This was today's entry in Jalal's blog.

Oh God. All this violence. All these bombs. All these burnign tyres. All these riots. All these mobs. All these guns. All these janazas. All these things.

Too much. It is too much. It has got to stop. It has got to stop.

Please post any comments you may have on his blog.

I have spent the last two hours wrestling with a horrific monster of nerdly proportions. Ô the horror! Ô the misery! Ô the suffering! I signed up for and downloaded free Movable Type. According to the personal blogging élite, Movable Type is the brie of blogs, whereas Blogger is merely spray cheese. If your online name is Surly Snob, this simply will not do; I won't even eat mozzarella.

I have known HTML for a whole two months now and I'm satisfied with how my blog functions. I've learned to correct almost every mistake I've ever made and I've even managed to make up a few things without reducing the entire bazaar to a sputtering page of unclickable links and gibbering hyper-personal nonsense.

But now it occurs to me that those who deem Blogger like totally uncool are the same people who have posters of Xena plastering their bedroom walls and idolize Barbara Adams, Champion of Intergalactic Peace and Tolerance (who actually has a fan page...I am not making this up, you know). So that's why I decided to spend a couple of hours swearing at my computer and stomping around the apartment like a baby allosaurus. If it ain't broken, heap piles of steaming manure on it. That's what I always say.

After staring at a directory of unzipped Movable files freshly downloaded into my computer for approximately five minutes, I realized I had absolutely no clue as to how to proceed. "I know! I'll check the online instructions!" I thought to myself triumphantly. After staring at the online instructions for approximately five minutes, I realized I had absolutely no clue as to how to proceed. I felt exactly like I'd felt after having read the following passage from Star Trek: The Next Generation: Technical Manual, a book my sister sent me as I joke (I hope). Keep in mind as you're reading that the topic is something made up:

"A subspace field of one thousand millicochranes or greater becomes the familiar warp field. Field intensity for each warp factor increases geometrically and is a function of the total of the individual field layer values. Note that the cochrane value for a given warp factor corresponds to the apparent velocity of a spacecraft traveling at that warp factor. For example, a ship traveling at Warp Factor 3 is maintaining a warp field of at least 39 cochranes and is therefore traveling at 39 times c, the speed of light."

Of course! I am nothing but an ignorant fool! But not so ignorant that I can't search the entire unzipped Movable files for anything with the word "install". There turned out to be several, but they all seemed to pertain to magical feats that only occur after installation. In vain I raced my pointer up and down the files, searching for something...anything!...that ended with ".exe". Nothing was to be found.

So now the files have been removed from my computer. I hang my head in defeat. I could have been a glorious god; instead I will a mere mortal. Vanquished, I return to my dots and that weird orange color I can't replace with anything...a broken blogger.

Maybe one day I will be like Frank, who I am not implying is a nerd, who designs his own sites and could kick Movable Type's ass, and who on his blog gives you a choice of three styles in which to view his wackiness, manic, arctic teacup, and feline. Maybe one day I'll turn like Jean-Luc Picard to my computer crew and say, "Make it so." And it will be so.

[Disclaimer: Voyager and Enterprise are two of my favourite TV shows. What's more, I think Captain Janeway and 7 of 9 would be pretty cool to have a few beers with, if they were real people, which they aren't. Moreover, I would enjoy multiple sexual encounters with most of the male cast of Enterprise, and maybe even with T'Pol...or with 7, for that matter. No nerds were harmed in the writing of this bloggie, although I certainly wanted to harm a few.]

can't blog...on vacation

The Dante's Inferno Test has sent you to the First Level of Hell - Limbo!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	Very Low
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Very High
Level 2 (Lustful)	Low
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	Low
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Low
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Low
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	High
Level 7 (Violent)	Low
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	Low
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Moderate

Take the Dante's Inferno Test

Click on the levels for a complete explanation.
Limbo?! I get boring, beige limbo? I thought I'd get some serious retribution for lust, homosexuality, or surliness (although I have to admit that spending eternity with Caesar, Homer, Virgil, Socrates, and Aristotle doesn't sound like such a raw deal). I guess being Jewish makes me a "virtuous nonbeliever". I must be so much more boring than I think I am.

(Pillaged from Bluewyvern.)

Joy! Thursday is Fake Librarian Day (Nancy can relate to me on this one)! Every Thursday I donate four hours of my valuable, blog-writing time to be an artificial librarian at Organization #1.

Here, I do various exciting things like compiling lists of overdue books. They never let me make the threatening phone calls, though. They really should. I don't think they quite understand the vast and profound talent they have before them, nestled in my slight, demure frame. I used to have a job where one of my duties was to remind Fortune 500 companies that they hadn't paid their invoices of thousands of dollars. Later, I had a job where I occasionally had to call up unionized hospital laboratories to remind them that I had not yet received scores of HIV and HepC test results for people my staff were due to council at any second. So I think I can remind a few people that their book is a week or two late.

My direct supervisor in my duties as fake librarian is the stereotypical soft-spoken, passive-aggressive, rigid librarian who is nevertheless quite sweet. She attempts to maintain order in the midst of chaos, succeeding where it comes to books and failing where it comes to people. For example, I was five minutes late two Thursdays in a row and her solution to this dastardly shortcoming was to ask me to document henceforth my days of tardiness. To this, I reminded her that I am a) in my thirties, b) giving of my own time and c) in my thirties. But I did it all in that smiley, winky way I've evolved over the years to mask that urge to bury the offending parties up to their nose in sand. She's too gentle for such violence. I just mocked her light-heartedly until she relented and giggled, wagging her finger at me and telling me "to be more conscientious". Which I will do. I promise. Today I will only be four minutes late.

This is just one of the many guises Snobby takes on in his joint volunteering duties at Organizations #1 and #2. In all, I do about 25 hours of free service a week. It is the perfect job for me after years of high-stress employment that has completely burned me out (hence the blog). There's a relaxed pace, friendly atmosphere, and that feeling of completing a task for the forces of good rather than for the forces of evil. A salary would be nice too, but if I volunteer long enough I'll have an in. It's not all about altruism, I admit.

