Sorry I Upset You, Jujyfruit Assbat

Almost two years ago I wrote a random post on this blog about a rotten little school where I went for a brief six months as a child. In it, I named the names of the foul bullies who were mean to me there, and even posted a link to a frightful photograph of one of them. I like to call a spade a spade, you see.

Someone found that post and apparently got upset, and recently flooded my comment box with spammy stuff. While I think all bullies deserve to be driven, naked and weeping, into the sea, I sure understand if they got hurty feelings. Gee, I'm sorry, guys. I will try to be nicer. I might even say a little prayer for you: "Dear Lord, please don't make those mean bullies fall into a ditch like I asked you about 25 years ago. Instead, bring them peace, as they frolic in fields of sweet lavender and money trees!"

So here's the post about beloved Berkshire Country Day School, with all the offending "real names" removed. I like their new names much, much better. Here's to you, Jujyfruit Assbat!

The Terror of Naked Feet

I like those people who can relax by sipping herbal tea or sniffing a sprigget of lavender. Those things don't relax me; they excite me into unstable, manic behaviors. Anything that is known to be relaxing has the opposite effect on me. It makes me think: "By God. I'm sitting here like a lump. Other people are doing things. I ought to be doing things, too. Not sniffing this spray of parsley! I am a fool and a wastrel. Relaxation will invite death, like a quick dagger in the night."

After such a realization, I usually run around and gnaw on the edge of the stairs, and do an occasional push-up.

Things were easier when I smoked cigarettes. I could just snarf one of those babies down whenever I felt like I was feeling too "alive" or maybe I was breathing a bit too much "oxygen." Times were good then, yes siree. If ever I felt this weird sensation called "energy," I could quell it right away by sucking on a little stick of paper and tobacco laced with pesticide. It was effective. That bothersome "energy" would go away and I could relax.

I honestly don't know what to do with half the energy I have, which is why cigarettes were so helpful. Without them, I find myself leaping about like a springbok and trying to stab people with a plastic scimitar. Sometimes, when sitting placidly in a meeting, I am really thinking about how I might choreograph Veruca Salt's "I want it now!" for 2010, while high-stepping down the conference room table and kicking the lattes left, right, left, right. Duck, you silly little Oompa-Loompas!

There must be other ways to relax. Some people take baths. I don't care for them. Your bits are never fully submerged. The water never stays hot for long.

Many people do yoga to relax. I find yoga frightfully stimulating, but in a scary way. First, the rooms in which people do yoga are filled with naked feet. There are many unpleasant details to be gleaned about these feet, if you look at all closely. Many people do not practice appropriate hygiene in this area, yet they gleefully strip their socks off.

Many of the feet have bunions.

Then there is the flatulence. Every time you bend to get into a certain posture, the old fellow behind you lets out a toot. Sometimes the whole room is tooting away merrily. The tooting is often accompanied by bad smells, as would be anticipated.

The people who practice yoga are also really "into it" and I admire their ability to be transported by the experience. They have glittering eyes and seem peaceful, like their organs have been feng-shui'ed into alignment. They never desire a cigarette! They have natural energy, and wouldn't tamper with it. The yoga devotees cart their own little rolled-up sticky mats with them everywhere they go. What's the matter with the communal sticky mats offered by the health club or yoga studio? Could it be that these sticky mats have been tainted...by feet! Naked feet!

Sticky mat. It reminds me of sticky buns. I don't like sticky buns, either. There is a great deal that I don't like. I can't imagine a worse fate than being forced to eat sticky buns all day long, without respite. I would feel most decidedly ill.

How many times can one do a Sun Salutation? I have been in a yoga class where we did the thing maybe 50 times. I was going to snap and kickbox someone in the eye. I had my sights set on the instructor, who kept murmuring "Breathe in! Breathe out! Don't get in your own way. Don't think. All your thinking is garbage! Junk!"

There was one yoga class I did like. It was at Kripalu, a yoga center in the Berkshires. My dear friend treated me to a weekend at this place, despite my antipathy to the mess of naked feet that were sure to be in residence. There was a hot tub in the basement, which we called Boob Soup. They served dry groats for dinner. There was a curried, oiled scent to the air.

