i won't say i miss namibia, but i miss it like i just broke up with a woman i love like rain but with whom i had no future. thinking rationally about relationships is tops until yr lying in an empty bed that feels like an amputated leg. oh, the sunsets...
i was out partying with myself last night a la late night drive and the bbc when i heard the bush administration had plans to list polar bears as a threatened species. the rationale behind the proposal was that the polar bear's habitat was threatened by melting ice levels, though some sort of interior dept. spokesman was quick to point out uncertainty about why that ice was melting. i'm thoroughly surprised: first, b/c bush's govt. has begrudgingly acknowledged the possibility of global warming; and second, that it's taken so long for the decider to decide global warming might be an actual phenomenon with scientific merit. of course, this concession wasn't without its requisite casuistry, that we should be hesitant when assigning outcomes to certain inputs. i mean, it's not like the wanker has ever shelved a report by his own epa suggesting human activity as the main cause of climate change. and it's not like his reason for dismissing the report would have been to allow for more gathering of evidence, presumably to paint a more accurate picture of fucked up weather patterns. and even more it's not like, it's not like dear leader has to seek out even more consultation on what to do in iraq. no, he has a vision, and were he an athlete rather than a male cheerleader, i'm sure he'd be one of those douche rockets who go from doctor to doctor to doctor until he receives a favorable diagnosis and declares himself fit to play. something like that.
i graduated from two universities: one allows me to order up to nine free transcripts per session and even pays the postage; the other charges $5 per. how can i afford $5 if i don't have the job i need the transcripts for? the degree they gave me isn't even worth $4, let alone the $5 for some record of the courses i took. can't i just show them my report cards? douches.
i felt a bit sheepish tonight when i borrowed my sisty's car and caught myself digging the mariah she'd left in the cd player, but then i realized it wasn't my sister's until she stole it from me. oh, the dirty girl crush. she was, after all, on the tombo shack top 20 playlist...
i won't even get into that whole respect the troops issue b/c it's incomprehensible to me on numerous fronts: would i be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice? any sacrifice? is this a conscious sacrifice or have my circumstances strong armed me into enlisting? are soldiers necessarily patriotic? ok, i will touch it: the idea of a soldier's commitment is not sacrosanct. it's not some sort of heavenly principle whereby unlisted peasants like me can't criticize the conduct of our armed forces. or the mission of our armed forces. defend freedom? sure, i'll tie one off with a yellow ribbon, then i'll use that same ribbon to suffocate the poor, peaceful tree out in my front yard as a way of yelling, VIVA! seriously, no third-world bedouin that our pop culture laughs at for ass backwardness and incompetence is going to all of a sudden become not stupid and a threat to steal my freedom. i know that for the reals b/c i watch fox news and have independent thoughts, and those thoughts tell me our troops are acting out a god-issued mandate. who's allowed to question g-d? certainly not the 142-year-old white men who decide whether or not to engage our country in warfare. nevermind, they can't be that old. trigger happy as policy's always been, at least men that age would have actually served in the armed forces before telling a group of 18 to 24-year-olds they had to run off and chance disfigurement and quietus (compare GHWB vs. GWB). now the best we get is lip service, so that's why i'm going to say the troops aren't sacrosanct. i won't question any of their commitment by breaking down individual motives for wielding the saber, but i will question the type of policy in which the rationale behind it isn't self-evident, when the only way to sustain public support is to equate an oligarchy's wet dream with a desire to see ppl we know not get blown up. the ones we don't know are ok, though... seriously, don't criticize our war, hippy. the troops are dying and yr eating granola. they're wearing 4000 lbs of equipment and yr wearing flip-flops. now that yr self-conscious about all the freedom that goes with yr broken-down 84 ford escort, we're sure you won't notice how our perveted self-aggrandizing policy (and i do mean self, b/c this $$$ is most definately not for inner-city schools) might result in perveted behavior from our troops:
fuck iraq
it's too bad a couple of rouchdags (cited: rouleaus) are busy tying their yellow ribbons into nooses for american pr, but i can't believe there are too many troops iraq side still blinded by the freedom they're apparently protecting. you probably have to eat at the whites-only counter to find anyone still lighting that candle.
fuck iraq
it's too bad a couple of rouchdags (cited: rouleaus) are busy tying their yellow ribbons into nooses for american pr, but i can't believe there are too many troops iraq side still blinded by the freedom they're apparently protecting. you probably have to eat at the whites-only counter to find anyone still lighting that candle.
the weight of a song's meaning lies initially in the fact two ppl simply shared a melody with one another. 'tis shite if you listen carefully afterwards and discover the lyrics to be apropos of why you said goodbye.
a thespian of a lovely friend said of her art that you reach a peak during exercise activities where the only thing left to do is act. it resonated with advice (criticism?) my father once leveled towards me about not necessarily needing to know every step of a gavotte to dance it. (me and form, classical reasoning? uhhh...) i suppose this is another way of articulating the same thought:
I see this a lot at the periphery (and only at the periphery) of, for example, the environmental movement, as many people whose sympathies run toward environmental protection find themselves unable to actively oppose ecological degradation, in great measure because their sense of self-loathing at being part of the industrial culture that’s destroying the planet paralyze them. The same dynamic tricks out in race, class, or gender issues, too, whenever people personalize their problem. Because they own a car, it becomes their fault the climate is changing. Because they live in a house or apartment (or a yurt, for that matter), they’re somehow primarily culpable for deforestation, as culpable, I’ve heard them say, as even the CEO of Weyerhaeuser. They need, they say, to eradicate their own hatred or anger before they can act. They need, themselves, to be pure in thought, action, emotion, before they can begin to do anything constructive. Of course this is silly, and of course they never get around to doing anything at all. They hang paralyzed at the edge of constructive action for years, never quite falling back into dissonance, but never moving on.
i have a bike with peddles and live in wicker park. i heart life. standard offer applies: if yr ever in chicago and need a place to stay, phone me so i can give you proper directions to the westin.
my george w. man crush
+ raging psychos
______________________
motherfucking utopia
the city of dearborn has acknowledged the time i spent in pee/see by employing my personal argot as a way to name its streets:
it really hit me a few days ago how much i miss NOrthern NAmibia when i received a message from a friend saying he met the person replacing me. apparently dooder's "quiet and normal," which is nowhere near the douche i was hoping he'd be. i mean, i love my commmunity and wish them the best, but the best hopefully doesn't include a better volunteer than i was. das ppl are supposed to carry on about how great it was when hair-ah-me-ah was there rather than smoke their epiphanies when it becames clear i was a wanker. there's still hope, though: he could quit and i'd win by virtue of making it the full two years. yeah, that's it... but at least he doesn't have a name yet, so this idea of being replaced and forgotten is still a bit amorphous. it won't be till i hear about his life in MY village that i have to accept the ties have been somewhat severed, that my experiences there are no longer exclusive to me. le sigh. too bad this all coincided with finishing out my post-malarial prophylaxes, the last palpable connection i had to nona. all that's left now are a shit ton of photos and the memories i don't necessarily want to share with other ppl, though i should probably be grateful for the all that sand still lodged in crevices i wasn't aware i had. that's a palpable connection of sorts.
it really hit me a few days ago how much i miss NOrthern NAmibia when i received a message from a friend saying he met the person replacing me. apparently dooder's "quiet and normal," which is nowhere near the douche i was hoping he'd be. i mean, i love my commmunity and wish them the best, but the best hopefully doesn't include a better volunteer than i was. das ppl are supposed to carry on about how great it was when hair-ah-me-ah was there rather than smoke their epiphanies when it becames clear i was a wanker. there's still hope, though: he could quit and i'd win by virtue of making it the full two years. yeah, that's it... but at least he doesn't have a name yet, so this idea of being replaced and forgotten is still a bit amorphous. it won't be till i hear about his life in MY village that i have to accept the ties have been somewhat severed, that my experiences there are no longer exclusive to me. le sigh. too bad this all coincided with finishing out my post-malarial prophylaxes, the last palpable connection i had to nona. all that's left now are a shit ton of photos and the memories i don't necessarily want to share with other ppl, though i should probably be grateful for the all that sand still lodged in crevices i wasn't aware i had. that's a palpable connection of sorts.
thank YHWH i have constant access to news and its subsequent commentary. oh blogs, i missed you. i would have never found out about this had i still been in nona listening to the bbc and a suprisingly non-partisan - save for the editorials - voa...
tell me herr muslim, elected to the house of representatives, how might you convince us cracker bigots yr not going to blow yrself up at the state of the union...
tell me herr muslim, elected to the house of representatives, how might you convince us cracker bigots yr not going to blow yrself up at the state of the union...
namibia's slipping further and further into my past, as evidenced by the slow expurgation from this blog of thoughts incubated in the hot, hot desert air. at least i've maintained the diligence i developed there to mention things three weeks after the fact. like my sisty's marriage. 'twas lovely:
oh, my sisty.. i'd regard her as lucky to have found herself a man-sans-douche, but it's not so much luck as it is just deserts. i can't really explain what kind of person kristine is, but i can relate a story about the time i moved back to eugene and was stupid enough to leave my wallet in an unlocked car whilst my bro-shat and i hiked to the top of spencer's butte. i was without cash, credit cards, and proper id to write out-of-state checks - though the hippy shop around the corner let me write them for wine...it won't bounce, dood, right? - and i was so desperate for $$$ that i had to return my milk bottle for the $0.95 deposit so i could buy the petrol to drive across town to my brother's aunt's and eat. i was also fairly buggered about the photos that were in my wallet, and two days after mentioning this to my sister i recieved a letter with $20 and a shit-ton of new photos. so yeah, make of that what you will..
anywhow, i think of that time and the dood she was with on the fast-track to marriage back then, and i remember how at my older sister's wedding when was she drunk and belligerent, and it wasn't till she was nearly passed out and i was pulling barettes from her hair that she said quietly, i don't want to marry matt. i'm happy she was strong enough to admit she deserved more, and her patience was rewarded with a man i've had the good fortune to tell, we're not brothers-in-law, we're brothers.
oh, my sisty.. i'd regard her as lucky to have found herself a man-sans-douche, but it's not so much luck as it is just deserts. i can't really explain what kind of person kristine is, but i can relate a story about the time i moved back to eugene and was stupid enough to leave my wallet in an unlocked car whilst my bro-shat and i hiked to the top of spencer's butte. i was without cash, credit cards, and proper id to write out-of-state checks - though the hippy shop around the corner let me write them for wine...it won't bounce, dood, right? - and i was so desperate for $$$ that i had to return my milk bottle for the $0.95 deposit so i could buy the petrol to drive across town to my brother's aunt's and eat. i was also fairly buggered about the photos that were in my wallet, and two days after mentioning this to my sister i recieved a letter with $20 and a shit-ton of new photos. so yeah, make of that what you will..
anywhow, i think of that time and the dood she was with on the fast-track to marriage back then, and i remember how at my older sister's wedding when was she drunk and belligerent, and it wasn't till she was nearly passed out and i was pulling barettes from her hair that she said quietly, i don't want to marry matt. i'm happy she was strong enough to admit she deserved more, and her patience was rewarded with a man i've had the good fortune to tell, we're not brothers-in-law, we're brothers.
i remember having an a.d.d., hyperkinetic, and tic-related obsession with sports when i was young. i had to play them, and if i couldn't, i had to collect trading cards of those who were able to professionally. that or watch it on the telly, except i was so schitzy i had to head off my mama's admonition to take a lap around the block by going outside to swing a bat or play one-on-none with myself.
eventually i turned 12 and one-on-none wasn't so much about basketball anymore as it was about girls, so i gave up the sporting cards in an attempt to play the gigolo. unfortunately i had buck teeth, so i had neither juvenile hobby nor girl to soothe my adolescent restlessness. a few years on i was 16 and had braces, but still no girls, so i'd spend my time out of school playing/talking sports with my equally lame friends and fantasizing about all the girls i'd have at university. no girls there either, but by then i'd begun to regard an obsession with sport as more and more infantile, though dorky is probably the better word for it. kind of like this guy. i mean, i watch the occasional sportscenter and have a general idea of what teams are good and which are shite, but it's not like i play fantasy football or research a team's strength and weaknesses when filling out an ncaa tournament bracket. and the only reason i care if the pistons or tigers do well is b/c it's a good excuse to meet up with friends at a bar. unless yr in africa, obviously, and the only reason you care about the tigers is that yr homesick and bored.
so yeah, sports...
mlb: bye
nba: bye
nhl: who fooken cares
nfl: seriously?
ncaa bball: i have to fart
college football....
