The man with the legs

There was an old guy riding a bike pulling a cart at the Fourth of July parade. In the cart, there was a very old merry-go-round horse and a pair of upside down mannequin legs with a giant plastic fly on the crotch and a giant plastic cricket on the inner-thigh.

I asked the guy what he had going on there.

"This is my float," he said.

She shining

My pal Lydia Netzer has a new novel coming out, and it just got a rave review from Janet Maslin in the New York Times.

“Shine Shine Shine” is able to draw readers into its tender, not-quite-human scheme of things because Ms. Netzer treats this as the only reasonable way to look at the world. “Sunny had come up bald from the cradle, and stayed bald throughout her life,” she writes unfussily. “She had been born at some point, and at some point in the future she would die. What happened in between was one long, hairless episode.” 

Buy it now before everyone else does.

Thongs

Thongs, Chicago, Illinois

No advice

I think "Miss Advised" is one of the saddest shows on TV. I was auditioned for it, and I guess I used to be one of those sex writer/relationship advice types of people, sort of, so I have a strange, special interest in it.

Since I got married late last year, I think I feel especially bad for these women. I would hate to have had a crew of cameras following me through my blundering dating. The thing you see most clearly is how miserable they are. Maybe so miserable that The One wouldn't make a difference, but sometimes I think, watching the show, that a program produced by Ashley Tisdale is a brutal meditation on how terrible aloneness really is.

They try too hard, they talk too much, they want to be funny and are not. They're lost but claim they're not, they obsess about men but can't land one, they don't know what to do but are willing to go public to show the depths of how sad they really are.

I get email

Hey Susannah, regarding your article on working, from home, I was wondering what your thoughts are on whether I should consider taking my cousin's opinion to take one of those work from home jobs, I graduated high school last year, I never actually worked when I was in high school, but recently at her place, she was basically just talking to me about it, so I can get a job. So I am just wondering if I do this, should I put this on a resume, or would it look ridiculous. And would it look like a good first job, or should I just seek a regular job at like McDonalds, Best Buy, etc. By the way I just turned 20 a few months ago, and my cousin's in her 40's. She works for this company: [redacted], I think the company name is [redacted].

Regards,

[redacted]