mirabiledictu's blog

I'm on a road shaped like a figure 8. I'm going nowhere, but I'm guaranteed to be late.

I do some of my best wallowing when I'm walking. Wallowing in bed has its merits, but there's really just nothing like walking around, looking at all the truth and beauty and kids playing and pretty plants and people cruisin' down the street listening to Blue Magic as you remind yourself just how bad you've got it. It helps to have been stranded downtown for a couple of hours before being dropped off about a mile from home with a bag of library books and your cranky mother because the car is fucked and the mechanic is a fucker and life sucks.

You know, I used to spend a lot of time hunched over my iPod, strategically pecking and scrolling to make sure that each song was the perfect song for wallowing to, but I don't have to anymore. It seems as if now, the perfect song pops up at the perfect time, every time. It really frees things up, allowing me to be 50% more efficient at wallowing and to intellectualize my wallowing by 25%! "Why," I ask myself, "is my iPod so tuned in to my wallowing efforts? Have I listened to so much sappy, earnest indie crap that it has learned how to feel? Is my iPod slowly gaining sentience? Is the technological singularity nigh? Or is this just a coincidence? I mean, my life is horrible, and so is the music I listen to, so forever the twain shall meet! 'I drove around for months and years and never went no place.' Oh, how true, Issac. How true! That's my life as a driving metaphor!" Unfortunately, it's hard to wallow for very long. Inevitably, something nice has to come along and ruin the mood.

Stuart

So, I'm flopped on my bed, legs hanging over the side so I can jimmy each shoe off with the opposite foot. Frank's perched on my stomach. Dr. Phil is on in the living room, and I can hear him urging the housewives of America to come on TV and tell him all about their loveless marriages and rebellious teens for the sixtieth time. Gross. Then it's an ad for Spatula City and a Mongolian BBQ, followed by the tinny horns and synth line that mark a breaking news bulletin, probably about pork futures. Hey, wait a minute! Did they just say...yes! Fuck yeah! Pink triangles for everybody! And even better, check out the crusty bags of dicks who are whining about it at 3:27 in this newscast! They actually gathered outside the courthouse to ask their primitive sun god to intercede and de-gay the state of Iowa or something. And don't you love the sign at 3:50? "SAME SEX ANIMALS DON'T MATE GOD BLESS CULVER MAN UP" My first reading of it was "Same Sex ANIMALS: Don't mate! God bless! Culverman, up!", but I think it's actually supposed to be "Same sex animals don't mate. God bless! Culver, man up!" Shine on, you crazy bigot!

I mean, I'm still technically opposed to marriage as an institution, but how can I not celebrate the world being a little less fucked up?

But when she comes, it's like a big brass lantern

Last night, I had a dream about Paul McCartney. We were standing in the vestibule of some swanky hotel and he was being a major dick to this girl standing opposite us. I made a crack about the disgusting Bono Mullet^[tm] he was sporting, and he walked away cursing. Later, when thought we had FINALLY gotten rid of him, he showed up begging for forgiveness wearing nothing but a pair of tighty-whiteys with what I hoped was a few tons of glued-on novelty body fur. I agreed to (outwardly) put aside my all-encompassing hatred for him, and he helped me break the door off my oven by jumping on it.
I have no idea what any of this is supposed to mean, but it stuck with me all day.

In other news, MARRY ME, NATALIE ANGIER. 
"In other words, for horoscope fans, the burden of proof is entirely on them, the poor gullible gits; while for the multitudes who believe that, in one way or another, a divine intelligence guides the path of every leaping lepton, there is no demand for evidence, no skepticism to surmount, no need to worry. You, the religious believer, may well find subtle support for your faith in recent discoveries—that is, if you're willing to upgrade your metaphors and definitions as the latest data demand, seek out new niches of ignorance or ambiguity to fill with the goose down of faith, and accept that, certain passages of the Old Testament notwithstanding, the world is very old, not everything in nature was made in a week, and (can you turn up the mike here, please?) Evolution Happens.

