The Autobiography of Jane Lane - With Fiber!

There is an incredible demand for my biography. I'm getting all kinds of hits. They all come from the same place, but every hit counts, as Daria says, so I take this as encouragement to keep writing.

Did you know that the Lane family once had a garden? No, seriously. When I was four I remember us having a garden in the back yard.

Summer told me that the goal was to plant cabbages, beets, and strawberries. It sounds like a failed dessert, but Dad decided that we had better have a garden just in case of imminent Lane poverty. I guess he wasn't selling any photographs then. He planned that garden like...well, he probably put more work into that than anything. I saw him using string to line the rows just right and I remember Dad and Penny working out in the garden. She liked the garden too.

We didn't have much of a yield the first year, but we had something. We had fresh strawberries, cream, and sugar.

The next year when I was five we had a drought. It killed everything in the garden. I rememeber flocks of butterflies flittering around the garden and Dad trying to chase them away. I got mad at him and began to chase Dad.

It seems that butterflies eat strawberries. Or something. I'm not sure how the process goes. I'd think it would take about five pounds of butterflies to eat a strawberry, but I don't know, maybe butterflies were more of a deadly menace ten years ago. It's like a M. Night Shalayman film. No one talks about The Day The Butterflies Came and Carried Off The Children. All I can remember is kicking Dad in the shins because of the butterflies.

With the drought, Dad lost interest. The squared off area became a source for weeds. Then three years later Mom resodded the back yard and removed all traces of Dad's garden. I don't think Dad noticed it was gone. He had moved on.

I asked Trent about the garden. He just said, "I hate beets." He ran his hands through his hair, and then started plucking a tune about beets...awful beets.

I guess I know who ate the beets. Looks like Dad's garden is still fertile. I expect strawberries, por favor!

The Autobiography of Jane Lane, Parte the Seconde

My friend Daria said I should write more. I don't like writing because I don't feel comfortable having her apply her super-sarcasm to my shitty writing. Having Daria around is cool because she doesn't know enough about art to judge what I do. I've been carrying her all year in Ms. Defoe's class. Daria can draw a good sketch now and then, but she should stick to painting ceramic kitty-cats.

Ms. D wanted us to make moldings of the male torso, which we would bake in the kiln. I think Daria's looked like a weightlifter with breast implants. We put it in the kiln and its little pecs blew up. No joke. Ms. D gave Daria a B because she's really nice even though Daria's was the only one that blew up. I didn't say anything or Daria would be in a pissy mood all day.

I thought I already told you everything about my life, you bastards. You're going to crucify me like Paris, just because I showed my cha-cha while climbing out of the car. Yeah, I was three and I forgot to wear underwear, but I know the Press has long memories. You guys never let up, do you.

What else is there to tell you? Oh yea, I got into trouble at school today. It seems that my locker set off some alarms during one of Ms. Li's sweeps for radiation. I've been keeping some interesting industrial metal artifacts in there, and one of them was radioactive. So I got sent to the local hospital, had things X scanned and cat rayed and a $2000 whatchamajiggy later I was pronounced healthy of body and sent home. Ms. Li was at the hospital grumbling all the while, asking the doctor just to use a stethoscope. I think she stole some tongue depressors on the way out.

I came back home tumor free, I think. But the scanner didn't find the lead based paint I ate as a child. I tried to expose myself to lead paint when I was nine because I thought I would paint like Goya, but all I got was a stomachache and blue teeth. Have you ever seen Goya's self-portrait? It looks just like what I think Trent will look like, sort of what Ludwig van looked like.

There. That's part two of my biography. I swear I'm just going to make stuff up next time.