In two weeks I begin training at Organization #1 for something I am greatly looking forward to. I will be a "buddy" to an HIV+ man. It's a programme to help counteract the sense of social isolation experienced by the majority of HIV+ people. If I'm feeling especially pedantic one day, I'll write a bloggie on this topic. In any case, I have been a buddy for friends before. But they were friends so it was a little different. I'm looking forward to being able to use this experience for the good of the general public. I encourage you all to volunteer somewhere.

I keep my promise to the sweet, rigid librarian. I guzzle the rest of my coffee and go.

US movie actor discovers he is an Afghan prince

And one of my ancestors traveled to Tahiti so I am the Prince of a small Polynesian island.

The terrifying tale of Snobbusnarf and the Two-Headed Homophogre!

Featuring:

Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen the Wise

Egjey the Magnificent

Kaallinn the Beauteous

Do you dare test your nerves in this shocking tale of horror?

"Troy" in fifteen minutes

Very, very accurate.

(via Radmila)

[Disclaimer: although The Guy Who Writes This Cr@p is usually quite happy to live in the Land of Heteronia, he is at times pushed to satire when he perceives once too often, in his presence, on another blog, or nestled in the comments of another blog, the word "gay" and its various synonyms used interchangeably with "bad" and its various synonyms. However, the fact remains that some of The Guy Who Writes The Crap's best friends are straight.]

One day Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen was hunting pink elephants in the woods with his friends Egjey the Magnificent and Kaallinn the Beauteous. As the three slunk silently through the trees they heard the sound of swearing coming from a nearby clearing. The heroes strode towards the noise.

The swearing became louder as the entered the clearing. In the middle of it were two lesbians. One, with eyes of blue, hair of blond, and cheeks of rosy sat on a boulder, staring despondently at a patch of wild flowers. The other, with longer dark hair was wearing a red t-shirt with the words "Dar Williams is Goddess" written across it in Celtic-looking letters. This was the one who was swearing.

"#&%#@!" she spat.

"Greetings, yon lesbian," Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen said as he strode towards her.

"What the fuck do you want?" She turned towards him violently.

"I want only to heal the ills that ail you."

"Great! I'm going to be "rescued" by an over-the-hill boy band." She turned back to survey a large square of smashed plants, littered with empty beer bottles and potato chip bags. "Where's your fourth member? You know: the blond jailbait who turned into a sleazy alcoholic once he turned eighteen?"

"Now, Monique," spoke up the one with hair the colour of honey. "These three fags are just trying to be nice."

"Yes, Elizabeth" said the first, somewhat contritely.

The second rose from her perch on the rock. "She's just upset because a two-headed homophogre destroyed our hemp field. This is our livelihood. Now what will do on market day in the village? What wares will we trade for the organically processed tofu that sustains us?"

This time it was Ajay the Magnificent who spoke. "This is indeed a sad state of affairs." He shook his head gravely. "But fear not, my all-natural friends, for I am Egjey the Magnificent, strongest man in all the land. With my great power I will crush the foes who have wrought this ruin upon your heads!"

"And I am Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen, the wisest man in all the land. I will taunt and confuse this vile fiend until it knows no more!"

"And I am Kaallinn the Beauteous," he stepped forth as a sudden breeze ruffled his hair in an appealing fashion. "I am the most beautiful man in all the land!"

The two lesbians waited for him to reveal the horrible fate he would bestow upon the demon. They noted that Snobbusnarf simply rolled his eyes and Egjey shook his head and they knew that nothing more would be forthcoming from his pouting lips.

"Well, we should be fine. I think we have enough to last us until we can grow more," said the Dar Williams-clad lesbian, brightening slightly. "Plus there was that loser who left us that bag of magic beans. We can see what they do."

"But we'll be ruined if the two-headed homophogre comes back!"

"Never fear!" exclaimed Snobbusnarf. "We will vanquish the foe!"

And the three companions strode off along the path of destruction and blatant littering left by the monster. As they moved along they could hear in the distance a lone voice shouting after them: "We don't need men to save us! We'd do it ourselves but we have Briggita's Tea Goddess ceremony this afternoon!"

The forest grew dark around our friends as they moved farther and further into it. The more they progressed, the less they heard the tweeting of pretty, little birds. The undergrowth became rife with evil. The stench of wickedness lay heavy in the palpitating air. They caught a whiff of malice.

"Bleah!" exclaimed Egjey. "Somebody really let loose a pungent one!"

Kaallinn wrinkled his nose. "And somebody is wearing really cheap perfume!"

They walked further in the gathering gloom. Leaves were ripped off trees. Tree trunks had been urinated upon. Cigarette butts littered the narrow pathway. An empty Yoo-hoo can lay upon a rock next to the path, the remains of its former contents dribbling slowly to the fort floor.

Snobbusnarf halted. "Harken, my friends. We draw close. The fiend is nigh."

And it was true. Shortly they drew close to a small stream. It no longer babbled. It seemed to whimper in unspoken terror. Beside it lay the most repulsive creature any of the three had seen, and being gay men they had seen a number of repulsive creatures in the dark. Even Egjey stepped back in disgust.

Its body was thick and swathed in a purple hoody with a Viking maiden wearing a fur bikini sprawling across the words "Ice Ice Baby". Its arms were thick as legs, its legs as muscular as torsos. But the most repulsive part was its heads. Two ugly heads lolled somnolently on two indolent necks.

The first head was a man's. It had a poorly trimmed goatee and a black baseball hat with a sports logo emblazoned across its front. A small greenish stream slithered from his nose.

The second head was a woman's. It lay pristinely on a pile of moss, it's red hair perfect and unmussed, its golden earrings clinked lightly in the wind. A slight whistling nose escaped from its nose as it breathed in and out.

"That's not real gold!" Kaallinn whispered sharply in disgust, a little too loudly.

The creature stirred and woke at the harsh condemnation of its fashion sensibility. It rose unsteadily. "What the fuck?" uttered the male head intelligently.

Egjey immediately sprang forward and faced the repugnant fiend, his powerful muscles flexed in anticipation.

The female head took on a look of shocked wonder. "Oh...My...Gawd!" it shrieked. "It's a ho-mo-seskshwel!"

"Prepare too meet your doom, foul fiend of the Otherworld!" he shouted bravely. "For I am Egjey the Magnificent and I will grind your bones to powder and feed them to the dung beetles!"

