Sometimes I am in the mood for a soda and I think hey, I will drink a soda. Why not? I should “live a little.” But then I discovered Diet Coke Plus and I got very sad. Do you know about this? It is totally ridiculous. It’s Diet Coke PLUS vitamins. Look, I drink Diet Coke specifically because it does not have vitamins. I do not want my Diet Coke to be healthy. I want it to rot my teeth until they’re little nubs and I have to throw all my food in a blender to eat it or get the fancy titanium bone graft implants that my dad has (who interestingly enough, rarely drinks soda). I want my body to be filled with all that glorious high fructose corn syrup and caffeine and whatever MSG type crap they put in their “secret recipe” that makes Coke so MF flavorful and delicious. I want all of this, yes. Listen, Diet Coke, you are not fooling anyone. I know your little games. Coke will never be healthy unless you replace it with water and call it Coke. Just saying. I guess the idea is that someone will want a Coke and think, hey, why not get Coke with vitamins? Anyway, the moral of this sad, sad story is that you should take vitamins if you want vitamins and drink Coke if you want Coke. And never the two shall meet. OR I guess we can go the other way and add Coke to salad. Like if you’re going to eat vitamins, might as well eat corn syrup and caffeine. It is an idea. Diet Coke with Salad.

I have a new blog post up at Emeco. This time it’s an open letter to Philippe Starck. Also if you are Australian and you are an architect and you are part of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects, then check out this week’s newsletter. I have written an open letter to all of you. I will post up the PDF’s here when I get them. This whole newsletter thing is very random. And since the first piece of hate mail I ever received was from an Australian architect, it makes it all the more awesome and strange at the sametime.

Thanks to everyone who came out to Pecha Kucha tonight. I understand that many were actually turned away at the door which totally sucks and I’m sorry. There’s nothing worse than dragging your shit out to rock, only to get totally denied from the rocking. Clearly people do not want you to rock. Listen, I have no control over this. If it were up to me everyone would rock. Rocking, in fact, would be some kind of requirement for just being a mammal.

I think the presentations went pretty well. I liked the dude from Snohetta because he seemed like a pretty jolly guy and also I like the idea that their employees get 5 weeks off and work 9 to 6, though I have a hard time believing that any office actually functions that way. I have a feeling that they “can” leave at 6 but never do. Kind of like how I “can” rob a bank, but I know I shouldn’t. I also liked the thing Israel (from 2×4) did with the t-shirts (though dude, Israel, you went way over the 400 second rule, you should be publicly flogged, but actually, there’s no such thing as private flogging is there? Flogging by nature is public so why do people always say public flogging? Whatever, English, you are vexing me again). There were about 800+ people there and it was so hot inside that I actually tried panting. I mean if it works for dogs, it could work for us right? Guess what, it doesn’t work, but I tried it so you don’t have to. So it’s confirmed. Panting doesn’t keep you cool. But you know what keeps you cool? MOVING AIR. Note to air: KEEP MOVING.

I was up till 5 this morning doing these slides–and there were three other people who took on a few slides themselves, so I’d like to give a shout-out to Marc, Lizzie, and John. Don’t ask me why I didn’t start making my slides last week, clearly I like to make my life really stupid. Basically up until the last minute I was frantically trying to figure out how I could make my slides as cheesy as possible, and believe it or not, it’s actually harder to make something look bad, than make it look good. Although I guess people make things that look bad all the time, but then again they think it looks good, but then if you really think about it, they probably worked really hard to make it look good to them, which is actually bad, so I guess people really do work hard to make things look bad, whether or not they think it looks good. Oh man I am tired. I think that makes sense in my head. It’ll make sense in your head too if you read it a few times or stay up long enough. Anyway, I am particularly fond of the slide with the cow that flew across and the ramen slide. Those are my two favorite. Though I also liked the one Marc made with the soldier that comes out and shoots hearts and the Egyptian pyramid one. When I first saw that I laughed so hard. It was about midnight and things were still funny to me. But then things stopped getting funny around 4. Anyway I’m glad I did it and I appreciate all those that came out.

