MILK EGGS VODKA [By Bill Keaggy]

Hmmm. “Tissues. Oil. AAA batteries.” What could they have planned? Maybe they need to lubricate their automatic tissue dispenser. Or maybe… hey! Oh! Nevermind! :-0

(This one appears in the “Paaar-ty!” chapter on page 43. As in, you know, private party!)

Yep. This one’s not in the book, so consider it a free bonus!

“Next time you go shopping, please get some buttmilk. I like the store-bought kind much better than my homemade stuff.” This one appears in the “Just Plain Funny” chapter, on page 8.

Here’s some recent reader mail from grocerylists.org:

Just want to say that I laughed very hard and out loud (and at work)while I read your incredible collection of grocery lists! (LOVED the mizpeld ones the most!) Besides the lists themselves, your comments from the top 10 lists were hysterical!! Having worked in a Supermarket for 15 years — I never realized until now how funny people can be — and they don’t even know it!

Keep searchin’
I’ll keep laughin’

Thanks

ps I too will be on the lookout for lists for your collection!

Lance

“Oreo B Interdental Refills” — now I don’t know what an interdental refill is, but I am sure they are more fun to use if they’re made out of Oreos. Also, “bourbin.” This list appears in the “Just Plain Funny” chapter, right up from on page 4!

This artery clogging wonder appears on page 183 of the book, in the “Eating Wrong” chapter.

I love this one. I mean, heck, they actually spelled “clothes” like this: “close.” How completely pathetically awesome is that? Darn so. This one is from the very early days of the Grocery List Collection. I couldn’t find the original so it didn’t make it into the book which is why I present it to you here:

1. At Coudal Partners (two of the good folks there helped out with the book).
2. “I’m lovin’ it” (on Flickr).
3. “One of the great web originals” at Quipsologies (see #8).
4. I guess I’d feel bad about a negative mention — but only if this fellow’s humor column was, um, actually funny: Boring books leave a bad taste.
5. But hey, the first Amazon customer review is in and … they like it! “If you love lists, this is great fun! There’s an interesting fact on every page, too. Highly recommended.”
6. And finally: “Book topics: Too Strange?”. My answer: “Of course!” His admission: “I’d probably read it.”

Oh, and today I was interviewed on Australian radio on the “Breakfast with Millsy & Tony Mac” show. So now I am officially considered a freak on 4 continents.

I owe a debt of gratitude to Jim Coudal and Susan Everett of Coudal Partners in Chicago. Jim wrote the foreword and Susan contributed her own lost collection. Thanks!

Bill Keaggy’s book Milk Eggs Vodka, a collection of found grocery lists, is officially published today. SE contributed some lists from her collection and I was happy to write the book’s foreword. See “a short story about life based on other people’s discarded grocery lists” and his new blog about the book too.

Today’s the day. This is HOW’s blog post about the book:

Milk Eggs Vodka, a new book from HOW, has just been released and we’re all super excited about it. The book is a collection of discarded grocery lists found by people all over the country. To this simple, voyueristic delight, the author adds an amazing sense of humor. I laughed out loud flipping through the book.

btw, HOW Books is the publisher. Thanks too all the great folks at HOW: Megan, Amy, Suzanne and Grace!

A blast from the past: This is the story Amanda Hesser wrote about me and the Grocery List Collection. It appeared in The New York Times Magazine on October 24, 2004:

If you are what you eat, then you are also what you buy to eat. And mostly what people buy is scrawled onto a grocery list, those ethereal scraps of paper that record the shorthand of where we shop and how we feed ourselves. Most grocery lists end up in the garbage. But if you live in St. Louis, they might have a half-life you never imagined: as a cultural document, posted on the Internet.

For the past decade, Bill Keaggy, 33, the features photo editor at The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, has been collecting grocery lists and since 1999 has been posting them online at www.grocerylists.org. The collection, which now numbers more than 500 lists, is strangely addictive.

Since yesterday’s list of the day was, um, hygiene oriented, let’s stick with that theme and scrub the other side! Ladies and gentlemen, may I present to you: Tush Cleaner! This one appears in the book on page 7, in the “Just Plain Funny” chapter.

Another kind note:

I just read the little short story from grocery lists you made to promote your book. It made me laugh out loud — made my day. I’ll be ordering to send to friends. It’s just the kind of humor they will enjoy, and I can’t wait to see.
—Sandy

Thanks, Sandy!

I get a lot of email from visitors to grocerylists.org, but this was the first real feedback I got from someone who read my book. It just arrived in my inbox two days ago and I’m reprinting it here (anonymously):

Got a copy of your book Friday afternoon. Didn’t put it down until I’d read it cover to cover.

Fabulous! Laugh out loud funny!

Great job turning trash into treasure!

—Chips & Dipe

The first List of the Day is a doozie, and it didn’t even make it into the book (all I had was lo-res version). Anyway, behold the “Coochie wash!”