claus

One reason I'm glad christmas is over is that I don't have to see this creepy as fuck ad anymore. Santa went from a Jolly fat man to a skinny albino eater of souls.

Razor's Edge

The other day, when work was cut short by a middling New York snowstorm, I capitalized by sharing some super happy hour brews with a friend. When a fortyish, silver-haired man my dad's age lumbered over to our stools, I figured he was a lonely accountant gone AWOL from the office party taking place in the far corner, or at most, a Murray Hill closet dweller with Chelsea dreams. Instead, he pulled out a generic plastic shopping bag from which he produced a single package of Gillette Sensor III. "Best deal you'll get." I examined the razor, admiring its virtues. "I'll sell you 4 for 20," he slurred. I thanked him, noting that with such a surplus, I'd have nothing to do but go out and slash people. The bartender, an ingénue, winced perceptibly. The stumblebum leaned in closer, whispering gently into my ear, "You can even take it into the bathtub." A fine point.

John Madden

John Madden has got to be the most annoying Cowboys homer. As a color commentator he offers nothing. I really wish someone would throw shoes at him. I had to turn off the sound and put on WFAN for the radio broadcast.

Here's another on the hate list.

Dion Sanders - A walking camel faced jackass. I actually change the channel when he's speaking on the NFL network post game show.

Riddles

When I was little, my dad would spend quality time with me in the following manner: Plopping down on the couch and asking my younger self if I'd like to play riddles (in Russian, of course). I'd get super-excited and climb on my dad's belly. His eyelids heavy and slowly shutting like medieval city gates, he'd drawl something along the lines of, "What doesn't burn in a fire, doesn't drown in water, doesn't rot in the earth?" While I scratched my head and searched my tiny little literal brain for an answer, Dad was giving in to the Slumber God and, by the time I looked at him to deliver a half-baked answer, he'd was well on his way to bucolic Snooze Village.

P0wned

In the Wake of Da Prophet

Why We Rage: Confessions of a Twixter

The word “rage” first entered our Lexicon in the early aughts, when a friend’s friend band was then encamped in LA and, from what I understand, living out of a van down by the river. During a transcontinental phone call he’d inquired if we’d be “raging” on a certain night. We’d been raging for years and didn’t even know it.

What’s a rage? The word often inspires radical interpretations: young lads swinging from chandeliers, scandalized women with rouge lips and hiked skirts piled unto pickup trucks, and empty bottles of liquor lining powdered glass tables like pines in an Alpine forest. In reality, a rage is something two or more decently educated post-collegiate dorks engage in on weekend nights after psyching each other up and pre-gaming on undergrad nostalgia. “We came, we raged, we conquered” is merely a group euphemism for innocent debauchery involving no more than a half-dozen extreme beers, silly inside comedy bits, and minor property damage.

Two weeks ago, I was at Bar None, an NYU haunt where, thanks to fake IDs, the average age probably falls short of 21. We strode in with a coupon (sign of the times) offering 2-for-1 beers handed to us outside by a bespectacled girl. After some ritual sideline mockservations, we were drawn into a friendly beer pong exhibition resulting in a fairly dominating win for us (it’s common knowledge that beer pong always comes down to the last cup, so it’s all about the start).

So what separates me from the hordes of age-denying post-collegiate frat rats packing bars from the UWS to the LES? Am I any better than the button-downed Lehman Brother carpet-bombing his friends with Jagerbombs and Stellas? Is it merely my preference for extreme beers and ironic perspective? Nope, any old hipster doofus can provide these dubious alternatives. As for me, I have another theory.

In the decade of doubt between school and responsibility, raging is not just a celebration of youth: it’s a small redoubt from the rapidly invading future, a raft in a fast-flowing stream with a certain terminus—the only question is how long until the plunge? Raging is a boycott against the inevitability of life-by-script and our invisible queuing to meet vicissitudes large and small. It’s a constant in an uncertain time dominated by certain variables. Rage is an anchor in the stormy sea of family, career, mortgage, disease, divorce, and death. Rage is way of life—at least for today…

Bah, Rack

I really did want to vote for McCain this year but, alas, the old man did everything he could to lose my vote. In his pursuit of power, JM has ceded a carefully cultivated image of independent, maverick legislation to appease the base. Worse still, he chose a supremely unqualified (though nice) lady as his second in command in a cynically calculated move of desperation, poisoning the race with irrelevant identity politics and inspiring careless vitriol. Further, with each debate and public appearance, it's become clearer that JM i a crotchety old man whose attitude could do more harm than good in a time when we need fresh ideas to compete in a global marketplace.

JM, I love you, you're a hero, but goodbye, and thanks for all the fish!

Palling Around with Criminals

nba

"I would trade Eddie Curry for chicken Curry."

an Observation

Harrison Ford + pig people from twilightzone episode "beauty is in the eye of the beholder"
= Bill Maher

TErrible awful movie.

This weekend IFC had on "IFC shorts".
I tuned in as they were showing, http://theclimacticdeathofdarkninja.com/ The Climactic Death of Dark Ninja.

This movie is by far the WORST student film/short I had ever seen in my life. I wish I had the 13 minutes back. After the first minute I kept on telling myself, it's on TV, surely this has to go somewhere! Now keep in mind, I went to art school and have seen some of the most horrible films (some of which I helped produce), none could match this.
It wasn't quirky, cute or ironic or funny. It was stupid. Watching it you can tell there was definitely some money spent on the production. The audio didn't match the kids lips most of the time. The dialogue was pitiful. The direction was making me dizzy.

So I was actually pissed off afterwards. I went online and found that this short had actually won some awards, one of them for BEST AUDIO. Maybe this can be the next Michael Bay, or Brett Ratner or

I wish my Dad never took me to a Met game 22 years ago

Fuck this team

How can you slap?

Crtics Gone Wild

LoL. Poor Ebert.

Ailing

Welcome to Israeli airport security, Alvin Ailey. Now the world knows. Why was it important for the AP to point out that Israeli security detained an "African American"? Are they trying to say that the guy was stopped on account of his skin color, rather than his first name, "Abdur-Rahim?" In any case, the most interesting development in this story is that Jackson is engaged to a Jewish woman. A straight dancer? Yeah, and pigs with lipsticks fly.

Hello, Dollface

Misogyny rears its ugly head again the form of the Sarah Palin doll. I wonder if anyone is mass-producing an Obama doll wearing a turban or a McCain doll complete with meat hook and water board in a Hanoi Hilton environment.

