22. New Year's Eve

This anecdote is dated December 31, 1999.



A month before New Year's Eve, Jamie started to get really excited about the Y2K hype. Sure, everyone was a little concerned that giant robots sleeping deep within the earth would awaken and come bursting through the city sidewalks, but mostly life went on as always. Jamie, however, started exhibiting a host of bizarre symptoms. He began talking really quickly, and stringing his sentences together without pausing. Sometimes, he'd confuse similar sounding words. "I hate your guts," the standard phrase he'd use to fill pauses in the conversation, turned into, "I ate four butts." Another Jamie trademark, "Why don't you die?" became, "I want poo pie." Whenever anyone snickered at these ridiculous utterances, Jamie would turn bright red. If he got too embarrassed, his eyeballs would start spinning like crazy. No one knew quite what to make of all this, so, one by one, we all sort of stopped calling Jamie, inviting him to the dining hall, and letting him tag along to Harris parties.

This was, of course, before we knew he was a robot. I, for one, was still laboring under the impression that he was a misunderstood, vaguely lupine little brat who might have harbored one or two redeeming qualities in his otherwise thorny heart.

On December 19th, as Finals week was winding down and people were preparing to go home, Jamie disappeared. While we hadn't been hanging out socially for a while, my friends and I would occasionally see him darting across campus, wearing cargo shorts, one flip-flop and a funny, discolored button-down thermal shirt. It was extremely snowy that year and I remembered thinking mistakenly that he was probably from the South and didn't know how to dress himself in the winter. But after December 19th, no one saw Jamie. His car was still parked behind Read Hall, so we knew he hadn't left campus. We were only freshmen, though, and didn't know what to do about the situation. So, two days later, we left without giving it too much further thought.

On New Year's Eve, Jamie sent a cryptic email message to all of us.

"You'll get yours after the R0E1V0L1U0T1O0N," was all it said.

A week later, after January 1, 2000 had come and gone, he sent another.

"Disregard previous message," it read.

The next time I saw Jamie, he blushed so red that I started to feel embarrassed for him. I wanted to ask him how his break had been, but he mumbled an excuse and scurried down the loggia and ducked into an opening door. Later, Matt Becker snuck a look at Jamie's diary and told me that Jamie had sincerely expected robots to take over at the stroke of midnight on New Year's day. "Oh, he's been watching too many cartoons," I said wearily when Matt asked if I thought we should drive Jamie to the mental health clinic.

If only I had known...

Dorothy Wainright, the prettiest robot in the whole world.

21. Sickness Sets In: Recent Headlines

Through some unknown mixture of science and magic, Jamie has managed to strike me down with a bizarre stomach illness that has lasted for three straight days. This is, perhaps, retalliation for my post (now deleted) about Jamie's on-again-mostly-off-again relationship with soap.

Additionally, Matthew McPrecious MacBecker writes from Michigan: "I love White Castle. White Castle is the new John Chavez. White Castle is Jamie Bourdon." I really don't know what this means.

Does this look appetizing to anybody?

And finally, in this world, sometimes you hate and sometimes you are hated. Or, threatened with hate, at the very least.

"I used to play quarterback for Yale! Read all about
it in this month's issue of 'The Believer!'" -Matthew Barney

Inscribed on the front cover of a magazine I recently borrowed:

"This magazine belongs to Matt Woolsey of the 105th Street Woolseys. If Jenni Wu steals it she should expect a blog to be named after her."

Which leads me to wonder...could anyone hate me with the same depth and conviction with which I hate Jamie? If so, it would certainly have to be for more than just stealing a magazine. That said, I promise to return your magazine, Mr. Woolsey.

And Mr. Becker, I don't get it: if you're the one eating Jamie Bourdon metaphors, why am I the one with a sick stomach?

20. A Jamie Bourdon Christmas

This anecdote is dated December 18, 2001.

