The Daily Grind Calls

Unless the other two bloggers on La Blogda decide to blog something in the next week (hint, hint!), there will be no new entries until around June 8 as I'm off doing corporate things. A girl has to feed her cats, you know. Hopefully, I will return with something witty or interesting to write, and if not, I'll just post a funny photo of Bush. You know what they say: a funny picture of Bush is worth a thousand words.

Communist Air

This is the last thing I'll say about my Asian trip, which must be getting tiresome to hear about by now.

I flew Dragon Air from Hong Kong to Shanghai. Before we even left the runway, it was obvious we were headed to a place where things were just done differently. As my grandpa used to say, "oh, those darn communists."

First off, let's talk about commie babies. They are more evil than your capitalist tot. There was one sitting in front of me, with parents that must have been deaf mutes, as they were silent as the child squirmed, screamed and babbled. This wouldn't have been so bad if it were not for the fact that we were stuck on the runway. The pilot had come on the PA, said something to the effect of "The delay is from the Shanghai airport, not us, not Hong Kong, and we don't have any information other than we are going to sit here for an hour." Then, amazingly, he told us to relax and enjoy the wait.

Maybe I would have had it not been for Commie Baby in front of me. He kept sticking his head between the seats to stare at me. It was like he was a moth and I was a flame. It babbled at me in Mandarin. Or Cantonese, I wouldn't know. I said to Hubby, "Make it go away, make it go away, make it go away."

I began squirming in my seat, I tried to reach for the call button to call the flight attendent, but my seat belt was on; I couldn't get it undone. The baby, or as I called it, It, began to squeeze through the crack as if it were trying to crawl in my lap. Of course, the space between the seats was too small and Commie Baby, too fat. But still. It was like being attacked by a snake.

I made enough of a fuss that a sympathetic Asian woman across from us leaned over to the Deaf Mute Parents and told them, as I imagine, "That neurotic American woman who needs to lose 5-10 pounds doesn't want to be bothered by your baby." The parents kind of shrugged, said something to the kid, who shot me a wounded look. I thought of sticking out my tongue, but I figured I had disgraced America enough for one day, or in this case, for five minutes.

Then the evil child did something truly mean. I had turned my attention to the small tv screen in front of me, on the back of his father's seat. The kid stuck his hand over the screen so I couldn't watch TV. I started squirming again and muttering, Make it Stop, Make it Stop. The Asian woman who had spoken to the parents on my behalf now just looked amused. She was on the kid's side. My husband did something to try to help: he made a kiddie gurgling sound to get the kid's attention off me. In the meantime, I popped a Xanax and tried to calm down. The Commie Baby eventually lost interest in me and decided instead to torment his mother (and the entire plane) by making a loud sound, "Bop!"

We took off an hour later, at which point my Xanax had kicked in and I was starting to think that this British show they aired, "My Father is the Prime Minister," was Must See TV.

I'm Wounded

America, you have awful taste. You are a country of great plumbing, great vino, and great retail stores. I could not wear Prada without you. However, you have awful taste when it comes to voting, and for that, for shame, for shame. In the rigged 2000 election, you let W win. In 2004, you let W win. In 2006, you voted Taylor Hicks the next American Idol.

I don't know you, but please change your wardrobe - red, white and blue just is not not flattering on anyone except the skinny Euroasians. Please exercise and diet more, please read something literate, and for God's sake, Celion Dion is a wretch. Please drink better vino. Watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer reruns, read Walker Percy, and did I mention, drink better vino?

You suck, unless you are a personal friend of mine, and if you are my friend, and you voted for Hicks, take me off your IM list now.

Have I insulted you? Thank God, except, oops, he doesn't care about you because the majority of you voted for that spasmo chuncked-out hick, Taylor.

It's the last two presedential elections all over again. America, why do you hurt me so? Such potential. Such bad taste.

PS, Asians are not even laughing at us. They think we are "so 1990s."

PSS 2007, no more American Idol for me. It's a nasty habit, like smoking or smack. I'm Lost from here on out.

Slow Blog to China

Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian's approval rating is at 5.8% -- that makes W look downright popular. So I guess you could say that we’ve found a president more hated than Bush.

When I was in Taipei last week, I had dinner with about 8 local business associates. We were in a private dining room, and they spoke openly of their disdain for Shui-bian, saying he was “shady,” “crazy” and perhaps “stupid.”

I can honestly say that I have never heard anyone call Bush crazy (except maybe for terrorists in one of their messages) but I have heard him called a “dry drunk,” mainly by recovering alcoholics.

Interesting thing happened: I went with our Taipei consultant to Hong Kong, where the conversation continued in a hotel lobby with some friends from HK. At one point, the consultant said, “I’m in public, I shouldn’t talk about him,’ to which one of the HK people said, “it’s okay, you’re in Hong Kong.”

