Tuesday, May 31, 2011

New Jersey has moved!! New Location - Approximately 10 Miles From the Sun... Also, Book Recs and Stuff.

It's fucking hot here in dirty Jersey. My tits are sweating and I'm pretty sure I have swamp ass even as I'm typing this. Once again, I'm wondering why the hell we thought it was a swell idea to buy a house without central air-conditioning.

More or less what I feel like right now...

I made ML put in the window units yesterday (not that they help a whole lot) and the conversation went something like this:

Me: I'm hot. Can you put in the air conditioners?
ML: Yeah.
Fifteen minutes later...
Me: Dude. My vagina is drowning in my swamp ass. Seriously. I'm gross. Put in the air conditioners. I'd do it but they weigh five hundred pounds and the heaviest thing I've lifted in years is my box of Bota Wine.
ML: Okay, okay. Going now. (I should point out that he has not yet even looked at me. His eyes are still glued to Facebook, which I presume is his go-to site when he's pretending he's not looking at porn. Because why else would someone spend so much time on the internet??? Oh. Shit.)
Fifteen minutes later...
Me: I swear to every god that has ever been mentioned in the history of this fucking planet if you don't put in the air conditioners rightthefucknow I will do vile things to you while you sleep and possibly also murder you by smothering you in my disgusting sweaty armpit.

Okay, maybe the conversation wasn't exactly like that. I think I said please at least once.

I'd crack a joke about this being my stash o' wine but I suspect most of you would actually believe me. I can't blame you.

Yeah, yeah, I know some of you live in places where ninety degrees Fahrenheit is considered a chilly day but ... well, I'm a pussy when it comes to heat. First of all, I sweat in the fucking winter when it's twenty below zero so you can only imagine how sweaty and gross I am now. I smell like a used litter box.

That being said, I'm feeling pretty fried (excuse the pun) and all I want to do is curl up around an air conditioner with a good book. Unfortunately, this heat puts a real damper on my bathroom reading time, considering that I broke a sweat pooping yesterday.

Anyway, I did recently read a book that I figured I'd share with y'all. It is quite possibly the farthest thing from Twilight you can get without being non-fiction but it was a very excellent read.


Brass - Helen Walsh
This is one crazy, speedy (sometimes literally) race through the seedy underbelly of Liverpool towards potential self-annihilation. The story revolves around nineteen year old Millie O'Reilly, who snorts and drinks and fucks her way through one encounter to the next, and her best friend, twenty-eight year old Jamie, who is getting ready to settle down and marry his very dull, very straight missus (who naturally hates Millie).

Don't get me wrong, this book isn't exactly a walk in the park, unless you're walking with a prostitute and a baggie of blow in your pocket. The sex is pretty hedonistic and bi-sexual Millie comes off a little predatory at times, but at the end, it's not really about that (though the title of the book is actually slang for "prostitute").

It's Millie. Her voice. She's tough as nails yet somehow vulnerable as hell. As she navigates through these harrowing situations that she jumps into full throttle - sometimes a little poetic, sometimes a little naive and often completely fucked up out of her gourd - there's just something insanely likable about a character who, for all intents and purposes, probably isn't really that likable. But there is something very real about that.

A review from here:
Along with recent noteworthy debuts from Bella Bathurst (Special) and Jardine Libaire (Here Kitty Kitty), this novel is part of an emerging subgenre that might be called chick-lit noir. Its antiheroines are motivated—if you can call it that—by a creeping anomie and low-grade nihilism. If these girls have any ambitions at all, they are emotional abnegation, deranged sexual pleasures and/or chemical obliteration. Walsh's 19-year-old Millie could be the poster child for the subgenre as she bombs around her native Liverpool, lusting after barely adolescent girls and packing her head with booze and blow.
So if you get a chance, check it out! And as always, let us know your thoughts in the comments or share your recs for summer beach reads (if you can - we are desperately trying to figure out how to disable Disqus because... we miss all of you who can't comment!!)

15 comments:

  1. Another post by JJ that uses the word(s) "swamp-ass"...Gawd I fucking love you JJ. Send some warmth our way, will ya? It's low 70's here in sunny (not so much) San Diego. Don't worry, it will probably be hot in August, maybe even swamp-ass inducing, but I'm promising nothing.

    PS your review of that book as piqued my interest....

    xo J

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  2. .....AND I would just like to say "FUCK YEAH!" I was the 1st comment. Good bye.