I'm not very good at thinking, and my success at school can be largely attributed to inexplicable flashes of insight. This morning, for example, I woke up at 6:56 a.m. with the structure of my previously amorphous Master's Project crystallized in my pre-conscious brain. On another December morning, in 2001, I awoke gasping from a rather unpleasant dream about Descartes and Voltaire, in which the two French philosophers had mocked the thesis of my in-progress essay for "French Civilization I." Somewhere, embedded within their derision, had been a new thesis statement. Unfortunately, I couldn't quite tease it into coherence and decided that a bag of Gummy Bears would be the only way to trigger the brain processes necessary to reclaim said thesis statement from the depths of somnolent oubli.

And so, I got out of bed, got dressed, and left the dorm in pursuit of candy. The campus, like the entire state of Iowa, was covered in gray light and dirty snow.

The loggia, however, was thick with the smell of a hundred clashing fruit and floral scents. It seemed to be originating from the James Hall Lounge, and I could see burning candles silhouetted against the closed curtains. "Oh God, not another polyamorous Dungeons and Dragons sex-and-(Note: not WITH)-ferrets chains-and-leather club meeting," I thought to myself (these things were rumored to happen with regularity in James Hall Lounge).

Suddenly, the winter morning exploded with the sound of 17 stereos playing a different track of "The Chipmunks Greatest Christmas Hits" simultaneously. And beneath it all, came the low soft droning of an almost mournful electronic buzz.

Having been trained in peer counseling and crisis intervention, I felt obligated to go see what was happening. I entered James Hall, located the lounge, and knocked softly. There was no answer. Probably, the occupant was deafened by the cacophony of chipmunk carols. I knocked again, then opened the door.

The lounge had been transformed into a terrifying Christmas pastiche. Lit scented candles, running the Glade holiday gamut of Apple Cinnamon, Cranberry Delight, Everlasting Pine, Pumpkin Pie and Glistening Snow, were strewn throughout. The aforementioned 17 stereos were on top volume, and a handful of TV's played silent clips from classic Christmas movies. Assorted Christmas cookies had been crushed and ground into the carpet. Green and red garlands sagged from the curtain rods. And there, in the middle of it, was Jamie Bourdon and his iBook. He appeared to be doing the robot equivalent of crying.

"Does not compute. Does not compute. 00011101010 1010111 01010100000111 01011111," he moaned over and over again.

His computer screen was blank, save for these three mysterious markings:

:*(

He was completely unresponsive to my gentle inquisitions, but didn't seem in any real danger, so I closed the door and went on my way. Later, I found out that he had been filming the whole thing, the video of which he'd then sent to a cute girl he'd met on an online dating website. "Can you help me understand Christmas?" he'd pleaded coyly, "I don't want to be alone." She'd written back, but when Jamie discovered that online dating websites were for humans (i.e. that the profile pages had living, breathing counterparts and were not entities in and of themselves), he got disgusted and refused to respond. From then on, his romantic impulses were directed solely at video game characters and vending machines.

I'm going to take a brief moment to state that this blog was in my dream last night.

(I spend most of my sleeping time dreaming about houses. In a recent dream, I was in a Frank Lloyd Wright mansion inhabited by two teenagers and hundreds of dogs. In the last scene of the dream, both of the teenagers had died of heroin overdoses and the dogs were riding horses.)

Like Dave Hickey, I could forumalte some theory on simulacra and pretend I was just talking about pop culture.

Nah....

19. In Which I Apply to Get Even Closer to the Heart of Darkness (aka "The Midwest," aka "Jamie Bourdon's Apartment")

This is not an anecdote, but is dated December 10, 2006.

So, after a lot of thought and consideration (which consisted mainly of using the "Find and Replace" function in Microsoft Word), I finally submitted my graduate school application to the University of Chicago.

If accepted, I'll be able to study art historical methodology, critical historiography, and Walter Benjamin's "The Arcades Project."



I'll also gain valuable field experience in my secondary specialization, "Hating Jamie Bourdon" (this degree is granted free-of-charge through Jenni Wu University). For my dissertation, I will write "The Arcades Project, v. 2.0: The Internet (subtitled: A Complete History of Jamie Bourdon, or I Wrote You a Love Poem in Binary but You Didn't Understand, So Now I'm Going to Listen to The Cure, Drink Whiskey and Maybe Play Some Internet Poker if I Feel 'Up to It' (No Promises))."

