Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 2:38 PM CDT

1. I don't have any funny aphorisms...my family must be really boring. Maybe I'll make one up...You're stupid, wash your face. No, it doesn't work. (But I can't wait to see everyone elses...RDD, does that mean that your husband misses his target sometimes?)

2. Since I don't know who Forbischer is, and the bastards not in my dictionary..I'll use foraminifer. "Foraminifers sure are the most fun protozoan sarcodinian to study." I don't know what I just wrote.

3. In 1989 I was in the fifth grade and since I had just grown boobies I was living painfully thru the torture of every boy in my class finding the time in their busy schedules to snap my bra everyday. May they all burn in hell.

4. My first real pad was $349.00 a month, a one bedroom that I had gotten with my college boyfriend who promptly freaked out (we had only been dating about six months) and moved out...my best friend moved in and put up a gypsy like tent in the corner of the living room as her bedroom. Then, another friend lived on our couch. But he didn't pay any rent. Then my boyfriend came back and he didn't pay any rent. To top it off it was a really bad neighborhood with regular drug dealers and murders. Only one person got shot the entire time I lived there, I think I brought the neighborhood good luck....I guess there was also the girl that ran down our hall at 8 in the morning screaming for help...anyway, it was cheap, and I was 19.

5. I haven't seen the Virgin Mary, I think that's something that skips a generation. I'm sure that my mom saw her while on LSD in the 70's..I've never done LSD, maybe that's why I haven't seen her.

6. My mental tick is that I have conversations going on constantly in my head, like I'm warming up to tell someone something, or making up conversations that I'm too chicken to have, or just testing the water to see how nuts I really am. Usually there's a constant song in my head that plays as background music of this brain film that goes on in there.

7. ..A woman? Or maybe hot dogs?

8. Sorry, I don't like cocaine.

Duckie, about your scrimshaw, I just want to tell you that what those raindrops are doing is illegal in fifteen states and that if Congress see's it they'll be trying to pass a constitutional law against it.

-Bubba

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 3:32 PM CDT

Bubba,

I do believe you could talk your way into or out of anything. You should consider becoming a politician. For not having read the book you have no idea how close your answers are.

In 1989 I was graduating from high school and hot on the trail of my future husband. I drove a 1978 VW bug convertible, white, with white leather seats, white rag top and black dash, chrome wheels, and a kickin stereo system. It was hoootttttt.

My first real pad was $325.00 per month, an apartment on campus. It was nasty filthy. I can't believe I bathed in that shower. I was 20 and determined to be independent and didn't care that my parents cut me off scott free. We painted and wallpapered and cleaned it as best we could. I remember our next door neighbors constantly having parties and me banging on the concrete wall with a hammer telling them to put a cork in it. I've always been early to bed, late to rise. I worked part time at an abstract company while going to school. Between rent and cable and my long distance bill , I was low on cash and too proud to go back home. I lived off of Little Caesar's breadsticks. The expansion of dough can be extremely filling, plus they were tasty and cheap.

My tick is mental typing. I was a whiz in high school, never missing a stroke and super duper fast. From that point on I have unconciously typed most conversations I'm engaged in. It drives me batty, but I can't stop.

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 4:43 PM CDT

1. RDD I'm not sure if you meant for our aphorism to rhyme... but my Dad has a few regular sayings: Insanity doesn't run in our family, it gallops / If you've got it flaunt it, and if you haven't flaunt it anyway/ You're not good, you're good at it!

2. Not knowing who Forbisher is I'll simly say this: It has been a commonly held view that fun seems to disappear whenever Forbisher is present.

3. In 1989 I was 16 and in Grade 11 (the second last year of high school in our school system.) I was just starting to assert my independence against my parents, and taking a great deal of notice of boys. Unfortunately, we aren't allowed to drive until we're 17 on our isolated island, so I didn't have a car... but RDD yours sounds fantastic! I'd have wanted an MGB - and when the time came to get one my Dad steered me towards a new car (with a roof) rather than a classic MG - in fact, I'm still waiting for my convertible.

4. My first real pad was in 1991 and I shared it with a close friend and her sister. It had two bedrooms and a large lounge/dining opening onto a poky little kitchen. I think it cost $130 per week, but we split it 3 ways, and it was across the street from a car dealership's service centre so it had a great perve factor with all those hot young mechanics running around, and a two-minute walk from a major shopping centre (always a big consideration) and transport.

5.Hey Bubba, maybe your mum and my dad have shared the same experiences. He did the LSD experience in the 60's & 70's too. In fact, when I was once asked by schoolmates if I was on speed (when, in fact, I was completely sober and I don't do drugs - I don't need them) my father told me that I should tell them it's a side effect of all the drugs he took in the sixties.

6. I think Morgan would have bought it already put together, as he's obviously got a lot going on in his life to have a whole book about him. And those little ships require a huge amount of concentrated effort to make.

7.Like Bubba I tend to have conversations in my head... but without the background music. I find it relieves tension as you're not supressing the annoyance but you stay out of strife by not arguing with everyone around you. (Unless it's necessary to argue!) I don't tend to type it, but I do occasionally mouth the words, a habit I noticed when walking my firstborn around in a pram. (Luckily, most people thought I was talking to him.)

