Extra time for Cat Worship!

How many times has this happened to you:

Tertiary Friend or Relative: So, what are you doing yourself these days?

You: I am a writer/ English teacher/ grad student/ three-legged cat that reads a lot of books.

T.F. O. R.: Oh! I like books, too! Have you read The Da Vinci Code?

You: (inner monologue) If I say that I haven't, I will have to search for some other small talk topic, like my feelings. If I tell her the truth (that I wouldn't touch that book with a 300-foot tree attached to a ten-foot pole) she'll feel insulted. How do I get enough knowledge of this wildly popular book without having to read it?

ME:What if I told you you could bypass the 500 excrutiating pages of The Da Vinci Code, but still impress your friends and family, by reading only sixteen pages of text??

You: Hell, that's even easier than seeing the movie!

...Here's the answer to all your small-talk woes...

JUST READ THE SENTENCES IN ITALLICS.

Mister Brown, CTRL-I-happy motherfucker that he is, really wants readers to know which parts of his book are MOST important. So he italicizes. A lot! This makes skimming eeeeeeeasy like Sunday morning. Thank God for crappy writing!

Consider this exerpt, where our trained scientists have extracted only complete italicised sentences. Time yourself as you read it. Ready...GO!:

CHAPTER 20

The captain of the Judicial Police is trying to frame me for murder.

The Vitruvian Man. A coherent symbolic set.

O, Draconian devil! Oh, lame saint!

s-o-PHI-e. Da Vinci . . .Fibonacci numbers . . . the pentacle. PHI. Divine Proportion

O, Draconian devil! Oh, lame saint!

It can’t be that simple. A code?
The Fibonacci numbers?
They have another purpose?
Une anagramme?

CHAPTER 21

The Mona Lisa.

I should have seen this!

O, Draconian devil! Oh, lame saint!

Leonardo da Vinci!
The Mona Lisa!

I am about to dash out of the Louvre . . . a fugitive.

That was almost 15 pages that you covered, people! God bless you, Dan Brown, for making your plaigarized, adverbose, printed crack something even the pretentious can love! Mmmmmwah!

And another thing...

If The Other has run off to be with that froggy gutter snipe "Des Moines," T.O.C.E. might just start shacking up with these two gentlemen. She loves them very much. How could you not love a musical duo who only allow themselves to be photographed dressed as movie characters?

Stormy Tuesday

Last night, The One Called Caroline "Rage Blackouts" Casey let T.O.C.E. take her on a fruitless search for Margaritas in Johnson county, then they settled at a bar just around the corner from here after much driving around [T.O.C.E. was so upset about the Margarita-less-ness, she kept talking in her sleep all night. "Mad Meeeex!" She howled, like Heathcliff waking to dawn on the moor with Cathy's name fresh on his lips, "MAD MEEEEX!!!!"]

Once there, they sat within earshot of a very trollish, not-so-young man was blabbing to his buddies about all these women of whom he was currently amassing biblical knowledge (human intercourse-- yuk). T.O.C.E., having drowned her Margarita jones with Pale Ale, nearly strangled said troll. T.O.C.C."R.B."C. almost had to physically restrain her.

Seriously, this guy should be thankful any woman would ever talk to him, let alone touch his trollish face. Why are women so very, very often infinitely cuter to the men they're reduced to have intercourse with? Ugly, blabby mofos like that should be neutered. Although perhaps it's what T.O.C.E. will soon have to deal with, what with The Other (who is light years cuter than Trolly McTrollerson) up and running to that french slut "Des Moines." Apparently, M'elle D.M. is big and sprawling, with a real penchant for Karaoke. And she's very flat-- something T.O.C.E. could never be in her wildest dreams.

Speaking of which, T.O.C.E.'s lumps and protrusions are fixin' to be on full display when her theatre thing opens next week. She comes home six nights a week, bruised and broken, complaining about sore thises and thats (try being an amputee, sister). Apparently, the play is just her thrashing around on the floor like a dying fish. A dying fish in heels and a push-up bra, no less. I hope, for The Other's sake, that Miss "Des Moines" is a little more lady-like.

Oh-- and all of that floppin' out and around is only 50 per cent of her duties to the Theatre Gawds. There's some other play opening in two weeks, which she'll do when she's not doing the floppy push-up bra play, that involves wearing a gray wig and sitting on a couch-- no prat falls. Yeesh. And she makes fun of me for taking 17 naps a day. Is her lifestyle really creating a new world order or anything? I think not.

Wassupdate

So apparently the whines have been pouring in from the various methods of social computing in which T.O.C.E. engages. You would think they would be whines for her to stop emailing, myspaceing, Friendster-ing, etc. But no. They are the whines of those who miss my on-line presence (yes, The One Called AshBut, I am looking in your general direction). And I do not blame them.

As you all know, I do get a little busier in the summer, what with all the small woodland creatures sashaying by my window. But Charlene knows that is no excuse. Just like there is no excuse for that new Elvis Costello album, a total snore which sounds like a bad wedding-singer rip-off of Leon Redbone. There you go. T.O.C.E. could never bring herself to say it, so I did.

Here is a list of verbs and nouns that best sum up my activity the past few weeks:

1) bite (elbow)
2) howl (back door)
3) stalk (squirrels/ chipmunks)
4) flee (musical saw)
5) ingest (kitty roids-- see May 2005)
6) puke (toes of T.O.C.E.)
7) sleep (The Other's side of the bed, as he is gone)

Yes, you heard it right, The Other has left the building for some woman named Des Moines. French babe. T.O.C.E. is coping by cleaning everything under this roof with a toothbrush. Then the TV broke. On her day off. That's when the merde hit the moulin. First, she tried to fill the silent hours with radio; who knew Iowa Public Radio was so sucky? I mean, who would favor farm and soil reports over "Car Talk" and "The Shamrock and Thistle" (okay, well, at least not over "Car Talk.") Now she won't stop talking to ME. Yesterday, she read aloud a few chapters of Pride and Prejudice, and kept snatching me back when I tried to escape.

I've tried talking back at her (like she listens), then I tried puking on her shoe, which leads to quite the screaming match between us. Then she turns on the vaccuum cleaner just to spite me. Insert scene from Endearing Postcard Terms From Mommy Dearest here.