Here is what I know about Neil Peart without Googling: he plays the drums for Rush. Rush may or may not be a Canadian band. They also may or may not have sung a song called Tom Sawyer. Rush has a lot of fans. Many, many rabid fans who get so excited about his drum kit that they started a fan page (or group or whatever Facebook is calling such things this month) dedicated to Chromey that chronicles Chromey’s appearances. Yes, Chromey tours.

That’s one thing that Chromey’s got on this Chromey. I rarely leave the house.

At this point you have probably gathered that being a Chromey, myself, I had to join the group or like the page or circle yes on the note it passed to me in Algebra. As far as I know I’m the only Chromey who is also a fan of Chromey. This makes me disappointed in all the other Chromeys (and there are a crapton of them. I have a gazillion cousins and they all have two kids and those kids have kids).

I can’t remember when I became a fan of Chromey (well the second time, the first time would have been when I was four and asked if I could have it for my last name, which had nothing at all to do with Rush). In fact, I probably liked it and promptly forgot it, such is the way with Facebook likedom.

But today, in the middle of a snowy, dreary Monday I got an email with the subject: “CHROMEY” sent you a message on Facebook. I was all, huh, which one of my doofy (and as you now know disappointing) cousins has taken the singular name for him or herself. But it was not from one of my name-hogging cousins. No, it was a message about some autographed drum heads that were played on Chromey in 1977. Apparently these are going to be up on eBay soon.

The message was so exclamation point riddled and filled with excitement that I got a contact adrenaline rush (rush, ha!). And being an official, card-carrying Westernerd, it makes me happy that there are other nerdy, goofy, rabid fans out there.

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From Merriam-Webster: of a man: to have casual or illicit sex with a woman or with many women; especially : to be sexually unfaithful to one’s wife

From Dictionary.com: (of a man) to make love with a woman one cannot or will not marry; carry on flirtations.

I guess I didn’t have any notion that the term was so gender-specific. Though if I guess using these definitions you could extrapolate that anyone who has illicit sex with a woman or a woman one cannot marry it coud apply to lesbians. But if you look at the word’s origins, it’s pretty clear they meant men:

1737, from Philander, popular name for a lover in stories, drama, and poetry, from Gk. adj. philandros “with love for people,” perhaps mistaken as meaning “a loving man,” from phil- “loving” + andr-, stem of aner “man.” Philanderer “male flirt” is from 1841.

Anyway, it seemed weird after learning all this to call the woman in The Ask a philanderer. So I did what every lazy writer does, I turned to Twitter for the answer.

I got: Slutty, slut, whore, one vote for using the word to describe a woman anyway, and cuckoldy (my favorite). And the comedians on Facebook came up with: Slutting around, Ho’in it up, and Ridiculous. Women are just as likely to collect stamps as men are (which made me laugh, thanks Barrett).

Interesting aside, the origins of cuckold:

Word History: The allusion to the cuckoo on which the word cuckold is based may not be appreciated by those unfamiliar with the nesting habits of certain varieties of this bird. The female of some Old World cuckoos lays its eggs in the nests of other birds, leaving them to be cared for by the resident nesters. This parasitic tendency has given the female bird a figurative reputation for unfaithfulness as well.

Really, I supposed she would be a cuckolding (making her husband a cuckold) but it doesn’t sound as elegant as philandering. Why I was going for elegant, I don’t know. But it is weird that a man gets to be something elegant sounding while a woman ends up being a whore/slut (and I can’t even talk about the bullshit phrase man-whore without my head exploding).

All this is to say that I have decided we need to bring back strumpet. It’s a good, solid word that is ready for a comeback.

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While many of the girls in Mr. Naegle’s 5th grade class traded stickers willy nilly, I was a hoarder. The thought of peeling a unicorn from it’s protective back nearly broke my heart. If that unicorn had a rainbow mane, there was just no way in hell that was going to happen. Around the 7th grade while putting together my scrapbook filled with pictures of The Outsiders and John Stamos, I came to the conclusion that a sticker was born to be stuck. Keeping it pristine was of no good to anyone. Nobody enjoys a sticker still on the sheet.

Once I became a grown-up my sticker fetish became a stamp fetish. Stamps were like stickers, but served a purpose. While a sticker that smelled like pizza might get a few sighs of jealousy on the playground, a stamp could actually send something somewhere.

However, even with a purpose, I still had have a hard time parting with my favorite stamps. I’m ashamed to admit how many Superman stamps are stuffed into my Mr. Lunchbox address book. The Superman stamps are only worth 39 cents. That’s two rate increases ago.

I think I still have a stamp from the mid-90s classic comic strip series. Okay, I know I still have it. It’s the Yellow Kid (considered the very first comic strip) one. I couldn’t mail it off. It was certainly too good for bills and I don’t think there was anyone in my life worthy of the Yellow Kid.

Tonight as I was writing out some cards to send off, I turned to the Eames stamps. They are glorious. It doesn’t help that I’m going through my mid-century modern phase where I have totally fetishized all that Eames stuff. So it’s like double-plus fetish night here at Supergenius HQ. Eames stamps, robot cards — gah!

I picked up the sheet of stamps and scrutinized each one. Trying to decide which of the beauties was the “ugliest.” Once that was determined I peeled it slowly from the sheet and I think my heart actually squeaked. I grabbed the second card and went for another stamp. This time there was no scrutiny. I just wantonly pulled a stamp off hoping the quick method was less painful.

I was wrong! It hurt so much that the next three cards got lame Liberty Bell stamps. I’m sorry Liberty Bell stamp receivers. It’s not you, it’s me. I was just not strong enough. It’s not that I love you less than the Eames receivers, it was just a simple twist of fate that your card was not at the top of the pile. I hope you understand.

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So there’s still about eight books on the diningroom table and a few scattered about the various rooms, but I’m calling the Semi-annual Supergenius Book Reorg 08 done. And since I don’t have a job and a real problem with prioritizing my time, I counted most of the books. I present to you a break-down of my books. Are you excited?

• 515 Fiction
• 135 Non-fiction
• 134 Short Story Collections
• 14 Poetry

Further breakage Fiction:

• 225 Novels
• 120 Sweet Valley High
• 77 Short Story Collections by a single author
• 57 Multi-author Short Story Anthologies
• 36 Misc. Other Crap Teen Romances (Caitlin, Seniors, etc.)
• 16 issues of McSweeney’s

Further breakage Non-Fiction:

• 29 books on writing/reference (thesauri, dictionaries, style guides)
• 20 books about rock and roll
• 8 books about journalism/journalists
• 7 books on political philosophy

Most Popular Authors:

• 14 John Irving
• 13 Jeanette Winterson
• 13 VC Andres
• 12 Douglas Coupland
• 8 Philip Roth
• 8 Kurt Vonnegut
• 6 Toni Morrison
• 5 Amy Bloom
• 5 Jonathan Lethem
• 5 Lorna Landvik
• 4 Lorrie Moore
• 4 Mary Gaitskill
• 4 Dave Eggers

Audiobooks not included in the numbers above:

• 37 fiction
• 14 non-fiction

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