A Tweet

February 13, 2018

Whenever I am scrolling through Netflix and I see one of their own productions in the “trending now” or “critically acclaimed” sections, I’m like, “Ugh, bragging like that is so unseemly.”

I Miss All the Good Shit

February 7, 2018

From a Daily Beast article published in 2014:

Marni Kotak sits on a gold-painted twin bed, wearing a gold satin nightgown, with matching bedsheets covering her legs. She’s scribbling in gold ink on a cartoonishly large notepad, an expanding list of the day’s emotional fluctuations. It’s a small room, littered with gold-painted everything: chairs, desk, exercise machine, dumbbells.

It isn’t Kotak’s apartment, but the microscopic Microscope Gallery in Brooklyn, where I have come to see Mad Meds, during which the 39-year-old performance artist will document her “personal struggles with her own mind, the US medical system, and the pharmaceutical industry as she attempts to withdraw from psychiatric medicines.”

Kotak has only just begun weaning herself off a cocktail of anti-psychotic, anti-depressant, and anti-anxiety medication. She started the pill-popping regimen—a combination of Wellbutrin, Abilify, Klonopin—in February 2012 after being treated for postpartum depression. A medicine cabinet stuffed with empty pill bottles provides an informal tally of the drugs she’s consumed in the past two years. When I arrive, Kotak is surprisingly relaxed, telling me that, at the moment, she’s only suffering from “mild anxiety and achiness.”

***

This woman is a genius.  The birth of the child which kicked off the postpartum was also staged as a “performance,” although that choice I find a bit less exciting.  Anyway, I’m a Marniphile now.

A List

January 25, 2018

of foodstuffs eaten in Penelope Fitzgerald’s The Blue Flower.  I skimmed back through to compose this list, so I might have missed some, as I remember there being more when I first read the book; still, I managed to catch a few gems, such as cow udder soup (how much would you have to get paid to try that?)

Coffee

White rolls

baked goose

cabbage soup

“a nice smoked eel”

Zwieback

soup made of beer, sugar and eggs

another made of rose hips and onions

another one of bread and cabbage water

another of cows’ udders flavored with nutmeg

dough mixed with beech-nut oil

pickled herring and goose with treacle sauce

hard-boiled eggs

dumplings

boiled potatoes

pickled raspberries

200 oysters

the ears snout and strips of fat from the pig’s neck boiled in peppermint schnapps

arrack

pickled goose legs

black ham

fruit liqueurs

sweet cakes

Stewed pigs’ feet

plum conserve

 

Literary Lookalikes

January 24, 2018

Ken Kesey:

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As portrayed by a young Gene Hackman:

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Class Subjects

January 22, 2018

… at NYU’s Center for Experimental Humanities.

nothingness

the 1990s

underworlds

anti-colonial pedagogy

bad women

John Berger

the curatorial

insomnia

David Bowie

(Among others, I’m assuming)

Agreed

January 17, 2018

Friend’s email titled: I want to work at this company solely because of the name

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Speak Truth to Power

January 16, 2018

AC: Honestly, I feel like you know your youth is over the first time you buy from Everlane.

WHY?

January 10, 2018

Why is this a news story?  Why is this world we live in such an empty, silly place?  In the words of the great cynic Eddie Pepitone, “WHY DO I HAVE TO BE CONSCIOUS FOR THE HORROR?”

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Someone Please Go After Dr. Phil

January 2, 2018

I was recently sent a news story about public enemy number one, Dr. Phil McGraw, and how he allegedly endangered guests on addiction-related episodes of show by putting alcohol into their green rooms or encouraging them to go score on Skid Row (proper noun?)  Of course my reaction to this was, “Natch,” because Dr. Phil is all about dramatic television, and doesn’t seem to care what it takes to get there.  Remember when a show staffer bailed out one of the Polk County 8?  Or when he tried to become BFF with Britney Spears during her breakdown so he could produce a show about her?  Gross.

Anyway, there are at least two allegations of sexual harassment in Dr. Phil’s past, and where there’s one allegation, there’s probably myriad episodes of misconduct.  Okay fine, so some of the previous allegations sound a little wacky, but I think that is immaterial, Your Honor.  Now that we’re in a more enlightened age, can we please resurrect these charges and get him off the air?

