Further Adventures in City Living, Pt. Eleventy Seven Thousand

Yeah, so my license plates got stolen last weekend. And because everything about my life is required to result in some sort of saga of ridiculousness and aggravation, I still don’t have any license plates now. The nice part is that no one, including law enforcement, seems to give two shits if I drive my unlicensed vehicle all over town, so I am not too bothered about it either. (It makes sense that they don’t care if I have plates, actually, as they really don’t seem to give even half a shit if someone’s stealing my wheels or fucking a hooker up against the side of my car or popping the passenger side door handle off with a screwdriver or whatever. I presume they have more important things to do. Like direct traffic and… well I’ve really ever only seen them directing traffic, mostly. Anyway.)

So last Friday night I went out to the bar and then to another place to see a friend’s band play, and that was all really fun until my other friend got maced by a third friend. And that’s another story entirely, and I don’t even know if I can do it justice, so I really won’t try. So anyway, I am sure I had license plates when I left that place, and here’s how I know: last year when I had to get new plates my dad sheared off one of the bolts on the back plate holder thing when he was trying to change them, and then w/o asking he strung the license up on one side with wire, so it hung down at a jaunty angle. And every single time I’ve approached my car since then I’ve though “Jesus Christ, I am a hoosier.” and then I’ve gotten in my car and driven away contentedly, because I hope my car looks extremely hoosier, to keep these ghetto motherfuckers from wanting to mess with it. So I remember seeing my dangling plate late Friday night/early Saturday morning when I got in the car to drive my friends back to their cars. Continue reading »

Can anyone predict what the next corruption scandal will be in St. Louis?

So it’s getting more expensive to park in St. Louis.

Downtown parking meters cost more today in St. Louis – STLtoday.com.

The cost to park at meters in the city of St. Louis goes up today, including a 33 percent jump downtown…

But no one knows why…

The exact reason for the parking increases has not been publicly stated. Parking meters are controlled by the office of City Treasurer Larry Williams, and he is not commenting.

Or how much money it will generate for the city…

How much revenue the increase in parking fees will create remains unknown. Green would not provide an estimate.

In fact, there’s a lot this guy doesnt seem to know..

He also would not say when the last increases occurred or how many parking meters there are in the city.

But I bet I know why we suddenly needed an increase, and where the money from the increase went…

Green did say his office hired a consultant, Performance Management Group, to review department operations.

I find all this ridiculous. Not because I don’t have $1 to pay the parking meter, but because I know from dealing with them in any capacity just how ineffective the St. Louis city government is. It’s full of people in jobs they’re not qualified for doing whatever they want with no oversight and a bad attitude, and only later do we ever learn the full extent of what “shocking” things were going on behind the scenes.

So whatever this scandal turns out to be: someone with their hand in the till to pay for gambling debts or coke addictions or mistresses or underage boys or giant shopping sprees or whatever the heck, I am willing to bet that this whole Office of Unanswered Questions the Treasurer will never stand up to any intense scrutiny/investigation.

Can’t wait to see what happens.

The Grand Conspiracy

A few months ago, some of the local St. Louisans I’ve met via Twitter told me about a project of theirs, known as The Grand Conspiracy*. Since they’re almost all artists and writers—and many are both—they wanted a collective place/way to share their work.

The Conspiracy was apparently originally conceived as a one-sheet of short fiction and artwork to be distributed in local bars and shops.  Since then the project has morphed into an electronic one, centered around a collectively updated blog, with a print version to eventually be taken from the best of its posts. The other Conspirators kindly invited me to play along, and I was really happy to accept. It’s much easier to write when you have an intended outlet in mind, and it’s easier to keep to a deadline if you know someone else is depending on you to do so.

Of course, people and their schedules being what they are, the blog has taken quite some time to get off the ground, but I am excited to announce that we’ve got our collective asses in gear, and will begin (hopefully daily) posting at The Grand Conspiracy today!

As luck would have it, Thursdays are my posting day, so there’s a new piece of mine “Make Your Selection” up now. I’d love for you to have a look and let me know what you think of the blog overall, and of course any critiques of my work are always welcome.

(I mean, I am not saying I won’t punch you in the face for daring to dislike my writing, but I certainly welcome the opportunity to punch you in the face.)

