i Dont Do It Unless I Can Destroy It

The Gloaming (The title has nothing to do with the post I just like that word)

2010-02-16T19:08:00.000-08:00

As you can probably tell by my posting schedule IDDIUICDI and I have drifted apart. (Is it somehow poetic that the acronym for the title of my blog has DUI in it like 4 times? I think so yes.) We still love each other as friends, and we can sit together and watch hours of Law and Order in comfortable silence while eating tuna noodle casserole, but we've lost the spark. I'll still call IDDIUICDI when I need to gripe about the small Asian women who throw 'bows at H&M and my frustration surrounding people who eat but we've both changed, and we need something new. So for the foreseeable future anyone who cares can visit me here.

Neurons. Who needs 'em.

2009-11-29T19:52:00.000-08:00

A C. Elegans Nematode worm has about 200 neurons. A human has anywhere from 10 - 100 billion. C. Elegan worms are a millimeter long and live for about 2 weeks. They eat, they poop, have sex, they reproduce and they die. Sometimes, if they worms are very lucky, they get captured by scientists and the scientist create little environments for them. Those worms get to poop, have sex, reproduce, navigate labyrinths and die. Sounds boring, right? I beg to differ. To my mind, those worms aren't doing a whole hell of a lot less than we humans do in a lifetime. Especially for those lab worms, I dare say they're actually getting a lot more done than many, maybe most people. So here is my question: what the FUCK are all of our extra neurons for? Okay, granted a worm can't do math. A worm can't drive or raise children or cook pad thai. Fuck they can't even see, but how many extra neurons does that take? If a worm can find another worm to have sex with and also make his way around a teeny tiny maze with only 200 neurons, I bet you it only takes about 5000 neurons to get through an 100 level sociology course at your average American college. I bet you can get an MBA with like 30,000. Maybe 100,000. I guarantee a entire human life can probably carried out very easily with 500,000. Or maybe I'm full of shit, and it would take WAY more neurons. But 100 billion? REALLY? I don't think we need that many. I think all of those extra neurons are up to no damn good. I think those extra neurons are the ones that create doubt and fear and resentment and jealousy and spite, and I for one don't want mine anymore. The extra ones, that is. I probably need about 10,000. I don't need to carry out any very high-level brain function. I'd like to be able to understand the plot of House, but it's pretty much the same every week so hopefully some of my neurons will hold onto what happened to Cameron and 13 last week. I wish I could donate some of my neurons to someone who would use them better. I wish I could give them to a cancer researcher, or a cop or one of the writers of Glee. Not to say that any of those people are dumb (well, Glee, Papa Don't Preach?? REALLY?)but I just know that I'm not using mine for any good purpose other than to create imaginary fights and problems and to talk myself out of doing all the things that I am capable of doing, so I'd like to give them to someone who would put them to better use. I recently heard an anecdote about people who were given lobotomies. All of their symptoms of depression and psychosis were gone, but when their brain chemistry was tested nothing had changed. It's not that they had actually been cured. Their dopamine was still super low. They were still very crazy, its just that the procedure had cause them to stop caring. It had disconnected one center of neurons from another center of neurons and the neurons couldn't gossip about how much everything sucks anymore. (I'm not really sure how a lobotomy works, but you get my driftu.) I feel like if I nixed a bunch of my neurons I'd just stop caring and stressing, and be able to live my life. Like a worm. Blissfully unaware of all the great societal pressures and stresses that we humans believe we have to bear because we have all of these extra neurons that need SOMETHING to do. As I write this I realize I'm proposing some serious sci-fi mind control shit. If you make the people dumb they won't ask any questions anymore and the powers that be can do as they please. Well, personally I'm fine with that. As long as I have enough neurons to get a cup of coffee in the morning and at least start a crossword puzzle that's gravy.
My next step is how to get rid of the errant neurons. I've tried the whole heavy drinking thing. They come back in the morning. With a vengeance. I'm told huffing glue kills some brain cells. But I don't even know where to buy industrial strength glue. Crack? I think I'm too dorky to buy it. Back to square one. I guess I'll go to bed, wake up tomorrow morning and start a new labyrinth. Stressing the fuck out as I do.

Scrooge McD

2008-11-11T13:16:00.000-08:00

Whadddup muthafuckezzz. I'm back. And BOY HOWDY do I have some tales of retardation. But not all at once. We musn't give ourselves a tummy ache. I'll start with my most recent feat of Corky-like strength and I Am Sam-esque genius. (What did you say? Oh right. Nobody said anything because nobody's actually reading this.)
I'm currently without emplyoment. Which for the most part I love. I mean, I ain't got shit to do. I sit around all day and hang out with the dog. Scratch that...I yell at the dog for EATING MY MOTHERFUCKING SOCKS I ONLY HAVE LIKE 3 PAIRS YOU PIECE OF SHIT. But at any rate, my day-to-day is pretty cool. Except when I have the fear. And all the loathing. I've been drinking a lot more lately and the fear has been having a return tour at all the major metropolitan areas of my brain. And also some of the smaller venues that they play just for the fans.
F & L can get you to think and, in turn, DO some pretty effed up stuff. It's like going to bed Padma Lakshima from Top Chef and waking up that white bitch Kim, from the Real Housewives of Atlanta. It's all highs and lows. I was on one such low last week and was having a knife fight in my noggin about my finances. Which are totally fucked, bee tee dub. We've all been unemployed at one point or another, and if I know my fanbase.....gulp. Cricket. If I know myself I know that when I'm jobless I'll often peruse Ye Olde Craig's List looking for that magical job that doesn't require me to change out of my lime green sweat pants but will have me raking in the dough hand over fist. Well wouldn't you know I found it. "WORK FROM HOME MAKE TONS OF OF MONEY! YOU WON'T HAVE TO SEE FUCKING ASSHOLES FROM YOUR OFFICE THAT YOU GOT DRUNK WITH AND SAID AWKWARD SHIT TO! DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR CAREER PATH? OR MUCH OF ANYTHING ELSE FOR THAT MATTER? THIS JOB IS FOR YOU!" If you think I didn't try and contact the folks that posted this job you are fucking retarded, because I TOTALLY DID! About 14 seconds after I contacted the listing I got an email back which outlined how I could sign up for this "job" with only a minimal, one-time fee and have access to the potential for LIMITLESS WEALTH! I totally pictured myself as Scrooge McDuck when he dives into his swimming pool filled with coin. (I've pondered this idea a lot and have come to the conclusion that diving into pool full of coins would fucking kill. But Scrooge McD looks pretty dope in his bathing costume and thus it remains in my fantasy pile.)
I think you can pretty much see how the rest of this story goes, but maybe not because I doubt any of you have been STUUUPID enough to even click on one of these postings on Craig's List LET ALONE go to the site LET ALONE pay the $39.95 one-time, minimal sign up fee. But who's got 2 thumbs and is a total fucking shit show when she feels insecure about her life? DIS GUUYYYY!!!! I did it. I signed up and I paid. The fee allows you access to this database of surveys that you can fill out and get paid for your participation. I figured this would be a good plan for me because at one time in my life I was fucking phenomenal at doing a shit load of data entry type work wicked fast, albeit with very poor quality. I figured I could bang out a couple of dozen surveys a week and I'd be snorkeling with the guy who made the Girls Gone Wild videos by Thanksgiving. This, sadly, was not to be. As it turns out you have to qualify for the survey, and I guess when you lie about everything on the screening questions you don't really qualify for that many surveys. Who would have thunk? Also, a lot of the surveys are actually just free trials for term health insurance and smoking cessation aids which you get paid to sign up for. Fuck that. If I wanted to get all fucked up on some nicotine patches I'd get them the old fashioned way: hold up Duane Reade at gun point and steal them.
Signing up and paying for this shit is pretty dumb for the average bear. It's particularly retarded for someone such as mahself, considering my employment history. I actually worked for a company that required payment up front for using a database but made no guarantees that the database of shit that you just got access to would do dick all to advance your current status in life. I believe the term we used was "We give you all the tools..." the conclusion to that sentence is "we don't give a shit wether you use those tools to clamp your own nipples and fuck a goat as long as you pay us first." The website I signed up for made similar claims. They talked about how the most successful customers were the ones who signed up for the most surveys. (read: the people who gave the most traffic to the affiliates and get us paid.) They said that you only got out of the site what you put in. (read: you're not making money? That's your fault, shit brain.) I think I actually saw this coming a mile away, but in my f & l weaked state I needed a quick fix to my financial crisis and this site was just the $7 trillion bail out package my life needed. Good move, tard. So far I've made $6 taking surveys. I now see how these scam sites prey on the weak of mind and of life. Which is a good plan. This is why smart, unscrupulous people are rich and people with bad impluse control and no inheritance are poor. A fool and his money are soon parted? A black out drunk and her self-esteem are soon parted...with their money? How ever that saying goes. I now see that in order to actually make money you either have to do real work or something illegal.

So. In short, I have learned several things from this experience:

1.) I'm an asshole.
2.) Drinking makes me crazy.
3.) I will continue to drink, and act crazy until one of these hairbrained, cockamamie schemes actually works.
4.) I need to be less dorky and figure out something illegal to do.

The Resurrection of B. Spears

2008-09-19T10:06:00.001-07:00

The following essay is not meant to be blasphemous or scholarly. It’s simply an analysis of two historical figures which will seek to draw conclusions about how society deals and dealt with people in the public eye. Jesus Christ was born somewhere between the years 2 and 7 BC/BCE. Britney Spears was born on December 2, 1981. Jesus was the son of a carpenter, Spears the child of a former elementary school teacher and a building contractor. Nothing of their very early life would foretell of what was to come for these two people. However each would, in their own way, eventually become an icon for the culture in which they lived. Both would rise to a status which thrust them into the public eye. Both would reach a level of fame and notoriety few had accomplished before and both would eventually fall before their judges and meet their demise, be it literal or figurative. The following essay will draw logical connections between the lives of these two enigmatic and controversial characters, hopefully to discern the role the public played in their rise, fall and eventual resurrection.
The stories of both Britney and Jesus begin well before their respective baptism, but for our purposes we’ll begin there. Jesus was baptized in the desert by his distant cousin, John. It’s a source of controversy in the Catholic Church that Christ was baptized by John. The Gospel of Matthew recounts that John was hesitant to perform the baptism, and insisted that Jesus perform the rite. But Jesus persuaded John, and the ceremony marked the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. Many member of the Catholic Church find it somewhat embarrassing that the future figurehead of the Christian church was baptized in the desert by a relative unknown.
Britney’s figurative baptism could be marked by her debut single, Baby One More Time. She was just 17 years old when it was released. As a teen in the music world, she sparked controversy with the video to that song and her naughty school girl costume. This song, and the album which would go platinum 14 times over, would mark her debut onto the international music scene. Britney began her career singing in the Baptist church of the town she grew up in. The song which marked her debut into the world of popular music caused quite a stir among the Church and other religious and conservative groups.
It’s the classic and cautionary tale of fame which tells of the temptation one encounters along the way. After Jesus was baptized he was lead out into the desert by God to fast for 40 days and 40 nights. During that time he was visited and tempted 3 times by the Devil. Each time he denied the temptation citing scripture of the Old Testament.
Britney was a virtual child in the entertainment industry. A sheep among wolves, if you will. Before she could really adjust to the fame she was caught up in the star-making machine. After her first album, she quickly followed up with another. She churned out hit after hit and was raking in money and fame hand over juvenile fist. It was inevitable that she would encounter temptation along the way. In 1999 she posed for the cover of Rolling Stone magazine in a photo shoot by David LaChapelle. ‘The American Family Association charged that the pictures, which showed Spears in push-up bras and a minuscule pair of shorts with "Baby" in rhinestones on the bottom, presented a "disturbing mix of childhood innocence and adult sexuality" and asked that all "God-loving Americans" boycott stores carrying her albums’ (Wikipedia) At this point she also began dating Justin Timberlake, and despite her claims that she would remain a virgin until she was married she was reported to have had a sexual relationship with him.
This is where one distinct divergence between these two narratives arises: Denial v. acquiescence. Jesus was tempted by the Devil over and over during his time in the desert but he continually denied the temptation. Spears on the other hand seemed to barrel headlong into the temptations offered up by Hollywood and the music industry and wholeheartedly accept all which they had to offer.
Another key difference between Jesus and Britney could potentially help to explain the aforementioned point of denial v. acquiescence. Jesus had a very close inner circle of supporters. Firstly and most important Jesus always had God in his corner. At myriad points in the narrative of Jesus God comes to Jesus to offer support and encouragement. God is a tangible character in Jesus’ life and when Jesus is tested he has that presence to remind of the right path. Jesus also had a close-knight group of followers, the Apostles. Britney Spears was raised as a Southern Baptist. Some might say that she also had God in her corner, or so her preacher and church community might tell her, however that all gets pretty diluted when you’re uprooted from your family and moved thousands of miles away from that community. Britney had been a show-business kid well before she was actually in show business and that hectic lifestyle didn’t allow for much time for childhood friends, or close ones at the very least. Her family was probably her biggest supporters, but when fame and fortune comes knocking it’s anybody’s guess who will stick by you.
At the height of Jesus’ ministry he was preaching to audiences numbering in the thousands. For an itinerant priest, preaching to people hiding from persecution, that’s a pretty good crowd. Before Britney Spears she turned 20 in 2001, Spears had sold more than 37 million albums worldwide. Even at the height of their notoriety both Christ and Spears seemed drawn to a "questionable" element. Jesus often met with society's outcasts, such as the emperor's moneylenders. The Pharisees protested, saying that Jesus should spend his time preaching to the righteous. This was one of the very early cracks that began to form between the early followers of Jesus and mainstream Judaism.
In 2006 Britney Spears guest-starred on Will and Grace as a closeted lesbian. This role drew criticism from conservative Christian groups who were most likely already disillusioned by Miss Spears due to her sexually loaded stage performances and song lyrics. In 2004 Spears married her one-time backup dance, Kevin Federline who had recently been linked to actress Shar Jackson who was 8 months pregnant with their child.
These events and many more like them were fodder which would begin to fan the flame of disapproval that licked at the careers and lives of both Jesus and Spears. Both would be called upon to defend their actions to the world at large and both their lives would become public spectacle over which neither of them had very much control.
In the account given by the synoptic gospels, Jesus entered the city of Jerusalem during the Passover festival and created a disturbance at Herod’s temple by overturning the moneylender’s tables claiming that Herod had turned the temple into a “den of robbers” (Wikipedia and The Bible) He was later arrested by the temple guards and put to trial. He and his apostles were praying and in the garden of Gesthemane at the time of his arrest. The temple guards knew to arrest Jesus because one of his Apostles, Judas, had accepted payment to point him out. He signaled Jesus’ identity by kissing him on the cheek in sight of the guards. Jesus was put to trail, but Pilate, the governor found him guilty of no crime. He could not let him go free lest a riot ensue so he put the choice to the mob: they could vote to release one prisoner, the convicted murder Barabbas or Jesus. The crowd chose to release Barabbas. Jesus was to be executed.
On November of 2006 Britney Spears filed for divorce from Kevin Federline. From February of 2007 through September of 2007 Spears was in and out of various drug and alcohol treatment programs. As the legal battle over the custody of their children continued, many members of her entourage have been summoned to testify about her parenting skills. (Wikipedia) One such testimony came from one of Spears’ bodyguards “Fat” Tony Barretto which made allegations about her dangerous lifestyle and lackluster parenting abilities. Spears lost custody of her children to Federline on October 1, 2007.
Jesus was crucified by his peers on the Hill of Golgotha, and by all accounts died in the late afternoon. The details of Christs’ last day are gory and horrific to say the least. He suffered more physical, mental and spiritual torment than anyone should ever have to see in 1,000 lifetimes. After he finally died his body was moved to a tomb which was to be his final resting place.
Britney Spears suffered her own version of crucifixion. It may seem outrageous to draw a similarity between what Christ suffered and what Spears suffered, but to place the suffering of one human on a higher plane than the suffering of another human is a tricky thing. To make a judgment on the suffering of human beings necessarily says that one human life is more important than another. The vast majority of the human populace would say that Jesus Christ was more important than Britney Spears. At one time the vast majority of the human populace thought white people were more important than black people. The human populace is a strange entity.
At one point in her life Britney Spears was one of the most beloved and sought after performers in the history of music and stage. She was idolized by millions of teenagers and lusted after by probably billions of the denizens of the internet. After that she had two sons. She was wealthy and beautiful and she had at least two people in her life that for the time being would love her unconditionally. She had “it all”. But for whatever reason she felt the need to single-handedly destroy it. She lost her music career, she lost many of her fans and she lost her sons. Each day she would look in the mirror and see everything that she was and had and all that she had lost. And then she would turn on the TV and the radio and go on the internet and read a magazine and the newspaper and she would see it more. She was most likely and alcoholic and a drug addict. She may have suffered from mental illness. But it can be argued that at least the substance abuse was brought on by the pressure to stay at the dizzying levels that she had achieved and the mental illness could have been caused be falling from that height. I personally cannot imagine the suffering that this woman must have gone through. And the worst part, to my mind, was that it was her and her alone that got her to the top, and it was also her actions and hers alone that brought her down so low. On January 31st a judge placed Spears under co-conservatorship of her father James Spears and Attorney Andrew Wallette, giving them complete control of her assets. (Wikipedia)
During Jesus’ trail he was asked if he was the King of the Jews. His reply is ambiguous, and some gospels translate it as “It is as you say.” That was enough of an admission of guilt for the accusing priests and the public at large to warrant his crucifixion. Before he was crucified he was imprisoned and the Roman soldiers tortured him. As a joke on of the soldiers created a crown of thorns for him and placed it upon his head. The crown worn by the King of the Jews was created by someone else. The title King of the Jews was put in his mouth and his admission to hold that title was coerced and his words twisted.
Britney Spears was crowned the Princess of Pop by the media and the entertainment industry. With her impressive record sales, and Grammy award numbers it was a well deserved title. However, when her life started to go awry the same people that put the crown on her head were only too happy to throw it in her face later on. Just as Jesus’ title brought nothing but a painful crown and his ultimate death, Britney’s title, in the end came back to bring her nothing but the memory or what she was and the realization of what she had lost. It brought her to the moment of her ultimate spiritual and emotional crucifixion.
Needless to say, it’s a cognitive leap to assume the similarities between Jesus Christ and Britney Spears. But how much of the vast difference that we perceive between them is actual fact? How much of that was part of their actual life and how much of it was created by external factors? It’s possible to assume that the role that each of them plays in the world and history at large is nothing more than iconography created by society. Jesus became the icon of the Christians and Britney Spears became the icon of the evils of excess getting too much too fast. Vanessa Grigoriadis reported in "The Tragedy of Britney Spears" (2008), her cover story for Rolling Stone, that "more than any other star today, Britney epitomizes the crucible of fame for the famous: loving it, hating it and never quite being able to stop it from destroying you." Did either of them ever ask for these labels or roles? Jesus at no point ever actually called himself the King of the Jews, and Britney Spears, although she worked hard a tried to achieve fame and success at no point asked to become the epitome of the crucible of fame and success.