...I'LL FOOKEN STAB YOU IN THE FACE!
i forgot, i'm still pretty religious about umich football and have been indexed as mildly obsessed, which is the classification for ppl who get pissed and and throw things but don't go so far as to beat their women-folk. it also means i break down and cry every time osu beats us b/c g-d obviously hates me. i suppose that means i should use my blog as a platform for all the poetic feelings i have about the HUGE FOOKEN GAME this week, but i don't really feel all that poetic towards football. i just want to watch umich kill those motherfuckers. in the meantime i'll (1) click all over the web and read as others speak forlornly about the game and (2) rock the shivers youtube-like:
eventually i turned 12 and one-on-none wasn't so much about basketball anymore as it was about girls, so i gave up the sporting cards in an attempt to play the gigolo. unfortunately i had buck teeth, so i had neither juvenile hobby nor girl to soothe my adolescent restlessness. a few years on i was 16 and had braces, but still no girls, so i'd spend my time out of school playing/talking sports with my equally lame friends and fantasizing about all the girls i'd have at university. no girls there either, but by then i'd begun to regard an obsession with sport as more and more infantile, though dorky is probably the better word for it. kind of like this guy. i mean, i watch the occasional sportscenter and have a general idea of what teams are good and which are shite, but it's not like i play fantasy football or research a team's strength and weaknesses when filling out an ncaa tournament bracket. and the only reason i care if the pistons or tigers do well is b/c it's a good excuse to meet up with friends at a bar. unless yr in africa, obviously, and the only reason you care about the tigers is that yr homesick and bored.
so yeah, sports...
mlb: bye
nba: bye
nhl: who fooken cares
nfl: seriously?
ncaa bball: i have to fart
college football....
...I'LL FOOKEN STAB YOU IN THE FACE!
i forgot, i'm still pretty religious about umich football and have been indexed as mildly obsessed, which is the classification for ppl who get pissed and and throw things but don't go so far as to beat their women-folk. it also means i break down and cry every time osu beats us b/c g-d obviously hates me. i suppose that means i should use my blog as a platform for all the poetic feelings i have about the HUGE FOOKEN GAME this week, but i don't really feel all that poetic towards football. i just want to watch umich kill those motherfuckers. in the meantime i'll (1) click all over the web and read as others speak forlornly about the game and (2) rock the shivers youtube-like:
i've hitherto been an opponent of gwb's war of terror, but now that security measures have frustrated my goes at generosity x 4 bottles of wine, i fully expect the newly democratic congress to supply el presidente with the super bazooka of love and sausage needed to kill everyone and their terrorist mother. well, not everyone, just their terrorist mothers, as well as the woman in amsterdam-schipol who asserted, yes, i am sure you and yr bitch ass can't bring that wine onto the plane. the woman at the post office who ran through her spiel about anything perishable, flammable, or liquid in the package can take a grenade to the face as well. seriously, ppl may have duties they're supposed to perform at their job thingies, but those responsibilities used to involve sitting on their fat arses eating soda and crackers or stamping fragile on my parcel before manhandling its contents into pieces. the sooner my george w. man crush can pee all over the world, the sooner postal employees and minimum-wage security guards can stop pretending they're vanguards of freedom and i can tote my wine around without feeling like a terrorist.
i remember a few years back when umich was at the center of the supreme court's affirmative action maelstrom and i sat in my graduate seminar taking inventory of my classmates:
-honkey
-cracker
-white guy
-mustache with a mullet
-token black guy
-dub tee
-farmer
-saltine
-token asian, though she's more an oriental now that prop2 passed
-rank & file kkk
-douche, w/ frilly yellow hair and a cheddar beard
-white etc. white etc.
-me
fooken eh, i remember thinking, something HAS to be done before the minorities take over. 25 ppl in our program, and only 23 of them white? and that was before noticing my professor was a black woman, no doubt the winner in a candidate search resulting in far more qualified white men settling for employment as dish washers, garbage collectors, and other great jobs all the mexicans are stealing.
but THANK GOD for jennifer gratz, her b-average in hs, and a shite act score. most ppl - like me - would take their average 3.5 to an average directional school and consider umich an option for graduate studies; jay/gee, on the other hand, went to court b/c all the blacks were given her place at the university and someone had to sound the alarm for racial equality. seriously, affirmative action sounds good in theory, but in practice all it means is that some black doctor's son from west bloomfield is going to be given preference over a more qualified honkey. we just can't have that. first of all, have you seen all the black doctors living in wb? crackers only account for 75% of the student population at umich, and if any more than one of every four students are non-white, that could mean more black doctors in wb. like two. it's a cycle, and it's out of control. secondly, even though we must do away with affirmative action and any mention of race, we all know the black doctor's son couldn't hack the umich. he's black.
so yeah, good thing for prop2, especially since it gets to team up with the kill all fags amendment from two years ago. michigan's the more beautiful for it. first, we extradite all the homos; second, the women and minorities. all that's left are us sexy white heteros whose disposition toward the woe-is-me circle jerk will lead logically and predictably towards rampant sodomy, which means we ourselves will have to vacate the great state of bigotry. all that'll be left are the mourning doves and their hard-earned rights...
-honkey
-cracker
-white guy
-mustache with a mullet
-token black guy
-dub tee
-farmer
-saltine
-token asian, though she's more an oriental now that prop2 passed
-rank & file kkk
-douche, w/ frilly yellow hair and a cheddar beard
-white etc. white etc.
-me
fooken eh, i remember thinking, something HAS to be done before the minorities take over. 25 ppl in our program, and only 23 of them white? and that was before noticing my professor was a black woman, no doubt the winner in a candidate search resulting in far more qualified white men settling for employment as dish washers, garbage collectors, and other great jobs all the mexicans are stealing.
but THANK GOD for jennifer gratz, her b-average in hs, and a shite act score. most ppl - like me - would take their average 3.5 to an average directional school and consider umich an option for graduate studies; jay/gee, on the other hand, went to court b/c all the blacks were given her place at the university and someone had to sound the alarm for racial equality. seriously, affirmative action sounds good in theory, but in practice all it means is that some black doctor's son from west bloomfield is going to be given preference over a more qualified honkey. we just can't have that. first of all, have you seen all the black doctors living in wb? crackers only account for 75% of the student population at umich, and if any more than one of every four students are non-white, that could mean more black doctors in wb. like two. it's a cycle, and it's out of control. secondly, even though we must do away with affirmative action and any mention of race, we all know the black doctor's son couldn't hack the umich. he's black.
so yeah, good thing for prop2, especially since it gets to team up with the kill all fags amendment from two years ago. michigan's the more beautiful for it. first, we extradite all the homos; second, the women and minorities. all that's left are us sexy white heteros whose disposition toward the woe-is-me circle jerk will lead logically and predictably towards rampant sodomy, which means we ourselves will have to vacate the great state of bigotry. all that'll be left are the mourning doves and their hard-earned rights...
marathons at home offer lessons in humility involving 85-year-old women too weak to stand straight shuffling pass me at the 20-mile mark; marathons in africa use barefoot 12-year-old boys to slap me in the face with that very same humility, though perhaps it was actually the 15-year-old girl with just socks that clued me into my douchedom. or the 16-year-old boy in bedroom slippers? selah, at least i can console myself with the fact they covered the 42 km as a relay team and most likely didn't piss blood three days beforehand like i did. i doubt any of them finished out on a broken foot, either. weak mo'fuckas...
i was wondering aimlessly around ondangwa the other day - thinking about whether or not i could qualify my stint in pee/see as a success - when a taxi driver interrupted me from my reverie:
-polio, you are the one who learned me in okaku.
fooken eh, i've at least been saved the trouble of writing out an interminable post trying to capture the essense of my two years here. that's about fooken it:
appreciation: tick
acknowledgement: tick
learning someone when i was meant to teach him: tick
i mean, you can teach a man to fish and other third-world development bee/es like that, but you'll most likely have to buy him the fishing pole, and he'll prolly use it to herd goats...
tick.
-polio, you are the one who learned me in okaku.
fooken eh, i've at least been saved the trouble of writing out an interminable post trying to capture the essense of my two years here. that's about fooken it:
appreciation: tick
acknowledgement: tick
learning someone when i was meant to teach him: tick
i mean, you can teach a man to fish and other third-world development bee/es like that, but you'll most likely have to buy him the fishing pole, and he'll prolly use it to herd goats...
tick.
it's brilliant when beautiful ppl tell lovely ppl that yes, i will marry you, but only b/c a wedding's a great way to score yr own sunnies and wicker hat. GIVE ME BACK MY SHITE! ransom, such a worthless movie..
tate na meme samurai
tate na meme samurai
i love my blog b/c i don't have to write how fooken sweet i am: i can just publish notes other ppl write telling me how fooken sweet i am, though it's a bit triste that the goodbyes have already begun...
i have nice hair? the lady at least does:
Hey there, Tate Polio -
Just a quick farewell before you adios.
I have loved knowing (not in the Biblical sense) you over the last couple of years & I hope we are able to continue our friendship in the States... or on a sunny beach in Mexico with a cold beer & hot tamale. (Basically, Cory & I like you & sincerely hope that you like us too, which would greatly increase our chances of meeting up in the future.)
I like you because you write nice letters to The Namibian, you are famous in 'Faces & Places', you say I'm pretty, you are so kind to your friends and an ass to everyone else, you take nice photos, you tell the truth, you have a great vocabulary & good hair, and you're pretty funny, too.
Bye bye, love.
i have nice hair? the lady at least does:
i sat in a darkened room at 5.00 am this morning, deep in the heart of africa, drinking my pain away - the sort of pain that accompanies five umich losses - when i saw something on the telly that made me shit my keks: my hetero life mate, saddled to bronson's face. (is it really so wrong to love another man's beard?) of course, it reminded me of what a bunch of scavengers photags really are. i was watching as the umich team ambled calmly toward the little brown jug when my serenity was disturbed by a bunch of fat ppl and their cameras scurrying through the frame just so they could push and slap each other for the exact same fotos. bronson, of course, has to carry that beautiful beard around with him - plus he's fatter than most photags - so i was able to see him clearly, bringing up the rear..
i've started a rumour in pee/see circles that i'm running a marathon next month, though my training has differed slightly from the ones i've done before. in my relative youth i actually included running as a part of my training regimen, but now i'm old, and the best i can do is drink beer. to wit: every time i get the silly notion that 42 km is a long fooken distance, perhaps i should build up stanima, build up strength, i go to the cuca shop and soothe my anxiety with a nice cold tafel. training's gone well so far, but a couple weeks ago i varied my approach a bit and attempted an actual run. aside from a slight cold, the midday starting time, and no sunscreen, my 30k went pretty well. you know, if vomiting all over yrself is a good thing...
there are times i'm rocking a wild saturday night in bed - with a book - and i'm slightly buggered b/c i'm, well, reading a book while ppl back home are, at that very moment, watching some team beat up on umich. i know umich football is 3000 years old and that i should make the most of my time here in af-ree-ka b/c it's not like the university's going to blow up and stop playing football, but still... umich or coetzee?
anyhow, i looked at my watch a couple of saturdays ago... ok, i don't own a watch... i looked at my friend's watch and noticed umich was playing its season opener against vanderbilt. a bit of wish i was there started creeping up, but then i looked out of the car window and noticed this mo' fucka staring at me:
fuck it. who the ef is vandy anyhow...
anyhow, i looked at my watch a couple of saturdays ago... ok, i don't own a watch... i looked at my friend's watch and noticed umich was playing its season opener against vanderbilt. a bit of wish i was there started creeping up, but then i looked out of the car window and noticed this mo' fucka staring at me:
fuck it. who the ef is vandy anyhow...
i have less than two months as a pee/see/vee and, in peace corps parlance, must soon begin signing my checks with comma - are/pee/see/vee. every so often i'm slightly buggered about this, and sometimes i'm even pre-emptively nostalgic (i am a yankee, and pre-emptive is our favorite word) about the time i've spent in namibia, but mostly i'm at a loss about my myspace profile. i live in af-ree-ka, and that's cool. how cool could telling ppl i live in dearborn possibly be? i'll just pretend the dtw borders stretch a bit more westward than the corporate elites' sense of security would like to admit.
selah, i've discovered a way to combat any of the morose feelings that've attached themselves to my sense of winding down: i grab a bucket and wash my clothes. i might miss the easy-going lifestyle of southern africa, the fact i have no administrative oversight to crawl up my arse, and the huge white smiles my students rock b/c of a 43% english mark (39%? i'm sooooo fooken smarter than you are, derelict..), but i won't miss the two hours i spend wringing soap from my clothes and pretending they're any cleaner than when i peeled them off the same body i clean once every three days. ef/tee/es.
i also won't miss this hole in my crotch. i've spent the last __ years buying old navy jeans rather than levis b/c the old navys have been $22 and the levis $27. the old navys generally last a year before they grow holes in the crotch and left knee, and it finally occured to me last winter holiday an extra $5 would let me conceal the concomitant holes that've eaten the crotch out of my five-year-old boxers. the type of ppl wearing levis include gold prospectors, doods on horses, and ppl with muscles, so the books i read shouldn't apply too much stress on my tough guy denim. but wtf, a hole? it's only september. a good pregger lasts longer than my $27 did. what possible scientific explanation could there be? perhaps it's the toxic pud that burns a hole into my jeans' ozone layer - soap's expensive, right - but my left knee? why doesn't my right wear any of my trousers threadbare? ef/tee/es, too...