Anyway, have a look, add it to your feed reader, check it every day. If I know these people at all, there will be some stellar work there for your edification and delight.

*For those of you who are not St. Louis natives, this name refers to the the street, South Grand, where all our favorite bars are located. Not that this is a group which centers itself on drinking at all. *ahem*

Conspirabust

Headed out to Conspiracy last night – went for a full-on goth whore look, with an impressive display of boob and a thick coating of cosmetics applied around the appropriate facial areas. (Had a weird hair night, but that’s what headbands are for.) Got there, met up with hotpants and her BF and a few other people, was fixing to have myself a nice time. However, apparently someone didn’t remember to pay the light bill, clear it with their mom, invite the cool kids, oh yeah procure a liquor license, so the cops showed up around 1 a.m. and shut the whole thing down.

I have evidence in the form of a typically shitty cell phone pic that I snapped of the proprietress being hassled by the man. Since this event has been going on for what, four or five months now? you’d think these trifling little paperwork technicalities would have been straightened out, but apparently not so much.

You can't pin nothin' on me, coppa!

Anyway, it’s a shame. Not just because I wasted so much cleavage and lipstick, but also because it looked to be shaping up as one of their more successful events so far. They’d moved some of the vendors upstairs, opened the front entrance to the club and they really had a good crowd there. People seemed to be having fun upstairs, and it was the first time I’ve seen the dance floor up there really packed. In the fetish/play room I still think they need some kind of ringleader. You walk in and there’s just a room of gear and some random people tying each other up or looking like they’re getting ready do something. But with no explanation you don’t know who these people are, what they’re doing, or why. You don’t know if there’s going to be some kind of show, if audience participation is encouraged, or what. It’s not a skeevy vibe, it’s more of a confused/unorganized vibe. Just random chicks being tied up by random guys with no rhyme or reason for it. That does need some work. Also, they really need to enforce the “NO PHOTOS” signs they have in that room. The girl taking pictures of the “NO PHOTOS” sign being a case in point.

But on the plus side the bartenders seemed to have everything under control, with no huge lines or people ordering 27 drinks at a time, and that was a huge improvement over last time. Even at $15 instead of the previous $10 (for a girl who’s mostly going to be drinking water) this is not a bad bargain. This has the potential to be a really neat and successful event, it just seems as if they need a professional event planner to advise them*. I’ve heard rumors that there might be a change in venue – and I for one would love something closer to home with actual parking that doesn’t leave my car dropping gravel out of the undercarriage for the next two weeks.

Better luck next month, Conspiracy!

EDIT: Heard a rumor from a reliable source today that there was, in fact, no problem with the licensure of the venue, only something that was not posted that should have been. Apparently the building’s owners showed up with the correct documents after we were all gone. Interesting. There’re also rumors aswirl about who might have called in a tip about this issue and/or caused the booze cops to check into the place.

Apparently St. Louis’ Tired Old Goths aren’t too tired for a little intrigue.

*another case in point, their main website is not developed yet, so their URL currently resolves to their mySpace page. That’s fine, except the profile is set to “private.” Doh! For someone like me who wants more information or to see pictures of what the event looks like, but doesn’t use mySpace, this is nonsensical. You can’t encourage people to attend your event by preventing them getting information about it.

Need your voting powers, people!

My friends Dave and Amy are finalists in Apartment Therapy’s “Small Cool Contest 2009″.

They could win $10,000 just for having a really cool house! Please go vote for them – there’s a simple registration in order to be able to vote, but it’s painless, I swear! And check out the pictures of their house, which incorporates a giant log. Log = automatic WIN.

Who is good?

St. Louis couple has a place to call their own, at least for now.

J.B.Forbes P-D

BY Denise Hollinshed

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

04/09/2009

ST. LOUIS  Julius and Hazel Watkins are expecting to be in their own place this weekend.

While it isn’t exactly their place, it beats moving among relatives’ homes. That’s what they have been doing in the month since fire heavily damaged their home.

The new quarters, in Hillsdale, have been offered free by Garry Session of Florissant, who read of the Watkinses’ plight last week in the Post-Dispatch. A construction firm has offered to repair their damaged home for free, and a fund set up to help the Watkinses now contains $2,000.