After Jesus was crucified and laid to rest in his stone tomb, a number of his apostles were headed to the town of Emmaus to eat dinner. Jesus appeared to them, but at first they could not properly see that it was him. Later while having supper at Emmaus "their eyes were opened" and they recognized him.

Recently pictures of Britney Spears began to surface in which she looked really good, more like her old self. The Britney Spears of In the Zone. Said the writer of The Superficial “Britney Spears hit up Vegas over the holiday weekend and, Jesus, she looks surprisingly awesome. I guess being deemed mentally unstable really does shed the pounds. Who knew? Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to explain to my confused penis it's not 2001 again. At ease, soldier!” She has regained visitation rights to her 2 sons, and she’s successfully completed her treatment program. Spears was asked to appear at the VMAs, but a backup act was arranged in case Britney reverted to her old tricks. Britney appeared, looking beautiful and won 3 awards including Video of the Years.

“But, in all seriousness, I hope Britney Spears appreciates my enthusiasm. There's no greater compliment you can give a woman than "Hey, nice rack." Chivalry: it's what's for dinner.” – The Superficial

Later while having supper at Emmaus "their eyes were opened" and they recognized her.

Way to Stop Committing

2008-09-15T10:59:00.000-07:00

I got really drunk this weekend and now I have fear and loathing. Also, I arrived at work today and my boss shoveled a pile of shit-work on my head. In my alcohol induced malaise and my busy-work fueled rancor, I bring you Emo Post.

I've been thinking about the title of this blog a lot lately. In the past almost-year I've become a less violent and hateful towards most everything, so sometimes reading the word "destroy" on my own blog can give me a bit of a shock. Then I remember what I actually meant with the title. I was trying to say I don't do things I'm not good at for very long. The first post on this blog is about how if the blog "sucked" I'd stop posting. So then I got to thinking about the things that I'm really good at. The things that I "destroy". And I realize there really aren't that many. I'm good at working. I'm good at drinking. Not lately, but that's kind of like riding a wiggly, black-out bike. When I actually do commit myself to things I'm usually pretty good at them, but I haven't committed myself to very much so those things are few and far between. The reason I'm not good at anything is the title of this blog.

When I was growing up my intelligence was regarded much more highly than my work ethic. I actually have a superb work ethic (read: I'm a total fucking martyr) but that never mattered. I always thought that everything would just come really easily to me because I was smart. Whenever I was bad at something, or got a bad grade it was for some reason that I was always secretly proud. "My mind works faster than my mouth" - Why I spoke incredibly fast and had problems getting ideas across verbally. "I'm not good with details" - Why I would get As and Bs for content and F-s for punctuation, grammar and mechanics. "I work better under pressure" - my procrastination. The list goes on. I was always very willing to accept my faults as long I had this one ace in the hole, my intellect. Then I turned 12 and went to boarding school. That was no help either, because I got into almost every boarding school I applied to so OBVIOUSLY I was a genius. I realize after the fact that when you're one of two kids in a single parent household need-based scholarships and acceptance letters are pretty much par for the course. Basically, they needed to fill some poor kid quota. My grades were terrible in high school. I was on academic probation a lot. I always had to go to the library during study hall, because otherwise I'd sit in my dorm room and harass my roommate who was trying to get her shit done. She had realized the importance of hard work. She's a doctor now. My mom thought I was rebelling. I didn't think about it because my social life at the time was far more important to me than any fucking $20k education. I did get good grades in some classes, and those were the classes that I enjoyed. When I didn't like a class I just sucked at it or maybe I didn't like it because I sucked at it and didn't want to have to try.

That pattern held into my adult life. That little ego that had formed when I was young turned into a total fucking monster in and after college. I couldn't handle doing things that I was bad at because I was so terrified of being embarrassed and called out for my fraudulent genius. I loved Art History (read: was good at and didn't really have to try too hard) in high school and college, so I figured I'd get something in that field when I was done with school. I moved to NYC after graduation and half-assedly applied to some gallery and museum jobs. Then I went to an interview at a (non-art) company that told me I was going to be a super-star! It lined up perfectly with my secret knowledge that I would somehow become wildly successful without ever having to do anything difficult. Ever. Hey, look! I got a sweet job with little, to no effort. I didn't even have to apply. They found me on Monster. I didn't need any specific background, and due to the youth of the company if I played my cards right I could be a total fucking success without actually ever having to try too hard or commit to anything. PERFECT! Not that I didn't work hard at that job, I totally did. But only at the stuff that I knew I was going to be good at: putting up numbers. I always did the most. Not the best. When project came around that actually required me to think outside of the box or use my brain I would pretty much shut down. I'd make a serious face, shake my head and go to the snack room for some coffee. What if my idea was bad? What if it didn't work? Here was my rationalization for that - "I'm the workhorse. Someone else can come up with the ideas."

Now, here I am, 27 years old and I'm not really good at anything simply because I was / am too scared to suck at anything for long enough to master it. Now I'm not saying that I was raised badly, that's not it at all. I'm also not saying it's too late for me. I'm still young. (Not as young as most of the dudes I try and date, but young all the same.) I'm just kind of excited that I've realized this. That sucking at something isn't all that bad. It's actually kind of fun to learn something new. Can you imagine? Just realizing this now? At 27? It's like being a kid again. I mean it's always going to be hard when I get to the point where my newly forming skill doesn't develop as fast as I want it to. That's currently happening with this marathon training. I'm about half-way in and I had a shitty run today. The FIRST thing I thought was "Oh well, I guess I'll just bail. I mean, I'm not a runner anyway. My boobs are too big." So that little voice inside me is always there, I don't think I can ever get it to go away. But I can choose to react to it differently. In this case I just have to keep calm and wake up tomorrow morning and put my fucking running sneakers on again. We'll see. Maybe I do bail. Then I'm a fucking asshole. AGAIN.

So at any rate, the title of this blog has taken on a different meaning for me. And it's actually kind of embarrassing that I felt that way at any point. More embarrassing? I probably always will. I'm still scared of looking dumb whilst sucking at stuff. I'm scared to learn because there's still that douchy person inside me that thinks that if I need to learn more stuff I'm not perfect and that means I'm a failure. For that reason I'm going to leave the title. As a reminder. Also, I don't actually know how to change it because I've never committed myself to getting good at using computers or this blog for that matter. Can somebody tell how to capitalize the first i??

Dirt in the Skirt, Jane. Dirt in the skirt.

2008-09-10T17:38:00.000-07:00

So I was trying to think about what I would write in reference to Martha Jane's b-day. I was trying to think of whom Martha most reminds me. Who else is smart, funny, hardcore (not porn...I don't think. Woah, Jane. Woah.) good at everything, goddam fine-looking and has a style sensibility that won't quit? (Don't act like this is the first time I've ever hit on you.) And then it dawned on me, clear as a baseball one-piece skirt/shirt thingy wearing day: Dottie Mutha Flippin Hinson.

"Then there's pretty Dottie Henson, who plays like Gehrig, and looks like Garbo. Uh-uh, fellas, keep your mitts to yourself; she's married."

Then I got to thinking, who would play everyone else if I were casting the single greatest movie in cinematic history? Let the hijinx ensue:

Dottie: Martha Jane "You KNOW you're not going to try and hit no fucking pop-fly in my ballpark while I'm trying to eat this delicious cupcake"Armitage

Kit Keller: Savage (You totally swing at the high ones. And you kind of got traded / fired.)

Mae "All the Way" Mordabito: Bizzle, obviously. You talk about your bosoms more than anyone I know.

Doris Murphy: Yeah, I know you were all thinking it before I even started this fucking post. I'm Doris.

Casting Note: The roles of Mae and Doris can be played by either Bizzle or the author as they are basically the same person and stand for all the same things which include but are not limited to: "Everybody Wang Chung" Wednesdays, Chili Con Carne slip n' slides for all public schools, the prohibition of all non-alcoholic beverages after 4pm every 3rd week of the month, strawberry flavored milk and Cloris Leachman.

Bob Hinson: Uncle Graeme Bagg. Congrats, GB. Both on becoming an uncle AND coming back from the war to a hot woman's baseball league heroine. And on your sweet limp.

Jimmy Duggan: Sarah Sallee. Also played by Sarah Sallee: Febuary, March and Fauvism.

Marla Hooch: She's not in this version because she's ugly.

Walter Harvey: Robert Gordon "Careers and higher education are leading to the masculinization of women, with enormously dangerous consequences to the home, the children, and our country. When our boys come home from war, what kind of girls will they be coming home to? And now the most disgusting example of this sexual confusion: Mr. Walter Harvey of Harvey bars is presenting us with women's baseball. Right here in Chicago, young girls plucked from their families are gathered at Harvey Field, to see which one of them can be the most masculine. Mr. Harvey, like your candy bars, you're completely... nuts." Soffel.

Betty Spaghetti: Who else do you know that looks like spaghetti? Sorry about the whole "dead husband" thing, Mona Spaghetti.

Ernie Capadino: Yeeeeaaaaah Squilla. "Pickle-Tickle" is totally something you'd say / do.

Stillwell Angel: Ben Perper.

I think that's not even close to all of the characters, but my creative juices have dried up and I'm spent. (Ew. TWSS?) At any rate, happy birthday Auntie Jane. I hope the grass stains come out of your baseball bootie shorts and that the poor chick in the back of the bus finally learns to read because I know it pisses you off the hear her stuttering through the good part of that trashy novel.

All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Victory Song

Batter up! Hear that call! The time has come for one and all To play ball. We come from cities near and far. We've got Canadians (WOO), Irishmen and Swedes, We're all for one, we're one for all We're All-Americans! Each girl stands, her head so proudly high, Her motto 'Do or Die.' She's not the one to use or need an alibi. Our chaperones are not too soft, They're not too tough, Our managers are on the ball. We've got a president who really knows his stuff, We're all for one, we're one for all, We're All-Americans!

A Music Video

2008-09-09T09:46:00.001-07:00

Dear Tony & Paul,

Just to reiterate, if you ever cast a music video without involving me again, I'll cut your fucking hearts out in front of your girlfriends and various pets.

Kisses.

-Moi

Confession.

2008-09-08T14:31:00.000-07:00

I'm a plagarist. And I won an award for it.

I just remembered this the other day. We (it's none of your business who "we" is. My private life is my own.) were at the library, checking out some literature which chronicled the lives of great historical figures such as Bob the Builder and Thomas the Tank Engine, when my eye fell upon a Brian Jaques book. I used to love Brian Jaques books. For those of you that don't know, he wrote a few literary gems called "Redwall", "Mossflower" and my personal favorite, "Martin the Warrior". I read these books non-stop when I was a tot. In bed at night, on the school bus, in class, all the time. I would carry around these huge, hard-cover novels with pictures of talking animals in castles getting into battles with other animals on them and wonder why I wasn't friends with the cool girls with the scrunchies and the layered slouch socks and the long t-shirts and belts. I still wonder.....

When I saw the book my first emotion was happiness and nostalgia because I remember just loving the shit out of those things. But then there was something else. What was it? Is that the FEAR?? How could this be? Why was I getting fear and loathing in the middle of the children's section of the West Tisbury Free Library??

Back when subject were "English", "Math" and "Gym" my favorite subject in elementary school was obviously English. Gym probably would have been my favorite if it hadn't been for the girls in the slouch socks making fun of how I ran. I would find out later in life that I have a gait which could be likened to a popular snack food, the Chicken Nugget. (I was informed of this in high school by a chap named Christoph Boominghaus. he would yell, "Chickeen Nugggeetttt!" in his German accent, and then throw me into the bushes outside of the cloisters of my prestigious boarding school. I think you guys are getting a pretty clear picture of my formative years, no?)

I used to enter all of the writing contest in elementary school. One such contest was a creative writing contest. I think it was fourth or fifth grade. I wrote a story, submitted it to the contest and went back to my life of dorkery without thinking too much more about it. The day they announced the winners of the contests there was an all-school assembly. Grades 1 - 5 gathered in the gym, and Dr. Vogel, the principal, stood up to give a speech and announce the prizes. Dr. Vogel totally ruled. He was about 65 when I was 10, and he was tall and bald and wore a bow-tie. He used to play the guitar in class and use really funny voices. I think in hindsight he was a #1, class-A candidate for a pedophile charge, but maybe I'm just jaded and think that all tall, bald dudes who play the guitar for children and talk in weird voices want to get into little-kid chinos. (Belle, this in not inclusive of any of your family members.)

When he announced the prizes he went from 3rd prize up to 1st prize. I think I kind of let it go after 2nd prize because there's no way in HELL I was going to win. I didn't win stuff. (I still don't, unless someone, who will remain fabulously and glamorously unnamed, stuffs the ballot box thus securing me a mouse pad with fruit on it and a cash prize. Come on, YOU ALL KNEW I DIDN'T DESERVE THAT SHIT!!) Then he read the title of my story. And my name. I had won. Part of the prize was that Dr. Vogel stood up in front of the whole THE WHOLE fucking school and read the story. Guess what my story was about. Oh, did you say "Talking animals living in castles getting into battles with other animals"? Yahtzee. Before he read my story he went on and on about how the story had won because of it's originality. I don't even think I realized I had stolen from the Jaques books until Big Vog started reading my story out loud. It was exactly like these stories sounded in my head. Dr. Vogel went up there and gave an amazing performance of the words B. Jaques had written. Homeboy would have been proud. But not I, not fucking I. I was horrified. Now everybody was going to know that I was a total fraud. Someone in this gymnasium is going to stand up, and point at me and call me a fucking liar. I looked around at the crowd. People were pointing at me alright. The scrunchie girls were whispering at each other and pointing at my fucked up haircut and palazzo pants. Holy shit. Nobody else had read these books. My obscure nerdery had somehow saved me. Nobody was going to find out. I'm just like Malcolm in the Middle but about 1/8 as smart!!!!

When I got home and announced my victory my mom was SO proud. My brother totally knew. He'd actually given me the books in the first place. I think he actually called me out but there was too much of a kerfuffle surrounding my prize and his protests were drowned out. I had gotten away with it. And it was at then that I stopped thinking about that day completely, until 17 years later when I would walk into a library and have a fucking heart attack upon seeing a book about some talking animals living in a castle getting into battles with other animals.

I wonder how many things in my past I'm suppressing. Maybe I'm not even writing this blog.

Eh, I'd have to the biggest douche alive to copy this garbage.

Okay, That joke I posted a couple of weeks ago? I stole it. Oops. I think I was supposed to suppress that.

I forgot to tell you guys....

2008-08-27T10:16:00.000-07:00

Something rad happened a while ago. I don't know, a couple of weeks? A month? Time? Fuck time.

At any rate, Annie was here visiting me and we were ruling at leisure time, like we always do. Annie and I love ourselves a good crossword puzzle because it makes us feel wicked smart. We'd picked up the Globe and we were all set up on the beach, fully prepared to perpetrate some verbal wizardry when we came to the crushing realization that we were without writing implement. Woe is motherfucking us. We lapsed into a disappointed silence, I ate a bunch of crackers and I think Annie fell asleep. A little while later I was squinting out at the ocean trying to decide if I wanted to go swimming or not, considering the recent outbreak of jellyfish sightings. As I looked at the water a shape began to materialize and I thought it was just another piece of flotsam jettisoned from one of the schooners, junks or yachts which call the waters off of Lambert's Cove home. When I took a closer look I was shocked to realize that there, floating in the ocean, directly in front of where Annie and I had set up our beach shanty town, was a motherfucking Bic pen. I leapt up from my ex-company sponsored beach blanker and charged into the briny in order to retrieve this prize. It was pretty funny that some old pen had floated in front of us just when we were talking about how much we needed a pen. More funny still? The pen worked. We were able to actually DO the crossword puzzle with this pen which we had fished out of the sea.

I just thought this ruled because I'm sure I was laying on my towel thinking "Man, I really want lots of money, a rad boyfriend, a good job, fame, notoriety, approval, liposuction etc." And along floats a pen. Just what I needed.

The words of a great Rolling Stones song immediately came to mind.

No, guys, not Honky Tonk Woman. No, it's not Gimme Shelter either. Beast of Burden? You're like, not even close. Guys, did you pay attention to my story at ALL?

Agreed, B of B is a great song.

No, I'm not mad at you.

Yes, we're okay.

I love you too.

If Blogging Were an Olympic Sport I Would Have Quit in Middle School Because I Hate Changing in Public.

2008-08-25T08:18:00.000-07:00

I haven't been feeling too bloggy lately. Basically I've got nothing to write about. I just don't feel that strongly about anything in my life right now. I don't hate anything or anybody, which always makes for a great blog post. I mean, Crocs kind of bother me, but I'm even starting to feel a little fondly towards them because they look pretty cute on little kids and when hot guys wear them they're not a total deal-breaker like a Teva or a Birkenstock would be. I haven't been consuming any media lately so I don't have any celebs to talk about and I don't have any friends so I don't go out and drink a lot so I don't embarrass myself (except for the the average fist-pump-in-the-grocery-store-because-of-coupon-for-free-cup-of-genric-brand-yogurt kind of way) so I don't wake up in the morning with overwhelming fear and loathing which causes me to want to think (or write on a blog) about ANYTHING aside from my own fucked up, retarded life. Essentially, I'm good for now. And "good" does not for interesting bloghorreah make.

So I sez to myself I sez "Self, you've got to got out and get yourself some FEAR! Where in the world can you come up with some LOATHING? Hmmm. Let me think. Oh yeah, MOTHERFUCKING GOTHAM!!" When I moved from NY to Boston I had developed such a massive case of fear and loathing that I believe it actually took control of my body and physically propelled me out of the Tri-State area. The last thing I remember of being in New York was sitting on my brother's couch, paging through my outgoing text messages with horror and revulsion and the next thing I know I'm trudging through a snow drift outside of South Station. My fear and loathing infested body somehow managed to get my decroded ass and 5 bags on a Fung Wah bus without the involvement my semi-psychotic brain. Nice job, Fear.

