CTA Etiquette

Dear Random Harried Lady on the El this Morning:

WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU SIT NEXT TO ME WHEN THE ENTIRE FUCKING CAR IS EMPTY? WOULD YOU PEE IN A URINAL RIGHT NEXT TO A MAN WHEN THE REST OF THE BATHROOM IS AVAILABLE?

Sincerely,

K-dizzle.

Gchatz

me: i'm not really as obsessive as i come off online

Shauvik: like me

me: its just funnier than talking about

my regular life which is like

"hey guess what, i went to the gym today

and i farted while i was on the elliptical

but no one heard because everyone has ipods"

Shauvik: hahahahaha

nice, i always do the silent but deadly ones.

P.S. I didn't change his name ON PURPOSE.

Fucking Hormones

I'm cold. Do you think it's because its almost FREEZING in Chicago? NO! It's because there are one too many women going through "The Change" in my office , therefore they think it is perfectly reasonable to TURN ON THE FUCKING AIR CONDITIONER in the middle of a Chicago winter (plus this random hippie man with long hair, who has hot sweats daily. And who is probably a woman. And who also reminded me that I COME FROM THE LAND OF THE INDIA in case I forgot. Way TO NOT live up to stereotypes)

Bizwas

I am Known by Many Names

This guy at work just called me Kim. I've been working there for 4 1/2 months...

Also, our staff only has 17 people.

Biswas

Agni Parixa (अगिन परीक्षा)

I woke up today and picked a nice warm spot on the Purple Express, happy to be making it to work relatively on time. Then the crazy man decided that he would sit next to me, sensing some crazy-person kinship, and proceeded to talk crazy-talk while expecting crazy-talk answers, which I half-heartedly gave. Then I did the cool rich-bitch-kid thing and stuck my ipod buds in my ear and looked out the window. He kinda fell asleep on me. And then he got up at La Salle and it turned out his entire buttox had been exposed to the soft fabric of the el seat for the entire ride. Oh, and he wears diapers. But I don't think he secures them properly.

Then I went to lunch at Subway and ordered a $2.97 Veggie sandwich from the nice lady that wears green eyeshadow to match her green Subway T-shirt.

I Swear I'm Having A Good Day Today

A-hole #1 (possibly: family member, older family friend, med student, law student, person with high-powered job with set career path):

"So, uhh, what are you doing with your life?"

Me (possibly: A-hole #2):

"I'm paying my bills fucker." (key word missing is "barely")

fraishus roshis bitches

No, I don't want to:

1. be a doctor

2. get my masters for some medical-related field since I'm not going to be a doctor (b/c obviously I must have just done shit on my MCATS or something)

3. go to law school

4. be an ibanker

5. or "at least, get married to a doctor"

6. Stop selling crack on the side

What I really want to do is buy a yacht, declare it as an independent country, sail around the world with California or Seattle as my initial launch and make up my own language which will be an amalgam of Spanish, Punjabi, Bambara and the words I made up with my sisters when I was 5. Like, fraishus roshis - definition: I am awesome-er than you.

Postgrad Hobbies

Now that I've graduated from college, it's time for me to pursue those hipsteresque hobbies that a soul-sucking university curriculum prevented me from engaging in. Like, knitting! Or rediscovering my long-lost love for art through MS Paint. This work is a series of portraits, inspired by Andy Warhol. The entire piece itself is entitled "Ashu, Stop Fucking Making Shit with MS Paint."

Ashu, Stop Fucking Making Shit with MS Paint

Each portrait is named respectively: "Ashu", "Ashu with Rajasthani mustache", "Ashu on crack", and my personal favorite, "Ashu on crack with Rajasthani mustache."

Making it in Mali: Paris to Bamako

So my internal monologue as recorded by my Mali Journal is really not that interesting. But I'm posting it up anyway. And now you all know that tough bitchy girl attitude is totally a front.

Feb 2, 2006

omg this place is f-ing crazy

I love it.

Smells kinda like India – not as pungent though & a different kind of sweat (yeah weird, whatev)

On our flight from Paris to Bamako, there was this entourage of around 10 policemen escorting a criminal – I didn’t get a good look at the criminal, but one of the policemen was hott [Kam 2008: of course that was what I focusing on during an epic trip to Africa] they moved our group up from the back b/c the criminal (or maybe 3 criminals?) was there. Not safe for a gaggle of young gals to be so close. Apparently, he was bound in some kind of strait-jacket.

The airport was small & dingy – getting our luggage meant getting pushed & shoved by many many ppl.

We started speaking French right away. Yeah. Mine <-- not so good.

Had to go up 4 flights! of stairs w/ my luggage @ the hotel. We all shoved into a van & 1 car. Desi-style man.

Ok,

Au Revoir (I have to wake up at 5:30 AM & it’s 1AM)

One Nomad Civilized

As of May 31st, 2007, I have officially surfed six couches (and I don't even know how to swim!), excluding that brief period which could be called subletting or could be called squatting. Whichever you prefer. Today marks the last day of my life as a serial pillow surfer and the first day of my adoption into an Anglo-Saxonish (who knows these days?) family. No more lonely nights reading forgotten books on friends' coffee tables where vaginae are called Heavenly Chambers and semen is called Joyful Juice. People - an era is ending.