“It’s wonderful,” Julius Watkins, 84, said Wednesday. “I just think it is wonderful, and like I said, ‘God is good.’”

via 04/09/2009 – St. Louis couple has a place to call their own, at least for now – STLtoday.com.

Whatever. By your logic “God” burned your house down, too. So now he’s given you somewhere to stay and $2,000? What a guy.

No. Random chance burned your house down. Poverty or carelessness or both meant you had no insurance. PEOPLE are helping you. PEOPLE gave you a place to live. PEOPLE are repairing your home, and donating money to your little fund. Imaginary omniscient beings had nothing to do with it.

And even if there was a “god” who had something to do with burning down an 84 year-old woman’s house – he’d kind of be a cocksucker, wouldn’t he?

Burrough’s Invite Controversy (+ poss. artwork thievery?)

Burroughs Prom Invite Pushes Envelope.

So those wacky over-privileged kids at Burrough’s created this over-the-top invite to an after-prom party.

With a theme of either “Lust” or “Sin” (I really can’t tell – maybe the theme is just “debauchery” or “we have no sense”) it features “satanic” imagery (a pentagram) and invites all “sinners” to come enjoy the fun. There was a minor brouhaha over the invite, and I think any reasonable observer would say that it really was not appropriate for a high-school audience, no matter the school in question.(I do love the defenders who say it’s more OK for Burroughs’ kids to do this, since they’re so smart and special and elite and need to blow off steam, darnit.)

But what really caught my eye was this cover image, which I recognized immediately as belonging to Marta Dahlig. Marta is a prolific Polish digital artist who contributes digital painting training materials & tutorials to many of the art magazines I read. This image belongs to a series of “Seven Deadly Sins” that she completed a few years ago, and I actually own a print of her image Vanity.

Marta’s popularity has skyrocketed in the last few years, and so I doubt that these kids could have afforded to license her work for use on this invitation (of course, they’re Burroughs’ kids, so who knows?)

If they didn’t license the work then they’ve stolen it. Is art thievery all part of the “sinners” theme of their prom? Perhaps there could be a few lessons learned here  – one on using discretion in party-planning and in thinking things through before we go to print with them, and one on respect for copyright and other people’s artwork.

I’ve emailed a link to the PD story to Marta, and am interested to hear back from her whether the work is, in fact, licensed.

Weekend Wrapup – Gastronomical Delights Edition

You know, my weekend did actually improve after my whole misery-guts Friday experience. It was a struggle, and took some epic willpower on my part (plus a lot of patience on the part of my friends who are really sick of hearing my stories) but I managed to hoist my broken carcass out of the depths of resentful misery and into a better, more productive place. Yay me.

Friday was errand-running during the day, with a surprise appearance by MyTodd™. I bought a new jacket, which cheered me. Then Friday evening was drinking and being irritated. Saturday morning was getting over myself and then some errand-running. I had to run to the grocery store and pick up about 62lbs of meat and seafood for Sunday dinner. Later, Todd and I ended up going out to dinner at Franco in Soulard, which was delicious. I had the mixed greens to start, Todd had the onion soup. We both had the wood grilled bistro steak for our entree, with raito, green beans and pomme frites. I had peanut butter ice cream for dessert, he had an apple tart/vanilla ice cream combo. We loved everything. I especially enjoyed the green beans, since I spent most of my life hating them until once I had them prepared correctly, so now every time I can find good green beans I get all excited. The interior of the restaurant was very nice, low-key, calm and modern. The staff were extremely friendly, to the point of an almost obscenely cheerful obsequiousness. When Todd got up to use the restroom, our server rushed over and refolded his napkin into a fancy shape. That’s a little OTT for me, but it never crossed the line to truly disturbing/offensive. Continue reading »

The Most Kick-Ass Deer Ever

I wish this deer could have done this guy a little more damage.

Dear asshole, if you’re going to get off on killing things, make sure they’re actually dead, lest they try to seek revenge on your ass.

STLtoday – Wounded deer attacks hunter who shot him
Wounded deer attacks hunter who shot him
ASSOCIATED PRESS
12/01/2008

SEDALIA, Mo. — A Sedalia hunter bagged a big buck on the second day of firearms season, but the kill caused him a lot of pain.