"No, brave Egjey!" interrupted Snobbusnarf bossily. "You mustn't kill it! It is just a poor, dumb beast that knows not what it does! Come, fair friend, use your brave brawn for compassion instead for senseless slaughter. Build the creature a Peel Pub in which it may while away the hours in pleasant, timeless abandon". He smiled benevolently upon the piteous thing as it scratched its backside, the female head berating the male for this impolite action.

Egjey graciously acquiesced to his friend's wish and went off in search of the tackiest wood he could find.

"You, gorgeous Kaallinn. Distract the brute with all the charm and beauty you can muster while I sit upon yon hillock to think what to do next by means of my awesome sagaciousness."

Kaallinn picked up an empty beer bottle and sauntered to a tree near to the creature. He stared resolutely over one of the beast's shoulders. He then pretended to take a sip from the bottle, glancing briefly at the creature, which took no notice of him. He then began to bob his head rhythmically to an imagined beat, glancing over occasionally at the still oblivious creature. He then ambled to another tree where he removed his cell phone from his pocket and began to talk on it in an animated manner, glancing over at the creature who now looked back at him, seemingly bewildered by the rapid language streaming for betwixt his pouty lips. He abruptly ended his call and stared steadfastedly away from the creature.

Snobbusnarf observed this with bewilderment and quickly called to his handsome friend to ask him what manner of distraction this was meant to be.

"What manner of distraction is this meant to be?" he asked his handsome friend.

"I'm getting its attention! This always works for me."

"This is not a bar, o dizzy one! Attempt to engage the beast in conversation."

Kaallinn let forth a heavy sigh and strode forward. "Well, hello there! My name is Kaallinn and I am very pleased to meet you!"

The male head spoke first. "Dude, are you like supposed to be gay or something?"

Kaallinn rolled his eyes.

Meanwhile, Egjey had returned with several stacks of wood and commenced erecting a large rectangular structure with no character whatsoever. He chuckled with humour to himself as he listened to the creature babble.

"I mean, I was like watching the game the other day and the ref was like making all these really gay calls n'stuff. I mean I felt like totally screwed up the ass! I mean like what a cocksucker!"

The female head nodded vigorously and spoke up. "Like why did you choose to be gay in the first place? Is it because you like to cook? You faggots are just afraid of women. That's what your problem is. You just need the right woman to show you. Honey, I'd straighten those wrists of yours...and something else as well..." She smiled lasciviously.

Kaallinn stood before them and wished that at least one of the beer bottles around him were full of beer, even warm flat beer.

No sooner had the male head finished a long speech in which he denied any trace of homophobia, using as proof the fact that he once worked with a guy who was gay and he was OK except for when he talked about his boyfriend which like totally creeped out the male head, when Egjey finished the Peel Pub. Snobbusnarf then arose from his perch on yon hillock and touched the tips of his fingers lightly to his temples. A warm glow emerged from his head and surrounded the building.

Anon, a young woman with a painted face and bosom larger than her head appeared at the Peel Pub door. "Well, hello there! My name is Candi-with-an-I and the Peel Pub is open for business! Come on in! We have two-for-one pitchers of Nondescript American Lite Beer, all-you-can-eat jalapeno pepper poppers, and all the reruns of "Home Improvement" and "Everybody Loves Raymond" you can watch!"

"Oooooooo!" gasped both heads together. The creature shambled towards the door. Once it was inside, the door shut...forever.

"Well, that wasn't a very good story at all," spat Kaallinn the Beauteous.

"I know," said Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen. "All that build-up for nothing."

"And I didn't even get to rip my shirt off and show off my incredible pecs and washboard stomach," sighed Egjey the Magnificent.

"Maybe our next adventure will have some sort of literary value," responded Snobbusnarf.

Suddenly the forest around them was filled with a blinding light. Our friends covered their eyes for they had been almost blinded by the blinding light filling the forest around them.

A cold voice filled their ears. "On your knees before me, weak creatures!"

Snobbusnarf gasped in shock. "Forsooth! It is Hjördís the Petulant

"It is indeed I! Bow down before the Ice Queen!"

Will our heroes survive? Tune in for the next installment of the "The Harem of Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen"!

Come back soon for the first installment of the continuing saga of Snobbusnarf Lyserøde Skjeggen (Snobby the Pink Beard), homosexual scourge of the North Atlantic. "The Harem of Snobbusnarf" is coming soon (like tomorrow, maybe) to a blog near you!

Discover the wonderous harem dwellers! Learn their awesome powers! Find out their terrible secrets!

(Image pillaged from Kobi Israel (you said I could use the images if it was for personal use!) and distorted. Buy his book. תודה רבה , קובי

One of my many highly successful ways to make new Internet friends when I discover a new site is to survey the target site to see if there are any gadgets or ideas I can rip off. I then pillage as much as I can carry in my virtual brutish, barbaric hands to adorn my own site. My popularity is on the rise, as you can tell by the changes going on here, as is my ego.

My latest victim was this guy. But he's funny so hopefully I'll be forgiven, and just to be sure I sent him the Icelandic milk ad – you'll see why that's extra hilarious (as I always am) if you go to his site. But as I am a marauding barbarian, I will continue to observe his site. He's very funny, so you should observe his site too.

From him I learned the mystic art of button making, through the guidance of these acolytes of buttonry. I have produced these:


So for those of you who have been clamouring for a way to link to Snobby in a unique and eye-catching manner, here is your chance. I will reciprocate should any of you also choose to learn this ancient technique.

And if anyone can tell me why the spacing suddenly changes here and what I can do about it, I'm very sure something very karmically nice will happen to that person.

Snobby Top 10

For lack of anything else of interest to write on this uninspiring, drizzly day, here is my own personal top of the week.

1. Komeda - Kokomemedada
   
2. Muse - Absolution
   
3. controller.controller - History
   
4. Metric - Old World Underground
   
5. Komeda - Pop på svenska
   
6. Gigi - Gigi
   
7. Jay-Jay Johanson - Poison
   
8. Meira Asher - Dissected
   
9. Jean Leloup - Le dôme
   
10. Pink Martini - Sympathique
    

This is my rough translation of "Scandinavia Day", pieced together from my unwittingly hilarious Teach Yourself Icelandic book that actually gives sentence examples like "The teacher rode up on a white horse" (Kennarinn kom rídandi á hvítum hesti) and "This is the sailor's house" (Hérna er hús sjómannsins), as well as just some guess work. Maybe one of my Icelandic readers can correct me...and show me wear hús sjómannsins is.