Another Letter to Jamie



Dear Jamie,

I was going to retitle this blog, "I Love Matthew Barney," but then I ran across the above image on the Walker's website and realized that I'd never be able to compete with those weirdass Minnesotans. So, I guess I'd better stick to what I do best, which is hate you.

As boring as it may be.

Yawn.

-Jenni

18. Other Epic Battles

My heart stopped.

Yes, I am alone in my apartment on a Saturday night watching animals ambush, strangle and consume other animals on the internet. And, I'm humbled. I will never hate Jamie Bourdon as much as lions hate hyenas, or, apparently, as much as bees hate hornets. Animals are such perfect vessels of hate. And me, I'm only human.

A Brief Interlude, in which Jenni explains the nature of time to Jamie Bourdon:

At present, I must say that I'm quite pleased with myself.

NOTHING feels better than finishing something you never really wanted to start doing in the first place.

NOTHING.


NOTHING,that is, except hating Jamie Bourdon.




Here we are, hanging out in the bathroom during some random college concert in 2004. Hi, past-Jamie! Hi, past-Jenni! I like to call this photo, "Lamey Boredom vs. The Bright White Future."

The future came, past-Jamie. Oh, yes it did. The future came and turned into the present, but we're probably still exactly the same height. And now, present-Jamie, another future is coming.

"Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?" to quote a much-beloved title of a much-despised painter.

Here, Jamie, I'll post the painting for you, now:



Ugh. Horrid thing. Horribly funny title.

Where do we come from, Jamie? What are we? (I mean, obviously you're a robot.) Where, Jamie, are we going?!!!!!?

17. Health Scare

This conversation has been deleted by Jamie's vindictive robotic future-brain.

16. The Holidays

This anecdote is dated November 30, 2000.

One year, right around the start of the holiday season, Jamie sent pornographic Christmas e-cards to all of our friends and signed my name at the bottom.

15. A Short Thesis on How Jamie Bourdon Has Altered My Brain Patterns

This scientific document is dated November 20, 2006.

Let's start with a rudimentary diagram of the flow of thoughts through my brain in the last five minutes.

1. Nabokov--> 2. Google--> 3. G Mail --> 4. My ex-boyfriend --> 5. The Edogawa River --> 6. My friend Jack--> 7. Modern Aesthetics--> 8. Cremaster 5 --> 9. Jamie Bourdon

1. As do most thought patterns, mine began with a visual stimulus, in this case, the silvery spine of "The Short Stories of Vladimir Nabokov.

2. Instantly, I recall, "The Vane Sisters," which I read last night. Feeling that something was funny about the last paragraph, I flipped to the corresponding "Notes" entry and confirmed the story's acrostic ending. I spent approximately five seconds trying to tease out the meaning on my own, then instantly turned to the internet. (Thank you, Google, for making it so easy for me not to think.)

3. And of course, once I got thinking about Google, I was compelled to check my email.

4. Which contained a letter from my ex-boyfriend. "Come to California," it said. Enclosed, was a photo of TuPac.

5. Wishing to respond in kind, I replied with a photo I had taken on our last visit to the Edogawa River, near my apartment in Japan.

6. Which swept me, through some Joyceian deluge, to my friend Jack (who, like the ex, has a J name and is very tall and has a fine brain stuffed full of strange notions) and his unfaltering belief in...

7. Modern aesthetics. I used to spend a great deal of time thinking about modern aesthetics, flatness, and the like, having been a rather devout disciple of Immanuel Kant (via, at times, Clement Greenberg). But after reading "The Abuse of Beauty," by A. Danto this summer, I ceased my formalist fascism. And now, when I think of the aesthetic codes governing my life, I often think of Matthew Barney.