The class I liked was called Yoga Dance. A woman stood in the center of the room with a microphone, while live drummers beat out a frenetic and exciting rhythm. Everyone started dancing about like crazy. The woman with the microphone would shout out instructions: "Strike a pose. Any pose. Move with it! You're a wildcat. You're a tiger! Growl! Growl, tiger, growl. Prowl around the room and snarl with joy at those you meet! Snarl! Snarl!"

I have a vivid memory of some older gentleman hopping about in "tree pose" like a bouncing stork, while holding his hands up like whiskers near his face. He splayed his fingers out and wiggled them. "Growl!" he went. "Growl, growl!"

If only all yoga could be like this, I would not be so scared of the feet.

Gee-Ardia!

Dear readers, my apologies for having abandoned you for so long. I was writing a book! And I had an intestinal parasite!

Whilst swimming in a crystal clear and blue lake sometime this summer, I must have breast-stroked gleefully, with mouth agape, right through a patch of water recently vacated by an incontinent beaver.

Or, an alternate vision: perhaps dirty-fingered Leonard, the fruit and veggie stocker at the local Stop 'N' Shop, touching the produce with doody-flavored hands? Touching, touching, and dreaming of his recent mountain hike during which he gurgled down fresh and clear mountain stream water sans iodine?

One of these visions must be true. How do we know, dear reader? Oh, because after many many days of miserable gut-wrenching agony, nausea, heartburn, and what are commonly known as "the skwertz," I finally decided to seek the advice of a doctor.

At first I had diagnosed myself, because I am a certified WEB MD. Not only did I have gluten intolerance, fructose malabsorption, lactose intolerance, and yeast intolerance, I also had multiple sclerosis. Now, I know that MS has nothing to go with GI troubles, but by God, that didn't stop me from finding a tenuous yet scientifically valid connection.

The pains and misery grew worse. Such were they that, upon receiving a catalog that features plaques and mugs with your grandkids' photos emblazoned on 'em, I almost ordered a miniature gravestone that one can place in the veggie beds. The thing was inscribed with a poem that read something like:

God saw that you were tired, a cure could not be found.
So He closed your weary eyelids, and we put you in the ground.

As I read those words I shivered with regret, for my children would trip over the little gravestone as they crossed through the garden, and would probably miss me as they did so.

Every time I passed a neighbor on the street I groaned and clutched at my midsection and went on about the ruination of my health. I don't know why I did this, except that any other topic of discussion was of little interest to me because I was about to throw up.

To my great misfortune and shame, the doctor asked me for a "stool sample." Three times. Delivering a stool sample is neither enjoyable nor fun. The nurse suggests that you use "something clean" to poo upon. One time, I decided to use aluminum foil. I suppose Saran Wrap would be been a poorer choice, but other than that I could hardly have chosen a more wretched and crinkly medium for my canvas. Things stick to tin foil. It's not like rolling something off a Silpat (TM).

Another time, I thought I would hit my own "feeling lucky" button and go right into the cup! It was daring. I dared, and I won.

Upon depositing the poo in whatever the chosen receptacle, one has to scoop out several bits with a mini shovel and scoop them into smaller vessels, which all had to be shimmied about a bit to mix the foul ingredients. The containers have "do not eat" yucky faces on them just in case you are tempted. Then, one has to keep "some" but not "all" of the poop in a refrigerated condition. So that basically means you are hiding bits of poop around the house and in the back of the fridge, in dark baggies and containers, after trying without success to remove it from the tin foil, or your shoes.

The frightful part is that on the sides of each container there are blank spaces for the scientists to write. They have to evaluate the consistency of each specimen, check for bad stuff in each, write a little poem about each chunk of poo-poo, and say anonymous stuff about it that they wouldn't dream of saying to the face of the person who produced it. I think one is judged and rated on the manner of delivery and if the container is Tiffany, Wedgewood, or otherwise. I got low marks for the black plastic and that hurt me, because we are poor.

This must the worst job in forever, but I'm sure there is a lot of laughter and ribald talk in the lab, and they pass the hours tossing specimens back and forth like those Seattle fish market guys did and made famous. "Go long!" they shout, and "Hey, not in my sandwich!" and fun, silly things like that.

When I dropped off one specimen, however, the people in the lab looked very bitter. It was hard to tell, because they all wore masks, but I don't think they were smiling terribly fiercely, or at all. I tried some rude "poo poo" talk and tested out some stage patter that my five-year-old is perfecting, but they stared at me with cold, lifeless eyes. I rather wished that I used a Lilly Pulitzer patterned coverlet for my sample, because their judgmental attitudes were giving me the pip.