The first event of the day comes from Iceland, nabbed from Adda's site. Here is an Icelandic milk commercial. Click and then click on the picture on the right (the people exercising). If this doesn't make you want to pour your cartons down the toilet, I don't know what will.

The second event of the day comes from Sweden. Komeda, the greatest group of all time finally released their new album. One of the things that makes them so great is that no one has heard of them. This allows Snobby to feel unique and iconoclastic, a feeling he enjoys greatly even if it's illusory. If you want to be unique and iconoclastic just like me, go to their distributor's site and watch their video.

I don't have entries from Norway, Finland, and Denmark...well, I do but I'm feeling cranky and short-tempered today and don't feel like typing anymore. I suppose, therefore, that a more accurate title would have been Íslendingasænskuradagurinn.

Happy Norrænnadagurinn!

Yesterday evening I attended a workshop sponsored by Organization #1 on mental health issues. As my early readers know, I find these workshops to be, by and large a colossal waste of my time; far too much emphasis is placed on "inclusion", which I define as allowing people who like to speak the opportunity to speak as long as they like, even when they have nothing much to say, and on "open sharing", defined as allowing people to veer off onto tangents as they tearful recount intimate, painful moments of their lives only vaguely related to the topic at hand (please read "Yak Milk" for background). When I attend a workshop I want education. I do not want a blow-by-blow on how we had to get grandma committed. There's a time and a place for everything. I am constantly under the delusion that these are workshops, not group therapy sessions. Perhaps that means that Snobby is the one with mental health issues. This workshop was not useful in helping me figure it out.

But good can come out of these three-hour mental deserts. There is always some sort of role-play activity that I invariable enjoy. It's like a game and I do find these activities educational in a manner in which no lecture can be. Yesterday's was probably the best I've ever done (aside from various and sundry associated with no workshop; no description here due to potential maternal readers).

In an effort to get us to understand what it is like to live with constant hallucinations. We broke into groups of three. Two were to plan a trip and one was to whisper in the ear of one of the planners so that the other couldn't hear. I was in a group with Some-Random-Guy and my friend SuperCool-Woman. I was to play the part of Disembodied Voice and SuperCool-Woman was the psychopath. I elected to whisper in English, in French (our main mode of communication), and, in honour of the fact that she is a recent arrival from Algeria, in the smatterings of Algerian Arabic (learned from ex-bosses), Palestinian Arabic (learned from a phrasebook), and Yemeni Arabic (learned from an ex-lover). None of these dialects are mutually intelligible, making the whole exercise extra fun for her.

SuperCool-Woman Plans a Trip With Some-Random-Guy (abridged)

SuperCool-Woman (SCW): Where should we go?

Surly Hallucination (SH): [Arabic] Cheap! Expensive! Train station!

SCW: [purses lips to try to keep a straight face]

Some-Random-Guy (S-R-G): I dunno. Any thoughts?

SCW: Maybe Iceland?

SH: [Arabic] Coffee! Tea! Airport!

SCW: [French] Stop it! [struggles to maintain composure]

S-R-G: I'm sorry? I don't speak French.

SCW: Sorry. Are you interested in Iceland? [takes sip of water – this is foreshadowing, the sign of a quality bloggie]

SH: [English] In Iceland they roast babies for Christmas! Mmmmm...baby gravy!

SCW: [almost spits water all over S-R-G. Fights to regain breath]

S-R-G: Are you OK?

SH: [Arabic] My love! Orange! My heart!

SCW: [falls off chair and is no longer capable of communication]

So now when I see people talking to themselves, to people I can't see, or laughing for no apparent reason, I have a much better idea of where they're coming from and why it's not such a big deal in terms of talking to them. It's a great exercise. I encourage you all to try it.

We all had to switch around. When it came my turn to be nuts, I found it much easier just to do what the voice told me. God help the world if I ever become a paranoid schizophrenic.

Crash! Bang! Bong! Bump! Like a teenager in a slasher movie, I stumbled naked through the gloom to investigate the strange noises in the dark, my dream of a Bollywood star not my fiancé beginning to fade. I lurched groggily into the living room and was unprepared for the wreckage that awaited me. Their bodies littered the floor, spines bent and folded into unnatural positions. On its perch high above, the vicious creature with large glowing eyes surveyed the destruction he had wrought. An expression of triumphant joy shone on its face.

This regal-looking creature discovered that if you knock off all the books, you can climb the bookshelves like a tree. And the books make such a great sound as they hit the ground; you can have endless fun simply by knocking them off and watching them tumble to the floor. He looked so proud of himself. He even chirped a little greeting at me from the highest shelf as I fell to my knees in a little literary triage. It was such an original way of misbehaving that I could not be angry at him. I went back to dreaming about Zulfi.

It will hardly be as cute if it happens again tonight, however. Anyone have any good cat recipes? Just being proactive...

Don't laugh too much at my super-ugly couch. It's really, really comfy!

In a comment below I alluded to the fact that I'm getting married. Yes, you read right. I am getting married. I can do this, you see, because I live in the province of Ontario, North America's first constituency to extend full marriage rights to same-sex couples, joined soon after by British Columbia and Quebec (which was actually the first to mandate it; Quebec's track was to wait for the federal government to legislate it, but it abandoned that approach after Ontario and BC legislated it first), and now Massachusetts. Unlike what may happen in Massachusetts, however, there is little likelihood that homophobic legislation will annul same-sex marriages that have already taken place up here on the tundra. * knock on wood *spit three times on the ground*

But I digress. As I mentioned, I am getting married! My husband's name is Ajay and he looks like this. He is handsome and strong. His hobbies include car repair, fish-gutting, and shirtless grape-eating (him, not the grapes; well technically, the grapes don't have shirts either). I like his shirtless grape-eating the best. He is employed, being a successful model and has even done a few Bollywood flicks too. So he'll support me as my comet-like writing career gets off the ground. As you can see, he's practically perfect in every way. Don't we make a beautiful couple?