New Sabia

http://news.yahoo.com/story//ap/20080908/ap_on_el_pr/college_republicans_obama

O-Ba-Ma!

So the hullabaloo is over. The Republican conventioneers packed up the tents and ten-gallon hats, deflated the balloons, and gone back to the oil rigs and rodeo barns. Sarah Palin is back in Alaska to take lamaze with her pregnant 17-year-old and her husband-to-be husband. Track Palin is snorting coke off some prom queen's thighs in preparation for deployment to Iraq. Joe Biden is making cripples walk and McCain is turning proverbs into gaffes. Let the games begin!

Joltin' Joe & Spanish Diddy

The Latin puffster, Daddy Yankee, has now endorsed Senator McCain. Now that's "Gasolina"! This in a week we learned Ducky from Pretty in Pink and Robert Duvall are both yearning for four more years of Bush, and that Jon Voight is a true believer in the Obama/Ayers/Wright axis.

That's so fay

What is your least favorite kind of rain?

-Annoying misty
-Do I or do I not need an umbrella drizzle
-Blinding downpour
-Light, but falls in gigantic drops

I'd say the last

That Wacky Bubba

That "rock star" performance at the '04 convention seems so long ago

FUCKIN THING!

Ok, I've had enough of this stupid Jets/Giants preseason game. the Preseason even. Remember back in 1998, Jason sehorn decided he could return kickoffs? Sehorn had his knee and pretty much his career torn off by Jet scrub special teamer. And now this. Osi Umenyiora is gone for the year in the most useless play in the most useless game. Now the Giants will need to shift some players around and maybe try to convince Michael Strahan to unretire. It's time for Mathias Kiwanuka to shine!

WE'LL DO IT LIVE!

The Winning Ticket for the World

If everyone abroad approves, it must be good

J-Date Code

To the uninitiated, those lovely twentysomething ladies of J-Date may appear all too reasonable and responsible. Never hunting for those superficial accouterments of material success their misogynist detractors always herald...But wait, just a minute...what's up with all the high-frequency descriptions of the ideal mate? It's almost as if there were a...code:

1. Ambitious and goal-oriented (provided ambition results in the acquisition of enviable real estate and goals revolve around furniture garnishes).
   
2. Looking for a man who knows what he wants (as long as what he wants coincides nicely with my plans for a new pair of Christian Louboutin pumps).
3. Must be materially and emotionally stable (to the point where said stability will not be compromised by excessive overpriced dinners and frequent tokens of your appreciation...emotional stability negotiable).
4. Someone who loves what he does (assuming this meets the conditions laid out in 1, 2, and 3 above).

Mothers Against Common Sense

There's "The Truth" about drinking on college campuses...and then there's "the truth"...

A sideline reporter for basketball games in the Olympics, said something like, “these gestures aren’t a big deal in China and they are less politically correct than in America. This isn’t an issue. ”
The Spanish players didn’t think it was a big deal either.
The reason why the Chinese in China aren’t as offended as someone like me can be easily explained. They didn’t grow up being mocked with the chinkeye gesture or being called “chingchong”. We are the minority here. It isn’t about political correctness, it’s about being an ass. Can you imagine if the Spanish team posed in “black face”?
In the Prince Philip scale of racist gestures this is a 8.

mens team

womens team
argentina soccer
spanish tennis team

if i weren't so lazy, i'd photoshop the black face and see funny they'd look then! amirite?!!

Carry Me Back to Old Virginny

Scandalous happenings in Central Virginia, someone alert Drudge if he can take a break from fapping to the latest tropical storm

Orympic Fever

I'm not sure whether I'm more surprised that the Chinese basketball team should have beaten the World Champion Spainards or that it took this long for some sweet Western-style racism to disrupt the usual international lovefest that is the Olympic Games.

Intimate Morning with a J-Date Bot

Clowwwn: hi
*** Waiting for ladystaceyB09E to connect
*** ladystaceyB09E's IM window is open
ladystaceyB09E: hi im stacey
Clowwwn: so I see
Clowwwn: how are you this fine morning?
ladystaceyB09E: im fine...
ladystaceyB09E: whats your name?
Clowwwn: Yan
Clowwwn: you're up early
ladystaceyB09E: yeah...
ladystaceyB09E: nice meeting you yan
Clowwwn: you too
Clowwwn: did you just join jdate?
ladystaceyB09E: yeah just now...im new here...
Clowwwn: you're a Floridian, ey?
ladystaceyB09E: yeah!!!
Clowwwn: are you from Talahassee or were you in school there?
ladystaceyB09E: fsu...
Clowwwn: cool
ladystaceyB09E: have you ever been at florida/
Clowwwn: I've been to Miami/Orlando
Clowwwn: what's Tallahassee like?
ladystaceyB09E: there were many beach here
Clowwwn: were? you're not there anymore?
ladystaceyB09E: no....i want to go to hawaii..i like the beaches there...
Clowwwn: what did you study at FSU?
ladystaceyB09E: mass communication
Clowwwn: oh, really, do you want to work in TV/radio?
ladystaceyB09E: yes i want to
Clowwwn: are you working now?
ladystaceyB09E: yes im a model
Clowwwn: what have you done?
ladystaceyB09E: what?
Clowwwn: what type of modeling?
ladystaceyB09E: wanna know?]
Clowwwn: sure
ladystaceyB09E: http://tinyurl.com/6owggs heres my site...check it out!!!
Clowwwn: lol
ladystaceyB09E: lol
Clowwwn: I run my own live webcam site, but no one visits
Clowwwn: wnna be my first paying customer?
ladystaceyB09E: what?
Clowwwn: I'm a model too
ladystaceyB09E: lol
ladystaceyB09E: haha!!!
Clowwwn: I'm a foot model
Clowwwn: I have perfect arches
ladystaceyB09E: i see....
Clowwwn: it's a very exciting world
ladystaceyB09E: try my site and i will be try yours
Clowwwn: there aren't too many Jewish models
Clowwwn: don't you think?
ladystaceyB09E: i think so
Clowwwn: are you on a webcam feed now?
ladystaceyB09E: yeah ....why?
Clowwwn: just curious
ladystaceyB09E: i see...
Clowwwn: do you have to be on all day?
ladystaceyB09E: yeah...
ladystaceyB09E: wanna try?
Clowwwn: do you get breaks?
ladystaceyB09E: i will give you my free access
ladystaceyB09E: wanna try>
Clowwwn: does this involve nudity?
ladystaceyB09E: noy really?
ladystaceyB09E: i will do whatever you want...
Clowwwn: what does that include?
ladystaceyB09E: then try....for you to know..
Clowwwn: what will you do?
ladystaceyB09E: i will do whatever you want....
ladystaceyB09E: what do you want me to do?
Clowwwn: will you discuss books with me?
ladystaceyB09E: ok...i will do that if that is what you want
Clowwwn: I don't want you to do anything you don't want to do
ladystaceyB09E: ok...then go to the site
Clowwwn: I am a bit uncomfortable with that, don't you think we should meet for coffee first?
ladystaceyB09E: ok...until you get access on me then i will give you my address until you finish filling up the form....
ladystaceyB09E: deal?
Clowwwn: sounds good, then I'll fly down to Tallahassee for our coffee?
ladystaceyB09E: yeah...
ladystaceyB09E: thats a nice idea
Clowwwn: alright! let's do it!
ladystaceyB09E: ok,...heres the link...click this completely for you not to cost....http://tinyurl.com/6owggs
ladystaceyB09E: http://tinyurl.com/6owggs
ladystaceyB09E: click this
Clowwwn: sweet!
Clowwwn: where is my free access?
Clowwwn: I'm packing my bag...
ladystaceyB09E: its alreadt indicated on the link...
Clowwwn: oh boy!
ladystaceyB09E: all you have to do is to click that and fill up the form
Clowwwn: OK, I'm bringing my Turgenev collection, I hope you like him
ladystaceyB09E: ok...
ladystaceyB09E: are you on the site./
Clowwwn: I'll have to do it from work...I'm running late
Clowwwn: Stacey, you'd better be there, I might be fired for this!
Clowwwn: OK, booking my ticket to Florida
Clowwwn: gotta go! see you online!
ladystaceyB09E: you have yahoo?
Clowwwn: thaat's right
ladystaceyB09E: i will give tyou my address until you finish filling up the form
Clowwwn: ok, go ahead
ladystaceyB09E: are you on the site?
Clowwwn: go ahead
Clowwwn: I can't log on now, please give me the address
Clowwwn: I'll do it alter
ladystaceyB09E: no...you need to do it now or else i cannot give you my address
Clowwwn: whaaaa?
Clowwwn: you're breaking my heart here
Clowwwn: OK, look, I'm coming down to Florida tonight, we'll sort this out
Clowwwn: jsut be on Jdate later