Tomorrow I move in with the O'Connor's**, a family of good-hearted people who are taking me in as their own. And charging me $0.

So I guess I'm still couch-surfing. But in a more permanent location and now sleeping on a bed. Ahh, the good life. And I will have an exchange-student buddy from Palestine. Exciting. Perhaps I will introduce her to the American literary phenomenon known as written porn, glossy illustrations included. On Sale, $7.99 (Canada $12.99).


*Side-note: Now you all know a perfect way to kill me. Great.
**Names have been changed. What inspired O'Connor? Why, Sandra Day, of course!

Finally, Some Direction in Life

Bring back the red-blooded bitch

Once women knew how to deliver a good, honest dig, says Julie Burchill, but now great bitching has been replaced by half-hearted hand-wringing and hypocrisy

The Guardian
Julie Burchill

One of my favourite films ever is The Women, the 1939 comedy by George Cukor. A sparkling cyanide soda-pop of a confection, it is remarkable for two things - the absence of men from the 130 speaking roles and the extraordinarily high quality of the bitchy repartee. "Good grief, I hate to tell you, dear, but your skin makes the Rocky Mountains look like chiffon velvet!" "If you throw a lamb chop into a hot oven, what's gonna keep it from gettin' done?" "He could crack a coconut with those knees ... if he could get them together."

Over the past decade there has been the occasional buzz about a proposed remake, the most recent allegedly featuring Meg Ryan and Lisa Kudrow. Well, if it does finally happen they can start polishing up that Golden Raspberry Award right now. Because the standard of bitching in the time that has passed since the original will surely render it about as sparkling as a bottle of Tizer with the top left off.

Read the rest here: Bring Back the Red Blooded Bitch

Confession

Posts marked as 9:00 am were probably written at more like, 3am.

Making it in Mali: Departure

Like a prom queen or a star quarterback's desperate attempts to relive the glory days of high school by getting drunk at underage parties, I've decided to grasp at my memories of Mali through this blog. About the email below: Apparently, I thought it would be utterly hizzalarious to randomly insert nonsensical words, which for some reason all reference food (minus the HONDA - what is up with that, yo?)

HellO everybody

I just wanted to say bye bye before I leave the motherland (I'm leaving Tuesday) and make sure that everyone knows that as of January 27, 20 CHICKEN 06, I am still alive. And yes, I know many of you detest these bulk emails but there is, apparently, only one internet cafe TOM!ATO!! in Bamako, and I am poor, so this is the best way to reach all of you. If I can, I will try to send out individual emails.

Much to your delight, (or chagrin, depending on what type of masochism you aim for), my emails BEEF will most likely be short. and most likely sent out inconsistently. CELERY IS GOOD. Sorry! Can't help it. So please email me the updates of Evanstonia and any other cities you HONDA are in, and also, please don't perform any major life blunders until I come back and am able to screw it up for you further.

Ciao!

Kansas

Obama won the Iowa Caucus and KU won the Orange Bowl tonight. What do they all have in common? Kansas! Because Kansas produces winners like me.

Hello Year of the Rat

Again, it seems apropos to commemorate the Great 2008! with a new post. And perhaps this dawn of the rat foreshadows a significant turn from previous years. It is a shrewd animal all about survival (and spreading fatal diseases, but that's another story for another year), whereas the pig is all about sloth, gluttony, rolling around in mud and smoking up some ganja. Ganja whuuut?

And so my year begins with an end to my couch surfing, anti-social tendencies, and possibly an end to my ubiquitous negativity all in the name of the adapting surviving rat. In that vein of change and positivity, I've decided to be more genuine and sincere* and explain what this blog is about:

Nothing.

Heehaw, y'all, I'm juss kiddin'**.

Mostly, it's about all the shit that goes down, since I seem to find myself in, shall we say, "interesting," situations. I have a sneaking suspicion that these convoluted situations have something to do with my attempts at becoming an adult. (Side-story: it's ego-boosting to know that your ex-boyfriend*** hasn't really bothered with the whole adult thing, despite being in med school. Proof: he calls you on New Year's Eve as a prank - the EXACT same prank he pulled the New Year's Eve 2006 - and says he, "wants you," as his Beavis & Butthead friends guffaw in the background. It's also nice to validate one's brutal dumping of aforementioned ex, in case one happened to have any lingering doubts.) I also have a suspicion that my attempts at becoming a fully-functioning adult are constantly sabotaged by my memories of Mali, as I have lost all semblance of life-direction and realistic goals since returning. So this blog is a record of Post-Mali life, which I assume will eventually merge with Post-Grad life.

And in case you're wondering why the fuck you should give a rat's ass (heehaw, pun totally intended), consider these posts as words of wisdom as you take a stab at being mature - perhaps you can avoid similar life-hiccups. Remember me when you microwave cookies and say "oh yes, Kamdizzle's poignant essay on the dangers of microwave technology has now made me wary of these new-fangled ways of cooking. I'll do the more American thing and cook some raw meat over a spit-fire on my back porch. Because I'm American. Yes. I mean, "YEAGHHHHHrghhh!"


*I'm lying.
**No, I'm not.
***I'm so fucking mature, I'm not going to say his name. He will remain anonymous. Fucker.