8. I'll hazard a guess and say that he has a penchanct for the scent of incense and the salty sea smell of the beach.

10. I agree with Bubba about your tear/raindrops, but on a positive note, they do look extremely happy in the process!

I can't make any observations as yet, except that I am really looking forward to reading this book!!!

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 5:46 PM CDT

#1. now everybody... all together... what's my family's saying? KISSHUGS

#2. it is absolutely no fun trying to use forbischer in any kind of sentence. (i know, easy out)

#3. 1989? managing a convenience store and counting the days til my kid moved out and i got my freedom back. which of course didn't stop me one bit.

#4. my first rented place was when my kid was 3. i found this little place, cost me something like $195. it was originally a 2-car garage which was remade into a 2-bedroom apt. go look in your garage and imagine all the space i had... the first problem i had was the address. since it was behind the building on the street, the mailman and i had to invent an address. so we lived at 232 1/2. but i still miss the place. we had a little lawn out front and i daydreamed about the house i would own one day. still dreaming...

#5. ok, now this is funny, where you all have gone with this one. it just so happens, that way back when, i went to a catholic retreat thru school. my best friend decided we needed to make it more interesting. so we dropped a lid of lsd. later on, in the middle of mass, i looked up at the ceiling. this beautiful church had a painting of the virgin mary holding the baby. as i watched, a moustache and goutee were "drawn" on her, along with slashing eyebrows. now i do not condone drug use now i do not condone drug use oops, relapse.

#6. he bought it in the altogether

#7. i daydream. sometimes i imagine different ways conversations could go, sometimes i scream at people, i talk to myself, the only problem is when my mouth opens and some of this stuff comes out. definitely do not ask me a sensitive question if you really don't want to hear the answer. depending on where i am mentally, i just might answer bluntly honestly.

#8. pine

#9. "-the house needing repairs, the lawn needing mowing, the neighbor needing killing..."

#10. can't draw, but am enjoying all the contributions so far. gonna watch the next rain to see if i can find some of those drops.

disclaimer: the author of this post may or may not have actually done what was written. she will neither confirm nor deny that she was using sensationalism to make her entry more interesting. she's old, forgive her.

kisshugs

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 8:23 PM CDT

1)I don't think we're much of an aphorism kind of family. We do say "Don't Panic!" rather a lot.

2)"Forbischer- Nobody ever claimed that accounting was fun."
"There's a reason we didn't call it Fun-bischer."

3)In 1989 I was 12, about three years into a very long “awkward phase”, and trying my best to blend in with the scenery.

4)About $300, American, after figuring the exchange rate. A lovely two-story townhome in Mexico, in a pretty ritzy neighborhood. Would’ve been awesome but for a couple of caveats. 1) We had a washing machine but no dryer, and no space to hang a clothes line, so had to hang clothes to dry in the living room. 2) The people who bought the property directly adjoining my bedroom decided to tear down the foot thick concrete wall. Using sledgehammers. Starting at 5am. Every. Stinking. Morning. 3)Gas for heating & cooking had to be brought in by truck rather than pipes, and it took us a couple days to figure out how to get the truck to come, so we spent the first week or so with ice cold showers and lukewarm food.

5)Every street corner in Mexico.
Oh, like in a vision? No.

6)Judging by the reference to the expense, and "not the most inteligent purchase" I'd guess it was probably already built. The ones you build yourself tend to be rather less painful to the wallet. On the other hand, Morgan was anal enough to put the work into it, down to the tiny utensils in the mess.

7)I always have music playing in my head. But, you already knew that. Also, lately, due to the lyme disease infecting my brain, I’ve developed what my doctor calls something like “peripheral visual and auditory hallucinations.”
But that’s a whole ‘nother story.

8)pine-scented cleaning products

9) Several, actually. A couple:
The last paragraph of the prologue, when poor baby Morgan was abandoned at the arcade, manages to be painfully sad and still funny. "It provided him no solace."

"They finally sprung me. Can you believe it?"
"If somebody else were to verify it..."
And
""Where do you think I got the outfit?"
"A store?"
"Nope. Already owned it."
"Oh, well then, that clinches it. You're a pirate."

Hopefully this qualifies as "brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews." I can try to be more critical if need be.

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 8:25 PM CDT

Would your 'shaw be "beads of sweat wrestling with one another to get thru his pores"?

Wednesday, 20 April 2005 - 11:34 PM CDT

Yes mum and dad were big time hippies and when questioned about it my mom can neither confirm or deny anything because she doesn't remember. Her honeymoon was something that even Hunter S. Thompson would have been envious of. And she doesn't remember it. My dad met Allan Ginsberg during this phase, played guitar for him..and went to a Greatful Dead concert in San Francisco, leaving his pregnant wife at home 2,000 miles away..she wasn't happy about that.

I too have a sometimes ultra hyper active personality, and haven't done LSD...although I did do mushrooms once and felt like I was five years old again...that was nice. I spent most of my college years stoned and not growing emotionally or mentally because of it. I've talked about it with my mom and we both agree that pot just stops a person in their tracks and just holds them in space unable to grow.

