his name is mud

When I watched the first half of the Project Runway season finale last night, I was surprised to learn that one of the designers, Chris, trimmed the pieces in his collection with human hair.

I kept expecting someone to say, “What have you done, you sick fuck?” It never happened. Tim Gunn came close when he compared the hair clothes to monkey poo, but even that analogy seemed euphemistic. While I am not a fashion expert, I would like to take this opportunity to explain why making clothes with human hair is grody, distasteful, and downright un-American.

I get annoyed when people conflate “being creative” and “doing something unusual.” The former is a product of talent; the latter relates more to sensationalism. Being creative involves sharing an original point of view; doing something unusual is its cheap knockoff. I think that Chris’s work is an example of the bad things that happen when an artist overreaches as he develops a concept.

Chris himself admitted that he was going for a “provocative” collection and the show’s judges seemed to agree with him, referring to his work as both “provocative” and “dark.” Technically, these descriptions ring true. Since I’m feeling generous, I’ll even allow that it’s possible (though not probable) that his use of hair was a surrealist gesture. But, for me, twentieth-century history really colors the concept of objectification—less in the feminist sense of the word, and more along the lines of using disembodied people parts as objects. Frankly, I think it’s in bad taste to trim your clothes with human hair when not so long ago there was a war that turned people into lampshades.

But maybe that’s just me. (On one hand, it strikes me as an extreme view. On the other, those really were my first thoughts when I saw the clothes. It was a visceral response, not an academic one.) In any case, people make all sorts of dumb offensive shit in the name of provocative. “Offensive” is, by definition, subjective. I would argue that “dumb” can be objective. I think that critical discussions of art would be a lot more productive if people could wrap their heads around that distinction.

That said, would the judges have found it “provocative and dark” had Chris made jewelry out of baby teeth? Some things just aren’t right. Sheesh.

just because it's true doesn't mean it's not a metaphor

I frequently make terrible decisions. Usually, I know they are terrible decisions before, during, and after I make them, yet I can’t seem to stop myself. It’s as though I were floating outside my body, a curious spectator wondering what the fuck I’m up to.

Then I berate myself for being a weak spectator person. It’s a charming cycle, as you can see.

To take one example, let’s examine my decision to watch the movie Saw IV.

I’m sure you must be wondering why in heaven’s name I would do such a thing. Let me just say up front that I agree with you. Normally, I am a reasonable person who likes to watch good movies. At least, I think I am—I can’t trust my own opinion, I know, having demanded Saw IV.

I knew that it would be awful. I mean, I didn’t necessarily know that there would be bestiality, pig’s head costumes with people hair, cyborgs, skewered couples, freaky knife hats, pervy autopsies, or Luke from Gilmore Girls, but I knew there would be those types of things. Still, last night when I couldn’t sleep, I decided that watching Saw IV would be a good way to pass the time.

God help me, I really wanted to demand this terrible movie. I had been thinking about it for days. I tried, in vain, to demand other, better movies instead, including Michael Clayton (which, incidentally, wasn’t much more original than Saws I-IV, though I didn’t see III.)

Why?

On the upside, it could be far worse. I have never once watched a movie starring The Rock. Or Adam Sandler (except for Punch-Drunk Love, which I heard officially doesn’t count). And I would never watch Atonement. (I think. I hope.)

I can’t help but marvel at these forces in the universe that compel me to behave in ways I don’t understand. I suppose I should be grateful that they don’t make me do things like go to church, kill hobos, or wear sweatpants.

feeling existential

Every so often, we encounter something that shakes us to the core. We go through life with a certain sense of self until something comes along that makes us question everything. We stop and say: Who am I? Who am I really?

I guess if we’re lucky, the catalyst for such questioning is something profound like a moving book, an interesting person, or a challenging project. For me, it was a series of peculiar late-night commercials.