Gratis and Gratitude

Recently I went out with a girl who felt that not only was it OK not to make the obligatory gesture of offering to pay (one I actually appreciate), but that she didn't need to so much as thank me for spending a substantial amount of money feeding a complete stranger. Apparently, in a Russian girl's mind, this is somehow part of the dating dance? Imagine a subway vagrant not thanking you for giving him a banana of some loose change. Does that mean the homeless have better manners than Russian women? That does not speak highly of our fairer sex. Sometimes it's amazing what some women are oblivious to or feel they can get away with, considering they're supposed to be the ones reading between the lines. Here's a sign for you: one and out!

J-Unit

Good news, Jents! Bohemigrant is back on the J-Date, at least for the next few months. The least he can get out of this are a few good stories, so, to celebrate, Bohemigrant Blog will be publishing some very valuable information to aid the rest of you in your Jewish, dating, or other pursuits. Enjoy!

Why, Lord, Why?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080728/ap_on_fe_st/odd_canada_large_family

Medal of Honor, Pt. 3 (end)

There was a deafening, rumbling elevated train overhead and nowhere to play soccer. It rained every other day during June. Neighborhood kids were strange and degenerate. Even the stray dogs and cats outside seemed hungry and ruthless, so unlike the kind animals back home. America was the land of moldy honey and near-expired milk—the kind in Aunt Zena’s pantry, served with disdain to us while her kids stealthily munched on Dannon Yogurt and Pop Tarts. And to top it all off, there was no medal to look at or think about while slurping down the soggy store-brand cornflakes. There was no game to play aside from some Milton Bradley soap opera trivia hand-me-down from my second cousins…

…There was only languor without dreams—a Nintendo without a cartridge. Certain it would turn up, I made a halfhearted attempt to look for my long-cherished sentimental keepsake, historical artifact, and future Halloween trimming, rummaging through my parents’ wooden chest of valuables, soon to be pronounced useless crap. Cheap costume jewelry, several faded fanny packs, tube upon tube of expired Soviet laxatives, ’60s books about American society and culture were all that greeted my chagrin.

I was starting to get worried. Missing was OK—possibly gone wasn’t. Not a soul—Grandma included, knew about the medal—or cared, since the beginning of our tumultuous departure from Russia and through our tempestuous beginning here. Yet here I was: in an increasingly fraught and frantic search amid a hopeless clutter of immigrant filtrate. From room to room (and there were only three) I ran, under and around my cousins, blind to my aunt’s rebuke, deaf to my uncle’s parroted words of castigation. Turning the house upside down for no good reason and incurring my parents’ wrath was one thing. Not finding the medal—that…that was unthinkable.

Running out of places to triple-check and domestic order to upset, I decided to take the last resort. “Grandma…” I asked. The look on her face, strangely, failed to shift from sanguine to suspicious. Grandma, so often the public face of our family—the one whose sterling reputation and demeanor swore integrity to those that would doubt ours—now looked, I could’ve sworn, less than completely candid. She shrugged her left shoulder, I queried again; she shrugged her right and left for the kitchen, where a pretext awaited her.

Suddenly, I felt like the time my parents took away our cancer-stricken cat to a feline clinic—one I’d never been able to find in all my later research—without granting me a proper goodbye. It was a moment of full-blown paranoia that penetrated the credulous walls of childhood trust. Luckily, it was only a moment, because in the next my grandpa strolled through the door, his hands laden with crumpled cellophane Thank You bags.

He flashed me a quick, noncommittal glance and continued in his firm, disciplined stride to the kitchen, where my grandmother was frying potatoes in a 2-inch pool of vegetable oil. “Gramps’, Gramps’!” I beseeched. In a stern voice, he advised I would have to wait, and make myself useful by peeling my cousins off the stairwell for dinner. But in my excitement, I couldn’t wait. “Grandpa, Grandpa, have you seen my medal?—Uncle Seva’s medal?”

