the type of people who give liberal hippie scum like me a bad name.

Today is the opening day of the farmers market season in Bellingham. The Stainless Steel Amazon and I are planning on making it a 'girls only' affair, and the goonybird gets to have a male bonding day with the yummy biker.

But there is a cloud on the horizon of this day, a little hairy cloud named Emily.

Emily is the phobic, whining, twat that married 'my' cousin, the supercilious prick. Thumbnail sketch: 'My' cousin ran for city treasurer a couple of years ago, a position which I have to admit he was well qualified for. Not only that; his opponent was pretty much just a high school kid with a notary seal. And she won by a landslide. Nobody voted for him. He is not likeable. And remember, this is the country that made Howard Stern a rich man.

How do you describe Emily?

For years she worked for the NEW YORK TIMES (fanfare) where she was shop steward for the union, making graphs. She moved here and got a job on the local newspaper where she worked for fifteen years and was shop steward for the union, making graphs. Recently she bought a share in, and is the editor in chief of, the floundering local Liberal newspaper, which has no union, and where her vast journalistic background in making graphs has paid off in hard hitting editorials about subjects nobody remotely cares about, with lots of graphs.

This is a woman who, when she first met me, bragged about having been able to 'pass' as a straight Christian all her life when in actuality she is a gay Jew. (What lead her to marry a straight irish catholic, one wonders? Particularly the one she chose? And why brag about it to a stranger you know is related to the man? It is a mystery, like the chupacabra, but with more hair.)

She followed up that statement with the SHOCKING LEFTY REVELATION -at least it had to have been to a simple country turd like me, right?- 'You know, back in NEW YORK our babysitter was GAY. And a MAN. And he was BLACK, too."

WOW!

OMIGOD!

Emily! You are SO LIBERAL! THATS TRIPLE POINTS!!!

So anyway, family issues of a vicious, revolting nature rear their ugly heads, sides are taken accusations are made, letters and phone calls fly back and forth and finally I make break with them all. And that is all. Just, 'the end.' Goodbye. No more contact of any kind. None. Nada.

That was 19 years ago. Time moves on.

Except not for Emily. Emily, who was only on the utter periphery of this affair but took up arms despite that like a woolly little Hun. Emily, who hardly knows me.

Well, how dare I indeed? I can't just run around all acting like I have self-respect; all choosing who I will and will not associate with like I'm somebody and all! I'm just a simple country turd! I drive a compact car! I HAVE to associate with her until SHE says otherwise! SHE is from NEW YORK!!

I'm going to gloss things over here and just say that her misdeeds are legion, and tawdry, and her cheap antics at one point became a therapy issue for my daughter *. The woman is, frankly, bizarre. And there I will let that matter rest.

..........except to say that if you are at the beach and you spy Emily in the distance coming towards you wearing a bathing suit, cover your childrens eyes and RUN THE OPPOSITE WAY. You do not ever want to see Emily wearing a bathing suit. Or shorts. Not even long shorts. Not any kind of shorts. Ever. Ever.

No. I do not like Emily.

This being opening day of the Farmers Market, Emily is very likely to be in attendance. What, and miss the first big event of the Granola year? Unthinkable! Plus she has to be there to record it for posterity now, too, I suppose.

God help both of us if I see her hairy little face. I'll fucking break it.

*until my daughter tore the bitch a new asshole to match the one in the center of her furry forehead. if you ever wondered why I refer to my daughter as the Stainless Steel Amazon, wonder no more.