I found it interesting and meant to ask the consultant about that later: can you not speak openly of Shui-bian in Taiwan? I thought of the US, and how I say stuff about W, though if I’m in a social setting, I hold back to avoid offending my Republican friends. Okay, I don’t do that, really, I just wanted to see what it looked like to write that.

The best thing about going to Asia is that it makes me appreciate the US. Asia is the new It Girl for sure, it’s economy is booming and so much US business is going there. We rank at the top of countries that import from there, so you would think they love us, but I get the feeling in talking to my Asian pals that they see the US as we see Britney Spears: a bloated has-been who is a little ridiculous. I don’t see us that way, but in talking to Asians, it’s a real eye-opener to see how we are viewed.

And, in my Carrie Bradshaw moment, I had an epiphany: sometimes, to feel patriotic, you have to sit in coach for 15 hours, eat Chicken feet and fish maw for a week, listen to stories about a crazy Taiwanese leader, and live without Weight Watchers 1 point yogurt.

America is great: insult Bush freely and enjoy the freedom.

Caveat to that: if Taylor Hicks wins American Idol, either the show is rigged or Americans have awful taste, worse than Chen Shui-bian even, and that is darn bad.

Taylor Hicks Must Be Stopped

My friends have emailed/called lately saying, “Binx, you’re back from Asia, blog will you? Blog about your experience.”

Fine. Asia is an unstoppable force, it’s the new It Girl, their economy is a freight train, they eat chicken feet and snake, blah, blah, blog. More on Asia later. What I need to write about tonight is that I’m obsessing over my latest guilty pleasure : American Idol. I admit that with great shame, by the way, so before you boo me, don’t worry, I’ve booed myself. It’s like heroin and I blame my husband for this because he got me started on that, as well as bad Chardonnay I might add.

Point is, Taylor Hicks, that gray-haired, spastic, chubby Southerner is to AI what George Bush is to America. An embarrassment. Both of them make Southerners look like the dumb hicks Yankees have made us out to be for years. I can only hope that AI is rigged, and that Taylor is truly not the 50 million AI voters’ number one choice. If so, it’s the 2004 elections all over again, without the war , the wire-tapping, and the conservative-stacked Supreme Court.

If Taylor wins AI, it’s not the end of the world, we’ll leave that to the W administration, but it is truly embarrassing. That boy is a mess – much more than any of my relatives could aspire to be. He’s painful to watch, with his epileptic moves and that incessant squatting (sweetie, are you constipated? There’s over-the-counter stuff for that). His singing is just okay, and honestly, he needs to be shot for trying to cover a Bruce Springsteen song last night. When Clive Davis assigned “Dancing in the Dark,” Taylor should have been a man and said, “What, you want me to be sacrilegious?” And keep in mind “Dancing in the Dark” is my least favorite Bruce song, so I must be serious.

Is he better than Katherine, his opponent? Oh, who cares? I gave up “Lost” for this crap. I should be spending my time reading a good book, exercising, or working on my writing. Instead, I’ve got brain rot and I’m outraged that a prematurely gray-haired spastic hick is probably going to be the next Idol. Would this happen in China? No. They would produce a knock-off of him, which at least might could be viewed as Ironic. Taylor must be stopped, and frankly, AI must be stopped. As for me, next week, I’m watching the season finale of “Lost.” Where is that little Walt boy anyway?

Cats with Herpes and Kids that Glow

My cat has herpes. Before you start thinking my cat is yet another hobag in Las Vegas, it’s not that kind of herpes. Poor kitty has conjunctivitis, brought on by some sort of stress-induced herpes virus -- sort of like shingles, except it's for cats and it happens to their eyes. I had to go to Orlando for work last week, and Sammy Davis, Jr., my cat, does not like it when I’m gone. He is going to freak tomorrow when hubby and me pack our bags and head off to Asia for a week. Most people have jobs that kill them. I have a job that kills my cat.

The vet says this is very common in cats. They have one particular eye that swells and gets runny. It can happen on a regular basis, several times a year. Then she told me that my cat has an especially strong emotional attachment to me, and that it’s not unusual that he would have an attack when I am gone.

Speaking of stressed-out cats . . . I went with some co-workers to Disney World one night when I was in Orlando. We had champagne at the French section. Then, feeling a bit tipsy, we started to head back to the monorail. It was dark by now. All of sudden, I noticed that all the kids, and there were billions of them, were glowing. They were some wearing freaky night glow necklaces and some yielding night-glow sticks. One girl had a night-glow butt. No lie. It was odd. Strange. It wasn’t a small world. It was a freaky-glowing kids world. I did the only thing I could do. I screamed. It was a sincere scream. My co-workers thought I was having a panic attack. Maybe I was. Kids glowing. Wouldn’t you panic?

And they kept running into me, like they were the ones who were drunk. That’s when I noticed it: Kids act like they are drunk. Maybe that’s why I never liked them. I get scared just thinking about that night.

I'll blog again when I return from Asia, where hopefully the children are not glowing. Or drunk.