In that instant, when I knew I would get no more than a cold shrug, Grandpa showed all his cards—which, in their literal form, were a wrinkled pair of kids’ Wrangler jeans, a brown Bugle Boy short-sleeve, and a shelf-worn 3-pack of briefs made by some unidentifiable Mexican company.

“What’s this for?”

“School starts soon. You have to look nice on first day.”

“Oh, thank you…” Instinctively, I assumed dull-birthday-gift mode. Grandpa fixed his gaze expectantly, as if waiting for the next question. “Thank you, Grandpa. This is nice,” I repeated, suffocating in my words’ inadequacy, as reflected on Grandpa’s screwed-up face.

“You are a big boy, so you understand.” It wasn’t a question. This took a few moments for me to process; it was an answer…

It didn’t matter that Grandma debunked every myth concerning the medal: ...never used it to marry Sveta…never even earned it…purchased, along with a certificate, by Seva’s father from a corrupt general to speed Seva’s return from service… Full disclosure was the last thing I wanted—the first and only was that hunk of metal previously occupying the empty box in my hands.

I stared at the box, fuming. Not one of her excuses released Grandpa from answering for what he’d done; none could unmake him the object of my scorn. I ran out of the house, to the Boardwalk, and scurried underneath—years before it was packed with sand to discourage bums and junkies from dwelling within its fetid folds—surrendering to a torrent of tears gushing from my quaking gut. Like a trucker barreling into a rest-stop bathroom, I found my release, against a damp stone pillar.

*****

After a deliberately silent night, I spied my moment. Emanating from the opposite corner of the room, his carefree, sonorous snore was my bugle for attack. Armed with the articles he’d selflessly acquired for me, I jumped on top of him, slapping him with the briefs and wrapping the jeans around his bristly face. Startled, Grandpa gasped for air and shrieked. I’d never heard my grandfather shriek. Shocked, in turn, I fell off the bed before he’d had a chance to fling me, sliding underneath my own cot, in leftover tears. In the next room, I heard Aunt Zena’s snarling, long-planned bark, muted no longer, “That is it—the end! Either them or me!”

Writhing under my meager shelter, scared out of my wits—but not of my imminent comeuppance, I reached inside the storage box and furiously felt around for it, groping, hoping that I had missed a spot...

Medal of Honor, Pt. 2

The stairwell and second-floor corridor smelled of fried fish and potatoes. My grandmother opened the door, revealing our halfway house—a 3-bedroom apartment. (My dad's cousin, his wife, and two kids temporarily, patiently occupied a single bedroom while my father, mother, brother, grandparents, and I split the rest of the digs.) She was wearing a ‘50s-era Russian apron with faded sunbeams radiating upon a dewy meadow, upon which she wiped the palms of her hands when I walked through the door, sweat beads lining her brow, taut as a clothesline. She waved me on, a bit more brusque than usual.

It was our eighth week in the apartment, and though I overheard my parents’ whispers, I dared not believe that my dear Uncle Lenny’s famous forbearance was wearing thin, his shrew wife engineering our eviction as they murmured in the dark foyer, pretending to check for a parcel. “This is what America does,” my mother hissed. But I didn’t share my mom’s rushed verdict. For one thing, it had Ninja Turtles. For another, 3 weeks and counting that my dad wasn’t called a kike by drunken subordinates.

One thing I did miss was friends. It was too early to seek initiation into one of the many street gangs that patrolled the Boardwalk with their water-guns and worn-out BMX bikes; too late to befriend the black kid downstairs my dad had shielded me from when he came over to say hello. It was another 2 hours until 5 PM and Ninja Turtles with nothing to do but attack the Victorian English workbook my mother had dug up for me with a friend in Moscow. So, it was time to polish the medal, daydreaming as I rubbed the engraving between my thumb and index finger. “Savour the flavour,” I enunciated.

Under my cot, my hands reached inside a plastic storage tub, ferreting through a jumble of Soviet coins, threads and needles, bubble gum comics, photos of friends left behind, cheap trinkets, Russian adventure books, laminated certifications of academic achievements, and a purloined airline sleeping kit. But there was only one item my hands were concerned with—the only item that was…wait…yes, gone!

Has Anyone Seen My Violin?

It's quite small. In fact, it's the world's tiniest violin.

Medal of Honor, Pt. I

At ten, nothing thrills a boy more than a veteran pinning a war decoration to your chest.

Uncle Seva was awarded a Medal for the Defense of Odessa in July 1943 after his submarine brought food, munitions, and gasoline to a besieged garrison off the coast of Odessa. It was a risky mission, and the medal spoke to that—with its gold-embossed print of two infantrymen intrepidly charging into battle, the back carrying the words For Our Soviet Fatherland. It was only the beginning of the adulation Odessa and its protectors would see as the status of Hero City was conferred upon the seaport town in 1945.

On July 23, 1993, exactly 50 years after Seva was awarded the medal, I took it out of my wallet. It was time to restore the luster. To that end, I took a small rag given me by my dad and a bottle of solution by my brother. Propping myself up against the paint-chipped wall in the cramped two-room suite that housed my grandparents and me, I started to scrub…

*****

In preparing to depart the former Soviet Union, people received the strangest of advice on what to bring to the New World—whether Israel, Australia, Germany, or the U.S. In our family’s case, it was a veritable hodgepodge of the unsellable and the undesirable: Cold War-era spy kits for young sleuths; commemorative china featuring the architectural highlights of Odessa and its environs; vial upon vial of green mystery potion used on minor cuts and major scrapes that left thick jade splotches on our palms, ankles, and foreheads; and, our prize possessions—two ghastly, poorly rendered paintings depicting the beheading of John the Baptist by a bloody red sickle and the Godmother as a skanked-out meth addict, respectively. It was only later learned that my father’s painter friend, Kolya, might not have been the connoisseur we’d all thought.

My dad, furrowing his thick, austere brows, instructed us to bring only the bare necessities, or, stuff of value that would fetch some ready cash. The idea was to sell our wares upon arrival at his cousin’s apartment in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, just until we got on our feet. This excluded my hobby railroad and collection of rare toy Red Army soldiers, which were to be distributed among left-behind relatives, neighbors, and friends; UFO clippings I’d been collected with my brother’s help since I was 5; and the collection of young reader fiction occupying our bulky bookshelves. It included my bulky scratchy wool sweaters, passport that stated Jew, and a little drawing of zoo animals playing soccer that had graced my wall since birth.