Forty-nine-year-old Randy Goodman said he thought two well-placed shots with his .270-caliber rifle had killed the buck on Nov. 19. Goodman said the deer looked dead to him, but seconds later the nine-point, 240-pound animal came to life.

The buck rose up, knocked Goodman down and attacked him with his antlers in what the veteran hunter called “15 seconds of hell.” The deer ran a short distance and went down, and died after Goodman fired two more shots.

Soon Goodman started feeling dizzy and noticed his vest was soaked in blood.

So he reached his truck and drove to a hospital, where he received seven staples in his scalp and was treated for a slight concussion and bruises.

On second thought, I wish this would have been a zombie deer. Maybe it was, and that’s why it went for his scalp. Zombie deer eats your brains.

Stupid Cop! Now I am Really Peeved.

So that cop stopping me has been bothering me all weekend. I really didn’t think I was doing anything wrong, and it freaked me out to be stopped for doing something I didn’t even know I was doing. So I decided to look it up in the MO Drivers Manual just now, and guess what? I WAS DOING IT RIGHT! Totally right! From the manual, page 38:

Exactly what he said not to do is what I was supposed to be doing. What a jackass! He didn’t even know what he was talking about. I am printing this shit out and taking it with me in case that fucker pulls me over again. What an idiot! And made me broody all weekend! Ugh!

Because all the murders have been solved already

I was leaving work today, and as I pulled out of the parking lot I realized that there was a cop not too far behind me. And there are four four-way stop signs between me and the next main street, and no one’s ever at any of those intersections. I determine that I will stop completely at every single one and go 25 MPH on the street, as I am supposed to. So I do. Full stops. Excruciating slowness. Last stop sign I look behind me and the fucking cop has his fucking lights on. What the fuck? So I pull over. He pulls up beside me and says (with an attitude like I am some kind of moronic fuckwit)

“Where did you learn to stop at stop signs?”

I look at him like “Wha?” And then he says to me, for real, that I have been stopping PAST the stop signs, by a FOOT. AT LEAST. I am not stopping level with the stop sign, but the front one-foot of my car is past the stop sign. I don’t know about you, but I stop with the front of my car positioned somewhere between the curb and the stop sign. I don’t know anyone who stops with the front edge of their car directly level with the stop sign. I just gape at him. His attitude is very rude and assholish, he’s gesticulating wildly and talking about how I am “halfway into the intersection” before I stop. And he does this mock ‘looking around cluelessly’ motion, like that’s me in the middle the intersection, looking around and not knowing where I am. Or something. And he’s saying I am stopping “in the middle of the intersection” right after he’s just said I overshot the signs by a foot. Which would make for a smallish intersection. He’s talking to me like I am the most retarded person, doing the most insane thing, that he’s ever seen.

So he’s all berating me, and saying how he’s supposed to write me a ticket (In the meantime, he’s never even left his car. He pulled up next to me and is blocking traffic himself in order to bawl me out through his open passenger window.) Then, weirdly and suddenly his attitude changes. The more I gape at him the more conciliatory he gets. “It’s alright.” he says “I got you covered, I am not going to write you a ticket. But you have to watch out, there’s lots of us out here, and we’re hiding all over the place. We’ll give you a ticket for that.” And I am thinking “Mother-effer, I KNEW you were behind me. That was my cop’s-behind-me stop. WTF?” So I said “Sorry, I had no idea.” And then he tells me to drive carefully and takes off. I am just sitting there like “WTF just happened here?”

I don’t know what his story was, or why he was so rude, then so faux-nice all of a sudden. It was so ODD. I mean, maybe he thought I was a student and could be easily intimidated by him, then saw I was a grown woman. Maybe he thought that in that neighborhood I would be someone who was up to more than over-shooting stop signs and he could drug-bust me. Maybe he was just pissed that there was someone in front of him doing the speed limit and coming to full stops at stop signs like cops NEVER do. It was bizarre. So I drove home. And there are a LOT of four-way stops between work and home, and I watched very carefully to see what other people were doing. Guess what? Everyone stops with their front bumper beyond the stop sign. They stop with their body right behind the stop sign (bumper somewhere between stop sign and curb.) Everyone. And the cop acted like I was the only person who ever did that, and I was like Speed Fucking Racer behind the wheel.