And if you don't find substantiation for your preferred divinity or your most cherished rendering of the afterlife somewhere in the sprawling emporium of science, that's fine, too. No need to lose faith when you were looking in the wrong place to begin with. Science can't tell you whether God exists or where you go when you die. Science cannot definitively rule out the heaven option, with its helium balloons and Breck hair for all. Science in no way wants to be associated with terrifying thoughts, like the possibility that the pericentury of consciousness granted you by the convoluted, gelatinous, and transient organ in your skull just may be the whole story of you-dom. Science isn't arrogant. Science trades in the observable universe and testable hypotheses. Religion gets the midnight panic fêtes. But you've heard about evolution, right?"

I wrote a poem on a dog biscuit, and your dog refused to look at it!

The only thing that sucks about taking long walks with my dog is that inevitably, someone is going to be walking towards us on the sidewalk. Usually, it's kids I have to pry away from Frank lest he snip one of their fingers off, but sometimes it's old ladies in power scooters who smile at us creepily, or joggers who are all, "Hey! Great day for runnin' around in Lycra shorts, huh!?", as if I'd know. Slightly annoying, but nothing special, right?

Yesterday, we were on the last block of our route when I saw two unfamiliar shapes in the distance. Sighing, I slip my hand into my pocket, prepared to pause my song as soon as they ask what kind of dog Frank is (mutt) or if they can pet him (no). As we approach each other, it becomes apparent that they are not going to compliment my dog or talk about the weather or even fake a polite smile in my direction. I notice the woman first: she's middle-aged with dyed-orange hair and a spaced-out expression. She's wearing a teal sweatsuit and her arm's looped through the arm of a stocky dude in his late teens, who looks deeply troubled and is holding a baby...I think. The closer I get, the more it looks like a lump of baby-shaped plastic. I'm too distracted by the fact that this dude is giving me the stink-eye to really find out what he's got wrapped up in pastel baby blankets, though. What have I ever done to him? Why is he actually turning as I pass by, just to get in some extra glaring? As I walk away, I am simultaneously relieved that I will probably never encounter them again and disappointed that I'll probably never know what their story is. I mean, you know it's a whopper.

Today, I'm trying to keep Frank from flying out of the open passenger window when I see them again! They're walking up the penultimate street in my back-up route, looking spacey and disturbed as ever. We buzz by before I have a chance to study the baby thing, and there just isn't enough time to think about them, because at that moment, "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing" pops on the radio and it's time to disco. But don't worry, Internet! I'll keep you posted. It's obvious that they're stalking me, so I'm sure I'll be able to find out what's wrong with them before they shoot me in a meth-fueled stalker rage.

All I know is you got no money, but that's got nothin' to do with a good time!

When I was twelve, I did a report on some astronomer for my science class. I had to make a poster with her face on it and everything, but the only thing I remember about her was that she went to Vassar. That was the year I realized that my one dream in life was to attend Vassar. Not long after that, I realized that Vassar was totally out of my reach. I mean, fuck if I'm going to participate in stuff just to pad out my college applications! And who wants to go through the trouble of achieving a 5.0? So I decided that my real one life's dream was to go to Hunter College in New York City. It had so many great things going for it: it was in New York City, it wasn't in the Midwest, it was far away from everyone I've ever known, etc. Then I realized that I'd still have to put some effort into filling out an application and appearing to be something other than a human ground sloth, so I gave up, and decided to dedicate the remaining years of my adolescence to hanging out in thrift stores and trying not to compare myself to those other losers who are still living with their parents. That's getting kind of pathetic and soul-rending, though, so now I'm off to the University of Iowa!