selah, i've discovered a way to combat any of the morose feelings that've attached themselves to my sense of winding down: i grab a bucket and wash my clothes. i might miss the easy-going lifestyle of southern africa, the fact i have no administrative oversight to crawl up my arse, and the huge white smiles my students rock b/c of a 43% english mark (39%? i'm sooooo fooken smarter than you are, derelict..), but i won't miss the two hours i spend wringing soap from my clothes and pretending they're any cleaner than when i peeled them off the same body i clean once every three days. ef/tee/es.
i also won't miss this hole in my crotch. i've spent the last __ years buying old navy jeans rather than levis b/c the old navys have been $22 and the levis $27. the old navys generally last a year before they grow holes in the crotch and left knee, and it finally occured to me last winter holiday an extra $5 would let me conceal the concomitant holes that've eaten the crotch out of my five-year-old boxers. the type of ppl wearing levis include gold prospectors, doods on horses, and ppl with muscles, so the books i read shouldn't apply too much stress on my tough guy denim. but wtf, a hole? it's only september. a good pregger lasts longer than my $27 did. what possible scientific explanation could there be? perhaps it's the toxic pud that burns a hole into my jeans' ozone layer - soap's expensive, right - but my left knee? why doesn't my right wear any of my trousers threadbare? ef/tee/es, too...
i had me a bit of a g/f last year who, while super hott, happened to be really fooken hott. (notice the two t’s.) aside from how hott she was, there wasn’t a whole lot more to our relationship other than the friday nights spent together doing the sort of things lonely pee/see types do after a week of solitude. i’d say that meant we spoke comprehensible english, but we didn’t really have a whole lot to say to one another. i’d sometimes do that faux-caring thing where you ask how her week was, but that was a waste of time considering i never listened to the responses. a waste of time in namibia? selah, i’m not going to lie and say i was there to chat in the first place.
anyhow, shallow as i am – HOTT! – it did bother me that i spent my time away from the bush with someone i had no sustainable interest in. then again, wasting time in namibia? there is no such a thing, so i toughed it out even though it wasn’t very trying in the conventional sense of tough. i mean, it sucks to go through the motions of a dead relationship, but each time i made up my mind to end things i realized breaking up with her also meant breaking up with her hot shower. africa, yeah, but still too cold in the winter to be bathing with cold water. there was also the small issue that after last september breaking up also meant breaking up with her germans.
before september my friday routine was to rock over to the lady’s, say hello, shower, read the paper rather than chat, eat dinner, try to talk about something, pass the time doing somehow, shower, go to bed, wake up, shower, return to the bush. after september we stopped pretending we wanted to talk to each other after dinner and started hanging out with the two german girls who recently moved onto the mission where my lady friend was living. i liked them well enough already simply for greasing the wheels a bit on my friday nights, but chasa was in the habit of dragging us to pee/see par-tays before ditching us for whatever it was she did, and that left us free to sit outside drinking beers, smoking ciggies, and becoming friends.
eventually a combi accident enabled the germans and i to cut out the middle-chasa and become wholesale friends of our own, and we've spent the last eight months either in my garden with the same beer and ciggies we had before or in oshaks at our friend andrew’s, which coincidently has a hot shower of its own. oh, and beer and ciggies, though not always the same (marlboro lights vs. stuyvesent?). this year has been so much better than my first year of pee/see, and i imagine for all the reasons i was told to expect, but i suspect the actual reason i've gotten on better has been that i've enjoyed my primary relationships rather than feeling apprehensive about them.
so marlene and anna came last september, and that was nearly a year ago, so they've just auf wiedersehen'd. bugger. looks like the next few months will be spent alone in my garden with my marlboro lights, unless i happen to rock oshaks, which means stuyvesents...
anyhow, shallow as i am – HOTT! – it did bother me that i spent my time away from the bush with someone i had no sustainable interest in. then again, wasting time in namibia? there is no such a thing, so i toughed it out even though it wasn’t very trying in the conventional sense of tough. i mean, it sucks to go through the motions of a dead relationship, but each time i made up my mind to end things i realized breaking up with her also meant breaking up with her hot shower. africa, yeah, but still too cold in the winter to be bathing with cold water. there was also the small issue that after last september breaking up also meant breaking up with her germans.
before september my friday routine was to rock over to the lady’s, say hello, shower, read the paper rather than chat, eat dinner, try to talk about something, pass the time doing somehow, shower, go to bed, wake up, shower, return to the bush. after september we stopped pretending we wanted to talk to each other after dinner and started hanging out with the two german girls who recently moved onto the mission where my lady friend was living. i liked them well enough already simply for greasing the wheels a bit on my friday nights, but chasa was in the habit of dragging us to pee/see par-tays before ditching us for whatever it was she did, and that left us free to sit outside drinking beers, smoking ciggies, and becoming friends.
eventually a combi accident enabled the germans and i to cut out the middle-chasa and become wholesale friends of our own, and we've spent the last eight months either in my garden with the same beer and ciggies we had before or in oshaks at our friend andrew’s, which coincidently has a hot shower of its own. oh, and beer and ciggies, though not always the same (marlboro lights vs. stuyvesent?). this year has been so much better than my first year of pee/see, and i imagine for all the reasons i was told to expect, but i suspect the actual reason i've gotten on better has been that i've enjoyed my primary relationships rather than feeling apprehensive about them.
so marlene and anna came last september, and that was nearly a year ago, so they've just auf wiedersehen'd. bugger. looks like the next few months will be spent alone in my garden with my marlboro lights, unless i happen to rock oshaks, which means stuyvesents...
man, i'm sooo fooken artsy: i used the full moon, a slow exposure, and photoshop to spell my name. next time i'll just use a bic.
actually, that's not art. art is the lift i got into town this morning: a big lorry driven by a man with no front teeth, a ciggie in his right hand, a bottle of wine in his left, and a vague recollection that i'm the oshilumbu he's seen running alongside the road the past few months. that dood needs to be embalmed and placed in a museum somewhere.
actually, that's not art. art is the lift i got into town this morning: a big lorry driven by a man with no front teeth, a ciggie in his right hand, a bottle of wine in his left, and a vague recollection that i'm the oshilumbu he's seen running alongside the road the past few months. that dood needs to be embalmed and placed in a museum somewhere.
i saw condi-matrix give a press conference the other day where she talked about getting high on love and brokering peace between the jews and arabs. or perhaps she was talking about the activation codes for israel's invisible missile force-field. i don' t know b/c i was more focused on the sign behind her head than i was the words coming out of that head. the western white house? what the ef is that? i understand that much of the criticism levied toward aWol about the amount of time he spends on "holiday" is unwarranted considering the technological environment we live in today. no president really takes a holiday the same way, say, a pee/see volunteer does when (s)he ducks out of country incommunicado for a week or two, and it's not as if fdr's lack of access to videoconferencing is ever mentioned when comparing his holiday record to bush's. but still, the western white house? how fooken orwellien does it have to get before someone says this seems a bit orwellien? the western white house? that's almost as bad as the network correspondents reporting from the western white house against a backdrop of bailed hay and spare wagon wheels. ok, aWol bought himself a ranch/media image in the run-up to the 2000 presidential election, but unless he's reflectively dyslexic and the w stands for mennonite, i'll have to say the wagon wheels are overkill as props. i hope. i can only imagine how easily the press has fallen in line: "...reporting from the western white house..."
since i've dressed up today as capt. obvious, i might as well point out that things here are a bit different. actually, i'm not in much of a euphemistic mood, so i'll just say ppl here are fooken strange. since i seriously considered studying anthropology while at emu, i believe i have adequate license to wax ethnologically about the owambos: if nervous or trying to pass uncomfortable moments of silence, girls will pick their noses and boys will put a vice grip on their tackle. e.g.
i don't know what he was so nervous about. i wasn't doing much other than asking him to stand still so i could get a head shot for his personal file. and yes, that is a peppermint patty shirt he's rocking, which makes him slightly less gangsta gangsta than the kwaito master who shied into my office last week, a firm hold of his testicles, to ask for condoms. oh the irony. i understand english perfectly well, and i know enough oshiwambo to pick up on a request for condoms, so i didn't quite see the need for an illustration of sorts.
-yes, i know you wear the condom there.. next time just help yrself..
i don't know what he was so nervous about. i wasn't doing much other than asking him to stand still so i could get a head shot for his personal file. and yes, that is a peppermint patty shirt he's rocking, which makes him slightly less gangsta gangsta than the kwaito master who shied into my office last week, a firm hold of his testicles, to ask for condoms. oh the irony. i understand english perfectly well, and i know enough oshiwambo to pick up on a request for condoms, so i didn't quite see the need for an illustration of sorts.
-yes, i know you wear the condom there.. next time just help yrself..
i like external examinations in the states and the #2 pencil required to take them. external here means someone else writes the exams and you have to correct them. belch. or rather, selah. every so often i read something that makes marking 400 tests and 400 separate essays worthwhile, and by every so often i mean yesterday was the first time in the two years i’ve been here. for the writing portion of the exams, students are expected to choose one of four or five prompts to respond to. for instance:
i’ve spent the past few weeks wishing it was october so i could go home, but after reading one of the responses to the prompt above, i’d prefer to live here forever:
fooken priceless, especially considering my troubles negotiating the cultural divide: i can't decide whether this kid has a loose grip on english or if he's a straight up perv. and i'm totally importing make that monkey dance into my personal vernacular..
Write a response to the following letter that was written to a magazine asking for advice:
I am 15-years-old and I have a problem and I don’t know who else to turn to. I have been going with a girl for six months. Now she tells me she is ready for sex. I told her that I wasn’t but now she says I don’t love her. She said she will find another boy if we don’t have sex. She says everyone is doing it. I do love her and I don’t want to lose her. What should I do?
Signed, Confused
i’ve spent the past few weeks wishing it was october so i could go home, but after reading one of the responses to the prompt above, i’d prefer to live here forever:
To aboy that has 15 years and he has a problem with sex a young girl. My Name is ****** I want to advice your problem. You said that you have aproblem about your girl friend.
I want to advice you. My friend If you want to solve that problem I have some ideas for you. First Just stay with you girl friend but don’t do sex with her. If you want to solve that problem sleep with a monkey when you sleep with it make sure that, that monkey is a female monkey. When you sleep with it push your pines in the vagina’s monkey and tell that monkey to dance. After having sex with amonkey go back to your girls friend and say that I want to have sex with you now. Your girl friend will not agree with you and she will Just said that no we will not have sex now but we will have sex when I am 13 years old that is what you need to do to solve your problem.
fooken priceless, especially considering my troubles negotiating the cultural divide: i can't decide whether this kid has a loose grip on english or if he's a straight up perv. and i'm totally importing make that monkey dance into my personal vernacular..
oh the owambo oh. not oh like the American ooohhh used to communicate that the slow process of understanding has finally completed itself; more like someone meant to mouth the letters o and h the very moment someone punched him in the stomach, the h lingering a bit as a glottal stop. it’s meant to register disbelief, so it’s often followed with an aa-ee (pronounced ahh-yay, it means no) and then an audible purse of the lips to signal that the original disbelief has segued into disapproval, an accusation of sorts, prolly that whoever’s speaking is also lying. i hear it most often when i tell my students they’re in trouble, though it tends to accompany anything i might mention to them, from outright fibs, such as american teachers bbq the worst learner after every term, to things wholly validated, like bats are blind.
-not every honkey has a shit ton of money, you effing wankers. i’ve told you this before. stop asking.
