Hey. Hi. I actually got to work early today. But someone just pissed me off and now I'm in a bad mood.

Mayn.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Answers

Who pissed you off? What did they do?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Stupid people at work. It's no big deal. I just got easily annoyed for some reason.

But it's cool. I got myself a latte as an it's okay gift.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

People, we just go cushions for our chairs at work and my ass is singing.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Is that kind of like, "I hear America Singing?"

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Hi.

I.

am.

on.

a.

dial.

up.....

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

What happened?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Our computer is so broken, it's in a million pieces, and we've tried to reinstall, you know, Windows and things, and it's still not working. No idea what happened. Yesterday morning it just wouldn't start up.

I want a new computer! Wah! Hate!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

The iBook? That's so sad!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Nooooo! Not the iBook, thank God. The PC. The lovely little Micron PC that has been so good for 3 years, and is now a very sad little PC.

I want a G4 Cube. With a flat-panel monitor.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Did the Sims kill it? Have the Sims done anything exciting lately?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

No, but the Sims are boring these days. And they did make the computer keep crashing. Hmmmm.

I think it was flarn-farned IE 5.5, which has been the bane of many a computer's existence.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Where is Miss Lowe?

Godspeed to the Micron.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

The Micron appreciates it.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

oh, AB, have you seen the new iBooks? So lovely. So want one. Only $1,200.

Right.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Yes, they are lovely. Right now I'm looking at that Flower Power iMac and the G4 Cube, though. We are getting a new computer, if I have to sell my soul for it.

I don't think I will, though--Master V wants one too.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Maybe A&F would buy you one, what to make up for your sore ass and all.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Right. That'll happen.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Good morning, good morning!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Sweet Berman is on nights now, so we will not see him around until latah. He will have to come in here and talk to himself when we're all gone.

Y'all. I'm sick of being depressed. I'm over it. I mean, I still feel like shit, but I refuse to go on in this gross existance. I have things to do. Time to do them.

Also, I keep getting e-mail from HYD readers telling me to snap out of it.

Also, if Whole Foods does not have my blackened chicken salad for lunch today, I will boycott them and start a picket line. Free the Free Range Chickens!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Good, Al. You don't need no stinking Paxil.

Also, if Whole Foods doesn't have the chicken, I will cry with you.

Also, somebody found my site today by searching for my daddy suck me. Beautiful.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

That's worse than "shit ass."

Why is the world full of freaks? I ask you.

Also, I may, indeed need some stinking Paxil. We'll see. Whatever I do, however, I have to stop moping around. Last night was another slow-moving night of me not doing the things I needed to do. My couch is not even that comfortable, but I can't seem to get my ass off it.

I have a mountain of laundry to do, and I did one load. Whoopee.

Also, JCo called and wants to know when they can fly me to Chi for an interview. Uh. People. What do I do? I told him I'd have to think about it. I sort of thought all of that was over, but clearly not. I shouldn't have answered the phone.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh - T! How was your dinner last night?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

You could just tell him that you sort of thought this was all over.

Al, do what you gots to do.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

The food was wonderful. Unfortunately, though, our friends Josh and Liz could not come because Liz is two months pregnant and is very, very sick. Very sad. I made a seperate casserole for them that I'm bringing to them tonight.

And since we have other friends coming for dinner tonight, we're going to re-pan the leftovers and serve the same thing again. Because we're lazy like that.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

That ain't lazy. You just don't want to be wasteful.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

T - that casserole you made, is that the one you had in your freezer when I was there in july? Because I loved that, and I think I could manage to make it.

Al - why would HYD peeps be telling you to snap out of it? I don't think your entries have been depressing. The mental ward one was brilliant, as was the Lucinda one. Tell them to suck it.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Speaking of the mental ward, my dad's cousin, William Davis Crutcher (my dad is William Davis Lowe - they are first cousins and are both named after William Davis, their grandfather, husband of Bertha), sent me an e-mail about how sad my great-grandmother really was, and enclosed her picture. It made me think maybe I shouldn't have spoken so lightly about her.