Did you know Gene Wilder went there? So did Grant Wood, he of American Gothic and Young Corn fame! The school's natural history museum is the home of Rusty, the giant Megalonyx jeffersonii! Wikipedia claims that some college guide claims this is a "Public Ivy," which sounds like bullshit to me, considering the doofuses I have seen walking around town in U of I sweatshirts, but hey! The point is that I need a college and they want me. I have three primary criteria for picking a school, and the University of Iowa fits them all!
1. Ease of entry: Can I get into this school with little to no effort? Well, I did, so yes.
2. Do cool bands ever visit the surrounding area? Saw the Late, Great Silver Jews there, so yes!
3. Dating prospects: are there any? I once heard someone refer to Iowa City as the San Francisco of the Midwest. I don't exactly know if that means the city's stuffed full of lesbians, but maybe! At any rate, it's surely better than where I am now, which is stuffed full of middle-aged dudes and my grandmother.

See? It's everything I've always dreamed of! Still, it's hard to be excited. It just doesn't seem real. I feel as if I've been cheated out of one of those important life experiences, the one where you obsessively check the mail until one day, you get a thick, official-looking envelope. You rip it open, and the letter says "YOU HAVE BEEN ACCEPTED INTO YOUR DREAM COLLEGE!" in big, official-looking letters! And you scream and jump while your mother looks on with pride, shedding a single tear! And as the music swells, you call everyone you've ever spoken to, even the people you were just being polite to at boring family functions, to tell them your awesome news! I only found out that I was accepted by accident. I decided to check the website and see if my ACT scores had been delivered yet, and bam!, right at the top of the page: Congratulations on your admission and welcome to ISIS, your online service center. The Admissions Profile reports up-to-date details about your admission and lists the steps you must take before beginning your studies here at Iowa. That doesn't feel very official at all! No one cried when I told them, and I didn't really feel like calling all of my old acquaintances from high school and saying, "Hey, guess who's finally doing what you did two years ago!" It was a pretty bland experience, overall. Appropriately, How I Got Into College was on Starz that afternoon, and I hoped that by watching it I'd force myself feel something, but it only served to heighten the lameness of my college application experience. Some twenty-five-year-old high school kid in a tacky '80s blazer spends months filling out papers and visiting colleges and flipping out at admissions counselors, and I spent, what, an hour calling some people and filling out a questionaire? How unfulfilling! 

But I guess I'm coming around. I'm trying to concentrate on all the fun college experiences I'm sure to have. Maybe I'll finally make some friends I'll actually want to spend time with! Picture it: me in the passenger seat of someone's car¹ as we all drive to the Picador to see some disgustingly hip band. I'm in charge of the music, so we're all shouting along to some epic Sonic Youth single, maybe "100%."
"Gun to my head, goodbye I am dead
Wastewood rockers, it's time for crime, hey!"
Fade to black, roll the credits! Doesn't that sound like the greatest happy ending ever? I have to admit, I've been feeling like less of a failure lately. Even the post office has noticed the change in me! Today, I got a letter from some teen beauty pageant. The top corner of the envelope said "National American Miss^(R), Growing Confidence^TM. "How fitting!" I thought to myself, and ripped it open. In tiny official-looking letters, it said "You have been referred to me by Natalie Hays, a participant in our 2008 state event, and I understand that you may enjoy modeling, acting, or learning stage techniques that will help empower and enable you to accomplish your future goals." Empowerment! Enabling! Yes! But wait, who the fuck is Natalie Hays?

I don't know what else to say, so here's Sonic Youth on Letterman:

100 % - Sonic Youth

¹Preferably some model that was cool in the '70s, but looks really tacky and dated now and is in effect the height of cool. Maybe painted puke green?

All alone at the '64 World's Fair! Eighty dolls yelling "Small Girl After All!"

Went to Kansas City again! TREMENDOUS FLEA MARKET HAUL THAT I CAN'T NOT CATALOG!