So I figured, what better than a couple of days in the N to the Y to the C to get my brain riled up enough to spew out some garbage on this self-involved shit pile I call my blog? Also, and the main reason for the trip was that Bob was on the Eastern seaboard for a couple of days and you know I'm not going to pass up an opportunity to see him whilst he was state-side. Bob: Your spectacles are magnificent. But things didn't work out as I had planned. When the morning of my departure rolled around I was expecting to wake up at like 3:30am in the fetal position, with my eyes wide open, staring at nothing. (that's my F & L pose.) But I didn't. I woke up. Oak and I drank coffee. I got on the train, and by Ashton Kutcher's wife beater, I was sad to be leaving. I wasn't fleeing the scene. I'd managed to have a visit to NYC without leaving in a hail of bullets. Fuck. WHAT AM I GOING TO WRITE ABOUT NOW???

Well I'll tell you what I'm going to write about, and it's Olympic Racewalking. This. Sport. Is. FANTASTICAL! (With a capital testicle.) Yes, I know. God, you're all very predictable. You're wondering how interesting or competitive a sport which involves walking can be. Well. shut the fuck up. This shit is real. I only watched the women, because I think the male competition would have cause one of the aneurysms which obviously riddle my brain to explode like a blood-bloated mosquito feeding from a diner, lingering too long about the outdoor buffet. (That sentence either deserves a Nobel Prize for Literature or made you queasy. Either way, I rule.) Okay, I'm not even sure where to begin. I can imagine you've all inferred from previous entries that I idolize the thin. Usually female athletes, although technically shapely, are too beefy for my taste because my ideal body weight ranges from infant - 34 lbs. The athletes which compete in racewalking are just my cup of underweight tea. These bitches is SKINNY. The chick who won the competition weighed 94 lbs. I mean, how can you walk wicked fast for like 2 hours, weigh 94 lbs., and not be dead? That's mental toughness if I ever saw it! And the actual form of the racewalkers is totally impressive as well. I guess the name of the game is to walk as fast as you possible can, without actually running at any point. There are judges all along the race track that hand out flags when you break form. If anyone runs they can be disqualified. Apparently, this involves swinging your arms about frantically and swiveling your hips in a figure eight motion thus propelling your tiny stick figure along at a rapid pace. As a noted social and sports historian noted of the form "They look like drag queens sashaying down the catwalk." Well played, Historian. So basically, this sport involves wee, thin women, walking wicked fast, wearing tiny amounts of clothing (at one point I think a chick pulled her uterus and you could see it from the outside), swinging their arms and swiveling their hips down a race track. (Insert "Victoria Beckham at a half-off tanning salon sale" joke here, I suppose.)

I'm trying to figure out a good way to live out the rest of my days without having to get a real job. (With all these aneurysms it shouldn't be too long. *SIGH*.) When I saw these brave women swaying swiftly down the race track in Beijing, dollar signs filled my mind. I immediately began to think of how I could cash in on this phenomenon. There has to be money in this. Skinny bitches don't do shit unless there's money involved, right? (The world of the very thin is shrouded in mystery for me. At some point I'd like to spend a day in their shoes but my feet are too fat and they haven't yet invented a suit that can make that happen. When they do I'm going to steal it.) So my wheels begin to turn and I start to think of how we can send this competition commercial. We'll obviously have to have a reality TV show about a novice racewalker who trains and competes until they're at the Olympic level. Next thing, who do I know that is tiny, mentally tough, able to go long periods of time without food while displaying remarkable stamina (ie day-long drinking binges and hung-over walks from Soho to the UES). Who's got incredibly pointy elbows that can cut a competitor down with one slash? Who, at very word "contest" immediately begins to figure out what she's going to do when she wins because losing ain't in the vocab?

Jen, when you get back from London we've got to start filming a pilot. Mona, feel like playing the fierce competition who we want to hate but can't help but respect?

Note: If anybody is actually reading this blog and doesn't now who Jen or Mona are, get a job or read a real blog. Or offer me money to stop blogging. All of the aforementioned options are acceptable.

I May Need to Invest in a Night Light

2008-08-12T09:57:00.000-07:00

I wrote the screenplay for the next blockbuster horror film. Im my head. Whilst in bed, paralyzed by fear. If I'd had to pee, I would have peed. Right there in my bed. (Was that iambic pentameter?)

I live right next to a farm, so nighttime animal noises are par for the course. In the course of an evening I'll hear cats, dogs, cows, pigs, horses, chickens and roosters. There are actually several roosters, none which actually sound like roosters, or at least what you would imagine a real rooster to sound like. The roosters that live next door to me sound more like a combination of the following: the beginning of that Janet Jackson song "If", the grinding of a clutch in a standard and the noises which would come from one of those wiffle-balls-to-the-junk videos if the stupid soundtrack wasn't covering up the actual sound effects.

Last night I heard a noise which did not come from a farm animal. I don't know that it came from any Earthly creature of which I am aware. The sound I heard could maybe be compared to the fucked-up roosters, but add a child screaming and multiply it x 1,000. It was terrifying. And it ended very abruptly, so I wasn't exactly sure I'd heard it at all. Once I was fully awake I laid there and imagined what could be out there in the night making those noises. And thus my screenplay was born.

At one point in my life I was kind of a horror movie aficionado. I fucking loved them and was always searching for my next big scare. This all started with The Blair Witch Project. That movie scared the bejeesus out of me, and I've been hooked ever since. It was that kind of scary that at the time you totally wish it was over and that you could leave, but you're too scared to move and when it's over you want it back. (It's right here that I wish I could build a metaphor for some great love story I've been through, alas I've only gotten to Chapter 2 of my relationship book: "He's Just Not That Drunk Anymore.", hence I really have no frame of reference upon which to build such a metaphor.)

In my experience I find that 9 out of 10 scary movies begin to falter about 40 minutes into the film. I think the biggest mistake made by filmmakers is showing the bad guy / monster too early or at all. They are rarely well done, and in many cases it's kind of funny when they are finally revealed. Take for example, M. Night Shamylan movie "Signs". He didn't show the alien until the last 15 minutes so it didn't completely ruin it for me. But when he did finally show the alien the movie went from pretty effing scary to "UM, Is that some tall, gawky dude dressed in a camo body sock? Is that the outline of his package? I feel uncomfortable". I think the problem is that the filmmakers haven't spent enough time lying in their bed, alone, listening to bloodcurdling noises coming out of a pitch black night. One notable exception to this rule is The Descent, in which a bunch of chicks decide to go spelunking in some cave in Appalachia and encounter seriously fucked up shit. However, the scariest part of that movie is actually one of the female leads and her ability to both hook up with her best friend's husband and also kill shit. I highly recommend this film, and I didn't totally ruin the plot twists there. Just sort of. If you need to borrow a copy I totally own it.

Another mistake which filmmakers perpetrate is trying to give horror movies any sort of logical plot. Like when they try and give the monster some sort of sad, sordid past which seeks to explain why he's eating everyone's brains. Or that it's the Republican party who caused the release of the toxins that turned everyone into zombies. Horror movies need to be inexplicable. That's what makes them so scary, for me at least. You can't rationalize it. Rob Zombie does a really good job of making movies that are scary simply because you can't explain why they're happening. The victims aren't rich thoughtless assholes, or even sexually promiscuous hippies. They're nice normal people. The bad guys don't have some horrendous past that is causing them to be this way. They're just evil and like torturing and killing people. And they're not going to stop when the police come. They're probably going to kill the police. And maybe eat them. With cutlery. Terrifying cutlery.

My horror movie is going to start with an environmentalist goes out into the forest to live as he tries to find out why a particular species of moth is dying. Good guy + deep forest = awesome scary movie beginning. He's out there for a week and eventually befriends a squirrel (0r some other forest creature) who hangs out and keeps him company. (Note: There will be very little to no dialogue in this film. One great way to fuck up a scary movie is by letting some hack actor run all over the place throwing out pearls of retardation. Also, I suspect I'll be paying a hobo to be the hero of this film and my type of hobo needs to keep his trap shut lest he get all excited and vomit up the contents of last night's glue and malt liquor bender aka Cast and Crew Party.) Needless to say, aforemetioned cute forest creature ends up dead. Like, really dead. Hero is super bummed, but it's the deep forest, this stuff happens. Then weird stuff starts happening while hero is asleep, and he starts to hear strange noises (Like clicks. Clicks are wicked scary.) and find evidence of something fucking around in his vicinity. There will be several scenes of Hero lying in bed in complete darkness and silence. (Script notes: Hobo has fallen asleep or died.) Then Hero tries to contact the proper authorities. I'm not going to do any of that formulaic shit where the cops don't believe him and leave him to die, thus proving some bullshit point about the American justice system. In this movie the cops come out, and search the place and act like cops and do a really good job. But they don't find anything. Hero starts to believe that maybe he just imagined it all, but even so he's going to get ready to leave. Fuck the moths. He just needs one last night to pack up his stuff and get out of there. As he's laying in bed that night he starts to hear the weird noises again. (Scene of him lying in bed breathing loudly / chocking on a little bit of puke.) Then we hear the distinct noise of what sounds like tearing nylon. Like tent nylon. And then the brush of something passing through or against nylon. Hero is lying on his side in his bed, with his back to the tent. There is about 6 feet between he and the far wall of the tent. It would take about 4 seconds for something to move across this space. 1 second....2 seconds....3 seconds.....4 seconds. Hero is still lying there. Most likely paralyzed with fear / delrium tremens. Finally after about six seconds he starts to slowly sit up in bed. His breathing is ragged now, and that's the only sound. He knows there's something else in the tent. As he slowly turns around the darkness of the tent is only slightly broken by the moonlight coming in through a slit in the nylon wall. He squints to try and adjust his eyes to the lack of light. As his pupils dialate he thinks he can just make out the outline of something else in the room, but mostly he just senses its there. Until it begins to move. It's movement is slight, and it sort of bobs in place. It's back is turned to Hero but we can tell it has a vaguely human form. Hero catches his breath. The form stops moving and seems to tense. It begins to very slowly turn. We make out that it's about 4 feet tall and has a now obviously human form. We can discern a head, shoulders, torso, legs, feet. As the form turns the hole in the tent wall is stirred by a breeze and more light is let into the room. Some of this light falls across the front of the figure and we can see what it looks like. It has a bald head and a massive brow that hides where it's eyes should be. Where we would imagine a nose there are two holes and below that a perfectly round maw, circled with wrinkles and teeth. It's head rests on a short neck, below which extend two arms that end in hand-ish things which are tiny wrinkled and hairy. The torso is humanoid and below that two legs. The legs terminate in feet, which end not in toes, but instead in a sharp, pointy claw that reaches at least a foot from the thing's ankle. As we get this full picture of the creature it turns to fully face Hero and zeroes in on him. Then faster than we can see and much faster than Hero can act, the creature turns and begins to close the space between itself and the cot on which Hero sits. Then the movie's over.

So folks, this is what I was thinking about lying in my bed this morning at 3:39am as I listened to a raccoon skull fuck a squirrel. I have almost exactly copied the plot of Blair Witch except left out all the running through the forest and getting lost and shit. Mine may actually be more of a horror short than a feature length film. And in my movie I've incorporated my personal nightmare creature who has elements of all that which I fear in life: a small child, an elderly person, a midget, an uggo and excess body hair.

It's going to make billions.

I guess I'm going to have to get a job this fall after all.

Martha's Vineyard Directions

2008-08-12T06:20:00.000-07:00

This is copied and pasted from an actual set of directions which people are supposed to follow:

"Go west on State Road past the in-town supermarket, past the
out-of-town Black Dog, past the Tashmoo Overlook and tke first
right,on LAMBERT'S COVE ROAD.

Go perhaps 200 yards past Tashmoo Farm and turn right onto a big
dirt driveway just past a set of about two dozen mailboxes on
Northern Pines Road (actually it's Chappaquonsett Road, but the
Northern Pines people can't handle that, so we try not to rattle their
cage).

Continue on Northern Pines Road [sic] about 3/4 mile, past the
Thompson's farm on the left. If the hogs are loose, don't get out of
the car.

Just beyond there will be a fork marked by trees with multiple signs
attached including signs for the POND HOUSE and the SWINDLE. Take a
right angle turn to the left there on Army Road (built by the Army in
the 1940s when they used the area for amphib landing practice).

Follow Army Road and it's famed "Six Hills" until it enters a
clearing. Do not go left to Hilly and Nancy Thompson's house. Bear
right, following the signs for the POND HOUSE .

About 200 yards beyond will be the 2nd drive to the right to a
two-story cape visible through the trees. Voila! You have reached the
POND HOUSE.

If you can see the water you have gone just a little too far."

I wish Mapquest was kind enough to tell you what to do in the event of hogs.

A Joke

2008-08-10T11:13:00.000-07:00

A mother was sitting on the couch reading a book when one of her children walked up to her and said, "Mummy, why is my name Petal?"

The mother replied, "Because when you were born, a petal fell on your head."

The next baby walked up and asked, "Mummy why is my name Rose?" she replied,

"Because when you were born, a rose fell on your head."

The last baby walked up to her and said, "BLAS CLAFLAS YIFRASSAM TASSM POONNFFFIINRTY."

The mother replied, "Please be quiet, Refrigerator."

Truth or Dare

2008-08-05T15:52:00.000-07:00

I just realized that all of my blog posts read like an episode of The Simpsons. The opening segment never has anything to do with the actual plot of the show, and about 23 minutes into the episode you're like "Wait, what happened when Principal Skinner found out that Bart blew up Springfield Elementary school with the help of the Scottish janitor?" (See that boys, I like The Simpsons. I'm a 'guys girl'. Endeavor to date me. Kthx bai.)

I'm also starting to realize (after my brother told me) that this blog reads like a big case of digital diarrhea. (We'll call it Blogarrhea. It's the word the New York Times will use in the review.) I'm not really one for "grammar" or "punctation" or "completed thoughts" or "appropriate use of words". I can imagine that it's kind of hard to read. Sorry. Have a cocktail. Should clear up that headache. I'm not fixing any of it.

I think what's currently happening in my life is this: the Universe and I are locked in a low-stakes game of "Truth or Dare". I used to suck at T or D when I was younger. I'm a total chicken shit and abhor nudity so that basically left me to take care of all of the prank calls. Which I did with gusto.

Dear Danielle LaBarre,

That was me that called your house and told you you should stop taking the steroids because it caused your bacne. Little did I know I was foreshadowing your career in female body building. Congrats on that.

Love,

I. Peefreely.

In my adult years I'm a little better at T or D. Better at D than T. I still don't know Truth from a hole in the wall, so I'll be taking some dares thanksverymuch.

Universe: Truth or Dare?

Me: Dare.

Universe: Ummmm. Okay...Let me think...shoot. OH! Got it!! I dare you to quit your job without having secured yourself another job and completely change your career path!!!

Me: Done and DONE!

Universe: Fuck. That was too easy. Okay, your turn.

Me: Truth or Dare.

Universe: Truth.

Me: UNIVERSSSEEE!! You're such a goddam PUSSY! Fine. Okay, when will my career as a Rhythmic Gymnast really take off? You're the one that dared me to change jobs.

Universe: Um, dude, like, never. You're way too old and you can't even do a cartwheel. Plus, that's not how you play. You're supposed to ask me something about myself. I'm not a fucking Oracle.

Me: WHAT? WHAT THE FUCK?? Shut up, Universe. I hate this game. MY TURN!! Dare.

Basically I'm always sitting around waiting for my next Dare from the Universe. Who's a big pussy and is always making me ask it Truths about itself. "Is there an Intelligent Creator? Do I have a mortal soul? Is Brad the father of the twins?"etc. LAME. I think my next Dare might have something to do with my plans for October and beyond. OOrrr lack thereof as the case may be.

My job is awesome, but it's seasonal. I'm officially unemployed as of Oct. 15th. Which kind of rules. Once again, I ain't got shit to do, but some weird part of my brain is nagging me to get my shit together and come up with a plan. (Oh, Hi Society. It's you. AGAIN. Sure, you can come over and hang out but my show is on at 9 so you really have to leave around then. I'm not trying to say you always overstay your welcome, but the thought has crossed my mind.)

Here's my list of possible options and the Pros and Cons of said options (in no particular order):

1. Seattle - I've kind of always wanted to live there. Also, I'm currently training for the Seattle Marathon so I feel like I'll be too tired to leave when it's over.

Pros: It's a cool city. I love the Pacific Northwest. I have a ton of family there. Gooey Ducks. The Experience Music Project. The plans for Whore Island West captained by the Arch Duchess of Whoredom ShaBOMB Galvin.

Cons: It's wicked Liberal. I don't actually know what that means but all the cars have tons of bumper stickers and I think the women wear really comfortable shoes. (Not you, Shabeezy. I know your tiny feet hurt all the time because of your dope footwear, except when you get so drunk that a fisherman has to carry you home from the bar.) Weather could potentially be pooey.

2. Boston - It's Home Base. I might want to live there for a couple of months to save up some dough and then do something rad in February.

Pros: Some of the best people I know live in or around Boston. It's comfortable. I'm pretty sure I have a waitressing job waiting for me there.

Cons: Housing is hard to come by. It's been done. I've lived there. I'm kind of looking for something new. I could very easily settle in and live there forever. Which isn't really what I'm looking for right now.

3. Martha's Vineyard - I could get a job here year round.

Pros: Free Housing.

Cons: Every time I tell someone I'm thinking about maybe staying here year round they pull a face and ask me if I'm single. When I reply in the affirmative the go "Oooohh, wow. It's REALLY hard to be single here in the winter. REALLY HARD." Now I didn't really know what that meant until I got Steve my computer guy to elaborate a little. He said, and I quote "There are bad men here in the winter. Bad men. Men that come here to escape from the real world. Don't live here in the winter. It's a bad idea." This leads me to imagine a winter filled with sexually deviant male zombies. (Is this really a Con?)

4. "Fuck if I Know" Plan - File for unemployment and figure it out from there.

Pros: Everything

Cons: Nothing

Universe: Okay, Truth or Dare?

Me: 'Verse. I fucking TOLD you. DARE.

Universe: You are the BITCHIEST drunk. Okay, fine. Close your eyes. Open up an atlas. Point to a spot on the page you opened up to. Move there. Figure it out.

Me: Woah. 'Verse. Toughie.

Know What's an Inconvenient Truth? The Environment is a Shitty Asshole.