I think she was probably bipolar, from what I can tell from her letters, but she sure did love her husband.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Yes, that is the casserole. It's so good, y'all. It really isn't that hard to make - it just takes time to chop all the vegetables.

It's like my favorite casserole, ever. And it freezes beautifully, which is always important.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Allison, I don't think you feel bad - it's difficult to comprehend the sorrow of a depressed family member if you never experienced any of it. My grandmother, Nancy Cumi Maxey, comes from a long line of depressed people - her mother (my great-grandmother) Pernie Jane Maxey, attempted suicide. One of her sisters committed suicide by drowning herself in a pond.

At one point, my grandfather institutionalized my grandmother at the Mississippi state hospital - she was treated with electro-shock therapy. She became catatonic after he died, and was really, really sick until my dad's youngest brother became a psychiatrist and began treating her. She's fine, now.

It's hard to understand it, though. I remember visiting her at LSU Medical Center when I was little, but I had no idea what was going on. The only way I can look back on it is lightly.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I mean, I don't think you should feel bad.

This is sort of funny - apparently, my father assured Chris that although there is a history of depression, alcoholism, etc., in his family, he thought that I was fine.

(There's some backstory to that - my cousin Vicky, whose father, my father's older brother Rodney, is alcoholic, asked my dad to make sure that her husband Stacy knew that Vicky would be okay.)

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Whose family doesn't have a history of that?

My grandmother, Josephine Novella Morrow, (since we're throwing out names) was institutionalized when my mom was a senior in high school. This was 1961 people, and she was given electro-shock. No one EVER talks about it. Certainly not my grandmother, but I got my mom to tell me her perspective once. But like today, they'd just put her on Zoloft.

And my other grandmother's eldest sister commited suicide when she was in her late 20s/early 30s. Apparantly she was this brilliant, beautiful woman who just went "crazy." Crazy probably meaning she was manic depressive, but no one knew what that was.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

It's amazing to think about how different out lives would have been 100 years ago. Chris and I were talking about that last night - he's be dead from the staph infectin he had when he was a kid, and I probably wouldn't be able to have children.

It's even mroe sobering when you think about mental illness.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

And I'd be retarded because I can't spell worth a damn.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I think I'd be in jail.

And both my parents and all my relatives would definitely be in Bryce (Bryce's).

I wish y'all could read the letters from Bertha. They are so well written, but some of them are really sad. Lots of "I wish your daddy would come visit me more often..."

He visited her pretty often, I think, but she was so lonely. He was an alcoholic, and probably should have been there, himself.

When I think about what my grandmother, Martha, had to deal with... I can't believe it. Her husband, Bill Lowe, was also an alcoholic (but who she loved like nobody's business, according to her best friend, Sarah Baker, who used to write the society column for the Huntsville Times). He was an X-Ray tech and had a brain tumor that killed him and left her with three little kids, my daddy being the baby.

Her mother died right after that and her younger sister, Betty, moved in with her. Martha paid for Betty to go to nursing school, by working as a secretary. She married my dad's step-father, who was a bastard, probably just to keep her family from starving.

She never talked about Bill Lowe after that, and my dad grew up knowing hardly anything about his father.

And that's what I like about the Soooooouuuuuth!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

There's no place like it in the world.

OH! I forgot to tell y'all about our housewarming gift!

So Mike and Bette Rose came by for dinner. They're great - very old souteh, very Georgia politics (before they switched parties, they were active in Democrats for GOldwater, that sort of thing. He would have been governor if it weren't for that affair. Anyway). Mike is from Jackson County (ooooooh), Georgia, and Bette Rose is from the Tidewater area of Virginia.

Y'all, they brought us a wooden rooster for the kitchen. Because, apparently, every home needs a rooster in the kitchen for good luck.

I love it. Love it. Allison, you MUST move here soon in order that I may buy you a rooster for your kitchen.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

THAT REMINDS ME!!!