But he lives in Mumbai and I live in Toronto. This is a significant impediment to our love. Another significant impediment to our love is that he has absolutely no idea who I am. Yet another significant impediment to our love is the fact that he appears to be straight. These factors may make our actual marriage ceremony somewhat awkward, not to mention the wedding night. But as soon as we set a date, you're all invited. I'll post a registry in the next couple of days.

Of the things I love about Toronto are the jumbo dogs, italian sausages, and kielbasa one may buy on practically every street corner. After having spent half the night and much of the day "running", I can safely say I know longer consider them such wonderful things.

That is all I have the stamina to write today.

Bon appétit, tout le monde!

Whenever you feel that there's something you need to hear but you're just not sure what it is, you should go here (nabbed from Maktaaq).

I have spent a fruitless day trying to figure out image hosts and find free FTP programmes and it's just not worth it. I am on the verge of committing random acts of violence.

This site will remain text-oriented and Snobby will remain the man of mystery you have all grown to fear and revile.

Yesterday while having brunch with Cigar-And-Leather-Sex-Boy, we witnessed a very curious sight. A young woman in one of those silly frilly miniskirts that died when the Go-Go's broke up - the ones that have recently been resurrected like brain-eating zombies (or maybe they've been resurrected for those whose brains have already been eaten) - walked by our favourite brunch spot. Her head was tilted to one side and the corresponding shoulder was lifted. This gave her the appearance of the living dead lurching down the street. It wasn't the case, though. She was just cradling her cell phone. You see, she needed both hands free so she could apply her lip-gloss as she slunk towards her very important date.

Although Cigar-And-Leather-Sex-Boy and I were not exactly discussing Pre-Socratic influences on controversial philosopher Heidegger's later theories (we were discussing hot boys), my immediate thought when I saw her was still "How vain. How vapid." I can just imagine her side of the conversation:

"So I was all, like, y'know, and he goes "chill" and I was like "I am so totally sure!" He is, like, so busted. It's like oh my god! You can not be serious."

Perhaps I am the vain and vapid one by being so quick to judge a book by its cover. Perhaps she was indeed discussing Heidegger.

"It's like, he totally ripped off the Pre-Socratics. Totally! Helloooo! You are so full of it!"

Although I am not a morning person – have I mentioned that once or twice? – it's still my favourite time of day. I like the relative quiet, relative in that I live on a somewhat busy street and it gets much less quiet as the day progresses rumble rumble screech rumble, and I like the feeling of slowly easing myself into the day.

Along with cat attacks and The Shower of Agony and Lava (which lately has been The Antarctic Shower of Blizzards and Sleet for some inexplicable reason), one of my jarring morning rituals is the regular torture session of news reading. This is where I'm punted from dopily contented coffee drinker into melancholy Earthling. All these cruddy newspaper editors want us to know about is the horrific events of the world, from abuse in a certain Middle-Eastern prison, to rocket attacks in Gaza, to the murder of pregnant Israelis and their children, to why a certain formerly voluptuous American starlet who is famous simply because she married an old, rich, now-dead gentleman is feuding with a very obnoxious American radio host.

As I meander into my day I am treated to graphic pictures and descriptions, which, in the case of that prison, I had to see to believe and now I never need to see again. But had I truly wanted to know how long it took for that young American's head to be hacked off or what noises he was making during the process, I would have found the video on the net. It wouldn't have been too hard. I will never understand why we think these kinds of details are news. A human being was butchered horrifically. This is no Tarantino movie.

So I usually rush through the news as rapidly as possible and dive into the Comment section. I am fascinated by people think of the news they've just learned. The Letters to the Editor is my favourite section (not just because I've had three published in the past six months). In this mystical realm, the outrage over a misused hyphen or American spelling grows to the same proportions as that over my southern neighbour's government's foreign policy. On this plane of reality, the comments of some irritating hockey commentator with bad fashion sense are as weighty as those of the American Defence Secretary trying to justify a reason why he still has a job. I suppose this is why people like the formerly voluptuous starlet become famous: people don't want to know what really happens in the world. Instead they want a background upon which to superimpose their fatigue and frustration. It's like religion. It gives us a feeling of belonging and of purpose, no matter how unrealistic the basis.

Today there were two editorials I quite enjoyed. The first, in true Classics professor style, tries to find meaning in the events in that Middle-Eastern prison by relating it to The Iliad. It's a dead school of thought, but he makes some interesting points. Plus he talks about Brad Pitt's butt (There. That should temporarily increase my readership) so how can you go wrong?

The second was on yesterday's ruling in Massachusetts that initiates that state's joining with Ontario, British Columbia, and Quebec as North America's first major constituencies to extend marriage to same-sex couples – and the first in the US – on Monday. It also explains, yet again, why civil union is a barely tolerable option. Anyone who has thoughts and opinions on this matter might get something from this.

Such an enigma the US is. It has some of the most progressive societal attitudes in the world – those of us, in the West at least, who scoff at out American cousins would not be we are right now had American students not gone on their collective acid trip in the 60s in reaction to another ill-conceived foreign invasion – yet it has some of the most repressive attitudes (masquerading as patriotism) towards self-expression, especially these days. But don't get me started on their government's foreign policy (NB – their government's foreign policy, not their foreign policy)...

Two hundred and fifty thousand years ago when I was deeply entrenched in my adolescent closet, such an editorial in the paper would have been unthinkable. And here I am, sipping coffee in North America's first major constituency to extend full marriage rights to same-sex couples. Reading the news isn't all bad.

Postscript

(Thanks for reading this far) As I write I am grooving to Metric (who have finally updated their site) and to my latest discovery, controller.contoller. Toronto has some great music! I'm not taking that job in Montreal.

This is how Snobby feels today. It even looks like me! As in the book, Snobby started off with a bad hair day and it was all downhill from there.

Actually, where it diverged from the book was the bizarre MSN chat Snobby had with odd friend, Works-Too-Much. Here, said oddity described a sexual practice Snobby will never, ever try – ever – let alone describe on his site. Works-Too-Much needs a vacation and Snobby needs to bathe his eyeballs. Oy!

This is way better than that colour thingie:

Snobby is...