-oh… aa-ee… *lip smack*
i was in tsumeb a couple weeks ago for the regional debate competition. tsumeb’s a proper town – one or two paved roads and actual houses rather than homesteads and fields of mahangu – so most of our debaters found themselves a bit out of their element. by element i mean the aforementioned roads. there are actually three or four, possibly even six, paved roads in tsumeb; a couple stretches are actually four-laned. this is quite different than the tire tracks cut into the sandy paths that pass for a road in the village. i wondered about this each morning as we footed from our hostel to the debate venue when the kids would step off the sidewalk and into the road, wholly oblivious to the power of physics:
mass x acceleration = dead learner, one less paper to grade.
our last morning in tsumeb i thought to tell the group of boys crossing diagonally across an intersection that there are some countries where that would merit a fine, that it’s not entirely safe, but then i anticipated the owambo oh and realized nothing would be added to their understanding. i kept mum instead, thinking i’d prefer much more to see them splayed in front a car rather than hear another smack of pursed lips. i’m not entirely heartless. i’m sure there was a hospital nearby, proper town and all.
speaking of debate, i’ve been legitimately pissed off perhaps three times since i’ve been in namibia, and two of those occasions were because of debate, a bit odd considering my flippant stance towards it last year. the first time i was shirty was a good month before our first competition was scheduled to take place, when the other school in my cluster arrived furtively and held the competition without my knowledge. they even selected which of my students were to participate without any input from me. i was, coincidently, going to begin teaching my english club about debate that very same day, and it was only because i had to ask around the school, where is? where is? that i discovered ppl were getting down and dirty with debate. yeah, irate. i busted into the debate just as they were reading the results. quite wroth, so i fastened the spurs to my boots and cut a wheel over those bitches’ faces. then i got out my lasso and tied them to a desk. finally i peed on them. don’t piss me off.
the second time i had the estoy enojado was just before the regional debate in tsumeb. I have one student here who looks like michael jackson circa jackson 5 and doubles as mildly not-stupid. he was supposed to tag along to tsumeb and compete in the debate, but some dildo-smack of a teacher told him he couldn’t go b/c an exam was scheduled. i hate these doss cunts who bully students into submission to ensure they’re never never never inconvenienced, so i went to his office and paid him all sorts of compliments, such as lazy fucker, incompetent wanker, go blow yrself, i hope you die, etc. when he looked ready to respond i interrupted by putting my ciggie out on his face. all that was actually after i tried to reason with him. i initially asked why jackson 5 michael jackson couldn’t make up the exam when he returned, but the douche-rocket answered, it is impossible. it is impossible, just like the owambo oh, is a local colloquialism and is definitely more connotative than denotative. it’s basically euphemistic, and translates roughly as i’m super fucking lazy and don’t ask me to do it if it requires effort on my part… oh it requires effort? it is impossible..
selah, i took black michael jackson with me to tsumeb and left that teacher behind to die. he was still alive when i returned, which is ok considering i tend to overreact when i’m angry. i don’t punch walls or kick doors, but i do tend to say things that burn bridges. i suppose i also leave ciggie burns as a sort of i was here and wasn’t very happy, which might be considered a bit over-the-top. the teacher i’m speaking of is actually quite hard working, but fuck him, he pissed me off. aside from that i’m quite genteel. take, for instance, the 1970s bus that drove us back and forth from tsumeb. the bus driver looked too modern staring into the sun, so i let him borrow my aviators:
-not every honkey has a shit ton of money, you effing wankers. i’ve told you this before. stop asking.
-oh… aa-ee… *lip smack*
i was in tsumeb a couple weeks ago for the regional debate competition. tsumeb’s a proper town – one or two paved roads and actual houses rather than homesteads and fields of mahangu – so most of our debaters found themselves a bit out of their element. by element i mean the aforementioned roads. there are actually three or four, possibly even six, paved roads in tsumeb; a couple stretches are actually four-laned. this is quite different than the tire tracks cut into the sandy paths that pass for a road in the village. i wondered about this each morning as we footed from our hostel to the debate venue when the kids would step off the sidewalk and into the road, wholly oblivious to the power of physics:
mass x acceleration = dead learner, one less paper to grade.
our last morning in tsumeb i thought to tell the group of boys crossing diagonally across an intersection that there are some countries where that would merit a fine, that it’s not entirely safe, but then i anticipated the owambo oh and realized nothing would be added to their understanding. i kept mum instead, thinking i’d prefer much more to see them splayed in front a car rather than hear another smack of pursed lips. i’m not entirely heartless. i’m sure there was a hospital nearby, proper town and all.
speaking of debate, i’ve been legitimately pissed off perhaps three times since i’ve been in namibia, and two of those occasions were because of debate, a bit odd considering my flippant stance towards it last year. the first time i was shirty was a good month before our first competition was scheduled to take place, when the other school in my cluster arrived furtively and held the competition without my knowledge. they even selected which of my students were to participate without any input from me. i was, coincidently, going to begin teaching my english club about debate that very same day, and it was only because i had to ask around the school, where is? where is? that i discovered ppl were getting down and dirty with debate. yeah, irate. i busted into the debate just as they were reading the results. quite wroth, so i fastened the spurs to my boots and cut a wheel over those bitches’ faces. then i got out my lasso and tied them to a desk. finally i peed on them. don’t piss me off.
the second time i had the estoy enojado was just before the regional debate in tsumeb. I have one student here who looks like michael jackson circa jackson 5 and doubles as mildly not-stupid. he was supposed to tag along to tsumeb and compete in the debate, but some dildo-smack of a teacher told him he couldn’t go b/c an exam was scheduled. i hate these doss cunts who bully students into submission to ensure they’re never never never inconvenienced, so i went to his office and paid him all sorts of compliments, such as lazy fucker, incompetent wanker, go blow yrself, i hope you die, etc. when he looked ready to respond i interrupted by putting my ciggie out on his face. all that was actually after i tried to reason with him. i initially asked why jackson 5 michael jackson couldn’t make up the exam when he returned, but the douche-rocket answered, it is impossible. it is impossible, just like the owambo oh, is a local colloquialism and is definitely more connotative than denotative. it’s basically euphemistic, and translates roughly as i’m super fucking lazy and don’t ask me to do it if it requires effort on my part… oh it requires effort? it is impossible..
selah, i took black michael jackson with me to tsumeb and left that teacher behind to die. he was still alive when i returned, which is ok considering i tend to overreact when i’m angry. i don’t punch walls or kick doors, but i do tend to say things that burn bridges. i suppose i also leave ciggie burns as a sort of i was here and wasn’t very happy, which might be considered a bit over-the-top. the teacher i’m speaking of is actually quite hard working, but fuck him, he pissed me off. aside from that i’m quite genteel. take, for instance, the 1970s bus that drove us back and forth from tsumeb. the bus driver looked too modern staring into the sun, so i let him borrow my aviators:
it occurs to me three months have passed since nate and kristi’s visit and i’ve yet to mention anything about it. i guess there’s nothing much to say aside from it was quite lovely. what else is there to really say? i mean, i putted around south africa and namibia with old friends who look like they’re in love. and it's not the in love i'm so impressed with; it's that they look like they’re in love. being in love is easy. shite, i’ve done it once or twice myself. but actually pulling off the look, that’s a harder gig to rock. look:
still, i imagine there are a few things i can mention about our holiday, things like snoop upside yr head; liberal amounts of beer and wine; painful thighs and a beautiful view; car surfing monkeys; afrikaaners who don’t like our music; canadians who do; petrol stations that sell gay bans but no petrol; and walalapo, walalapo, walalapo. about here is where i should insert the et cetera.
still, i imagine there are a few things i can mention about our holiday, things like snoop upside yr head; liberal amounts of beer and wine; painful thighs and a beautiful view; car surfing monkeys; afrikaaners who don’t like our music; canadians who do; petrol stations that sell gay bans but no petrol; and walalapo, walalapo, walalapo. about here is where i should insert the et cetera.
so my little filipino just had a baby, though i suppose spanish / tagalog / whatever they speak over there would have that she's actually my little filipina. i suppose even further that she's not so much my little filipino/a anymore as she is rob's wifey. wait, i think i've made it sound as if sarah and i once had a relationship. i mean, we used to live together, and we even shared a bedroom, but seriously, we slept in bunkbeds and argued over who got to sleep on the couch in the living room so we didn't have to hear though the walls as our third flatmate got busy with his lady.
anyhow, congrats sarah and rob, and welcome ava love kalani.
anyhow, congrats sarah and rob, and welcome ava love kalani.
i love the trees here that look like something dr. suess would've drawn...
...though i love even more when someone pisses their way into the foto.
...though i love even more when someone pisses their way into the foto.
i love living in africa. this type of shite doesn't happen at home. well, detroit, so yeah, it happens. kind of. at least this guy didn't actually pull the trigger:
On July 9 2006 at about 22h45 I went home in a blue Toyota Corolla taxi (the model just before the new one, I think it came out in 1996). Unfortunately I did not get a chance to see the number plate. We were going along Claudius Kanduvasu Street. At Abraham Mashego Street we turned left heading towards Khomasdal. There the driver accelerated to the point that he overtook two taxis on the speed bump and on the right bend the taxi went over the kerb. At this point the car was actually sliding between the last taxi he overtook and a third one.
I was sitting on the right rear seat and when this happened my head was centimetres away from the rear left door. I asked him to slow down and he said that was the way he drove. Then I asked him to stop the taxi since I felt my life was in danger. He refused. I then took out my 9 mm pistol, loaded it so that he heard that I was armed. He then had a lot to say, but I noticed that he slowed down to 60 km/h. Later he apologised. The question is, did he apologise because he put my life in danger, or because I was armed at the time?
Concerned,
Windhoek
i was driving around in my donkey cart as some lady walked past (slow ass fooken donkeys) and asked if i wanted to buy the oshimbale basket on top of her head, n$20. the rand's finally down, so i've been using my debit card for added purhase power, except she didn't know what the fuck a debit card was and told me to stab myself in the face, cash only. so i did. i was fairly excited about scoring a basket for less than us$3, but apparently she was more excited to cop n$20 of some honkey pushover. i should've negotiated.
at least she danced with me.
at least she danced with me.
my closest relationship in namibia has been with a colleague of mine, lydia. our friendship has nothing to do with the fact that she’s intelligent and speaks english well enough for us to talk about more than how hot it is; it’s more a result of her car and satellite dish. oh, her daughter too. i can say without hyperbole that tsepo is the most beautiful child i’ve ever seen. in person, of course. a healthy amount of bias will shift my preference toward maggie once i finally meet her, but until then i’m an uncle without a niece i can tote around. i suppose i have fotos to help maintain match fitness, but fotos get taped to the wall in my office and become a logistical nightmare whenever my students ask, “uncle polio, can we see yr niece?” selah, i’ll just thieve me a stand-in…
i was going to post this foto, or perhaps this one or this one, or maybe even one of lydia and tsepo together, but i took this one last week and like it bestest:
i was going to post this foto, or perhaps this one or this one, or maybe even one of lydia and tsepo together, but i took this one last week and like it bestest:
namibia markets itself as a land of contrasts, and nowhere is the contrast more apparent than between form and content, theory and practice, de jure and de facto:
my girly soccer team is 3-1-0 at last count, which translates into american as 3-0-1. point: zero losses, mofuckas! more point: apparently my best work here is simple initiative. girl soccer, there is no such a thing, or at least there is no such a thing until some american cracker puts a team together, they win a few matches, and then everyone begins to assume the team is theirs. at first i couldn’t get anyone to help me – a substantial problem b/c all i know about soccer is that i want to play love with mia hamm – but then i remembered gee-wanker-bush is my hero. his managerial style takes no account of personal ignorance as long as one surrounds himself with cronies-who-know, and obviously that approach seems to work, so i adapted it to my own circumstances: i walked into my grade 10, grabbed three derelicts, and told them they must teach the girls how to play proper soccer while i sat under a tree drinking beer (w = lush, i = lush). it was a headache those first few weeks – prolly just a hangover – but then the girls had some success at a tournament and interest has since compounded itself. now the principal uses his free time to teach the team basic skills and strategies, the boys organize training regimens, and the girls have become more assertive about their right to play. they’ve even become slightly proud of themselves, or at least that’s how i’d interpret their insistence on cleaning their uniforms before matches (uniforms generally get thrown in a box and stored away until a match… they tend to smell like shite). my own role as supreme leader has since been downgraded. now all i do is shame other schools into playing us, take fotos, and write notes on my blog about how they’re still my girls. something like that. i suppose i also maintain confidence in my team while the principal criticizes their abilities. he may be more interested than he was before, but he’s still a raging chauvinist. last week he was laughing to me as they were taking a corner, “those girls stand next to the goal; they know she can’t kick that far.” this just before she launched the ball past the net…
i fooken love true/false questioning. it doesn't engender much critical thinking, but it definitely boosts self-esteem. kind of. consider:
-mateus, true or false?
-true.
-no, thanks though. hileni, true or false?
-true.
-uhh... no. filipus, true or false?
-true.
-next question...
this exchange varies occasionally:
-true or false, and the answer isn't false?
-false.
selah, english isn't working, and the spanish never got off the ground, so i'll pin the last of my pedagogical hopes on french. a sample lesson:
-the u.s. is soooo great at soccer… we’re #5 in the fifa rankings… we would’ve beaten italy if it wasn’t for that wanker ref… blah blah blah…
-you are not good at soccer. the u.s. is only good at carrying guns and warring with ppl.
[blink]
-touché.
and sheeat, while i'm on the school tip, might as well relate a meeting i had with a parent and our two translators:
me ----->
principal translates english into english ----->
cleaning lady translates broken english into oshiwambo ------>
parent nods assent ------>
cleaning lady again ------>
me, i think. i should actually relate the content of the meeting, but i wasn't really listening. i'm sure it was nothing more than four hours of greetings.
-mateus, true or false?
-true.
-no, thanks though. hileni, true or false?
-true.
-uhh... no. filipus, true or false?
-true.
-next question...
this exchange varies occasionally:
-true or false, and the answer isn't false?
-false.
selah, english isn't working, and the spanish never got off the ground, so i'll pin the last of my pedagogical hopes on french. a sample lesson:
-the u.s. is soooo great at soccer… we’re #5 in the fifa rankings… we would’ve beaten italy if it wasn’t for that wanker ref… blah blah blah…
-you are not good at soccer. the u.s. is only good at carrying guns and warring with ppl.