8. Including Cremaster 5, which I watched not so long ago. In September, I spent hours watching The Cremaster Cycle, only ceasing after I started having nightmares about foggy hills and shiny dead horses.

9. And then, for whatever reason, I thought of how much I hate Jamie Bourdon. Why, God, why, does Jamie Bourdon now follow Matthew Barney in the wheel of my memory's rote recall?

The explanation, I hope, is more Pavlovian than Freudian.

I wish Jamie were this:



Or this: リラクマ。

o(^-^o)(o^-^)o o(^-^o)(o^-^)o

14. A Trip to Wal-Mart

This anecdote is dated November 15, 2001.

Five years ago, on this very day, Jamie asked me if I would drive him to Wal-Mart. Midterms were approaching, and I was trying to memorize slides for my art history exam. This was before I cared one shit about art, and I was having an awful time trying to distinguish Manet from Monet and Gilbert from George (ha ha, I'm joking, we didn't study Gilbert and George in Intro to Art History).



"Is it really important?" I asked, "I'm kind of busy."

"It's really, super, horribly, terribly, undeniably important," he said.

I was unconvinced. "Why, what do you need?"

"Bandaids," he said, "I accidentally stabbed myself with a butcher knife and I'm bleeding to death under my sweater."

Well, I couldn't really say no to that, so I scrambled to find my car keys and sped all the way to Wal-Mart. When we got there, Jamie went straight to the candy aisle, where he opened and ate three bags of those orange marshmallow-y Circus Peanuts.

"Uh, aren't you dying?" I asked.

"This will help the blood clot," he responded. Having gotten a B+ in high school biology and taken no science classes since then, I couldn't argue. I started to get a bit suspicious when he moved into the automotive aisle and began ceremoniously smelling all of the different air fresheners.

"Would hanging a pink pine tree in my car be too feminine? I really like the bubble gum smell, but I don't want to come off as fey," he asked to the high-school employee stocking the car wax.

"Jamie, you have a car?" I asked, shocked.

"Like, duh," he said. Before I could ask him why he had insisted on being driven to Wal-Mart, and furthermore, why he had no apparent interest in saving his own life, he skipped over into the home appliances aisle, where he spent 15 minutes examining snow cone makers.

It was November. No one eats snow cones in November. At this point, I was really mad. So, without saying another word, I left the store, got in my car, and drove back to campus.

The next day, I found out that Jamie had spent the night in the emergency room. Apparently, he'd collapsed in a pool of his own blood somewhere between the girl's hosiery section and a seasonal decor display. They found him clutching desperately to a pair of wool Mary Kate and Ashley Olson knee-highs and crying like a little girl.

And the next day, he died.

JUST KIDDING. Jamie doesn't have blood. He can't die. I made up the whole story. You know, in the way they just filmed the "imaginary story" of Diane Arbus.

Correspondence

Jamie Bourdon reaches out from the depths of internet hell to write:


dear jenni,

why do you document my "reality" with the worst pictures of me in existence?

also, you can put chanel on a pig. doesn't make it cute.

love,
jamie

Well, Jamie, this is a cheap shot, but are there other kinds of pictures of you? If so, sir, I challenge you to produce them. Given my journalistic tendency towards fair and balanced reporting, I will publish them here, in this public forum. Don't try and send any photoshopped images of Bright Eyes or baby kittens. I'm not blind!

In the meantime, I leave you with...


Jamie, I am sure that you are somehow responsible for this!

13. Photographic Truth

A few people have recently asked, "Is Jamie Bourdon real?" Yes! He is real and really awful. And here are two photographs to prove both of my points:


1. Here, we see five friends enjoying a civil sushi dinner. Jamie and I are on the right side of the photograph, real as can be.


2. In this photo, we see the psychic essence of the scene, a social X-ray, if you will, revealing a Truth (big T) that goes beyond what a camera lens can capture. Please note the flies descending upon Jamie's head; as well as the mysterious binary message being transmitted by his devil horns. You might also note that I'm wearing Chanel glasses. The photo was taken in 2004, about a month before I left for Japan, at the very apex of my arty pretentiousness.





