I used to have veins that made junkies weep in jealousy. Big old things, they stuck up and were fat and healthy. I donated blood regularly, and the hematologists were always happy to have me and my veins on their tables. I could fill a bag and be gone before the person on the next table had even pumped a quarter of a bag. But those were the happy days before Hurricane Andrew. After the storm, there were calls for blood, so I drove through the wreckage up to Mercy Hospital in Coconut Grove and offered up my type B.

Unfortunately, either the hematologists were traumatized, or they weren’t really hematologists because despite the garden hoses in my arms, they couldn’t get a vein. At least two people took the needles to me, and at least two people drove spikes through my veins and left me with hematomas and bruises. And veins that are collapsed. I haven’t been able to donate blood since. In fact, I can barely squeeze enough out to fill a vial for blood work during my physicals.

And I made that clear today to the girl who was about to draw blood. Don’t waste your time going in the elbow, I told her. You need to use a baby needle and do an old-fashioned draw, manually. You can’t use the kind of draw that fills automatically, because they won’t. She smiled at me, and tied me off. She tapped the bulges in my elbow joint. Oh, nice veins, she said and drove in the hollow railroad spike that they call a needle. And dug it around. And around. And around. And finally looked at me and said, huh. I’m in your vein, and nothing is coming out. I guess you were right.

I guess I was. So she found a baby needle, and drove it into my wrist. I promptly filled up two vials for the blood sucking fiend. Why do I even waste my breath?

We open in the kitchen, with Whitney, who is opining as to how happy she is to be there. Lauren exhibits some serious Dittoheadness and allows as how she is very happy to be there, too. Stacey Ann is happy and doesn’t want to leave. O, editors, have you gotten as jaded as the rest of us? We haven’t even gotten to the first commercial and there is already foreshadowing of doom? Happy to be here, happy to be here, doesn’t want to go home. Which of these three girls will be packing their bags by the end of the episode do you think?

But wait! Here is Fatima, reminding us that she is not a US citizen, and thankfully, not reminding us of her special condition i.e.: her female circumcision. But really, and come on, who, having heard about it once, can ever forget it? In any event, her lack of citizenship is noted because she is also, somehow, without her travel papers, and she’s thinking that it’s about time to leave the country or get thrown off the show. One or the other. And I think that I speak for a lot of us when I say that getting thrown off the show is sounding pretty good to us right now.

Finally, Anya says something about something. There is a lot of debate on the intarwebs about Anya. Is she foreign-born, but not allowed to be Slavic/Eastern European because we already have one of those in Katarzya? (Sort of like Nic wasn’t allowed to be gay because they already had Kim cast as the lesbian in that season) Or does she speak pidgin as a first language? Or is she deaf or born of non-hearing persons? Does she just have a weird-ass speech impediment or a really weird-ass accent? We’ll never know, I suppose. But she needs sub-titles.

Finally, we are gifted with some action. Paulina comes to the loft and this elicits much high-pitched squealing from the hamsters. She is here to do the interview and mingle lesson that all top models need. She will practice with them as they pretend to be at a fabulous party. She will be Miss Dubois, the owner of a cosmetic company. They must impress her. Anya goes first and except for the fact that nothing she says is in the least bit understandable, she does well. Stacey Ann comes up next and grovels over Miss Dubois’ line of moisturizer. Dominique-inique-inique blahblahblahs on and on for about thirty minutes, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Paulina’s eyes glaze. Keep it short, she says. Whitney had blank eyes.

Next we play pretend red carpet and the hamsters must think on their feet. This will be hard. It’s bad. It’s so bad, that we cut to the kitchen, where Lauren and Whitney are going to make potato pancakes, or latkes, as my people say. We get a close up of Lauren being as graceful with a kitchen knife as she is with her big ole size 10s as she Frankenlopes down a runway. This is not boding well. And, sure enough, she slices through her thumbnail and thumb. She’s pretty stoic about it, and the producers haul her off for this season’s emergency room visit. Me? Every time I do that shit, I’m cursing like a longshoreman. But Lauren just sucks it up and goes.

