20 posts tagged “drinkin and thinkin”

Now, anyone who knows us very well knows that my husband and I don't have normal conversations.  For one thing, they are randomly bilingual.  For another thing, much of what he says to me is nonverbal, and I just know what he means because I've lived with the laconic bastard for so long.  Finally, we have a tendency to start a conversation, drop it, both silently ponder it for a while (hours, days, weeks) and then just pick it up again exactly where we left off as if no time had elapsed. 

Last night while I was damn drunk (proof:  I was chatting to Zack, and I kept typing stuff like "yer cuuuuuute"--real articulate), I got angry at the "debate" going on over at this post.  The point of the post and the ensuing "debate" (I'm putting debate in quotation marks because that is not a debate; it's a farce.) is that white people (that's me!) are privileged in America and we're racists and we're all white and all the same and so forth.  She wants to end racism by, uh, apparently by starting a war with whites (which, dude, we outnumber you...bad idea) or, in lieu of that, getting whites to admit that, yes, we are bad people, incapable of distinguishing a Kenyan from a Senegalese (one of them is Anglophone, one is Francophone--see how I did that?  I defined them in terms of their colonial history.  I am the oppressor!) or a Korean from a Filipino.  Because, see, when you're a "person of color" (her term, not mine), your cultural background and your past matter; when you're white, they don't.  She even, much to my glee (sorry, Shmuel), lumps the Jews in with us whiteys and asserts that they, too, can't understand the experience of racial discrimination in America.  Hee heeeeee.  That's funny.  Jews don't understand being oppressed?  HA!  Alright, rockin'. 

[Just for the record, the above is an extremely flippant characterization of the post and the ensuing "debate."]

So, anyway, I got angry.  My husband, a POC himself as y'all know, came home about 1:30 am by which time I was giddily sloshed and angry and depressed and laughing my ass off all at the same time (the latter, of course, was due to the characterization of the Jews as privileged and also to my extremely articulate ["yer niiiiiiice"] discussion with Zack).  I said, "Hey, honey, you think I'm a rashist?"

T:  giving me WTF? look.  How much beer did you drink?

Me:  Dunno.  You want one?  I think there's some left.  I'm drinking your beer now.

T:  Maybe you should come to bed. 

Me:  Can't.  Busy.  Talkin bout ninjas.

T:  ...giving me that put-upon look that says, "why did I marry this freaky gaijin?  what did I do to deserve this?"

Me:  So, imma rashist?

T:  Huh? 

Me:  This lady says you're a "person of color."

T:  I'm tired.

Me:  You like that?  "Person of color"?

T:  looking dubiously at his arms.  Color? 

Me:  Yah, yer brown.  And now you're the gaijin, too.  I have color, though!  I'm pinkish.

T:  White, like rice.  That's why I like you.  It isn't a meal without rice.

Me:  So, what does that make [our son]?  Crosshatching?

T:  OK, I'm going to bed.

...

T:  You know, since we've been here (in the States), it doesn't seem like white people care about my skin color.  It is irritating though, because around here all the brown people are Mexican, so they think I am too, and they start speaking Spanish to me, and I don't understand.  If they figure out I'm not Mexican, they think (American) Indian or maybe Chinese.

Me:  Ni hao! 

T:  telling me to shutup with his eyes

Me:  Oh, and you know, Mexicans are counted as "white" in most of the data.  You can't be Mexican, as you are clearly brown, not white. 

T:  They're the same color I am. 

Me:  Yeh, but they speak Spanish, while you speak one of those crazy "Asian" languages.  See?

T:  ....?

Me:  Yeh, yeh.  So, you think I'm a racist? 

T:  I don't even know why you worry about it.  This isn't worth thinking about.

Me:  Ah, because this kind of shit bugs me.  The past counts for this group, but not for this one.  Because she thinks I'm X, Y, and Z because of the color of my skin which is exactly what racism is and what she's theoretically railing against.  Because I have no idea what this great "privilege" is that I'm supposed to have from my lovely skin tone--we were really fuckin poor, I worked my ass off at two or three jobs a semester to put myself through college...I don't care that the President has roughly the same color skin as I do--it doesn't mean anything at all, as we have nothing else in common, and anyway...

T:  I think I've heard this before.  (Actually, what he said, with a deep sigh, is "mata ka?" which just means "Again?")