Anyway,
Bubba

Thursday, 21 April 2005 - 9:34 AM CDT

3) What was I doing in 1989? Refer to question #4.

4) First "real" pad was an old two-room cottage on the beach. One of the rooms was useless because it had no windows. So the main room had the floor to sleep on, a small dining table I had inherited from a Wendy's restaurant undergoing a renovation, a sink and stove, refrigerator, amd a teeny tiny bathroom that had a metal shower stall and a floor in danger of caving in. Rent $275 a month, and I broke a sweat trying to pay for it on top of paying for school and working various jobs. After a couple of years I upgraded to an apartment in the crime-infested ghetto part of the city. Main entertainment in the evenings was sitting out on the front steps and watching people running by carrying TV sets.

5) I saw the virgin Mary on this morning's news. She is living under an overpass in Chicago, or something. The nation really needs to crack down on the homeless problem, don't you think? Maybe that is her message.

6) Morgan put that model ship together himself, he is an anal sort of pirate.

8) Ditto on that fresh piney fragrance.

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 4:37 PM CDT

That's my favorite line as well.

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 4:38 PM CDT

LOL, that would be it. I figured that might be a tough one since it was hard to make out whether they were hugging or mugging or what. Good job Trillian.

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 4:39 PM CDT

Wendyjo,

How the heck did you cool that place in the hot Georgia summer? Was the ocean breeze enough?

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 4:40 PM CDT

The penchant was for the smell of pine as per feenxc's answer, but I must say, kudos to you for making a guess being that you haven't even read the book yet!

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 5:36 PM CDT

Was not living in Georgia at the time, was living on the Chesapeake bay.
Where are these shaws? Rancette's was my favorite because it had so much personality. I am looking forward to you posting them. And I NEED the ending to your story, RDD! Even if you just sum it up in one last entry, I must know who the killer was!!

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 5:53 PM CDT

I'm still waiting for yours WendyJo! You didn't send me a shaw for this entry yet...

Friday, 22 April 2005 - 6:51 PM CDT

scribbling away...

Sunday, 24 April 2005 - 2:06 AM CDT

Sorry I am so late to the party this week...I promise RDD, I am working on a "scrimshaw" as we speak.

1. Am I the only one who didn't know the meaning of the word "aphorism" until reading this book? Probably because my family never had one.
2. Forbischer sounds like the least fun place on earth (and beyond).
3. 1989...I had just moved to California with my ex and started a new job. I think that is the year I first got involved in cat shows.
4. My first place I paid for out of my own pocket was a 1 bedroom apt. in Ypsilanti, MI, and for the life of me I have no clue what the rent was (this was 20 years ago!).
5. No visions here, sorry.
6. He bought the model already assembled...they said it was an antique.
7. My mental tick is counting everything I do in sets of 10's. This annoying OCD habit reached its peak in my early teen years, but I still do it on occasion.
8. This one's already been answered...pine.
9. It isn't a quote of dialogue, but I love the description of Avery Vail walking into the boardroom: "...the soles of his loafers came into contact with the floor only out of modesty."

Tuesday, 26 April 2005 - 3:00 AM CDT

NEW STUDENT HERE...

1. Offenzeeclick, to be uttered in a German accent, translation, "obviously"

2. Fun to make fun of Forbischer for his fear of fun
(bare in mind my book has yet to be delivered)

3. Learning to suck dick

4. $200, with pet beagle, studio, 1994, 110 Horatio Street apartment 605
New York City, by means of support from the playboy son of a Greek tycoon,
because my 3 guys lived downstairs and because 5 chicks from out of town
shortly ceased to be an interesting option

5. THE VIRGIN MARY IS DYING WE MUST PRAY TO HER LADIES

6. It was given to him

7. Mental Tickling Bomb -astic -shell -ardier -ed

8. GOLD

9. "I saw her one day with a big old pan, pouring ice cold water on a
drowning man."
From Rockabilly song by Joe D. Gibson 1957

10.-

Love the sweat love scrim

Tuesday, 26 April 2005 - 3:09 AM CDT

new student here

1. Offenzeeclick, to be uttered in a German accent, translation, "obviously"

2. Fun to make fun of Forbischer for his fear of fun
(bare in mind my book has yet to be delivered)

3. Learning to suck dick

4. $200, with pet beagle, studio, 1994, 110 Horatio Street apartment 605
New York City, by means of support from the playboy son of a Greek tycoon,
because my 3 guys lived downstairs and because 5 chicks from out of town
shortly ceased to be an interesting option

5. THE VIRGIN MARY IS DYING WE MUST PRAY TO HER LADIES

6. It was given to him

7. Mental Tickling Bomb -astic -shell -ardier -ed

8. GOLD

9. "I saw her one day with a big old pan, pouring ice cold water on a
drowning man." -From Rockabilly song by Joe D. Gibson 1957

10.

Tuesday, 26 April 2005 - 11:34 AM CDT

Thanks for sharing bastardess. Can't wait to hear what you have to say next...