Got Wellbutrin?

OK folks, I could use some good karma, so I'm issuing a public health announcement. And without a gross medical picture to accompany it. (I'm not a doctor or anything, so don't take this as some official announcement. Beeyotch. Consult your own doctor with your questions.) I feel the world needs to know.

If you get cold sores, and you also have some Wellbutrin/Zyban/bupropion lying around, you might want to take it when you feel a cold sore coming on. Supposedly it helps prevent/treat them. But don't take it from me, bgeeplers. Take it from the person filing patents for the treatment:

http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6512011-fulltext.html

I didn't know. (Well, I didn't up until a few weeks ago. I just wanted to see more about it.) So I figured there might be other people who didn't either. So there you are. Do with the information what you will. And that's my good deed beep for the day.

(Oh, and that's a picture of and by my friend Mark Baratelli at the top of the blerg. I didn't have a pic for the entry, and I just think that's the cooliest.)

Beep!
Ed Shepp

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January Blips

Is it January 1st? It feels like it should be. Because today is what Beginning looks like (oh yes I did--oh yes I did capitalize something in that pretentious way! Booyah!). The sky is zirconium brilliant (isn't that the phrase I used in The Story of Celeditude?) and the air is crisp and refreshing. All in stark contrast to the dreariness of all of evermore. (The exception being 5th avenue--you know, the tony part. Jowza, did you see those light displays?!?!?! I'll never think of De Beers in the same way again. Not that I ever thought of them before.) It was all such a blur that in my last entry I remarked, "Well, it's January." Of course, it wasn't yet January. Yesterday it was. But the sun made its first appearance today. Typical for the sun--come out and prance around when we're all at work. Bastard sun. Well, at least I got my first New Years gift: a bitch-ass fine from TLA, because my roommate never returned that rental of House!!!! Hmmph!!!!!

Anyway, let's recall just a few lessons from 2006, the ones that I can recall through the crack haze:

• Prose matters. I used to dislike the New Yorker, but the more I find articles that I use from it in my show, the more I appreciate it. The writing is so good. Clear, crisp, expressive, so unlike mine. It almost makes me want to go get a literature degree and work at Starbucks. Of course that urge is always battling with my desire to change my sex and become a PE teacher, just for the awkwardness. Contrast the New Yorker to wikipedia. I've had times where it was nearly impossible to interpret text from that, because some of it is so badly written. Almost as bad as amNew York.
• Just say what you mean. No, not in the grow-up-and-not-be-neurotic way, but in the when you have to say something way. I think I learned this when an old friend died and I wrote this long entry about him. I didn't hold back, because I figured the occasion allowed immoderation. I just said what I felt, and people were telling me it's beautiful. Beautiful? I just wanted to say something honest. And then this year I had to write a private message, in a similar context, and it was a huge challenge not to throw in cliches and dress up the language. But I just tried to say what I felt was necessary (the timing of it made it really important to say the right thing). So I did. And even though a couple of times I felt like it read like a prepared statement from some publicist, I was on the whole pleased with it. So when my roommate asked me what he should write in his xmas cards, I said, "Just write what you feel." Hmm, from life-and-death to xmas cards---it doesn't seem to translate well. But I think it works anyway.
• It's hard to do a good live show! I have a whole new appreciation for Oprah. And for my friend Jason, who can both do really well live, because I haven't gotten it figured out yet. I also feel like I'm right there with my opera singer friend, who said that when she hit a wrong note in a performance she felt like crap for days, because I sometimes feel the same after a bad show. Luckily I don't feel bad about hitting wrong notes, because then I would never feel good. Case in point: Quorn, from my Thanksgiving show. After running the pitch correction software (which just puts things in the right key, not necessarily on the right notes), I kind of liked it. But the chorus always sounded odd. Then I realized it was too low--I think I was doing the harmony. I guess my only resolution for this year is to not worry about my singing. Because someone told me the other day, "So many people tell you you can sing, so why don't you believe it?" Well, that was kind. But I know that I am not a good singer, and I'm OK with it. Allz I want is to be able to sing Torn on the subway within 50 cents of the right notes. Of course, my dream is to sing Take On Me on the subway in that Britney Spears suit with the snake, and strip until disappearing in a cloud of pink smoke. Not really. My real dream is to not have to ride the subway anymore. And Miss Cleo told me that one day I wouldn't have to, and I believe in her.