One of my life's little tragedies is that I suffer from frequent bouts of insomnia. Sometimes, when I can’t sleep, I watch television. Recently, in the middle of the night, I found myself thinking: Why are these commercials all geared toward poor/insane/stupid people?

And then: Am I one of them?

Here is a sampling of the commercials I saw just last night:

1. Cash4Gold: “Turn your unwanted gold jewelry into cash!”
Cash4Gold offers a very straightforward service: you mail them your gold, silver, or platinum jewelry, and they send you a check. Is it disturbing or awesome that they accept dental gold? I can’t decide.

2. Video Professor: “Learn the computer.”
The video professor sells CD-ROM lessons that help halfwits learn the computer. (I love the article there—it’s always The Computer.) The people in the commercial look normal, but the most amazing things come out of their mouths. I am especially fond of the lady who says, “My daughter knows how to use the computer better than I can, and she’s 3-1/2!”

The professor offers lessons for most major Microsoft applications, as well as more general topics such as “Learn the Internet.” My question is, if someone is so dim that they need to learn the Internet, can they really be expected to know how to use a CD-ROM? Not to worry, according to one testimonial: “This is easier than a VCR, because I don’t know how to use my VCR!”

I find it hard to believe that such a person managed to turn on the TV to watch the commercial in the first place.

3. Colonial Penn Life Insurance
This one isn’t nearly as funny as the others, but I find its approach rather fascinating. Your first clue that this is a thinking man’s commercial is its spokesman, Alex Trebek. I guess that, to stupid people, the host of Jeopardy! is the epitome of intelligence. (This is similar to the approach of those Allstate commercials that use President David Palmer from 24 to personify reliability.) Are people so easily manipulated?

Also, I like how the actors are meant to represent the audience; the pitch is delivered by old people who wake up in the middle of the night to talk about life insurance. Message: you, the insomniac viewer, can rest easy once you have this insurance. Subtle.

4. Extenze Pills: “Increase the size of that certain part with real science.”
In theory, I am a fan of any “capsule that can make a man larger,” but I think the Extenze team needs to refine the “real science” part of their pitch. My favorite bit is when someone says, “Do you really think we could afford this commercial if Extenze didn’t work?” The most cursory examination of that question suggests that the answer is an emphatic YES.

meet my nemesis, the peacock

Friends, a new threat is upon us.

As far as I’m concerned, peacocks are just fancy turkeys.

One of the joys of having a blog is that friends think of me as their go-to person when weird stuff happens to them. Writing about my quirks has elicited some truly terrific stories from people, my favorite being a voicemail message from K a few days ago that was so funny I had to listen to it twice.

Remembering my post about turkeys, K thought of me when he found a party of peacocks loitering near his car, “hanging around like they were going to cheat [him] out of money.”

You see, K lives on a quasi-farm (just a few miles from my mom’s house, incidentally) that is crawling with roosters, goats, and donkeys. I’m guessing that his constant exposure to those threats is what made him bold enough to approach the peacocks with offerings of food. He started with oatmeal (??), but they were not interested. After some research revealed that the birds are fond of corn, K found some canned corn in his cupboard and dumped it in his yard.

K feels like this picture really captures the tension between his resident roosters and the peacock intruders.

As it turned out, the peacocks didn’t care for that, either. Later, when I called him back, I told K that they’re probably too fancy for the canned stuff; they might prefer fresh corn. But when he left the voicemail, K was feeling shunned and betrayed. This led to my favorite part of his message, toward the end, when he said, “So, at this point, the peacocks are just really moody and picky and really fucking annoying.”

My own research confirmed K’s impression; National Geographic describes peacocks as “testy” on its website. While that was news to me, I have long harbored a special loathing for them. I used to live near a peacock reserve in London, where I learned that female peacocks (actually called “peahens,” NG tells me) shriek like cats being slaughtered. Their cries echoed through the neighborhood at night. Believe me, whether or not you have a crippling fear of birds, that shit is not cool.

