[Newspoetry] report from Fairfax, VA

[Joe Futrelle]

Newspoem 1/19/2000

by Newspoetry Roving Reporter
"Big Joe" Joe Futrelle

Fairfax, VA (Associated Poets):

Internet service to the Newspoetry laptop was restored today following
today's outage, caused by a maid who must have tried to remove the
previous cord from the phone's data port, tearing it out of its jack,
which was the only part left in the phone when I returned to my room.
I thought the phone was dead.  But one of the hotel's "engineers",
smiling ear to ear, gave me a complimentary hunter green phone cord
which will forever commemorate my stay here.

My connections to the outside world consist of my window, my phone,
the internet, and a smattering of cable channels.  From these I have
the following to report:

Weather.  Sheets of ice slide off of cars, rain thunders against my
window.  I've learned that the bad weather will persist only until I
leave the greater Washington D.C. Metro Region tomorrow.  Am I really
that bad?

Politics.  Why I should care about these two liars who are trying to
get South Carolinans to nominate them is utterly beyond me.  Ted
Koppel's hair remains as unflappable as the man wearing it.

Sports.  Apparently, all of that Microsoft money has been unable to
buy a pro basketball team which could defend itself against the
Sacramento Kings, who trounced them.  This rather exciting game
resulted in a display of incomprehensible statistics apparently
representing league standings.  Perhaps Sigfried can explain this to
us, in XML or a set of relational database tables, or both.

Antiques.  A melted fork from the Hindenburg is worth thousands of
dollars.  Some woman made orgasmic sounds upon having her antique
appraised at over $10k.  They certainly resembled the sounds some
appartenly multi-orgasmic woman in the next room was making this
morning while I was trying to sleep.  "Antiques Roadshow" is the kind
of mind-numbing meditation programming PBS provides with such
comforting year-in-year-out consistency.

Business.  Biotech is hot, hot, hot, never mind that the Dow just
erased almost a year's worth of gains.  It seems that every category
of TV programming is underwritten with edgy ads by online stock
trading companies, so there's no turning back now.  Their servers will
all melt down when this market crashes, a vast, coordinated denial of
service attack that'll make all the script kiddies shit their diapers
with envy.

The Yeti.  The Yeti is vocally concerned that someone might be
entering the house at any time. She also understands that the
promotional frisbee I left on the basement floor is to be fully
dismantled post haste.  She also disagrees with me that 1am is
bedtime, rather than an ideal moment for some tug-of-war.  I like to
imagine that she misses me when I'm gone.

Entertainment.  Stereotypes are funny.  Hospital emergencies are
dramatic.  Money is fascinating.  Police detectives are utterly
gorgeous.

Crime.  An inmate who cooks last meals for the condemned plans to
market his own brand of hot sauce in "5,000", "10,000" and "20,000
volt" strengths.  I turned off the TV.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Joe Futrelle                  | "She posited Wurzburg, even as Caroline
Team Leader, Emerge           | isn't subsiding." -- Madeleine Lancing 
Scientific Data Tech. / NCSA  | 
http://emerge.ncsa.uiuc.edu/  |