[blink]
-touché.
and sheeat, while i'm on the school tip, might as well relate a meeting i had with a parent and our two translators:
me ----->
principal translates english into english ----->
cleaning lady translates broken english into oshiwambo ------>
parent nods assent ------>
cleaning lady again ------>
me, i think. i should actually relate the content of the meeting, but i wasn't really listening. i'm sure it was nothing more than four hours of greetings.
polio's been rocking out in nam, which is quite funny when you walk two hours into the bush to visit the the twin memes and they keep asking in broken english about yr father, tate polio.
-he's fine, he's fine... oh, yr making a joke... i get it... finally.
-he's fine, he's fine... oh, yr making a joke... i get it... finally.
the world cup's well into the second stage of group play and my prediction seems to be holding fast. it could change tonight, though i shouldn't use could b/c the u.s. is playing italy, and the italians tend to know beforehand who's won, lost, or drawn. selah, at least the game's in kaiserslautern, which is the administrative seat of the political district my sister and i were born in. banal personal trivia is almost like playing the sex, non?
anyhow, i had a reason for mentioning the world cup: david odonkor, my new favorite soccer player. i don't know who he plays for, or even if he's any good, but i do know he looks a lot like pedro, and pedro makes out with dogs. good enough for me.
anyhow, i had a reason for mentioning the world cup: david odonkor, my new favorite soccer player. i don't know who he plays for, or even if he's any good, but i do know he looks a lot like pedro, and pedro makes out with dogs. good enough for me.
my pee/see recruiter told me i was making a two-year commitment, not a two-year sacrifice. i can do without the electricity, teevee, internet (kind of), hot water (not really), coffee (not at all) and especially the noxious family (hmmm..), but now there's word of a ten-year hs reunion and i'm no longer sure this was the best decision for me:
a. two years africa side, the slight chance an elephant might trample my garden
b. a chance to survey how fat my hs crush has become
normally i'd choose b., but i ran into her just before leaving for namibia. she's still pretty hot, definitely skinny...
a. two years africa side, the slight chance an elephant might trample my garden
b. a chance to survey how fat my hs crush has become
normally i'd choose b., but i ran into her just before leaving for namibia. she's still pretty hot, definitely skinny...
i found a way to consolidate pee/see responsibilities:
income generation + girly soccer = prize money
i stuck my ladies in a tournament against big bad senior secondary schools. we're but a village school, and those mofuckas can actually afford to tie shoes onto their girls' feet. selah, shoes are for boys. my girls won their first game and then drew in the final. they technically should've taken second b/c of goal differential, but my principal shit all over the field until the team we drew with agreed to split the prize money:
$225 prize - $150 entry fee = more money than we had before
so yeah, we didn't win, but my girls didn't lose either. that's something to be proud of, especially since the only mention of girly soccer last year came when the principal said to me, "these girls, they are troubling me to play." now he actually refers to them as his soccer players during morning assemblies. progress.
income generation + girly soccer = prize money
i stuck my ladies in a tournament against big bad senior secondary schools. we're but a village school, and those mofuckas can actually afford to tie shoes onto their girls' feet. selah, shoes are for boys. my girls won their first game and then drew in the final. they technically should've taken second b/c of goal differential, but my principal shit all over the field until the team we drew with agreed to split the prize money:
$225 prize - $150 entry fee = more money than we had before
so yeah, we didn't win, but my girls didn't lose either. that's something to be proud of, especially since the only mention of girly soccer last year came when the principal said to me, "these girls, they are troubling me to play." now he actually refers to them as his soccer players during morning assemblies. progress.
keeping up with the blog's a lot easier the second year of pee/see than it is the first. all i do now is find what i wrote this time last year and write, ditto. 3-2? sheeat.. i suppose one thing's different this time around: i have a friend who has a girlfriend who has a satellite dish. fuck day-old voice of america; i'm watching this shit live...
i heard part of the gw’s memorial day commemoration given at arlington, more specifically his assertion that america is reluctant to engage in warfare. i presume he was speaking on my behalf, so yeah, reluctant, but had he been speaking merely as himself, he should’ve just dropped trough and pissed all over the tomb of the unknown soldier.
le wanker should also stop confusing integrity with integral, at least when he's announcing his nomination of some other mass-produced white collar criminal to his administration. i'm sure the new treasury secretary will be just as much a man of integrity as john snow was. i'm also sure he'll be just as integral to the ballooning deficit. meet the new douche, same as the old douche..
le wanker should also stop confusing integrity with integral, at least when he's announcing his nomination of some other mass-produced white collar criminal to his administration. i'm sure the new treasury secretary will be just as much a man of integrity as john snow was. i'm also sure he'll be just as integral to the ballooning deficit. meet the new douche, same as the old douche..
One of my favorite phenomena of the human mind is cryptomnesia, in which you genuinely regard an idea of yrs as original even though it's not: it simply fell into the memory hole. I suppose afflatic forgetting is an indispensable part of the creative process, non? I suppose as well that cryptomnesia isn't a proper explanation for the times I've read someone else's ideas and swear I'd thought the same thing myself, that I simply never got around to categorizing them into a communicatable philosophy. So my third supposition must be that cryptamnesia is a means in itself, an excuse to mention my awareness of freaky mind tricks. Next blog: jamais vu.
Anyhow, ideas that aren't mine even though I swear they were, unless they were mine till someone forgot they weren't his and published his thoughts so I'd eventually read them and swear I'd thought of that bullshite myself. Whatevs. I'd call this the most intelligent book I’ve read since I’ve been in Namibia, and that counts as high praise considering I want Kundera to make babies for me. Granted, Kundera's chosen form of expression requires that he disguise his philosophies as some mildly fictional plot about some Eastern Euro-types named Ludvik or Jaroslav, but understanding his system of thought requires intellectual acumen, and most the time I’m just too lazy to think anything other than, oh, nice boobies, even though nice boobies are oftentimes more literary than actual literature. The Secret Lives of Bees, for example, that fucking horseshite of a book. I gather it would be wise to model proper behavior to a classroom full of kids I've been stressing the importance of reading to, but I couldn't contain my rage over wasting 200 pages of my life as I chucked it outside the room and into a dirty, dirty puddle of mud. Then I stepped on it. After I spit on it. Imagine if I actually finished the book. I'd have prolly stabbed someone in the face.
So yeah, guest writer, if by guest writer I mean someone who wrote a book that I transcribed into a Word document so I could ctrl-c ctrl-x the next time I had internet access. Screw you and yrs.
Anyhow, ideas that aren't mine even though I swear they were, unless they were mine till someone forgot they weren't his and published his thoughts so I'd eventually read them and swear I'd thought of that bullshite myself. Whatevs. I'd call this the most intelligent book I’ve read since I’ve been in Namibia, and that counts as high praise considering I want Kundera to make babies for me. Granted, Kundera's chosen form of expression requires that he disguise his philosophies as some mildly fictional plot about some Eastern Euro-types named Ludvik or Jaroslav, but understanding his system of thought requires intellectual acumen, and most the time I’m just too lazy to think anything other than, oh, nice boobies, even though nice boobies are oftentimes more literary than actual literature. The Secret Lives of Bees, for example, that fucking horseshite of a book. I gather it would be wise to model proper behavior to a classroom full of kids I've been stressing the importance of reading to, but I couldn't contain my rage over wasting 200 pages of my life as I chucked it outside the room and into a dirty, dirty puddle of mud. Then I stepped on it. After I spit on it. Imagine if I actually finished the book. I'd have prolly stabbed someone in the face.
So yeah, guest writer, if by guest writer I mean someone who wrote a book that I transcribed into a Word document so I could ctrl-c ctrl-x the next time I had internet access. Screw you and yrs.
Hypocrisy
Norms are based neither on nature not on reason, but on passion. Virtues are tricks to satisfy our selfishness. Under the guise of propriety, we sail round the rocks barring the satisfaction of our self-liking. Hypocrisy dogs pride like a shadow. Quite often our cant is not deliberate. Selfishness lurks behind even sincere altruism. Every man deceives himself. Reason, too, is unwittingly guided by passion; all thought is a rationalization of desire. In the end, we even learn to look on egoism as something sinful. For that very reason, the revelation that self-conceit lies at the heart of society is felt as an affront to our self-conceit.
Stupidity reigns where all seems self-evident. We are blind to the role of pride and to its camouflage. Intelligence cannot tear the veil away: pride blinds even the most sensible man to pride.
Stupidity as the Basis of Civilization
Stupidity is unwitting self-destruction, the ability to act against one’s best interests, with death as the extreme result. This talent is typically human. To begin with, man is the only species stupid enough to attract the attention of wild animals by the cries he utters at birth. In addition, man comes into the world a livid purple so that he lacks the protective colouring needed to vanish in the undergrowth. Moreover, man is one of the few mammals unable to walk at birth.
Worst still, while animals have retained an instinct for self-preservation, man is capable of risking his own survival and that of his species on a whim. For the sake of delusions concerning race, nation, sex or religion, we are prepared to sacrifices ourselves and our fellow men.
On the one hand stupidity poses a daily threat to civilization; on the other it constitutes the mystical foundation of our existence. For if man was not to fall victim to his own stupidity, he had to develop his intelligence. All the strategies aimed at controlling our stupidity combine to form our civilization. Culture is a time- and place-conditioned product of a series of more or less abortive attempts to come to grips with the self-destructive folly found in all countries and at all times.
Second Nature
Habit frees us from the necessity of having to think about everything. Without a fixed frame of reference we should have to constantly reconsider the fluctuating situations in which we find ourselves. The rituals of propriety, which regulate our social relations, relieve us of worries about mutual tensions and allow us to concentrate on the conversation. And we can only speak spontaneously by blindly observing the grammatical rules. Rhetoric abounds in platitudes for channeling our thoughts, which cannot develop if the rules of logic have become second nature.
As soon as we become aware of automatisms, our thoughts cease to range freely. The pianist stumbles over the keys if he thinks about the fingering. The walker loses his balance if he pays attention to the rhythm of his steps. Dumb habit is no obstacle to free development. Enlightened thought does not prove its worth in the fight against routine; rules have a liberating effect as long as we follow them unthinkingly.
Our intellectual creativity can only flourish within conceptual limitations. The spirit thrives by grace of the dead letter, on condition that we ignore this fact. Stupidity, in short, is a prerequisite for intellectual growth.
same as last year, except this year i know better than to confuse sisty with ma's and pa's. happy anniv, happy bday, oshili rocka, sucka bustas..
los tigres have the best record in mlb? ¿¿¿mofucken como??? you'll scroll down and notice i've been rocking the old english dee africa side...
(front runner)
(front runner)
since i’ve been here i’ve done those sorts of things inexperienced volunteers are supposed to pull off that the local populace apparently can’t, things like book acquisition for a fledgling library, managing the debate club, generating ideas for alternative forms of income, arranging hiv testing opportunities for students, noticing the rather skewed emphasis on boys soccer, etc. oh, and my favorite: getting students to pass. i didn’t do an amazing job in this regard – another pee/see had 100% of his students pass english – but 60% of my students passed english last year compared to 14% the year before. cookies for me, obviously, but the response i received from the school community was, well, i don’t know. i suppose the response was commensurate with the exploit, but now that i’m privy to how the school is willing to demonstrate its gratitude, i feel a bit unappreciated in terms of academics. in addition to books – whose arrival was met with you can put them in the corner – i also solicited donations for soccer uniforms, balls, and equipment. now that they’ve arrived i’ve become the object of adulation. i don’t necessarily have girls throwing themselves at me (other than the usual, more obvious ones: sex for phone credit?), but i will have a large party thrown in my honor, not to mention a school named after me. well, not yet, but that’s the recommendation…
cape town’s so rocked out that i get why it’s actually called CAAAPE TOWWWN! but first you actually have to get there, and that requires either (1) paying $100 for 24 hours on a shite bus or (2) standing on the side of the road with yr thumb in the air, except in southern africa that thumb would communicate something akin to a-ok, that yr standing at the side of the road for recreational purposes. if you want a lift you have to hold out an outstretched arm while flitting yr wrist in such a way that mocks gay ppl but at the same times evinces a type of desperate homophobia requiring a safe distance from all things gay, even a feigned limp wrist. something like that.. anyhow, i opted to hike and made it down to ct in three legs for $16. the first leg was from whk to keets and wasn’t much of a story, just a dood named robert who said i could smoke when i asked him where he was from. in keets i joined a friend so we could hitch together. the first car we saw was a beamer, and lucky for us it was driven by an owambo. busted ass ford, cattle car, mercedes benz, or whatever, an owambo expects you to pay for a lift. i don’t want to pay for a ride, but i also don’t want to stand somewhere when i could be moving toward ct, so i didn’t mind that we were hustled into the car and driven to the petrol station.
-ok, you can give me yr money now.
