Jilian the Astonishing profile picture

Jilian the Astonishing

Luxurious in Disaster

About Me

"if you go home with somebody and they don't have any books, don't fuck 'em." -John Waters
Which fucked-up genius composer are you?

Tom Waits... charismatic story-teller with a penchant for freaky people and unusual settings. You thrive on the concept of the underdog coming out on top.
Take this

Myspace Layouts at Pimp-My-Profile.com / Equality

"Wands are only as powerful as the wizards who use them. Some wizards just like to boast that theirs are bigger and better than everyone else's." --Hermione Granger

My Interests

lichens and mosses; reading in bed; punctuation; the Spanish Civil War; sushi; micropress publishing; the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure; cartography; reading out-of-doors; two-toed sloths; Canada; medieval siege weaponry; rogue taxidermy; reading in the bath; victorian mourning jewelry; dark beer; old photos; fancy cheese; shrines to the Virgin; utopian communities; reading while bicycling; welding

Music:

bob dylan; tom waits; wilco; the white stripes; rilo kiley; mates of state; jolie holland; the decemberists; rasputina; joni mitchell; joanna newsom; rachel's; the weakerthans; the mountain goats; dessa; heartless bastards; sigur ros

Movies:

the big lebowski; the royal tenenbaums; the princess bride; i [heart] huckabees; i, claudia; lord of the rings; kill bill; good night and good luck; anything ending in 'of the dead'

Television:

the daily show; antiques roadshow; northern exposure; firefly; trailer park boys; arrested development; venture brothers; carnivale; this american life (radio: it's like tv but with no pictures)

Books:

the rum diary; the dharma bums; the unstrung harp; a people's history of the united states; chomsky on anarchism; watership down; lord of the rings; neverwhere; perfume; off for the sweet hereafter; borges' collected fiction; sexing the cherry; the omnivore's dilemma

Heroes:

emma goldman; edward gorey; bernardine dohrn; hunter s. thompson; frank lentini; hedonism-bot

My Blog

ode to clean living

"Grandmomma Jeeter lived very nearly forever or anyway to the closest approximation of forever that anyone anywhere around could come up with, even the clergy who generally paid some attention to the ...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Fri, 28 Dec 2007 01:55:00 PST

communists in the summer house

hammock seasonwar in Virginiathe red tide's inAunt Flo is visitingred thread in the sewing machinethe kitty has a nose-bleedriding the cotton ponyarts and crafts week at panty camptaking Carrie to the...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Thu, 06 Dec 2007 12:37:00 PST

eugenics in America

Carrie Buck's Daughter: a popular, quasi-scientific idea can be a powerful tool for injustice By Stephen Jay GouldThe Lord really put it on the line in his preface to that prototype of all prescriptio...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Thu, 26 Apr 2007 11:37:00 PST

what's wrong with me (according to colorquiz.com)

Unable to exert the efforts to achieve her objectives. Feels neglected, desiring greater security, warm affection, and fewer problems.Delights in the tasteful, the gracious, and the sensitive, but ma...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Thu, 22 Feb 2007 12:28:00 PST

a night to stay in

there's a stagnant air warning in the willamette valley tonight. close to a week without rain and the fog and pollution are hanging in a suffocating cloud between the hills like an oily, congealed pu...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Thu, 07 Dec 2006 11:30:00 PST

Concerning the posessive "its" -or- These things I believe

From Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss:   "To those who care about punctuation, a sentence such as "Thank God its Friday" (without the apostrophe) rouses feelings not only of despair but of ...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Tue, 18 Apr 2006 11:52:00 PST

fun with law school stats

law schools applied to (alphabetical order) 1. College of William and Mary (Williamsburg, VA) 2. Cornell University (Ithaca, NY) 3. University of California at Berkeley 4. University of Colorado at Bo...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Fri, 03 Feb 2006 12:38:00 PST

why?

Why has william shatner become such a depressing parody of himself?  Yeah, he was always sort of a joke, but he could have ducked out gracefully and just shown up for the occasional tim...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST

four more years

Woke up feeling like Hell this morning, and it wasn't because of the Corona and the Tequila shots. Not exclusively, anyhow. My estimation of my fellow Americans, which had already been significantly r...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST

a fish learns to think symbolically

Ziggy entered my life by chance  an impulse buy made on a stoned, 4am trip to Wal Mart. In retrospect it seemed rash to so lightly take the responsibility for the welfare of a living thing. But the...
Posted by Jilian the Astonishing on Mon, 01 Jan 1900 12:00:00 PST