Some Uncensored Opinions

So there's some stuff I feel the need to express. If you don't like swearing and/or curmudgeoning, feel free to skip this.

1. Barack Obama drives me fucking nuts. I liked him back when he'd only written ONE book. Now his grinning mug is everywhere, and his shtick is becoming clear, and I am SO OVER him. Hillary has my vote, that's how annoyed I am.

2. That said, I am so fucking sick of this election already. Just vote how you want to vote, people, and then we'll see who wins, won't we? Meantime, shut the fuck up already.

3. That book you're buying? Is stupid. No, shut up. It is. Stupid. I'm just saying.

4. New computer! Yay! I love my new computer. I want to marry it. It has a little camera and it can have more than one program open at a time without crashing.

5. That said, Best Buy could be a hell of a lot more specific on its website about which games are supported for which systems. And your games-for-Macs selection? Sucks ASS. Bejeweled. Jesus Christ. For one thing, I can play that for free online, and for another, my little sister's game where she's a jumping piece of gum is way more interesting.

Thus ends the curmudgeoning of the day.

Questions... Questions That Need Answering

These are my questions today:

1. Who is going to crack me up today? The Christmas season is annoying in certain ways (obviously) but there seem to be higher percentages of customers who ... how can I say this? Who could easily be satirized in a Jane Austen novel, how about that. Like the older couple in last Monday, who appeared so confused that I stopped "shelving" (read: reading) and asked if they needed help. I got them sorted out, and heard the woman tell her husband triumphantly, "You see, Frank? All we had to do was ask!"

2. What does The Guy I Have My Eye On think about me? I know, I know, so shallow. But I haven't gone remotely ga-ga over a boy in almost a year and a half, so I am due. And this guy is cute and sweet and polite, and I can't tell if he has his eye on me back, or if he's just a nice guy. And there is no one I can ask.

3. When is the guy whose room I took going to move off the couch? He's a nice guy, and I totally understand the legarthy that seizes one at the prospect of moving out, especially packing up one's stuff and moving to another country, but they put the ad in, I only answered it, and it has been a full month since I moved in. Again, I have no objections to him personally, but the house really isn't big enough for four, and he spends forever in the bathroom.

4. Where are all these ants coming from? Look, my friends, the buffet table is CLOSED. I thought I made that perfectly clear when I took all the dirty dishes out of my room and then squirted you all with Windex.

5. How am I going to find time to go to the city and get my nose ring adjusted? Which it needs, sometime before Christmas. In broader terms, how is it that I have loads of time to spend goofing off checking my email and such, and none at all to do the research I am supposed to be doing? How can I make time for dates with old college chums (not date-dates, see above. Just hang-out dates) but not to sit down at the library and do some good old-fashioned research? How does my internal time management even work?

6. Why don't I like any modern playwrights except Stoppard? I saw a play last night, by an award-winning playwright, and it seriously just sounded like Lionel's efforts from season two of Slings & Arrows. I mean, don't get me wrong, the staging was excellent and the story reasonably compelling, but the dialogue just... did nothing for me. Why is that? It's not just this guy, it's pretty much any play that's been written in the last twenty or thirty years, except musicals, Stoppard, and the short plays my friend Tangy used to write when we were teenagers.

Crisis of American Values

All those reports about how Americans read only like four books a year or whatever, and no one can read anymore? Whoever did those studies needs to spend a week working retail in a bookstore in December. (For God's sake, it's not even December yet. It's bad enough now Thanksgiving is past.) Also all those people who were like, oh, there's a recession, so post-Thanksgiving sales are down, and blah blah blah. They should work retail too.

Because it's all nonsense. The world is full to bursting with people who want books, and aren't sure what books they want, and and are appalled -- appalled, I tell you! -- when we don't have the book they aren't sure they want, and do we have any recommendations for a blind parakeet who hates books and can't read, and why not, don't we call ourselves a bookstore?

Sweet Christ, does no one stay home and watch TV anymore?