Adventures with Dr. Lady Cutie Troublemaker

Aaron and I have nice friends!

Last year, my parents had me vote for a local guy to be on the show Next Food Network Star. His name was Hans, and he got enough votes to be on the show. Aaron and I watched the show, and he actually turned out to be our pick to win. Unfortunately, he didn’t win, but it may have turned out to be the best thing, because soon thereafter, he became very sick with cancer. Now, he has a blog on Live Journal, and he’s documenting his experience with severe illness, and he’s leaving nothing out. It’s a great blog to read, and even though it’s not always good news, it’s always good to read. I had actually just finished reading his latest this morning when I got an e-mail from my mother with an excerpt from a comment on his blog regarding the whole "Merry Christmas" controversy from this year. It’s a must read:

Can’t believe Christmas is over already. Good thing war didn’t break out on the season’s greeting/happy holidays/merry christmas pc front…I found it deeply disturbing that controversy and boycotting came about over that. Hey, if the cashier at WalMart who makes little over minimum wage, still has enough mental stability in her, after the 37th price look up, the 54th refund, the 82nd child crying, the 17 yelling, micromanaging supervisors, the $94 the government took out of her 68 hour, $233 check, and the loser boyfriend who called 4 times in the past 45 minutes to tell her to remember the cigs before she gets off work, to still be greeting at all by the time I get there, she can tell me anything she wants, even if it’s that she hopes Santa stabs Jesus in the leg with a broken bottle of champagne because he took a piss on Rudolf’s list of New Year resolutions (of course his first is to stop saying "Merry Christmas", 2nd is to stop snorting coke because it’s turning his nose red…), so not to be expecting Jesus or Santa on the 25th because one will be in the hospital getting his leg cast, the other will be hiding from God’s wrath ("oh shit Prancer, we gotta get outta here, I just stabbed Jesus, God’s gonna be pissed!"). I’d say "Thanks, Happy Weary Willie Day!", and walk away thinking…"she was sooo friendly…they should give her a raise…"

I never used to be obsessed with crime before moving to Memphis. Someone like me probably shouldn’t read the Boston Police Department’s blog, but I can’t help myself. They just released updated crime statistics for 2005 today. This one is staggering:

It’s enough to make you want to move to England, although we’ll probably just move to Brookline!

I’ve been on Tribe.net since the week it launched, way back when. At one point, I was the #1 poster there. Tribe has released a new Terms of Use which calls into question the security of what is posted there. As a result, I’m removing much of my content from the site, and many of my friends and I are bugging out. I’ve decided to stay in the tribes that discuss banal and public topics, because why not? Why should I kill the "BBC America Junkies" and music-themed tribes I moderate? Nothing too personal goes in those anyway. It’s sad though… the end of an era.

In other news, yesterday on a walk with the dogsittees, my feet flew out from under me, and I landed right on my ass. Then today, I stood up quickly and bonked my head on the under side of the breakfast bar to my kitchen. As a result, my brain’s all fuzzy, and there are all these reports to write. And I don’t want to!

Hope you’re all having a fine bit of downtime before the new year gets going. 

That’s my Ph.D. That little piece of paper took 7 years and a 6-digit student loan debt. And now it’s mine. Think I might frame the sucker.