125 YEARS AGO -- March 27, 1875

Oliver, Finnie & Co. of Memphis yesterday received by flatboat from the Ohio River a big shipment of smoked hog jowls.

And I bet there was a riot on the banks of the Mississippi, as the stinking, toothless denizens of nineteenth century Memphis descended on the unfortunate barge and devoured the salty treat that is hog jowls.

I even love the past of this town.

Sunday night - and instead of staying home and watching American Beauty win awards - we went out to dinner with Donna and Ben. Greasy Mexican food at Molly's; yummy! Then we went and actually saw American Beauty. I liked it - it's a smart movie in an era of filmed stupidity. My only problem was with Thora Birch being Mena Suvari's plain friend, when Thora is far and away the prettier of the two.

So I've got a sinus infection. Isn't that fun? I went to the minor medical place last night and they confirmed what I've suspected for the last two weeks. I have drugs, though, drugs that make me loopy and dry-mouthed and keep me (today, anyway) running to the bathroom. But my face doesn't ache and feel like it's about to slide off my face like so much overcooked chicken off the bone, so that's good. I can live with it.

I have a new exercise goal, too. Isn't that exciting? The Gibson Guitar 5K is on June 9; if I can run it in under thirty minutes I'm going to get my other nipple pierced. Hey, you do what motivates you, right?

I'll have to lose some weight to get that fast, so that's part of my plan, too. Coincidentally, my ten-year high school reunion is the next day. Fine by me. They may be able to say I went bald, but I'll be damned if they'll be able to say I got fat.

Actually, I'm ambivalent about the whole reunion thing. I've kept up with exactly one person I went to high school with and I'm fine with that. I probably haven't seen half the people I went to high school with since graduation, and I've seen the other half maybe once or twice. And I'm cool with that. What am I going to talk about with these people, anyway? "Yeah, we sure went to the same school together back in the late eighties, didn't we? Have you gotten anything pierced? I have!" My problem is I don't really like

people, and besides having to mingle with people I haven't spoken to in years I'm expected to visit with their spouses and children too? I don't know. There's a family get-together that afternoon and then a drunken adults-only thing that night. Maybe I'll just go to the adult thing. That would be good. When I'm nervous and around people I don't know I tend to drink. That would be less noticeable at a bar than at my old high school cafeteria.

Mind you, Sonya and I are considering going out of town to see the Cure this summer - possibly that weekend. Robert Smith is far more important than the majority of people I went to high school with.

In my last entry I totally forgot to talk about books and music; I even mentioned a book but forgot to elaborate on it. Silly me.

At Gatwick Airport on the way out of London I picked up The Temp by Serena Mackesy. It was fun, though uneven. It went from lighthearted world-of-work observational comedy to rape-revenge-thriller to overblown and slightly unbelieveable romance. Good airplane reading, though.

What's currently terrifying me, though, is House of Leaves by Mark Danielewski. It's about a guy who finds a manuscript about a movie that doesn't exist. The movie doesn't exist, I mean. But the shit that's in the movie (which is about a haunted house, basically) starts to mess with the guy who finds the book. So far it's been a Blair Witch-level scare for me, and that's saying something. You can also read the whole thing online, but having a paper copy around the house is more satanic.

Music-wise, the new Moby, Play, is really good. As are the dance music MP3s from Gregg's Music. And the A-Teens are the best thing happening. You really can't have too many Abba covers.

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