You already DID buy me a rooster for my kitchen! I keep forgetting to thank you for the Portugal pot holder! It's so cute!

Also, I don't want a wooden rooster! I want a framed photo of Little Jimmy Dickens for my kitchen!

Where in the world is AB Chao? I fear, in her dial-up frustration, she has thrown her iBook across the yard like a frisbee.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

It's true. Every kitchen needs a rooster.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

How about a framed photo of Little Jimmy Dickens that includes the poem?

I could Photoshop it so it's all cheesy like one of those "Footprints" poems, but I wouldn't ever do that to Little Jimmy, or to you.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

God... that would be the funniest thing in the world. I would have to hang it up, just out of loyalty.

I just went to Whole Foods, and once AGAIN they did not have my blackened chix sal. I was so enraged, I just went to Whataburger, breaking my covenant that I would deny the french fries and Diet Coke.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

By the way, jags, I cannot believe you fools have turned up your noses at the HYD "Survivor" Challenge. You have but a few hours to submit your entries.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Whole Foods is many things, but it cannot hold a candle to Whataburger.

God, I miss Whataburger. What I wouldn't do for a Whataburger with cheese, no onions.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Teri - Me too! Ah, the beauty of being able to ride your bike to a fast food place and not have to cross a "busy" street.

Al - I'm sort of uh, intimidated. Yeah. Okay, okay. I'll try.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Okay, I made my Survivor contribution.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

So did I. The tithing line KIRR me!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Tithing?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Hey, Allison, do you get a lot of hits from randomhouse.com? Does someone want to cut a book deal, or do we know someone who works there?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

T - maybe Allison post mine, and you see!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Maybe.

That is, unless she posts mine. I found something to rhyme with "Smyrnan."

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I do get a lot of hits from them. I was all hopeful that some editor was reading my site and wanted to give me lots of cash, but it's just another journaller, girl. Some 23-yr-old with a diaryland site. I can't remember right now what her name is, or the URL.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh, I didn't make mine rhyme. Well, sort of as I somehow used all -ing verbs. Damn! Now Allison never love me! How can you beat a song about Smyrna. Lippincott!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Yeah, she checks me out about four times a day. She should just join the notify list.

I get a lot from the University of Oregon - I think that's that Colie girl who links to the MATH Club.

I just got the nicest email from writergirl.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Did you help her with her interviews?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Ha! I knew Smyrna would be good for something!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I forwarded her some articles about the election.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

How is it possible for the quiet, gentlemanly Omar I met to be the same Omar who writes the entry that's up today? Hilarious.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

oh, Al, are you working on your update? Huh huh?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

No, I'm doing some legit work. But my update will be today, and it will have an embedded .wav file of Survivor. HEEEEEE!

I know, Omar's entry today is soooo funny. You guys are going to die when you read his Survivor submission.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I wanna try again.

Mine sucked.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Gaah! He's funnier than "Smyrnan"??

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

And look at the ladies of ATH, rolling with the convo today.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Uh, well, no - nothing's funnier than "Smyrnan."

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I mourn for AB and her dial-up.

My resume has made its way into the hands of government relations for Georgia Power. Suh-weet.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Okay, I fear that I'll be shunned from all MATH group activities for saying this, but...

I think Omar's entry today is funny and all, but isn't it just an adaptation of a Smoove B column in The Onion?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Not that it's not funny, because it is. And not that I don't like Omar, because I do.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I'm back. See, I don't often read the Onion, so I didn't notice that. Of course, he may have written it as a parody or adaptation of that, on purpose, and probably did, because he mentions the Onion all the time.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Didja update? I'm impatient.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Where in the world is AB Chao? I fear, in her dial-up frustration, she has thrown her iBook across the yard like a frisbee.

Almost.

*Miiiiiiiiiicrooooooon!!*

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I'm getting it together now. I just sent you an e-mail.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I didn't even get to enter! Damn! But y'all know, "You thought I was payin/I was tippin" is really my line.