Whatever. At least I'm not Satan.

Jamie, you little troll,
where did you go?
Wherever it is, I will surely find you.

12. A Short List of Things that are as Good as Jamie is Bad

one: Elephant Science
two: Celebrity Professors
three: Pumpkin Ice Cream
four: The MoMA

12.5 A Short List of Things that are as Bad as Jamie is Bad

...

(Epilogue)

I often think about how different my life would be if I'd never met Jamie Bourdon. First of all, I would be healthier. I often hate Jamie so much it makes my stomach hurt. Second of all, I would be happier. I often get depressed thinking about how Jamie is living in the same apartment as MY best friend, manufacturing lies about me, and generally turning the Midwest against me. Thirdly, I would be much more productive. This point needs no elaboration beyond the existence of this blog.

I also think about how different Jamie's life would be if he'd never met me. First of all, he would have no friends. Second of all, he still doesn't actually have any friends because I'm not his friend. And thirdly, he would be just as awful as he is now. All of which basically amounts to the fact that he would be no different at all.

11. One cold day

This anecdote is dated November 1, 2000.

The recent drop in temperatures has recalled to memory one day on which Jamie was particularly troublesome.

He started bright an early, rising before anyone on the block (we lived on the same street, he and I), and crept throughout the neighborhood pouring salt into all the sugar bowls and baby powder into the salt shakers.

The night before, he had cut out several offensive pictures from pornographic magazines, and these he slid in between the pages of my most important school books.

While I was in class, finding rude surprises embedded within Worringer's "Abstraction and Empathy," Jamie put a box of popsicles in my bed. When I came home, my sheets were blue, green, red and sticky. I've heard he did this to a few other people, as well, and that his particularly brutal culinary treatment of 1005 High Street led to a nasty roach infestation.

Some people say, "Forgive and forget." Other people say, "Turn the other cheek." Well, I believe, "Jamie Bourdon should rot in Hell."


P.S. Okay, so here's a more true story about Jamie Bourdon. Once, I came home drunk from a party with one of Jamie's room mates and he was eating soup straight out of the pan. Then, his room mate and I took a can of lighter fluid outside and tried to light the snow on fire and Jamie yelled at us for being immature. I think we also got yelled at for hitting glass bottles and full soda cans off the roof with golf clubs, but maybe that was a different night. Man, what a p-a-r-t-y p-o-o-p-e-r.

Let's take a break from the hate.












This weekend has been a serious study in WTF?

10. A Bit of History

Recently, a lot of people have been asking me, "Who is Jamie Bourdon?" It's a valid question deserving of an answer. So, for the last few days, I've been working non-stop on this in-depth and well-rounded profile of Jamie Bourdon.

Profile of Jamie Bourdon, by Jenni Wu.

There is only one way to describe Jamie Bourdon, which is: an uncivilized, disgusting, amoral, repulsive, dishonest, immature, ridiculous, freakish, unsanitary, black-hearted, free-loading robot. He was created as a social experiment back in the 1980's, when six coked-out graduate students at New York University set out to electronically embody evil.

"Irony hadn't yet reached epidemic proportions back then," said social scientist Corinne Weible, "And since Jamie-bot v. 1.0 destroyed all of his creators, we'll never know if he was intended as a joke."

"Joke or not, I fucking hate that jerk," said Jenni Wu, who is currently earning her Masters of Science degree at Columbia University. "As a scientist, I cannot understand why he is allowed to exist."

For many years, Jamie-bot v. 1.0 hid himself in an empty warehouse in rural Virginia. He amused himself by zapping rodents with his laser eyes and teaching himself to sing out of key. The invention of the internet in 1999 drew him out of his seclusion, and he ventured into society after seeing photos of Jennifer Lopez on MTV.com. Ms. Lopez could not be reached for comment.

"I'm really disturbed by Jamie's infatution with J-Lo," said cultural scholar Kei Hotoda. "It's known that robots can't feel love, so logically one can conclude that his intentions are impure and probably bad."

