2003-03-29 - 11:40 a.m.

HI!

AMEMBA ME? I'M TORNADO-ALI-WHEAT!

ORDER MY NEW WEKKID, �TORNADO-ALI-WHEAT SANGS!�

You'll get all these classic hits:

"Unce�. Mice�. Fee tines an Ali�."

Okay, enough of that.

How have you been?

Tornado Ali has been dormant for awhile because:

A) I went away for a few days to a warm, non-Midwestern place where there are cacti and strip malls aplenty, not to mention aging hipsters like Stevie Nicks, Alice Cooper, and John McCain.

(Is John McCain a hipster? You decide.)

B) When I came back, I discovered that my Goldmember* status had run out, and I debated whether or not to sign back up. (*Whenever I see this word in my in-box or have to write it or say it, I think of Mike Myers wearing gold paint and eating flakes of his skin. It's entirely disturbing.)

While I love to obsessively check my stats and see how many of you little darlings are reading, the Goldmember status usually doesn't do much but remind me that people who land on my page are looking for one of two things:

1. anything related to the "Goonies," or, more specifically, pictures of Sloth (because of my entry long ago about an upcoming "Goonies" reunion).

2. sexual things that turn my stomach (because I happened to write the words "nude scene" in a movie review of "Lovely and Amazing.� Somehow, my sweet little innocent page has turned into a net for porn-hungry creeps: Because my review included the words �child actor,� I actually saw this in my stats one day: "child + nude scene."

Yeah, um, hi, police?)

C) As I pondered whether to spend the dough on returning to Goldmember status, I began to ponder other existential questions, such as "For whom doth Tornado Ali exist? And why? To blog or not to blog? And in "No More Mr. Nice Guy" by Alice Cooper, is the narrator really a bad guy or a nice guy to begin with?� That last one still stumps me.

D) I have been wrapped up in watching how the latest reality TV show plays out. You know, the one everybody around the water cooler's been all excited about. The one with all the violence and exciting visuals, called "I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Operation Iraqi Freedom."

So what have you been up to?

I'm having dinner tonight with Older Sister and the Conservative Republican Bro-in-Law, and I got an e-mail from my mother this morning "politely reminding" me that �it might not be a good idea� to get political at the dinner table.

Ok then. So maybe instead of politics I'll ask who wants to talk about religion! That ought to be fun. I: Lapsed Lutheran. They: Love Lutheranism.

I�ve decided that even if it puts me in jeopardy of pissing some people off, I�m no longer going to let them say things to me that bowl me over and make me feel like I�m a milquetoast. (NEW FAVORITE WORD OF THE YEAR, TAUGHT TO ME YESTERDAY BY EL JEFE: milquetoast: n., any timid, shrinking, apologetic person).

Last night, a person I pretend to be friends with came up to El Jefe and me, after not having seen us for several months, and, before even saying hello, made a circling motion around her ring finger and said, �So, when�s it gonna happen, you guys?� She says this every time she sees us.

And because I have come to this no-more-milquetoast decision in my life, and because I was drinking whiskey*, and because I am so sick of her inappropriate questions, nosiness, and general attitude that I must live by the same social codes she lives by, I looked at her and said, �Actually, we�re never getting married BECAUSE I�M FUCKING GAY.�

I�m not sure if we�ll pretend to be friends anymore now.

*I�m quite proud to say I made up an alcoholic beverage last night, one I�m sure will sweep the nation just as the Cosmo did, even though I came about making it up in a rather embarrassing way.

I was sitting at this fine bar in downtown G-Spot, watching all the single moms with Biscuit Bangs out on their one night per month to cruise for some action, when I heard a waitress say to the bartender: �I need two Bud Lights and A JACK AND DIANE.�

And then, I swear, I heard the bartender say, �A JACK AND DIANE?�

And the waitress replied, �mm hmm.�

And so I thought, �Well, that�s kind of clever. I get it. Jack Daniels and Diet Coke. I wonder who invented that name?�

So when the bartender, the very same bartender, asked me what I wanted, I sexily flashed a 20 dollar bill and said, �Make that a JACK AND DIANE, please.�

The bartender, who looked much closer to 16 than 21, looked at me as if I�d requested absinthe or carrot juice.

�A what?� he said. �Jack and.... what?�

�Um, a Jack and Diane,� I said, becoming very milquetoasty again. �You know, it's Jack Daniels and Diet Coke, I think??�

The bar tender looked around as if he might signal for help to some Mental Ward Attendants waiting in the wings.

�Okaaay,� he said, "Jack and Diet, whatever."

Well, instead of being ashamed, I�m patenting this drink name and telling the world proudly about this little ditty, �bout two American kids growin� up in the heartland.

P.S. Who and what are Bobby Brooks, and how does one dribble them off? Just wondering.

that was then - this is now