Me:  Yah, sorry.  I know.  So, my handsome person of color...

T:  You should call me "Chinese" or something.  "Hey, Korean!"

Me:  laughing   Well, that would explain your fucked-up Japanese* AND the love of kimchi.  You can call me cracker.  Oh, and also, she keeps saying "Asians."

T:  laughing.  Yeah, we're all the same.

Me:  Well, you do all have the shiny black hair.

T:  Mine's falling out.

Me:  Damn.  I need a younger man then.  A younger person of color man.

T:  You said Zack's only 20.

Me:  He white.  White men bad.

T:  Too bad then.  What about that 17-year-old [Mister Lokii]?

Me:  He is an oppressed person of color. And I believe he has a thick head of shiny black hair.

T:  There you go then.

Me:  So, what about this little man (our son).  White or person of color?

T:  Color.

Me:  You think so?  I don't think it matters because he's too handsome for a category.

Son:  White!  He's white!

T & Me:  laughing.  That settles it then.  White you are, boy.  With all its attendant privileges.  Off to Harvard with ye.

*About his fucked-up Japanese.  Seriously, it's messed up.  This isn't going to mean much to you people who don't speak Japanese, but, ah, I guess it might mean something to Kimura.  He says "sukiku nai" instead of "suki ja nai" and "kireku nai" instead of "kirei ja nai."  Drives me insane.  My son is going to think that's proper Nihongo.  Grrr. 

So, today we moseyed out to the garden to see what was happening.  I had just barely got more or less caught up on the last big batch of harvesting, the one we did just prior to the first frost.  Lo and behold, what did we find today?  About 10 more pounds (say, 5 kg or so) of zucchini!  Joy!  It's not as if we had enough zucchini already stockpiled to last us the rest of the year.  I have had my Crock-Pots (both of them) working all day.  I just chop things up, stuff them in there with some basil and olive oil, and call it ratatouille or something.  Then I cool it, package it, and freeze it.  I have no idea how well ratatouille and pseudo-ratatouille freezes, but I guess we'll find out.  Fortunately, my husband will eat damn near anything.  (We also harvested peppers, various herbs, green beans, pattypan squash, a melon, and a bunch of cucumbers today.  The eggplant for the ratatouille came from the farmer's market.  We have some eggplant, but not a lot.  I think I told some of you that my son dumped a chocolate milkshake on my eggplant seedlings way back in spring, thereby killing most of them, so I had to start the eggplant from seed outdoors, and that didn't really allow it enough of a season.  Anyway.)

My husband then did the only sensible thing.  He went to the garage and got the axe and he gave the zucchini 40 whacks.  Two of our four zucchini plants are now dead, hacked to bits mercilessly by my aggrieved, tired-of-freakin-zucchini husband.  He also killed the cucumbers, but they weren't doing too great since the frost anyway.

Also, this may seem like an odd question, but does anyone out there need some dill seed?  We apparently planted way too much dill.  I will have dill seed to last me several years.  I always think dill plants look so festive, and so I think my zeal for their ferny prettiness ran away with me.  I have sworn not to plant so much, but everybody in my house knows that is not a vow I will keep.  I have a weakness for planting too much. 

Now, a couple of totally unrelated, random notes because I'm drinking and I get a little random when I'm drinking.  First, I REALLY freakin wish my gmail didn't put SPAM recipes every time I look at my spam folder.  I understand why it's happening--the spam/SPAM connection, I get it.  But, man, the recipe today for "Vineyard SPAM salad" that involves combining SPAM, grapes, peapods and onions--no, no way.  That's some sick shit.  If I wasn't drinking, maybe I could handle it, but as it is, I'm totally going to barf.  Jesus.

And then this.  Um, so this guy is, like, smart?  Right?  So, how the hell did it take him so long to figure this out?  I figured this out ages ago.  I have argued about this shit with every economist I have ever known, and you can't convince them.  And yet it is so obvious.  I used to worry sometimes in my old philosophy seminars that the point I was about to make was so obvious to everyone else in the room that they would roll their eyes at me, and that worry often kept me from making the point at all; I mean, if it was obvious to me, then it must be obvious to everyone, right?  Seems like sound thinking.  Only, I discovered eventually that it wasn't true.  Most people had not, in fact, thought of it before.  So, maybe I should have written Alan Greenspan a long letter some years back, patiently tutoring him in some facts of life that are crazy obvious to the rest of us.  I guess that's the problem with basing everything you know about life on the work of Ayn Rand.