2008-07-30T14:55:00.000-07:00

I had a stressful period of 30 minutes about two hours ago and I blame the environment completely. Allow me to elaborate.
I was heading back to work after my 4 hour lunch break. As you guys know (I'm always tempted to use "y'all" when addressing hypothetical readers. Jen, if that ever happens please throw your computer at a picture of me. I'll buy you a new one. A picture of me, that is. Also, if I ever refer to you as "hypothetical readers" again please put the replacement picture of me in a pot of water with a pinch of salt, a little allspice, bring to a brisk boil and smash against the wall. You're my one and only.) I've been all thoughtful lately. On of the reasons for this may that I haven't been all vodkaful lately and thus am capable of stringing a couple of concepts together. (BIZZLE!! GET UP! Here, eat this gin popsicle. See? All better.) One of the things I've been thinking about is my carbon footprint. Having a big one makes me feel wicked fat so I'd like to try and reduce mine. I've been making an effort (as of this morning) to limit the number of plastic bags, bottle, shower caps, saran wrap bikinis, paper cups, paper towels, cartons, crack pipes, kitten pelts etc. I've been using. At one point in my life (yesterday) I was drinking coffee like a marathoner drinks water. I would take a sip and promptly throw the cup away. Right down the throat of a baby seal. I'd like to try and curb habits like that. I'm also trying to eat locally and organically. (That's a lie.) SO on my way back to work I stopped at a local farm stand to fashion myself a delicious salad from their salad bar. 4lbs., an entire tomato, a head of lettuce, 2 peppers and $10 later I paid and said "No thanks!" when the young lady asked me if I wanted a bag. Think globally, act locally, right! If not now, when! Out with the old, in with the new! In for a penny, in for a pound!! Skate to where the puck is going not to where it's been! What? Okay. I got into my gas-guzzling SUV and placed the salad on the dash board for safe-keeping. I figured it would be safe there (that's what Humpty Dumpty said about his egg-shaped ass after he drank a whole bag of wine and went to sit on that wall.) t-minus 4 seconds later the salad-sans-bag was on the floor of my car. Oh whelp. Fast forward past me cleaning up the mess on the floor of the car, scraping the salad back into the container from whence it came (dude, I'm still going to eat it. I'm a hungry environmentalist.) and pouring the really dirty bits onto the ground next to the car. What? I was composting. I wanted to grab a cup of coffee before heading back to work and my new-found environmentalism prompted me to invest in the $20 refillable coffee cup that I've been thinking about buying since I threw away the last $20 refillable coffee cup I bought. (I hate money.) Well it seems as though I was one of the only people that had such gusto for saving the environment because the Oksana Baiul looking chick who sold me the cup totally overfilled the thing and I spilled it all over myself when I went to put the 6 packets of Splenda that I use to totally remove all coffee flavor from the brown liquid that I use to replace love in my life. I lurched out the door of the place with the 3.5 lb. salad (.5lb was composting on the ground next to my car) and the enormous stainless steel coffee mug which was dripping molten fake-sugar all over my hand and stumbled down the street to work. Well I guess I wasn't too present in the moment as I was fantasizing about what I was going to wear to ceremony when I was awarded the Nobel Prize for Environmentalism and I crashed into a fence post and my $10 organolocal salad literally exploded like an atom bomb all over the sidewalk.

So here I was $10 poorer, with burns on my hands and mouth, owner of a stupid heavy cup and no salad. In conclusion, I say fuck the environment. I'm going UNvironment. Somebody give me a six-pack of beer so I can drink 1, throw the other five into the ocean, catch a turtle and lasso him with the rings.

Sorry, Wilmer Valderramma the Turtle. Collateral damage.

Something I Should Have Done 2 Days Ago

2008-07-26T06:21:00.001-07:00

Happy Birthday Bizzle.

I'm sorry I missed your birthday. Thank you for being such a good friend. I hope that someday I can be there to change your band-aids when you've managed to get yourself blackout drunk by 6pm and you no longer have motor skills because your hands are frozen from clutching the 45 vodka sodas which were your only comfort in a cruel world where Great Britain doesn't want you, and you've quit the only job you knew for more than 3 years. Your only comfort, that is, until you best friend comes to save you, and take you home and change your bloody band-aids and make sure you don't die alone in a gutter, or worse, with a bunch of fat blonde ladies from Cincinnati carrying erroneous purses.

I love you Itsabairan. Happy belated.

Emotions: Why They Are Awesome and Important

2008-07-23T15:27:00.000-07:00

I wasn't supposed to be blogging tonight. I was supposed to have the night off and my home computer shat le bed, so I was to be computerless for a few days. I was still going to be taking notes in my Hannah Montana trapperkeeper, but no real, bona fide bloggage until next week. I had a nice little evening planned for myself. I was planning to head over to Oak Bluffs and take myself on a date. I thought I'd mosey about a bit, hit up some galleries, maybe catch a screening of The Dark Night then wrap up the evening at a bar where hopefully I'd cross paths with a pirate / drug smuggler with loose moral fiber and poor eyesight. I'd even gotten myself a lil' gussied up. (No make up or deodorant). Put on my going out clothes (a see-through deep- v, rolled up cargo pants with holes in the crotch and flip flops) and did my hair nice (pony tail). But the veiny, liver spotted hands of fate (sorry, Fate. Your hands are kind of gross. You should use sunblock.) were busy weaving another path for our heroine. I got a phone call and apparently I had signed up to cover a shift for a co-worker and had forgotten. Good thing I wasn't actually going to have a real date with anybody! They would have been so disappointed that I would have had to cancel! Phew! Imaginary relationship really dodged a proverbial bullet on that one, right??

Initially I was pretty pissed about this. I was sort of looking forward to a little "me-plus-a-possible-awkward-hook-up time". Then I thought about it a little and I figure, what could be better than sitting here in this gallery, listening to Tegan and Sara, eating a cobb salad out of a plastic container and writing on my blog? Surely not meeting people and possibly having a meaningful relationship one day!! uedphsadsadweq34324. Sorry! The massive sob which just wracked my body caused my forehead to hit the keyboard and type some stuff. (In hindsight I think that's pretty much how this whole blog got started.)

On to the post.

Confucius (or Anjelica Houston) once said: "Why are Crocs like getting head from a guy? Because they both feel good until you look down." If you don't find that joke funny it's because it lost something in the translation from Chinese. Or you're a girl. Or you're gay. And there's nothing wrong with that. Some of my best friends think I'm gay, so it's cool if I make jokes, right? Please don't put me on the list.

An epidemic has swept the island nation of Martha's Vineyard. (It's a nation. Fuck off.) It has replaced the once good, God-fearing folk of this place with zombies. Zombies that all wear the same thing on their feet. Whole squadrons of children run down the street wearing pink, orange, blue, yellow, vomit, shit, death, sadness and fear colored footwear. These things are made in basically every color of the flipping rainbow. And other rainbows that we like, don't even know about yet. The "shoes" that these zombies wear are brightly colored. That's bad. But worse? They have holes in them. And weird strappy things that go across your heel to keep these hellish creations afoot. These demon-shoes are called Crocs. And everyone here wears them. Everybody has motherfucking Crocs.

I've had a nightmare which starts out like a zombie movie, but instead of people trying to eat your brain they're wearing Crocs. In the dream my roomates and I manage to get on the last ferry off the God-forsaken Croc-infested island and make it to the mainland. When we arrive in Woods Hole there are rescue workers and government official waiting there to tell us where to go. A big, burly police officer wearing a full flack suit reached for my hand to help me get off the boat and I'm so relieved. Until I look down, and he's wearing Crocs. Pink ones. With an NYPD Croc-charm shoved in one of the drainage holes. I wake up screaming. I'm still screaming. Oh wait, no I'm not. I just coughed, but it's because I drank my water too fast. The doesn't really qualify as a scream, but it's like a totally stressful noise all the same.

I first saw Crocs back when I was working in a restaurant on the Cape. The chef used to wear them because they were rubber and didn't hold kitchen stink like regular shoes did. He could wash them with a hose or in the dish washer or with beer or whatever. Also, he was drunk and stoned all the time. Homeboy could have been wearing schnauzers on his feet and he wouldn't have cared. The next time I saw them was on the feet of Mario Bitali walking through Washington Sq. park. And then on a member of my ex-company on "Beach Day". Not necessarily in that order. In the case of the former they were pink and paired with a fat red-headed dude. In the latter case they were purple and paired with jean shorts and Navajo print detailing. I don't think I need to really get into why I assumed this fad would swiftly expire in it's stupid, shallow, clog shaped, aerated grave. But both instances made me sufficiently nervous and decidedly skittish around these Crocs.

Then I arrived on Martha's Vineyard and started seeing the things everywhere. The gallery that I work at offers art lessons to kids, so every morning the fucking place is LOUSY with styrofoam shoes. I guess I just don't understand why these people in particular are wearing them with such vehemence. I can understand their role in society. They're good for people who want to wear ugly shoes with holes in them. But these people are usually dressed to the proverbial nines and loaded up with David Yurman and Tiffany jewelry. You KNOW their other shoes are Zalos or Jack Purcells or Tods or whatever. So WHY have they taken a hard left and opted for these fucking decroded, cheap-ass clog things? It's not like they're slogging through muck all day and need extra drainage, or slaving behind a hot stove and need to be able to air their feet out. Does walking from house to yacht to lunch to cocktail hour to dinner to after dinner drink REALLY require such a functional pair of shoes?

Whatever, I fucking hate the things and I like to imagine that I have an army of faeries at my disposal. (What, is that weird?) In my imagination me and the faeries have a staff-meeting, a family forum if you will, at the beginning of each evening. At this forum I tell of what mischief I would like them to perpetrate this night. One night I will tell the faeries all about the hateful Crocs. (Oh, my faeries are all dudes.) And one of the faeries will ask me "But Good Queen why, pray tell, do the evil Crocs have all those holes in them?" (Since the faeries are probably pretty horny little dudes he's leading me to the answer he wants to hear.) And I will answer. "Well, Vijay Singh the Faerie, those holes are for fucking!! Go out into the night and fuck the holes of every single Croc that you can find!!" And my army of faeries will cheer and cheer, and paint their faces blue and white and in formation they will go out into the night and they will fuck the shit out of all of the Crocs on the island. Right under the noses of the yuppies and preppies and yachties who took them off at the end of a busy day of doing shit-all.

I don't know what this says about me but the only use I can imagine for all those holes in all of those Crocs is for faerie fucking. (I'm even doing the annoying spelling of faerie. So what's the word for one step past eccentric? Oh. Psycho. Good to know.) I have a sunburn, and I think I'm still dealing with the fact that I had to work tonight instead of spending the night alone doing the solo-tango of desperation in Oak Bluffs. That might be why I came up with that use for the Croc holes. That could be it, but I actually had that idea like two weeks ago while I was driving and I made myself giggle so hard that I almost crashed. I guess I'm just weird.

That said, see if you didn't giggle the next time you see a pair of Crocs. Just picture a little faerie dude fucking the shit out of one of those holes, all pumped, making the O-Face. Then picture bending down and giving him a high-five. See if you can even come up with a bad mood for the rest of the day.

There is one person in this world who can wear Crocs and not summon my ire. Her name is Helen O'Connor. She can wear whatever the fuck she wants. Why? Because she fucking rules. Stop asking questions, Vijay Singh the Faerie. I just told you you can go out and fuck a bunch of Crocs. What else do you want? You're very spoiled.

Also, I totally fooled you with the title of this post.

PUNKED!! PWNED!!1!!!!!OWNED!FAIL!111!!!!

Disclaimer: Shmaltz

2008-07-20T06:35:00.000-07:00

I'm a babysitter. It's my secondary occupation at the time, and I live rent-free in exchange for the child care stuff. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal, right? Wrong. Children terrify me. I've thought long and hard about just exactly why this is true. I'm bigger, smarter and know more karate that like 70% of the juvenile population of America AND Canada. I should feel pretty confident around these motherfucking ankle biters, right? But I don't. And I think the reason is that kids don't have something that adults have. They haven't learned something that would make it easier for me to be around them. Namely, they haven't learned how to lie.
Just as an aside or a disclaimer about this post, lately I've had a lot of free time. That free time has allowed me to think about some stuff. I'm feeling particularly thoughtful today so I'm going to blog about it. Also, it's really fucking hot out and I hate AC. My bedroom is a veritable sweat lodge right now. I'm pretty much in a Hogan, on a spirit quest, looking for my power animal due to loss of electrolytes, so bear with me. (Update: I've ascertained the identity of my spirit animal. He's an Albanian Conversophile who goes by the name of Itsabairan. His power word is "Twat". Power move? Oh a little dash o' this, and a little dash o' that.)
Back to lying. As I mentioned, I've been thinking. And listening to techno. One of the things I've been thinking about is the meaning of words. Words like "nice", "lie" and "selfish". I'm starting to get a real bee in my fedora about the word "nice". I think "nice" people are actually incredibly "selfish", because they "lie". Oh shut up and allow me to explain. One of the ways in which we attribute meaning to a particular word is by looking at the connotation society has projected onto it and that which it describes. I don't know the origin of the word "nice", and if you try to work it backwards and extrapolate the meaning of the word by looking at that which it describes you get totally fucking lost because the word "nice" is used to describe things that run the gamut from the taste of wine to the experience of taking a shit. (I'm not looking in the dictionary for this on either. Those things are for hippies.) I know there's a town in France called Nice. Maybe the word "nice" comes from Nice where a group of guys got together and were talking about the girls in their town. "That cheek Sofie. She told me zat my beret looked good, and she bought me a baguette but she's totally fucking boreeing. I can't call her a beetch because she does nice sings for me, but I don't think she ees all zat great. Oh zee Nice girls. What word can we use to describe zem?" Nowadays when you think of someone nice (or at least when I think of someone nice) it's someone who tells you what you want to hear and doesn't call you out an any of your bullshit. Basically someone who "lies". Now somewhere along the line the word "lie" got a bad rap. Lies aren't always "bad". (There's another word that makes me itchy. Bad. So fucking arbitrary.) When we lie we're coming up with a scenario that is more comfortable for ourself or others than reality. Reality and honesty are hard and they fucking suck and we do what we have to do to make sure our lives aren't TOO hard and don't suck TOO much. We all had to come up with a million lies to get through the formative years of our lives. Mine was the marriage of Claire and Heathcliff Huxtable. When I found out about Ahmad Rashad I was shattered. SHATTERED. We lie every day. How many times have you said "Excuse me" when you meant "Get the fucking fuck out of my way, fat ass". Now, you said the former rather than the latter because you didn't want to hurt the other person with your actual response to their in-the-way-ness. You weren't really asking for that person to excuse you. That was a lie. You didn't want to raise a fuss, or get into a whole thing about how this fucking bitch brought her four-wheel drive SUV stroller onto the subway at 9am on a Wednesday and you're already totally fucking late to this bullshit meeting that you forgot you had and don't care about. In effect you were being "selfish" because you don't rreeeally care about hurting the other person's feelings because you in fact said "Excuse me." with venomous hatred while jamming your laptop case into her back. You were more protecting yourself from an awkward situation. But again, the word "selfish" has a bad rep. "Self" and "ish". I give an "ish" about mah "self". What the fuck is wrong with that? What's so wrong with giving ourselves a break for a minute and doing what's in our own best interest? I think a lot of problems would be solved if the word "selfish" were to be unstigmatized and people allowed themselves a little bit more "ish" for themselves. We beat the shit out of ourselves for ever thinking about what we want, so we then resent ourselves AND everyone who forces us to suppress these "selfish" thoughts and actions.
Okay, back to kids. Kids don't lie. The don't know how. They don't say "excuse me". They say "move". The don't say "you look great in that dress" they say "why does your face look like that?". They don't say "sure you can play with this" and then quietly resent the shit out of you for taking it. They say "mine". And they keep it. And they're happy. They're not trying to pretzel their little personalities to fit what they think you would want them to be like most adults are. They're just being. And that's fucking terrifying. They don't do stuff to please you. At least not when they're young. That comes later. So when you ask them to do something you better fucking hope they want to do it too, otherwise you're in a world of hurt. If they don't want to put back to box of tampons which they deftly plucked from the Feminine Hygiene aisle you're going to have to figure out how to make them want to or everyone in the store is going to see that you suck at this, and your whole fragile armour of lies and ego is going to crack wide open.
One of the hardest things about dealing with kids is getting them to do the basics: Eat, shit, bathe, sleep. All the other stuff is kind of extraneous. When you can't get a little kid to eat, you start to get into a semi-scary, pre-survival situation. There are a lot of things that can happen in a day that I can give myself a break about fucking up. If I can't run a marathon it's not the end of the world. Maybe I'll never get a high paying job, or any job at all. I can live with my mom. I crash my car and don't kill anyone, whatever. I can get a new car. If I can't get this fucking kid to eat he might get sick, and then Mom is going to come home and fucking kill me. When Moms think their kids are in trouble they are so fucking scary. For example, the fire alarms in my house have a habit of going off at 3am. Well the first morning they went off it was just me, Mom and kid in the house. When the alarm went off I was up just in time to see Mom scoop kid out of bed, FLY down the stairs and out the door of the house to safety. This all transpired in about 2 seconds. What I didn't mention was that she had no free hands to open the door to get out of the house because they were full of kid. She took the door of it's hinges with Mommy adrenaline. It was a screen door, but regardless. That was an amazing and terrifying thing to behold and I won't lie when I say I'm scared of Moms, this Mom in particular (Jesus, how many things am I scared of? Oh Jesus. I'm totally scared of Jesus. Beards. Apostles. Yeesh.) So when it comes to trying to get the kid to do the basics that are required for survival, you better believe that desperation is creeping into my voice as I'm looking to get this kid to eat his fucking turkey dog.

Lately he's been having some trouble sleeping. When I was first trying to get him to go to bed I didn't stress out about it too much because we all just assumed it was a developmental thing and he'd get over it. Then he started to have some problems. His moods started to be affected by tiredness, and he wasn't eating. Mom made a point to tell me to put him to bed early and make sure that he go to sleep. Um, what. How do I do that. Give me an engine block to rebuild, a knot to untie or language to learn. I'm good. I'll read the directions or whatever. Tell me that I practically have to force a little person to do something that they seemingly don't want to do? Iie, arigato. In any other instance I would try and use logic. But homeboy doesn't really get logic too well yet. He doesn't understand that the feeling of frustration and sadness that comes upon him at night mean he's tired. I don't think I even figured that out until I left NYC. You can't explain that to him and make him want to go to sleep. All he knows is that when he lays in that bed trying to go to sleep his body and his mind won't just shut off, so he thinks he's not tired. And he's frustrated so he wants to give up. But when you give up on sleep Mom gets mad and kills babysitter, so that won't do.
I talked to some people about how to remedy the situation, and the overwhelming consensus was hug therapy. You just need to hug the kid, and make him lay still and then he'll fall asleep. (Itsabairan suggests Shnapps. I'm amenable to that suggestion.)