Lovers From The Moon

The Magnetic Fields

- Ugly liquor(?) flask from the 1964 World's Fair, made of "genuine Regal China!"; $3
So hideous! I ONLY bought it because I, like most sensible people, sort of love They Might Be Giants and "Ana Ng."
-1962 Seattle World's Fair Bolo Tie; $2
- Souvenir glass paperweight from Santa Cruz featuring lots of shells and one teeny tiny starfish; $1
"Getting confused in Santa Cruz/living in a dream" - "Lovers From The Moon" by the Magnetic Fields. Totally in my Top 20 Magnetic Fields Songs. Maybe even my Top Ten!
- Chinese fan earrings (that really open and close!) from Disneyland; $2
The new highlight of my "Earrings That Look Like Things" collection!
- Two wooden saint bracelets, plus a metal bracelet featuring the Virgin of Guadalupe and a Saint Mother Theodore Guerin charm; $???
Okay, so I'm not Catholic. And I'm totally irreligious. Is it my fault that the Catholic jewelry vendors at the flea market are totally keyed into my aesthetic? SaintWear is so me.
- Pink and orange parrot broach with rhinestones; $1
- Charm bracelet with tiny colorful pressed flowers in plastic and frames; 50 cents
- Colorful and grossly overpriced "YOU KILL ME" pin; $3
- White beaded clutch with two secret compartments; $5
TOTALLY AMAZING! It's got the standard coin purse clasp at the top, a zipper on the bottom that opens into an entirely different space and a secret pocket on the front! Without a doubt the greatest tacky beaded thing I have ever bought.
- Large amount of ugly vintage material (brown with blue, white, yellow, and orange flowers); 50 cents
- Tetris game for my Gameboy Color; $7
- Unopened Drilldozer game; $7
Holy shit! If you have a Gameboy Advance or a DS, BUY THIS GAME. I'm only two levels in and I'm in love. I can't believe it took me nineteen years to figure out my one true goal in life: to ride around in a massive drilling robot drilling things. A MASSIVE DRILLING ROBOT. Jesus!

Later in the day, we went to a Goodwill none of us had ever been to before and got:
- Chocktaw Yellow Jackets duffel bag; .49 cents
According to Google, the Chocktaw Yellow Jackets are the football team for Chocktaw High School in Chocktaw, Oklahoma. Chocktaw! Say it five times fast! And bonus: "Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge,/And now Billy Joe MacAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge."
- Rush Limbaugh Is A Big Fat Idiot and other observations by Al Franken; $2.48
The guy at the check out was roughly six billion years old, and when he got to this book, he slowly read the title aloud. "Rush...Limbaugh...Is...A...Big...Fat...Idiot...Well, he may not...be right...about everything...but...I don't...know if he's...an idiot." Old people!
- All-American Girl by Meg Cabot; $1.48
Yes, I like to read lame Meg Cabot novels between my smarty-pants non-fiction science books^[1] and super-intellectual Al Franken Disses Republican Blowhard #57 dissfests. Shut up.
- Gimme a Kiss by Christopher Pike; .49 cents
Ever since I got A. Bate's magnum opus Party Line from the Salvation Army for a quarter, I've been looking for a good follow-up in the "Trashy Possibly-Semi-Supernatural Teen Murder" genre. Christopher Pike novels always seem to have great cover art, but the first one I read was just about these dying kids who tell each other boring stories about their 'past lives' to distract themselves from their impending deaths, and then one of them is like, "Fuck all of this past life bullshit. You know why I'm dying? I HAVE AIDS. I AM A HOMOSEXUAL. And it's okay! Blaarg, I'm dead." The end. This one looks promising, though. A quote from the back cover: "Some girls would simply die. Other girls would kill. But Jane Retton...she would do both..." Can't screw that up, right?
- Clueless on tape; .99 cents
I already have Clueless on tape, obviously, but my first tape is in bad shape and I'm too cheap to buy the special edition DVD. Plus, it was only .99 cents!
- A "Vermont: The Green Mountain State" glass; .49 cents
- Leather Hopalong Cassidy photo album; $2.98
Some dingus actually left some awesome vintage postcards and autographed pictures from famous old-time radio personalities stuck in the little picture holders! I love you, you idiot(s)!