K wonders how the peacocks made their way to his home and why they have chosen to stay. I’m pretty sure they’re an omen of some impending evil. The real question is the extent of the blight—i.e., are there more of these things strutting around JC?

Foul play alert level: heightened

imaginary friends

Two people who meant a lot to me died yesterday.

Of course, they weren’t real people: one was a character in a comic book, the other a character on television. Still, I’ve been feeling pretty sad. You might even say I’m in mourning.

I could make a long list of fictional deaths that hit me hard, and I’m hardly alone. This, we know, is one definition of great art: when someone lodges a figment of their imagination so firmly into our heads and hearts that, like an old lover or a favorite teacher, they leave an indelible mark long after they are gone.

A few of these figments walk with me still—my imaginary friends.


RIP: Sandman and Omar, two of my all-time favorite fictional characters.

The deceased could hardly be more different, but the timing of their ends revealed some striking similarities that I might not have noticed otherwise. Both were tragic characters who shared a teleological, self-centered worldview. Both reeked of machismo, but subverted my ideas about masculinity in interesting ways. Both believed in Old Testament-style retribution. Both valued codes more than individuals…valued their systems of belief more than themselves, even.

As tragic characters, these beliefs led to their inevitable demise. I have read The Kindly Ones many times, so there were no surprises there; even the first time, I knew what was coming. And I have been dreading Omar’s death for so long that his end was almost a relief. Almost.

But it is their differences that made me really reflect on what makes fiction compelling. You see, someday I’d like to create some figments of my own, but so far my gift leans more toward comedy than tragedy. I consider this a flaw.

On one hand:
We have a character who is technically more of an idea than a person. Yet it’s safe to say that what made readers love him was his humanity. The scale of his story was epic, but the heart of his problems was quite human: his unwillingness to change, his inability to connect, and the impossible question of where unwillingness ends and inability begins. This, to me, explains why most of Neil Gaiman’s work is so compelling—the balance he achieves between the lofty and the mundane...his knack for bringing low the gods.

On the other:
We have a cold-blooded criminal mastermind on a show that is unapologetically gritty, fucked up, smart, and perfect. Omar, like most of the characters on The Wire, is also an archetype; it’s not for nothing that David Simon considers his creation a postmodern take on Greek tragedy. This is what makes his work so compelling—he finds the epic in the everyday. He elevates familiar dramas and gives them the shine of high art. His m.o. is, in a sense, the inverse of Mr. Gaiman’s.

We watch Simon’s archetypes struggle against an uncaring world. We watch them murder children and shoot heroin and torture people; we also watch them eat Cheerios and ruin relationships and mourn lost loved ones. We watch them wake up in the morning. We watch them make bad decisions. We watch them make jokes. We watch them self-destruct.

I consider myself reasonably informed about many of the societal ills that Simon addresses—i.e., the public school system, homelessness, and the drug war. And, you know, it is so depressing that it’s hard not to become desensitized to it. What should be a call to arms often leaves me kind of numb. Even so, I have sat and sobbed through entire episodes of The Wire. A recent episode (the one with Prop Joe) haunted me for a solid week. I still feel kind of fucked up about it. That alone is an amazing achievement: to Address Issues and make real art at the same time. It’s very difficult to be so earnest without coming off as preachy or sappy.

But to return to the idea of formulaic tragedy, the equation seems so simple: recognizable archetype + endearing quirks = awesome multifaceted tragic character. But if it’s so easy, why I can’t think of any other show with characters who I count among my imaginary friends? Before I started watching The Wire, I thought the best show on tv was The Sopranos. Now that show seems so…one-dimensional. I think it treated its characters more like stereotypes than archetypes, and the way it made them “complicated” was to show that even the most violent psychopaths can be pathetic and boring. (Like us!) The Sopranos was entertaining, but I, for one, was unmoved.

I might have to stick with comedy after all.