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  3. It's that time of  year again.....time to hear about JJ's swamp ass.  Come to Seattle sweet stuff...it is still chilly here.

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  4. Can you imagine the swamp-ass problems our JJ would encounter if she wore pants? I shudder at the thought. Someone needs to get her some icy undies....

    I believe Maine will be at least that close to the sun today....glad my office is air conditioned.

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  5. What do you mean, your house doesn't have a/c?  I don't understand these words.  My brain won't process this concept. 

    The highs here for the next week (straight from weather.com, I'm not exaggerating): 96, 95, 94, 94, 97, 96, 94. That would be a hot week in August - it's the freaking beginning of June.  WTF.  Combine that with hot flashes and the hormone cocktail currently masquerading as my blood and you've got one sweaty h00r. 

    I've got a book rec that everyone should read - This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003JTHRGE/ref=cm_cr_mts_prod_img).  Holy hell, this book is hilarious, and still manages to be a serious plot.  JJ, you'll like it - at one point, poop ends up on the good china.  I lent it to a friend who attempted to read it on the treadmill (I know, she's an overachiever) and said she had to step off before she fell off because she was laughing so hard.  Seriously, yall, read this one. 

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  6. Snarkier Than YouJune 1, 2011 at 1:10 PM

    That book has "trashy summer read" written all over it (since you all know that I normally only read the finest literature). I'm in!

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  7. Makes sense to me that Jeresy moved, because somehow Massachusetts ended up being fu@king Kansas this afternoon. Tornadoes. Here. WTF?

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  8. This is not trashy beach reading but...

    City of Ash by Megan Chance. It is just out. Historical novel about an acting troupe and the Great Seattle Fire.


    Now, I will admit I am pimping Megan cause she is a good friend but she is an AWESOME author. We've been in the same critique group for 20+ years and she's pulled my writing out of the ditch many times.
    Any of her books are worth reading. (Pick up The Spiritualist and imagine Jackson as Michel. I do!) And if you want a SUPER read, go look for the e-book of The Portrait, about her bi-sexual one-handed artist in 1850's New York.

    Plus she's a Huge Twilight fan (she's the one who got me started!)I used to spend hours at work scouring the web for Rob porn for her (Or so I claim)

    I'm trying to get her to come to FORKS II but she is resisting. Buy her book, send her a fan letter and tell her to get her ass there!(meganchance.com)

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  9. YAY!! You guys musta figured out the problemo cuz I can post again! JJ, you have a way with words. Yeah, it's been fucking HOT here in NJ for sure! Got better weather coming I'm told.

    Right now I'm reading Steven Tyler's book cuz I've loved him since like 1976. Typical 70's rock star stuff; not much I didn't already know.

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  10. damm...and I just signed up for Disqus!

    You know, in the midwest they say, "It's the humidity not the heat." My answer was always, "I don't give shit."

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  11. @rockmygypsysoul - This weather is straight up bizarre. We had tornado warnings yesterday!

    @Kintail - Thanks! I'll check that out.

    @tiolie - I hope we get better weather soon because I'm a big baby and hate this heat, lol.

    @MyAfterCar - Nope, no central air in the house. That's what we get for buying a house that's almost 100 years old and in relatively original condition. It sucks monkey balls.

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  12. I am so excited for this weekend!! Up here in the greater Seattle area it's supposed to be in the mid seventies!!! SQUEEEEE!!!

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  13. No, your not a pussy, JJ. Im in Maine and the weather literally went from the 50's to the 90's in one goddam day. We get no in between in the North East. Spring, I'm beginning to believe, is fucking myth made up by tripped out happy-pill poppers. No one in our bi-polar climate is sane when it comes to extreme heat. I made my husband put the AC in and it blew a fucking fuse! I hate this old farm house!!!!

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  14. OH! And I too had a tornado touch down in the fricken back yard last season! No foolin! WTF?! We live in hurricane alley, not tornado alley... *blows out breath*... there, I've ranted enough.

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  15. I love in Florida. The air conditioner is not turned off ALL YEAR, except for the three days we have to switch it to heat. I'm not joking.

    Book rec? Cosmopolis, of course. I read it last weekend. That is one strange but compelling book. I feel sure that Rob's portrayal will shed many Edward Cullen fans. Four words: Anal exam in limo.

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