Morpheus


?? Which Of The Greek Gods Are You ??
brought to you by Quizilla

(PS - I didn't know I could put images in! Hmmmmm...the possibilities have just jumped exponentially...)

(day pa-tahnt ay-pa-tahnt, "amazing doodads" in Québécois French)

Search Engine
I am growing increasingly amused at some of the searches that are bringing people to Snobby. There is consequently a new section below "Tell Uncle Snobby" to document my amusement. I won't put in the numerous search results for "unemployed" I see because that search actually makes sense and should not be poked fun at, although I would dearly love to know what those people think of this site. To them I say, "Start your own blog!" However, I will put in the first search for "snobby" I see, as I am in the #1 position when you google that word. I am the Snobbiest of almost 87 000 snobs! Why would someone search for the word "snobby"?

I really wish people who stumble into Snobby's Unemployment Office by accident would let me know what they think. Have their expectations of the Net been lowered or is Snobby to become a fun new pastime for them?

Metric
My amazing friend, Médecin-Sans-Frontières, gave me a new copy of my lost Metric album when I went over to his place for a couple of beers yesterday evening. It was stolen along with 23 other favourites right out of my bag while my back was turned, fumbling for my cell phone in front of my apartment, while waiting for above mentioned great friend to pick me up for our drive to Montreal a few weeks ago. One replacement down, 23 to go. Now that I think of it, this may explain the difficulties described in yesterday's bloggie.

What a great friend he is!

Kitty-Klok
Noudnic does not like it when I sleep past 7AM and usually wakes me up if I sleep in simply by staring at me. This morning he had a new approach. He jumped on my bed at around 7:20 and swatted my nose repeatedly – without claws – until I awoke. He then drew his little kitty head close to my mouth to smell my breath, immediately recoiled violently, and dashed away to cower under my desk. True story.

Snobby Breakfast
This morning I had bagels and boursin instead of bagels and cream cheese. Delicious! Try it!

Green
Check out this thing I nabbed off of Adam's blog. Shockingly, I am "green", defined as follows:

At work or in school: I work best by myself. I like to focus on my ideas until my desire for understanding is satisfied. I am easily bored if the subject holds no interest to me. Sometimes, it is hard for me to set priorities because so many things are of interest.
With friends: I may seem reserved. Although my thoughts and feelings run deep, I am uneasy with frequent displays of emotion. I enjoy people who are interesting and of high integrity.
With family: I am probably seen as a loner because I like a lot of private time to think. Sometimes, I find family activities boring and have difficulty following family rules that don't make sense to me. I show love by spending time with my family and sharing ideas and interests.

Like I needed the Net to tell me that.

Flow It, Show It, Long as God Can Grow It
For the third day in a row Snobby is having a great hair day. However, the butch chic of my stubble is beginning to transmogrify into an unclean itinerant look. I will therefore have to shave. I hate shaving. I don't know why.

Dear Diary
Go to Charles' blog and find the Sunday, April 4 bloggie about the diary he found, and then click on the link to read selected entries. It will blow you away.

Dear Dairy
Go to Angry Alien, turn your speakers on, and click on "Amy's Diary". After you've picked yourself up off the floor and regained your breath, check out the rest of the site. It will blow you away too.

Extra
Give a little bit of money to a charitable organization today.

I have almost one thousand CDs. I therefore have a rather large array of musical styles from which to choose when the fancy strikes me. Yet I never know what I want to listen to and when I do know what I want to listen to, I cannot find it. Such is my agony right now.

It is by far too nice a day to languish inside, toiling over bloggies. It is time for another trek to the amorphous Eastern European deli for some pea soup, as well as some kind of politically incorrect delicacy involving various kinds of baby animal or, alternately, animal parts not normally associated with food in North America.

I feel for you people trapped in the confines of your overly air-conditioned offices and cubicles on such a lovely day. I truly, truly do.

I am most curious to know what the person who came to Snobby by searching for "slutty librarians" thought of the site. Why didn't you want to tell me how many languages you speak? Have you no opinion on Snobby's new look? Did you enjoy the story about Snobby's mother? How about the one about the simple little muscle boy who tried to pick me up in a very unflattering manner? Do tell me, tell us all, what you thought. I hope you weren't very disappointed by what you found here.

I'm also curious to know what kind of a moronic search engine would send a slutty librarian searcher to me, but I'm really more interested to know what he (had to be a "he") thought. I hope he enjoyed his stay.

Frank, whose unique communication style has had me scratching my head in bewilderment while rolling around on the floor, gasping for air, pointed out that I must speak every language in the world. It's true. I do speak every language in the world, particularly if every language in the world is this:

• English


• French – but as pointed out several times previously, not that snooty French from France but the far superior, rock'n'roll Québécois variety


• Spanish, although it has mostly faded away due to disuse


• A little Catalan – really!


• A little Swedish


• A little Danish – but it mostly comes out like Swedish (any comments? You know who you are. You know you wanna...)


• A little Dutch


• A little Hebrew – more than some prayers. I can speak enough for Israelis to understand what I'm saying and mock my accent, poor grammar, and practically non-existent vocabulary

When I was a kid I lived in Poland, but I cannot remember anything of the language. Going back didn't bring anything back to me either. Too bad.

I can say "hello", "good-bye", "please", "thank you", and "Do you speak English/French/Spanish?" in several languages too, but if don't speak them, they're probably not real languages.

If you count wanting-to-learn-Arabic-because-it-is-so-amazingly-cool-sounding as a language, then I speak that too.

What do you speak?

Actual phone conversation with my mother last year's Mother's Day

ring ring ring

Mum: Hello.

Snobby: Hey.

Mum: Is something wrong? I just talked to you yesterday.

Snobby: (Instantly exasperated) No! It's Mother's Day and I was just calling to say Happy Mother's Day.

Mum: Well it's a good thing you caught me. I'm on my way out and I can't talk all that long.

Snobby: Uh...ok...well, Happy Mother's Day.

Mum: Thank you! But since when do I care about some made-up holiday?

Snobby: I know! But all my friends are guilt tripping me because I say I don't do anything special on Mother's Day!

Mum: But I don't care about Mother's Day.

Snobby: That's what I keep telling them! But they're, like, buying cards and chocolates and special hundred-dollar bouquets they pre-ordered weeks ago. And Too Cute For His Own Good...remember him?

