Don't Smoke — But If You Do, Smoke Fictional Brands

Names of all the fictional cigarette brands I can think of.

• Laramie (from "The Simpsons")
• Morley (the ones the cigarette-smoking man smokes on "The X-Files")
• Red Apple (from the QT universe)
• El Dorado (from "Family Guy")
• Kentucky Slims' Chicken Flavored Cigarettes (from "Futurama")
• Dromes (from Lolita)
• Bilsons (I think I saw this label on "Lost," which is my new televised obsession.)

I could have sworn there were more.

Fourside

I'm here and that's what's important.

I just woke up in Jessica Jessica's apartment on the lower east side. That geographical term means nothing to me, really. I have a vague knowledge that I'm on an island. Jessica tells me that "Seinfeld" took place on the upper west side and the only time the show ever went to this neck of the woods is when Kramer gets lost and has to call Jerry for help. "I'm at the corner of first and... first?! How can that be? I must be at the nexus of the universe?"

The intersection of First Street and First Avenue does in fact exist, though I haven't seen it yet.

We got in later yesterday evening, so we didn't have time to see sights, so to speak, but Jessica's neighborhood is a lot to take in anyway. She says she somehow unknowingly moved into the DP of the lower east side. There's actually a shop called Paul's Boutique here, though it's apparently named after the album and not the other way around. We ate at a geographically vague Latin bar and saw "Bad Education" and then just hung out.

I'm here and that's what's important. Adam's showering and then I'm in and then we're gonna try to hit as much of the city as possible. It's not warm but it's actually a little sunny out. I think Adam and I are going to check out Central Park soon, before it gets dark and all the weirdos go crazy.

I don't smoke, but I'm somehow compelled to have one cigarette on Jessica's fire escape.

I'm here and that's what's important.

That Tricky Fucker Called Time

Boston is cold. Boston is old. Pretty good seafood, too.

Adam and I met up with Jessica Twin last night in Cambridge, which turned out to be pretty cool. We had fondue at a bar called the Grendel's Den and then saw a kickass brass band at a pub called the Plough and the Stars. People apparently drink literary in Massachusetts. Jessica Twin showed us some spots where "Good Will Hunting" had been filmed and told us that that movie was a big reason she moved to Boston. I think that's as good a reason as any to move anywhere.

We're staying at a hostel instead of Jessica Twin's place. It's totally cool though -- American hostels blow Euro ones out of the water.

We woke up early this morning and saw Fanieul Hall, which is different from Nathaniel Hall, which doesn't exist, we learned. I like the Boston, even if it doesn't like me and tries to push me away with biting cold. There's a massive shopping area downtown wherein I experienced the most Christmasy moment of my life: a department store display of "A Christmas Story" tableus, the bell tower chiming out "Come All Ye Faithful" and the sweet smell of roasted nuts. Plus the biting cold, of course. I never realized how integral cold was to my perfect mental picture of Christmas. Now I've got to learn to Christmas without it.

I thought I could see random specks of snow all day. By the time we were walking through Boston Common, it snowed for real -- the first time I've seen snow in at least four years. There was this string of statue ducks that the city commissioned in honor of Make Way for Ducklings, which I haven't looked at since I was a kid. Adam says Holden sees them in Catcher in the Rye and wonders why they they just stand still in the park in the middle of winter. Someone has to tell him that they're statues. I don't remember that part of the book.

We had dinner at the "Cheers" Bar, which isn't really the "Cheers" bar but the Bull and Finch and then we got tired of fighting cold and saw "Closer." I spent the whole movie trying to spot locations in London that I remember from two years ago, but couldn't. (The movie, meanwhile, made painful moments seem beautiful and reminded me that I haven't had a relationship in nearly a year.)

We wandered around the cold city for a while then eventually ended up seeing a different Jude Law movie about relatonships at the Mariott movie theater. I'm starting to feel like this extended holiday with Adam is one prolonged platonic date, though I guess it could be a lot worse.

Jessica Jessica finally called back and I think things are set for New York tomorrow. She's being distant again, but maybe things will warm up a bit when we actually get there. I can't believe I'll finally get to see all that: the Statue of Liberty and the rest of the iconic bullshit I've seen on screens since I was a kid.

Don't Shoot Until You See the Reds, Blues and Aquamarines of Her Eyes

A rerun of the "Drew Carey Show" airs on the local FOX station before midnight during the week. I haven't watched the show in a few years and I believe it's not even on the air anymore, but back when I was younger, I used to think it was funny. The roommates and I couldn't even sit through a full half-hour of the what we saw. I'm pretty sure the episode was from the show's last season, since Mimi had lost a lot of weight and Drew's brother wasn't a character anymore and Kate had been replaced with the blonde chick from "Titus." Also, it was pretty evident that the writers had just stopped trying, as everything that's wrong with generic sitcoms was wrong with this episode.

Anyway, seeing the show reminded me of this one Christmas episode some years back that had a surprisingly touching scene. Granted, I was slightly intoxicated at the time, but thinking back on it sober — tired, but sober — still moves me, just a little.