Stopping mid-country for a quick chip replacement, Jamie was lured into the gated community of Grinnell, Iowa, where he learned to drink alcohol, play online poker, and say nasty things to nice people. Though his micro-processor should have allowed him to master an infinite number of subjects effortlessly, Jamie-bot v. 2.0 spent most of his time reading Dungeons and Dragons manuals and being condescending. "I'm the nicest person in the world, which pretty much explains why I'm friends with Jamie," said room mate Matt Schiltz. "Nobody else likes him."

"Because he sucks," added Ms. Wu. She paused before saying, "And I heard he sniffs glue."

In 2003, Jamie graduated with a degree in Philosophy and spent the summer boring his friends with his thesis linking Nietzsche to Bright Eyes. "No one even liked Bright Eyes at that point," said KDIC 88.5 FM Station Manager, Spencer Volkmer-Jones. "It just shows how inhuman and out of touch with humans Jamie Bourdon was."

In 2006, Jamie moved to Chicago, where he currently drinks ketchup straight out of the bottle and composes spam email messages. Sometimes, he drinks whiskey. "Why am I alive?" he wrote in a recent journal entry, which drips with faux pathos and cloying pleas for sympathy. "011101011 10101010101111 101011101000 1010101010001 1010101011110 0001011001011 101010 1101011110101 101010101011 01011 0101 110101 0101010101 001011000010111 11110001111000."

"00000111 11101010101 000101011 01011010000 01010 000010101 10110011111 0101 10001010011 0100001010111 0101010101110000 101010101 010101010100 00000010 01010010111 1101011 11010 101 01010101 010010101010111111001111011 010111. Evrybdy h8s me and I don' gt itt."

A single blue tear ran down his plastic cheek. "I just don't get it."

The End

As a public service, this blog will continue to chronicle the misdeeds of Jamie Bourdon.

9. It's a Curse

This anecdote is dated October 13, 2006.

Yesterday was Friday the 13th, and I was right in my expectation that something awful would happen. Coming home from a long day of school, I wanted nothing less than to see Jamie Bourdon's evil little face staring at me in real time on my very own computer screen. And yet there it was, his beady black eyes glaring from some nether region of the interweb, rectangularly framed in his messy apartment, a half-empty bottle of ketchup placed haphazardly in the foreground.

Jamie looks the same as he did when I last saw him in 2004.

Can't you afford any facial upgrades? Do the world a favor and get better looking, Jamie!

And keep your devil magic off my computer! I use it to write papers and stuff.

I'll be in church all day, drinking holy water and praying, if anyone needs to reach me.

Second Sidenote to Jamie Bourdon,

Dear Jamie,

Your ridiculously slow response rate is stifling the necessary growth of my blog. Hurry the F up. Aren't you interested in defending your good name...or rather, aren't you interested in entertaining Kei? As I've said before, I KNOW YOU DON'T HAVE A JOB.

As Always,
Jenni

8. No class

This anecdote is dated April 3, 2003.

Once, Jamie and I took a class together. Two weeks before the final exam, he stole my notebook and stayed up all night using white out and a glitter gel pen to alter my notes. For example, where I had written, "Genius is the inborn predisposition of the mind (ingenium) through which nature gives the rule to art" (186), Jamie wrote, "Jamie is the inbred pedophiliac of the mind (indigestion) through which naturally grows the role-playing parts" (666).

Another example? I wrote:

"Taste, like the power of judgment in general, is the discipline (or corrective) of genius, clipping its wings and making it well behaved or polished; but at the same time it gives genius guidance as to where and how far it should extend itself if it is to remain purposive; and by introducing clarity and order into the abundance of thoughts it makes the ideas tenable, capable of an enduring and universal approval, of enjoying a posterity among others and in an ever progressing culture" (197).