-mofucka, this a mofucken beamer, and ppl driving mofucken beamers don’t need no mofucken money from some busted ass volunteers. bitch.
glad i choose to hike with the friend i did, b/c that certainly wasn’t my potty mouth. it worked though, b/c afterward he drove 180 km/hour all the way to the border without saying a word. and good thing he drove fast, b/c we ended up waiting three hours for our next lift rather than the two we would’ve otherwise. or was it four hours instead of three? and when do i account for the extra two we waited after securing a ride in some caravan of retrieved rental cars? apparently they were required to travel back to cape town as a pack, and the pack can’t travel too efficiently if part of it’s been carjacked. hmmm.. whatevs, losses were finally cut and we began eight hours of jesus in afrikaans. the singing wasn’t so bad, but it became unbearable as we drew close to ct and our driver began to serenade us with requests for money.
-is 400 ok?
-ok what?
-400 rand. for the lift.
-uh… i have 50.
i would’ve thought that jesus was all about the para gratis, but it seems afrikaaner jesus drops you in the middle of ct at 3.30 am if you don’t cop the full R400. or perhaps it was afrikaaner not-jesus who abandoned and not afrikaaner jesus, b/c the world grew dark, and there shone a light. what I mean is that ct’s a wonderful place to get robbed, raped, shot, and stabbed at 3.30 in the morning – if yr into that type of thing – so it was with mild trepidation that my friend and i wandered about with our appeals for a good mugging. you know, oversized bags; i suppose we could’ve looked more inviting, if we tried… eventually we found ourselves at the backpackers we were booked into, but no one inside would answer our cries, which was fine, b/c afrikaaner jesus was outside, and he was our salvation. he was a bit drunker than i’d expect jesus to be, and we had to pay the cab fare back to his flat, but in exchange he bought us bread, tea, milk, and sugar for breakfast, not to mention pizza for the ride home; kicked some girl out of her bed so friend + me had a place to sleep; woke his brother up to give us a tutorial on how to use a remote control; and gave us a tour of the washroom, with complimentary roll of toilet paper. he was still sleeping when we left the following morning, but his g/friend paid for our taxi fare back to city center. she also mentioned that afrikaaner jesus was some sort of yacht skipper and they’d come fetch us later in the week for a day out. pretty nawa, except i don’t know my phone number and ended up giving her the wrong one…
-ok, you can give me yr money now.
-mofucka, this a mofucken beamer, and ppl driving mofucken beamers don’t need no mofucken money from some busted ass volunteers. bitch.
glad i choose to hike with the friend i did, b/c that certainly wasn’t my potty mouth. it worked though, b/c afterward he drove 180 km/hour all the way to the border without saying a word. and good thing he drove fast, b/c we ended up waiting three hours for our next lift rather than the two we would’ve otherwise. or was it four hours instead of three? and when do i account for the extra two we waited after securing a ride in some caravan of retrieved rental cars? apparently they were required to travel back to cape town as a pack, and the pack can’t travel too efficiently if part of it’s been carjacked. hmmm.. whatevs, losses were finally cut and we began eight hours of jesus in afrikaans. the singing wasn’t so bad, but it became unbearable as we drew close to ct and our driver began to serenade us with requests for money.
-is 400 ok?
-ok what?
-400 rand. for the lift.
-uh… i have 50.
i would’ve thought that jesus was all about the para gratis, but it seems afrikaaner jesus drops you in the middle of ct at 3.30 am if you don’t cop the full R400. or perhaps it was afrikaaner not-jesus who abandoned and not afrikaaner jesus, b/c the world grew dark, and there shone a light. what I mean is that ct’s a wonderful place to get robbed, raped, shot, and stabbed at 3.30 in the morning – if yr into that type of thing – so it was with mild trepidation that my friend and i wandered about with our appeals for a good mugging. you know, oversized bags; i suppose we could’ve looked more inviting, if we tried… eventually we found ourselves at the backpackers we were booked into, but no one inside would answer our cries, which was fine, b/c afrikaaner jesus was outside, and he was our salvation. he was a bit drunker than i’d expect jesus to be, and we had to pay the cab fare back to his flat, but in exchange he bought us bread, tea, milk, and sugar for breakfast, not to mention pizza for the ride home; kicked some girl out of her bed so friend + me had a place to sleep; woke his brother up to give us a tutorial on how to use a remote control; and gave us a tour of the washroom, with complimentary roll of toilet paper. he was still sleeping when we left the following morning, but his g/friend paid for our taxi fare back to city center. she also mentioned that afrikaaner jesus was some sort of yacht skipper and they’d come fetch us later in the week for a day out. pretty nawa, except i don’t know my phone number and ended up giving her the wrong one…
i won't lie and say cape town doesn't continually remind me of its connection to someone i used to love. bad timing there, but definitely perfect timing with this bottle of gin i'm sleeping with. the weather's nice, too...
me, i'm going to...
...CAPE TOWN!!
an inside joke that four ppl would understand, so a bit of an explanation: explained, in a confusing manner that doesn't really explain a whole lot. what i can mention rather clearly is that i'll be hanging out with my two best friends: wine and snoop dogg. mofucken holla-day on yr face..
...CAPE TOWN!!
an inside joke that four ppl would understand, so a bit of an explanation: explained, in a confusing manner that doesn't really explain a whole lot. what i can mention rather clearly is that i'll be hanging out with my two best friends: wine and snoop dogg. mofucken holla-day on yr face..
mellie points out that i've finally found the lord. whilst i'm sure jeez and i would get on rather well together, i'd prefer to get my toes wet before jumping in completely. you know, something like harboring an actual belief in god before building a mega site of bible studies and information.
(take note of the url)
(take note of the url)
i was looking through a friend's foto collection last week and found some pics of chase, which reminded me we used to kick it, and she was fooken hot. i imagine she still is, but we've become rather inconsequential to each other pretty quickly and i've sort of forgotten to think about her. perhaps things should've ended with fuck you fuck you so that i could carry some bitterness around. whatevs, i just wanted an excuse to stick this pic on my blog:
that reminds me, i should post pics of ppl i still think about; namely, myself and some lovely folk with sufficient investment capital to fly their cameras to namibia in order to cash in on the cottage industry surrounding some shite actress and her fat bell (yeah run-on sentence).
not that our holiday won't be anything less than perfect, but it could be even more so had a fourth decided to join. or even a fifth, sixth, seventh, or eighth. i wouldn't even mind if a ninth tagged along, though i prolly sound like i'm complaining that it's only nate and kristi visiting. i'll let you know how shite our holiday is after i rock out on another bottle of pinotage..
that reminds me, i should post pics of ppl i still think about; namely, myself and some lovely folk with sufficient investment capital to fly their cameras to namibia in order to cash in on the cottage industry surrounding some shite actress and her fat bell (yeah run-on sentence).
not that our holiday won't be anything less than perfect, but it could be even more so had a fourth decided to join. or even a fifth, sixth, seventh, or eighth. i wouldn't even mind if a ninth tagged along, though i prolly sound like i'm complaining that it's only nate and kristi visiting. i'll let you know how shite our holiday is after i rock out on another bottle of pinotage..
ppl here laugh at me b/c i'm laughing at them, but they're so much funnier w/o having any clue as to why. have i mentioned the best joke i have here is to simply say, fuck! fuck fuck! fuck fuck fuck this fucking fuck!
-hahahahahahahahahaha....
for the silence in my slow falling snow, a poetry reading of sorts:
arse like green plant
a complimentary transcript in case you interpret differently from the author and would like to submit a reading.
arse like green plant
a complimentary transcript in case you interpret differently from the author and would like to submit a reading.
i'm here perusing this rubric entitled controls for developmental protocols, though i'm not sure if that or protocols for developmental controls is the proper caption. fuck it, i don't know, which is asinine considering i'm the author of said rubric. selah, not like it's too elaborate. in fact, but two controls, or protocols, or whatever:
1 - does the proposed project require even the slightest bit of assistance from anyone else?
if yes, stab yrself in the face.
if no, proceed to question 2, though you'll eventually stab yrself in the face.
2 - do you expect yr project to be maintained after initiate's departure?
if yes, stab yrself in the face.
if no, then yr prolly just passing time till yr sister's wedding. stab yrself in the face anyhow. projects? projects? we talking 'bout projects?
1 - does the proposed project require even the slightest bit of assistance from anyone else?
if yes, stab yrself in the face.
if no, proceed to question 2, though you'll eventually stab yrself in the face.
2 - do you expect yr project to be maintained after initiate's departure?
if yes, stab yrself in the face.
if no, then yr prolly just passing time till yr sister's wedding. stab yrself in the face anyhow. projects? projects? we talking 'bout projects?
parent-teacher conferences in detroit public often involved a moo-moo and a head full of curlers that oscillated between looks of supplication – toward me – and ima kick yo ass – the student in question. parent-teacher conferences in namibia involve the same moo-moo and a…
…large tree. oh, and ima kick yo ass, though not necessarily as a consequence for poor school work. it’s more of a cultural tendency to equate beat with teach, something about the two sharing a long e sound. if i plug my oshiwambo vocab into english syntax it comes out as otandi ka dhenga etako yoye, which lacks the lyrical terror of ima kick yo ass. so yeah, ima kick yo ass, especially if you don’t come to school with my bag of shite tomorrow. oh cultural relativism: it’s perfectly acceptable here to hand a student a plastic bag and ask that he return it full of shit. i might have asked students in detroit where my bags of shit are, but at the moment i’m lost as to what the possible euphemistic connection might’ve been, so i’ll simply mention that my present concern for bags of shit is related to the new garden i’m in the process of planting.
…large tree. oh, and ima kick yo ass, though not necessarily as a consequence for poor school work. it’s more of a cultural tendency to equate beat with teach, something about the two sharing a long e sound. if i plug my oshiwambo vocab into english syntax it comes out as otandi ka dhenga etako yoye, which lacks the lyrical terror of ima kick yo ass. so yeah, ima kick yo ass, especially if you don’t come to school with my bag of shite tomorrow. oh cultural relativism: it’s perfectly acceptable here to hand a student a plastic bag and ask that he return it full of shit. i might have asked students in detroit where my bags of shit are, but at the moment i’m lost as to what the possible euphemistic connection might’ve been, so i’ll simply mention that my present concern for bags of shit is related to the new garden i’m in the process of planting.
ppl make fun of me for being old, but they’re 24, 25. me, 27. sheeat, my dad’s not even 50 yet, and today’s his bday. plus, it’s been mere weeks since we’ve started calling him grandpa, and no one actually calls him grandpa since the one person who can is linguistically confined at the moment to waaaaah... while i'm sure her future's colored crimson, cardinal, or perhaps even blue, i highly doubt she’s speaking yet. unless ¡ria! counts. lovely girl, that maggie. can’t wait to meet her.
and since i’m on the family tip, i should mention that my sister equals good sister:
10.14 @ penn state
10.21 iowa
10.28 n’western
11.04 ball state
11.11 @ indiana
she’s to be married this fall, and while i’m perfectly willing to quit the peace corps to see her handed off to some dou-che (though not dou-che like an actual dou-che), skipping out on part of the big ten season is unthinkable. i might as well kick it in africa and hear about the wedding through email. the forecast was dark since there aren’t any bye weeks this year, but my sister chose 11.4, and 11.4 chose ball state. ball state? late season mac? lloyd might have trouble against notre lady (llloyd), ohio state (lllloyd), and some random po-scrub team that would’ve been 5-6 had michigan not humped itself (llllloyd), but in mac circles lloyd is known as oyd. that leaves my only concern as what to drink at the wedding, cranberry and vodka or gin and tonic? i could even fit in a tom collins or two..
and since i’m on the family tip, i should mention that my sister equals good sister:
10.14 @ penn state
10.21 iowa
10.28 n’western
11.04 ball state
11.11 @ indiana
she’s to be married this fall, and while i’m perfectly willing to quit the peace corps to see her handed off to some dou-che (though not dou-che like an actual dou-che), skipping out on part of the big ten season is unthinkable. i might as well kick it in africa and hear about the wedding through email. the forecast was dark since there aren’t any bye weeks this year, but my sister chose 11.4, and 11.4 chose ball state. ball state? late season mac? lloyd might have trouble against notre lady (llloyd), ohio state (lllloyd), and some random po-scrub team that would’ve been 5-6 had michigan not humped itself (llllloyd), but in mac circles lloyd is known as oyd. that leaves my only concern as what to drink at the wedding, cranberry and vodka or gin and tonic? i could even fit in a tom collins or two..
remember that shite song george bush co-wrote with alan jackson, something about the the world not turning?
i watch cnn but i'm not sure i can tell you
the difference in iraq and iran
but i know jesus and i talk to god…
how prophetic. no wonder g-o-d asked him to collaborate on one of his major projects, the proverbs:
these six things doth the lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.
i watch cnn but i'm not sure i can tell you
the difference in iraq and iran
but i know jesus and i talk to god…
how prophetic. no wonder g-o-d asked him to collaborate on one of his major projects, the proverbs:
these six things doth the lord hate: yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.
