Life on the Cusp

The Why of the Hate

2010-01-25T04:21:00.003-05:00

Twilight is a worldwide phenomenon.

And I hate it.

A lot of people ask me why I hate Twilight so much. Why, when I love P. N. Elrod's The Vampire files, Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and stupid 80's B-movies like "My Best Friend is a Vampire" and "Vampires Anonymous"*, did I spew so much bile over the vampire "masterpiece" that is Twilight.

Well, I'll tell you. It's BECAUSE I love P. N. Elrod's The Vampire Files, Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and stupid 80's B-movies like "My Best Friend is a Vampire" and "Vampires Anonymous".

I hate Twilight because I know so well what good vampire stories are like, and they are NOT Twilight.

Vampires have fangs. Vampires can be killed embarrassingly easily, and so have to make up for it by being crafty and charming. Vampires walk a thin line between human and beast. Vampires crave blood. Vampires personify humanity's darker impulses for sex, violence and dominance. Vampires, in short, ARE FUCKING MONSTERS!

And Meyer has done nothing less than castrate the vampires in Twilight. Oh, sure her "evil" vampires like James are still pretty beastly,** but in a tired, animalistic way. The true terror of the vampire doesn't lie in its monster side, but in its human side. The perversion of the familiar and the safe, of the charming and romantic. This is the essence of the modern vampire: a creature of guile and deception which, and this is crucial, DOES. NOT. SPARKLE!

But Meyer misses the point! Her "vampires" are basically angsty X-Man villains (not like Magneto, more like Stiltman). They're bland and pretty and utterly empty. And, you know, that's not necessarily a bad thing if you work it properly, but then you would be Scott Westerfeld and the book you'd be writing wouldn't be Twilight, it'd be Uglies. This? Is not Uglies.

But the biggest crime, the number one reason why I hate Twilight with the burning hot intensity of 1,000 suns, is because it isn't bad.

That is, it isn't always bad. There are genuine glimpses of real talent, of wit and charm, of actual characterization. The scene where Bella's father gives her the truck is actually a personal favorite. It's beautifully staged, perfectly executed and fun to read. But it and scenes like it are few and far between. I get this painful feeling like Meyer started out wanting to write a proper story, but decided revision was too much work and settled for her rough draft. And the rest of the world settled right along with her. I'm mad that she has such potential and she didn't even try to reach it.

Her characters are flat and lifeless, okay. They're almost completely static, undergoing no personal journeys and learning NOTHING. Okay. I'm fine with that. Let this book suck in an ordinary way, and we can forget the whole thing and move on.

What kills me is that they didn't HAVE to suck! If she had just tried even a little, they could have been great. But being inside of Bella Swan's head is like having a root canal that never ends. She's melodramatic, melancholy, self-obsessed and deluded to a point even teenagers rarely reach. There's nothing about her to relate to. She actually pushes the reader away, something I didn't think possible. Her endless whining and obsessing. If I wanted to read a neurotic, emo-girl's diary I'd surf LiveJournal.

Edward is worthless as a love interest. Aside from being a psychologically twisted, emotionally abusive pedophile...he's boring. I literally have nothing else to say about him because he has no character to speak of! He's empty!

Jacob is lack-luster and awkward, moreso than his age requires. Charlie is virtually non-existant (I consider him the most heinous example of wasted potential in the whole book), and Edward's family are...well they're set pieces, basically.

And yet Meyer's books are treated like legitimate literature. It actually hurts me to see people championing Twilight like it's the next Harry fucking Potter, and knowing that the majority of the reading population is willing to settle for mediocre rather than demand excellence.

What I can't understand is why good YA authors, even great YA authors like John Green love Twilight so much. I mean, Meyer's tripe and books like An Abundance of Katherines are lightyears apart. They shouldn't even be on the same shelf!

And that, readers, is why I hate Twilight.

*Yes, I know "Vampires Anonymous" was done in the 90's. Stay focused, people.

**I did read the book. That's why I'm so full of hate. I know that of which I speak.

Bully to You

2010-01-24T20:22:00.002-05:00

So tonight after I got home from buying some fish (YAY FISHIES!) I watched The Pit Boss on Animal Planet. I gotta say, I like it.

But it did bring up some shit that drives me up the wall, and that's the surge of hate out there directed against pit bulls.

Pit bulls are far and away my all-time favorite large breed dog. One of the most endearing things about Kilo is how his forehead mysteriously looks pit bull-ish, even though he hasn't got a drop of pit in him. One of my regular customers at work has a pit he brings by every now and then and she is the biggest dork and the biggest sweetheart I've ever met, and I've known a lot of sweet, dorky dogs. Hey, I live with one.

My beloved memoirist Jen Lancaster has a pit named Masie, who is also a dorky sweetheart. In fact, my whole animal-strewn life I have never met a single aggressive or antisocial pit bull. I have been bitten once. It was by a lab/setter mix named Roxie or Rocket or something, and that was 'cause I was trying to take her toy away while she was playing with it. But I digress.

The fact is, a dog's breed has nothing to do with it's behavior. The meanest, most aggressive dog I ever met was a 9 pound Pomeranian/chihuahua mix named Benji. I hated that dog. The sweetest dog I ever met? Probably my poor, sweet Maddie before she died. She weighed 70 pounds and was half German Shepherd. The big dork downstairs is probably a close second. He weighs 85 pounds and is a Neapolitan Mastiff/Yellow Lab mix. And right now we're deciding whether we want to adopt a 50 pound English Bulldog/Pit Bull mix. Yep, I'm on the verge of my very first pit bull ownership experience!

So what are pits really like? Well, they're hyper. Bullies have a lot of energy. They're loyal. See, pits used to be the most popular family dog in the country, because they were bred to have loyal, devoted attitudes toward their owners. A bully will do just about anything to make his or her owner smile. They're affectionate. A bully hates to be ignored, and will climb on your lap so you make with the cuddles now. They love to lick hands, faces, whatever they can reach. Their tails never take a holiday (I walked this red pit bull at my sister's local shelter, I swear he didn't stop wagging once the entire time I was with him). They're smart. Bullies are quick to learn new tricks, and even quicker to figure out ways to trick you out of a cookie. They're gentle. Bullies used to be famed for their tender interactions with children, and when the American Canine Temperament Testing Association tested pit bulls, 88% of the dogs tested passed. To give you some perspective, the Golden Retriever scored 84.6%, and the Bearded Collie? Only 53.3%. Source for all that information right over here.

The Staffordshire Bull Terrier, which is the pit bull's proper name, get's a bad rap, and they're not the only ones. Rottweilers, German Shepherds, Mastiffs and other powerful large breed dogs have the same stereotype. And because of it, loving, gentle dogs are left for dead in kill shelters because of a criminal element, bad press, and a bad name.

So, yeah. I'm going to have a pit bull some day. A pure breed, which isn't hard because the shelters are swimming with them. And it's gonna get me dirty looks, and threats from my neighbors, and it will probably lose me the security deposit on whatever apartment I move into. I'll have a hard time getting homeowner's insurance, I'll be interrogated by people who see me walk my dog, and it'll be worth it. Because I'll have saved an innocent dog from death, and I'll use all of these conflicts as opportunities to spread the word about how wonderful pit bulls actually are.

Oh the Oddness of Me

2009-12-10T11:32:00.002-05:00

I have this...habit. Sort of a quirk. Ganesh alone knows where it started. I talk to books.

But I don't just talk to them, I ascribe personalities to them. I refer to them by their author's first name. For instance, say I'm reading the latest Dresden Files novel, and I'm keeping it close at hand while I do something else. Let's say I'm sitting on my bed, and as I shift from one position to another (probably because my foot fell asleep while I was messing around with my laptop), the book slides off the bed to land with a thunk in the space between my bedframe and the wall.

My standard response to this situation is to roll my eyes, give a disgusted snort, and hiss "Dammit, Jim!"

For those of you who don't know, the author of The Dresden Files is Jim Butcher.

And yet, for some books, this simply doesn't work. For those, for some arbitrary reason, I refer to them by their protagonist's first name. Like, were I to reread the Uglies trilogy, and I'd misplaced the book somewhere, you're very likely to find me wandering through the house calling out: "Tally! Tally? Where are you?" (Unless I'm reading the fourth supplemental novel, in which case the name I use is "Aya".)

The scary part? I think I almost half expect the book to respond with a slightly dusty-sounding "Here I am! You left me on the counter by the bathroom sink!"

You'd think the protagonist vs. author thing would be if the protagonist was one gender, and the author another. But that's not the case because I refer to my newest Border's purchase, Graceling, as Katsa even though the author's name is Kristin Cashore (btw? GO READ GRACELING! FR SRS!) I think maybe it has to do with a few factors, like how strong the protagonist's perspective is. Sometimes the main character infuses every aspect of the novel. Other times, it may have to do with how connected I feel to the author. I've read every single Discworld novel ever published, and a few of Sir Terry Pratchett's other works. I read about him and watch his interviews online, and I own The Hogfather on DVD. So I call all of his books "Terry". Likewise, I've been a member of Jim Butcher's fan forums and even talked to him personally online. So all of his books are Jim. Phillip K. Dick is a huge part of the sci-fi universe, and therefore an intrinsic part of my life, so his books are all "Phil or Phillip". And being a Nerdfighter, I feel incredibly close to John Green, so all of his books are "John".