I don’t know. I hate to make generalizations, but cops can really suck. Power-mad weirdos who act all erractic and have the power to arrest you. It’s unsettling.  I’ve been driving for 20 years, I’ve always driven the same way, plenty of cops have seen me stop at a stop sign, FFS, then this one freaks out on me. It makes me feel paranoid and it makes me think cops suck ass, all cops. And I know they don’t, but they need to really stop with the random petty and subjective shit and get to busting all these people who are shooting people.

Welcome to the War Zone

STLtoday – 4 injured in 4 shootings in StL

Four shootings yesterday. Four separate shootings.This city is insane. Do not linger on the streets, people. It’s not safe.

Favorite badly-written PD sentence in this article has got to be:

The girl and a woman were arguing and a man in a crowd that had gathered fired shots.

That’s not only badly written, that’s also funny in that it makes it seem as if the man got fed up with their arguing and shot at them. Which may or not be the case, actually. Hrm. Must rethink guns as a solution to making people STFU. Though I do understand the urge.

Saturday Randomosity

At home tonight, after a sleepy/lazy/industrious day, then a shopping trip then a jaunt over to Todd’s for Chinese food and backlogged Tivo. He watches shows that I only think are funny if I watch them with him. Like Reality Bites, which is just retarded and offensive, but when I watch it at his house is kinda funny. And Tim & Eric’s Awesome Show, Great Job! same thing. I brought magazines to read so as not to distract him from his mission of Tivo-clearing, and caught up on some 3D World.

My Mom kept asking me what I wanted for my birthday and I kept saying “nothing” because there’s honestly nothing (that I would ask my Mom to buy me) that I can think of that I need. If there’s anything I want that’s low-to-medium priced I buy it myself, and I am at the age where it’s no longer OK-feeling to ask my parents to buy expensive things for me. So she ended up taking my word for it and giving me cash. I decided to spend it, and went self-birthday shopping for me.

I went to the Galleria which has instituted a policy of no under-18’s alone after 3 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays. That was in response to some violence at the mall involving youth, and it’s been in effect for several months. Maybe a year even? Anyway, whether in response to the ban or the good weather or the fact that people now think the mall is violent, it was dead there. And even though it was dead it felt run-down and dirty. Like a big, sloppy crowd had just cleared out five minutes before. Lots of closed stores with no “coming soon” signs on the boarded-up storefronts. Things like the Kenneth Cole store and the BreadCo closed down. Who ever heard of a BreadCo closing? I grabbed some coffee at Starbucks and it was grimy there, like no one had wiped the counters down all day. Gross.

I went first to Sephora to get a new bottle of Euphoria, and they were doing a decent business. Decent enough that no one asked me if I needed any help, even though I was in there for a good 10-15 minutes looking around with a bemused expression on my face. Deciding that they must not carry Calvin Klein fragrances anymore, and that I was damned if I was paying $22 for a tube of Stila lipgloss, I headed into the Apple store. (That shitbag place is always hopping. I swear that if I had to work in there I would kill myself and others within an hour.) Anyway, I wanted one of those iTrip things like I borrowed from Todd for my Savannah trip. But if you can imagine, no one asked me if I needed any help, and I couldn’t find it on my own. I found one that was similar, but the price tag was torn off, and there was no one to ask about the cost. It wasn’t the same model anyway and I wanted to get the same one because it had worked so well. So I fought my way back out through the crowd and left.

OK, 0 for 2. I am beginning to form a theory of inverse helpfulocity, in which shop workers only ask people who are clearly browsing if they need help, because people who look like they need help may want… help. And that’s work. It’s much easier to swan around bothering people who are just looking. This is based on my own personal experience of being bothered by many, many shop people when I want to be left alone, and never finding anyone to help me when I want to ask questions and buy something. I headed to Aveda to see if they’ve come to their senses and brought back Deep Penetrating Hair Revitalizer. (They have not. I hate them.) If you can bring yourself to feel astonishment one more time, no one asked if they could help me as I searched fruitlessly for anything that might be a decent replacement. (Seriously. I got home last night and my hair looked like it belonged on a deranged maiden-aunt who’d escaped from a period romance via the tropical rain forest.)

Not quite so much gray, but seriously it was huge and scary-frizzy.