Still, I’d managed to sneak the medal into my kid-size leather wallet, sent as a gift from one of my distant aunt’s friends in America. Now, as I studied the bronze-colored coin, I wondered what exactly Seva did for it—I only knew what it did for him. Aunt Sveta told me the story herself—how Seva, the snot-nosed kid just back from the front in 1945, one of a morbidly popular group of men known as “male deficit,” had proposed to her with the medal after 3 months of courtship, too poor to put a thimble round her slender finger. What I didn’t know—and what I always wanted from Seva—was the account, full of gore and glory, of the gallant exploits that netted him the precious lump of metal.

Although so called, Seva wasn’t truly my uncle—he was Grandma’s second maternal cousin—ordained as father figure when hers was claimed by the German war machine. Our friendship was a quirk of my parents’ busy schedule—and my reticence among peers. So it was that Seva, childless himself, became a multigenerational surrogate dad—a Father Emeritus. We spent days in his woodshop—a rarity in any Soviet apartment; nights going through photo albums and listening to the bombastic, patriotic records of his youth.

I would not only eat, but sleep at Seva and Sveta’s much coveted three-room, park-side apartment. My toys were wood and saw; my playmates, Seva and his neighbor, Alec the cobbler, who taught me bridge and solitaire, much to my parents’ chagrin. There I spent many Friday nights, until, at 1100 hours sharp Saturday, Grandpa came to get me.

Grandpa never passed his medical test and spent the war making plane parts in a munitions factory. He was a tall, stout man, probably head and shoulders above his diminutive, malnourished coworkers, drawing attention and questions—why was this vigorous lad making planes, not flying them? His favorite mode of conversation was censure; he enjoyed delivering short, impersonal homilies. He knew no games and played no records. I visited him, but always briefly, since he had lost Grandma. When asked about the war, he had little to say.

When I asked Seva about the war, a vague excitement knotted my throat and swelled my eyelids. I stared directly at him with affected gravity, the way I saw adults do in movies when they asked veterans the ever-important question: “What was it like?” But he just turned away and lamented our soccer team’s woes, or polluted water at the Lanzheron beach. The almost scripted silence sent my mind ambling in the romantic vortex of unfinished sentences and meaningful looks.

It was these reveries through the battlefields—fed by Seva’s silence, nourished by scores of war films—that possessed me every time I removed the medal from its case, a French candy tin I found under a seat in the international lounge of Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. It was this reverie I would retreat to when I returned to our temporary digs after losing both my quarters—one to the Ninja Turtles game and one to the teenage pickpocket—at the video store downstairs.

NPR has a story on LATINA'S FOR MCCAIN

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92426941

Here's a short summary: Obama is a lying Muslim.

rock out!

i want to do this. 

Everybody Nazi

Quite a week in Nazi news. First, Hitler gets decapitated...just kidding, I meant the wax Hitler, 60 years later...now the racing head can't even get it on with some hookers. If this guy gets off on SS guards delicing him and he's got the money to make it happen, I say, so be it!

wow

virgin women = men article in New York Times. 

this is a really fascinating story. 

Stay Safe!

What's the deal with the glut of death-mobile stories in the Big Apple last week? There can be only one culprit: the prices at the pump! Road rage rules!

WANTED

err, here's something for the masses.

Angelina Jolie (or ole box-jaw mcgraw as I call her) has a new movie called "Wanted". From the trailer I can only surmise it's the Matrix without that cumbersome computer bullshit. Imagine the Matrix's cool poses and bullet dodging sequences without all that philosophical and religious tone. Friends this isn't a simulated reality, in this reality, you can make a bullet BEND (try it! cept for you Uri Geller) just by jellying your arm whilst shooting.
Now don't tell me about wanting to see a reality based movie, we got your reality right here with Morgan "Red" Friedman. Friedman playing wise old slightly older than Lawrence Fishburn (your role's been filled sucka), surely will deliver magic. Rapper Common also stars as bald Fishburnesk character. In the Trailer he has a gun against white protagonist's head. "you shoot or I shoot you" I assume Common is a no nonsense assassin with a devil may care attitude, willing to kill British neo just like THAT! You betta shoot white boy! Common means business.
If you can't find the time to watch this movie I recommend you buy the newest issue of vogue. Both should have a similar amount of POSERS.

Kind Words

Says it all, doesn't it?

Live from Madison Square Park

A portly man basks shirtless in the partial sunshine of the mid-afternoon. Resting his triple chin on the plump cup of his hand, the hairy beast slowly claps his curled feet together behind him like a chastised boy beating chalky erasers together in detention. He yawns with idle satisfaction and turns over on his blanket.

Bug Got Your Mouth?

Hat tip: Duke Nobbins


Bug in Mouth Brings Out the Street in Reporter - Watch more free videos

Pump It Up

Yet another example of the type of raging the readers of this blog do NOT typically engage in.

You've gotta love the surge in churning out stories that bear even the tiniest iota of relation to gas prices, paralleling the ridiculous spate of celebrity home foreclosure stories.

Just as wars are good for struggling economies, are recessions a boon a dying media?

monster love

Have any of you noticed the latest e-harmony commercial? It features two people who look eerily similar. The guy looks a little like Gerald Butler (minus one key chromosome) from 300 and the girl looks like girl-Gerald Butler. As they go on about how they're complete opposites but compliment each other I can't help but notice, both look like they're smelling something bad, the distance between the eyes to the nose and the nose to the mouth are about the same. Both have this Secretariat stare. 

I sure hope eharmony does some sort of dna test before hooking up these monster couples.   

Cubicle Rage!

mm-eh

The saddest thing that came out of Saturday night's Elitexc show as not the actual fights.  It was this 

Many people who had never seen a well fought MMA match will continue to echo John McCain and call it "Human cockfighting". And from the Lame amateur fights displayed on Saturday who can blame them. From James Thompson getting gassed 2 minutes into the fight to Kimbo Slice's head squeeze attempt at a submission the whole thing was laughable.. The good fighting took place on the WEC event held on Sunday night.  

I beg cbs and Elitexc, PLEASE NO MORE FREAK FIGHTS. Treat MMA like a sport, a competitive sport and you'll get your viewers and silence your detractors.  Props to UFC for making an attempt at putting on competitive fights.   

The Original King of Comedy

Bohemigrant can't help but laugh at the antics of Father Pfleger, who does an excellent impression of Eddie Griffin at the Apollo.