But even then, sometimes the main character trumps the author. And it's still weird, talking to books like they can understand me. But I like the way it makes me feel connected to something wonderful. Especially right now, when I have Azar Nafisi's memoir Reading Lolita in Tehran sitting beside me. It's probably my favorite book, and I get this warm feeling whenever I pick it up and murmur, "Let's go, Azar", and for a moment it feels like this wonderful, inspiring woman is walking beside me wherever I go.

Y'know, it kinda feels like an incredibly lonely, and at the same time remarkably connected mentality. I'm alone enough that I feel comfortable talking to inanimate objects, and yet as long as I have them, I'm never truly alone. Odd.

I wonder if it'll still be possible to feel that connection when physical books are rendered obsolete by things like the Kindle. I'll miss them when they're gone.

Growing Restless

2009-11-27T01:14:00.002-05:00

So...I have this idea. It's a stupid, crazy idea, but it is an idea.

And it won't go away.

Here's my life:

I have 1 dog.

I have 1 brand new nephew.

I have 1 metric butt-ton of classes I still need to take to get my associate's degree...and then I need to figure out how to pay for my bachelor's at a real school.

I have a job that I hate.

I have no idea what I want to do once I'm out of college, nor what skills I have to offer to potential employers.

I make about $130 per week after taxes.

I am stuck in a rut.

Here's the idea: I want to just forget about all of that, the dog the nephew the job the classes the fact that I'm POOR, all of it. And I want to get on a bus and go...somewhere. I just want to pack up the most important things I own, get on a bus, and go.

Hey, I did say it was a stupid idea. Thing is, it won't go away. I want to go to Portland, OR (except the job market apparently SUCKS), but mostly I want to go to Victoria, BC (that's in Canada, for the self-centered Americans among us). Point is, I just want to go. I want to make a bee-line for the horizon and not look back. I want a fresh start, I want to be on my own, away from all the homey touches around here that make me feel like a child. And the more frustrated I get with my crappy job, and the more depressed I get with how much more I need to do for college, and the more my newest family member makes me feel tied securely to my home town, the more this insane get up and go idea appeals to me. I want independence. I want the chance to grow up, by force if necessary. I'm 20. I want to feel 20, not 15 (which is the oldest I can manage to feel these days).

I want to get away from my family, my friends, from everything familiar. I'm starting to feel smothered by it all. And I can't get it out of my head. I want out!

I feel like I'm suffocating.

Halp.

2009-08-12T12:28:00.002-04:00

Bianco is sick.

I changed his water, and it seems to have helped.

God I hope he pulls through.

Bianco Got His Groove

2009-08-08T02:39:00.002-04:00

Coolest thing about my fishy? He always swims to the front of the tank when I sit at my desk. Then when I leave, he swims back to his plastic plant, where he likes to chillax.

He was having some stomach problems when he first came home, but they seem to have cleared up for the most part. I've figured out that he prefers two pellets to three, and a bloodworm dessert. I think he has a hard time getting down the third pellet, and they are kinda big for his little mouth.

It's fun to feed him one pellet at a time. He hangs around the surface, biting the bubbles, until I drop his next morsel. He plays with his pellets a bit, but he inhales bloodworms like a little scaly vacuum.

Mom just got a beta of her own. I think she's calling him Larry, which is weird. He's stunning with these blue-ish color-shifting scales.

Bianco is such a good fishy! I kinda hate that I can't feed him tomorrow, but it's best to let Bettas fast for a day so their digestive systems can recover and even out. But he gets foods again on Sunday!

Oh, and I get to spend Monday and Tuesday with my boyfriend, which is also cool.

As long as I can get home in time to feed my fish.

LadyG: Getting her priorities straight since 1993!

Introduczione!

2009-08-05T19:29:00.003-04:00

Everyone, this is Bianco:

He's kinda hard to see, but he's in the top left of the picture. My mom's digital camera is made of suck and won't take a non-blurry picture to save it's life, so I had to use Hugh's onboard camera, hence the weird angle.

Bianco is a male pastel opaque veiltail betta. And he's GORGEOUS! Right now he's living in an aquaview 360 2 gallon tank, but I'm going to upgrade him to a 5 gallon as soon as I have the money. He eats betta pellets (reluctantly) but only, apparently, if he get's a freeze-dried bloodworm chaser. I'm thinking of switching his diet to flakes. Or maybe switching brands.

Right now he has a plastic plant with no sharp edges, but as soon as his aquarium regulates and starts to grow some nice, healthy bacteria (yes, bacteria in a fish tank is a good thing. For the most part) I'm getting him a live plant. That white smudge in the back is a Greek ruin. I think it's a doorway. Anyway, that's why I refer to his new tank as his Loft Apartment in Athens. ^.^

So, yeah, I've been bitten by the fish bug. I love keeping fish. It's like The SIMS only eleven billionty times more rewarding. I hope to get a pleco for the 5 gallon, because they usually get along with betas as long as there's plenty of algae to munch on. Then I want to take Bianco's current tank and put a couple of Tetras or Danios in it. For now, though, I'll settle for a new surge bar so I have someplace to plug in Bianco's new heater. Grrr! All the technological advances of the past few decades and we still haven't found a way to heat a fishtank without a handy wall socket?!

Bianco is awesome. Ever since I set up his tank, I've been using my laptop at my desk instead of on my bed so I can have him next to me when I type. He always swims to the front of the tank when I sit down, then when I leave he swims around to the back to lounge around in his plant. He kept coming right up to the glass when I was trying to take his picture with the digital camera. I would've gotten some amazing shots if the stupid camera would've cooperated. Ganesh I need one of my own.

Oh, and my boyfriend. He is an idiot. He sent me an e-mail midweek saying he needed to talk to me in person, but we couldn't get together until Sunday, so I spent the rest of the week trying not to convince myself he was going to break up with me. I finally get to see him, and the whole thing was a FALSE ALARM!!! He was just unsure about how "emotionally available" he was, and whether or not I was happy in the relationship. I wanted to punch him in the neck!

GRR! BAD BOYSHAPEDTHING MAKING GIRLSHAPEDTHING WORRY FOR NO REASON!

And then he wondered why I put him in the doghouse. Men.

Okay, that's it. Enough rambling and stupidity. I'm going to glare at the clock until 9 pm when Leverage comes on. Yay, Hardison!

Sigh...and me without any orange soda...

Things Have Happened

2009-08-04T23:34:00.002-04:00

Oooh, but right now my head is killing me and I can't stand looking at the computer screen any longer. Ow. So until tomorrow when I introduce a new character, talk about my boyfriend's annoying antics in ALL CAPS and start getting really annoying by talking about my new hobby, please enjoy this wonderful video of super awesome:

You Have Been Warned.

Uh guh bluh

2009-07-12T14:53:00.002-04:00

Minions, I am SO tired! My sleep schedule is FUCKED! I wake up late afternoon and I'm still too groggy to function. Blaaaaaarg!

But, be that as it may, Cheeky Lotus posted a new blog post and I will not be outdone even though I have nothing to say that isn't simpering about my relationship or complaining about work.

But wait! I have dogs! Kilo is now 75 lbs, Maddie has arthritis in her back legs, and they're the only dogs I know who get their dinner with a side dish.

I also have a nephew! Who...I only saw twice since he got out of the hospital. Apparently he's gaining weight like it's his job and also he is adorable. Somewhere in this house there exists a USB to connect the digital camera to Hugh. One day, I may find it. I promise nothing!

I have a GRRRR! Because my boyfriend is an annoyingly good guy who actually posesses a work ethic. The result? The only chance I have to see him is Monday night because all the other days of the week he's at one of his two jobs and RAWRDONOTWANTRAWR!!!

And I have a reccomendation! If you're not reading Jeph Jacques' webcomic Questionable Content, you really, really should. It's AWESOME, but don't read it if you have somewhere to be because it's nearly 2000 pages long and addictive as hell!

That's all I can think of, so... please enjoy this condensed awesome:

This. Means. WAR!

2009-07-01T01:57:00.002-04:00

Last year, it was fruit flies.

This year, it's motherfucking ANTS!

This Job has been invaded, invaded I say, by six-legged demons from the spawning pits of Hell!

I was sweeping up the sprinkles and nuts behind the register when I noticed some of the chocolate sprinkles seemed to be moving.

Okay...a lot of them were moving...and segmented...and were way smaller than chocolate sprinkles should be and HOLY CRAP ANTS! ANTS IN MY STORE! DIE! DIEDIEDIEDIEDIE!!!

So I called the store manager to see if this development merited a freak-out. Kickass Manager was peeved, but not freaked, and suggested that we should sweep and mop behind the counters more often than once a week (maybe) like it says on the list.

Well, being the daughter of Mum, a.k.a. "She who vacuums up lady bugs with extreme prejudice." I snatched up the broom, sent Depressive to fetch the mop, and attacked. Sadly, there were stupid ice cream customers and I couldn't pull out the far counter for a good ten minutes. When they finally went away I swept every inch of exposed floor and swabbed like a shanghaied cabin boy staring down the business end of a flintlock.