They have some new moisture line and I have to commend myself for not just buying it, but testing the conditioner on one wrist and the masque on the other. A few hours later when I was at Todd’s and scratching at both welt-covered wrists I knew I had saved myself a trip back to return the stuff. Anyway, I bought some Anti-Humectant pomade, as if anything could fight my hair’s attraction to humidity or vice-versa.

After Aveda I went down to Macy’s, where a girl actually asked if she could help me! I asked her if they had any Euphoria gift sets, and she pointed out to the ones which were cleverly hidden right where I was standing. Genius strikes again, in the form of my enhanced powers of perception!

So here’s where it gets funny. She walks away and I peruse the prices and the gift sets on offer. Small bottle (1.7 oz) of perfume = $58. Large bottle (3.4 oz) = $75. So I am getting the larger one. You know, value. So I look at the gift sets and realize they aren’t really all that gift-setty. They’re a silver bag that you could reuse for storage with a silver fabric headband wrapped around it, which you could use if you take up being a ballerina. But the price for the bag that contains the 3.4 oz bottle of perfume is $70. I look at the bag which contains the small bottle, and it’s $50. So basically I can save anywhere from $5 to $8 by buying the same size perfume and taking a free bag and headband. Sweet. I go to purchase it and the girl who’s checking me out doesn’t scan the bag, which has a regular price and bar code on the bottom. She opens the bag, takes out the perfume box and scans that. Which rings up $75. I point out to her that the bag says that it’s $70 not $75, and she talks to the lady at the next register, defaming some not-present “she” who “switched out all these gifts yesterday” and “must have not changed the prices” (sic). She then turns to me and says “This has gone up since yesterday.” Expecting that to make sense to me, when I know darn well that the price of the perfume itself is fixed, and if anything the price of the set was incorrect, not magically raising and lowering like a deli special.

Now, if there had only been one set like that I might have gone along with her unlogic, because I don’t want to seem as if I am scamming the store. But there were 3-4 sets just like that, with various sizes being sold at lower than face value because they were in this price-transforming silver bag. So I just raised my eyebrows and looked at her. (Eyebrow-lifting is the first step you take in your transmogrification from regular person to Angry Customer Lady.) Her companion at the other register said “Just give it to her.” (Note: Thanks Macy’s! I love for you to mislabel your shite and then make me feel like a scam artist!) So anyway, that was a bargain. I guess. Todd thought the headband was cute, though he didn’t want it for himself as far as I could tell.

I tried to look at shoes, but their whole shoe department looked like a bomb went off, and even the displays of regular-priced shoes were fudged up. The whole wall that had Born written on it was stocked with nothing but Easy Spirit shoes, and no matter how farked my feet get I will not wear Easy Spirit shoes. I was vaguely embarrassed to be inadvertently looking at them. So I just left. Wow, looking back at my total experience, that whole mall was a real shithole tonight.

I don’t know. All of St. Louis seemed totally dead. There was no one on the roads, no one at Borders when I stopped in there, no one on the highway. I don’t know if people were holed up in their houses or all out of town for one last hurrah before school starts on Monday, but it was dead as a doornail.

And that concludes all of Susan’s Wild and Soapy Showertime Shopping Adventures for this Saturday!

Oh, and one more side note regarding the bar on Friday night: Just because I am at the bar with my friends at/after last call doesn’t mean I am looking to be picked up by your drunken skank ass. I happen to like to stay out late when I choose to go out, and closing down the bar doesn’t mean I care to be treated as if I am easy-pickings, or the last-resort chick. I am planning to go home to bed, alone, and your drunken last-minute ramblings when you realize you’re inadvertently planning the same are not impressive. That’s all.

she says
any two points can make a line
but i know i can never make you mine
i can never make you mine

Deb Talan – Two Points

STLtoday – StL logs 100th murder this morning

STLtoday – StL logs 100th murder this morning

ST. LOUIS — In what could be the city’s 100th murder this year, a man was shot while sitting in a car Tuesday night and died early this morning, police said.

The man was sitting in his car about 10:11 p.m. Tuesday night, when a man attempted to rob him and then shot him, police said.

Further proof of the St. Louis maxim “Sit thee stationary neither on thy front porch, nor in thy vehicle. For if you do, surely shall ye perish.”

WIN or FAIL?

Click to embiggen, obvy