Chicago fashion vanguard

You may have heard that we’ve had some cold weather here in the Midwest. While most of you swine have been enjoying temperatures around the forties and fifties, we Chicagoans have endured weeks of subzero days and frozen snowdrifts as far as the eye can see. So, first of all, let me just say: fuck the lot of you. In the words of Corky St. Clair, I hate you and I hate your ass face[s].

Okay, that was mean, but maybe you’ll forgive me when you learn that I haven’t worn normal shoes outside in a month. The only thing more demoralizing than looking so bad all the time is being surrounded by people who look even worse. If these winters have taught me anything, it is that all this ugly is not good for morale.

Lately, my wardrobe challenges have not been limited to the outdoors. The extreme cold causes the temperature to oscillate wildly inside my apartment, which is heated by primitive torture devices called radiators. More often than not, I am way too hot or way too cold, depending on the whims of these fickle appliances.

Now, one nice thing about working from home is the the freedom to wear whatever one wants to work. Lord knows I have worn some interesting ensembles on the job, but the radiator problem has inspired some especially amazing outfits. I have taken to wearing lots of layers to make it easy to adjust as the temperature fluctuates throughout the day.

As an interesting exercise in compare and contrast, let me tell you about what I was wearing at my desk just the other day:

Crazy Lady Outfit v.1: radiator off
Tank top
Long underwear top (these things are like fucking hair shirts, I don’t know how much more I can take)
Turtleneck sweater
Wool cardigan
Polar tights (arctic-style stockings)
Striped socks
Jeans
Scarf
Earmuffs
Blanket (wrapped around my upper-body, hobo-style)

When the radiators start steaming and my apartment becomes a sauna, I start peeling off the layers. I guess that explains how, later that afternoon, I found myself in this charming little number:

Crazy Lady Outfit v.2: radiator on
Tank top
Polar tights
Striped socks

Striped socks really tied my whole look together.

The sad part is that I didn’t even notice until I was using my phone with a headset and found myself tucking it into the tights because I was on the move and there was nowhere else to put it. I laughed at first, but I was quickly sobered by the realization that I am probably becoming unfit for polite society. Surely normal people do not stash their phones in their polar tights.

Sometimes I worry that being self-employed is like being home schooled—that spending too much time on my own will mark me as an outcast in some subtle way that I’m not even aware of. One day, when I go out into the wide world, people will look at me and know that something is not quite right.

i heart gocco

By now, many of you will have received my weird little Valentine’s Day packages. This is the story of how I made the cards, in case you’re interested.

I recently bought a Print Gocco PG-5, which is basically a tabletop screen printer disguised as a funny-looking toy. Gocco was conceived of as a diversion for Japanese children (evidently, one-third of households there have one), but have become popular among artists (professionals and dilettantes) all over the world.

I was so swept up in my V Day project that I forgot to take pictures to document the process, but I have included a few post-project shots here to give you an idea of how rad this thing is.

1. Meet gocco. It uses small disposable bulbs (like the ones used in old cameras) to burn carbon-based images into small screens.

2. First, make a drawing with a carbon-based pen, then center it on the gray sticky pad.

I never claimed that I'm an artist.

3. Next, insert a small blue screen. You can only use it to make one set of prints, so the screens are sold in packs of five.


4. Close the lid. You should be able to see your drawing through the window.


5. Twist two disposable bulbs into the nifty reflective hood. Bulbs are sold in packs of ten.

6. Position the yellow hood over the drawing window and click the hood into place. Press down on the orange part with both hands until you see a crazy flash. This is my favorite part.


7. Remove the screen and add ink. The inks come in lots of colors and cost around $3-4/tube. Re-insert the screen and you’re ready to start making prints.


8. For this design, I used black ink on watercolor paper. After they dried, I painted the cards with watercolors.


9. For this one, I used several different gocco inks on regular pink paper.


This thing is so neat. I highly recommend it.

meditation for valentine's day

D and I had a long conversation yesterday about the possibility that we might be sociopaths.