I want those ants DEAD! No way in Hell am I gonna be responsible for the mass poisoning of This Job customers. I may hate their greedy, self-absorbed asses, but I will not be the one to whom the CDC traces the epidemic.

Oh, yeah, I'm so about to become my coworkers' worst nightmare.

Ladies and Gentlemen: Your Cast!

2009-06-29T16:18:00.004-04:00

As promised, the cast list of my misadventures at This Job:

The Store Stock Players:

Aspiring Actor Lacking Work Ethic: Red-headed 21-year-old with a Captain America belt buckle and an aversion to doing his job.

Depressive-Depressive: Slow speaking high school student with a daily quota for suicidal/homicidal comments. Often expresses wishes to blow up the Earth. Has twice electrocuted himself.

Efficient Veteran: Bespectacled savior who works whenever school is out of session. The days when Veteran is away at college are the darkest days of my life.

Brudda-Brudda: Brother of Veteran, newest hire, very little is known of this employee.

DevilSpawn: Redheaded sixteen-year-old demon child, formerly the ice cream girl, currently the biggest pain in the ass ever to darken my shift. Aspiring Actor ignores his work, DevilSpawn resents hers, and will do anything, up to and including blatant refusal citing "hangover", to get out of doing it.

Kiddo: Current ice cream girl. Fifteen years old and carrying some odd form of hero admiration for me. Weird.

Lummox: Thick limbed employee currently doubling in the Deli section, notable as the only male on the Deli payrole. Has been at This Job for a few months less than I have, still seems to have no idea what they pay him for.

Chipper Manager: Rarely seen in the evening shift, exceptionally nosey about EVERYTHING in the employees' personal lives. Damn good worker.

Kickass Manager: Big boss who demands 100%. Also encourages lazing around and goofing off after the work is done. If executed properly, all work can be finished with time to spare. Kickass manager likes down time, and encourages workers to get shit done so they can goof off.

The Deli Divas:

The Paminator: Deli manager and single most effective employee in the store. Does part time duty in the store area, often finishes your job just as you've realized it has to be done. Comes early, stays late, saves everyone's sanity. No one dislikes the Paminator.

Cavalry: Deli veteran who was called in to resume her role after a series of hiring disasters left the deli short staffed. Damn good at her job, currently pulling double-duty in Deli and Store.

All Smiles: Relatively recent hire, never in a bad mood, efficient worker and a quick hand at dishes.

Drama Queen: Hired around the same time as All Smiles. Very poor at her job, finds insults wherever she can, constantly tries to stir up tension and loves to ask me whether or not I've slept with my boyfriend yet.*

Enigma: Works mornings, so I rarely see her. I know next to nothing about her.

So there you have it. My cast. Don't you wish you had my job?

*The answer, by the way, is nunya.

So That Worked...

2009-06-29T02:38:00.003-04:00

Apparently ya'll liked my blog about my inept coworkers. (And by "ya'll" I mean one person who was all agog.) So after I, y'know, sleep, I'll post a cast list, showing you all my coworkers in their moronic glory.

...okay that's not fair, some of them actually rock. Like The Paminator. But more on her later.

Also, from now on all This Job posts on this blog will be equipped with TJ-Stoopid tags for ease of access. See below.

That is all.

Reflections on This Job

2009-06-26T02:16:00.002-04:00

My headache, let me show it to you.

Okay, so the deal is this: there are certain co-workers at This Job who rock. Unfortunately, they are the minority. Tonight (actually last night, because my schedule is evil) I was working with...none of them. Not kick-ass manager, not chipper manager, not efficient veteran guy, none of them. I did have the one and only Paminator, also known as the savior of sanity, but she was busy commanding the troops in the deli section. On my side, I was stuck with depressive-depressive dude, and aspiring actor lacking work ethic. One day I might give these people better nicknames, but I doubt it.

See, depressive-depressive can't be trusted to do anything without constant supervision, because there's always the possibility he'll electrocute himself...again.

Aspiring actor lacking work ethic can't be trusted to do anything period. A surefire way to make sure something never gets done is to ask Aspiring Actor to do it. I dread the day a director has to work with this guy. If it weren't for the Deli Divas like Paminator, I'd never get anything done.

See, here's how it works. I get to work, and nothing is done. The list of tasks for the day is empty and there's a line of assho-I mean customers-extending a country mile. Both registers are occupied and there are, blessedly, no ice-cream morons at the window. I get to work, cleaning and stocking and trying to organize something approaching order in the store. I get stuff done as far ahead of time as I can, and then the rush starts.

The problem is, the rush is entirely unpredictable. Sometimes it coincides with rush hour, other times it's around 8, sometimes it's more like 7 or 6:30, and it SUCKS! Anything I don't get done before the rush hits doesn't get done at all. And the reason is this:

AA: Danielle!
DD: Danielle!
AA: Danielle, you've got register!
DD: Danielle, can you come here?

And on...and on...and on. If Aspiring Actor isn't disappearing into the back of the store, Deppressive-Depressive is spending his entire shift doing dishes. It's like working by myself! And the constant complaining and OH MY GOD WHY ARE YOU STANDING AROUND BEHIND THE REGISTER WHEN THE COFFEE ISLAND NEEDS TO BE STOCKED RIGHT THE FUCK NOW?!?!?!

I am so sick of babysitting these guys. I feel bad for Veteran, 'cause he's closing with Aspiring Actor tomorrow and I'm out at 10:00. I can do my best to get as much done as possible before they have to close, but Friday night is Hell Shift and there'll be way too many customers wanting ice cream to get much accomplished.

I fucking hate retail.

Thank Lena

2009-06-25T00:23:00.003-04:00

My return to posting is all her fault.

That and the fact that I'm in a relationship now. Which makes me wax prosaic.

Anyway, the trip to OKC was great, and Neña is still awesome, and I kinda miss Braums. Alas, I must bid adieu to affordable, quality hamburgers.

But moving on, being back with boyshapedthing has made me go kinda wonky...again. He has that effect. And I tend to see things differently. I'm wondering if anyone else had this sort of revelation or whatever when they first started exploring the world of romance.

The thing is, I watch TV and movies differently. Love scenes, kissing scenes, even just moments where a couple is having a private conversation all feel different than they did before. This is...weird. And I'd kind of like it to stop because it's threatening to break the wall separating me from the program and I like that wall. That wall allows me to feel all superior and omniscient.

So I'm bringing back the old LadyG's Minion Q segment.

Minion Q: Did you notice any strange changes in yourself after entering your first relationship? A new worldview, suddenly getting jokes you never quite understood before, that kind of thing? I realize I may be asking some of you to dust off a few mental cobwebs, but go ahead and give it a shot.

LadyG's A: You pretty much got it from the post. The TV thing is odd. But I've also noticed an irritating tendency to reference my boyfriend way too often. For this, I sincerely apologize. Especially to Neña, who had to put up with it all last week. Trust me, everyone, I'm annoying myself just as much.

Reporting From the Trenches

2009-06-16T18:17:00.002-04:00

I've been in OKC for about three days now, and I've discovered a few things.

Like, for instance, a chain of burger joints which sells, entirely unironically, a "bag of burgers". Yeah. I thought so too.

But there are considerations I've been making about my future and whether or not I can live here. Such as:

-Oklahoma has no AIR. It's so sweltering hot here I can't breathe.

-Traffic here is insane. Every time N. merges I hear the Grim Reaper sharpening his scythe.

-People here use the phrase "Thank you kindly" and they aren't being sarcastic!

-It's flat here. There aren't a lot of gradients in the ground. I'm from hill country, I get nervous without inclines.

-It's bright. I'm used to living where streetlights dare not go, and in the city every night is a smorgasboard of ambient light.

Even aside from all that, being here has made me acutely aware of the distance between me an the people I love. So even though I'm having a good time, and even though I love Athena dearly, I'll be glad to go home and see my life again. And while I definitely intend to come back, I honestly don't think I could live here. I'm a New Yorker. It's who I am.

Shmegeggy!

2009-06-11T04:07:00.002-04:00

Holy crap! Blogger dashboard says I hit the 100 post mark 9 posts ago. How the hell didn't I notice?

Well, there's one milestone I'll never get back. Guh.

So my Oklahoma trip is currently barreling down on me at warp 9.98 (which, for non-Star Trek Fundamentalist translates to "really fucking fast...yo.") and I've found myself securely in freak-out mode. This isn't actually a bad thing since I used to spend so much time in freak-out mode that I decided to purchase a small yet tasteful bungalow there and have recently begun contemplating the possibility of new curtains in the den.

This is fortunate because OKT (that's Oklahoma Trip for anyone who doesn't love abbreviating as much as I do) arrives at precicely the same time as the most massive emotional upheval to hit my life in approximately a decade. I won't say too much in the interest of maintaining my rule against simpering relationship posts. Suffice to say my relationship with boyshapedthing is chock-full of firsts, only a few of which it turns out I was marginally prepared for. That is all.