I really don't like hugging. It's a total set-up for rejection. And I HATE rejection. (Morgannnnnn...) What about when I go to hug someone and they don't want to hug me? How am I supposed to deal with that? (Not that that happens all that often. Most people like getting hugged, but you all know about what the inside of my head looks like. Spandex. Cupolas. "It's a Small World." Rejected hugs.) The idea of laying in bed with someone else's kid forcing him to allow me to extended-hug him is my personal nightmare. I started to come up with all the "lies" I had in my bag of tricks to make me feel better about feeling so scared about this. "He's not my fucking kid." "This wasn't in my job description." "I may have The Clap. I don't want him to catch it." These are all the things I was telling myself to make myself feel more comfortable about dreading doing what I had to do to help this little guy fall asleep. Then bedtime came, and Captain Refusestoshit Sir Eatsonlybacon Von Sleepsanhour is all piss n' vinegar. He wriggles around in bed for an hour and recites 64 lines from that movies "Cars". (I hate that movie. Mostly because he makes me re-watch the first 25 minutes over and over again and I can't get the weird version of "Life is a Highway" that plays during a drive-down-Route-66 montage out of my fucking head.) SO finally I'm so frustrated and scared of Mom that I just grab him and hold on for dear life. Hug rejected, crying, whining "I want Mommy", rip my heart out, fuck. But I hold on. And he starts to calm down. Before he was pushing my arms away, and then he kind of starts to grab my wrist, and then my hand. And his breathing slows down. And he's asleep holding my hand.

Okay, so you know how I hate rejection? Well here's what I'm thinking right now: The people that read this blog are used to me being funny and this is shmaltzy. I have to be funny for them to like me. I should erase this and write a funny post about Crocs. (Also I'm thinking that Disclaimer Shmaltz would be an excellent name for a sidekick to my superhero, Malidea Jones.) That's what I'm thinking right now. I'm making up lies that keep me in my safe little world that holds no fear for me. If I stay the same guarded asshole who hides behind her humor everything will be safe and I'll never have to do anything hard and everyone will like me and nobody will reject me and I may as well be fucking dead.

I told this story because it was something that I was really proud of. I know I totally overthunk the whole thing, and in the "grand scheme" getting a little kid to fall asleep by hugging him falls right in front of the guy that finally got the navel orange pyramid to stand at the Price Chopper, but I'm fucking proud of it. (See? That was my mind telling me to tell you that I understand that you guys probably don't care about this in the hopes that you won't reject me as readers. Hey, Mind? You're being kind of a dick.) I'm proud that I was finally was able to see that the lies I was making up in my head to keep myself comfortable were causing me to potentially and actually fuck stuff up. I know this is a little Tony Robbinsy or Eastern Mysticismy, but at least it's not "nice". And at least Mom didn't kill me. Yet. He was up at 5am the next morning because my cell phone alarm went off and woke him up. Oops.

I think I might be an eccentric

2008-07-17T17:23:00.001-07:00

Earlier today Jennifer "Sigh"ya Savage asked me if I was going to bleggg tonight. I said no, trying to pretend I had better stuff to do.

Well I am, and I don't.

I also was a little hesitant to write anything because I'm starting to feel like this blog is a big Thanksgiving Day Parade float for my ego. (It's got like 6 chicks in spandex riding on it and a spinny cupola covered in flowers. The float is playing "It's a Small World After All" but I think some water got in the music machine because it's coming out really slowly and all distorted-like. It's a pretty creepy float.) But then I says to myself, I says "Self, stop being douchy. It's your blog. You can write whatever you want. They don't have to read it. And if they do read it and judge it harshly they are ugly, and live small, sad lives." So that little chat with m'self made me feel oodles better. Also I realized that I don't have too much fodder for blog posts these days other than my dark, twisted Turkey Day float of a mind. I haven't watched TV in like a month and a half. (JEN! GET UP! BREATHE! Here. Drink this ranch dressing. See? All better.) I mean I read People.com and shit, but there's not even anything going on in celeb world. Pregnant man gives birth? THAT'S A CHICK! WITH SHORT HAIR! Also, Heather Locklear's depression does not for a radical blog post make. So it's back to me. And my apparent eccentricity.
I began to ponder this potential eccentricity this afternoon as I was walking to my yoga class. Aforementioned yoga class is approximately 2.5 miles from my home. I put on my yogatume and skipped out the front door. I grabbed my gallon jug of water (with no top!), my shiny black patent leather evening clutch and iPod, walked right past my perfectly good car with a full tank of gas and headed on my merry way. Yoga class started at 5:30pm. I left the house at 4:40pm. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it only takes 50 minutes to walk 2.5 miles on the North face of Kilimanjaro. I cannot give myself less than 50 minutes to do anything. I have to meet someone a 5 minute walk from my house at 2pm? I'm leaving at 1:10pm. Job interview? Forget it. I'm leaving 2 hours ahead. If the job interview was at 12 noon on the first floor of the house that I lived in, I would leave my room to walk down 13 stairs at 10am. The only time I'm ever late is if I'm hung over. If I'm still drunk I'm even earlier that I would have been normally. I have distinct memories of browning in at work at 7am, hours before anyone else arrived, trying desperately to piece my morning together. (I don't even try with the nights anymore. They've gone the way of the vodka soaked Dodo.)
The first time the word "eccentric" actually entered my mind was when I was standing on the side of the road, holding my going-out clutch, halfway to yoga drinking out of the top-less water jug which I proceeded to spill all over myself. As I stood on the shoulder of the road with a water-soaked shirt listening to techno music at full blast and laughing at myself I thought, "Hey, this is a little weird. Am I weird? Nah. I'm eccentic!!"
Now, obviously this one event of semi-wierdness does not constitute an eccentric personality. There's more.
1. The early thing. It's pretty out of hand.
2. I often make a weird face when I hear a song I like. The face is a combination of when someone says something wicked obvious and when you see a really pronounced camel toe. I think you get the idea.
3. I will play the aforementioned great song on repeat. For days. And days. There is usually a pretty heated struggled going on in my head when I have an obsession with a song. After I've played it say, 14 times I'l l think to myself "Okay, just one more time." I will then come to 45 minutes later having had listened to the song 10 more times. Then I cry. (Just kidding.)
4. I often break up the repeated playing of aformentioned great song with intense bouts of house, trance and other techno music. I usually listen to this music really loud, whilst driving down the tree-lined, cobblestoned streets of Edgartown, MA. If any of you have ever been to E-Town you know what I'm saying. For those of you that haven't think about rocking out to "She Fucking Hates Me" by Puddle of Mud at your grandmother's birthday party. It's kind of exactly just like that.
5. I tend to go into wardrobe K-Holes. My current K-Hole consists of gold flip flops, awkward length cut-off jean shorts and a fedora. Yes, a fedora. I used to do this in college as well. I briefly attended (read: failed out of) a really small college in Florida which was the playground of the kids whose parents sent them away to hide them from their prep school coke busts. These people were rich and faaancy. I over heard a quote one day of a girl telling a friend about how she felt far away from her boyfriend. The friend replied "Oh you don't spend much time together?" The girl answered "Oh no, we see each other all the time. It's just that he drives a Hummer and the passenger seat and the drivers seat are so far apart!" (That's not a joke. I mean it is a joke in the "nice fucking life" sense, but that conversation actually happened.) I was surrounded on all sides by Lilly Pulitzer, Theory, Diane Von F, etc. I chose to walk around that place in white painter pants with stains on them and a mallard green v-neck sweater with a hole in the armpit. I think it might just be my way of rebelling against the man. In Edgartown I dress like someone out of Slash's Snake Pit, at Rollins I dressed like your high school Biology teacher who was accused of hooking up with the class slut in the cooler where they kept all of the dead frogs. I'm not sure I perpetrated such ensemble rebellion when I lived in NYC. Jen, can you think of an example? (Hold on, I've got an incoming email. Oh, it's from Tranny Air. She just wants to make sure we're still friends. )
6. In response to the question: "If you could have any pet in the world, what would it be?" My answer, "An ill tempered, genetically engineered 4 lb. hippopotamus with Crohn's Disease." Okay, I know what you're thinking. "That's a stupid fucking questions." Hippies. 'Nuff said. Also, you're probably asking "why the teeny hippo"? Well I'll tell you. Because who the fuck is going to love a monster like that? This tiny disaster bites you, farts and then poops on you. (Insert Olsen Twin joke here, I suppose.) And it has to be in water for a good portion of it's life so it lives in a gross pond and is probably slimy. Who's going to love him? Nobody. Except me. I'm going to be the only one in the world who loves him, and know what that means? That means I'm going to be the only one in the world who he loves. We'll love each other. Two against the world. He'll need me. To brush his four gross teeth. To change his diaper. To clean out his grimy baby pool. I will be the sun to his decroded Earth. DO YOU HEAR THAT RICHARD DREYFUSS? ANJELICA HOUSTON? MORGAN FREEMAN? I HAVE LOVE!! Dodi Al Faypottamus and I are very happy together. So you go off, date your "girls". Have your "lives" and your "families". Dodi and I will be here, sunning ourselves on the beach trying to clear up these rashes. WITHOUT YOU!!
7. I play the air drums when I go running. Like, a lot. The weirdest part of this idiosyncrasy is the running part. I've been a big exerciser for a long time now, but it still seems to strange to me that I do ridiculous things like "go jogging". I guess this is because the mental image that I've constructed of myself for myself, my "ego" if you will, is some combination of Andrew Dice Clay, Brigette Nielson and Kit from Night Rider. Needless to say, this amalgamation of awesomeness does not need to work out. So the running part is weird unto itself. But the drumming. Who does that? I've never even played the real drums. What in the world gave me the idea that I'm allowed to play the imaginary drums to the trance song that I've been listening to on repeat since I began this "jog" which fundamentally goes against ever fiber of my chauvinist, in-recovery, wicked-helpful-awesome-car being?
8. The "Dear Reader" thing. That was weird. I annoyed myself. Sorry about that.

I could go on, but I think you're picking up what I'm putting down. Also, I'm tired and I need to make up some excuse to the Ginger about how I have to wake up wicked early tomorrow and go "running". Or am I making the excuse to you? Who's the Ginger now, dear reader? Who's the Ginger now.

Relocation Fail

2008-07-15T15:04:00.000-07:00

I was supposed to move to London. But I didn't.

Let me just start out by saying I never really wanted to move to London. Well, I actually really did want to move there, but not under the circumstances such as they were. The company I worked for was headquartered in NYC, but they were going international and I was offered the job of starting up the customer service department in the UK. I was really excited because I was pretty sick of my job and I figured this would be just the change I needed. Also, London is a super rad city. Or so I've ascertained in my few brief visits there. I guess I didn't really take into account the fact that even if I was moving to London I was moving for a job and I'd be doing the same work, just somewhere else. I thought it would be enough to be in London, and I'd figure out the shitty job thing later. I found out about the move about a year before I was scheduled to go and that was definitely what kept me at that company for the extra year. I loved the company, loved the people, HATED the work.
In the months leading up to the move I was hearing various opinions about the move I had planned. My boss and other co-workers would not stop talking about how lucky I was. What a great opportunity this was . How this would never happen at another company. This is all true. I was really lucky to get this shot. I won't argue with that. I also totally fucking deserved this opportunity. I worked my ass off, gave 150% and was really good at my job. I supposed the problem comes when opportunity is confused with compensation. Also troublesome, when people tell you how excited and grateful you should be. Every day. For A YEAR. Some people created entire relationships with me based solely on asking me if I was excited to move to London. "Hey! How long till the move? You ready? Found an apartment yet? I have a friend who lived in London for 3 months 35 years ago. I'll TOTALLY give you their number! How excited are you? You must be SO excited!! Oh my god, if I was your age / single / not totally fucking lame I would SO move to London!!" *Squeal* This is literally the conversation that would happen at me when I would go to get coffee in the morning. Or a snack in the afternoon. Or to go wash my hands. Or in the elevator. Or when I would go to take shots of triple sec in the snack room after my boss left. Usually I didn't even contribute to the conversation. When it first started I would answer and share my hopes, fears, excitements and concerns. Then I realized they weren't actually listening to me. I don't know if they were just looking for a reason to talk to me because I'm hot and awesome, or if they were trying to live vicariously through me, but it was hard to deal with. I virtually stopped eating and drinking in the office just to avoid these conversations. Some people have empty relationships based on sex. Not I. I have empty relationships based on great opportunities. Motherfucker.
I was also hearing some opposing opinions. I'm not sure if you've heard but apparently the dollar's pretty weak, especially in comparison to the pound. The first thing most people said to me when I told them I was moving to the UK was "You'd best be gettin' a raise. A hyuck!" (For some reason I always remember this comment coming from a toothless hick out of Appalachia.) I was regaled with horror stories of the expense of living in London and how my salary would basically have to double in order to maintain any standard of living. These people would convince me that since I was basically giving up my life as I knew it, I should be compensated infinitely more than I deserved. I was, to say the least, confused. When I brought these concerns up to my boss and HR department I was told that it would all be figured out and that I shouldn't worry. Maybe I should stop trusting people and figure stuff out on my own. Hindsight's always 20/20. Motherfucker. (Note: I'm getting sad and nauseous even writing about this shit. I'm so fucking glad there's some Livingston Cellars in the back room. I'm going to need another spritzer to get through this post. Also, I just checked out a girl. I liked her dress. Whatever.)
Since the company was going international this required the creation of a whole new business unit. We need our own little customer service team (me). A new tech team (a couple of dudes). A new marketing team, sales, etc. All of this was to be managed by a GM who was hired in the UK. She came over to the states for six months to learn the business before we moved back to London together. She was my direct boss and she was really great for me when she first started. She got me a raise straightaway and restored a bit of my faith in the whole project. She also quoted me the salary I would be making once I moved to London and it was well more than I had expected. That was cool. One of my really good friends was originally supposed to be moving to London when I did. That made the whole thing a lot more exciting for me. Then he quit. That sucked. I was already really scared, and this shook my confidence further. My boss tried to make me excited after my friend quit, but there was some shit going on in my head that couldn't be undid. A couple of months after my that guy quit they brought Bob on board as the sales the department in the UK. That was totally radical because Bob is my hooomeboy, and I was super pumped that he would be moving too. But when he became a part of the team I couldn't help feeling like I had tricked him into getting involved in something that might be kind of a shitshow. Now, Bob is an adult, and it's pretty conceited of me to think that I had much effect on his decision to join the team and move to London, but I was feeling pretty crazy at the time and this was just another tire on the Springfield Tire Fire of fear and loathing.
As the months and weeks rolled on I made no preparation whatsoever to move to another country. I tried to look for an apartment, but it couldn't really be done from across the Atlantic also I had some serious drinking to do before I left and that was priority #1. I had a vague notion that I would need a work Visa. When I lived in Italy I tried to apply for a work Visa once I got there only to discover that it needed to be taken care of before entering the country. It worked okay in Italy because I just pretended to be the mute cousin of the owner and the plan was that I would scuttle into the back room when we suspected any restaurant patrons of being INS. Basically if we saw anyone wearing a suit and tie enter the restaurant I would put my head down, mumble something incoherent and run for the basement. I'm sure there are some Italian business men who believed that La Darsena restaurant was doing the universe a solid by employing a retarded chick for the summer. At any rate, I didn't think this plan would work at an internet company in the UK, namely because our office in London was on the 345th floor and I didn't think I could make it to the basement in time to avoid La Migra. So I emailed the HR department about getting my Visa. And then I went and talked to them. They were busy ordering lunch so I didn't hear much, and because they weren't stressed I wasn't going to worry about it. Also I was drunk.
My bosses heard my concerns about the fact that it would be really tough to find an apartment without actually being in the city, so they decided to send me to London to attend some conferences, get familiar with the city and scope out some possible areas to in which to live. That was totally rad. In theory. I went to a couple of conferences and talked to some realtors but mostly I was by myself walking around London, which was fucking awesome. I really love that city. At one point in the trip we realized that my hotel room hadn't been paid for in advance and that we would need to put it on a corporate card. My boss was really sketchy about helping me figure this out and at one point it looked like I was going to have to put $2,000 worth of hotel room charges on my own credit card. Which was maxed out. I distinctly remember walking along the Thames thinking "Okay, if I call my mom and get her to wire me $2,050 I can afford the hotel room and maybe I can eat tomorrow." I lost 6 pounds on that trip because I couldn't afford to eat. If these were the problems I was having on a fucking recon mission to London imagine what would happen when I actually moved there. Forget seeds of doubt, doubt had just taken a huge steaming dump in my brain. (Wow, I just really grossed myself out. But I'm not erasing it.) Also when I got back my boss was angry that I had charged food to my room. The 2 meals that I did eat in a week were a source of major stress in my happy little business unit. I think this is when I started to drink at lunch.
Now my departure is just weeks away. At this point Bob and I were starting to get stressed out about all of the stuff that HR and our bosses hadn't figured out, so we kind of formed a two-person ACLU for white kids moving to London. We were still really unsure about how our salaries (and a million other things) were going to work, so we wrote down a list of our concerns, emailed them to our boss and he sat down with us after he'd gone through the list to try and figure everything out. Also joining us was the VP of People who apparently was instrumental in forming the "relocation plan". Here it was: We were to have no Visas. We would go as "consultants" until the HR department had time to figure everything out. We would continue to be paid in US dollars, however the company would pay for our housing which, in a white board diagram, in purple ink, explained in a thick French accent seemed to show we were breaking exactly even to what we were making in the US. (This does make sense considering the dollar is half the value of the pound and half our salaries were going to rent. Or it doesn't make sense. I was probably drunk.) There would be no raises. We hadn't proven ourselves to deserve a raise thus far. This would be reassessed at a later date. The VP of People then went on to discuss that everything else aside, this was going to be "awesome". And the really important thing was that once we got to London we had to make sure to plan a super fun time for him when he came to visit. And then he left. And got on a plane to Japan. Leaving myself, Bob and our two bosses in a room with no air. This line rang in my head for weeks after this meeting: "You're going to be consultants, and we're going to figure it all out, and it'll be AWESOME!" At this point I'd pretty much checked out. You know that scene in Austin Powers when the steam roller is coming towards the guy really slowly, and he just stands there screaming and never gets out of the way? That was me. I was in the great opportunity barrel going over Niagra Falls. Just pass me the sippy cup full of vodka and make sure you don't spill any as you do.
Time, like the shitty asshole that it is, waits for no man. I didn't start packing up my apartment until a week before I left. And by "packing up" I mean throwing everything away. I triaged 60% of my worldly good. When Jan. 4th, departure day, rolled around I had 5 boxes and 5 bags left. No home, no furniture, no nothing. I had a great New Years. My best friend Annie came to New York and I think she was one of the only people who actually said to me "If you don't want to go, you don't have to go." I also think she was one of the only people I told of my fears. She returned to me a lot of the faith I had lost in conversations with my bosses and the snack room carrion. I realized that opportunity is in the eye of the beholder. Maybe this wasn't mine. The day Annie left I went out to dinner with my mom and my brother. I told them how I felt, and my mom agreed with Annie. If I had spoken to only those two women in the days before I left I would never have gotten on the plane. But my brother, as only your motherfucking brother can, urged that I just get on the plane. He echoed what I had been thinking, that if I didn't just get on the plane I would regret it forever. So that's what I did. I got on the mother FUCKING plane.
Okay, speaking of the plane. Always looking to save a buck, the plane tickets our company booked were really weird. We went through Munich to get to London. (Look at a map. That's retarded.) I in fact helped find the tickets and Bob and I thought it was pretty funny. We were actually sort of excited to get a stein in the mother country en route to our new home. Too bad it was 9am when we go there. (The first time.) When we were booking the tickets it didn't seem to matter, but this becomes important later in the story.
Rewind to day of departure. The plane left at like 5pm and I had one of those hangovers that gets worse as the day goes on. I had been staying at Morgan Freeman's house because I'd sold my bed three days prior, so everything felt extra surreal. We took a cab to work, I packed up the rest of my shit, said goodbye to like 4 people and headed back home to "finish packing". (Read: "start packing".) I had been so lazy and reticent in my packing job that I had decided that instead of shipping stuff I would just bring 5 bags to the airport and pay the extra $150 a piece to check them. My brother was at my apartment and I made him wait for FedEx to come pick up all of my boxes so he was totally annoyed with me when I finally left. (Also when I was born, on my 3rd birthday, yesterday, March 13th of '02 and that time I walked in on him when he was hooking up with that chick.) I got to the airport and checked in after paying $300 to get the extra bags on the plane. We had a fun flight to Munich because Bob speaks a lot of German so he was translating a lot of stuff the pilot said. (Even though he also said everything in English.) Munich Airport at 9am may as well have been Louisville, then back on Lufthansa to London.
This is the part of the story that I always tell quickly, in a mumble. It's these minutes of my life that my boss used to throw me under the bus. To make the whole thing my fault. He used these couple of words to pit Bob against me so he wouldn't be totally demoralized and quit. (Or so I believed in my guilt / fear / vodka addled brain.) This brief moment is something I have replayed in my head 1,000 times and can't figure out a way I could have done it better.
When we were in line at customs I was ahead of Bob and was called to the counter first. (Deeeep breath. I'm about to start crying.) I had my passport ready, and just like I had done dozens of times, I walked up to the customs agent and presented myself. He looked at me and asked "What's the purpose of your visit to the UK?" Um. Well. I have no fucking idea. I had had so many conversations with so many different people regarding the purpose of my fucking visit to the UK. I knew I couldn't say business because I would need a Visa for that, right? But I'll be lying if I say I'm going for pleasure. Especially because I want nothing more than to poke my pointer finger and my middle finger into your two eyes, turn around and run right back onto the glorious Lufthansa plane that brought me here. If I'm a consultant, does that mean I'm here on business? And for how long should I be here if I'm a consultant? Why is your head so shiny? Why can't I hear anything? WHY WAS HR ALWAYS ORDERING LUNCH? Fuck.