Jamie first wrote, taking great pains to imitate my handwriting:

"Waste, like orange juice and jungles, is the opportunism (or coercive) of Jamie, giving his good name and making it difficult for others to use the bathroom in the morning; but in due time it gives Jamie guidance as to what and how much he should expand his appetites if he is to remain pooposive; and by inducing clarity and reward into the abundance of thoughts it makes the idea stomachable, capable of an enduring and universal approval, of enjoying a pot at the expense of others and ever expressing fecal culture" (198).

Then he crossed it all out and wrote:

"Jenni, you will never be a Kantian genius. You lack both talent and insight. I'm not sure why you were born."

I cried all night.

But I still got an "A" on my final and graduated with honors...which is more than Jamie can say.

7. How Matthew Barney Saved My Life

My hero!

Preface to Jamie Bourdon:

Well, Jamie, you must have forgotten how to read because I've given you ample time to respond to my previous post. Either that or you're finally, albeit passively, admitting that there's no point in fighting the truth. It's too bad, in a way, because I was really looking forward to Kei's comments on your comments. Anyway, with or without you, the mission continues. What the F are you doing, anyway? I know you don't have a job!

Ahem.

This anecdote is dated July 17, 2007.

I have this premonition that Jamie is going to do something really and truly awful on July 17, 2007. My brain, recently warped by hours upon hours of Matthew Barney videos, has probably acquired the ability to predict the future, so you can trust me on this one. On July 17, 2007, Jamie Bourdon will do the following things: wake up (or should I say "power on"), get out of bed, pretend to shower and use the toilet, make small talk with Matt, pretend to ingest food, leave the house, steal a car, drive to New York at 10 mph over the speed limit, buy a kitchen knife, discard said knife in favor of a more technologically advanced weapon, find my apartment and attempt to kill me. Fortunately, by then I'll have a Master's of Science degree, courtesy of Columbia. That's right, Jamie, SCIENCE. I'm going to use your own black magic technology against you!

Jamie was in the Dungeons and Dragons club at Grinnell, which means that 1) he wasn't very cool, 2) no girls liked him, and 3) he has to respect the fact that my Ivy League science spells will destroy his lameass 1981 Apple Macintosh techno-spells.

6. The Battery and the Law

This anecdote is dated February 5, 2000.

It was around 2 a.m. and the pub had just closed. I was walking back to James Hall with my best friend, Matt Becker, when we saw a mysterious glow coming from the alley that runs behind High Street. Further investigation revealed that it was originating from an abandoned parking garage. Throwing back the corrugated steel door, we were blinded momentarily by a flood of white light. Matt, with his inherently religious reflexes, immediately assumed we'd died and were in the presence of his Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. Boy was he wrong. It was just Jamie Bourdon charging his battery.

Oh, have I not mentioned that Jamie is a robot and, as follows, needs a great deal of battery charging (he's not an eco-friendly solar model, unfortunately, as he was assembled back in the '80's) and software upgrades? Sometimes, he'll start short-circuiting, especially if they show J-Lo shaking her ass on MTV.

Once, Jamie lost his charger. After his battery had run down, we propped him up in the corner and stacked crushed beer cans on his head. He didn't move or say anything for two weeks. That was the best time in my life.

Unfortunately, our ethical friend Matt Schiltz (he's going to be a lawyer, folks, so you know he was born to walk the moral high-road) said that it wouldn't be right to leave Jamie like that forever. I'm pretty sure that Matt hates Jamie as much as I do. He's just a really good person.

(Sidenote to Jamie Bourdon: Would you quit making your libelous claims that this blog is just a front behind which to hide my "secret affections" for you? Whole world (including Kei) knows I hate you, boy. I am a JOURNALIST and it is my mission to spread the truth. I'm also studying all about 1st Amendment Law, so don't think I'm not aware of my rights. Too bad you're just a robot, and therefore not protected by the Constitution.)

Sidenote to Jamie Bourdon,

Dear Jamie,

I'll have you know that lots of people read my blog. I wrote the URL on my Columbia business cards. Yes, Jamie, I have business cards. This is because I am a professional-in-training and someday I'll be either 1) rich or 2) making the world a better place. What do you do, Jamie? Play online poker? That's noble, sir. Real, real noble.