So between panic attacks and random heart implosions I've managed to locate a familiar area of zen in which my mind busies itself with random minutia in the hopes of avoiding pesky disturbances like reality. Here's a look inside my head:

Brain: Twilight is terrible.
Writer Monkey: But it has potential!
B: Who the fuck are you?
WM: I'm the part of you that comes up with stuff to write!
B: And you're awake before 3:00 am?
WM: It's after 4:00.
B: Oh, would you look at that...
WM: But seriously! Just imagine where Twilight could've gone! Like, forget sparkly vampires, what if exposure to sunlight made their skin transluscent so you could see a network of black veins all over their faces?
B: ...that's actually pretty cool. But you came up with that just so you could use "transluscent" in a sentence, didn't you?
WM: ...maybe. Have you given any though to the possible symbology behind the cactus?*
B: *shakes head saddly* Such a missed opportunity.

Okay the above actually stems from a challenge M leveled at me to rewrite Twilight so it doesn't suck. Which I'll probably do, because as long as I don't sell it it's still fanfiction and probably no one but M will ever read it. Ever. Which is sad.

But seriously, I am still pissed at Twilight for taking everything that is good about vampire mythos and weeing all over it. Why in Hell would vampires sparkle? It makes no sense! And no fangs? Come on, there have to be fangs! Even Dracula had fangs and he was a total twat!** Either give your vamps fangs, or be as awesome as Darren Shan so you can get away with it!

But back to my life. I'm seeing Matt again on Friday, which I think may see the return of my suede split-fronts. I haven't worn them in ages ever since my mum mentioned that they didn't work with my height, but I distinctly remember being drop-dead gorgeous in them and I've got the kind of legs you want to show off, so bugger that!

*For those of you intelligent enough to avoid Twilight altogether, in the beginning of the first book the protagonist (Miss Blandina O'Blandypants) dug up a small cactus from her mother's property in Arizona before moving to the Pacific Northwest to get rained on all the time. Stephanie Mayer made a big fuss about the cactus when Blandina dug it up, but as soon as the sparkle clan showed up she forgot all about it. As a symbolism enthusiast, this pissed me off.

**...alright I'm being mean. Dracula is actually awesome in theory but the Bram Stoker novel made me lose the will to live after Van Helsing showed up and I don't think I can forgive that.

So Neña Was Right...ish

2009-06-09T00:10:00.005-04:00

So when do you have proof that you may be drifting toward domesticity?

When putting your last load of laundry in the washing machine makes you want to do your happy dance.

And yes, that totally just happened. (Shut up, Neña)

Okay, so I'm back and I've got a shitload to talk about, so we're gonna list this mofo as only LadyG knows how: in multiples of five. Because I'm OCD like that.

1: Relationship with boyshapedthing. Goin' strong, have gone past "fond" and am comfortably entrenched in "smitten". Emotionally, this is wonderful. Socially, it sucks. Why? Because nosy nellies like my mother and long-distance friend Neña to bandy the "L" word around like a frickin' shuttlecock. (Again, shut up Neña) And that's just awkward.

2. The Sister Thing. Going into as little squee as humanly possible: Thomas Joseph G----- born 11:27 a.m. on May 23rd, 6lbs 11 oz. Also? Easiest birth in our family's history. Her water broke, she went to the hospital, she was there for three hours, she pushed four times and done. Srsly. My sister don't dick around when it comes to getting that damned kid out of her.

3. Scholastic achievement. Yep it's that time of year again. Not the time of year when I go to school, but that time of year when Default Community College invites me to join their Honors Program. I swear, half the time I surfed the web and e-mailed my boyfriend all throughout class, and the lowest grade I got was a B- (don't tell my mom). I ignored most of my homework, barely got in my writing assignments and take-home quizzes, but I pick up on shit I've never seen before within minutes and I test well so I sort of skate through and make it look like I applied myself. So then I get offered honors status and you know what? No. I'm lazy and unmotivated and lack self-discipline. There's no way I can write a six-page paper when the rest of the class is doing two pages, tutor my classmates and take notes for the special needs students (they pay you for that shit, too.) I guess what I'm saying is, I need to get my ass in gear and I shouldn't be rewarded with top student status for essentially doing nothing.

4. The M thing. M is still pregnant, and still keeping the baby. And I'm fine with it, largely because that tiny glimmer of hope I had back when this first became an issue seems to be growing into a torchlight. M is really getting her act together, and so is Shmuck (I can call him that now, because M knows it's more of a term of endearment than anything else.) But she's really stepping up, and she's turned her house (which was kind of scary) into a home, and the more I see what she and her family have done, the more hopeful I am that this is going to work out, and the baby is going to have a good life. And that's what I want more than anything: for Marisa and her baby to be happy and healthy.

5. Who the "F" is Neña? Neña has been mentioned before, both as Goddess and Thena. She's the new love of my life (in a heterosexual, platonic, lesbian-lover kind of way) and I talk to her almost as much as I talk to my boyfriend. Which is a lot. A freakin' lot. This is why I shelled out $320+ to fly to Oklahoma next week to visit her. So I'll be away, on my own, for the first time in my life. And if that doesn't say "growing up" I don't know what does.

6. What's New on the Net? Well, there's this (NSFW):

And this (also NSFW):

And The Cheeky Lotus is back so you should probably go check her out, like, now. Seriously. I'll wait.

7. In Cars. Still no license, but M is teaching me and I hope to have one before school starts again, because she may be too preggers to drive.

8 The Job Market. I've decided to take an interest in the FBI. After watching WAY too much "Criminal Minds", it occurred to me that I love Behavioral Sciences like Anthropology, Psychology and Sociology, and the FBI is a place that's willing to pay me over $63,000 in my first year to use them. I'm not sure if I'm definitely going to join the FBI, but it's a possibility I'm prepared to explore. Unfortunately/fortunately, it will most likely require me to get Lasik, which I desperately want, but is very expensive.

9. The Current Job. This Job still sucks, and now it sucks harder. Ice Cream season means we constantly get slammed by crouds of the pushiest assholes in the world, all of whom want frozen desserts. But I seem to be doing something right because my store manager has given me some more responsability. I am now responsible for the weekly gas inspection, which is a manager's job.

10. So, you're getting a raise, right? Nope. I calculated that I do approximately six jobs at This Job during every shift. That is, I do six completely different jobs which could theoretically be held by six individuals, but I do them all. But I still make fifteen cents over minimum wage, and until MW goes up, my paycheck will remain the same.

So that's my life at the moment. Comment if there's something you think I'm leaving out, something you want to know, or if you think I'm being a whiny bitch. I'll read them all, and unless it's spam or something totally asinine, I'll post them to the comments page.

Ciao bellas!

Meet Boyshapedthing

2009-05-06T09:47:00.003-04:00

Hi everybody!

You may be wondering where I've been for the past few decades (or weeks, I can't keep track).

It seems I have, quite inadvertently, been acquiring a boyfriend. Who'd have thunk?

This is Matt, also known as boyshapedthing:Cute, huh?

Okay, no, that's not him. That's just the guy he cosplays as.

Yep! I landed a cosplayer! And a damn good one, too. Kinda sort of famous (infamous) in the convention circuit. This is actual boyfriend:

Fiiiine, right?

Hee hee!

Okay, in the interest of maintaining professional anonymity I'm not going to show you his actual picture. I will, however, tell you that he exists on YouTube where he plays an eccentric, egomaniacal director named Victor Juliet, the face of Fiendish Films. If you're industrious, you can maybe find him and see my boyfriend's acting chops.

Why tell you this, O my minions, when for so long I have shunned personal details?

Two reasons:

1. I HAVE A BOYFRIEND! YAY YAY YAY!!!

2. I'll probably be referencing him at some point in the future, and I don't want a bunch of questions like "who the eff is boyshapedthing" and "...Matt? Who's Matt?"

Okay, there's a third one. I lied.

3. I don't blog much when I have a relationship, apparently. This is my crappy, cop-out reason for being invisable for so long. *ducks rotten fruit and vegetables* I sorry!

That is all.

Revitalized!

2009-04-20T15:20:00.002-04:00

I can't believe I left this blog so long! Gah! What must you think of me?

Well, a large part of it is probably the last entry. Yeah...that worked out well. Anyway, an update on the whole thing:

Yes, I apologized, yes M forgave me, and yes, the M-biased comments were mean and unnecessary and from people with exceedingly limited knowledge of the whole story. That aside, everything is cool now. (And no, Goddess, I didn't disregard the opinions of people who responded to FrienDilemma. I simply disregarded the mean-spirited tone of some of those comments. There is a difference. I.E.: I realize I was wrong to say what I said, but I also realize that one moment of poor judgement does not make me the single biggest super bitch ever to walk the Earth.) The comments from my actual Minions were balanced, and they favored M as well, and they were the reason why I decided to call mea culpa and apologize.

But you don't care about that! You care about this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUd1BhokZq4

Sorry I can't embed the video, but damn Internet Explorer keeps crashing if I try to paste anything!!!

Yeesh!

2009-03-25T10:08:00.002-04:00

Well, it would appear the votes are in, and the answer is "bitch".

Man, I finally get some commenters and they basically hate me. Although, I take it with a grain of salt because my biggest critics are all close friends of M with whom I have exceedingly little contact, and who are pretty blatantly biased.

It may also have something to do with my deliberate attempt to paint myself in the more negative light, since the alternative would entail a detailed description of why I think M is making a mistake, which would probably cause hate mail to rain down from the heavens.