Back to Fatima and her consulate telling her that she waited until the last minute to get/replace/deal with the missing papers. Insert Casablanca joke here. I am impressed anew with how truly terrible Fatima’s skin is. Where’s the dermatologist they had for Yaya? Respeto! Well, whatever. Back in the living room is a huge gold box, containing… lemons, limes and an invitation to a 7-Up green carpet event. Whitney blahblahblahs about being plus sized. Yeah. We get it. You’re a big girl. Bitch, you are still younger, prettier and thinner than me, so stick a sock in it already, OK? Well, her problems are solved, because the doorbell rings and in comes a big old rack of party dresses and a stylist, all courtesy of one Jay Godfrey, who is the subject of this green carpet event. Or is it diet 7-Up? The product placement is making me dizzy. Unless it’s the carbonation.

Fatima is too stressed about her

bad skin

missing visas to unclench long enough to look pretty. It doesn’t matter, because they have to go and work the carpet and the party. Don’t forget to mention who designed your dress! Rock on, little hamsters.

Anya tells the interviewer that she (Anya) is an inspiration. To what? To whom? Why? Who says? Dominique-inique-inique says that she’s wearing Jay Georgio. Which she isn’t. Oopsies. Lauren is looking hot with an enormous thumb bandage and probably a fair amount of pain killers on board and answers the question of why she should be AMTN by saying that she could just kick the shit out of the other girls in the house. Works for me. Whitney, on the other hand, says that as a Normal Sized woman, who eats like a Normal American, she should be the winner. And off they go to the par-tay, where Nigel disses Whitney with a “wots all this then?” Lauren shmoozes Nigel and Ric Ocasek (with whose work Lauren is actually familiar, and thereby earns even more of Miz Shoes’ love). Nigel is impressed. Ric is too, but that’s the last we’ll see of him.

Stacey Ann interviews that she has this one in the little beaded handbag because she is aces at selling herself. Indeed. She’s up on some platform, announcing who designed her dress and shaking hands all around and telling everyone that she’s from Miami and geez, I’m exhausted just watching snippets of her. The editors are over her too, so off we go to the judges telling us what they thought.

Anya was charming. Eh? Dominique-inique-inique didn’t know her designer. Lauren needs to lose the potty mouth. Why? Works for Kate Moss. Stacey Ann charmed no-one and over thought everything. So Anya wins, and Whitney’s face falls because she clearly thought that she won just for keeping the girls covered in that horrible metallic blue, cut to her pipik, trash bag Jay Godfrey stuck her in. What does Anya win? A photo shoot for Diet 7-up that involves being “natural” (aka nekkid) in a bunch of leaves and lemons and limes. She gets a check for ten thousand dollars and a basket of lemons and limes for her troubles.

Salacious-D has Cover Girl ad. And she tells us that now that she’s a role model and everything, Cover Girl has dragged her ass down to the courthouse and made her register to vote, something she hadn’t bothered with before now. Miz Shoes doesn’t know whether to laugh, cry, thank or curse Cover Girl for this. But they’re pushing the vote, so I have to fall on the side of thankfulness, I guess. Unless there was some subliminal message to vote Republican that years of jaundice over the state of the union caused me not to see.

Well. Anyway, Fatima gets a meeting at the consulate through the auspices of the show’s producers. Which is a good thing, because the next scene is the hamsters squealing (again) over some Scrolling Tyra Message that leads them to believe that they’ll be heading abroad in the next 24 hours. Squealing. Packing. Fatima wandering around like a zombie. At 5:30 in the morning the girls and Dominique-inique-inique are hauled off to an airport with their carry-on luggage. At 7 a.m. they find themselves on a tarmac with a mini-jet. Squealing. Excitement at flying away in a tiny little jet plane. Somewhere close, I should hope. You couldn’t shove Miz Shoes on a plane that size and expect her to fly to Europe. Nuh-uh. No sireee. No freaking way. Bermuda. Maybe. If we had enough fuel to by-pass the triangle. But it doesn’t matter, because the only place the hamsters are going is hair and make up because it was a FAKE OUT!!!! Except for Fatima, for whom it is a freak out, because she has to take her spotty face back into the city and try to convince the consulate to issue her travel papers. Unless she can find Ugarte and his letters of transit. Unless he’s already given them to Rick. In which case she’ll have to try and get them before Victor Lazlo.