Mum: Yeah. He is cute.

Snobby: Well he's taking his mother to Aruba for a week and I...

Mum: (Laughs) Can you imagine the two of us trapped to together on a beach for a week? Right.

Snobby: (Laughs) Well, no.

Mum: You tell your friends that I am just fine.

Snobby: I will, Mom.

Mum: Now I have to go. Your father's been waiting in the car for me all this time and he's starting to beep the horn. (Yells full blast straight into the receiver) I'm coming! Christ! (Returns to "inside" voice) He can't hear me. We're going to see an exhibit on 19th Century frontier kitchen implements at the Museum!

Snobby: (Ears still ringing) Uh...have fun.

Mum: We will! Thanks for calling. I love you.

Snobby: I love you too, Mom.

(Thanks to DC and, of course, to Mom for the inspiration for this entry)

Actual conversation late last night/early this morning in a bar between Snobby and Hot Dud, an amazingly cute shirtless boy with big muscles, bigger ego, and itty-bitty brain cells:

Hot Dud: Hey.

Snobby: (Intrigued and a little aroused) Hey.

Hot Dud: I came over here 'cause I wanted to talk to your friend, but he looks kinda busy.

Snobby and Hot Dud survey Slut Kitten grinding against whomever's closest somewhere near the dance floor.

Snobby: (No longer intrigued) Kinda.

Hot Dud: Hmmmm...(staring around the room despondently. Gives Snobby the once over and shrugs). You're kinda cute, I guess.

Snobby: (No longer aroused, giving Hot Dud a smile he's too stupid to interpret) Wow...thanks.

Hot Dud: No! I like totally mean it! I mean, yeah, I came over to check out your friend, but you're cute too. Don't worry (gives Snobby a reassuring pat on the shoulder, which lingers and begins to wander).

Snobby: Phew!

Hot Dud: You just need to get your hair cut. That 70s thing is like so...

Snobby: Oh no! You don't like it?

Hot Dud: Ha! Ha! But I still think you're kinda cute. (Slides his hand down to Snobby's crotch)

Snobby: Do you enjoy use of your arm?

Hot Dud: Wha...?

Snobby: (giving Hot Dud a look he perfected when he taught English as a second language in Montreal) I said, "Do you enjoy use of your arm?"

Hot Dud: (removing wandering extremity) Wo....so sorry...

Snobby surveys the room for a cuter place to stand.

Hot Dud: So you wanna get going?

Snobby: (Bemused) You have got to be kidding.

Hot Dud: Dude, you have got to loosen up if you wanna get with me.

After the carnage, Snobby brushed off the little pieces that remained of Hot Dud's ego, got his coat and left, stopping to get a hot dog and to sing a rousing chorus of "Stop in the Name of Love" (complete with dance moves) with a very soused drag queen teetering on her stilettos on the corner of Church & Wellesley. He extends his sincerest apologies to the people who live on the corner of Church & Wellesley.

Fine. Some people who posted comments recently remind me of high school (I'm like totally sorry guys but my parents won't let me have a party!). So these people are obligated to do this meme. The rest of you are under no such obligation, but I'd be very happy if you did it nonetheless.

Invent a memory of me and post it in the comments. It can be anything you want, so long as it's something that's never happened. Then post this in your journal so that people can invent memories for you.

via jelly donut

Blogs and blogging no fun this week. Vacation time!

"But you don't look Jewish!" Even though I've been hearing this since I first realized I was supposed to look like something else, I'm still a little taken aback by it. And I heard it again last night.

Now, my usual response is to ask what a Jew looks like. I find this is a much better approach than what I did when I was younger. I would stammer as if I had been given a compliment and go on to explain that, genetically, half of me isn't Jewish (which half?), thereby demonstrating how much I actually do fit in with normal, polite society. Now I ask what a Jew looks like and I wait to see what the response is.

Most people don't say this thing to me. The large majority of those who do have the good grace to realize they've said something slightly silly. With these ones I put on a ridiculous New York accent ("It's like buddah!") and talk about my father's shnoz (admittedly, a significant one). It's part gentle mockery and part silly comedy to put everyone back at ease.

Some, however, actually go on to describe to me in vivid detail what a Jew looks like. What they describe to me is invariably the image of a money-lender on some Nazi propaganda poster circa 1933. These are the people who often go on to describe with distaste their impressions of the Hassidim of Montreal's Mile End neighbourhood or Toronto's Lawrence & Bathurst, for example, astonished that people could live in such a manner. Is it worth it for me to tell them that almost all of these people are the children and grandchildren of Holocaust survivors and see a good reason to cloister themselves, to use a Christian term? I usually give them about 60 seconds to pull themselves out of the hole they've dug before I cut off any possibility of further communication. It's just not worth it.

My good friend and occasional character in this blog Alef Alef is a Jew of Moroccan origin. He is often mistaken for an Arab, much to his bemusement. My friend Really Tired Mommy is an Ethiopian Jew and she really doesn't look anything like that horrible character from Oliver Twist. And then there's my mother, who converted to Judaism and is thoroughly Jewish, although she certainly doesn't look Jewish. Actually, she's a Buddhist now and she seems much happier. She doesn't look Buddhist, either.

Then there's my friend Works Too Much, an Arab of Syrian origin, who looks like one of the guys I used to play with in front of the synagogue when I was a kid and our parents got tired of our bored squirming during prayers. When I was over at his place last week I reminded him how Jewish he looks. He told me to stop "occupying" his couch. We then had a food fight. I think only and Arab and a Jew could play with this topic without it being distasteful.

So because I don't look Jewish, I knew that the spate of graffiti in my elevator a few months ago, swastikas surrounded by writing in Arab script, wasn't directed at me, tenant of apartment ####. But it was generally directed at me as a Jewish individual. When the spate first started (it lasted about a month), every time I took the elevator I felt as weak as I did when I was a kid and first realized what "jew" meant when used as a verb. Then I grew angry as it continued until I wanted to do like the Hassidim and cut myself off from all goyim (non-Jews) except when absolutely necessary. Finally it stopped and my anger faded. I never talked about it with my friends, even the Jewish ones, or family because I didn't like the violent emotions it brought up in me.