Also, this blog is all about me, why should she have the spotlight?

And I figured if I painted myself as the bitch, it would take some of the sting out of what happened and make some headway into showing how I've decided to be supportive whether or not I agree with her. She's been my sista for the last 8 years and I figure I owe it to her to yank my foot out of my mouth and stand by her...even if I edge away a little.

And, yeah, the hate comments do kind of bother me, but I'm trying not to let it get to me too much because in the end? M has already forgiven me, and hers is the only opinion that matters.

Hello Life, I Missed You

2009-03-23T20:19:00.002-04:00

School started again today!

Ah, the sweet, sweet drag of exhaustion. I forgot how tired it's possible to be.

I remember now.

Ganesh, today was insane. I spent FOUR HOURS in the library doing homework, and thanks to my lame-ass schedule (available for snerking at here) I haven't really had much of an opportunity to chill all day. Hopefully this means I'll fall asleep at 11:00 pm sharp rather than tossing and turning like I did last night. That? Was not fun.

The inevitable has come to pass. My english class has reached Shakespeare. Now, I have no problem with Shakespeare. Actually, I kinda dig Shakespeare.

Okay, I have a dangerously intense, unyielding obsession with Shakespeare. This means that I? Am a fucking freak because no one in my peer group is expected to know the first thing about Shakespeare. Hell, I was the only one in my class who knew what the fuck the fourth wall is!* Much less what it has to do with asides.

I still have no clue why the fuck The Tempest is considered a tragedy. Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but it seems to me like it has a happy ending, and I'm pretty sure no one meets a dismal fate after falling from a lofty position into the depths of human failure. And there's a fucking drunk butler trying to usurp an island from a fucking sorcerer! That's funny shit!

But then again I actually liked Matthew Lillard in Love's Labours Lost, so what do I know?

I kind of think my english prof. doesn't like me much. I think it's mainly because I actually, you know, know stuff. And I'm torn between wanting to participate in the discussion, and hating that look she gets on her face when I'm the only one with my hand up again. Annoying.

But hey, we're doing Hamlet in class and I love me some Horatio, so I guess it's not all bad.

*FYI, it's what allows Frankie Muniz to talk right to you during Malcolm in the Middle.

FrienDilemma

2009-03-22T01:50:00.001-04:00

M forgot me tonight.

Or, more accurately, M’s body placed me low on the list of priorities after gestate, secrete hormones, and sleep. Apparently, I didn’t quite make the list.

So somewhere around 12:25, with my manager sitting beside me at a picnic table next to This Job’s main building, I finally gave up on waiting for her and got a ride with said manager, who was reduced to a heap of explosive laughter and intermittent giggle-fits by my inability to give directions worth a damn.

Here’s the kicker. Even though M left me stranded at work at almost half past midnight, thus forcing me to beg a ride off of my boss, she’s pissed off at me.

She may have every right, of course, since I’m the judgmental bitch who can’t keep my mouth shut. Or she may just be a hormonal cocktail of crazy with a hair trigger. I don’t know, you decide.

See, M is pregnant and she’s decided to keep the baby.

I happen to think this is the biggest mistake of her life, and that she has suddenly achieved an MTV reality-show level of stupid. As you can imagine, we’re not exactly seeing eye-to-eye right now.

It just get’s worse and worse, because there are few conversations you can have with a pregnant person which don’t eventually come around to the pregnancy, and whenever we talk about the pregnancy, M starts gushing about all the baby-related freebies she’s getting from her previously pregnant friends and I start looking at her like she needs to be wearing a helmet and riding the short bus.

As you may have guessed, O Minions, I have a hard time keeping my thoughts to myself. If you think the shit I come up with here is bad, you should hear the stuff I don’t say. Or, erm, type. So, like an idiot with amnesia, I inevitably find myself voicing my opinions re: stupidity of keeping the kid, and am promptly treated to the slow freezing of expression which turns M’s easy-going smile into a spine-chilling death rictus. And I KNOW telling M how I feel is a stupid move, and I KNOW it’ll piss her off, and we’re both stuck squirming through a pretend-cheery conversation as M tries to shrug off my bitch-comment and I try to play the supportive friend with genuine yet misguided concerns.

I mean, this whole arrangement would go so much smoother if I just learn to shut the fuck up. *
But, naturally, being the verbose moron that I am, I just have to express my opinions such as:

How much I hate her boyfriend
How stupid it is to keep the baby
How dangerous Idiot Boyfriend is behind the wheel

And so forth…

Of course, there’s an element of selfishness at work here, too. M is my only means of transportation to and from school, and if I don’t have my own wheels by the time her baby gets here, I’ll be looking at a decline in dependability from an already not-all-that-dependable carpool, which would totally kill my efforts to get an education, not to mention my ability to work late nights at This Job.

Which brings us to tonight. Having completed an 8 hour shift, then being stranded outside a locked convenience store and escorted home by a boss who already thinks I’m a freak, I call M to tell her I got home okay and find out why she didn’t show.

Turns out IBF’s pre-existing two-year-old is a handful, and M passed out after a desperate attempt to get the tyke to finally go to sleep already! So M apologized, informing me how putting a two-year-old to bed is one of the more Herculean tasks in existence.

Now, Rational Me knows M is tired, and hormonal, and having one of the less pleasant first trimesters you can have (unlike my smooth-sailing sister, bane of preggos everywhere!), and probably needs support and comfort right now.

But Judgmental Bitch Me spies an opening to once more prove my point re: keeping baby is stupid-o! And reminds me none-to-gently that a screaming baby in the middle of the night is definitely not conducive to a successful carpool. Unfortunately, Judgmental Bitch Me moves a lot faster than Rational Me, especially after midnight, and I found myself saying, “And yet you still think it’s a good idea to keep the kid.”

To which M responded with a snap, “Shut the fu--”

And that’s where our connection crapped out.

So, what do you think Minions? Am I right to be concerned about my friend making what could be the most disastrous mistake of her entire life, or am I just a nosy, selfish asshole who loves the sound of my own voice a liiiitle too much?

Don’t be afraid to be brutal.**

*This phrase comes up later in the story. Go ahead and guess where.

**But if you don’t take my side, I am SO never making you cookies!

Hugh says hi.

2009-03-11T16:48:00.002-04:00

Wow! So this is what happens when you put off blogging about actual stuff for weeks on end, you end up with no idea how to fit it all in one post.

I guess we'll begin with the most recent Awesome:

BOB IS GONE!!!

Yes! My evil, sociopathic, schizophrenic laptop shall never again darken my sofa. In his place, I have an Acer Aspire, whom I have named Hugh, since naming him Bob would create too many bad associations. How can I give my new bestest buddy the same name as the machine I threatened to drop-kick on an almost daily basis?

Hugh is wonderful. He boots up fast, he shuts down fast. He's a bit slow on the uptake when I'm web surfing sometimes, but no where near as long as the ponderous, oft failed web page navigations of Bob. And for the most part he's very quick.

Sadly, he comes with McAfee, which I don't know how to get rid of. I WANT IT GONE! I am sick and tired of being prompted to restart my computer every single time I turn it on! I already have AVG, I just need to either figure out how to ditch McAfee, or else grit my teeth and bear it until the trial period runs out.

He also comes with a mic and a camera, which has AMAZING quality. God help YouTube if I ever figure out how to use it.

I think I'm in love with a hard drive.

...to be continued...

Credit Where it's Overdue

2009-03-04T13:37:00.003-05:00

Today I attended a seminar about credit cards. This was entirely accidental, and yet savvy, because I only really decided to sit in because there was free pizza and I didn't want to spend any money on lunch. I figure me plus financial literacy seminar equals smart.

This puts me in an awkward position, however, because I can no longer avoid the fact that I need to get myself a credit card. This may prove a problem because, well...

I am freaking terrified of credit cards!

Let me explain, because this is actually a totally rational fear. See, when she was younger my mom managed to accumulate 19 credit cards before filing for bankruptcy (sp?) and ever since then she's been on my ass about managing my money wisely (this is a bit counterproductive, however, when she urges me to totally blow $70 at Barnes and Noble because "I can afford it.") (Okay, to be fair I had just come into a pretty hefty amount of money for a 19 year old and I didn't have any obligations and mom believes in the cathardic benefits of treating oneself on occasion, which is actually a useful strategy for a working class shmo to alleviate stress. Provided you don't go overboard.)

Where was I? Oh, yeah, so as the day drew closer when I would have to take financial responsability for myself, the idea of a credit card got scarier and scarier. Debt consolidation commercials were EVERYWHERE, and something about vikings, and people were swiping cards left and right while NO ONE CHECKED TO MAKE SURE THE CARDS WERE THEIRS!!!

*Hyperventilates*

I'm okay. Anyway, eventually I discovered the wonders of a bank card. No muss! No fuss! Swipe the card, sign your name and the money comes right out of your checking account! No bills! No interest rate! No chance of a late payment! And, since I watch my checking account like a hawk, no chance of my account being overdrawn! Yay!