Overall, I'd say that getting out of bed^[2] this morning was a wise choice.

^[1]The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Beautiful Basics of Science by Natalie Angier. Apparently it's a bestseller and I'm pretty sure that I heard everyone raving about it a few months ago, but I'm going to just pretend that I'm the only person in the world with the good taste to have bought this book. I'm just starting on the physics chapter and I'm totally not bored yet!
^[2]Technically, I got off a lumpy couch in someone else's apartment after a very stressful and brief night's sleep.

And I was born in a laundromat! I was born in a cul-de-sac! Just give me some tension release!

My first job was at the Pizza Hut inside a SuperTarget. Looking back, it was a pretty sweet position; I got all the pizza and smoothies I could shove down my throat as long as no supervisors caught me. I usually got to work alone. I met some amusing creeps and did some (ultimately unsuccessful) matchmaking. I had plenty of time to read, as long as I looked up every few sentences to make sure none of my supervisors were sneaking around. I can see now that it was the best job that I will ever have. Naturally, I was miserable thoughout the entire ordeal.
My second job was legitimately terrible. When I first went to the temp agency, I was afraid they'd give me some sort of office job and I'd have to wear nice clothes and put up with some Michael Scott clone. Perhaps sensing my distain for blouses and loafers, they sent me to this corn...thing. I stood in front of a machine for eight hours a day breathing corn fumes. It was totally mindless, so I was able to spend all eight hours wallowing in existential despair. 

My third job is ridiculous. I'm basically being paid to do what I'd be doing anyway for free. It's the kind of job I've always dreamed of having! And I am going to quit. As usual, I have thought too much about it and stressed myself out. I've spent the last week on the verge of vomiting over this evaluation on Friday. It's not a big deal. I mean, there are these forms I really don't want to have to show my evaluator, but they've been forged already and everything. There's some cleaning to do, but I can do it all on Thursday. My real problem is that this is starting to be, like, official! Suddenly, I'm reminded that I'm working, technically! This really -- deeply! -- bothers me, and I can't exactly explain why. Plus, the forms are changing and they'll just be so much harder to fake. So fuck it! I quit!

I had come to this conclusion at 4:47 am. I had been lying in bed freaking out over the evaluation for about an hour, and it was the only way to get over it and get to sleep. At 7:58 am, I woke up again. Frank was barking and walking on my head, which is his usual way of telling me that someone is at the door. For a few seconds, I denied it. It's Thursday! It's Lesbian Neighbor #1 coming over to borrow some coffee! It's more old ladies with Jesus flyers! Then I grabbed something out of my closet, sighed, and walked out to the living room, prepared to fake faint if necessary. My evaluator was waiting for me. She's this nice older lady with dyed red hair and sensible shoes, which just makes everything worse. If I could see her as the villain in all of this, maybe I wouldn't be having such a hard time. Instead, she's just this normal person doing her job, and I'm the shifty freeloader whose malfeasance^[1] justifies the existance of her career. But oh well! The evaluation is not as bad as I have been expecting. I still feel as if I've swallowed a large and oddly-shaped paperweight, but she isn't asking me anything I can't answer. She hasn't asked to see any forms. I haven't passed out! From where I'm standing, I can see the bottom keys on her laptop. There's this one magic moment where I notice for the first time ever that the letters C, V, and B are clustered together on the bottom row! C-V-B! Camper Van Beethoven! That can't be a coincidence, can it!? The common abbreviation of my third favorite band of all time (as of November 2008!)'s name showing up on keyboards everywhere!?