The end of all this is that I was found to have GIARDIA, aka Beaver Fever. The people in the lab found it! Maybe that brought them some joy, to find something of conversational interest.

Then I had to take a bunch of antibiotics, including one called FLAGYL. Flagyl came with a horrific list of side effect warnings that included things like: "You will tear your eyeballs out and eat your own brains," and "You will vomit so prodigiously that your life will end prematurely." I was so scared to take Flagyl, especially because I could not have one wee drop of alcohol during the time I was on it. I wasn't even to use shaving lotion! I don't use shaving lotion, but I was scared I might rub up against some, or eat a bourbon-filled bon-bon that I found lying on the street. If you drink any booze while on Flagyl, you will get hot flashes, obscene cramps, and the vomiting willy-wags.

Flagyl worked. It finally did the trick, and the whole horrible thing ended. Sometimes I still have lactose intolerance, but that's it. I have one remaining fear. That is that the doctor will want "proof" that the parasite was vanquished. He will want another sample, and I will need to find a receptacle that hasn't been tried before so I can be innovative, new, and different! It is hard to always reinvent oneself. I may choose something bold, and very tiny, so that I get Olympic style points for verve and finesse. My sample shall be bold. My sample shall be trendy, and most delightfully free of Giardia.

Window Dressings: Nightmare animals

These mannequins are desperately evil and bad. Not only did they probably lose their original heads in some obscene accident, but their heads were REPLACED BY ANIMAL HEADS. And the animals in question want to have sexual relations with you. Against your will, in a field filled with rotting turnips and the burnt-out husks of buildings bombed in the Great Cataclysm of 2011. Many rude braying noises will fill the air and...god, this is a horrible vision. I won't be shopping here!

Source: Necessary Objects, SoHo

Window Dressings: Lake Placid Style

My new theme o' the month, the Delicate Art of Consumer Seduction, will now be called Window Dressings. Here is a wonderful example from a recent trip to Lake Placid.



I [Heart] My Nana. But I have no pants and no discernible sexual organs. What is the message here? I am not sure that references to a loving grandmother and "no pants" should appear within the same image. What happened to the child's nether regions?

I'm a Cutie Patootie is clearly not wearing any pants either, and I would suggest that the child also lacks underwear. This is a significant and horrifying problem. Shame on you, Grandpappy!



Here are their cousins, clothed. If I go to the Adirondacks, they will kill me with their laser eyes and barely-muzzled slavering beasts. See the little boy's hand? It is reaching out to I [Heart] My Nana to snatch her pants clean off and feed them to Its Master. Strange pagan symbols behind them control their every move.

The Delicate Art of Consumer Seduction

This will be the first in an exclusive Party Pony series documenting the delicate art of consumer seduction--the most compelling and inviting window dressings, mascots, advertisements, and taglines designed to please and tempt the consumer.

In the Christmas category, we have these examples:

Longing for some new negligee to tempt the man in your life? Don't look further than Main Street Hosiery on Mamaroneck Avenue. Not to be outdone by Bergdorf's in the city, Main Street Hosiery spent weeks arranging their jolly display of a 10-foot tall humanoid female about to whip off her sexy black robe, and a small, angry gnome who is clearly ready to nip under her nighty or flash us--either way, it will be perverted and wrong.



Also a jolly holiday tradition at Main Street Hosiery, Griselda the mannequin fondles her pink terrycloth robe while contemplating the red panties. Which shall it be tonight, which shall it be? But wait! The flannel suit on the wall behind her is FOR SALE. Oh, rapture!


Who among you knew that Smurf is called, in other tongues, Pitufo, Schlumpf, and even SCHTROUMPF? Isn't that how two Smurfs make another Smurf? Look, the Schtroumpf are Schtroumpfing again! Look closer and you will see that one of them is dressed up as a crab, while another one appears to be a carrot. Their eyes are filled with a mad light. No wonder these toys are so perennially popular!


This mascot for Veloce Pizzeria in NYC makes me regret every diet I have ever been on. His whole aspect says EAT. In fact, it says EAT ME. I AM GOING TO PUNCH YOUR LIGHTS OUT. When eating items with pepperoni on them, do we need an angry, snouted hog-thing staring at us in a menacing way? Yes, we do! Note the teeth, suitable for edging pie crusts.