I realize it is probably futile to try to contextualize a statement like that. That said, let me explain that our conclusion stemmed from a conversation about societal norms that we don’t understand, which include the following:

1. Forging ties with your extended family just because you are related.

Why do people feel compelled to stay involved in the lives of their extended family members? Why do blood ties create a sense of obligation toward people we frequently have nothing in common with and/or dislike?

I’m not talking about your favorite aunt—more along the lines of the cousins you see once every five years at family reunions. As a case study, here is an inventory of my maternal cousins:

AL: methadone clinic member, mother of a crack baby (since forcibly removed from her custody), jailbird
C: former crystal meth addict, current pothead, divorcee
T: former pyramid scam runner, current house cleaner, divorcee
A: pediatrician, mother
B: power broker

I’m pretty much equally uninterested in all of these people, though I’ll admit that I enjoy hearing stories about the deviants. And that’s just on my mom’s side! We’re estranged from the paternal cousins, though I understand that at least one has been in prison. Sometimes I fantasize about seeing one of them on COPS.

2. Feeling obligated to spend holidays with your significant other’s family (and also, for that matter, your significant other).

I know many couples who have blowout fights about where to go for the holidays. Frequently, this leads to the family-merge phenomenon, which is when couples force their families together for awkward holiday gatherings. It rarely works since there is almost always some undercurrent of animosity.

When such issues arise, I invariably wonder: why not divide and conquer? Surely you spend enough time with your partner that you can bear to release him for a few days to deal with his own shitty family. There’s some weird possession thing going on there, and I believe it’s at the root of why most relationships don’t work. My own familial obligations are draining enough. I wouldn’t dream of inflicting them upon someone else, nor would I tolerate someone else inflicting his upon me.

3. Seeking out your secret family.

This thread dealt with unknown biological parents and/or secret siblings—issues that neither D nor I have dealt with personally, but have affected people we know. Invariably, these people seek out their secret family members. Maybe I would feel differently were I to find out I have my own secret family, but I doubt it. Why bother?

All of that said, if you know me, you might be aware that I am actually rather sentimental and sensitive. I’m not sure what that means; maybe I’m bipolar?

I’m pretty sure D’s not, though. She strikes me as a normal sociopath, though hopefully not a secretly violent one.

xoxo, KO

the public and private spheres

Most of my friends here in Chicago make fun of me for having a blog. I think it’s less about me and more about their idea of blogs, which, in their minds, are for earnest teenage girls who write about boy trouble or getting their periods. As far as I know, very few of them actually read mine, but that doesn’t stop them from snickering and making snide remarks.

While they can fuck themselves, I have to admit they have a point. We’ve all read plenty of crappy blogs. I have an acquaintance who writes daily entries about the most mundane topics you can imagine—for instance, a series of posts detailing a conflict with the cable company. It’s not even his topics per se, it’s the way he treats them: it’s like a log or the minutes from a board meeting. There’s no art to it, and since I have my own artless battles with the cable company, I don't read it.

Then there are those with the opposite problem, the sentimental bloggers. These are the sad bastards who use their blogs as dumps for their emotional problems. Thankfully, I don’t have any friends like that, but I know their kind. Whenever I read something by a sentimental blogger, I think, you should save that shit for your journal.

That's right: I have a journal. Because I am from the South, and because I am an introvert, I believe in keeping things close. I am an extremely private person and an excellent keeper of secrets. No doubt I would be completely bottled up and repressed were it not for this outlet.

You see, my journal is a magical place where I let out all the crazy.

Of course, it took some time for me to become comfortable with the medium. At first, the process was pretty excruciating. I would write some censored version of whatever was on my mind, and then just sit there and shudder, totally mortified by the lameness of it all.

The reason I don't kill hobos: I have a special place for all the crazy.