I asked myself, what would David Lowery do in this situation? And fuck if I know. Still, it made me feel a little better. It's not like I believe in fate or "spirit guides" or whatever, but I imagined that it meant David Lowery was somehow supporting me through my difficult hour. Maybe he paused from eating or songwriting and said to himself, "You know, I hope all of my adoring fans are doing okay today!" The rest of the evaluation went off okay, and as I pushed that nice old lady evaluator out the door, I expected that sick feeling to evaporate. Instead, I spent the next two hours lying in bed semi-freaking out, expecting her to pop back in and say, "Gotcha! Now show me those forms your forged yesterday!"

^[1]Malfeasance for malfeasance's sake, no less!

"In the immortal words of Jerri Blank, 'I GOT SOMETHIN' TO SAY!'" - Myself

A few months ago, everyone started going nuts over Rachel Maddow. I didn't get it. I felt like I should get it, but I didn't feel like going through all the work of actually getting it. Got it? So I was very pleasantly surprised to realize a few minutes ago that I am gradually falling onto the Rachel Maddow bandwagon^[1]!

WHY I LOVE TO WATCH OR LISTEN TO RACHEL MADDOW DO OR TALK ABOUT ANYTHING:
- She is a big ol' liberal lesbo with brown hair and glasses who likes to wear sneakers and make fun of people on TV! She's basically me, except older and wittier and more educated and on TV. Also, I haven't had my natural hair color since 9th grade, and even if I didn't dye my hair to death, it's a totally different shade of brown. Still, my point is that I sort of see a little bit of myself in her, and as you may have guessed, I love anyone or -thing that I can see myself in. I realize this sounds a bit like I'm comparing my love for Rachel Maddow with my love for mirrors and other reflective surfaces, but oh well.
- She's strangely compelling. Example: She's rolling footage of Sarah Palin's impromptu press conference from the Elk's Lodge or whatever, and the hilarity is totally overshadowed by this little box to the side featuring Rachel's reactions (in real time!) to Sarah's statements. It's not gutbustingly hilarious or anything, but I can't look away. Even when it's gotten so ridiculous that the only expression she can manage is one of amused disbelief, I am mesmerized by her five or so minutes of amused disbelief.
-She helps me clean up my closet area! I don't know why, but watching The Rachel Maddow Show puts me in a cleaning mood. I didn't think to take a 'before' shot, but believe me, that area was basically one gigantic pile of shit in my pre-Maddow days. Three feet tall, AT LEAST. I swear. Admittedly, two or so feet of that pile are just piled inside my closet at this point, but whatever. I don't go in there! I never wear those clothes! It's totally cool.
- She's friends with Keith Olbermann! Do I kind of think Keith is (at times!) a pompous douche and a bit of a bore? Yes, but affectionately! Plus, when he's yelling and going on, he's yelling and going on about things I agree with. I like people who agree with my political opinions, and they both qualify.

The end!

^[1]I know you're saying to yourself, "How the fuck does one fall gradually?" Well, one doesn't. But it's almost 4 AM and I'm cutting into my usual VH1 Classic music video watching time to write this, so I'm not in a very witty or intelligent frame of mind. I probably could wait until some other time to write this, but in the immortal words of Jerri Blank, "I GOT SOMETHIN' TO SAY!" Blahblahblah, I love footnotes.

What's your pers-aaahhhh-na about this Americ-aaahhh-na?

SUCK ON IT, REPUBLICANS!

NAILZ 4 HOPEY

There's nothing to say besides perhaps "FUCK YEAH!" I am so looking forward to crowing over this victory for the next four (or eight?!) years while the people with "W '08" bumper stickers sob openly. There is NOTHING more satisfying than slopping on some Obama colors and sparkles while you watch McCain's concession speech on BBC America.
YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The day has come and we'll go on and shine again tomorrow!

