Warning: This post is aggro.

So yesterday I check out the YAAMNY website. While there, I decide to post a blurb about jello wrestling, since the chick who owns Stain in Williamsburg keeps promoting her stuff there and some slumlord in Elmhurst is trying to charge jacked up rent. If these bozos are posting stuff, I’ll add my two cents. Spice things up a bit.

My post might get deleted by the God of YAAMNY so I’ll include the copy here:

Women’s Jello Wrestling
February 11, 2007 8:00pm-10:00pm
Don Hill’s
The Feminist Fight Club hosts a night of Amateur Female Jello Wrestling downtown, including THAIGRR, the jello wrestling alter ego of me (JE’99). Prepare to be abused. I mean, amused.

Posted By: ANP

Short, to the point, and it’s not like I’m selling tickets like all the theatre momos promoting their plays, and it’s not like I’m selling wine like Ms. Stain Bar. And I indicate my class year and college affiliation — stuff that most bozos off the street wouldn’t know about. You’d need to be in Da Club (yo, root canals is MAD EASY, yo!) to drop it like that.

Get back home tonight and there’s an email that transports ANP straight (back) to crazy-person land:

Hello ANP,

I just saw your yaamny post. Please confirm your year and Yale Affiliation or I’ll have to delete the post. In addition if you could expand on your post and include a bit more info to make it both informative and make sure it doesn’t look like spam that would be much appreciated.

Happy jello fighting.

best regards,

The Ass Munch a.k.a. The Self-Appointed YAAMNY president

If you’ve ever seen Jonathan Ames do his hoary call, that’s the noise I made on the inside when I read this email. Only, an angry version.

The email infuriates me on many levels. Allow me to divulge:

• This dude is supposed to be a Yale grad. One would assume that he WOULDN’T BE AN IDIOT. Clearly, I’m an ass.
• MY YALE AFFILIATION IS INDICATED BY THE JE’99 PORTION. WHAT PART OF JE’99 DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND?
• Expand on my post? You mean, make it long and unwieldy like the other mongoloid posts cluttering up the boards? I’m sorry, but I’m an ONLINE MARKETING EXECUTIVE and I like my info SHORT AND SWEET. To the POINT. If they want more info they can CLICK THROUGH (no click left behind, my friends) to the WEBSITE that I have HYPERLINKED TO.
• SPAM? I’m sorry, when was the last time you read SPAM that was punny? Clever? Grammatically correct? And didn’t try to MAKE MONEY off of you?!?!
• Who the fuck appointed YOU King of New York Yale Alumni? I didn’t vote for your ass. And I’m reminded all over again of jack-a-napes IASMH self-appointed God. Shit, a “man” puts up a pizza box server and some klugey ass code and a .net domain suddenly thinks he’s God. Man, I’d set up my OWN damned website on principle if I had the friggin’ time!

(Clearing throat; switching to aristocratic voice.) Yes, quite. So, abandoning the all caps and creative punctuating from my inner monologue, I fire back my pissy email reply, which is entirely childish and yet entirely indicative of my annoyed mood:

Prez. YAAMNY -

Feel free to delete it if you’d like, since between my duties as class secretary, a member of the asian american yale alumni, a member of the yale crew alumni, an interviewer for yale, and a member of WISER (women varsity athlete alumnae) i don’t have time to make it look like not spam. if the JE 99 info isn’t enough (how about actually reading the post?) , and if people can’t read, then i don’t want them joining in.

JE. 1999. AS POSTED IN THE POST.

P.S. Your entire email kinda sucks. Since. Actually. You and I have met in person. And I find your entire email insensitive. And mind-boggling. Seriously. When was the last time you saw spam that actually had 1/4 of the personality in my post?

Consider me officially offended by your insensitivity and entirely un-amused. What on earth made you think it was spam? Seriously. As. If.