Please help me. My neighborhood smells very bad. It smells like feta cheese. It also smells like hot trash and pee and B.O. and also like room-temperature plain yogurt. Sometimes it smells like bacon. But mostly it smells like feta cheese and every time I walk out of my apartment I feel “totes nosh” and want to vomit in my own mouth. It turns out that the culprit is a tree. It is very large tree. It has bark and branches and green leaves just like a regular tree but it also has fruit that is filled with feta cheese. It is a feta tree. I know you thought that feta came from sheep, but actually it grows on trees, just like money. I keep thinking that at some point the fruit will all be gone, but the tree keeps making more feta. It wants to share it with the world, as if to say, “hello friend, please, have some fruit. It tastes salty and smells like socks.” It wants birds to take the feta fruit and carry it to faraway places where more feta trees can grow, but I can tell you right now the birds are looking at the feta fruit and they are like “You’re kidding right? We didn’t even eat this shit during the Depression.” I think it’s actually a ginko tree but my friend Brian is positive that it’s a sheep-eating feta tree. So if you have sheep, you will not want to walk it around my neighborhood. Just a little friendly warning. Leave the sheep at home.

Tomorrow night if you are in the fair City of New York, I will be giving a presentation at Pecha Kucha, which is kind of like Powerpoint karaoke. There will be 20 slides, 20 seconds each slide. The computer is set and I can’t control it. So basically if it’s boring, you will be spared. There will be extremely hip and potentially annoying and mostly pretentious designers and architects in attendance and you can look at the speaker list here. I’ll be talking about “Dear Architects.” I hope it’s funny. I haven’t written it yet.

“Dear Architects” appears in this month’s Abitare Magazine, an Italian/English magazine on art, architecture, interior design, and other industries that involve black clothing (including the black clothing industry itself). The cover story is about “daily life in Rem Koolhaas’ Bordeaux home.” The photo features a plump maid who I assume works for DJ Jazzy Rem Koolhaas. People tell me that his two personal assistants are called PARK’s, which stands for Personal Assistant Rem Koolhaas. Hahaha oh man I cannot make this shit up. So there’s PARK1 and PARK2, and I have a feeling that’s part of their email addresses too. I would also like to have a personal assistant, but the only person I can afford is myself, which defeats the entire purpose of having one.

Anyway, “Dear Architects” appears in the special “The Reader” pullout section and the letter is translated into Italian, alongside the English version. It came out a few days ago, which explains why I received a piece of Italian hate mail the other day. I got it, and I was like cool! It’s in Italian! I wonder what it says? Then I Babelfished it and it was all very confusing and a total mess, so I had Chris translate and once he got to the word “imbecile” I figured out pretty quickly that it was in fact, a letter of hate, and not one of love or even tepid acknowledgment. However, the writer did apologize for writing in Italian, which I thought was very polite. As if to say, “I HATE YOU, YOU ARE AN IMBECILE. P.S. Sorry for writing this hate mail in Italian so it’s harder for you to understand how much I hate you.” Touche, Italy. Well played.

After “Dear Architects” exploded in my face (I am still picking shrapnel out of my eyeballs, thank you), a chair design company called Emeco asked me to blog for them. I don’t really know anything about design. Seriously. I think finger puppets are good design because, uh, they are puppets that go on your finger. Like, oh sweet! Finger puppets! Here’s one that looks like a giraffe! Anyway Emeco didn’t seem to care. They basically asked me to make fun of them. So I said, uh, OK, yo momma so old she owes Jesus three dollars. And then they were like, uh no, not quite, why don’t you write about design? And I was like, oh ok. But yo momma really is old.

Emeco makes magical chairs from the FUTURE that are obviously handcrafted by aliens and unicorns, and a few are on display at MOMA and they are all sectioned off by a velvet rope and if you get too close someone yells at you. That’s how special these stupid chairs are. Anyway a new version of their site just launched, and you can peep it here. I’m under “collaborations” and the blog is called FH&CC. I’ll let you try and figure it out. I like that I am in the same category as Norman Foster and Phillipe Starck. That makes me laugh really hard. I mean really.

It’s hot and I’m pretty sure something has crawled into my air conditioner and died because when I turn it on it smells like death. OK you’re right, it doesn’t smell like death. It smells like mildew. So that means mildew has crawled into my air conditioner and died. I cleaned the filter, but it still smells like junglefoot. Did I mention it’s hot? No? OK, it’s really hot, did you know that?

Last night there was a tornado in New York City. Or maybe it wasn’t a tornado. The scientists haven’t agreed yet. NY Times says OH YEAH BIG TIME TORNADO LOOK AT BROOKLYN IT IS HOSED. And them some meteorologist says NO CALM DOWN YOU JUST GOT A LOT OF RAIN. 17 INCHES IN AN HOUR TO BE EXACT YOU KNOW OTHER PEOPLE HAVE IT WAY WORSE HAVE YOU SEEN SOUTHEAST ASIA STOP FREAKING OUT. But you know, it’s New York. People like to freak out. That’s why I live here. For the ample opportunities to get my freak out. Anyway, the point is this: I don’t really care. Tornado or not, it wrecked the trains and I had to walk to work, which isn’t bad because I don’t live so far, but I really like the option of taking the train because I like options. Options are what makes us human and not like amoebas. Amoebas have only two options: Do I divide now? Do I divide later? Humans have at least six, maybe seven options. But apparently taking the train was not one of them this morning. So now we’re down to like five options. Which makes us just a hair better than amoebas.