I digress. It’s a group shot, and each girl and Dominique-inique-inique will get a chance to be the star. There is a vintage theme to the shoot, and our photographer is Bill Heuberger. They must be finished and off the tarmac by 3 p.m. Tick tock tick tock. Will Fatima make it back in time to participate? Will Fatima get her travel papers? Will the audience give a rat’s ass? Lauren struggles to look excited while the pain killers are wearing off. Stacey Ann is from Miami and has never experienced the cold, bitter wind that blows across a NYC tarmac, or maybe it’s Newark. In any event, her eyes water to the point where they have her posing with tissues. Whitney was too dramatic and pageanty. Mr Jay says that Whitney is backsliding. Anya is thinking outside the box, whatever that means. Dominique-inique-inique is giving us “remedial posing 101”. Remedial. Not even just Posing 101. She sucks, in other words. And we are done. It is three and we see Fatima in a cab, trying to get back to the shoot.

The girls and Dominique-inique-inique finish up and go into the hangar, where they find the judges! OOOOOh. Drama llama. There will be an elimination. Right. Now. But where is Fatima? says Miss Tyra, ever astute and alert. We are one girl short. And in straggles a ratty-looking Fatima, who must take her place in her puffy anorak next to the models with hair and make up and wardrobe. Sigh. It is not good for Fatima. Fatima, she is worried. The audience is cued to worry by showing other seasons where, for one reason or another, a girl skipped a shoot and was sent. home. This is the season of surprises, so our surprise judge is Mr. Jay, and the surprise foreign destination is… a surprise! We aren’t going to tell you. Neener-neener.

Katarzya had a great 1960s shot. Lauren did something that resulted in Miss Jay or Tyra (I get them confused) saying that she was “living for the tippy toe on the extended leg.” She was also great at the party and she nailed a 1940s look in her shoot. Nigel says something vaguely pervy about bringing the party girl to the judging. Dominique-inique-inique nailed it for the first time. (Oh, shut UP. That dog nailed it for the first time before he was 15.) Stacey Ann was too fake at the party and oversold herself and she had a lousy shot at the plane, too. Whitney gets praise for her “natural” pose and then ragged on for the next five minutes for being too pageant and too fake at the party and just a big old fakey faker. Stop smiling, beeyotch. Anya is praised, on the other hand, for being herself and letting her weird speech thing hang out at the party and being so lovely that nobody cared that she can’t really speak English. Or anything else. She also stole the whole photo shoot today.

So. The judges deliberate thusly: Katarzya has legs for day, but they can’t remember her. Dominique-inique-inique is given high praise for NOT looking like a man in this shot. Lauren is loved by Mr. Jay and Paulina. Whitney gets the “stinky personality and too pageant” edit. Is she a Big Girl pageant girl? Wouldn’t that have been mentioned by someone by now if it were so? Stacey Ann is getting weaker. Fatima missed the shoot, so the judges will look at her portfolio to date. And Anya gets the Big Love of the week. Photos go to: Anya, Lauren, Dominique-inique-inique, Katarzyna and Whitney. Fatima and Stacey Ann stand side by side, waiting for the ax to fall on one of their dreams. Fatima disappointed everyone by not being prepared to go overseas. She didn’t participate in the shoot. Stacey Ann, on the other hand, had her papers and a lousy shot. She’s not getting any better, and she’s not getting on the plane. Buh-bye Stacey Ann. Maybe that WAS you I saw crossing Biscayne Boulevard the other day.

So everyone get on the plane! We’re going abroad! Oh, not you girls. You ride coach. The judges will take the private jet to ROME! And the helacious squealing commences once more. Next week? Fatima gets sick and Dominique-inique-inique proves that languages are not his strongest suite.

I was waiting for this. From the official site, the official endorsement.