So that's all I can pull out of my butt for now. Let's review New Year's Eve, what I can remember. Which is spotty. I went out with Veep and my roommate to some party uptown, where I began getting drunk. I think I got too loud, because someone popped a cork on some champagne and it scared me and I spilled a drink and I feigned shock when someone spilled something on my sweater and I pretended that the cork was lodged in my head; and then the hose came up to me and asked, "Are you all right?" At the time I thought he was asking me if I was fine. But looking back I think he was asking me if I should be making my way to Bellevue. Score another one for Ed's bad party behavior. It still doesn't beat when I got too drunk at a party and kept throwing up in the sink of a certain Princess's loft. That takes the cake. Yes, beeyotches, I may be a cold, remote, reserved whatever, but after a few drinks the Tara Reid in me comes out. Anyway, then we went to another party--Veep's friend invited him and I begged and pleaded Veep to let us come along. Damnz, I don't know how much I can say about it, but it was a director's party. I don't remember much--I remember talking to this delightful girl who I said looked like one of the Olsen twins ("not the anorexic one! the healthy one!"). I have no idea what we talked about. I also remember talking to a psychopharmacologist. "You're really a psychopharmacologist??" And I remember talking to a gorgeous British gentleman at the end of the evening. I think the topic was Estuary English, or how to pronounce the word Magdeline. Or was it Madeleine? Anyway, I was getting this hardcore flirty vibe, which is always fun, like that bubbly marimba lounge music. But the best part was when his gorgeous wife told him it was time to go. I just thought it was the cat's pajamas: here I am in full flirt mode, and nothing is at stake. How wonderful it would be to interact like that with people all the time. Oh, such a lovely party.

And then yesterday it was back to January. Sigh. So hats off to 2007, beeyotches! Eat your fiber, and stay away from that McDonalds across the street.


Beep!
Ed Shepp

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Happy Futhermocking New Year

So this is the new year, and I don't feel any different...

What song is that from??? It's been going through my head for days now, and I can't remember who did it. I used it in last year's New Years show, for Chrissakes!!

I want to write something NewYearsy, but I find that every sentence I type just keeps melting into venom, and I of course have to then retype them. What can I say? It's January.

This is the most horrible time of the year--the distraction of Christmas--you know, where we all gather round a tree and breathe in helium balloons and sing Dahoo Doores Dahoo Doores Welcome Christmas please don't fart--is over, and from now until May it's all short, cold, dreary days, mothball stinking coats and the physical effects of holiday cuisine showing up. It's also probably the only time of year I don't pine for Sweden, even though they have those light cafes there. Oh please please please please if you're rich and reading this, invest in my light cafe idea!!!! Just $500,000, please? Yeah, that comes with a happy ending. And don't knock the happy ending, either! Because if you can name anyone who's gotten that from me in the millennium, you're lying. It's a very exclusive club. And, in fact, I'm thinking of making it a real club, a la SoHo House or something. That idea stemmed from a piece of spam my roommate got--a message from some girl, I think she was named Heather (they're all named Heather), and she said that she thought he was cute and was inviting him to the special site/club that she created called letsdoheather.com, or whatever it was. And I was like, What a great idea! Why don't I start up letsdoed.com?! Although I'd rather start up letssendedtosweden.com. Because really, why shouldn't I be sent to Sweden? Or Denmark or France or any of those places. Whoever you are, finding this blog searching for all those lewd things that I've never said, why don't you contribute to the Send Ed to Sweden Fund!?! Cheap bastard. Go join Heather's club; you're not wanted here.