In the episode, Winferd-Louder, the department store Drew works for, had decided to have a nativity scene in the window. They'd also decided to cut costs by using store employees as the various characters. Some clerical error had made Mimi the Virgin Mary and when shoppers saw the Holy Mother smeared with clown make-up they protested. Eventually, Mimi has to explain herself to the whole angry mob. She explains that, in her mind, the Virgin Mary must have been the most beautiful woman in the world. That's what would make the whole virgin angle exciting. Ugly virgin: who cares? Pretty virgin: we're still talking about it two thousand years later. And then Mimi went on to say that she wears her make-up because that's what makes her feel pretty and she's only doing it because she wants to make Mary look as beautiful as she knows how.

Of course, she follows that with something like "And if you don't like that, you can shove it up your filthy anus" or something like that. But for a moment, I feel like they gave her character actual depth, made her seem more like a real person instead of some garish accident at the crayon factory. Considering that Mimi is basically a one-joke character, I think that's pretty remarkable.

That's gotta be the reason I've remembered it all this time.

Yellow Meat Pounder With Ping-Pong Ball Eyes

Characters on "The Simpsons" who have undergone long-range changes in lifestyle or personality:

• Kirk and Luann van Houten got divorced in "A Milhouse Divided."
• Barney is sober now (and less funny).
• Principal Skinner and Mrs. Krababel started dating in "Grade School Confidential," then got engaged and then finally broke off the engagement on their wedding day.
• Skinner also was revealed to be Armin Tanzerian, which Lisa brought up again in a later episode despite Judge Snyder's decree that no one in Springfield could ever do so.
• Apu married Manjula, they had octuplets and Apu cheated with the Squishee Lady. Now they go to marriage counseling.
• Lisa became a vegetarian and then a Buddhist (though I can't actually recall her Buddhism being mentioned after the episode dealing with her conversion).
• Maude Flanders died, making Ned a widower.
• Bleeding Gums Murphy died, which is fairly life-altering.
• Dr. Marvin Monroe died off screen, then re-appeared inexplicably.
• Lenny and Carl developed this gay-vague affection for each other (like so many male-male pairs on "The Simpsons" do).

And then, I've read that this season will see a prominent regular character come out of the closet. And it's not Smithers, though it's still pretty obvious once you hear it.Characters that have become regulars in the past few years:

• Lindsay Naegle, the blonde, professional-seeming but apparently alcoholic businesslady
• Cookie Kwan, the shrewd realtor
• Gil, the only guy in Springfield with worse luck than Hans Moleman
• Judge Constance Harm

Characters who don't show up anymore because the actors who provided their voices either left or died:

• Troy McClure
• Lionel Hutz
• Lunchlady Doris
• Helen Lovejoy — haven't heard her near-catchphrase, "Won't somebody please think of the children?" in a while.
• Maude Flanders
• Does Miss Hoover ever talk anymore?
• Princess Kashmir

Dyluck (or "Die, Luck")

My brain connections sometimes connect inappropriately.

Walking through the city on the day immediately following the election, I noticed that everything felt just a little heavier. I didn’t see any of the emotional meltdown — the hysterical crying like the women in the streets just after Kennedy got shot — though if I had I surely would have stopped and watched. And the black shirt I was wearing wasn’t picked out necessarily as a sign of mourning. I’m not that dramatic. I just think I look good in black. Sure, the sun didn’t come out today. Sure, I can feel that nasty east coast winter coming. But knowing that the vast majority of DC residents voted for Kerry instead of Bush, I shouldn’t have been surprised that people seems just a little down.

Strangely, I had a song stuck in my head that I’m sure I couldn’t have heard more recently than eighth grade. When I was a kid, I played this game called Secret of Mana. It’s like Legend of Zelda, just not. Early in the game, the hero happens onto the first city — not a village, a full-on city with a castle and everything. The town, which I think was called Pandora, however, is cursed. Everyone’s mute. You talk to them and all you get is “……………” That’s how text-intensive video games represent silence: with ellipses.

Anyway, I can remember all this clearly now, when I haven’t really given it much thought since then. But the memory that seems to outweigh all the others is the music for that area: a sad, repetitive ditty that doesn’t go away until you beat the witch who’s cursed the area.

Sometimes, my brain connections things inappropriately. No symbolism. No foreshadowing. Just an odd song from my childhood composed for the primitive sonic capabilities of the Super Nintendo sound processor.

I wish it would connect to a melody that I wouldn’t mind forgetting.

I'm not really mad. And I guess I'd be kidding myself if I said I was all that disappointed. I'm not even all that surprised that to so many people, everything that happened in the last four years — 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Patriot Act, the prison torture, Michael Moore and other things which surely must matter, regardless of a person's political affiliation — added up to equal four more years of the same administration. What really gets me is that there's that much difference in Americans. I could probably no better understand some Bible-thumping Mississippi native than I could Joe Eskimo. Statistically, I'm the odd one, not Bible-thumper.

I wish I could unearth the Super Nintendo and play video games all day.

Battle of the Fluffy Tails

Observed at the DC zoo: A red panda meets a squirrel. They regard each other cautiously. Understandably, the squirrel flips upside-down.

More photos when I get a chance to post them.