Best Cures for Halloween-Isn't-Fun-Anymore Malaise:
- Spending frivolously at the flea market
- The Apples in Stereo
- Cutesy earrings
- Smelling my one of my favorite smells, burning leaves^[1].
- Obsessively cataloging my purchases

Stuff From Flea Market #1 (In Chronological Order)
1. Rainbow "I [heart] Mexico!" pin, Buddhist Dude pin - $2
Because I really do [heart] Mexico and Buddhist Dudes, I guess. I'm 99% sure that it's supposed to be a little bodhisattva. Here's a picture of a bodhisattva statue from the Nelson-Atkins museum that freaks me out. I know it looks puny and compassionate in that picture, but up close it is so fucking menacing. I can't stand to be around it for more than five minutes.
2.Hawaii magnet, orange "Let's Send Sonja" pin - 50 cents
3. Plastic oil lamp on a rainbow string - $1
One of the many things I bought not so much because I desired it, but because "I know I'll regret not buying this ridiculous tchotchke in the future when I realize that I am desperately in need of a plastic oil lamp on a rainbow string and cannot find one." Later on, some old lady commented on the tea pot around my neck, and I realized that it's kind of fat for an oil lamp. But it's kind of weird for a tea pot! I have no idea what this plastic thing is anymore. While my mind was exploding and the fabric of reality was tearing over this oil lamp/tea pot dilemma, Old Lady chattered on about tea. "Tea's very popular now-a-days, after all."
4. Guatemalan Friendship Bracelet, coil of colorful microbeads on a wire - $2
5. "The World's Only Corn Palace!" Pennant - $1
I don't think I'd ever actually heard of this Corn Palace until about three weeks ago, when I bought this South Dakota mug with a picture of it at Flea Market(:The Store). Still, it seemed natural to me that one would exist. Where else would the Corn King^[2] live, after all?
6. "Model Viola" and "Model Samuel" - $10
I have been looking for some good mannequin heads for AGES. EONS! So I basically collapsed in a pile once I found out that Vi and Sam, the two most perfect plastic heads I've ever seen, cost ten bucks as a set. I assume that they used to be beauty school practice heads, because their hair looked like shit. Vi's was particularly bad; it was a teased out post-apocalyptic rat's nest that was just barely improved by a vigorous brushing when I got home. Sam is more or less okay except for the weird bald patches.
7. "I'm A Year Older!" pin, Oscar Meyer Weiner Whistle - $1.50
8. Wooly neon winter dork hat - $3
9. Globe (not pictured) - $5
10. Arkansas and Chicago pennants - $2
11. Neon yellow shell bracelet - $2
I've been in a neon mood lately. I don't know what the deal is with that, but I guess it could be worse.

At this point, we meet up with Mother's friend Stephen at the food court, made a few puerile jokes, and were told about a giganto crap store we'd never heard of: Collectamania.
"You've really never been there!? It's full of all that junky crap you guys like."
"No! Where is it?"
"I can't remember the street. By, uh, the dirty book store and some factories."
"What dirty book store?"
In the end, we followed his truck down some backstreets and past the dirty book store until we got to a squat, tan building. The only distinguishing feature was a big sign on one side that said "COLLECTAMANIA!" with a list of things one could find within, such as "Toys" and "Cookware" and "Just You Guess!"

Stuff From Collectamania (In Chronological Order):
12. Cartoony ceramic owl with lantern (for Granny) (not pictured) - 50 cents
13. White plastic robot figurine (not pictured) - 50 cents
14. One of those plastic menu/sign boards with a box full of plastic pop-on letters - $10
You know, like what local restaurants advertise their specials on? I can't think of anything I can do with it specifically, but I have a general sense of "possibility" regarding it, or whatever. What a steal!
15. Neon Tootsie Roll bank, probably from the '90s - 50 cents
16. Four ridiculous "vintage" shirts that probably won't fit me very well - $3.50
17. Plastic lizard - $1

Well, I guess that's it. It seemed like a lot more at the time.