Unfortunately, a bank cards builds no credit, so I have to get one. This scares the living shit out of me, because I? Am so not about the self-discipline. Seriously, I just gave up doughnuts, and I literally get jitters whenever I see the doughnut display at work. I've tried cutting back on soda, and ended up chugging down a couple 20 oz. bottles per day. I mean, I can control myself, but I'm just so damn good at being persuasive that I can talk myself into anything. My power to rationalize amazes and astounds (me, anyway). And if there's cake on the counter? Well, it won't be there much longer.

Part of it, I guess, is because it's naughty. My mom explodes if I have an extra piece of cake. She just lost 50 lbs and for the YEARS she's been struggling with her weight she's been laying on the guilt trips if I so much as look at a bag of sun chips too intently. So, forbidden fruit, I snag an extra treat whenever I can. I don't particularly want to eat myself into a sugar coma, but there's something so delicious about sneaking around. It's pretty disturbing actually, and not my best feature. (That would so be my legs.)

Another part of it is sort of like taking a starving man and slapping him in an all-you-can-eat buffet. There's a sense of something once denied being right there and you don't know if you'll ever see it again! When I was little, we used to have treats all the time. I never really splurged because I knew there would be cookies tomorrow. Then around adolescence the money stopped and the diets started and suddenly there were no cookies EVER! So on the rare, rare, rare occasions when I actually got something sweet and decadent, I tried to get as much as I could because it could be gone any minute and I never knew when or if I'd see anything like it again.

That's not really true anymore now that I have my own cashflow, but the mentality is hard to shake. I treat myself to bad foods that taste good way more than I should, and that brings me back to my original point: I spend money.

Most of it goes to food. It adds up pretty damn fast, especially when you're buying your lunch in the DCC cafeteria. Shit here is expensive! I've pretty much nailed the cheapest satisfying combo (Rubber Cheese Pizza and Large Watery Fountain Soda, $3.33) but we've got little snack kiosks around, and it's really hard to pass them by without dropping a good $5.00 on candy and soda. However, lately I've had a small health epiphany, which is why I gave up donuts and am escewing Skittles and chocolate bars until further notice. (Pop-Tarts and I broke up years ago.) On the one hand, I feel pretty superior right now. On the other, it's sad that a couple disturbing heart palpitations are what it took to convince me I was headed down Bad Idea Street in a Ferarri.

So, give me a credit card and I'm not entirely positive I'll use it wisely. I'm sort of hoping my paralyzing fear of huge interest rates and viscious collectors on the phone will keep the damn thing in my freaking wallet and FAR AWAY from anything even remotely resembling a scanner. On the other hand, when I'm busting the damn thing out once a month to pay for a turkey sub, it'll be interesting to see the funny looks people will give me because seriously? You're going to pay for $3.97 worth of sandwich with a credit card?

Well, if I can't pay that bill on time, then I don't deserve plastic in the first place.

Pick a card, any card. Then, for the love of God, PUT IT BACK!

Relationship Advice from a Nerd(Fighter)

2009-02-25T19:16:00.002-05:00

I've been a bit Hank-heavy lately. So I thought I'd give you a John vid, so you guys know who the heck Hank is talking to when he says "good morning, John."

In LadyG news, I've been invited to join Phi Theta Kappa, DCC's honor society. Like all annoying, tedius and potentially expensive things, this claims to "look good on my resumé". They want $53 to join, and my mom's practically chomping at the bit to pay them.

That being said, here's John:

The Saga of the Boobs Continued

2009-02-22T23:45:00.002-05:00

I'm not exactly sure how to start this update, since it kind of has roots in a lot of random life-of-LadyG moments. So we're gonna start with something called The Tiara Society.

The Tiara Society is a CNY-based group which, once a year, gets all dressed up and goes to the opera. I am friends with a memeber, ergo I get to go see Roméo et Juliette at the Opera (note the capital "O"). So I needed a dress.

Dresses are notoriously choosy about the underwear department.

So I needed a bra.

Those of you who remember the initial Saga of the Boobs know that I hate, Hate, MOTHERFUCKING HATE my breasts. Like, I would hack them off with a band saw if I could. Nipples, mammary ducts be damned, I WANT THEM GONE. And I figured that at 42 DDD, they had pretty much done all they could to make my life a living hell.

I was wrong.

Minions, I am now officially a 42 F!!!!! F people! My boobs have hit the "Fail" mark. (In case your wondering, boobage is just like a high school essay in that it goes various degrees of A, B, C, and D, before skipping nice, friendly E altogether and slapping you with an accusing, asshat-ish F. Stoopid boobs.)

Now I'm strapped (literally) with massive 42 F-cup bras with underwires (read: Torture Devices) to provide the requisite support for my twenty-plus-pounds of unwanted flesh, so my ribcage is continually under torment, my abdomen is bound to suffer continual bruising and I haven't even gained any fucking weight! Jeeze, if anything I've lost a few pounds. Only you wouldn't know it, because my fucking boobs tip the scale at over twendy pounds!

I give up. I fucking give up.

Enjoy this video while I go look for a nice, sharp steak knife.

Life Lessons from an Anglerfish

2009-02-18T14:42:00.002-05:00

Presenting:

The Anglerfish Song Regarding the Human Mentality in Respect to how to Interpret Perpetually Felt Emotions While Educating You On the Subject of Anglerfish

Or The Anglerfish Song, for short.

Rites of Succession

2009-02-18T13:51:00.002-05:00

Yeah we're going to get a little serious here. I know, I know, it isn't fair. You're all, "Where's the funny LadyG? You disappear from the internets for EVER and when you come back you don't even bother to make with the giggles?"

I'm sorry. I fail.

But I'm a college student, people! What do you want from me! I've got new informations pinging around my head like a hyped up Pong blip.

(Yep, that's me, hitting you upside the head with a video game reference dating back to Atari. Pwn.)

Anyway, this semester I'm taking an Anthropology of Marriage and Family class. We're gonna call it Crazy Uncles 101. Until I think of something else to call it which makes me chuckle. Anyway, it's got me thinking about my own family, and seeing things which I might otherwise have missed if I didn't know to look for them.

I've always known my family was matrifocal (though, I didn't know the word until about two hours ago when Prof. Français told me), but lately there's been...a development.

Okay, let me explain. Like most Euro-American families, I'm from a bilateral family. That means I recognize relatives on both my mother's and my father's sides of the family tree (which for me is more like a thicket), however, in my family the balance of power is pretty one-sided. Namely, my mother's side is dominant. While I know my father's relatives, and acknowledge them as family, I haven't really had anything at all to do with them in longer than I can recall. In fact, the only member of my father's family I or my immediate relatives ever deal with is, well, my father.

Conversely, I still maintain at least functional ties to my mother's relatives. My two uncles, their kids, and even to a limited extent my almost-disowned aunt (the one who married her cousin and failed her daughter and is regularly referred to in terms of "before she lost her mind" and "until she lost her mind"). That's a long story.

But the emphasis goes farther than that. My mother's mother, known as "Grambutter" to all of us, holds the most power in the family. She's the undisputed matriarch to whom we give the most respect and deference. Now, considering how disrespectful my relatives and I tend to be, that's saying something. When Butter talks, you listen. Usually.

But Grambutter is getting old, and I've been forced to acknowledge the effects of her advancing age and the unavoidable fact that she's not going to live forever. She's getting weaker, which is terrifying because my Grambutter is the kind of tough-as-nails capital-W Woman you only get in working class America. Until recently, I couldn't fathom anything that'd make her lose a step.

Today she did. In a big way. Mom was just on the phone with my uncle Frankie, trying to figure out a shedule for her and her brothers to check in on Grambutter from time to time, because apparently today she fell and didn't have the strength to pick herself up. This is scary. Grambutter has always been fiercely independant, to the extent that her decades-long relationship with her boyfriend remains solid even though he lives full time in Florida.

So it occurs to me that someday, and sooner than I'd like to acknowledge, the matriarch of our family will die. I hate knowing that. I hate thinking that. I hate that the possiblity has evolved into a certainty and I can't avoid knowing it anymore. And until recently I wondered what would happen when she did die. I mean, who would inherit the power and be the new matriarch?

Now I know. See, logically, it should be my Aunt Mea, and that would've been feasible (before she lost her mind). She is the eldest, and like her mother and indeed all women of our bloodline, she's a dominant and controlling personality. However, she's also more intellectual and less practical, and since she went crazy she's only tenuously included in the family anymore. She's essentially a pariah, since we hardly talk about her, but the Maternals have a fierce familial loyalty which forbids us to turn a blind eye to her when she needs a favor or wants to talk. (The Paternals, on the other hand, are continually engaged in in-fighting, feuding, and regularly ostrasize their members for varying periods of time.) My uncles, both junior memebers of the generation before mine, are out of the question. Men have never played an active part in the Maternal family governance, and are considered on an informbal (albeit very vocal) level to be less capable of managing the extended family than women, who are held in my family to be superior on most intellectual and emotional levels, and equal on most physical ones.

That leaves my mother. And I know this with a certainty, having just witnessed her shouting at her younger brothers about the above falling incident, which is tantamount to treason. As I said, Grambutter is fiercely independant. Mom going behind her back, informing her sons that she's in failing health, undermines her image and proves she's losing her grasp on authority. Mom wouldn't dare do that if she didn't already wield a considerable amount of respect and authority among her siblings. If one of them had tried it, they'd have faced harsh retribution. I now know without doubt that my mom (flawed as she is) is the only logical successor to Grambutter.