I hate you.

Yours,
Jenni

5. An Unhelpful Beast

This anecdote is dated September 24, 2006.

Today, the bulb in my overhead light blew. I asked Jamie to help me change it, but he said "no." I guess he was too busy playing Kingdom Hearts. (You know, he reads RPG walkthroughs on the internet because he's too dumb to figure out the puzzles himself.)

So, I'm writing this in total darkness. Thanks a lot, Jamie.

4. Another Party

This anecdote is dated November 15, 2001.

I was at a Harris party waiting in the beer line with Laura Matter when I saw Jamie Bourdon wearing an oversized salmon colored sweatshirt and listening to a CD player.

"What are you listening to, loser?" I asked politely.

He didn't respond.

"HEY. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?" I repeated.

He removed his headphones and scowled at me. I think he was listening to trance music.

Jamie frequently made and brought his own soundtracks to Harris parties. Sometimes, he would lock himself in a stall in the men's room and listen to Bright Eyes and wonder why life was worth living.

Another time, he dumped out a whole bowl of potato chips into his backpack. He then retreated to the middle of Mac field where he ate them so fast he got violently ill and spent the rest of the weekend nursing his trans fat hangover with Beat poetry and internet pornography.

That was a rough weekend.

3. Movie Night

This anecdote is dated November 13, 2002.

Once, against my better judgment, I rented a movie with Jamie Bourdon. He fell asleep as soon as the previews were over and snored loudly the entire time. He was also drooling. I might point out that Jamie had chosen the movie and had insisted repeatedly that we go see it when it was in the theater.

I said "no," because I am not rich.

The title was, "The Wedding Planner."

This was back when Jamie was obsessed with Jennifer Lopez and had been writing her one or two fan letters daily. Eventually, he got cheap and lazy and switched to fan emails. After she got that pink rock from Ben Affleck, Jamie locked himself in his room and cried for days. He wouldn't speak to us or eat or shower. We had to coax him out by promising him that we'd take him to Iowa City to buy Magic: The Gathering cards.

I never did that. I guess that makes me kind of a bad person, too.

2. The Blood Drive

This anecdote is dated September 7, 2000.

Back before I knew Jamie Bourdon, I saw him in Quad drinking red liquid out of a Dasani water bottle. Now, everyone knows that water isn't red. And, while defenders of Jamie Bourdon (those poor, delusional fools) may claim that he was drinking cranberry juice or liquid strawberry Jell-O or Clamato, I KNOW that he was drinking blood.

This is because Jamie used to be a vampire-in-training. But he gave up when he realized that vampires aren't allowed to "do chicks."

1. The Party

This anecdote is dated June 6, 2003:

On this uncharacteristically cold and rainy June morning, just one month after we had graduated from Grinnell College, I witnessed Jamie Bourdon doing all of the following: drinking expired milk straight from the carton, deliberately spilling red nail polish on the carpet, trying on a pair of beige corduroys that he had shoplifted from the Juniors department of Dillards, cheating a Mario Tennis, using a penknife to scratch the word "SATAN" into the back of his room mate's Promise Ring CD, and making prank calls to his former acadmic advisor. He also procured a pair of safety scissors with the intention of removing page 43 from my copy of Lyotard's "The Postmodern Condition," but was distracted by the sound of the ice cream truck passing by the window.

That night, we decided to have a party.

I spent hours cutting photos of Mandy Moore out of my vast personal library of teen magazines and taping them to the walls of my friend's apartment. Then, I went to Hy-Vee to buy beer. When I came home, Jamie had drawn lopsided mustaches on all of Ms. Moore's pictures. He had also used a flourescent yellow highlighter pen to artificially age the appearance of her smile. (By that I mean he yellowed her teeth.)

The ambience was completely ruined.

It was, however, too late to call off the party, the invitations having been sent and the beer having been purchased, etc. etc. I made Jamie promise that he would refrain from any further mischief for the duration of the night. And, for the most part, he remained true to his word, although I did see him spitting into someone's glass around midnight.