Al, I saw you called. Were you screaming in the phone about Whole Foods and their Blackened Chicken Reich?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Thanks Al, I got your email. You probably won't use my second one but I rove it. hee!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I just turned in my Survivor lyrics. I hope I'm not too late.

Where are y'all?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh, and T! I loved your entry. You know what's crazy? As I opened it up last night, I was just finishing tearing my hair out over the computer, and I was singing the Music Machine "Have Patience" song to myself. I was killing myself laughing when I got to that part.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Allison - that's what I figured, that it was a purposeful (if that's a word) tribute-type thing.

AB, that song is my mantra. I knew that Chris was something special when, on our second date, he revealed that when he's stuck in traffic, he sings the "Have Patience" song to stave his road rage. Because mercy, the boy gots some road rage.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I forgot to say - when I was little, my dad would make me sing the "Have Patience" song when I would start to hyperventilate.

I can't wait for the HYD update.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I can't either.

Another search engine hit, for y'all's pleasure: dead babies. Y'all. What is wrong with people?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

My sweet Chris just emailed Mike with some fantasy baseball questions. Y'all, he takes it so seriously. And for some reason, I find his baseball obsession and his 10,000 comic books to be very endearing.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh, god, that is not right.

I swear, there are more freaks on the internet than anything else.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

What entry did it link to?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

It's gross, is what it is.

It linked to the 3/7 entry, about dead baby dolls on eBay. Freaks.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

People, the Survivor contest is out of CONTROL. It has turned into a smackdown session between me, pamie and Omar.

If y'all want to do some more, go ahead.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Sheeit. Does this mean my "Smyrnan" one won't be posted? I don't know if I can top that.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

But my best line. I. Okay. No. I know. Okay. Okay!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh, no - I'm posting all of them. (Except Hannah's secret one, which she will have to e-mail you.)

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I think that Hannah's Secret Survivor is the best of all.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Yes, but it's full-on, unadulterated evil. And just for girls - sorry, Berman.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Poor Berman.

It's sad that you can't post it, because it's brilliant.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Ah thank you. It'll be posted, just not en toto.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Al - the girls of MATH are writing one. And then I have to stop thinking in Survivorspeak and go home.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I like Survivorspeak better than I like haikus. Maybe.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Al - here's ours!!!

Thought that I played guitar/It was a banjo Thought that I had a skillet/It was a pan, Joe! Thought that I had a vibrator/It really was a handjob Thought that I had cool slang/I really said "rocks like bob"

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Greenspun!!!!!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I think that last line is my most favorite, ever.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

It is, indeed.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I'm all about the final lines. Wait till you see the pearl necklace one.

Okay. I'm realllly going now.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I don't know how I'm going to fit all these in here...

Y'all know my mom is going to read you saying hand-job, right?

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Yeah, well, J-Lo won't know who actually wrote it. Even though it was me. Don't tell her!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

My. Another week has flown by. Almost.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh, AB, JoLo read the Sassinator entry. She called me this morning all:

"Damn, Anna Beth is crazy! I love her."

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Oh my God, now I can never face her again. How many times did I say "muthafuckin'" in that entry? Damn.

But I'm glad she loves my trash-mouth self.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

She said you had a screw loose "just like me."

JoLo can roll with the swear words. She doesn't like to hear me say them, but you know, she's been around.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

*Dialuuuuuuuuup!*

Just like you, or just like JoLo? Because I want to be like JoLo.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

Well, y'all, I'm out for the day.

I'll be back here tomorrow. At my job. Ugh.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

She meant just like her.

You are, sort of. Y'all are both so clazy. That must be why I love you so much. Because you seem so familiar. And scary. And sweet.

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I updated.

Allison I raced home for a new entry and nothin!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001

I'm here. Tired already and the shift just started.

So sad I missed the Survivor rhyming!

-- Anonymous, May 10, 2001