Annoyed, and I have to get up early and take my car to the shop, and I haven’t written one word for my homework assignment due tomorrow. And And And And

P.S. YAAMNY President for whose first name last name I have built this post to be search engine optimized: EAT IT. Seriously. Why don’t you try READING for a change. Don’t think I’m fooled by your “Happy Jello Fighting” bullshit. Admit it: it boggles your mind that someone with a Yale degree would be so inclined to jello wrestle. Don’t flatter your little .net that anyone’s trolling it in an attempt to spam it with well-crafted event listings.

Skeeriously.

Got home this afternoon and Academy friend Joe’d left a comment that he’s in town. Since size 30 skinny jeans were sold out @ Arden B., I stopped by acquaintance Colette’s boutique Coco & Delilah (she’s friends with Banker Rachel and also my mom’s best friend’s son Nick) to git her counsel on a pair. (I’m finally dipping my toe in the tapered leg waters for the first time since puberty.)

Anyhoo I learn from Colette’s Louis that I am STILL buying jeans too big for me (Millsy, why did you ever move to LA and make me fend for myself?), after having JUST purchased two (2) pairs of $100 size 30s. Shizer. So I now own a pair of dark blue skinny 29s (!!). Then quick popover to KMart to git some $2 stretchy gloves & an $8 clearance 2XL white button down shirt

And then I met up with Joe and the woman he’s seeing (who was in the same Academy class as my little brother) and a woman he went to Purdue with who now lives in Greenpoint. Hoosiers in the East Village! Such a nice Tibetan din din and then tea at Cha An.

So anyway nice conversation catching up with Joe and gossiping about Academites (mind you, Joe and I exchanged maybe four words while actually at the Academy) but in the car home I am still moody and mopey and so friggin sensitive !! Horoscope:

You are very picky about whom you socialize with today, but your criticism might actually get in the way of your happiness. Even if you are sure of your perceptions, keep in mind that you are possibly over-reacting. For now it may be better to just go along with the group and save your judgments for another day.

Ugh so true. So I get home and pop in to email and see a nice note from a college buddy which was just the cherry on top of a really nice weekend so far:

Dude,
I want you to know that the only reason I read the alumni magazine anymore is for your column.
Keep up the strong work…

Aww. Aww! Make-a-me brush over here.

It’s nice when people shovel the snow around their hearts and let their sunshine glow. I want to be a melty melt melt. I want to be a happy snowflake. I want to laugh out loud and I wish the people in earshot wouldn’t glare at me when I do so.

I blame the noncaffeinated chai for the total randomness of this post. Time to go try on my new sparkly blue belt with a soon-to-be-tailored-by-ANP 2XL men’s oxford.

xo xo xo

File under: Best Blog Comment Ever, or Why She’s My Best Friend Data Point #D224:

I hate it when you start waxing nostalgic about this toxic fuckfo.

The man-child dropped one girl off for an abortion and drove off to fuck some other girl before driving back to pick up girl one. And that, folks, is all there is to say on this topic.

Except for, at the risk of being accused of not supporting the troops, I hope some crazy taliban busts a cap in his sorry ass.

And that, folks, is all there is to say on this topic.

Tonight I add no value and simply act as a zero-liability pass-through mechanism. Don’t worry, I take zero margin, and consider this linkage a ross reader for the delightful Google adwords that you will click on prior to navigating away from this website in order to get me twelve cents closer to paying off my college loans.

• Watch the short film of Alecia’s hubby. Like Alecia, the film is supercute. Like every hairstyle I’ve seen her with for the past fourteen years (holy crap…), the film is also short. “Sometimes a man has to follow the echoed yearnings of his soul.” (Another picnic video.)
• Read the ?s couples should ask before getting hitched. My curious fascination with marriage right now is a very academic one. Consider:
• The universe’s transition from the age of Pisces (woman lives through man) to the age of Aquarius (each individual is their own tree with roots and branches entangled with those of their beloved)
• My desire for at least my own bed (if not my own wall-to-wall carpeted bedroom) even after I get murried
• Robert Firestone’s Fantasy Bond completely altered my interpretation of human interactions & especially romantic relationship dyamics

And, finally …

I am Wonder Woman

Wonder Woman 100% Supergirl 95% The Flash 80% Robin 70% Iron Man 70% Batman 70% Superman 65% Spider-Man 60% Catwoman 60% Hulk 60% Green Lantern 50%

I am a beautiful princess with great strength of character.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Quiz

(via Ari “Iron Man” Paparo)

(Alecia, I looked everywhere for the photo of Hallowe’en 1993. Alas, it remains MIA, but would have been the perfect addition to this post, n’est-ce pas?)