In part, it felt lame to “share,” but I also had a hard time with the mechanics. I am a writer and a neurotic, which means that I am batshit crazy when it comes to editing. The process behind almost anything I write—from a thank you note to stuff for work—involves endless refinement; if I ever sound the least bit skilled it’s because I edit myself until I’m fit to puke. I am either good at my job or a monomaniac, depending on how you look at it.

Either way, this made journaling that much more difficult. But I had a little crisis last year, so I kept at it out of sheer desperation. Eventually, the shuddering stopped and the censors eased up. It reminded me of the process of becoming comfortable with a boyfriend. At first you’re embarrassed to fart in front of him, but then you turn a corner and you’re having, like, fart contests.

(I’m sorry—this is when you find out that I have the sense of humor of an adolescent boy. Just last night I started laughing uncontrollably during Boggle when I found the word pube. For real.)

Now, when I write in my journal, I don’t worry about sounding salty or clever. I allow myself to sound unintelligent—borderline retarded, even. I also let myself obsess over minutiae, explore unhealthy fixations, and rationalize bad decisions. Ultimately, I think I’m better for it.

Very soon, the shame-loss phenomenon might dissolve the border between blog and journal. Meanwhile, I have a dilemma: what should I do with the journal I just finished? Burn it? Shred it? Leave it at some random public place for a stranger to find? Save it to revisit when I’m a better-adjusted person (to gloat) or a more defeated person (to reminisce)?

I guess I'll leave it in the drawer for now.

weird like me

I recently read a friend's blog post about being “tagged,” where someone asked her to write about things like what books she's reading, what she's listening to, etc. I like this idea and decided to come up with a tag theme of my own. I landed on weirdness, mostly because I really dig weird people.

To get things started, I have cataloged some of my weirdest habits and beliefs. I decided not to include any of my neuroses, since I have already droned on about so many of them.

Top 10 Weird Things About Me, ranked from odd to bizarre

10. I hate used bookstores. They fall into the category of things I feel pseudo guilty about not liking, which also includes Jim Jarmusch movies and Velvet Underground songs featuring Nico. (That's right--I don't actually feel guilty about not liking these things; I only feel guilty for not feeling guilty. O hipster obligation, what a fickle pomo bitch you are.)

9. I might have missed my calling as an entrepreneur. As a child, one of my favorite playtime activities was developing fake business ventures. First there was The Sea Turtle Library, but I quickly learned that book lending wasn't a moneymaking industry. Later, I started a more Machiavellian tutoring company and hit paydirt with my parents.

8. Transsexuals despise me. I used to think it was just this one bitch, but now I'm convinced it's the lot of them.

7. Sometimes I eat pasta with hot sauce and nothing else. This seems particularly weird since I can actually cook and am interested in food. On a related note, I have this thing where I'll become obsessed with a particular food (kale, most recently) and eat it every day. I also tend to order the same dish at restaurants I frequent. Sometimes I worry that I'm mildly autistic. That's probably weird, too.

6. I never learned how to ride a bike.

5. I enjoy washing dishes. I think everyone has a secret cleaning chore fixation. My friend T likes mopping. A derives great satisfaction from cleaning his bathroom. On a related note, I also enjoy mundane tasks such as grocery shopping and shredding paper, which supports my concerns about autism.

4. I frequently worry that I'll throw myself on the train tracks, even though I have no desire whatsoever to off myself. It's the weirdest compulsion. My friend A once admitted that he has the same problem, though he believes that it's somewhat normal. Then again, his most famous college prank was leaving a fake suicide note for a roommate that he didn't like. I guess I'll keep this filed under weird for now.

3. I think my lifelong participation in fake bands is pretty weird, though M told me he had one, too.

2. This is a tie between my abiding hatred of foods that other people really like, such as bananas and melons, and my secret love of dancing, which I practice at home, usually while cleaning.

1. My favorite Beatles' song is “Octopus's Garden.” While I am appalled that my favorite is by Ringo, I think it can be attributed to a riveting performance of the song by my sister's preschool class. I disliked children even as a child, and still I was thoroughly charmed.