i met my my sister after work this past december to drink drink away some of her man's allowance tab at the restaurant he runs. we’re ready to leave and she gives the bartender $10 for pulling us each a couple pints, but he waves it away with a smirk and a no worries scoff. –no really, i made $250 tonight, my sister persisted. fuck this hem-haw, i thought, and palmed the cash while neither was looking. i only mention this exchange b/c pee/see just sent out our income surveys, and it says i made $243 for the whole of december. pretty good considering i wasn’t in namibia for most of the month, but i was in november, and i only made $3 extra. ditto september and october. i made as much as $288 last february and march, but that’s b/c dub’s strong dollar was trading at n$5.67. it’s been hovering around n$6 lately, so that means i should earn $273 this month, which is a shit ton more than my sister and her six hours of work. perhaps i’ll buy her a drink. nevermind, that quiche is before taxes. taxes? when all is said and done i’ll have cost the american gov’t about $6000 per. that other purveyor of american diplomacy, the bomb, costs millions, and it doesn’t have to pay taxes. perhaps i’m thinking too fiscally, and returns can be measured in other terms. iraq?
so what do i and my graduate education do to earn all this cold cold cash? i teach primarily, but apparently i’m also responsible for scribbling obituaries in memoriam of dogs hip to the scene: the honkey doesn’t beat. sancho, for instance. i’m still not sure whether she’s dead or alive, and my access to information runs scanty: either my common sense or my students’ shaky english. the sensory evidence i’ve collected so far points to dead. the obvious reasoning is that i haven’t seen her. surely by now the witchdoctor would’ve taken her out for a stroll, but i haven’t seen him either. perhaps they’re both dead? for corroborative purposes i’ve occasionally steeled myself for the six miles required to run past her house. at first i would pass nonchalantly, leery of confrontation, and sneak a passing glance toward her homestead, but eventually i realized i could kick this dood’s arse if the penny dropped and asserted myself a bit more boldly. a whistle, a yell, scraps of raw meat, a pole and some windex for my strip tease. nothing. that leaves me with student interrogation: i’ve found straighter answers in a gay bar.
-does anyone know if my dog’s still alive?
-she is dead, sir. help me one dollar.
-really, you know?
-yes. help me one dollar.
-that’s she’s dead?
-no, she is not. help me one dollar.
-so sancho’s alive?
-yes. help me one dollar.
-but you said she was dead.
-yes. help me one dollar.
-do you know what the fuck yr talking about?
that was the yr dog is dead chat. the she isn’t dead chat went like this:
-mr. polio, sancho is not dead. help me one dollar.
-you know? you’ve seen her?
-yes, she is just that way? help me one dollar.
-wtf is ‘that way’?
-just this side. help me one dollar.
-haveyouseenmyfookendogandwhereisshe??
-she is just around. help me one dollar.
so yeah, i said all i have to rely on for information is common sense and report from my students. neither are very reliable. students are students, and i obviously possess zero common sense if i continue petitioning them for answers. guess i’ll earn my $$$:
sancho – late 2004 to late 2005/early 2006
you were my bitch.
sancho was my first dog, so i had no frame of reference for moving on, but it turns out dog ownership is similar to being a boyfriend: selah. g/f involved in a crash and sent home from pee/see, get a new lady. dog eaten as a holiday snack, get a new dog. i see how this works. unfortunately, this new dog i allude to – her name is gulliver – isn’t my dog in much the same way sancho never was. she just hangs around eating the food we throw out and enjoying the tranquility that accompanies the absence of a stick. this arrangement worked somewhat peacefully with sancho b/c her tate had a clubfoot and lived so far away, but gulliver’s fam lives in the homestead across the way, and i have a rep in the village as a dog thief. whatevs, i’m not going to start beating things unnecessarily to just assuage the concerns of a few wankers too stupid to understand that dogs don’t speak oshiwambo. two things happen every day:
1 – someone from gulliver’s homestead ambles over under the pretense of asking me how my day is. walalapo walalapo fifteen minutes walalapo blah-fooken-po yes it’s hot walalapo. -so, is this yr dog? i don’t know if this is a different cultural approach to confrontation or simply a piss job at entrapment. i think the expectation is for me to answer, why yes, ‘tis mine, just before a cadre of policemen emerge from behind the tree to apprehend the suspect, me. the chances that my interlocutor has passed grade 10 is slim (nil), so it should be at least six weeks before i finally fall for this ambuscade.
2 – after i answer, no, it’s yr fooken dog, stop asking me if i stole it, my bedeviler will grab gulliver, yell at her for rocking out at my house, beat her, and then tell her not to come back. i once used this opportunity to explain behaviorism, that gulliver has begun to associate their sudden appearance with a beating. oh, and that she doesn’t speak oshiwambo, so that won’t help you either. –oh yes, you must beat them if they are to learn. i’m not saying gulliver’s smarter than my neighbors, but if she can piece two and two together, and they can’t…
so pavlov still counts as legitimate thought and gulliver had begun to spend more and more of her time at my house. the neighbors have responded by tying her to a post and announcing her as dinner plans, which means i should begin earning my $$$ for april:
gulliver – late 2005 to ???
thou couldest have been my bitch.
so what do i and my graduate education do to earn all this cold cold cash? i teach primarily, but apparently i’m also responsible for scribbling obituaries in memoriam of dogs hip to the scene: the honkey doesn’t beat. sancho, for instance. i’m still not sure whether she’s dead or alive, and my access to information runs scanty: either my common sense or my students’ shaky english. the sensory evidence i’ve collected so far points to dead. the obvious reasoning is that i haven’t seen her. surely by now the witchdoctor would’ve taken her out for a stroll, but i haven’t seen him either. perhaps they’re both dead? for corroborative purposes i’ve occasionally steeled myself for the six miles required to run past her house. at first i would pass nonchalantly, leery of confrontation, and sneak a passing glance toward her homestead, but eventually i realized i could kick this dood’s arse if the penny dropped and asserted myself a bit more boldly. a whistle, a yell, scraps of raw meat, a pole and some windex for my strip tease. nothing. that leaves me with student interrogation: i’ve found straighter answers in a gay bar.
-does anyone know if my dog’s still alive?
-she is dead, sir. help me one dollar.
-really, you know?
-yes. help me one dollar.
-that’s she’s dead?
-no, she is not. help me one dollar.
-so sancho’s alive?
-yes. help me one dollar.
-but you said she was dead.
-yes. help me one dollar.
-do you know what the fuck yr talking about?
that was the yr dog is dead chat. the she isn’t dead chat went like this:
-mr. polio, sancho is not dead. help me one dollar.
-you know? you’ve seen her?
-yes, she is just that way? help me one dollar.
-wtf is ‘that way’?
-just this side. help me one dollar.
-haveyouseenmyfookendogandwhereisshe??
-she is just around. help me one dollar.
so yeah, i said all i have to rely on for information is common sense and report from my students. neither are very reliable. students are students, and i obviously possess zero common sense if i continue petitioning them for answers. guess i’ll earn my $$$:
sancho – late 2004 to late 2005/early 2006
you were my bitch.
sancho was my first dog, so i had no frame of reference for moving on, but it turns out dog ownership is similar to being a boyfriend: selah. g/f involved in a crash and sent home from pee/see, get a new lady. dog eaten as a holiday snack, get a new dog. i see how this works. unfortunately, this new dog i allude to – her name is gulliver – isn’t my dog in much the same way sancho never was. she just hangs around eating the food we throw out and enjoying the tranquility that accompanies the absence of a stick. this arrangement worked somewhat peacefully with sancho b/c her tate had a clubfoot and lived so far away, but gulliver’s fam lives in the homestead across the way, and i have a rep in the village as a dog thief. whatevs, i’m not going to start beating things unnecessarily to just assuage the concerns of a few wankers too stupid to understand that dogs don’t speak oshiwambo. two things happen every day:
1 – someone from gulliver’s homestead ambles over under the pretense of asking me how my day is. walalapo walalapo fifteen minutes walalapo blah-fooken-po yes it’s hot walalapo. -so, is this yr dog? i don’t know if this is a different cultural approach to confrontation or simply a piss job at entrapment. i think the expectation is for me to answer, why yes, ‘tis mine, just before a cadre of policemen emerge from behind the tree to apprehend the suspect, me. the chances that my interlocutor has passed grade 10 is slim (nil), so it should be at least six weeks before i finally fall for this ambuscade.
2 – after i answer, no, it’s yr fooken dog, stop asking me if i stole it, my bedeviler will grab gulliver, yell at her for rocking out at my house, beat her, and then tell her not to come back. i once used this opportunity to explain behaviorism, that gulliver has begun to associate their sudden appearance with a beating. oh, and that she doesn’t speak oshiwambo, so that won’t help you either. –oh yes, you must beat them if they are to learn. i’m not saying gulliver’s smarter than my neighbors, but if she can piece two and two together, and they can’t…
so pavlov still counts as legitimate thought and gulliver had begun to spend more and more of her time at my house. the neighbors have responded by tying her to a post and announcing her as dinner plans, which means i should begin earning my $$$ for april:
gulliver – late 2005 to ???
thou couldest have been my bitch.
the best i can do re: baby present. i brought some clothes back from south africa during my quick respite home, but seriously, $1,58 per doesn't turn the screws on my little little bank acct. speaking of little little bank accts, anyone want to send some coffee?
if i was given a choice between swearing off either women or the beta band, i wouldn't hesitate to enter catholic seminary. read that how you'd like.
word on the email is that there's a new sucka busta: maggie kathleen dziedzic. i'll bootkick anyone who forgets to call me uncle sucka busta.
congrats to kelly and mike.
word on the email is that there's a new sucka busta: maggie kathleen dziedzic. i'll bootkick anyone who forgets to call me uncle sucka busta.
congrats to kelly and mike.
Dear polio
How are you doing over there! Here everything is jumping up and down
Am 20 years girl school at one of the institution at Wihdhoek. I wrote to you these letter in the idea of borrowing you some amount of money to continue my further studies but now I stay at home until end of February but I need your help please!
I just had little money but now I want you to add me even a half amount money.
Our parent are not able to satifying us because we are many. but me I want to continue my study as usually. because in now days if you did not receive enough education you will suffer a lot because education first before everything in the world please help me.
If you are afford to help I need N$ 300 – 00 if its small or even amount of what you expect to give please help one help a nations make it with two hands I was think who must I go and borrow. you come out on my mind.
God will bless you. and make it before the 1st of march because I have to registed before 1st of march and if get a time I need to talk to you face to face only I didnt receive enough time to come to you to be angry of that because I want to try my best for the future to be good and easily
please reply it as soon sorry I wrote with pencil immediately?
from
************
___________________________________
for the record, i walked over to her house and slapped no all over her face. i'm not paying for some donkey to attend uni:
1 - i'm dirt fucking poor. i've told EVERYONE in my village, i'm a volunteer. still, help me one dollar, help me one dollar. what the fuck can you by with one namibian dollar? a loose ciggie, i guess.
2 - why the white man came to mind, i don't know. perhaps someone who needs money should ask the other teachers, who coincidently make near 3x what i do.
3 - an audience with god is hard to come by, so using that sort of opportunity to ask if (s)he'll bless me for my generosity rather than asking YHWH itself for the $$$ means you lack the critical thinking skills for higher education.
4 - why haven't you thrown yrself in front of a cow's arse yet?
How are you doing over there! Here everything is jumping up and down
Am 20 years girl school at one of the institution at Wihdhoek. I wrote to you these letter in the idea of borrowing you some amount of money to continue my further studies but now I stay at home until end of February but I need your help please!
I just had little money but now I want you to add me even a half amount money.
Our parent are not able to satifying us because we are many. but me I want to continue my study as usually. because in now days if you did not receive enough education you will suffer a lot because education first before everything in the world please help me.
If you are afford to help I need N$ 300 – 00 if its small or even amount of what you expect to give please help one help a nations make it with two hands I was think who must I go and borrow. you come out on my mind.
God will bless you. and make it before the 1st of march because I have to registed before 1st of march and if get a time I need to talk to you face to face only I didnt receive enough time to come to you to be angry of that because I want to try my best for the future to be good and easily
please reply it as soon sorry I wrote with pencil immediately?
from
************
___________________________________
for the record, i walked over to her house and slapped no all over her face. i'm not paying for some donkey to attend uni:
1 - i'm dirt fucking poor. i've told EVERYONE in my village, i'm a volunteer. still, help me one dollar, help me one dollar. what the fuck can you by with one namibian dollar? a loose ciggie, i guess.
2 - why the white man came to mind, i don't know. perhaps someone who needs money should ask the other teachers, who coincidently make near 3x what i do.
3 - an audience with god is hard to come by, so using that sort of opportunity to ask if (s)he'll bless me for my generosity rather than asking YHWH itself for the $$$ means you lack the critical thinking skills for higher education.