If a waiter stopped by right now to take your order, what cocktail or drink are you having?

Why stop at just one?  It's Friday, and that means it's time for a 5ive.

Tonight's drink order:

1.  Gimlet.  With gin, please, none of that nancyman vodka.  I like a 3:1 ratio, if you don't mind.

2.  Tom Collins.  Lovely.  Again, if you dare suggest to me a poseur Collins featuring vodka, I will suckerpunch you. 

3.  How about a rum and tonic for a change?  Yes, lime--lime makes everything better.  *slurp*

4.  Ooh, now it's time to break out the Campari.  Let's go with a drink I call the GinBaby:  an ounce of gin (the good gin, thanks), an ounce of Campari, top it off with tonic water and a lemon slice.  Gracias y muchos besos all around.

5.  Jeshush, I need a beer.  Or, have you any lambic?  No?  OK, then, hefeweizen.  Oh, what the hell, go ahead and throw the lemon slice in there--I'm in a good mood.

I may now need a shot of -brisk!- Akvavit to wake me up.  It is, after all, the very water of life.

RE:  #4.  Does that combination actually have a name?  I know it is akin to a negroni, but not.  I used to get it all the time in a friend's bar in Numazu, Japan, and there they hadn't heard of it, so they just started calling it after me.  It's good, though. 

Lately I've been drinking a drink I'm calling "The Babysitter."  It's Jones Pure Cane Soda Lemon Drop (which tastes just like CC Lemon, a drink I completely adore) mixed with a Campari-esque liqueur I made from mountain ash berries up in Alaska.  I don't measure--I just pour until it looks a pleasing color and then drink.  Sweet and sour and bitter, all at the same time.  If you dusted the rim with salt, it'd be a treat for the entire tongue.  I used to drink gin-and-CC Lemon a lot in Japan, too.  But I'm guessing that the esoteric nature of these ingredients would flummox your average waiter.  The above listed 5 drinks will do nicely. 

Hop to it if you want your tip, handsome.

I just have to make a comment about this.

While I do find it repulsive and outrageous that America has become so obsessed with celebrities--to the point where they often, yes, know more about the crash-and-burn starlets than they know about the war in Iraq or our government--I am not really comfortable with the implications of this article.  I am sure there are a lot of morally indignant people who want to see Paris Hilton burn or rot in jail or something because she is a slut, and a rich, skinny slut to boot. 

That isn't, though, why I find it reprehensible that she's out of jail.  I don't really care how skinny she is or how rich or how many men she's slept with, and quite frankly I find her to be one of the most asexual people I've ever laid eyes on.  Marilyn Monroe, she certainly isn't.

No, I think she belongs in jail for the very simple reason that I think drunk driving is a crime that deserves serious punishment.  It is a serious crime.  It is true that she didn't kill anyone--not yet.  Most drunk drivers do not kill anyone on their first or even second offenses.  Hell, most drunk drivers probably never do kill or injure anyone--particularly when you consider how many drunk drivers there are, counting high school and college students here. 

Unfortunately, though, many drunk drivers do end up killing and injuring people: 

"According to preliminary data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), in 2006, 17,941 people were killed in alcohol-related crashes - an average of one every half-hour. These deaths constituted approximately 41 percent of the 43,300 total traffic fatalities.  Drunk (those at or above an illegal BAC of .08) drivers were involved in 13990 fatalities in 2006."

Did you get that?  That's 17,941 fatalities last year related to alcohol, a mere 13,990 of which involved legally drunk drivers.  To compare, guess how many homicides were committed in the United States in 2005 (I can't find stats for 2006):  14,860.  Many people, myself included, are for strict gun control legislation, particularly of handguns, which are by far the most common guns used in homicides.  In 2005, 68% of the 14,860 homicides were committed with guns.

Give me a minute to do the math.  Aww, fuck it--let's estimate, because it's not important at all.  Something like 7000-8000 more people died as a result of driving under the influence than by guns?  That's about right.

