It’s bad enough that I want to stick my head in a cement mixer (putti, putti), but then to be insulted by a pie? It’s too much.

Yes, I decided to find out what kind of pie I am. Something light? Something dreamy? Or something that harkens back to kids in diapers eating dirt? Oh, most definitely the latter:

You Are Mud Pie

You’re the perfect combo of flavor and depth Those who like you give into their impulses

Riiiight. I’m flavor and depth. And crunchy granules of loam. And an earthworm or two.

What does this prove? You can’t trust pie. I once loaned a Boston Cream a sawbuck and did I ever see that money again? You know the answer. Down with pie.

Finally, proof that there is an Og and that Og hates telemarketers with the same fury as the congested podiatrist who just got roused from a much-needed nap by a seller of a lifetime subscription to “American Noodle Monthly.”¹

The FTC has fined DirecTV $5.4 million for violating the “Do Not Call” rule.

[Nelson Muntz]Ha ha![/Nelson Muntz]

¹ References to “American Noodle Monthly” do not constitute an endorsement of the American Noodle Lifestyle or the American Noodle Agenda and should not be mistaken for such. Perverts.

You know it’s bad when the searing headache and intense sore throat of a sinus infection that made you want to die was in the good part of your week.

Last week began rough and ended rougher, what with the consumption of Bad Chili and the barfitude therein.

Let this be a warning unto you. When you think it can’t get worse, it can. Tempt it not.

Now I’m going to crawl under my desk and talk, quietly, to myself.

So the Winter Meetings are over, and the Indians haven’t signed Millwood. And according to all signs, they won’t.

It’s what I get for being a Cleveland fan, I suppose, though it seems that even the deep-pocketed Yankees aren’t extending their payrolls, quite unlike them.

But the Mets are, and the Blue Jays. 55 million dollars for a sub-.500 pitcher. And despite my crissy-crossy fingers, someone decided to take a flyer on Kenny Rogers. You make it hard to root for you, Detroit.

Bah.

Humbug.

It doesn’t matter, of course. Come hell or high water, in April I’ll be curled up on the sofa, watching the Indians lose. If I had a soul, they’d own it.

I’ve written too many poems, many of them bad. And I’ve lost track of dozens. Most of the time, that’s for the best. But I’ve been in a rut and looking at some of these older pieces just might be able to inspire something in me. It’s worth a try anyway.

Do most poetry writers find they remember so little of what they’ve written, or is this my special curse?

Snip

Betta Splendens

Bowls gloom with dirt,
twelve ounces each, short-lipped
and deep. Then water rots
clamped fins to dying lace.

In old Siam, the puddles bloom
with fish, seeded by flood, unfurl
scale petals out behind, all blue
and red. They die in mud
or jarred like pickles.

The vet says that the strange imbalance in Albert’s pupils is not a sign that he’s on kitty dope, but if that’s true, why does he sit in the water fountain?

These are the questions that fuel science.

(Excerpt from an old poem)

iv.

Woodpeckers morse the neighbor maple, frilled
against the grey cool days, the old birds dying.

Then came stalking times when all but Albert
found the screen holes and birds flung themselves
just out of reach.

My coworker is a moron. We’re not talking your run-of-the-mill stupid person here, but a Grade A moron. When hired, she claimed to have computer experience. Guess how she reboots a computer? By turning the monitor off.

But I live in Ohio. What can I expect?

The recent kerfluffle over Kansas’s “Intelligent Design” decision made me wonder why no one was throwing stink bombs at Ohio. Yep, the Buckeye State redefined science long before those Kansan chuckleheads. “The other proposal is backed by intelligent-design advocates and is similar to language in Ohio’s standards.” Not content to be the birthplace of aviation, nope, we have to be the birthplace of ID ideation.

I’m so proud. It makes me want to hug Bob Taft until his eyes pop. But then I’d be a little closer to these thugs than I’d prefer to be. I’ll content myself with sending imaginary secular greeting cards and shopping Target.

I tried blogging before and discovered that I’m wretched at it. And trying again definitely goes against all of my beliefs in “If at first you don’t succeed, give up and take a nap.”

We’ll see how it goes. I can’t actually die of this, right?

****

It’s been ten years since I bought my house. Ten years. And I can barely remember the anguish I felt when it when into contract just minutes before I made my offer.

I wanted it. I got it.

And I hate it.

I hate its drafts and its street and its neighbors and its windows. I hate every last squeak in the floor or ill-fitting door or the bad-tempered boiler in the basement. People tell me it’s pretty, but it’s just an eyesore to me, bad tempered and badly plumbed.

In ten years, did I gain vision or lose it? The skeleton of my ambitions gets shorter, and brittle.

Oh well. It’s nothing a well-placed tornado can’t fix.