All Doped Up and Can't Even Drive My Big Rig

We all know about the common side effects of SSRIs and their ilk: nausea, dizziness, fecal urgency, murder, and other mildly aggravating symptoms that are well worth the relief and well-being--the very same, mind you, that one might also get from a sugar pill stamped with the words "Eat me and be happy! I am a magic Jesus pill! I heal your fucking woes you silly depressed so and so!" Such type would be very small and you are probably too depressed to find your glasses, and even if you did you'd be worrying about the grammatical accuracy of the statements, so never mind.

But when was the last time you called in a complaint about side effects to the drug company that peddled you its latest panacea? Think about it: The poor devils who are writhing on the floor thinking their genitals are being nipped by aphids aren't exactly in the position to dial a 1-800 number and rattle off a list of complaints. Nor is that guy in the backhoe loader who just crawled into the shovel bucket and started whimpering for his momma. He'll go home and have a beer and think it was just a bad day and he will never call that troubling side effect in, will he?

This is why I have determined that a whole host of unreported side effects are going...unreported. In a journalistic foray into truthiness, I feasted on a whole bunch of these mood-alerting Scooby Snacks during one particularly gloomy and rainy long weekend, when even painting my toenails and singing lighthearted songs about daffodils and bunnies failed to lift my spirits.

Here was my menu--a delectable array of the finest that Big Pharma has to offer us poor, weary souls.


The Results of My Very Scientific Experiment:

Effexor: Stabbing electrical pains in the medulla oblongata, followed by a desire to outrun one's demons via fast and reckless highway travel. Occasional belief that one is a squirrel, and must mate with one's kind. Visions of angels coming down from the Heavens and prodding one with fondue forks, coupled with the maniacal laughter of unseen children. Vivid sense that the scent of poo is in the air. Realization that it is one's own poo.

Lexapro: Imbued with a sense that one is a salmon, and one must swim upstream with all deliberation. Attempts to do so in the kitchen sink are met with futility. A wish to eat poisonous plants is followed by a trip to Burger King, where the alarmed kitchen staff find a surprise, naked visitor at the burger station, trying to construct a warrior helmet made entirely of beef patties. The trip home results in vomiting and hearing a choir singing "These Boots Are Made for Walking."

Wellbutrin: Oh, I'm not sure one can talk about this drug. One did very bad things while on it, including a romp through a nearby shopping mall where one tore apart a candy store and ran about shrieking "I am the King Eel! I will bite your duodenum!" However, feelings of anxiety were greatly relieved and one had the best sleep in decades.

Prozac: Feeling great! So not depressed anymore! Except for that weird deadening of all erogenous zones, including the earlobes and buttocks. The feeling got so acute that one started slathering oneself with butter, whipped cream, and other foodstuffs in an effort to feel something, anything! Tried stabbing at self with a butter knife. Wound up lying on a platter with a pomander in one's mouth. A wonderful drug.

Zoloft: Became convinced that this all was just a dream, a lovely dream. Thought the world was an apple or a pomegranate, and one could eat it in one bite. Imagined that one had invented the whole world and all its history in a kindergarten daydream. Finally recognized that one was in Hell, and was attacked by fire, burning lakes, brimstone, hornets, and little fellows with pitchforks. Met with Satan and think he is overrated. Still possibly in Hell, although it is hard to tell, and my gym instructor will not divulge where she learned her craft.

Cymbalta: Depression hurts. Damn it, it even hurts one's damn dog, and other pets. Decided that they would all be better off dead, without one's gloomy presence. Murdered animals with pitchforks and staves in a large ceremony that included a giant Cookie Puss ice cream cake from Carvel as a celebratory after-hours feast. Mmm. Cookie Puss, you are so good. You are one's overlord.

Pristiq: Felt like a wind-up doll that some other, bigger force was controlling. It made one do awful little jigs and pick up the garbage, and perform unnatural acts. Simply frightful.

Xanax: Not an SSRI, but a benzodiazepine. However, after all the other pills and goofballs, needed something to come down and chill-ax. Also needed steely calm to battle the laser-eyed moon marmots, who now outnumber us and will soon overtake the capital.