PS Let us not forget who foisted Dr. Phil onto us all in the first place.

Bluelight Live

December 26, 2017

So I’m in a weird phase in my life, and one of the things I’m doing to entertain (err, distract) myself is explore odd corners of the Internet.  By far the most exciting site I’ve explored is Bluelight, a well established (but new to me) hub of information for drug users of all stripes. I’ve spent a bunch of time this evening reading blow-by-blows of “precipitated withdrawals” (the more you know!), recommendations of what benzos to take when suffering night terrors, and “eye alignment issues on meth.”  The most exciting post I’ve come across, though, is the below, titled “Have I ruined my amphetamines???” and written by a user who goes by the handle speedyhousewife.  I read it aloud to my husband in a posh British accent, which made me think that perhaps there should be some performance called “Bluelight Live,” a la Letters Live.  Who’s with me?

***

Hello everybody here, what a fabulous resource you have here. I’m not sure of all the proper terminology for everything so please do excuse me for any errors. I also do not know anyone else who uses this, nor does anyone other than the seller know that I use it, so I have no one to ask and Google didn’t help me much at all.

I live in Hampshire in England and i have been secretly taking what I know to be called Speed for about 5 years. It usually comes in a mildly smelly pure white sticky paste, sometimes a bit grainy, wrapped in plastic. It’s about the same size as a small butt plug! I was initially told by the seller to put it in the freezer and cut off what I need, but it tastes nasty, so I have always opened it up, spread it on a silicone board and left it in the airing cupboard to dry out. Once dry the next day, I flex it off the board and whizz it into a powder in a food processor. Then I divide it into 50 cigarette papers for easier swallowing. Always been fine, never been a problem, it has always been pure white and mildly smelly.

2 days ago, I bought some and shoved it in my bag without looking. I arrived home and realised that the house wasnt empty, so in a panic, i shoved it in the gas meter cupboard outside overnight. It was a very cold night and i was panicked so i still didnt actually look at it. The next morning, i opened the gas cupboard and the smell was VILE, I wondered if I had a gas leak! I took out the speed and the smell was coming from that, it was nasty and it was a creamy yellow colour! I spread it on my board, but it wasn’t spreading easily. It also made me feel sick because of the smell * I do have extremely heightened sense of smell for the last 3 years though *. I left it to dry over night and it hasn’t dried well, still quite sticky and the smell is still awful. I’m scared to use it.

Has anybody ever known anything like this? Or could it have reacted whilst hidden in the gas cupboard, either to the gas or the cold night? Will this make the speed dangerous to take? Am I being paranoid and irrational? Is variation in colour and smell normal?

I cannot ask the seller as we have no contact at all to protect my secret. I hide the funds in the secret location at the same time every month and the following day I return to collect it. What should I do? I won’t be able to get anymore for 1 month and I only have 2 days left from my previous supply.

Just in case this isn’t actually called Speed, the effects of it are super increased energy, excess sweating, increased motivation, no appetite, sometimes irrational thoughts and crazy ideas (both good and bad), fast talking too much, increased productivity, reduced judgement when shopping (I.e, likely to massively overspend), feeling of invincibility (I.e, attempting tasks that wouldn’t normally be considered for an untrained late 40s 4ft10 woman, like building a summerhouse from scratch, chasing a burglar for 2 miles on foot and roofing repairs) and sexual rampancy. I dont know how much this is in weight that i buy, but it is much much much much cheaper than a months supply of cocaine. Previous threads I have read have not mentioned any prices of things so I haven’t quoted the price to avoid flouting any rules.

The effects hit in 20-30 mins, and usually last from 7.20am-5pm. Once worn off, there is ravenous hunger and occasional emotional sensitivity, but nothing else really, does not affect sleep that night unless a second amount is taken at 5pm. When not able to take for 2 or3 days, major paranoia kicks in, but that might just be my mind and nothing to do with the speed. If it’s not speed, I’d love to know what it might be as I’m really paranoid that I won’t be able to get this if my seller ceases trading. But it was speed I initially asked for.

Thank you so much for reading and for any help! Middle class bitch here with no other help available!