"I'm here on vacation."

"For how long."

"3 months."

"Are you traveling alone?" And that's why writing this makes me cry. It was bad enough that my fucking bumbling uninformed retardation fucked my chances of getting into the country. I was drowning, and I had just pulled Bob down with me. He was so excited to get to London. And I wasn't. Had I fucked this up subconsciously/on purpose so I would get to go home and had I just fucked Bob's life up while doing so? (This is crazy. Bob: I know you're a grown up, but this is how I felt in the weeks after shit went down.)
The shitshow got good after that. I went on some spiel about being on a sabbatical from work while we investigated possible business opportunities in the UK. I may have shat my pants at this point. I can't really remember. The customs official, who we'll call Pat Sajak, told us to have a seat while he went over our documents. Pat left for a long time. Bob and I shat our pants more, joked around, waited, complained, stressed etc. until he came back. We talked about how any moron could clearly see that we were both dressed in multiple articles of clothing with our company logo on them. Two of my pieces of luggage had the logo. It was like shooting fish in a barrel for UK Immigration. We won the Darwin award over drinks that night, I'm sure. "Can you believe these two homeless looking motherfuckers tried to tell me they were coming to London on vacation? FOR 3 MONTHS? HAHAHA, Americans. If they hadn't destroyed us in the revolution it'd be another prison colony for hippies and rejects just like Austafuckingralia." Then they brought us to baggage claim to pick up all of our bags. We brought our stuff to some back room and they started going through everything. They went through EVERYTHING and took anything that was on paper. Birthday cards, letters, pictures, everything. Then they put all of our stuff back, very poorly. I watched a $400 dress get stuck in the zipper of my suitcase and laughed to myself.
It is now, dear reader, that I will tell you of our temporary home. The Heathrow Airport Detention Center. It looked like the lobby of the DMV. In Hell. If you needed to get you driver's license renewed in Hell, this is what the surroundings would look like. We had to leave all of our stuff outside. They wouldn't let us bring anything in because "Ya neveh know whaaash in that shhtaff." (That's supposed to be a cockney accent. Sorry, Eliza Doolittle.) The attendants at the detention center were the nicest people. They seemed to understand the fact that the protocol they were expected to enforce was stupid, but it had to be enforced nonetheless. They offered us the full array of vending machine fare available. This consisted of the following: Three different types of sandwiches. White bread with cheese and mayonnaise. White bread with cucumbers and mayonnaise. White bread with ham and mayonnaise. Two different types of "crisps". Plain, and I think the other was Mayo and Fried Cod flavor or something. (That should be the next Dorito flavor. I'm calling them.) The beverage assortment consisted of water, PG Tips tea and two types of Starburst brand fruit drinks. Lemon and strawberry, I believe. All of the beverages were served in the little plastic cups you drink floride out of at the dentists' office. Basically one sip of liquid. If you were still thirsty you had to go back up to the little hole in the plexiglass, flag down the chap who was watching the telly at full blast and ask for something else. The PG Tips was the best thing either Bob and I had tasted in all of our lives. The Starburst drinks were the sweetest thing I had ever ingested. And I've downed and entire bottle of Watermelon pucker in a night. I guess that's what comes with a Starburst brand drink. When we first arrived neither of us took part in the sammies because we didn't think we'd be there that long. As the night wore on I managed to eat one of each kind. The cheese one was my fav, but I really liked them all. Bob wanted no part. I think that poor guy really lost some weight on this adventure.
Before he dropped us off at the crib, Pat S. told us that he needed to go talk to his boss to see what was to be done with us, but first we would be interrogated by ourselves. (I don't think he actually used the word "interrogate" but just give me this one little thing.) So this guy pulls me and Bob out of our one room palace to get the real scoop on just what the fuck we were doing in London. I went in first. I think he was expecting me to try and keep lying. But no. Oh nononono. It was time to start playing a little game called "Throw EVERYONE under the bus." I told Pat the whole story. about how I'd tried to get my Visa worked out, how I didn't know how they'd come up with this plan, that I was a blinding alcoholic, how I was scared of thunderstorms and loved to sleep with the windows open. I told him everything. This guy made me feel like and A+, #1 moron. The second to last question he asked me was "So after you quit your job, what are you going to do?" His last question was "So you really thought this plan was going to work?" Whelp, Pat, to be honest I hadn't really thought about it. That's probably the problem here. Can I please buy a fucking vowel now?
After Bob went in he came in to talk to the both of us to tell us that we need to get mug shots and finger prints taken. Bob and I both perked up at the mention of shots, but our excitement waned as we realized our mistake. I really wish I had gotten a copy of my mug shot. I think my picture probably looked like Nick Nolte's mug shot. Bob somehow managed to get his hand in the picture while he was wiping the detention center and shame off of his face. I almost asked for the picture but I think Sajak would have tazered me. He was a total weenie. Then we were escorted back to our palatial estate to await the verdict. He had to go talk to his boss again to find out if were going to be let into the UK or sent back to the US. I frankly think he went to go flog the dolphin at the idea of exercising his massive and impressive immigration power over a couple of American douche bags, but whatever.

There was a phone in the room. We managed to talk to some people back in the States. Our UK boss was in pretty close contact with us, and she even managed to get a lawyer sent down to the airport. We called them, they called us but nothing was going to happen until we heard from Pat and Pat's boss. When the phone would ring it was usually for us, but sometimes it wasn't. When it wasn't for us it sounded like Osama Bin Laden calling to order pizza. I couldn't get the address of his cave right, so I usually just hung up.
The room we were housed in was totally weird. There were only three posters on the wall that didn't involve some list of customs infractions. One was an eagle (a symbol of America, no?), one was a flower and then the other was either a big horn sheep or an elk of some sort (do they have either of those species in the UK? I think they are indigenous to the US. Bob thought so too.) At some point in the proceedings Bob developed an extreme distaste for these posters and started to rant about it. Now, dear readers, many if not all of you know Bob. And you know if his ability to rant. This poster hatred produced some of the best Bobrant I have ever been privy to. Almost equal to when the temperature goes above 65 degrees or when Outback is out of potato soup. All in all Bob was an ideal cell mate. He has an amazing sense of humor and I think it was his presence which makes the whole thing seem funny in retrospect.
Sajak can back about 4 hours later. Or 8 hours. I have no idea. I think we landed at about 11. We got our verdict at about 9pm. We were going home. We had been found to be guilty of trying to pull a fast one on the Queen. Fuck us. We would have to go home, apply for Visas and then come back again once we got them. So the next question was "When do we get to go home?" Well rules state that when you get detained and then sent back you have to travel the exact same route that you came. This means that we had to find a flight that went from London to Munich, Munich to NYC. There was one of those flights. It didn't leave until 9am the next morning. We were staying here over night. Okay, fine. That sucks. Here's what sucks more: there were no beds for us. Apparently there were beds in this detention facility but only the real criminals (aka drug mules, weapon smugglers, terrorists etc.) got to sleep in beds. Corporate pawns with misplaced trust issues had to sleep on metal benches. We weren't even allowed to go get our books or iPods or anything. There were only a few books in the room. The only ones that looked mildly interesting were some shitty mystery book and the Koran. I read the whole mystery book and still had 8 hours to go. The TV came on at about 2am playing the original of the movie Carrie. With no sound. And the grate in front of the screen made it impossible to see the picture. You can imagine the fantasies I had of exploding a certain internet company with my mind. I tried to find a comfortable place to sleep. There was a side room that I kind of made my own. We were the lifers of the detention center so we got first dibs on the best chairs and shit. Nobody else was there for more than a couple of hours. I was pretty pumped about my little room until I discovered that this used to be the smoking lounge and I had most likely contracted contact emphysema by nestling my face into the pleather seat covers. I was in there alone for awhile until Bob woke up and came in to chat and then promptly take a snorecoma on the floor. (I love you Bob. You were very tired and uncomfortable.) So I didn't sleep. I just thought. About my life. And decided that this must be a sign from God, or Jen Savage or whoever is in control out there to make a change in my life. I had decided to quit my job many times. I'd actually got the words out to a superior twice, but those quits never quite stuck. I wasn't really sure this one would either, but the events that had unfolded and would continue to unfold were making it pretty hard to stay at the company with any of my pride intact. Plus, whilst lying awake for 12 hours I'd come up with some pretty radical ideas for food dehydrators and closet organizing implements and was resolved to call up Ron Popeil the minute I got within a PG Tips throw of a telephone. Having a job would just get in the way of my career as a great inventor.

The next morning Bob managed to smooth talk his way into laying hands on a toothbrush and face wash, and I rode on his coat tails in order to do the same. Then we noshed on a healthy breakfast of Starburst syrup and Fish and Chips....chips. Eventually we were escorted out of the DMV, to our stuff and we began to make our way to the plane that would take us home. Little did you know, dear reader, the benefit of being exported from a country. We were shot to the front of the line for our flight. And then we didn't have to take the normal passenger bus that brought all the other sheep to the plane. Oh no. We got our very own van. With a metal cage between us and the driver. It was a beautiful morning to be in a prison van in London. The van ride was pretty fun, and Bob chatted it up with the driver asking him all about how the gear shift configuration works in a van of this sort across the pond. Were things different because the steering mechanism was on the other side? Bob couldn't get enough. I was so amazed at Bob's ability to still wonder about anything at this point. I had given up, and he was still asking questions. He's a far better man than I.

When we got to Munich we were released from the authorities and if we weren't sleeping we were drinking. I crushed a split of 'pagne in Germany. At least I can say I did that. Proud, Mom? After minor crushing we got back on the plane and were homebound.

When we landed we both had 1,000 messages and emails from various member of the company. Apparently lodging had been arranged and we would be staying at one of the okayest hotels in Manhattan. All we wanted was to get back to some semblance of home, shower, eat, sleep and stare at a TV for at least elevendy blue hours. This was not to be. I still can't discern the motives here, but our boss had arranged for a "welcome home" dinner with our friends from work. We weren't going home to sleep. We were going out to dinner. With our boss. No. Fucking. Way. He took us to a fancy steak house and needless to say, without agreeing to it beforehand we all ordered the most expensive thing on the menu. If I hadn't been so tired I would have ordered a Gold Martini with a side of Sergio Rossi sling backs (Wow. I've never sounded more like a gay man in mah life.) I did manage to get a seafood extravaganza tower which made le boss wince, so that made me feel kind of good.

The next morning I woke up and decided I would go take a walk and think about shit. (Not actual POOP, silly.) I walked out the front door of the hotel and lo and behold there was a giant, inflatable rat standing out front surrounded by protesters. The employees of the hotel were protesting unfair and semi-illegal employment practices by the hotel chain. And this was the hotel where my company had chosen to put us up. Par for the motherfucking course. If I indeed needed another sign, here it was. Thanks for sending it over, God Savage.

So there it is. In a long, long, long blog post. I think I still left some shit out. Bob, if you feel that I've missed anything vital please feel free to start your own blog entitled "ThisDrunkBitchFuckedUpMyLifeGood III.blogspot.com" (There are two other with the same title originally penned right around the same time I discovered double bottles of wine.)

Postscript: Okay, in the company's defense, HR did send us an email outlining what were were supposed to say to customs when we arrived in London. Everything was legal, I just didn't read the email. Maybe I deserve the blame for that reason. Neither of us assumed that anything this important would be sent in an email with no follow up. But then who could have known that it was going to be this important? If we had tried to enter the UK at a different time, on a different day, talked to someone other than Sajak things could have been completely different. Who knows. Can't change the past. Just passive-agressively blog about it.

"Yeah, Sorry. I get NO cell service out where I live."

2008-07-14T12:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, dear readers, (I stole that from Brad Neely, who I think stole it from someone more famous. Dear Brad Neely, If you're reading my blog you must be drunk, but you'll remember me as the wierdo who was sitting behind you chair handing you beers and blocking the door to the bathroom during the rendition of 'Dear Readers' after the showing of "We Are Wizards" at the Boston Independent Film Festival. Remember the chick that passed out drunk in the comic book aisle and snored? No, it wasn't me but we shared that. I love you very much. Let's make sex. Love, The Wierdo Door Blocker Chick.) Holy parenthetical digression, Batman.

Okay, as I was saying, dear READER, (Sup Jen. What's going on? How was your pizza?) I'm entering into some uncharted territory here, and I thought I'd share it with you because it's NOT pompous and self-centered to believe anybody gives a day-old shit about what's going on in my life.

This may be obvious to the outside observer: I'm totally single. Totally, completely, terminally single. This means that I'm allowed to go out and meet dudes. I recently met one such dude, and was rather proud or myself because for fucking ONCE we don't work together. We met at a coffee shop. (Hello? Cliche? Can you call me back? I think we have a bad connection.) We talked and he seemed pretty unretarded, had the use of all four limbs and he could use words and stuff. All in all we were off to a good start. He walked me back to work and I, in a totally bold, un-me move, gave him my phone number. He called and we went out for a drink and I, in a totally bold, un-me move, did NOT get pantshittingly drunk and went home que solo. Then my good pal Jennifer came to visit and I dusted off my drunken-tard-whore mantle, got hammered and made out with the kid. Oh yes "kid" implies he's younger than I. What else would you expect? Primordial Dwarfism? Yeah, I guess that's a safe bet too.

Post-make out I was having second thoughts. The very idea of him made me feel a little queasy. Maybe it's because I was wicked hungover, or maybe it was his gingerism, either way I was having regrets. Here's where I get into unknown territory. This has never happened to me before. I've never liked a guy, hooked up with him, and then been over it. I've always gone from MO to clinger in t-minus 2 days. This is totally new, and to be completely honest, pretty fucking great.

I'm snubbing. I've never been the snubber, only the snubee. This is fun. I've been using all sorts of tricks that I didn't know were in my arsenal. So far my favorite is the "Call back 30 seconds before you drive out of range of a cell tower". I've done that twice. Also, the "Pretend to not get text until the next day and weave elaborate tale of how you were busy trying to cajole a 4 year-old into taking a dump." I do these things because I'm a dick and I don't want to be honest and say to him "Listen, Ginger, I really like my life and I don't need any supplement to it. I'm going to go home, hang out with my rag-tag band of roomates and a four year old child. I might watch an episode of Starship Galactica. I might read the first 3 pages of a self-help book and fall asleep. I don't know. I don't know if I'll have enough time. I have to get up super early tomorrow to sit at the coffee table and drink 4 cups of coffee before I eventually pour myself into my bathing suit and decrode on the beach for 3 hours. At any rate, what I'm trying to say is that it's not me. I'm perfect. It's you. You're not a good fit for my awesome life. Sorry. I'll keep your resume on file in case I get depressed and lonely at some point. Chances are that I will, but I probably won't call you. That's what booze is for." I wish I could just say that to him, because I'm sure he'd just be like "Uh, okay psycho. It's called 'Battlestar Galactica'. Thanks for letting me know. I'm all tore up. I'll go bang the same 19 year old Scottish chick you saw me talking to when we met at the coffee shop. Good luck with your wicked fun life."