A Woman's Place Is in Jihad

Love how the Jihadi gender politics debate is being scrutinized as an academically fascinating event. A terrorist is a terrorist is a terrorist. That women have succumbed to this evil is a saddening perversion.

She Has a BF

The British are leading a new invasion. In video comedy.

She Has A Boyfriend - Watch more free videos

Stinksox

Ok, Boston has sold it's soul to the Devil. After 80 years of futility all of a sudden they win two world series and have back to back NO HITTERS? How else can you explain this? Like Hank says, we must restore the universe to order. Hopefully by playoff time the Yankees will bounce back. Hughes makes his comeback and has a good second half. Pap-smear has his arm fall off. Papi is caught with a hooker and Manny high fives a mack truck. All this redsox success is making me angry, I MUST RE-WATCH THE GIANTS SUPERBOWL.

If the Yankees don't win the world series, they should shell out the 100 mill for Yu Darvish.

Putin the Cryptofascist

Sounds kinky, don't it?

the force is strong in this one.

Han Solo might not have the force, but his reflexes are second to none.  

and the Yankees should get this guy 

Acta Es Fabula

Hard as it was to identify any of our kith and kin under the best of circumstances, my aunt’s estranged second husband was beyond recognition with Ki-Adi-Mundi’s gigantic egg-cone head, canvas robe, brown vest, and Jedi Council-issue collared tunic. A onetime star engineer in Sevastopol, Stepan failed to sell any patents in the U.S. Finding his life’s work obsolete, he’d traded in his Ph.D. for a barber license and opened a buzz cut salon in Forest Hills. His horn-rimmed glasses, slanted over the bridge of his bumpy resident alien nose, optically camouflaged near-empty, half-foot-long eye sockets. Stepa assumed an intellectual stance, hands behind back, looking toward the empty hupah amid set pieces resembling the idyllic lake retreat on Naboo.

It was a sight to behold. Weeks of incessant planning, checklists, research, fighting with relatives, recriminations, and political triangulation, all culminating in this very ordinary Sunday. Collateral damage sullied both sides. My maternal grandparents vowed never to speak to Marisa’s. Marisa’s catechism-trained stepdad reneged on his share of our condo down payment. The wedding party pairings had to be revised several times due to mismatched personalities. Marisa’s aquamarine-clad bohemian Jedi friends couldn’t get behind the aisle walk with my high school friends (whose gold Magen Davids were as thick as their necks), all clad in the scarlet robes and helmets reserved for the Emperor’s Royal Guard.

Rabbi Yoni, one of those ultra-reform guitar-wielding kibbutzniks fresh out of seminary, proved accommodating of our special requests, but stood his ground on the central issue: there was no way in hell he was sporting a full-body Yoda outfit. “No f’n way,” as he put it. He was 6’5” and not terribly found of jumbo ears. “Besides, someone has to be the center of gravity…I can’t do it looking like a huge green troll.” But, he’d go as far as wearing an olive-toned rustic robe of fine linen, and did make one important concession —the Seven Blessings in Yodish rearranged sentences —a Hebraic challenge Jonah embraced with heroic zeal.

The service began. After the wedding procession, the room, now heaving with extraterrestrial family, friends, and business associates, settled in —some wiping tears, others puckering brows in lingering disapproval, many curiously observing these heretical proceedings, everyone passively enduring the discomfort of their costumes. I looked over at my wing of the three-ring circus, where Marisa’s older brother, Vincent, was fingering his light saber. In comparison, my best man Sergey’s thoroughly wrought Obi Wan was an afterthought. Yeah, that Afro-hipster hair really brings out the force in Luke, I imagined him scoffing.

We said our betrothals and sipped from the special bottle of Mouton Rothschild Marisa’s oenophilic parents generously provided from their personal hallowed cellar. I placed a ring around Marisa’s slender finger and advised her that it betrothed her to me by no lesser law authority than Moses and Israel (“law of the Jedi” was stricken from an early draft over my bride’s muffled objection). Her impish eyes shifted upward slightly at the mention of these patriarchal relics of antiquity (as she once called them). And here, before our closest —and most alien —witnesses, we were prepared to embark upon the great mystery of marriage.

I turned back and swept my side of the aisle, evident emotion stronger up front and receding toward the back with each successive row of relatives. My own tearing eyes stopped on Grandma Ida. Her laser-beam glower was apparent even through the furry Chewbacca head, slightly modified to accommodate her asthma. My loving Grandma, who survived starvation in a ghetto when the Germans invaded and cursed Marisa in Yiddish every day until the wedding. We looked at each other a moment longer than the situation required, and I thought I finally saw consent in her eyes. Maybe not absolute approbation, but the unavoidable nod to the inevitable was there. Encouraged, I blew Grandma a kiss and imagined she caught it. We turned back for the last blessing.

“Blessed are you, sovereign of the world are you, Lord our God, the fruit of the wine created you have.” Marisa and I swapped a brief glance. By God, he did it! Yoni went Yodish, croaky voice and all. We smiled affectionately. It was real, then—we did it—we really were husband and wife, lord and lady, goose and gander!

Suddenly we started back as a spastic shriek filled the pews. Grandma Ida’s furry mask was off. She spat with a younger woman’s vigor, right into the aisle, the hallowed ground my sweetheart’s feet had touched just moments ago. Arms hoisted in the air like a manic music conductor set to bring down his baton, Grandma was raring to perform an exorcism. In the blink of an eye, Jango Fett and a coterie of Trade Federation viceroys surrounded Chewbacca and conveyed the churlish creature to the side exit.

Heaving a sigh of relief, I crushed the chalice beneath my shiny A. Testoni (a humble gift from my beloved well-heeled uncle), mashing the chards into the carpet fibers with heavy heels. After all, this could be the only chance I’d ever get.

Duuuuuude...

Don't ever call potheads uncreative. If you smoke weed out of a man's corpse, does his soul get high???...duuuuuuuuuuuuude.

Scared Vows, Part IV

Dad lifted off his hulking plastic helmet to adjust my Corellian bow tie. After months of tensions, squabbles, and threats (mainly from his side of the family) to defect back to Ukraine, I needed an anchor just now. However temporarily, I had to pick a side. “Papa, thank you for putting up with this. But you know these American girls. Hopefully this will quiet her silly Western temperament,” I grinned, rubbing my dad’s gray mane the way Marisa did her family’s mare. She’d have eviscerated me slowly with a hot serrated rake for this betrayal, but it came easy now. It felt good on this side, simple and right.