And I suppose I've always known. A few years back, Grambutter gave mom The Breadbowl, a cast-iron bowl as wide around as a tree-trunk which has been in the family for about 70 or 80 years. It's almost sacred, and all of her children were vying for it, particularly my mom and Uncle David. When mom got it, it was almost a passing of the torch.

My mom has always been very active in managing the family. She's hosted almost all of our holiday gatherings, organized most of our reunions, moderated the majority of feuds and squabbles, and organized virtually all of the familial efforts such as Grambutter's new glasses, this latest health-monitoring schedule, and myriad other incidents in which the ties that bind needed a bit of patching up.

She's followed in Grambutters steps for years, including her inate ability to provide food for huge quantities of people on a semi-regular basis while maintaining a tight budget. She's even mirroring Grambutter's relationships, to the point where she divorced her first husband only to enter into a long-term comitted relationship with a man she has no intention to marry.

Grambutter won't be around forever, and as I write this her grip on her family is slipping. But there can be almost no doubt as to who will take her place.

And on that day, a long, long time from now when it's time for mom to pass the torch? Well, let's just say my sister was pretty much born with the patented Maternal Shouty Voice of Doom.

I'm just sayin'.

Pre-Pre Dawn Jitters

2009-01-25T21:50:00.001-05:00

So you wanna know how I know I’m excited and nervous about school starting back up tomorrow? It’s ‘cause I’m totally calm and collected, I suddenly look stunning in the mirror, and I gargled.

It’s weird, but whenever I’m about to do something scary and thrilling that has me all a-twitter, I suddenly drop into Ellie Mode. I’m 100% in control, and yet I find myself doing things I’d never do ordinarily.

Like gargling. My hygiene regimen is…rudimentary at best. I tend to skip showers when I know I’m not going anywhere for a while. Brushing my teeth, not high on the priority list. Miles below, say, watching a Burn Notice marathon until my eyes crack. I know, I know, it’s horrible and I should really take better care of myself, but it’s just so easy to forget and by the time you remember, the key has been in the ignition for a good quarter hour. But tonight I actually gargled. With mouthwash. For the first time in my life.

There are many reasons why I’ve refused the wash before now. It tastes disgusting, it’s a hassle and it fucking burns (I experimented a bit in my youth). But chief among them is the unfortunate fact that I’m allergic to, of all things, Fluoride. (Dude, I totally butchered the spelling there. Thank you Spell Check.) Toothpaste is fine, but the concentrated stuff you get at the dentist’s office or, say, in a gulp of mouthwash, makes me incredibly nauseated and dizzy. Not fun.

But tonight I brushed my teeth, took in my (for once) well-behaved hair, and caught a glimpse of pro-health formula and teeth-whitening rinse and I thought what the hell? So I gargled first with the pro-health (yucky, burny) for 30 seconds and then the whitening rinse (yucky, burny, greasy) for a full 60. I had to immediately gargle some water after each rinse to keep from getting queasy. It seems to have worked but I’m still waiting on the fallout.

Tomorrow I hope to get up early enough for a serious scrubbing with my exfoliating soap from Villainess.org. Maybe I can even have some fun with my hair, if it’s still feeling cooperative after a good night’s sleep. I’m pretty sure that if I were to be interrogated by the FBI, I’d pause and use the two-way mirror to check my lip gloss. It’s like a kind of security blanket. Like, I can’t control anything that’s about to happen, but at least I can control how I look and smell and carry myself. Every ablution suddenly teems with ritual, and even my breasts seem okay with me. (Right now I have some killer cleavage and it’s not even chafing…for now…I got my eye on you, you ta-tas.)

Oh! In stuff that actually kinda matters, my straight A’s got me on the President’s list (Yay! Presidential!) and some lady wants to talk to me about joining the Honor Society. I’m a bit leery about that, because the Honor Society tends to want you to sell crappy candy bars and pay them money for…not much of anything really. We shall see about this.

Oh, and it’s taken my 25 days but I’ve come up with a resolution. My goal is to be out of the house before snow flies again. That means car, license, new job close to school, roommates. In that order…I think.

Well, best be getting some shut-eye before l’italiano cento-due con la mia Professoressa Pallotta.

Ciao, i miei amici!

Genius Crossing

2008-12-24T23:44:00.000-05:00

First Semester grades are in.

I got straight A's.

You may now worship me.

That is all.

LadyG's Top 10

2008-12-11T10:33:00.004-05:00

Reasons why Potheads annoy the shit out of me:

10. They're useless. The pot doesn't calm them down or make them easier to talk to or ANYTHING. It just makes them sound really dumb when they talk. Really, really dumb. Like, "you were in the special class, weren't you?" kind of dumb.

9. They are perpetually shocked and dismayed to hear that someone, somewhere, might disapprove of their drug.

8. "Mind-Expanding". What the fuck is that supposed to mean? You really expect me to believe that a little weed inflicting the same amount of damage on my neural cell tissue as an entire night of drinking is going to make me more intellectual? See, now we're back to the short bus.

7. The arguments are ridiculous. I mean, seriously, it's ALWAYS THE SAME SHIT! "You'd have to inject youself with pot for it to kill you, which is impossible." "It's harmless." "It's only illegal because they can't tax it." Blah, blah, blah! You still sound like an idiot, and you're still about as trustworthy as a three-year-old around cutlery.

6. Stop eating already! What is the point of smoking something wich, besides costing a mint in extra-legal transactions, requires you to restock your kitchen every two days?

5. Brownies are sacred. Thou shalt not profane the brownies.

4. Yes, it is natural. You know what? So is arsenic. Natural does not always equal "good". But if you're gonna keep this up, how about I introduce you to some curare? At least your mouth will be too paralyzed to talk to me.

3. No, you don't need it. Seriously, you don't. I don't care if it makes you calmer, or nicer, or better behaved. Millions of people manage not to be jackasses without any chemical assistance whatsoever. Give yourself an attitude check and put down the joint.

2. Wow, so...that's deep, huh? Look, whatever universal truth you discover from deep within that smoke-screened brain of yours, why don't you just keep it to yourself? You have not just decyphered the meaning of life by looking at a spoon for six hours. Shut up, and play with building blocks.

1. No, I don't want any. Seriously, I'm fine. No, I mean it, I don't want any. OH MY GOD WOULD YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP AND GET THAT SHIT OUT OF MY FACE! For crying out loud, and I thought Jehovah's Witnesses were annoying! I kinda hate what you do, and I really don't relish the idea of joining in. If you don't want my high-heeled shoe geting up-close and personal with your face, I fervently suggest you back off.

End!

Clarification

2008-12-09T19:10:00.004-05:00

So I got a comment from my PiC, and I realized I may have given you Minions a false impression of my culinary skillz.

Namely, that I have them.

I am SO sorry if I ever gave you that impression. The truth is, I cannot cook to save my ass. Seriously, if you can't microwave it, I'm lost.

Well, okay, I can bust out a mean shrimp and spaghetti when the mood takes me, and there's not a soul on this Earth who can best me in scrambled eggs (well, okay, maybe a few souls). But for some reason, during Christmas time, my brain forgets that and suddenly I'm Susan Homemaker (call me Suzie and you die). I don't know what it is, but something about the simple, matter-of-fact proceedure of baking comes naturally to me. Scottish Shortbread? Bring it on! Chocolate Chip Cookies? No problemo! White Chocolate/Peppermint pseudo brittle, also known as "Christmas Tree Bark"? Okay, now you're just insulting my intelligence.

I dunno, I guess it's because it's one of the few things mom and I can bond over. It's not as much fun now, though, since neither of us has oodles of time and we're the only ones left now that Sister is AWOL.

Alright, tis the season. Time for a LadyG holiday recipe!

For a quick, delicious treat that'll have your F'n'F drooling in anticipation, try this stupidly easy Christmas Tree Bark.

Ingredients:

1: White Chocolate Chips
2: Peppermint candy canes (red is favourite, but any other color sheme will do AS LONG AS IT'S PEPPERMINT!)

Materials:

1: Wax Paper
2: Melting Pan (now, for this you can use a teeny tiny crock pot like we did for the Cherries, or you can go the traditional route and use two saucepans, one with water and a slightly smaller one for the chips. DO NOT LET THE WATER AND THE CHOCOLATE MIX! THIS IS VERY VERY VERY IMPORTANT!)
3: Spatula
4: Hammer and plastic baggie (hammer optional)
5: Cookie Sheet

Now, I'm not going to tell you how to melt the chocolate. One, because mom always handles that, and two, because the process is different depending on which chocolate you use. So I'm gonna suggest doing a bit of extra research on this one. Some chocolate requires butter, some doesn't. I've even seen a special chocolate melt which required water, and boy did THAT freak me out.

Step one: Melt the chocolate.
Don't fill the pan all the way with your white chocolate (yes, I know it's actually cocoa butter. stay with me.) Leave enough room for some vigerous stirring without slopping all over the stove. Just pour in however much chocolate you think you'll need and begin melting it according to the needs of your particular chocolate. We use baggies of chips like you'd put in cookies, and as far as I can see that just involves a bit of butter and a LOT of patience.