I'm not trying to be mean. I find that real meanness only occurs when you're not trying. So although I'm not trying to I probably am. Whatever, I'm just a scared little douche trying to get through the day, and it's making me kind of happy to be able to snub for once in my life. If you're going to begrudge me that you fucking suck. Get off my blog......No. Wait. COME BACK. I'm sorry. I was wrong. You don't suck, you're allowed to have an opinion too. I love you. NO I love YOU.

Wait, fuck. Did I tell him I had a blog?

CONGRATULATIONS ON ALL OF THE FIRING!!!

2008-07-08T14:56:00.001-07:00

3 of the best people in the world were recently fired from their jobs. This leads me to believe one thing: the world is going to hell in a hand basket designed by Rue McClanahan.

Dear Economy,

Stop being sluggish. Your posture is terrible. If you keep making that face it's going to stick that way.

Love,

Getting fired from your job fucking sucks. It's one of the more embarrassing things that can happen. Besides pooping your pants in public. In the daytime. And having boogers coming out of your nose after you get out of the water to talk to the guy you've had a crush on for like 11 years. (Don't assume that either of these things happened to me. You're very assump....tu....ous. Fuck.) Wow. Now that I listed those two things I realize getting fired isn't really even in the top 10 most embarrassing things. What about falling down in public? Or spilling water on your crotch so it makes you look like you peed? Oh what about ass sweat stains? Sex farts? Neckne? Gingerism? Being Canadian? At any rate and all of that aside, getting fired fucking sucks. A LOT. But it happens. And then once the firing is over, you're left with something. It's actually the lack of something. It's the lack of a job. It's the lack of a mothertrucking JOB. You have NO JOB!! HAHAHAHA! SCORE!

Why has society turned the phrase "I have no job." into some sort of admission of failure or fault? To my mind, that's a cry of victory. You have arrived! You aint got shit to do! Or, more accurately, you have everything to do. For a brief time in your life, pretty much anything could happen. That's fucking SWEET.

This post will be a list of all of the things which can possibly be accomplished during a period of unemployment. I'l begin with some examples of real achievements already banged out by this crack team of jobless wonders:

1. Two kickball championships, and a successful reverse sleeper choke hold on some dude that was going to beat up your good buddy Karl: Completed. (All three of these things happened in one night. Who does that? WHY DID YOU GET ALL OF THE AWESOME GENES? I WANT TO BE THE WILLIAM WALLACE OF KICKBALL. MOOOOMMMM!!!!)

2. One shower caddy dissassembling mission: Aborted. (Mission aborted because of decreased fine motor skills due to 9am Red-Headed Slut shots.)

3. 9am Red-Headed Slut shots: Completed.

4. Mission to Martha's Vineyard: Completed.

5. NOT being the reason a passenger ferry became engulfed in flames, crashed into China and sunk to the bottom of the ocean. (Nice job, Savage. Way to look where you were going this time.): Priceless. For everything else, there's American Express.

6. MO with wicked hot baseball player: Check.

7. Daytime margarita crushing: Completed.

8. Dance Party at random local bar: Check.

9. MO with waiter: Aborted. (I can't disclose the details of this mission as only those on the "Need to Know" list have that information, however it is this reporter's belief that the eyes of history will look fondly on the reasons this mission was not completed. For further information contact jensavage@ifuckingrule.net)

Wow. Now that I look at that list, there's not too many more things these guys could possibly want to do. The above list is pretty comprehensive.

But let's give it a whirl, shall we?

Things to do whilst unemployed:

1. Get a haircut that makes you look like you have a bony growths on your skull that could be the beginning of devil horns.

2. Give a haircut that makes someone look like they have a bony growths on their skull that could be the beginning of devil horns.

3. Whittle.

4. Boat.

5. Spelunk.

6. Carabeen.

7. Belay.

8. Stage a live performance of an episode of The Hills. Use a real couture dress for the scene when LC realizes she fucked up huge.

9. Learn to impersonate a D-list celebrity perfectly and use that ability to get laid by a moderately attractive person that you probably could have hooked up with even if you hadn't nailed the impersonation.

10. Learn all the swear words from that sweet African click language, and hurl insults at strangers. "CLICK$$#$%#CLICK#$ YOU!!"

11. Just one day, start drinking the MINUTE you wake up.

12. Hang out with me and repeat 5,9, 10 and 11.

13. Hire a camera guy to film you walking around being yourselves. Fame and fortune will follow.

14. Hire me to be your Brian Gerard "Kato" Kaelin.

I love you guys. Congratulations. GET TO WORK YOU CLICKING CLICKS!!

The "Do"s and "Don't"s of Dealing with a Girl You Don't Want to Date. Alternate Title: Sorry Oak

2008-06-25T15:14:00.000-07:00

That title is something I made up back when I lived in NYC. Pretty cool, right? Yeah? Totally awesome, I say.
I used to think I was pretttttty radical. Still kind of do. I fancied myself the ADA of my own personal episode of Law and Order. Not the dykey red-haired one that's always trying to fist Olivia, but the tall, brunette that gave Jack McCoy the only stiff-arm of his long ADA-bedding career. (Or so I imagine. She very well could have had one too many Sloe Gin Fizzes and let him play "just the tip". I hope not though. These people are real to me. They're all I have.) I thought I was so cool, so cool that I could pick and choose what feelings I had, and avoid any sort of emotion that made me look less than totally ADA-y. In hindsight I was and still am, sweetly retarded. (Thanks Jen). Samantha Jones I am not. She's fictional. I don't think a lot of people understand that. Hot. Cool. Totally fictional. I'm not saying I've had my heart broken or anything. I've always been too chickenshit to fully get my heart broken, but I've been really fucking pissed off a couple of times and also one time I wasn't allowed to get pissed off. (I did anyway, but because I couldn't get mad at the dude I channeled it into an awesome diet which I have yet to be able to replicate. If I could bottle that shit I'd be a gazillionaire.)
I'm going to go over three real-life case studies of examples of guys that I wanted to date but that didn't want to date me and how things played out. (Note: I hate ALL of the nomenclature for the male gender in the English language. I hate "man", "guy", "boy". I also hate all words for female underpants. Actually, I kind of like the word "underpants". If I ever get a dog I might name him Underpants. DON'T STEAL THAT!!!!) This post is for all the homies out there who want to be able to bag chicks but still look like the good guy. Or less cynically, how to stay friend with girls you've hooked up with and want to be your GF. I'm going to teach you all you want to know. Why? Because I want you to think I'm the cool girl that has all of this figured out, thus fooling you into thinking that I'm too cool to become a clinger when in fact I'm the worst clinger of them all but you don't realize that until AT LEAST week 3 when you notice that my ability to climb tree and look in your window is neither cool nor cute. What do we think, Jen? Bored yet? Well it's only going to get worse so pour yourself some wine. Oh can't get the cork out? Sad face.

Case Study #1. Subject: Richard Dreyfuss. (names may or may not be real or spelled correctly.)
Richard was my roommate and we worked together. (I KNOW. Please hold all questions, comments, exclamations, under the breath mutters, rebukes, cat calls, racial slurs and facial tics until AFTER the lecture.) We hit it off immediately. We were both well into our respective alcoholism at this point but one time we even bailed on the bar to sit at home and hang out with our pet spider, Max. (Granted he drank 12 beers and I a bottle and a half of wine, but it doesn't count because we weren't at the bar.) Those were the happy times. A couple of weeks later I came to find Richard had a girlfriend who lived in Vermont. I think he may have told me straightaway, but I was either too drunk or too deluded to realize it. This was hard for me because I was totally clinger status at this point and we lived and worked together and he was wicked fun AND I was always drunk. But I managed stop anything really serious from happening further. Actually he may have stopped it, but history is written by the person with the blog so fuck you. Things were okay for awhile, and Richard and I still hung pretty tight. That is until he started fucking another girl with whom we worked. Nuclear. Psycho. Rage. Spiral. K-Hole. Crazy. I was inconsolable. Completely taken by surprise that this guy who cheated on his girlfriend with me would bang another girl IN FRONT OF MY FACE. The humanity!! The summer took a sharp turn for the worst at this point, and things ended with me smoking a enormous amount of pot, writing him a long hate letter and leaving it in a drawer in the house for him to find. Or to not find. "Dude, I'll just like, leave this here and if he's meant to find it, he like totally will and if he's not meant to find it, he like, won't. Totally, man. Pssshhh."

Case Study #2. Subject: Morgan Freeman
Morgan Freeman and I worked together. (Yup. I know.) Morgan was really nice. I was just coming out on the other side of Case Study #3 when MF and I started hanging out. I was sad, and he was nice. It was pretty innocent at first. Movies and shit. We made out once and then nothing for months. Then one night I went out to sushi dinner, got drunk, called him and shit got real. I was surprised by the whole thing and I think he was too. Especially considering I was supposed to be moving to another country in a month, so no matter what happened we had a hard date when it would all be over. I suppose that's what made it easier for me to commit. I didn't actually have to. So I totally threw myself into it, and from what I understood he did as well. We spent almost every day and night together in the two weeks up to my departure. Then I left. We hugged. It was sad. Get on plane. Arrive in foreign country. Said country didn't like the taste of me, and spit me right back to the U.S. like so much rancid Unagi. So I was back. And I called him. And he didn't call back. And then I saw him. And he wasn't happy to see me. So I got drunk, and I called. And I called. And I called. Then I moved to another city (in America) and cried. For a million different reason (probably least among them, Morgan) I cried for about a week. Then I emailed him, and he was very nice and tried to explain the best he could but I still don't get it and probably never will. What happened in the 22 hours I was on an airplane? If it was anything less than at least 3 phenomenal blow jobs with full ball cuppage this kid is fucking hit.
Case Study #3. Subject: Anjelica Houston
WE FUCKING WORKED TOGETHER. WHAT?? I could have gotten fired for this shit. I don't even know how the whole thing stared, but I know there was booze. I think the moment I hit clinger stage with him was watching him take shots of vodka and chase with water. SWOON!!!! Anjelica was very honest with me. He told me daily that he was a total asshole. That he was going to hook up with other girls, that he didn't want a girlfriend. That totally sucked to hear. But you know what sucked more? The night we were out at a bar and he tells me that he's going home to hook up with another girl. He looked me in the eye and told me this. I think he even said "sorry". Well, fuck. What's a girl to do? No self-righteous rage? No lies? He has not lied to me at any point. How am I going to deal with this? And he knew I was fucking pissed, at least I hope I told him as much. I'm not sure that I actually did. In my experience with Richard and Morgan (And TV shows.) this is when dudes check out. Peace. It's been nice knowing you. You're about to go crazy and kill my bunny. I'm cutting all ties. Anjelica didn't check out. He stayed around, but not in a mean, taunting kind of way. He didn't go out to the bar when I was there and let me throw myself at him like the sad, battered drag queen I turn into when I have too much Boone's Farm. He still talked to me and treated me as he always had, but he wasn't around as much as he used to be. I was incensed. How can he not let me hate him? How can he be treating me like he still cares about me but just as a friend so I'm not totally confused? How could he be helping he deal with this in the healthiest way possible? I don't even know if he was doing it on purpose, which is even worse! Is this dude so good to his core that he just naturally treats all people as he would wish to be treated himself? WHAT A FUCKING COCK SUCKER!! The real shitty part about the situation with Anjelica was that we had to be in the same office and the other chick he hooked up with was there too. Otherwise I've moved on from that pretty nicely and I count this chap among my best friends.
So what? Who fucking cares? No really. Who cares. I'm not going to try and answer those questions. I wrote this post because it's my blog and I wanted to get it all out. I think deep down I hope Richard, Morgan and Anjelica read this because I never had the balls to be as honest with them as I'm now asking them to be with me. If they do read this I want them to know one thing: THEY'RE FUCKING REAL!!! ALSO, that I know all of you (well maybe not Richard) were doing the best you could. We're all just fucking chumps walking around trying to not die and in the process protecting ourselves the best we can. I guess the one thing that stands out with Anjelica is the honesty, which is the hardest fucking thing in the world. Why did he have the balls to just be honest with me when nobody else did? I don't know why. I wish Morgan had known that he wasn't into me before I'd left and told me as much. The worst part about that situation was feeling like a total idiot. I wish Richard had...well I wish I'd never met Richard. (Richard: Call me. Seriously.) Clearly I made mistakes too......Ha. Just kidding. I totally didn't.

So dudes, here's moral #1: Never hook up with me. Moral #2: if you absolutely HAVE to hook up with me NEVER tell me you like me. Moral #3: If you have to hook up with me and you have to tell me you like me and you actually don't like me JUST TELL ME THE TRUTH. And then duck. You're a fucking deadman.

Preppies. Wow.

2008-06-24T09:43:00.000-07:00

I live in Martha's Vineyard. I won't get into why I haven't posted in more than a year. Nobody noticed. Except Jen. I love you Jen.
SOOO I live in (or on) Martha's Vineyard. I came here for a job, which is interesting considering I grew up on Cape Cod and never came here before two weeks ago. (For those of you that don't know, MV is an island off the coast of Cape Cod. Oh wait, Jen is the only one reading this. Jen, MV is and island off of Cape Cod.) The locals here call me a "recent transplant". I keep telling everyone they're real. Then we all get uncomfortable and I go home and cry into my pillow.
There are a lot of preppies here. I thought I knew what a preppy was. I went to boarding school. All those guys wore khakis and "bucks" and called each other by their last named and fantasized about sodomizing each other. I figured they were the true preppies. I had head rumors of the denizens of Martha's Vineyard. I have a ribbon belt with bass on it. I've stolen a flippy wallet from J. Crew. I figured with that wealth of knowledge and experience I knew exactly what was up with the people on this island. To say that I had any idea of preppiness from my days at boarding school is like saying that I am a marine biologist because I once looked into the toilet after I peed. (I always do. It's a sign if health when...whatever. Judge me if you will.)
This place is out of effing hand. You go to a game park in Kenya to taunt wild lions by hanging your younger siblings out of the door of the jeep until they cry so hard they poop their pants. You come to Martha's Vineyard to see preppies in their natural habitat. I realize now that the buck wearing sodomites in high school were either total preppy posers or they were scared to practice their true, undiluted preppy religion lest they be persecuted for their beliefs. I know how THAT is. I DO look at my pee, and it's intolerant jerks like YOU people that make me ashamed to talk about it.
I've never really thought about the meaning behind the term "preppy". If you have you're a huge douche bag. Wikipedia says "Preppy also spelled "preppie", is a chiefly North American adjective or noun traditionally used in relation to northeastern private university-preparatory schools, as well as those who attend some of America's prestigious private colleges and universities." I say poppycock. (Ha. I just said cock.) I think "Preppy" is short for "Prepared" because these people are fucking PREPARED! For what you might ask? Well I'll tell you in a roundabout, super confusing manner.
I'm sure the people of Martha's Vineyard don't go out onto their yachts every day. They're just humans, right? They lead normal lives. They have families and cars and other shit that makes someone appear normal. But what if they had to go out on a yacht at a moments notice? What if they were whisked up in a yachting plan with no forewarning whatsoever? Well, they would not be caught with their oddly colored pants down. Oh no. They would be ready. Armed to the teeth with all of the accoutrement required for an emergency day of yachting. Let's start from the bottom up, shall we? (Everybody now: THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID!!)
Deck shoes. Those yacht decks are slippery! We should all wear shoes that are made of leather and don't really have a good tread on them, but someone once told us this was the appropriate footwear for yachting, they say! Wait! Make sure the laces aren't too long! Mother Buffy warned us with tales of little prepsters pitching over the side of our 100-footer after tripping on an errant lace. Just go ahead and tuck those suckers right inside. Who cares? It's not like you're wearing socks!
Shorts! Pale red, or even better PATCHWORK MADRAS! We like pale red because when the sun beats down on regular red this is the color it fades to so we're just preempting the harsh effects of mother nature. I submit the madras fabric came the famous marine disaster tale of the "Buffy III" out of Edgartown, MA. Old salts tell of the 2 harrowing hours that Jock Hippenpoof Von Waterdale IV spent with a Pepsi stain on his favorite pair of Nantucket Reds, and how he heroically saved his reputation and his snazzy ensemble by crafting a pair of shorts out of small square pieces of dinner napkins he got from his yacht maid. And thus a hectic style was born.
Next, and arguably the most iconic image of preppy style; the polo shirt. The polo shirt spans many style movements and can be seen anywhere from the front-butts of fat, old, tourist ladies to the fake-tanned biceps of the Gotti set of Strong Island, NY. However, what earmarks the preppy polo is the "popping" of the collar. Popping means to ignore the manufacturers pre-fabricated fold of the collar, and instead flip the collar up and away from the body. This, of course, serves the function of protecting the neck from the harmful UV rays of the sun. Thank goodness all the traders on Wall Street have that protection on casual Friday or we might see some serious irregularly edged moles on the St. Paul's class of 2003!! An additional element of sun protection is of course the hat, which is not complete without some embroidery announcing the wearer as a crew member of one the America's Cup boats. Gosh, where do they hold the America's Cup? Is the starting line the entire coast of Australia? It would sort of have to be because if all of these hats are to be believed there are a KAGILLION ex-crew members of the America's Cup.
These "prep"ared people have really got all of their proverbial bases covered. Footwear, thighwear, neck and head protection. What could they possibly be missing? Oh GOD! The retinas!! They must be protected as well! That's what sunglasses are for. But we're not just strolling around on land! We're yachting! Shit gets pretty messy on a yacht. What if the sunglasses are suddenly flung from the wearers face into the briny! Really? Do you REALLY think the preppy set would be unprepared for this eventuality? Hell NO they would NOT! Those sunglasses are held onto their ever-so-tan faces with FROGGIES!! Neon pieces of squishy fabric that not only clash with the baker's dozen of hues they are already wearing but make sure that no Ray Bans will be lost to Davey Jones' Locker this day! (Note: I might have made the name "Froggy" up. I can't find any evidence to back up my claim that this is what they are actually called. But neither could Copernicus.)
I can not pretend to be making a scholarly report on the full life cycle of the preppy. I know nothing of their behavior in the fall or winter. I know nothing of their mating habits (But who knows, I'm here all summer! Know what I'm saying? Huh? Right? No? Okay.) I only know what I have observed of the early summer preppy in their natural habitat, and from what I can see these folk are READY!! So in conclusion, preppies: I salute you. If the world is ever under alien attack, and our only means of escape is via yacht, the lives of every man, woman and child will depend on your preparedness to man aforementioned yacht. The rest of us will be slipping around on the desk, with faded red shorts, sunburned necks and we will be blind because our goddam sunglasses fell into the frigging ocean! I think we can all breathe a sigh of relief knowing that you preppies are more then prepared to save the world.