Dear Friends and Fans:

LIke most of you, I’ve been following the campaign and I have now seen and heard enough to know where I stand. Senator Obama, in my view, is head and shoulders above the rest.

He has the depth, the reflectiveness, and the resilience to be our next President. He speaks to the America I’ve envisioned in my music for the past 35 years, a generous nation with a citizenry willing to tackle nuanced and complex problems, a country that’s interested in its collective destiny and in the potential of its gathered spirit. A place where “...nobody crowds you, and nobody goes it alone.”

At the moment, critics have tried to diminish Senator Obama through the exaggeration of certain of his comments and relationships. While these matters are worthy of some discussion, they have been ripped out of the context and fabric of the man’s life and vision, so well described in his excellent book, Dreams of My Father, often in order to distract us from discussing the real issues: war and peace, the fight for economic and racial justice, reaffirming our Constitution, and the protection and enhancement of our environment.

After the terrible damage done over the past eight years, a great American reclamation project needs to be undertaken. I believe that Senator Obama is the best candidate to lead that project and to lead us into the 21st Century with a renewed sense of moral purpose and of ourselves as Americans.

Over here on E Street, we’re proud to support Obama for President.

Bruce Springsteen

Let’s see if he preaches the word on Friday night.

Yesterday, on the ride home, a well-dressed young woman sat on the opposite bench on the train. She put her large, fashionable bag and her trendy trench coat on the seat beside her. Then she spread a couple of paper napkins on her lap and opened the little cardboard box which contained her dinner, a slice of pizza. She ate it delicately, wiped her lips and tucked the box under her seat. She made a few calls on her cell phone. At South Miami, she collected her bag and coat and prepared to exit the train.

“Don’t forget your garbage,” I chirped, loudly. “There’s a can right on the platform.” She smiled at me with just a touch of condescension and shame, and picked up her trash. Whether she actually put it in the can or just tossed it on the platform seating, I couldn’t see.

AND ANOTHER THING

Look, if you want to call me names, and tell me my blog is stupid, you have every right. I, of course, as proprietor of the site, have the right to delete any such crap. If you want me, in all fairness, to leave your comments up, then try using a real e-mail address and a real or even imaginary name, but not a jumble of letters. Another tip? Use correct spelling and grammar, and try to be a little bit brighter than a refrigerator bulb in your insults.

Miz Shoes is off for the next couple of days, swanning around, drinking by the hotel pool, arranging for a massage and generally acting the princess. BRB.

Arrowmont was fabulous. The women in my class were (are) fabulous. My instructor rawked. The food at art camp was spotty, but the morning oatmeal was fabulous. After the snow on Monday, the daffodils and jonquils and narcissus and wood violets and forsythia and wisteria bloomed. I saw a single tufted titmouse. I love them, and they don’t venture south to Miami. However. Gatlinburg itself is scary. If Niagara Falls had butt sex with the cheap end of International Drive in Orlando, and the resulting love child was birthed by Las Vegas, that love child would be Gatlinburg proper.

It is a single long road, bordered on two sides by Elvis impersonator shows, haunted houses, museums dedicated to the automobiles of dead celebrities, chain restaurants, themed miniature golf courses, taffy and fudge shoppes, multiple offerings of “vintage” photography studios (the kind where you dress up like old west hookers or gun slingers and get a sepia toned 5x7 for $45), multiple iterations of Ripley’s Believe it or Not “museums”, a Hard Rock Cafe, an aquarium of some repute (“Hah. Fish in tanks.” says my friend Diana) a scattering of nutjobs preaching the Word from atop bus benches, tacky tee shirt and tchatcke shops,  windows with ticket hawkers reminiscent of hookers in Amsterdam, and the random banjo player looking for hat change. And then there are the tourists who find all that a desirable destination. Good lord. If I hadn’t already had a drink, I would have needed one.

And yet, turn left at the Hard Rock, go up a shallow hill, and you are in an art school. A fine craft wonderland. I’ll go back, and I might even wander down to the joint where we had some great micro-brews and amazingly good pizza. Just, please, don’t make me go back down the gantlet to get there. I don’t know if I’ll be able to say no to the vintage photography set ups.