The point is that drunk driving is a very serious crime, and we need to start treating it that way.  Paris Hilton has not and may never kill anyone, but she might have served in this case as a symbol.  It might have got the point across that we regard violating this particular law seriously if she had served any kind of serious sentence.  Instead, the message is that (certainly if you're rich and of feeble constitution) it doesn't matter at all.  Sorry we kept you from your important parties, miss.  Go ahead--go kill some lovely family of four who was out for a drive. 

People think I'm all crazy being so uptight about following traffic laws.  I know it's terrifically uncool not to speed and to actually stop at stop signs.  I'd much prefer to be alive than to be cool, though, and so I do follow traffic laws and also good defensive driving.  I have not--in 17+ years of being a licensed driver--ever received a traffic ticket, and I have not ever been involved in an accident involving another vehicle (I have tragically hit patches of black ice and slid off the road.  I also nearly rolled a car going too fast on a gravel road before I was even licensed--but, hey, at least my stupidity would have only injured myself).  I have never been injured in a traffic-related incident. 

There are over 43,000 traffic fatalities each year in this country.  I prefer to drive defensively than to put myself or my son--or anyone else--among those 43,000. 

In my own life, I have known victims of drunk driving--one of them, as previously noted, was my father's best friend, and my father was the drunk driver.  (He was never really punished for that, either, except by his own conscience.)  Maybe that's why I see it as so serious.  Maybe, like the war, it takes on more urgency to those it has touched. 

Admittedly I am not terribly surprised Paris is out of jail, and it's so expected as to not make me outraged.  I should be, though.  Not because she's a slut or blonde or rich or totally annoying.  No--we should all be outraged because she committed a serious crime for which she will effectively pay no penalty (um, yeah, the ankle bracelet--right).  True, her crimes are not quite on the level of GW's crimes; that is certainly true, and GW's crimes have not exactly been nonviolent, victimless crimes, either.  How I wish the worst he had done involved somewhat silly interns.

Hmmm.  It seems like I'm forgetting something.  Something like "all equal under the law."  No, no.  What a silly, outdated notion.  Maybe it was something about how if she'd been poor or black or--no, not that either, as even poor people rarely face serious penalties for drunk driving that involves no fatalities.  No, I guess that's it, then.  Oh, wait--I think it was that I sincerely need a drink now.

UPDATE:  I have just read that Paris Hilton is going back to jail.  What a constantly entertaining circus the Los Angeles courts are.

I don't usually write about celebrities, and, honestly, I don't really keep up with celebrity gossip and whatnot.  Nearly everything I know about celebrities comes from The Fug Girls, The Superficial (which is written in such a way that you never know if any of it is true), and the occasional piece on Salon.com.  Oh, and I read the headlines of all the tabloids and People and all that while I'm waiting in line at the grocery store.  So, I am by no means an expert on what I'm about to rant about.  Yet, still, I will rant.

Because, see, I've about had it up to here (slapping underside of chin forcefully and repeatedly) with bloggers who write condescendingly about Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, and all these other little chickies.  The jokes you make about them are easy jokes to make; the material is all there, laid out for you like a cheese tray.  Making the jokes does not prove your wit or your great intelligence--all it proves is that you will take the easy bait and make the easy joke.  Calling Paris Hilton a slut or any sort of word like that requires no critical thinking skills at all. 

In other words, it's stupid, and you appear stupid when you scrape the bottom of that particular barrel.  You appear no smarter than Paris when you write these kinds of things.

And I will go you one further.  I do not like the music of Britney Spears--indeed, it is repugnant unto me and violates in the most gruesome way every musical ideal that I stand for.  I'm not sure what Paris Hilton even does to like or not like, and I have never seen a Lindsay Lohan movie (I know--miraculous, isn't it?).  In other words, I am not invested in the reputations of these girls. 

I do not, however, find it just and proper that you assault them so.  From what little I have read, all three of them have, like Drew Barrymore and others before them, been pushed, pushed and more pushed by parents eager for fame and money.  They have been sexualized by their parents from extremely young ages--Britney was playing the virgin/whore dynamic long before she could have possibly known what that was (I don't know if she really understands it now).  They have been told--at least implicitly and possibly also explicitly (as in the very creepy case of Jessica Simpson's dad and his explicit appreciation of her boobs)--that the road to money and fame and happiness is their bodies, hypersexualized and shoved in everyone's faces.  These girls have been told from the time they were very young that their job--nay, their very reason for existence--is to shake it, work it, tease, and so forth.  They were made into virgin-whores by their parents, the very people who were supposed to protect them and nurture them. 

