As a cunning linguist in training (constantly plagued by our rivals the Fellow Ratios over in the Math department), I listened with interest to Geoff Nunberg's story on Fresh Air yesterday. He was talking about the "Word of the Year." Webster's chose theirs (overshare), as did Oxford (hypermiling). Mr. Nunberg chose "Joe" as in "average Joe" and "Joe six-pack" as his most important word of the year. So we here at Mango Haiku checked with the office staff (consisting of two cats and a ball of lint) and decided that the word of the year is "arugula." Arugula is the new take-down for out of touch merlot-sipping kale-huffing wasabi-pea popping liberals like Geoff Nunberg (and the staff of Mango Haiku, excepting the ball of lint who is a Libertarian). Watch Jon Stewart comment on it. Like the "six-pack" for Joe, arugula can be joined with a name -- Annie perhaps? For example:

"I don't know about all the Annie Arugulas out there, but we Average Joe's don't like tax-and-spend socialist ideas like health care for children."

"NPR-totbag toting Annie Arugula may want gays to ruin her marriage, but we Joe Six-packs uphold the sanctity of 'traditional' marriage by stoning* our wives."

Arugula has just made its way into our previously iceberg lettuce chewing little suburb of Oak Park via hated arugula and berry tea peddler Trader Joe's. (Of course, it's located next to Borders.) Oak Park is being overrun with Annie Arugulas and Kyle Kales.

Liberal foodstuff of yesteryear: Carob instead of chocolate.
Liberal foodstuff of 2008: Arugula
Liberal foodstuff of 2009: Stevia

*(start at verse 13 for the stoning bit)

The arugula pic below is from this fine article.

Nervous? On edge? Could be blood impurities. Check out this ad from the January 1949 edition of that great Canadian magazine, "Fantastic Novels".

What does this have to do with Pohnpei? Click here for more.

Borders, my alma matter of wage slavery and wobblie organization, sent me a 20% off coupon, then 30%, and finally today a 40% off coupon -- any 'ol thing in the store could be mine for 60% of the list price. I got "Sin in the Second City" -- the answer to the question: what do you give a Lutheran minister for Christmas?

Check out the girl with the strange fish-like cat toy on her head. That's the way things are done in Kentucky.

I have resisted the urge to blog, being someone who does not have a single, quirky, obsessive passion. Also, I'm not a funky hometown press. I tried to blog once. I even set up my blog on Yahoo! My blog got nixed by central command. Yahoo! was of the impression that I am a machine. I wrote an e-mail to Yahoo! explaining that I am not a machine. Yahoo! did not reply to this e-mail. Ergo, I am a machine -- wait, no. I'm a cyborg without gender (thanks Donna Haraway, matriarch of feminist epistemology) -- or that part of me that is machine is that part which Yahoo! observes as machine and that part flesh and blood is my own imagining and, really, who has a tighter grip on reality: me or Yahoo!? (And how do you punctuate a question with Yahoo! at the end without seeming confused?!?!)

Below please see the image that haunted me through college (from the cover of Donna Haraway's book) Who can type so calmly with floppy skeleton-puma draped across their shoulders and the entire universe spinning fractally behind them?

Here at Mango Haiku we will never use your photo without permission, unless you are 1) married or engaged to me 2) my daughter or 3) Santa Claus.