What are the weirdest things about you? I feel sure I'm not alone.

breaking news: i'm a bitch

Meet G, my estranged uncle.


As you might know, one of my favorite ways to procrastinate is to google people. Recently, while googling my uncle, I discovered something very special: his website.

Since we have been estranged for so long, it was nice to read about what G’s been up to. For instance, I learned that “his interest in the diverse applications of music, video, and audio refuses to accept boundaries.” Neat!

I also learned that his website is named after his handle in the “online karaoke community.” My next procrastination project will be to uncover some of those performances.

Meanwhile, I leave you with this song from his album, “When Lightening Strikes” (sic).

(Oh yes, one great big ball of bitch.)

happy birthday

K is for krump, which he does pretty well
E is for earnest, though not like a douche
V is for vertebrate; v is too hard
I is intense, for he is Extreme
N is for nosy 'cause he gets the scoop

K is for krump

T is for TN, the place where he be
H is the helmet he wears just for math
R is for riding mechanical bulls
A is for artist, though not like a douche
S is for sassy 'cause he has a mouth
H is for holla, a.k.a. "hootie hoo"
E is for emo in case he goes gay
R is for rad, 'cause Kevin's my boo.

R is for riding mechanical bulls

Have a good one, old friend.

meet my nemesis, the mouse

D, my friend who lives in the apartment below me, is pretty sure that she saw a mouse in her kitchen.

I have written at length about the time and energy I expend managing my irrational fears, including birds and driving. The best thing about those fears is that I can mostly avoid them. So it has been sort of interesting, at least on an intellectual level, to confront one of my irrational fears here at home—a place that, by definition, I can’t avoid.

I have such a powerful fear of rodents that I have long suspected my terror might conjure one. (I suppose irrational fears beget irrational beliefs, because I am convinced that fear conjures nemeses.) This is one reason that I could never live in Manhattan, where chubby rats run down the sidewalks like toddlers at a playground. (D, a New Yorker, has even had rats run across her feet…twice.) Chicago has lots of old buildings, but it is also very clean, so I used to feel pretty safe.

That is not to say that I have not faced down other threats. At my old apartment, for instance, I battled a number of occasional invaders. They upset me, but at least I was emboldened by their menace for long enough to kill them. I also worried that the crazy-eyed squirrels that hung out on my back porch would run into my apartment whenever I opened the back door. (I fear squirrels and so should you; they are the crackheads of the rodent world.)

Past nemeses

But mice are far craftier than occasional invaders or squirrels. That is why, when D told me about the problem, I immediately sat down and made this list of actionable items:

E-mail/call landlord
Call mother: This was for comfort and advice.
Borrow cats: This item was based on D’s belief that cat smell repels mice. She wants to borrow friends’ cats for a few days.
Clean D’s kitchen: D recently had a big exam and she let things go a little bit. As a result, her kitchen looked like it could be on one of those tv shows where they clean up crazy people’s places with shovels and power sprayers.
Research mice: I spent about an hour online researching mice. So did my mom. Then I called her back to regroup and strategize.
Leave note for neighbors: I considered leaving a note for the neighbors asking if they have seen anything. D thought this was crazy.
Contact exterminator

I also wrote "constant vigilance" at the bottom of the list, as both a reminder and a talisman.

When I get upset, I make crazy lists.

As I panicked, D called A, a friend who has been battling a mouse of his own. They developed a plan: A would come over and stomp around her kitchen to scare the mouse (evidently, they don’t like a lot of racket), and then bait traps with peanut butter. In addition to these things, he ended up helping D clean her kitchen (god love him) and promising to come back for mouse retrieval should we hear the telltale thwack.

A says that he doesn’t think the mouse will be interested in my kitchen, but I am still trying to steel myself for the possibility that it will appear. Of course, you never know how you’re going to react when faced with a traumatic situation. Maybe it will be like the time I screamed at my muggers until they ran away. Sometimes I surprise myself.