Yeah, of course, at some point they might have rejected this.  Actually, Britney did for a while there, during her breakdown.  Getting ugly tattoos, shaving her head--maybe she was doing that to say "fuck you" to all the people who have told her for years and years that she is only as good as her looks, only worth what someone will pay to watch her soft-core videos.  And good for her, or anyway it might have been good for her, except I think maybe she had some serious postpartum depression going on, which isn't so good.  Anyway, now she is apparently going back to her old self, and more's the pity.  I thought maybe we were going to get an Ani DiFranco-ized Britney there for a while, which would have at least been interesting.

Sigh.  My point is that enough people have already told them that they're sluts, whores, vaginas, whatever.  It's enough.  Adding your version of it isn't going to help them or help our besotted and besmirched society.  Of course they represent a throwback notion of femininity (but does any man or woman that you would actually want to befriend/date/screw/whatever actually accept that notion of femininity?  seriously?  because none of the ones I know do).  Of course they play the dumb girl (or perhaps are dumb girls--who would even know? who can now separate the real from the act in the cases of such celebrities?).  Of course they have lurid, publicity attracting affairs.  They have been made this way by unscrupulous parents and a society--that includes you--that wants that love-hate relationship.  You, too, want a whipping post; you, too, want to feel so superior to someone, and especially someone who has so much money and fame.  If you didn't, you would just ignore them.  If you had no need to make yourself look better, then you wouldn't write about them at all.  If you had the self-confidence you claim to, you would have no need to rant and rave about these chippies.  They're not ruining our society.  The people who pay them any mind are.  They're not turning our nation of innocent little girls into harlots, at least not single-handedly.  They are just cogs in a big wheel o' raunch.  If you don't like that Ferris wheel, then fucking jump off of it, but don't blame the people sitting in the other cars--no, not even the hot chick at the top who is squealing in fake fear of being stranded up there.  Just pack your superiority complex into your purse and exit the ride now.

And now for a laugh:

I just have a quick question for Andy Partridge:

Really, Andy, why not go for the big reduction in the price of beer?  If you're going to solicit God anyway, it doesn't hurt to ask for the price of beer, especially Guinness, to go down, does it?  Are you worried that he might think that was one request too many and thus veto the entire package? 

Because it seems like God, being omnipotent and shit, would have the power of the line veto.  If he were inclined, he could grant us world peace and still make Guinness fecking expensive--or maybe he would give us both.  Think how much happier the world would be if the joy and harmony embodied by a pint of black-and-tan were affordable to all.

What could it hurt, really?  Go for it, Andy. 

What does it mean to live well? 
Submitted by Dean.

Well, ho ho ho, let's get right to the meat of the matter, eh?  For me, broadly speaking, it means living both happily and ethically.  Neither of those is exactly simple, and putting the two together is sometimes vexing, because on the surface there seems to be conflict sometimes. 

As far as living the happy life, I refer to Book X of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics as a general guide.  I wish I was making that up.  That third link there (Wikipedia! Anyway, the second link is the best one) doesn't give a helpful summary of Book X, but it will perhaps give an idea of why I am so attracted to Aristotle's ethics:  Everything in moderation.  The Nicomachean Ethics is all about finding the mean between two extremes.  For example, courage is a virtue and lies between cowardice and foolhardiness, i.e., a deficiency of courage and an excess of courage.  Both of the extremes are vices, not virtues.  Foolhardiness would be, of course, being courageous in situations that are not worthy of the courage (e.g., "extreme" sports, running traffic lights, etc.).  Courage is somewhere in the middle, in a slightly different spot for each person AND for each situation.  In a battle (uh, he was very into battles) to defend your home, you should be much more courageous than you would be when you're just hiking in the woods or something, because the battle demands courage.  Also, if you tend to be a coward, you should lean more toward the foolhardy side to find your mean. 

So, virtue lies in finding a correct balance for yourself and for each situation.  I like that. 

Unfortunately, Nietzsche was correct that the old, virtue ethics don't suit modern society too well.  Except for Mister Lokii, we are not warriors, and we are not very simple.  The turning-inward to a good/evil morality means that, although the idea of moderation remains good, the virtues themselves are not entirely applicable. 

