09.24.05 - 12:59 a.m.

Is it wrong that I find Shep Smith of FOX supremely fuckable when he is a) out in the middle of hurricane describing how Category 5 hurricanes lose strength over cooler waters/through eyewall replacement cycles/whatever while directing his cameraman to keep the camera on a metal Enteregy sign (held together by rivets! that's all, just rivets!) so that we can see it fall apart (live!) as it happens? I'd never heard of the man (because I am smart and do not torture myself by watching any of cable news channels, let alone GOP-central-news-now, on a daily basis), until earlier this month, when I'd heard that he was going off FOX script and baffling the creepazoid hosts of their evening shows by, uh, talking about poor black people in a sympathetic way and defending people who were looting for survival to the same creepazoid hosts (presumeably advocating shoot-to-kill for grandmothers stealing diapers for their infant grandchildren).

Wait, I take that back. I FIRST heard of him when I saw some video on Crooks and Liars of some NOLA guy, walking his dogs in the hurricane, who told Smith off when he was reporting from downtown NOLA on August... 30, I think. I feel guilty for laughing, now, and hope both the guy and his dogs made it. Anyway: Shep(ard? herd?) Smith: supremely fuckable under thankfully limited circumstances, made moreso by 1/2 bottle of Vin de Crete and Nick Cave's Abattoir Blues and new goddamned shoes.

So so so so... I have half a dozen abortive attempts to capture x, y or z over the past month, but in truth I haven't felt all that reflective. Depressed, yes, dissatisfied, abso-fucking-lutely, detached and occasionally floaty, with chances of strange delight and a strong possibility of exhaustion: check, check, check. I've written nothing - nothing here, and nothing there - and done absolutely nothing about the upcoming EITC campaign (still pissed @ self for volunteering to organize that. WTF was I thinking? As if my billable hours weren't bad enough...) and still have not finished stripping the many, many layers of paint from my baseboards, a task I wish I'd never started. What a morass, and - moreover - a waste, since the layers of paint make it almost impossible (for impatient me, anyway) to remove every last scrap of paint without damaging the wood and, in the end, I'll probably just prime and paint them. As it is, I've uncovered the white layer, the brown layer, the light brown layer, the off-white layer, another light brown layer, an aqua blue, another white, and yet another layer of brown paint on the poor things. In the midst of the tedious work - not meant for a chick of my temperment - I try to dream about who or what was hear before, but I whatever I come up with dissolves into impatience and irritation with the whole damn process.

Okay, so: it IS wrong for me to think that Shep Smith is fuckable under these circumstances, because it only serves to reinforce the whole posture of the media (and the public) longing-for-catastrophe/responding-with-web-sites-of-ascending-angels, which encourages both the sensationalism and short attention span of the country generally, the media particularly, and me specifically. Lovely.

It was positively tropical here today, the air was muggy and wet, and even though it's almost October, I have the a/c on this evening, and am grateful for the relief from the humidity. I'm also grateful for Spanakopita and Vin de Crete and birdsnests, yum.

And I've promised myself not to watch any more weather porn.