“Don’t worry son,” Dad said, hugging me. He pushed me away slightly for a better look and fixed his squarely eyes on mine. “This is the way with women.” No doubt about it —he was sending me a grave message, a warning more profound than the simple words couching it. And all I could do was nod back with practiced solemnity. But he was back on my team. Back where we had started. My father placed his right hand, calloused from a lifetime of grinding factory work and unmentionable side employment, on my back, as if to support me in case I fainted. “I wasn’t going to do this, Vitka…but my friend Edik said he did this for his son Misha —you know, the doctor?” I ignored the immaterial implication. “Anyway, he says this is an American tradition, so, here, I want you to have the American wedding.” Dad produced a tiny box and for a moment I thought he was proposing to me.

“Papa, I’m afraid I’m already spoken for. Maybe Mom can use a second ring.”

“Smartass, ey?” He took his hand off my back and gave me a quick shaloban —a mild act expressing both affection and aggression as a middle finger, pulled back like a slingshot by the big finger, lands on your forehead with considerable impact. Dad opened the box with some embarrassment, the way he’d always opened costly, elaborate gifts for us. Producing a clear zip-locked bag, I saw the contents immediately, incredulously. “Look, even has initials.”

Rapt with gratitude for this unlikely present, I felt a tremor only experienced during stirring old movies and the night Marisa smiled at my first profession of love (naively surrendered in appreciation for her sleeping with me). Suddenly the lids around my eyes swelled and filled with that familiar but —in my family — forbidden substance. My fingers numb with stupid happiness, I pinned my dad’s nuptial gift onto my shirt sleeves and jacket: pair of 24-karat gold Millennium Falcon cufflinks.

BWAHAHAHA

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

BALLIN'!!!!!!

Fresh off displaying his strong (basketball) fundamentalism playing in a USMC shirt with a diverse crowd of ballaz (in the cradle of hoops fundamentals, no less), Barack steps up his game to workhorse college player of the year Tyler Hansbrough and the powerhouse Tarheels. Now that is good pandering, imo!

Substance Abuse

Don't you love it when politicians complain about negativity getting all the play, then lament the dearth of coverage "substance" gets on the campaign trail? Lately Bill Clinton, for example, has been playing the victim, but he's just one of many.

First off, and most obviously, bottom lines are bottom lines, and bottom lines for media (especially one that's struggling to perpetuate its existence in a rapidly changing technological environment) coverage is numbers. More importantly, let's suppose that political stump puffery really is a significant body of information that the American public deserves to hear, and that the media should somehow be compelled (through force or shame) to provide it. Imagine pages and pages (and hours and hours) of Bill Clinton's legacy-laden homilies, the candidates' nearly indistinguishable sound bites, and focus-grouped oratory from every man on a soapbox who can get in front of a camera.

Now that's public service!

updog

Couture and Mamet have a new movie coming out. I hope it's as good as this one.

Would the Jets pass up on selecting Darren MccFadden? it's just the dumb move the Jets have been known for.  

venture bros season 3.

last weekend I was in a line to see this. Season 3 coming in june 

..... it should be noted that my sn was named after this  and not Rusty Venture. Both voiced by Terminator: the Sarah Conner Chronicles' James Urbaniak.  

Honor Thy Parents

Nice to know there are ways to make money during a financial crunch. For instance, filling stock is way up!

"People are really cashing in. If a dentist passes away, their kids come in with a big pile of gold teeth," said Scott Taber, owner of Taber Coins, a Shrewsbury, Mass., coin dealer that buys dental gold and then resells it to a gold smelter.

Who knew dental hygienists were sitting on such precious nest eggs?

the new indiana jones movie

I have a horrible feeling this movie will suck. It's hard to believe that Sr Spielbergo would ever cast a shia laboof in anything but evidently he did. did Spielberg not remember JAKE Lloyd? yes one person can kill a franchise. A shia laboof has the annoying quotient of a jar-jar with the acting chops of a lloyd.  

Nucear Fallout

Nuclear nonproliferation is usually a good thing (I guess), but I do wonder where all those now unemployed Russian nuclear scientists are going to go from here. Good thing due to proliferation in other parts of the world, there are a number of peaceful civilian nuclear projects going on around the world...

Sacred Vows, Part III

I had to start with the phone call I wanted to make last —it was the only way to do this thing. I drew in some breath and pressed the digits, my fingers shaking, jumping now to the wrong row, now to the wrong column. She’d slammed the phone twice already.

“Grandma, will you talk to me? You’re coming as Chewbacca…yes…a large, furry character from her favorite movie…no, I have not been sticking needles in my arm…it’s already paid for —we have size and all, Grandma…it’s only for 2 hours or so…everyone is donning something…I don’t know why Chewbacca….no, it’s not because of your facial hair…no, Marisa loves you, really…her grandma is Grand Moff Tarkin…yes, human, but pretty unimportant…everyone loves Chewbacca—he is affectionately known as Chewy…yes, I am serious.”

Dunking my head right under the tap, I lapped up the warm, soothing spray of fluorinated water. One down. Fifty-five to go. Our Judaeo-Catholic matrimonial alliance carried with it the curse of two large families —and, necessarily, gave Marisa the opportunity to dip into Lucas’ extended universe —including cartoon and book characters so obscure I couldn’t dig them up without the help of some friends in the IT trade. Now there was room for Clegg Holdfast, Stass Allie, and Gizor Dellso.

The sheer breadth of the cast of characters/guest list made me wonder how my wonderful Marisa —the girl who was always too busy with mock trial, animal activism, and psych experiments for long phone conversations or horsing around in our dorm suite —had found the time to study the most trivial and arbitrary details from the mind of an overgrown sci-fi nerd. I suppose we all have private pockets where no hand but our own can gain admittance.

The bell rang. It was Mom. Luckily, Marisa was out shopping for art supplies with her former roommates to build a set from the forest moon of Endor. Kids from both sides of the family, whom I’d projected as my easiest targets, were in a silent revolt against Marisa’s unilateral decision to cast them all as Ewoks. “What’s an E-Wak?” my youngest nephew asked. “Is it an iPet?” Clearly, Marisa and I were the Lost Generation here. Half the brood wanted to be Harry Potters. The other half wanted to be home playing video games.

Without greeting or a customary kiss, Mom stepped through the doorway and proceeded to the bathroom, dropping two large shopping bags to the floor. “What’s that, Ma?” I inquired.