And this architecture thing refuses to go away: Marc, editor over at Pidgin, tells me Abitare, some fancy high-fallutin’ (sp) architecture magazine is going to reprint my piece. I only know that it’s a fancy high-fallutin (yes still sp shut up) architecture magazine because architects tell me that. I’ve never heard of it. Because I’m not an architect. As we have already discussed. Man, I don’t talk about much on this blog anymore do I? Anyway, this means more hate for mail and love letters for me. I’ve been told it’s been translated to Italian, Hungarian, and some strange language where the c has a fancy, little hook. Portuguese? I like languages that have festive letters. Like, I totally want a c with a fancy hook in my name. It’d give me major pirate cred. I’d even settle for an ñ. That’s like an n with a festive hat. Hats are cool. I dig em.

It’s 11:44. I’m about to go eat dinner. Why? Because I was waiting for a friend to finish work. Oh you know where this is going I don’t even have to say it. We’re going to Blue Ribbon because it’s close and open, two things I value in a restaurant at this hour. Sadly it is expensive, but home to the best $12 hummus you’ll ever have.

Thank you, architects, for all the comments and emails. Most of you were so very nice and gracious, and some of you, not so much. But that’s OK. I’m just happy that I can write something that drives strangers to ask me on a date or tell me that I am a horrible person who needs to die a horrible death (most likely by taking meeting minutes) for all the horrible atrocities I committed against all the innocent, starving, orphan architects just trying to make a living. Just so you know, the letter has not stopped any of my architect friends from talking about architecture. Plus, the three non-architects I know are now talking about architecture, so it appears that my plan has backfired. Damn you, architects! Damn you! You’ve won this time, but I’m watching you. Don’t fuck up.

And in other news: Harry Potter finally dumped me. After ten years of what I felt like was a deeply committed and loving relationship, he gave me the finger (or two fingers if you are in the U.K.) and said, “Don’t let the door hit your ass on the way out.” Just like that. We’ve been together for ten years. I spent the best years of my life with this douchebag. And now what? No thank you, no comforting hug or squeeze on the shoulder. Just a big F U and a flippant wave of the hand. So that’s how it all goes down. I also learned that he was apparently cheating on me with, like, millions of other people, including MEN AND CHILDREN. Not that it’s a bad thing, but a little heads up would’ve been nice. Maybe just a few words: Hey Annie, I really like you, but I want to see other people. I would’ve been hurt, but I would’ve understood. God, Harry Potter, I hate your guts. Wait, you know what? You can’t dump me because I DUMP YOU FIRST.

About a year ago, I wrote a piece for Pidgin Magazine, an architecture journal out of Princeton. More or less all of my friends are architects, except for maybe three of them, and they don’t count because they are writers and are not “real people”. I guess I know doctors too, but they don’t have time for me because they are curing a little something called AIDS. You might’ve heard of it.

Anyway, the point is, I have a very complicated relationship with architecture, which is to say that I don’t really give two poops to the wind about it, but all my friends are architects and the only thing architects talk about is architecture. They don’t have time to read or watch a movie or even buy me dinner. All they do is go to the office and complain how they are at the office. So they talk about what they know, which is architecture, and even though I try my hardest to not pay attention it eventually seeps into my brain like selenium in the East River and then I gain knowledge that has no relevance and takes up valuable space in my brain, which I could’ve used to learn how to bet on horses or how to make a souffle. Anyway, I wrote an open letter to architects and it got scanned and posted to an architecture blog called Part IV and now I’m receiving hate mail (with a few love letters sprinkled here and there). Turns out, not all architects understand irony or humor, this is because they are not humans. They are robots with a soul made of steel and concrete. Except they are not as cool as Transformers because they do not blow shit up.

I spent Friday night with a bunch of architects (and Saturday night for that matter) and Kathy had mentioned she was working on a 11-inch sidewalk. And I got really confused because I wasn’t sure if the 11-inch sidewalk was some kind of design element, the kind of crap normal people see and get really pissed off by its lack of practicality and usability and common sense, or if it was something that had to be repaired. So I guess what I mean is that sometimes architecture can be really confusing and makes no sense to me and in fact, a little irritating, like a diaper rash. (The latter is the answer by the way.)