^[1]Favorite Smell #18, to be specific. It'd probably be ranked higher if I could actually think of a good reason to like it so much. I mean, burning leaves are the official smell of autumn, which happens to be the official season of one of my most detested yearly events, "Back To School!"^[a]. Plus, it's just not particularly pleasant.
        ^[a]Most Detested Yearly Event #2, to be specific.
^[2]When I was a kid, I remember seeing some newspaper clipping in my mother's papers about this local hero who called himself "The Corn King." It was just a blurb next to a picture of this super tall guy with a crown walking through a crowd of tiny normal people. I could never find anything else about him, and eventually I started to assume I was delusional. But as I paid for my pennant, Mother started talking to the old dude.
"Have you ever heard of The Corn King? He was, uh, seven feet tall, I think, and he'd show up every summer and they'd photograph him, you know, going into Hy-Vee."
"Yeah. He must be pretty old by now."
"Oh, yeah. I was just a kid back then."
"He's probably dead."

They say, "Why are you dressed like it's Halloween?" I say, "Because it's the best day of the year!"

Awesome Halloween Playlist!

1. It's Spooky - Daniel Johnston & Jad Fair
2. Do They Know It's Hallowe'en? -  North American Halloween Prevention Initiative
3. Zombie Boy - The Magnetic Fields
4. Witchcraft - Patience and Prudence
5. I'm A Vampire - Future Bible Heroes
6. Gypsy Wine - Paper Garden
7. City of the Damned - The Gothic Archies
8. Monster Mash - Bobby "Boris" Pickett & the Crypt Kickers
9. Frankenstein Monster Song - One Ring Zero
10. I Put a Spell on You - Bette Midler in Hocus Pocus
11. Falling In Love With The Wolfboy - The Magnetic Fields
12. Ghost Dance - Patti Smith Group
13. My Girlfriend Is A Witch - Cattanooga Cats
14. Fashion Zombies! - The Aquabats!
15. Make All The Ghoul Girls Cry - Quix*o*tic
16. Tuff Ghost - The Unicorns
17. Thriller - Michael Jackson(Duh.)
18. Every Day Is Halloween (Ministry semi-cover) - The Postmarks

All day I've been kind of down about the fact that Halloween isn't fun anymore, but it's hard to complain while I'm watching Poltergeist. At least I don't know anyone who's been sucked into some mysterious dimension reachable only through the snowy channel on TV, right? Still, it's sad to see my number one holiday just sort of fizzle out like this. I mean, Christmas was always a disappointment. You spend all of December just waiting for that one perfect Christmas moment where the sugar cookies your mom made taste as good as the store-bought ones and Christmas carols don't sound hokey and you feel all Peace On Earth-y like people in movies do, but instead you wake up in the morning and open up some presents and it's just like, "Oh, yay, a Slinky." And by the afternoon you're sitting around at your aunt and uncle's house waiting for the big Christmas dinner to be ready, feeling kind of blah and fiddling with this tacky religious book your uncle obviously just picked up from his church that morning because he forgot to buy you a real gift and because he's in that crazy zealot "Just Converted!" stage. Christmas never delivers. And Valentine's Day? Yeah, it's fun to decorate shoeboxes with construction paper hearts, but no one ever puts anything worthwhile in them. You're all eight, after all. Once you're old enough to really understand the "meaning" of Valentine's Day, you're also old enough to realize the whole holiday is a sham.

But Halloween was always worth it! There were no bloated expectations to contend with; Halloween was pretty straight-forward. You dressed up in weird outfits, ran around with your friends after dark and for once, you could take candy from strangers with impunity. When you got home, the Disney Channel would be rerunning Halloweentown and its fifty sequels and prequels and you would watch it for the billionth time while you sorted and organized your candy haul. It is the perfect holiday until you get too old for trick or treating. Once that happens, you're stuck! The only thing you can do is wander aimlessly around Nobbies, "The Halloween MEGASTORE!", wistfully fingering the cheap fabric of this year's most popular costumes and buying face paint that you'll never use. God, they'd better celebrate the shit out of Halloween in college (assuming I ever bother to send in some applications)! For now, I'll just have to distract myself by watching the Halloween episode of My So-Called Life and eating pumpkin-shaped candy.