And I also recognize that it is, thus far, a random occurrence and not evidence of some larger plot.

Besides, some of my best friends are goyische.

And so to the repugnant lush from last night who thought that telling me I don't look Jewish would make me want to sleep with him, who then went on to tweak my nose and say that it didn't look so big, I say that I may not look Jewish, but you certainly do look like a pathetic insect who is probably at this moment vomiting his guts out, whose beer I could barely restrain myself from spitting in when you weren't looking. You seemed to think my language was too strong, but you're really not worth the explanation. Other people are.

Cheers!

Guess what? I just found out I have an Atom/XML feed! I have absolutley no idea what that means but it's supposed to be quite good. Apparently, I can now be syndicated. Just like "The Simspons" and "The Facts of Life" (I am so Joe. Which "Facts" character are you?). Anyways, this is the site feed, whatever that means: http://snobby-n-unemployed.blogspot.com/atom.xml

I spent much of the day filing for the Director of Operations of Organization #2. This is part of my volunteer duties at this organization. I find it interesting that I won't consider jobs with a hundred times more responsibility because I am "overqualified" for them and they are "beneath" me, yet I will volunteer my time and energy to do this menial task for free.

No big bloggie today. It's a little nippy but the sun is shining and there's Serbian pea soup to be bought on one end of the city and feta cheese to be purchased on the other. A very Balkan day.

Enjoy this instead (thanks to mikevil for alerting me to the update). The thing has nothing to do with the Blalkans and neither does mikevil, being Danish.

Instead of chicken soup, I'm having cold KFC for my cold. What better to make you forget crappy weather than transfat-laden comfort food, an hour of never-before-seen Simpsons ("He knows just how I like my martinis, full of alcohol") followed by a X-Files rerun?

Mmmmm.....evil Krychek

I am still cranky and it is getting tedious. How many grumpy moments must one suffer before one returns to one's habitual state of slumbering contentment? A few more, apparently.

This is an abridged list of the things I've found wrong with the past 24 hours:

• It's raining (screw that "April showers bring May flowers crap". It's May 2, already);


• While walking down the street with Urbaniteur-Franco-Ontarien yesterday afternoon, a car drove by and someone shouted out of it, "Faeries!" In downtown Toronto! In 2004! I almost flapped my gossamer wings and flew after the car to cast a hex on them ("I transform your Honda into a Pacer!" – taken from here). Instead I pretended it was funny. hahahaha...;


• I seem to be developing a cold, which does not jive with an encounter I'm supposed to have with a very cute guy this afternoon;


• I suffered from insomnia last night, which does not jive with...see above;


• For two days in a row my weekend hour-and-a-half of "The Simpsons" has been pre-empted for golf. Golf! It's more dreary than figure skating and curling combined!
  
• I lent my brolly to The British Diplomat last night and now it's raining and I have no food in my house and I'm hungry and cranky and feeling sorry for myself for very little reason.

It's all too horrible to truly comprehend, isn't it.

But because life is fun, one serendipitous thing just happened to lighten my mood. My cat, whose name is Noudnic (nood-neek, meaning "pain in the butt" in Hebrew), just did something hilarious. He is absolutely entranced by things he cannot have, and so when I heard Splash! Crash! splop... splip... splop... splap... coming from the bedroom, I knew something feline was afoot. Sure enough, a creature resembling more a waterlogged otter than a cat appeared in the living room soon after. As it turns out, he had reached up my nightstand with his little kitty claws and knocked a plastic pint glass off that was almost completely full of water, and most of it got on him.

Now he's sitting in one of the living room windows trying to look austere and sphinx-like. Yeah right, Noudnic. You meant to do it. You decided it was time to take a shower. Hahahahaha. Silly cat.

I woke up cranky today. I don't know why. Yesterday was a fine day (it's finally spring!) and yesterday evening was a fine evening.

I went for supper with my excellent friends Alef Alef and Stressed-Out Doctoral Thesis-Writing Constitutional Lawyer at a Punjabi restaurant in the Annex. The food was little more than mediocre but I liked the feel of the restaurant so I'll more than likely go back. We were amused when, in the middle of a conversation about composting (*sigh* aging lefties have the zaniest conversations), the super hot, smiley waiter broke in with a rambling lecture on Sikh dietary laws. It took us a little while to realize that he'd heard only the last little bit of my sentence, "basically anything organic but meat", formed his own interpretation of our conversation, and decided to share. Until we'd figured out what had caused the lecture it was a little surreal for us, but it was interesting to get more than mere food at the restaurant. And I think I mentioned I thought the waiter was hot, as well.

So Alef Alef, ever the good friend interested in Snobby's happiness and well-being, announced that he was of the opinion that the mini cultural seminar was directed mainly at me, in his opinion, and that this was because Super Sexy Waiter wanted to get to know me in all the various senses of the word. I pointed out that maybe it was directed at me because I was the only one who didn't look bewildered at the non-sequitur and was actually attempting to engage him in conversation because he, I mean what he was saying, was interesting. Besides, I continued, Stressed-Out Doctoral Thesis-Writing Constitutional Lawyer was most likely more his type than I. Too bad for him her girlfriend would object.

Then I invited us all back to Alef Alef's place for tea and cookies (Super Sexy Waiter couldn't come). Tea and cookies? Composting? What has happened to me?!

So, after all that I don't understand why I'm so cranky today. The caffeine is just making things worse. Now I'm cranky and jumpy. I'm beginning to get a glimpse of what kind of old man I'm going to be. I will have a cane and I will shake it at people. I will remove my dentures in public places just to disgust people. I will yell at teenagers to turn down that damn racket ferchrissake. I will call sales people "whippersnapper". I will write fifteen letters to the editor a day (as opposed to the fifteen a month I write now) bemoaning the misuse of the semicolon, the invention of such words as "agendize", or the use of "trend" and "transition" as verbs (which I admit to hating even at the tender age of late early thirties). I will be a lot of fun.

But anyways, I should try to snap out of it since I'm spending the afternoon shopping for DVD players with Urbaniteur-Franco-Ontarien (for him, not for me; I am poor'n'unemployed) and then supper with The British Diplomat somewhere cheap in Little Italy. Must find Snobby Charm. Maybe it's at the bottom of my coffee cup.