4 - why haven't you thrown yrself in front of a cow's arse yet?
a bit late, but it's not like emu can find any of its successful alumi. this guy, however, gets his pierce hall correspondence hand delivered...
a few of my friends are photags, so there's no reason i can't take up the craft myself and pass myself of as howard hughes, expert. so here's my first submission to the world o' art. i call it: boys. and a guitar. that they come into my house and grab w/o asking. like everything else i own. and no, you can't keep it, mofuckas. go home. no, i will not help you one dollar.
ok, i actually like the little pricks. it makes me feel so warm and pee/see inside when some barefoot kids without stomachs pass their leisurely hours in my home. but still, i'm not helping any one of them their one dollar. i will, however, help them their live action…
ok, i actually like the little pricks. it makes me feel so warm and pee/see inside when some barefoot kids without stomachs pass their leisurely hours in my home. but still, i'm not helping any one of them their one dollar. i will, however, help them their live action…
i hadn't expected to dwell on chase's disappearance for too long, but still, i'd like to think i'm a decent human being, and decent human beings can generally mourn for the lone month they've set aside to do so. but alas, namibia is a poor country, and poor countries are given heaps of international aid to maintain income inequalities. sometimes this assistance takes the form of liberalized trade agreements, occasionally it looks like straight quiche, and apparently it can also sound like an irish brogue. ooh, an accent! how continental, though i suppose ireland is a bit off the mainland. how au couture, then? whatevs. anyhow, i've managed communication thus far, but i'm soon going to start having bronson tag along so i can have my assignations translated. he's no more irish than the rest of the americans who'd be irish if they weren't not-irish, but at least he has a red beard and discriminates between "good" and "bad" guinness. i gather he's also been to ireland once, so that should count for something. big crac aeol?
a codicil for my treatise on the rainy season: fooken moths. what the ef, i don't remember this problem last year. they're everywhere. well, not everywhere, but they're under everything. each time i pick something up i evidently disturb one of the wankers and their buttery wings. grab my towel, there goes a moth. a bowl from the dish drainer, moth. my blanket as i get into bed, a moth. my bag so i can walk to school, two moths. i started to scratch my head over the problem, but a moth flew out of my hair, too. my only recourse has been to wait until nightfall so i can light a candle and watch the fuckers kill themselves, but that candle also doubles as my electricity, and i'd prefer to work without interrupting myself every five minutes to bulldoze singed carcasses from off my desk. selah..
a codicil for my treatise on the rainy season: fooken moths. what the ef, i don't remember this problem last year. they're everywhere. well, not everywhere, but they're under everything. each time i pick something up i evidently disturb one of the wankers and their buttery wings. grab my towel, there goes a moth. a bowl from the dish drainer, moth. my blanket as i get into bed, a moth. my bag so i can walk to school, two moths. i started to scratch my head over the problem, but a moth flew out of my hair, too. my only recourse has been to wait until nightfall so i can light a candle and watch the fuckers kill themselves, but that candle also doubles as my electricity, and i'd prefer to work without interrupting myself every five minutes to bulldoze singed carcasses from off my desk. selah..
man i fooken love the rainy season. i had resolved while in the states that i was turning the ef around if this place was brown, but i get here and... [gasp] ... GREEN! well, not a lot, but enough to make me want to stay. i mean, if the trees haven't killed themselves yet, then there's no reason i can't scuttle through another year of sand. i suppose there's too much faux-dirt to pretend it isn't there anymore, but as long as my sightlines are slightly verdant, then i'm going to rock the rainy season positive sauce. to wit:
- the ground now provides relative locomotive stability. generally the sand's so dry and loose that it takes a week to recover from a 10 km run, and by dry i mean i stop for a piss and the sand meets my stream halfway just to remember what moisture feels like.
- i love my corrugated roof. i can stand under the open sky and wouldn't know it was raining if i didn't hear the pitt patt patt patt pitt falling on my house.
- i smell the breathing of living flora rather than hott hott cow shit. i take that back. i don't smell shite all that often b/c it takes the sun a good three minutes to wisk any odors away.
- oh yeah, the sun. rainy season means clouds, and clouds mean a slight reprieve from the sun.
- clouds also mean crazy sunsets, replete with colors i've never seen before. ok, i've seen blue, pink, and purple before, but not bluer, pinker, and purpler. or something like that. they're so... violently demulcent?
stoodents, on the other hand, don't enjoy the rainy season quite as much as i do. that's b/c there's a ministry of education, and it's the ministry's responsibility to allocate money for actual floors in its schools:
- the ground now provides relative locomotive stability. generally the sand's so dry and loose that it takes a week to recover from a 10 km run, and by dry i mean i stop for a piss and the sand meets my stream halfway just to remember what moisture feels like.
- i love my corrugated roof. i can stand under the open sky and wouldn't know it was raining if i didn't hear the pitt patt patt patt pitt falling on my house.
- i smell the breathing of living flora rather than hott hott cow shit. i take that back. i don't smell shite all that often b/c it takes the sun a good three minutes to wisk any odors away.
- oh yeah, the sun. rainy season means clouds, and clouds mean a slight reprieve from the sun.
- clouds also mean crazy sunsets, replete with colors i've never seen before. ok, i've seen blue, pink, and purple before, but not bluer, pinker, and purpler. or something like that. they're so... violently demulcent?
stoodents, on the other hand, don't enjoy the rainy season quite as much as i do. that's b/c there's a ministry of education, and it's the ministry's responsibility to allocate money for actual floors in its schools:
there was this oft repeated platitude in teacher ed about classroom mgmt, something about not smiling until xmas. since i'm a frontline warrior for us hegemony, i've decided to wear the scowl of american education into my namibian shackrooms. the problem: school runs from jan - dec, and if i don't smile till xmas, ppl will mistake me for someone who gives an ef. at least they won't mistake me for a namibian teacher. i had a meeting with the other english teachers in my cluster (the rough equivalent of a us school dist.) where we discussed such pertinent matters as goals, the national syllabus, lesson planning, how to wake up in time to be at school by 8.00, etc. we eventually got to required reading when one of the teachers made this bold suggestion:
-if yr teaching a poem, you must read it before the class. that is the way you can understand it before you teach it.
my response:
[...]
another teacher's:
-it is the same for short stories. you must read it before the class.
das sigh. 'tis nearly as funny as a memo sent out by my principal last year:
-the meeting for 24 november 2005 has been changed to nowhere 2005. i apologize for any inconvenience.
-if yr teaching a poem, you must read it before the class. that is the way you can understand it before you teach it.
my response:
[...]
another teacher's:
-it is the same for short stories. you must read it before the class.
das sigh. 'tis nearly as funny as a memo sent out by my principal last year:
-the meeting for 24 november 2005 has been changed to nowhere 2005. i apologize for any inconvenience.
this is my first go ‘round with break-up-by-broken-hip, so rocking a post-chase namibia has left me in an odd state of luminality. there are standard emotions that generally accompany the end of a relationship, and i’ve often relied on their predictability to mark how long it’s been since i’ve had some loving, but with chase things have been oddly…different? i mean, bus flipped, she broke her hip, and pee/see ended our gig together by sending her back stateside. that leaves me alone in the african bush and ready to assume the fetal position. so, first emotion: WHYYYYYYYYY????? ok, that’s out of my system; i’ll move quickly on to response numero dos: rage. that fucking bitch, i started to think, but then i recalled a curious lack of malice on her part: bus flipped, she broke her hip, pee/see sent her home. not much to blame her for there, eh. so what’s next on my emotive checklist? regret? ok, that’s good. let’s see… i should’ve told her.. no, i shouldn’t have slept with... no, that wouldn’t change things, either. how about.. nope, bus would’ve still flipped regardless. shit, anything else i’m supposed to feel? oh, how about that lamentable breakdown in logic where i phone her at 3.00 am trying to convince her we should work things out? perhaps the only thing that’s kept me from that gaff is that i don’t know when it’s 3.00 am in colorado, though it’s more likely b/c no woman is worth the money it takes to plead from a namibian mobile. seriously, that shit’s out of hand. n$15/minute just to hear i'm a wanker and should move on? perhaps i should try a different emotion: spite? angst? a quick dabble with confusion? i'd rather read a book...
so yeah, no more chase. selah, it’s not like i’ve never had to cope with goodbye before. i suppose the aftermath has yet to resemble any of my previous break-ups, but i imagine it’ll eventually assume the basic routine most farewells engender when some replacement voila’s herself and allows me to resume my bitter struggle with what the fuck is love. that leaves complacency as my biggest obstacle toward getting over chase. sniff sniff, big tear, wah. my life just isn’t worth living…
so yeah, no more chase. selah, it’s not like i’ve never had to cope with goodbye before. i suppose the aftermath has yet to resemble any of my previous break-ups, but i imagine it’ll eventually assume the basic routine most farewells engender when some replacement voila’s herself and allows me to resume my bitter struggle with what the fuck is love. that leaves complacency as my biggest obstacle toward getting over chase. sniff sniff, big tear, wah. my life just isn’t worth living…
i had anticipated before ever teaching that cheating would be a constant headache, but i never envisioned someone would actually trouble himself over the alphabet. who the fuck copies the alphabet???
selah, at least one or two more of my stoodents passed their english exams than did the previous year:
grade 8 - 35% --------> 65%
grade 9 - 28% --------> 82%
grade 10 - 18% -------> 61%
fooken wird..
selah, at least one or two more of my stoodents passed their english exams than did the previous year:
grade 8 - 35% --------> 65%
grade 9 - 28% --------> 82%
grade 10 - 18% -------> 61%
fooken wird..
my g/friend was in a severe auto accident and fractured her hip. of course this happened an entire week ago and i only found out this morning when an email precipitated a flurry of internet click click as i scoured all sorts of blogs and message groups for any sort of information. i finally got a phone number from her parents and waded through a series of dropped calls and bad reception, all just to find out she's being flown home to the states for at least six weeks, probably for good. seriously, dating and the peace corps make a shite mix. if one of the two is pee/see then there are 750 days of separation to weather, though it seems there's even more to endure if both are pee/seeing it. i definitely won't love chase forever, but that's irrelevent when i think of how much i love her right now. no selah today.
i was pretty excited when my parents offered to fly me home from namibia so i could spend the holidays stateside. i suppose i was looking forward to seeing my family, but the actual source of my eagerness was the bar and all the peace corps game i could run on the ladies. so far, not very successful. the standard exchange:
-hey hot girl, i'm in the peace corps. you know, peace corps. i like peace, and i like you. peace corps.
-huh? what? why is yr hand down yr pants?
-SCREWYOUIALREADYHAVEAGIRLFRIENDANDSHESHOTT!
selah, game wasn't working, so i varied my approach. instead of mentioning pee/see, i eventually started dropping info sans who my employer is. revised strategy:
-27-years-old
-live in my parents' basement
-need to phone and let them know when i'll be home
-can only drive if my mama lets me borrow her car
-unless my sister lets me
-in which case i have to have the car back in kzoo by friday
-and i make $4000/year
-so you wanna kick it?
-wanker.
-SCREWYOUIALREADYHAVEAGIRLFRIENDANDSHESHOTT!
speaking of my lady friend..
can't wait to resume the routine. it's oddly reminiscent of my forays into the bar world, game and all:
-oh hott g/friend, i missed you so much. let's osculate. yes, i said osculate. kiss kiss smooch smooch..
-get off me, wanker. why are you so fat? you weren't gone that long.
love..
-hey hot girl, i'm in the peace corps. you know, peace corps. i like peace, and i like you. peace corps.
-huh? what? why is yr hand down yr pants?
-SCREWYOUIALREADYHAVEAGIRLFRIENDANDSHESHOTT!
selah, game wasn't working, so i varied my approach. instead of mentioning pee/see, i eventually started dropping info sans who my employer is. revised strategy:
-27-years-old
-live in my parents' basement
-need to phone and let them know when i'll be home
-can only drive if my mama lets me borrow her car
-unless my sister lets me
-in which case i have to have the car back in kzoo by friday
-and i make $4000/year
-so you wanna kick it?
-wanker.
-SCREWYOUIALREADYHAVEAGIRLFRIENDANDSHESHOTT!
speaking of my lady friend..
can't wait to resume the routine. it's oddly reminiscent of my forays into the bar world, game and all:
-oh hott g/friend, i missed you so much. let's osculate. yes, i said osculate. kiss kiss smooch smooch..
-get off me, wanker. why are you so fat? you weren't gone that long.
love..
oh, ariel sharon. he must've looked so cute lying there in that coma that YHWH staid his vengeance. smite technically doesn't equate with kill, but moses, joshua, et al's tendency to placate YHWH with a thorough stoning, stabbing, or hot oil rub left me with the impression that pat robertson's remarks meant thou, sharon, shalt surely die. perchance god is more predisposed towards beneficence than towards retribution? i suppose i'll have to watch an episode of the 700 club to find out, though i'm unsure of the context i'll use to frame any anwers i get. a lot of what i've read about the nature of god has focused on the oscillation between a rational and mystical experience of god, so i'm struggling to decide which of the two i'm supposed to use as i digest the theism of a coulter-sized douche rocket. das sigh..
