means we look this great naturally. Even if you wash yourself, you will look like ass in a terrycloth romper, because anyone over seven pretty much does.

Extra fun -- here is the bathing suit that looks like ass (even on the model).

If you click the plus-sign "click for detail" button, you get what is apparently a close-up of the fabric -- over the model's belly bump! Hideous!

This suit is so poorly designed it looks like it came from some FIT freshman intro class. Just two more years to an associate degree, honey!

the dirtiest movie ever made, "blow by blow"

The Aristocrats opens July 29.

Radar magazine has listed (alphabetically) all the unsavory sex acts detailed in the movie, as in:

Bicycle, ridden by grandmother while urinating on family

Dried Semen, chipped off mother’s desk by father

Flattened Penis, used by father to beat children

Et cetera.

Incidentally, I signed up for a free trial copy of Radar, and they sent me a bill before sending me the actual magazine, which is a bit like cooking someone dinner, but then trying to coerce them into sex before letting them eat.

snark, snark, snark

A certain sex columnist wrote to a number of us womyn and requested "some short, sexy, chatty quotes about your favorite sex toy" for an upcoming column. And, because I simply cannot give a straight answer to anything (see previous blog post in which I registered for my college reunion as "Jennifer Skywalker, maiden name Dziura"), I offered up the following panoply of responses:

"My favorite sex toy is your mom!"

"I have a blowup doll of Bob Hope. Is that wrong?"

"My favorite sex toy is just old-fashioned wooden clothespins used as nipple clamps. Not many people can say they are using sex toys that have been in their family for generations! If you use the old-fashioned ones that don't have springs, you can even feel vaguely colonial."

what do you MEAN, Little Italy is in Chinatown?

I was reading Gothamist's paean to cool things in Queens, and I am reminded of asshole things I used to say when I had just moved to New York, including, once, to a Greek girl:

"I've never even seen a Greek restaurant."

She looked at me like I had said "New York has a ... a what? ... a subway?? Where?"

I went on to explain that I had been to many diners that appeared to be run by Greek people (usually a good clue is when there are lovingly labeled pictures of little "Athena" and "Spiros" behind the register), but that they were not Greek restaurants, per se.

To be fair, I was living in East Harlem and working in Midtown, and that is not a commute that runs through Astoria.

Another favorite from those new-to-the-city days:

"Um, where's a subway around here?"
"Which one?"
(despondently) "Oh... I don't know. Any subway."

I have also spoken to a number of people who, upon moving to New York, were completely baffled by the presence of large numbers of black people who are native Spanish speakers. There just aren't that many Dominicans in, say, Utah.

speaking of trashy NYPost headlines...

This guy is rather obsessively blogging about the NY Post's "Meet Market" dating column.

I was in this column, once.

The first time I got interviewed, the reporter added an exclamation point to everything I said, which made me sound unnecessarily bubbly, so I insisted on writing up my own "She Said" followup and emailing it in so I'd have proof that any exclamation points later added were not mine.


Previous blog post -- I am a "hipster hottie"

this post contains Too Much Information and cannot possibly be explained as work-related

Someone on Craigslist is offering $100 for a woman to kick him in the nuts:

100 dollar challenge - m4w - 24

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Reply to: anon-84965750@craigslist.org
Date: 2005-07-17, 12:05AM EDT


Hello ladies,
I spoke recently with a friend of mine and we had a debate about whether it would hurt or not to get kicked in the nuts barefoot by a woman. I honestly don't think it would, so I am presenting a challenge to any woman in the New Jersey area between the ages of 18-35, must be under 200lbs and at least somewhat attractive. I am 24 years old, 5'11, brown hair, brown eyes, tan 164lbs. Alright heres the challenge....if you kick me and I fall down, you get 100 dollars plus a free dinner at a restaurant of your choice, if I don't fall down you still get a free dinner if you're cute. :) Let me know if you are interested. Ciao!

The problem with this, as I see it, is that the guy will be *standing*, and I don't think I could kick a guy in the balls that hard if he's upright (since he'd probably be taller than me). If he were laying down with his legs spread, it's a different story.

So I think this guy just has a kick-me-in-the-nuts fetish (not unheard of -- feel free to take a moment and google this from work) and doesn't want to admit it, or prefers the kicking to seem "surprising," or just wants a bargain -- if he doesn't fall down, he doesn't have to pay. I've gotten (possibly apocryphal) offers to make $150 an hour doing this.

Incidentally, some women who have been hit in an ovary like to say "imagine getting whacked in the balls!" when describing the experience.

After discussing the feeling of getting whacked in the balls with a couple of men, I have to conclude that the two sensations, while both acute, do not seem very similar at all. Men have been describing a nauseating, spreading-through-the-body feeling, whereas getting whacked in an ovary is a very sharp pain, like a knife in the kidney might be, for instance.

Happy Birthday to My Mom!

Dear Mom,

Happy Birthday!

I am sorry I moved to New York instead of staying back home and starting up that phone sex line we always talked about!

xoxo
Jen

I am reminded of a college girl who had her personal website at suckmybig.org til she sold out to a porn site

I received an email from domain registrar GoDaddy, offering .NAME domain names for the low, low price of $5.95 (GoDaddy offers .COM domains for $8.95). I looked up a few prospects:

www.heybabywhatsyour.name
...is available! However, I wasn't so lucky with:

www.bitchsaymy.name
Someone already has that! They haven't put up a website yet, though. I was hoping I could go there to hire an escort who doesn't mind being slapped around.

a dog of a pony show

A reporter covered a story about a man's death from having sex with a horse. She received appreciative letters from readers for telling the story straight, refraining from using phrases like "horsing around."

targeted marketing

I searched walmart.com for a "beach umbrella," and the site took me directly to Bette Midler's "Broken Blossoms" album, presumably because she was once in "Beaches."

Maybe next time I search Freshdirect for "tomato sauce," it can try to sell me a copy of "Beetlejuice," since Winona Ryder was once in "Fried Green Tomatoes."

I am embarassed by everything that isn't nailed down

I recently read Wendy Shalit's "A Return to Modesty," which had been on my reading list for years. Among (many) other points, Shalit mentions that "young girls are embarassed by everything," and that most women retain some of this into adulthood and are more easily embarassed than men.

This is certainly true for me. If seeing a comedy on a date, for instance, I don't want any bathroom jokes. Not one! Mortifying!

Today I was terribly embarassed when buying a brioche in a little cafe. There were bread loaves hanging in baskets behind the counter, and I asked about a particular item, and the girl said:

"Oh, that's just a decoration."

Again, mortifying.