Bravery: Cruella, Kate and Nicole (If you're easily offended...fuck off.)

2007-06-12T04:10:00.001-07:00

I've been thinking about writing a post about weight issues and images in the media for a while now, but haven't been sober enough to come up with any coherent thought in a while.

One of my first idols was Cruella Deville. She was really skinny, and she wore a huge fur coat. I knew that she was probably way too busy hunting dalmation puppies and smoking butts to eat every meal and that seemed so cool to me. I was always a tubby little fuck, so to see her dress hanging off her gaunt frame made me want to work hard to lose any and all extra lbs. I actually haven't changed. At all. In the last 20 years. (Awesome.) I still think it's cool to be skinny. That's why i'm particularly struck by the strength, bravery and fortitude of two young women in the media today.

I'm pretty sick of the way the media is harshing on the proverbial mellow of people like Kate Bosworth and Nicole Ritchie. (Okay, I think "mellow" might always be proverbial as it's not an actual object. Oh well. I went to a commuter college.) Okay, sure, them bitches is mad skinny. Who cares? I think Nicole looks better tan and skinny with good hair than she did fat and drunk with pink dreadlocks. And Bosworth looked pretty dope in Blue Crush as boyish girls go, then she got herself so that she looked awesome in couture. Again, who fucking cares? These girls felt a pressure to be a certain way so they dedicated themselves to a goal. How is that bad? I've been trying to get anorexic for like 16 years. That shit is hard! You get hungry! I'm proud of them. And you know what? They are helping our society. In a world where people don't have enough to eat, we should thank people like Kate and Nicole who are leaving more resources for the less fourtunate. I used to hate it when my mom would use the rationale: "There are starving children in Ethiopia." to get me to eat my dinner. I would always think to myself "What the fuck are you going to do, Mom? Package up this leg of boiled chicken and mail it over to Addis Abad
c /o Skinny Black Children?" (Yes, i thought "fuck". I don't lie. Stop looking at me like that.)

Back to the societal pressure thing. One might say that it's a negative thing that our society puts pressure on women to be really skinny. One might say it's unhealthy, and that we should all just be happy the way we are. Well i'm a fucking alcoholic. Is that okay? Bad example. What about the pressure that is placed on people to be doctors or lawyers and the devote their whole being and existence to that effort. They may not be healthy in mind spirit or body, but because the end product is considered prestegious nobody writes any US Weekly articles about it. I don't think fat people should be praised for being "just who they are". Fat is unhealthy. The human body was not made to hold up a whole lot of weight. People weren't meant to sit on their asses all day and eat Wendy's. You slobs aren't being who you are, you're being lazy. Work out. Eat less. Look to Bosworth. She's dumb as hair, and she managed to work it out. (Jokes, Kate. You're my girl.)

So i say "you go girls". Blow your coke. Eat your cotton balls. Do what you've got to do to get to where you want to be. I think MTV should do a Made show about Anorexia. I'd be first in line. If i wasn't so damn old.

Glossary of Terms

2007-06-05T07:16:00.001-07:00

Spice: n, v, adj:

n. something that adds flavor. See also Spicy.
v. to spice. To engage in an amorous encounter, usu. (hopefully) without emotional attachment.
adj. spice / spicy. The predecessor to the Paris Hilton catch phrase "That's hot" but way more nuanced. Spice refers to anything cool, interesting, sexy, intelligent, controversial, and will be used by someone who is too drunk to think up anything more eloquent.

Schoolie: n.:

n. Literally "a school aged person". The meaning of this word is derived from the practice of pursuing those that are much younger that oneself. See also Schoolie Stalk. Originally it referred to recent college graduates going after those in their teens. More recently it has evolved to also encompass almost 30 year olds going after late teen / 20-somethings. See ie eg Matthew McConaughey in Dazed and Confused . "I keep getting older, and they stay the same age."

Jag: n, v, adj.:

n. A party or celebration of epic proportion usu. without any floor for classlessness. Often schoolies are stalked at the jag with every intention of spicing them. See also Jagger.
v. to jag. To drink without regard for societal norms or conventions. Jagging is usu. done in the company of other jaggers, who have a similar taste for strong spirits.
adj. On the jag. Engaging in a consecutive series of jags, resulting in a perpetual state of drunkeness. Only the hardcore jagger can truly be on the jag, and other more novice will aspire to such said level of jag.

9,489.....9,490!

2007-06-05T05:43:00.000-07:00

Today is my 26th birthday.

I'm finding 26 to be sort of a tough age. Yesterday somebody asked me how old i was, and the shock and awe that registered on their face when i answered was a surprise to me. That was until i looked around me and realized i had beer on the front of my shirt from my most recent keg stand, and my cell phone was ringing to the tune of Avril Lavigne's "Girlfriend".

Okay, so i don't necessarily "act my age", but as someone with a penchant for stalking schoolies, i've always been of the mind that age ain't nothing but a number. I don't FEEL like i'm 26. i still have dreams of being a professional figure skater or possibly winning a gold medal in the pommel horse one day. Clearly the only reason neither of those things is going to happen is because of my advanced age. It has nothing to do with the fact that I'm built like a duck-billed platypus and i have the coordination of a can of baked beans.

26 is four years from 30. 30 is 10 years from 40. Then i'm pretty much dead.

So i guess i'm starting to understand the idea that life is short. However if the space time continuum seems to have shifted to shorten months and years, why the FUCK does the work day still seem like it's 1,000,000 hours long???

Dishes and Chunks: On Ineptitude

2007-05-31T08:36:00.000-07:00

There are certain people in this world that avoid responsibility by feigning ineptitude. I've done it. I think you all have too, at some point or another. It's a pretty neat trick and will work if you surround yourself by the smart, capable and egotistical. If you pretend you can't do something as well as someone else, there's always some eager beaver that will throw themselves at the particular task, thus absolving you of responsibility. The uber-talented bullshit artist can even spin this to make themselves look better. When questioned about why they couldn't complete the assignment, they retort that it's not every employee that has the self-awareness to realize what they can and cannot do. This person has simply realized that on that particular subject another person would have been more capable, and it was for the benefit of the project and in turn the company thay someone else work in it. Is it not true that the great leaders realize where their strengths and weaknesses lie, and seek to surround themselves with people that can fill in their gaps? This is exaclty what the feigner has done. As i've mentioned before, most people are too wrapped up in their own bullshit to care who gets anything done, as long as the still look good. This excuse can get the feigner pretty far up the corporate ladder, although upon closer inspection they have done absolutely nothing at all.
Now to balance out the corporate feigner, we also have the corporate martyr. This person picks up the slack when the feigner is feigning. This person will gladly be accountable for all projects that come their way, regardless of their work level or aptitude. They never complain, and pretend that they are ashamed when lauded for their hard work and follow-through. This is simply another form of pretense, because in fact it is the compliments and gratitude that get them out of bed in the morning and if anybody forgets about how hard the work they'll find myriad ways to indirectly remind everyone within shooting distance. The martyrs are the mitochondrial work horses of the company, and are the reason anything gets done at all. They all burn out after three years and end up sitting in dark basements writing out lists of the feigner's name while fondling their assault rifles.
At times in my life i've been both a feigner and a martyr. We all have. But there was one particular instance in my life that caused me to think twice about pretending to suck at stuff, and as usual this lesson came from my shitty brother. He used to ask me to do the dishes. Being that i'm royalty in my own mind this request came as a full-frontal assault to all of my sensibilities. When he finally beat the shit out of me and forced me to do them, the job was half-assed at best. The next time it came to be my turn for dish duty, recalling the last episode. I would whine, "But Oak, look at what happened last time. I did such a bad job. There were chunks all over the dishes."
His response: "Fuck you. You're not going to get out of this by pretending you're bad at it. A drunken marmoset can do the fucking dishes. Take some responsiblity for yourself. Asshole."

In those exact words.

This post isn't about favoring either position. I could not care less what you do. I'm just observing shit everybody else already knows. Just more astutely.

Like how i'm trying to cover my ass for being self-indulgent about my blog? That's why i'm awesome.

Fruit Bats and Other Tales of Love

2007-05-29T04:28:00.001-07:00

This is probably the first and last time you'll ever see me give a shit about whether a relationship works out or not, but i really want to see Pam and Tommy end up together in the end. These crazy kids have been through a whole lot together: from the kids, to the porno, to the illeged abuse, to the Hep C (or Hep B, i'm not sure which they have, but it's something they share.)
Pam Anderson is one of my favorite celebrities because she's unabashedly fake, and doesn't pretend otherwise. When i somehow manage to make enough money to afford all the plastic surgery i want i'm just going to bring Pammy's pic into the doctor's office and say "Let's do this thing." Also, she wrote a reoccurring article in Jane Magazine for a while that i rather enjoyed. This was before i realized that Jane is a magazine for hipster chicks that are pretending they're not lesbians and for rich chicks that like to buy wicked expensive clothes with holes and stains on them in order to pretend they're hister chicks that are pretending they're not lesbian. BUT I DIGRESS... I realize that Pam's article was most likely penned by one of the lesbos on staff at Jane, but i really liked her moxy.
Tommy is one of those guys that's so ugly he's actually really fucking hot. I really can't put my finger on what makes him so attractive. I've always really like tattoos. And he seems like he drinks a lot, which has always appealed to this genteel lady. I also think it might be that deep down he seems like the type of guy that just got all wrapped up in this big rock and roll life, and doesn't really know how it all happened.

Awesome. I think drug/drink-addled morons are hot. My mom is sitting in her room at the asylum clapping her hands wildly , and she's not really sure why. (Note: This opinion of Tommy i have created from what i saw of their short-lived reality series. I CLEARLY have no fucking idea what he's like. He's just hot. Same holds true for Pam. They're probably both total assholes.)

At any rate i hope these two eventually realize that they're made for each other and live in a huge house in Malibu with their nipple piercings and their big floppy hats. Also, this is probably the best plan to prevent the further spread of Hep C (or B). Also, from what i've heard of T. Lee's proportions Pam's most likely ruined for other men forever anyway. (Yeah, gross, whatever. You've all thought it.) Especially that weenie Kid Rock. I submit he's hung like a fruit bat. That just got out of a cold pool.

More to the Point

2007-05-25T11:10:00.000-07:00

[10:19] anabell11@hotmail.com: also, i'm totally wearing a white skirt before memorial day
[10:19] anabell11@hotmail.com: HAHA
[10:19] anabell11@hotmail.com: SUCK IT BITCHES
[10:21] LizHall349: i wear white pants like every day
[10:21] anabell11@hotmail.com: that's cause we are above the law
[10:22] LizHall349: um
[10:22] LizHall349: that self doubt comic?
[10:22] LizHall349: genius
[10:22] anabell11@hotmail.com: hilarious.
[10:23] anabell11@hotmail.com: "T-Rex rules the schools! I cannot stress this enough!"
[10:23] LizHall349: hshs
[10:23] LizHall349: haha
[10:23] anabell11@hotmail.com: i think you should start responding to things as hshs instead of haha
[10:24] LizHall349: me too
[10:24] anabell11@hotmail.com: you'll confuse people as to whether you are laughing with them or hissing at their idiocy
[10:24] LizHall349: thats more how i laugh
[10:26] anabell11@hotmail.com: http://www.qwantz.com/index.pl?comic=577
[10:26] anabell11@hotmail.com: on top of all the other ways this comic has changed my vocabulary for the better, i am now going to replace "I think" with "I submit" in all contexts
[11:03] LizHall349: YES
[11:15] anabell11@hotmail.com: ugh, i am SO BORED and it's only 11:18
[11:15] LizHall349: ME TOO
[11:15] LizHall349: getting to work really early totally blows

Did You Just Eat a Blossom?

2007-05-25T10:19:00.001-07:00

An Ode to Bob
Casual Fridays begin the weekend,
tremulous gossamer strains El Scorcho.
Crushing with fanatical persistence,
tousled hair brought to you by after shower nap.
To begin a day without "Hey Bob" brings tears to bloodshot eyes.
Foot on table for all to see, demostrating Zeus-like balance.
Though not Canadian by birth, sentences end in a upswing,
mirrors my spirit upon his arrival.
Shirts as textured as the streets of Pittsburgh.
Buttons of opal.
Robert Soffel.
Woah.

I'm really Self-Absorbed (I Love My Life)

2007-05-25T08:58:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a rambling, self-indulgent, unfunny post. I'm working on the format of this shit. Give me a fucking break.

I love my life. That's a pretty annoying thing to say, right? It makes you pissed and uncomfortable? Makes you kind of hate me? It makes you think about why you're always sitting around, complaining about you're boring, hum-drum, do-nothing life, right? What is this uppity little bitch doing that makes her life so awesome? Well I'll tell you: nothing. I've done nothing. I'm way too young and inneffectual to have done anything of any worth. I'm pretty much free of any sort of real responsibility, and I have almost nothing in my life that would cause me to have to think very hard. Oh sure, I've got a job. My job is pretty standard as jobs go. I do stuff. During the week. There are computer monitors and excel sheets and Outlook invites. I get stressed out about work sometimes. But then i take a good look at what i do, and i realize something very important: Nothing fucking matters. (Yes, I realize i have used two colons in this post. I might even use another one. I'm okay with that. I'll ask for your courtesy in letting it slide.) What i do impacts the universe at large in no way, so it's virtually impossible to take myself seriously. I'll start to get down on myself because I'm worried I'm not doing a good job and everyone will realize it, but nobody is paying attention to me because they're so worried about keeping their proverbial asses out of their respective fires. So i just roll along. I've contructed a vertible shanty of a life for myself, and it could crumble at any moment. The history books will speak disapprovingly of my hubris. To steal a phrase from my brother, that shadow that's obscuring the sun is the other shoe. Like Ginuwine's next album, it's about to drop.

But fuck if i don't have fun. Fuck. Fuckfuck. Fuck.

What People Are Saying......

2007-05-24T11:13:00.000-07:00

[13:37] jen_savage2001: liz is a genius

[11:49] anabell11@hotmail.com: you're wicked funny and an entertaining writer to read

[15:48] marthajane122000: L - ladylike
[15:48] marthajane122000: I - inspirational
[15:48] marthajane122000: Z - zesty
[15:48] marthajane122000: H - haberdashery
[15:48] marthajane122000: A - amorous
[15:49] marthajane122000: L - languid
[15:49] marthajane122000: L - lucious

"Liz Hall is the hero in all of us. She is a beacon in the dark night of ignorance. She stands when others kneel. She is a leader. A prophet. A friend. A human" - Anon.

" Liz is the go-to resource for so many different bars in the NY area. She really understands the tastes and needs of the drinker - both novice and veteran - and has helped me accelerate my black outs. She's an invaluable asset to anyone's social life." - Anon.

"I once saw an unseasoned colleague question Liz's faultlesness, and I cautioned that ill-advised seedling not to ever even feign to suggest that Liz Hall can be contended with. For if there is one thing I have learned in what I can only call the honor of knowing Liz, it is that Liz Hall is never, ever wrong. You do not sass the sass queen. " - Martha Armitage

Liz Hall is god... - Bairam Rizai

It's All About SEO

2007-05-24T09:17:00.000-07:00

I work at a tech company.* At least there are tech people here. I mean people at my company say "tech" a lot. At any rate, my current vocation exposes me to those in the tech field. Hence, i think that i have more technology awareness than that of the average bear. One word that keeps popping up, like drunk me at the bar where the dude I stalk is hanging out with his girlfriend, is SEO. For you folks that aren't quite as tech-savvy as myself, that stands for "Search Engine Optimization". This is the process by which we try to get our site to return higher in search results on search engines like Google and Yahoo.** So AT ANY RATE, back to how this pertains to me. The name of the blog game is to get lots of people to sign up for your shit, right? So I says to myself, I says: "Self, let's come up with some hella good keywords." That way when people perform a search for any of the sick keywords i conjure up this neophyte blog will be one of the first results. So lets think about some words that people search often, and then let's make them bold and capitalized so the search engines can SEE them better:
FISTING
PARIS
LOHAN
PING PONG BALLS
GOLDEN SHOWER
CAMERON DIAZ
DIRTY SANCHEZ
JAQUE CHIRAC
ATTACK
IRAQ
PENILE

Methinks that should get me started. Google, prepare to meet your new Queen.

*Note: I'm not really sure what my company does. I have a drinking problem.
**Note: That might not really be what it is, but if anybody out there dares to correct me I will turn this car around and we won't go get ice cream again for like two weeks. I can't stand to be corrected.

So THIS is Blogging

2007-05-24T06:43:00.000-07:00

It's pretty lame that I haven't started a blog until right now, as I clearly have many things to say that will eventually change the course of humanity. I guess in my first post I'll go ahead and explain what the title of this blog means.

I'm kind of a small person, mentally and emotionally speaking. My world is separated into four arenas.

Things that I can win
Things that I can't win
People I can be better than
People that I can't be better than

I classify virtually everything in the world into one of the these four types. If I can't win it, I don't do it. If i cant be better than someone I tend to avoid them.

Now you're probably thinking (if you're even reading this drivel) "This girl sounds really boring. Nice life." You're right. I'm pretty boring, in the most UNboring, witty and self-effacing sort of way.

And you've got to give it to me, I'm honest.

So pose this question to yourself "Why should I continue to read this blog?" I'll give you the answer to that question: potential. This blog has the potential to suck, and it has the potential to not suck. It even has the potential to be totally radical. You could either be signing up to read another bullshit blog where some generic 20-something writes stupid comments about famous people, or you could be getting on board a cultural phenomenon at its very quickening. To tell you the truth, i don't know which it's going to be. My enormous ego leads me to believe the latter, and as we have learned from the beginning of this diatribe, i don't do shit that i'm not awesome at so if it sucks, i'll just stop.

At any rate, stay tuned! Or don't. I don't really fucking care.

Just kidding, please like me.