Step two: Have some fun!
Melting doesn't take all day, but it takes a while. At first, those stubborn little off-white confections will just refuse to liquefy! You do have to keep stirring now and then to stave off burning, but in between stirs you should have ample time to ready your candy canes! This is where the hammer comes in. Essentially, you want to put a bunch of candy canes (or a couple really big ones, like we have) in a plastic baggie and crush them into tiny pieces by any means necessary. Then, either keep them in the bag, or pour the chunks of peppermint into a bowl for easy mixing.

REMEMBER! Keep an eye on your chocolate as you do this. Burns can happen in seconds, so remember to keep stirring every few seconds or so, depending on how the melting is going. This might be a trial-and-error kind of thing, but practice makes perfect.

Step Three: Mix it Up!

Once your chocolate is smoothe and creamy, pour the crushed candy canes into the pan and fold them into the chocolate. Stir it well, you want to get as much peppermint into every inch of chocolate as possible.

Step Four: Pour it Out.

This is where the wax paper comes in. Just greasing the cookie sheet won't do it. If your pan doesn't have a good handle, or even if it does, I suggest an oven mit because that mix you just made is HOT.

With the wax paper covering the cookie sheet, pour the mix out of the pan as smoothely as you can. Don't worry about making it even, that's what the spatula's for. Just avoid splashing. Then, use the spatula to smoothe the mix across the wax paper until it's as even as you can get it. Don't make it too thin, but try not to make big honkin' bricks either. DO NOT TRY TO COVER THE TRAY. Trust me, no one cares if your edges are straight and neat.

Step Five: Solid!

Once you've got the mix spread out on the tray, pop it in the fridge for a good half hour to an hour. Or the freezer, if you're impatient, but I'm not sure how well that'll work. Once the chocolate is hard and stiff, and the peppermint ain't going nowhere, take the tray out of the fridge. Now, use the wax paper to help you break the sheet of chocolate into small chunks. It's better if these look rough rather than neat, because it's like peanut brittle.

Step Six: Bask

Now just hand out chunks of Christmas Tree Bark to people you don't hate and watch them worship you. Oh, and save a few for yourself. If you want to go the extra mile, wrap a few pieces in celophane and tie it with a shiny twist-tie or a pretty ribbon. It only takes a few seconds, and your F'n'F will really appreciate the thought.

Happy Hogswatch!

If you're confused by any part of this recipe, or have any questions about other cookies/treats, or you want advice from someone who actually knows what they're talking about (namely, my mom), then just email me at LotCblog AT gmail DOT com or leave a comment and I'll get back to you.

Christmas Neurosis

2008-12-08T14:18:00.003-05:00

Or:

How my mother takes Christmas just a leeeetle too far.

I can't remember if I've already mentioned this, but my mom is slightly crazy for Christmas. I'm not sure when I first came to understand this. It might have been when she started playing Christmas carols in the beginning of November. It might have been how the first snowfall of the year coincided with the installation of colorful, twinkly lights along our porch roof. But I'm fairly sure it has something to do with the Cherries.

Capital C.

Okay, here's the deal. Every year my mom makes cookies. But we're not talking about those simpering little sugar cookies in various holiday shapes which get slathered with frosting and look, lets face it, homespun. No, my mother is a true cookie gormet. Her Cookie Platters, famed across at least two counties, consist of holiday confections like maple walnut fudge, church windows, rum fudge balls, peanut butter popcorn balls, bitter chocolate truffles and, of course, The Cherry Cordials.

The Cherry Cordials were added a few years ago on a whim. Mom saw the recipe in one of her massive confection tomes and figured it might be a good addition to that year's selection. She anticipated, logically, that the Cherries would simply enter into the arrangement for one year, make their splash across the tastebuds of our friends, family and co-workers, then retire from the menu, secure in their contribution to holiday mirth.

No. Such. Luck.

The Cherries were HUGE!!! People wouldn't shut up about them! They easily became a huge hit, and mom could no more retire them than stop whipping out tray after tray of artfully crafted spritz cookies (btw, if you ever want to appear like the world's most awesome cookie-maker? Go with spritz. The dough is laughably easy to make, and with a decent extruder gun, you can whip out over two dozen in less than five minutes. Then ten minutes in the oven and BAM. Instant familial worship).

Strictly speaking, the Cherries are simple to make. Simple, but not easy. Let me explain. While the actual process of making a Cherry Cordial is exceedingly simple, it's also very time consuming and demanding. There are a lot of steps which could make or break the final product depending on how you do them. The most annoying of these steps? The rolling.

That's where I come in. Many have tried, most have failed. The sad truth is, rolling cherries is an artform, and some people just aren't cut out for it. So far, it appears that only LandLady and myself are worthy.

The process basically is this: You have cherries. You also have a bowl of wrapping, which is a mixture of butter, confectioner's sugar and milk, stirred until stiff. Your most invaluable tools are your hands and the bowl of confectioner's sugar nearby. The relatively easy part is taking a carefully measured pinch of wrap and molding it around the cherry. A monkey could do that part, if it was a patient monkey and if it had remembered to coat its hands in powdered sugar to keep the stickiness at bay (it's like flour when you're handling bread dough). The hard part is rolling the wrap smoothely so that the result is an almost perfectly round white sphere with a red stem.

Unfortunately, we've only found two people capable of doing this. Most of our "helpers" try to use their fingers to shape the wrap. This simply does not work. Fingers make the wrap lumpy and unappealing. The secret is all in the palms. LandLady and I know how to roll the white coating in the concave part of our palms, smoothing out all the rough edges and producing a clean, elegant product ready for dipping.

That's the penultimate part of Cherry construction. Once the wrapped Cherries have set in the freezer for fifteen minutes, they get taken out and submerged in melted milk chocolate. This part is easy, anyone can do it. But it's also messy as hell and takes forever. While not as taxing as the rolling process, by this point any helpers on hand are fed up with the whole thing and just want to chill out on the couch for an hour.

Nevertheless, The Cherries have become an irrevokable part of the Christmas Season, and their production has come to definitively usher in the Christmas Baking Season. Once they're out of the way we can focus on fuddlesnix (a variation of the spritz cookie my mom and I invented, a huge favorite at social gatherings), surprise package cookies (shortbread surrounding an Andes mint chocolate and drizzled in melted Andes pieces), or whatever new and innovative cookie recipe mom decides to try out this year.

Oh! One final thing about the Cherries, in case any of you are crazy enough to try them out. Once they've been dipped in the chocolate and placed on cookie trays (wax paper is a MUST for EVERY STEP of the process), you have to keep them refrigerated until you're ready to serve them. This is IMPORTANT because the longer they sit in the refrigerator, the more the juices from the cherries will mix with the sugary wrap. Eventually, the wrap will semi-liquify and the flavors of the wrap and the cherry will combine, creating the distinct flavor of the Cordials. This, however, is dangerous. There are relatively few ways to hide a large tray of sugary treats in a refrigerator, and friends and relatives are bound to stumble across them. At this point, surreptitious "tasting" is likely to result in the decimation of your entire batch. One year we ended up with half of our initial total because my Uncle David saw them in the fridge and started snacking secretly while the rest of us were unawares.

Generally we try to keep them refrigerated for two weeks or so, that seems to be the magical time frame for maximum Cherry-ocity.

If you're interested in this, or another recipe, leave a comment or drop me an e-mail at LotCblog AT gmail DOT com and I'll get back to you with some of my mom's Christmas wisdom. Also, if you'd like me to put up some of our most popular recipes on this blog, tell me in the Comments. The truth is, most of our most successful cookies are actually pretty easy to make, and they'll turn you into a saint among your friends and family, not to mention the folks at work.

Let it SNOWZ!!!

2008-11-21T16:08:00.002-05:00

I've lived in Central New York all my life. Like, literally. I'm used to the white stuff. When I was four I stepped out of my front door and my dad suddenly couldn't see me. There was tunneling involved.

Plus, we live virtually next door to one of the Great Lakes (New York's major claim to fame. Well, Proper New York, not that city place.) so we get this special kind of snow called "Lake Effect" which is a whole new rung on the ladder o' weather. It's cold, it's wet, it's downright EVIL! Lake Effect snow is snow with a grudge.

But, as I said, I'm used to it. So used to it, in fact, that I forget that there are those who aren't.

Like, oh say, a certain puppy. A certain enthusiastic puppy who was born in May and has never, ever seen so much as a snowflake before. A puppy, say, named Kilo.

Yep, it's Kilo's first winter. His first winter ever. And he? Is ECSTATIC!!!

It goes a little something like this:

Hooman: Okay, Kilo, enough whining you can go out.
Kilo: Hurry, hurry, hurry gotta gogogogogoooo!!!!
Hooman: Okay, okay, yeesh! Just hold still while I clip on your lead. I don't want you running into the road in front of a speeding car. Again.
Kilo: Gotta go BAD!!! Hurry hurryhurryhurry!!! Wanna roll in the mud and get all stinky! Gotta go--wait a minute. What?
Hooman: Go on. Go potty.
Kilo: Where did the ground go? Why is everything all white? Maddie???
Maddie: Shut up and go already, I don't have all day.
Kilo: O--kay. