Saturday, December 22, 2007

making lists like Richard Nixon

Yesterday I noticed one of Iris's notebooks on the coffeetable, and I idly flipped through it. My casual nosiness was rewarded when I saw a page labelled, "Loser List." The "loser list" read as follows:

LOSER LIST

Lucy*,
Louise**,
Lucy's friends,
Lucy's schoolmates,
I.L.***,
Anton (just lately).


* Lola's legal name.
** Lola's best friend.
*** a girl from Iris's school whom Iris heartily despises.

I loved the lawyerlike methodicalness with which Iris singled out everyone associated with Lola: not just Lola and her best friend are losers, but also everyone who goes to school with them! Iris is SO ready to draft interrogatories. Attending law school would be an unnecessary formality. I also loved the way she tempered the Sober Husband's entry with "just lately."

I shared this with the husband, who laughed but then had to stop to ponder, wondering what he had done "lately" to earn the loser status.

6 comments:

Silliyak said...

You're both on the fast track to loserville when she gets her hormone groove going, as if I'm telling you anything you don't already know.

hughman said...

i love how she wrote "lucy" as if even acknowledging the name lola would be too kind.

2amsomewhere said...

Hmmm... If a bulldog copy of a story over at the WaPo is correct, J. Edgar kept a mighty large list himself.

Regarding Hughman's remark:

i love how she wrote "lucy" as if even acknowledging the name lola would be too kind.

Starting sometime in my high school years and continuing to this very day, my brother calls me by my first name rather than by my initials, as everyone else who knows me does. It started as a way of pulling my chain, but now it's just something we laugh about.

--
2amsomewhere

M said...

She's the next J. Edgar!

Silliyak said...

Well, at least her clothing choices might resemble his when he was getting in touch with his feminine side.

Anonymous said...

First of all I wrote that over two years ago and I now regret leaving that book on the coffee table. And also NO ONE SHOULD HAVE BEEN LOOKING AT MY NOTE BOOK!