Time to inflate some balls for tomorrow night’s game against a 4-1 team @ 94th n Park.

There’re so many things to say that there is nothing to say. I do want to alert my readers that a new contributor will be joining Chez xoxoANP! soon: Thaigrr. An amateur Jello wrestler whose appellation, unbeknownst to him, was coined by none other than Florida-based director / film editor Bradley P.Q. Bryan, I felt it important to allow Thaigrr a forum in which to share her experiences unmediated to the public.

February 11th we take this thing a bit further west to a larger venue. Stay tuned for more info.

And, since she’s bit modest and not so agile with the keyboard, I will say that Thaigrr’s first foray into the world of Jello wrestling was met with:

• a Reuters interview
• an interview by some French television show
• mad photographs. And some happy ones.
• cheers on Stanton by her newest female fans

All you ladies need to seriously, seriously consider joining next time. (Unless you are a Leo; I’d hate to see you with a mussed coiff.) It’s crazy fun: part sport, part theatre, and 100% kick ass.

Previously:

• Jello wrasslin‘
• Add these to your bland new planner

Wanna git started as a writer?

Buy my (lovely, sweet, talented, smart) friend Jane’s book:  Beginning Writer’s Answers Book

I just loaded up on Writer’s Digest publications at the Mishawaka Barnsenfelden and can’t wait to dig in.  Go get it!

& congratulations, Jane!!

Mossm put an article regarding mongs on my radar -

Those with IQs between 51 and 70 were called morons. Morons had adequate learning skills to complete menial tasks and communicate. Imbeciles, with IQs between 26 and 50, never progressed past a mental age of about six. And the lowest of all were the idiots, with IQ between 0 and 25…

Just the kind of information that could have been lethal in the hands of an Academite…

Just popped into the “rate me” folder on my iTunes and stumbled upon this gem –

 

4:05;
In my neighborhood,
When shots go off,
No one bothers.
A POP, and a reply POP, and no reply…

 

Dinosaurs on the quilt I wore
With a girl.
Such a classic girl…
Such a classic girl…

Such a classic girl,

 

Gives her man great ideas.
Hears you tell your friends,
Hey man, listen to my great idea!
It’s true I am a villain
When you fall ill,
that’s probably because

 

Men never can be.
Not like a girl.
A classic girl…
Such a classic girl…

 

They may say, Those were the days…,
But in a way,
You know for us these are the days.
Yes, for us these are the days,

 

And you know you’re my girl!
Such a classic girl…
Such a classic girl…

 

Yeah for us these are the days…

Man, it’s like a time capsule, bursting into my ears, and there I am, Eric Bilski, middle school, Melba Holmgren’s home ec class in the basement at Urey, wondering what it might like to be cool, and Eric talking about Jane’s Addiction, and me not knowing he was a foster kid, and me not knowing what all that entailed, and me not knowing anything about foodstamps or welfare or that many of the kids I grew up with were on them, popped into their mailboxes with the cable bill, my family had none of those things, me not knowing the sacrifices that my parents made or the ugly that they had seen, me only having to worry about getting my homework done, me not having to worry about getting food on my plate –

Just listen to these violet blue guitars jangling, circling, can you hear it, do you feel it, do you remember crying yourself to sleep wondering if someday someone would think that you were a classic girl, does the yearn wrap itself around your spirit and jog your memory of the adolescentia of your yesterday –