In the face of the modern internal morality, then, there have to be different goods.  Courage might still be a virtue, but not necessarily and not only the kind that Aristotle meant.  As is well known, I am Martin Heidegger (eh, more Buber or, better, Charles Taylor and Albert Borgmann--except I'm not religious, and all three of them are), and so ethics and morality for me are questions of situation, of culture; they are immediate questions, not theoretical ones.

Oh, fuck it, what am I doing this for?  Let's just stick with Aristotle.  Sweet Moses fancypants.

Alright, so to live ethically, I try to live a life of moderation and balance.  The only thing we really need to add here (from Buber) is that I think listening (actively, in an engaged and profound manner) is the single highest and most necessary ethical act.  Listening to another person, of course (and not just when they are actually speaking), but also listening to nature, listening to Death (uh, thanks, Heidegger), listening to the eternal silence of Being. 

I think I got this way from growing up in a desert.  The desert is really the place for tarrying with the eternal silence of Being.

Anyhow, so that is how I try to live ethically, in moderation and always ready with the listening.  You people who read this blog might think I'm all about talking--and I am that, too.  I do talk a lot.  But in my real life, I know when to shut up.  Scoff if you wish.

As for happiness, I am again with Aristotle, that happiness is engaged and active.  The human capacities need to be fully exercised for true happiness, the mental and the physical ones.  I also think that happiness has to be self-sufficient, i.e., it cannot be dependent on others' opinions of you or the presence of others.  If happiness can be taken away by hearing snide gossip about yourself behind your back or getting a bad grade on a test or whatever, then it isn't a very deep happiness.  Find happiness within yourself, the happiness that arises from knowing yourself thoroughly, assessing and using your strengths, keeping yourself active and fit and engaged with challenging activities.

Learn new things.  Be competent.  Do it yourself.  Love without fear and even when it is impossible.  Listen.  Listen carefully.  Let nature speak to you.  Let art speak to you.  Let children speak to you.  Let the tragicomic wash of history speak to you.  Care for living things.  Come to terms with mortality.  Give your time to activities that will make your life better, because time is really your most rapidly dwindling resource.

Well, anyway, that's what it means to live well, for me.  How's that for a fifth-grade-level summary paragraph?  Did I mention beer?  I think I forgot to mention beer.

I just want to add a short addendum to the Housewife post.  I don't believe for a minute that most women believed those things.  The myth of the 1950s housewife is, in large part, just a myth.  Yes, there were tons of etiquette books and guides encouraging women to do these things, and, yes, there were some women stuck at home with demanding husbands and all that.  But, I don't believe that women "couldn't" work or didn't have the right to complain to the master of the house as we would currently be given to believe.  In fact, many women did work.  My grandmother worked and raised 5 kids as a single mom (and married and had torrid affairs, etc., but I would prefer not to think of it too much) back in the 1950s when she was supposedly not allowed to do such things.  She had a long career with Motorola. 

OK, I have to go.  This bitch in the ad off to the side--you know, the ones who "speak" whatever words you type in--is really creeping me out.  WTF?  Can I get one of these of Johnny Depp telling me over and over again, "You're delightful"?  That I would want. 

I was forwarded a link to this article, allegedly from Good Housekeeping in 1955, giving tips on how to be a good housewife.  Some people have claimed that it is a fake; if so, it is a convincing one.  I happen to collect etiquette books and handbooks for housewives and old cookbooks and other old gems, and I could give you pages and pages of similar advice from those books.  I thought I would go point by point and see how I compare to this Donna Reed fantasia. 

I must first confess that I am not a full-time housewife.  I am a housewife by day (sadly, no, not a hooker by night, as the movies would have you believe), and I work part-time online at night and on weekends.  I schedule my work life around my family, so I consider myself to be mostly a housewife/SAHM, and I like it that way.  I have a dedicated baking day (Mondays) when I get a vast array of snacks and breads baked for the week (my men eat like horses).  I also have planned crafty activities with my son, and I garden and do home canning, and assloads of laundry. 

But could I ever be a paradigmatic housewife?  Let's see...

So, it doesn't look like I would fare too well when matched against Donna Reed.  Maybe next year we can have a grudge match to see which of us can better interpret the works of Martin Heidegger or analyze the morphosyntax of Albanian and see how she likes that, the smarmy tart.

(With thanks to NYCinephile, my muse.)