Ahh, the bitterness. Good for you. Strengthens the jaw. Anyway, so how about new years resolutions? Does anyone make those anymore? Well, I do, out of nostalgia. It's like baking blackeyed peas and doing voodoo on New Years Eve--you know it's crap, but it's still kinda fun. I also like the whole putting-cigarettes-and-John-Waters-movies-in-a-basket-and-floating-them-down-the-river-at-sunrise thing. I think it gets you in good with some god or goddess. And if cigarettes, John Waters movies and red lights are what this god likes, you really wanna be on hir good side. Think of the parties! (Now think of the afterparties!) (Now think of the penicillin shots! Hello, Dr. Chase!) Oh, rambling anecdote time: we put these electric candles in the windows every Christmas. They used to have these deep orange, pretty much red bulbs. A high school friend said they looked Satanic. Well, this year the parents put in clear bulbs, which are brighter. But my Mom had an additional reason for using clear bulbs: "The red lights made the house look like a brothel." I think that's what she said. You know, as in Red Light District? File that under Hilarious Things I Never Thought I'd Hear From Mom. That reminds me too--before she visits me, I really need to take the bright red lights and gyrating silhouettes out of the window. Although the silhouettes are really just flowers and snowflakes, so maybe not.) /anecdote (See what I mean about being an ersatz geek?)

So back to the resolutions. What do I want to achieve in the new year? Well, I want to get that cold/remote/distant/mysterious thing down. I've kinda got the chilly down, even though it's mixed with a lot of wacky, but then ever and anon someone will tell me, "Ed, you're not cold and remote; in fact, I find you warm and open." And then of course I have to throw an onion in hir face. ("Onions in your face!" It's the new phrase for 2007, just like it was for 1999-2006.) Although maybe I should be throwing a peppermint onion--we are thinking cold, you know. See, the idea stems from some interaction of my obsession with Sweden, my limited knowledge of Warhol, some Gattaca-type aesthetic, and something I read long ago about Nicole Kidman and her "icy demeanor." That phrase always stuck with me. So that's what I want to be--inscrutable, unreachable, a little melancholic. (Believe me, I got the melancholic down! You should see my forlorn gaze. So hot. You'd totally be throwing your clothes off in a second. And I'd be saying, in my forlorn voice, "Is that 100% cotton?") So I'm guessing that I have to wear a lot of grey and talk a lot less, both of which I should do anyway because 1) I need clothes that hide stains and 2) I'm retarded. And autistic. And total trailer trash. So the less I say the better.

And on that note. Happy futhermocking new year. Or, rather, may I have a happy one and you have a just slightly-less happy one. But we're all happy, except I'm more so. Which you won't notice cux of the cold, opaque thing. So we ALL win. So, uh, send some money or something.

And as Miranda Priestly would say, That's oil.

Beep!
Ed Shepp

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Recrapping Down Your Piehole

Why do I keep doing this--not updating this blog? One of these days my reader is just going to give up on me the way I gave up on that milk that's been in the fridge for a month now. The one that I'm afraid to touch. And then I'll be the one sitting in the refrigerator, stinking in my sourness, screaming, "Why will no one touch me?? TOUCH ME! IT'S SO EASY TO LEAVE ME....."

Oh wait. I do that now...

OK, I'm finna try to recap everything since, um, a long while ago while at the same time being brief. Brief? Yes, brief. So strap in, buckaroo, cux you're about to hop on a ride called Failure. Hmmm, that was my first dog's name. Anyway, here we go:

So I went to a screening of Perfume that Sniffapalooza put on. Afterward the peeps from Thierry Mugler spoke about the coffret they made that was inspired by the movie. First, some blips about the movie:

• Come on, Dustin Hoffman, pick an accent and stick with it. I didn't believe your character AT ALL. It's so clear that you were put in just so the film could have a "name" that I almost think your entire role was some ironic joke. An industry thing? Anyone in the industry who can tell me?
• To the lead: EAT SOMETHING! No wait--don't. I'm so jealous of your thinness I could spontaneously combust.
• Sound design: liked it. Would have done some things different. Would have liked more audio (and visual) representation of the smells. One thing I keep mentioning to everyone: There was this scene where the protagonist (henceforth to be known as P) is following this woman. He's following her scent through some alleyways in Paris. Eventually the alleys open into a courtyard-type space and he realizes he's smelling her. The whole time there's some woman singing in an opera style in head voice--that same old thing. And there are strings or something backing here. I thought it woulda been cool if the singing were flattened while he was following the scent and then brought into tune with the strings when he realized the scent was from the girl. That's just my opinion. I know nothing. Except all the sound design I do for my radio show. Which would only be, uh, maybe superultramegaspectacular if I had the budget and time that I imagine (incorrectly, I'm sure) goes into a feature-length motion picture. Whatever.
• The story: It wasn't made clear enough WHY this perfume is so megaspectacular. Someone explained to me later the line in the movie about "the soul of a thing is in its scent." That needed to be made clearer in the film.
• Is the novel this over the top? Wow. This will never fly with general audiences, even considering the rampant stupidity of the public. And this coming from a retarded person (me)!!!
• Geek moment: I mentioned to someone that the perfume was like The Ring (Orlando Bloom, not Naomi Watts). I mentioned just after that I felt a little embarrassed to have said that. She replied, "No, don't be ashamed of being a geek," and said something about Galadriel. Well here's the thing: yeah, I read digg, I use words like w00t and FTW, and sometimes I'll reference things like Lord of the Rings, but I'm not really a geek. So my response to her was, "ZOMG, Cate Blanchette is so great." The conversation chilled. I guess I'm an ersatz geek, or a geek manque. I don't intend to be. I'm just not a big geek, and I didn't mean to give that impression. Alas. As Marie Antoinette may have said, "Let them see fake."

And some blips from the luncheon afterward with the Mugler people:

• Wow, that one guy from IFF--talk about sssssibilance! After listening to him speak, I realize that I had never known what sibilance is before, but now I do. I swear he could call dogs with his s's. I don't know how he did it.
• They passed around some scents. Some I liked, but none would I spend real money on. There was a nice one called Virgin No. 1. It smelled kind of creamy, milky, a bit vanillic to me. The perfumer said they used headspace technology to capture the scent of an actual virgin. I found that gimmicky. Or "gadgety," as the perfumer might say. There was one scent called Human Existence--it was supposed to smell unpleasant, like a stinky human. (Why not just do headspace tech on the 3 train?) To me, it smelled like old person and eggnog. But not altogether unpleasant. And I know very unpleasant scents can be created. I was disappointed. And there was a jasmine absolute. I was excited to smell this one--real jasmine absolute!! From perfumers!!! I couldn't even imagine what it would smell like. Well, it smelled like jasmine absolute. With a weird finish. And not quite as much depth. I prefer the jasmine grandiflorum absolute at Enfleurage, which smells thick and creamy and even fruity and has that body that some people think stinks.
• And now I finally know how I'm supposed to pronounce Mugler, although I'm still mispronouncing it out of habit. I think maybe I'll just keep mispronouncing it.

And that was Perfume, which was Saturday day. Saturday night I went to a dinner party hosted by the Veepster. What can I say if you don't know the Veep? Ummm, the food was great, the people were great, the apartment is amazing. Veep was Veep. And the light was low enough so that no one could see my hideousness. That's always nice. And I wore that brown shirt I love so well!

I hope you heard the last 4 shows, The Ed Shepp Radio Experiment's Liberal War on Christmas, because if you didn't, you missed out. I should've mentioned them before, but I've kinda fallen out of love with blogging, so eh. And now they're over. Hey, did you know that Roxette's It Must Have Been Love was originally a Christmas song, subtitled Christmas for the Brokenhearted? Yeah, they changed the phrase "Christmas Day" to "winter's day" for the regular version. Well, that's how I'm feeling about my xmas shows now--it must have been awesomeness, but it's over now. Sigh.

Oh yeah, and my party! (Can you tell I'm looking at a list of what I needed to mention?) It was pretty cool. Just a big excuse to show off all the lights. I'm in love with LED lights. They're so vivid. Thanks to everyone who came to the party. The pic atop this entry is from the party.

So now we reach Christmas: I went home, I overate, I went to Publix, I got NOTHING done, I got a great orange sweater and other stuff, and I got plastered on the flight home. It was mostly overcast, but the first day was amazing. There was something in the air, some ions or something. It felt like a late summer day. It was magical.

And now I'm back. And it ain't magical.

So lastly, if anyone's actually made it through this entry, you can click on this li'l audio file. It's sort of the experience of talking on the phone with me. Yes, it's an actual telephone conversation I had, except just my part and cut down. Click here for the file.

That's all.


Beep!
Ed Shepp

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