Clown tears’ Kleenex has come in the form of a frenzy of friendsies, who have appeared en masse apropos nothing save perhaps the holiday festing natural to this time of year. Returning the generous spirit of a Crazy Omeze Turkey Day or a rockin’ Nicholas P.Q. Hot Dog party in the ‘Slope, I want to

• Give a shout-out and thank you to KDub for her props to my brog. I’m trying to feed esprsso with her blog 411 and hope to become a regular reader once MySpace gits it backend in order.
• Welcome JRC back into the fold of Team USA and HIGH FIVE him for choosing WordPress, the numero uno choice for communists and comment spam fighters alike.
• Thank Heather for her regular stream of workplace-inappropriate email forwards, which keep me chuckling while I’mma paper-shuffling. Can’t wait to see her when I’m home.

The real impetus behind this post is a touching email I received earlier this week.

Backstory

This summer I frolicked around my hood (SOuth of the Navy YArds) for a SONYA open studio, where I peeked into the studio of artist MPLandis. At first I thought it was the same Michael Landis with whom I used to work at a pharma agency, hence my investment in many flights of stairs. Although it wasn’t, I really dug his art, and put my name on his mailing list.

A couple of weeks later, I get an email announcing that MPLandis is clearing out storage and selling much of his work at cut rate prices. ACT NOW! Having achieved a new place in my “personal work” and realizing I was worth my own sammich art collection, I vowed to buy something of his. Anything.

The day of the open studio sale, I puttered over to my grody neighborhood grocery for a sticka butta, gallona milk, and loafa bread. While rounding the corner of the C Train, I noticed a perplexed white dude with a large black instrument holder thing.

(Alright, first I noticed his build, and thought mournfully and self-pityingly “Oh, that looks like Mr. 940P, boo hoo for poor always-getting-doom-ped-moi.” (Never mind that 940P was an unawares alcoholic with a coke problem who made out with the very male editor of People en Espanol in front of my very eyes.))

Anyway, perplexed white dude asked me which direction Lafayette was, and I pointed him on his merry way.

Couple hours later, I change into my hoops gear so I can shoot some hoops on the courts outside o’ MPLandis’ studio. When, a few blocks later, I huff and puff up the steps, who do I see in MPLandis’ studio but the perplexed white dude playing cello!

I can’t decide which pieces to buy, but finally settle on this chaos in blue painting, approximately 3.5′ x 4′.

Turns out it was created while Tom (the cellist) played and MP (the artist) painted. Which makes sense; perhaps with Tom playing as I regarded the works made this piece in particular speak to me. Putting my brain in the right place and all.
So I buy the painting, go shoot some hoops, go on my merry way.

Fast forward to this week.

(Click here to continue reading…)

The Megazines at Visionaire Gallery exhibit has been extended through the end of the year.

I checked it out on Wednesday, curiosity piqued as I published an old-school zine (think: rubber cement, masking tape, old magazines, and a copier) back in the day. The exhibit’s not about that world but rather the Blackbook/Madison-esque niche. I even saw some issues of Interview magazine that may be sitting in my closet in my parents’ home.

But I stopped in my tracks when I saw Academite Angel Chang’s Me Magazine, and brainchild-of-Yalies’ n+1 magazine. I’m older than both Angel (who sported a YALE tee shirt in our high school yearbook and ended up going to Barnard) and the Yalies; my ‘zine got a shout out in Sassy in the nineties — commence miniature bout of self-doubt.

What am I doing with my life? Where is it all heading?

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

I still like magazines, haven’t ruled out the possibility of getting back into the fray (albeit in a more sophisticated way, now that I understand the profitability dynamics, distribution, and marketing levers of that industry) in a future career, but I just can’t get that riled up when I see people doing what, at one point in my life, I wanted to do. It’s not their fault that they cared more and had the drive to do it, rather than just think it.

Which reminds me. I’ve got a manuscript to draft.

–

Megazines at Visionaire Gallery / 11 Mercer Street / 10013. A unique collection of independently published megazines, and worth fifteen minutes of your time. Plus, you can pop over to Pearl River & get your shop on right afterwards.