“This?” she asked, with histrionic ire. “This, is what you think of us, and of yourself.” Without another word, she pulled out a peasant robe. With the limited number of female Star Wars roles, it didn’t take a genius to figure out that Marisa wanted my mom to be Shmi Skywalker.

“Oh, get out —you think that’s bad? This is the easiest role in the whole wedding party! Uncle Borya is going as Jabba the Hut. Jabba, Ma! He’ll probably need time off from work to start putting on his costume if he wants to make it for the wedding.”

“I’m no fool, Vitya. I saw The Phantom Menace. I saw the Attacking of the Clowns. This Shmi, she is some sort of floozy, no? Is that what Marisa thinks of me?”

“Well, no, not quite…she’s a slave —it’s different. She’s sold to the Tusken Raiders, and it’s not really explicit about what she does.”

“Marisa wants me to be a work slave, that’s better? Funny, I don’t see her parents going as a Tuscan prostitute or Mandalorian pimp.” It was plain as day; Mom had been brushing up on her Wookiepedia.

“Dad’s not a pimp, Ma. He’s Jango Fett, a very important bounty hunter. Very powerful. And you know it was Marisa’s idea, so, you know, her mom is Queen Amidala and her father Bail Organa. Woman’s prerogative, and all that.”

She looked at me blankly, without reproach, blinking wordlessly, now pathetically, the fire in her eyes extinguished. Sinking into my Goodwill-acquired couch, Mom buried a doleful look in her weary hands and sobbed.

It was too much. My mom. The one who birthed me, defended me from Dad’s crazy whims and tenacious dogmas; the one who supported my every decision, no matter how moronic or ill-conceived. Till now. If she wouldn’t stand with me, how could I stand? Why was I standing at all? On the cusp of this momentous breakthrough, Mom beat me to it with one of her own. “Your father wanted a crazy wedding? Out all day with his damn partners doing ‘estimates.’ Well, he’s getting one!” And with that, she picked up a sample invitation, commending Marisa’s character while carping about her taste. Her spiteful alliance would be a toxic comfort.

Golf

Ronnie Lott played a game with a SEVERED finger. 

Aaron Ross separated his shoulder TWICE against the Cowboys in one game making tackles.  

Brett Farve didn't MISS a game for 15 years. 

Fedor Emelyanenko was slamed on his HEAD and ended up submitting Kevin "donkey kong" Randleman. 

Renzo Gracie would NOT TAP OUT even thought Sakuraba had broken his arm with a Kimura. 

Larry Bird suffered a concussion in the first half of a game and RETURNED in the second half to lead his Team to a victory. 

Tiger Woods played the Masters with an ouchie on his knee. 

Wait, what?

 

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/extramustard/03/28/25.toughest.athletes/index.html

Recently Sports Illustrated named Tiger Woods the toughest athlete. Anderson Silva was ranked 3rd. Evidently their definition of tough involves  fist pumps more than avoiding fists. please!

More importantly, golf is not a sport. Just like darts isn't a sport. As Max Kellerman says golf is a game for middle aged white guys to play and feel like they're still participating in a sport. Golf is weather porn. Please espn and sports radio, no more Golf talk.    

Sacred Vows, II

“If there’s anything I can’t stand, it’s a tacky wedding. People always take the path of least resistance – well, I won’t settle. I want it to be personal and unforgettable, all about us, and I want it to really mean something. You know what I mean by that? Not some hokey vows we scrap together surfing poetry.com. It’s not style over substance, it’s substance that speaks to you,” she lectured.

“Honey, you know I wanna be on your team here. But I was also born to a team that believes wholeheartedly in tacky weddings, and last I checked, I’m not a free agent till I win the World Series.”

“Okay, I think you can switch off the strained sports metaphors. I could have dated a lax player for those.”

“Yeah, I’m sure he would have given you the new-age wedding of your dreams! ... Okay, okay, I’m sorry,” I relented.

“If you asked me for something that meant as much to me, you know I’d go to bat for you,” she snuffled, “and yeah, I know I’m back on baseball.”

Using the small opening she gave me, I decided to soften the tone. “You know that I’d do anything for you. But this­ ­—this is lunacy! I mean, ask me to beat up that asshole kid in your painting class who’s always drawing sketches of you banging the cafeteria guy…ask me to buy you that vintage bike with the stripes…ask me to get rid of a second-tier friend, even —come on!”

“Thanks, I can take care of myself. A real man would find a way —he’d find a way no matter what. Stand up to your family for once in your life, will ya? Or what’s the point?” she threw up her hands. Then, walking over to the nightstand, my lovely Marisa grabbed the latest issue of Mademoiselle and disappeared behind the screen door on the balcony.

There it was, then, the stinging ultimatum of unconditional love.

***

Of course I could have broken her down or buttered her up and, in a few days, she’s drop it. I could have held my ground and asserted my muscular self-governance. But in the end, I knew I’d be giving her the first ammunition to stockpile for a later date, the inevitable surprise attack. So I set out to do the impossible.

“She wants what?!” Trying to focus on my dad, I could hear my brother choking from laughter in the background, no doubt exaggerating his mirth with milk-snorting sound effects.

“Dad, you have to understand, this movie means a great deal to her. Her mother adored…it was the only thing that cured her depression when she was getting chemo. Marisa thinks the second one helped her mom recover…I mean, she had a death sentence!”

“Which one’s the second one? Remind me. Jabba Hut?”

“The Empire Strikes Back. Luc Solo gets petrified. It’s generally acknowledged as the greatest.”

“So we play the stupid movie on a TV at the youth table. We set up a room, we have a special viewing party and we play the movie on the big screen —she’s happy, you marry, she has boy, then girl, The End.”

“Uh, I’m afraid not. She already said no to everything I could think of. Marisa doesn’t do compromise. She had a sociology professor lower her C to an F. Trust me, we have to do this.”

“Have to? Did I have to send you to that stupid school in Maine? Did you have to take ‘Physics for Poets’? Did your grandma have to spend her pension on your Native American drumming classes? Did you have to date an Episcopalian from Portland? Now you want me to spend our hard-earned savings on this silly American child fantasy? When are any of you growing up!”

“You’re right Dad, maybe I’m not ready for marriage. Maybe marriage is not for me. I’ve been thinking, Marisa and I should just pack it up and move to Thailand. She can help start a group counseling child prostitutes and I can teach English to destitute villagers.”

There was silence on the other end. The silent intermission before success.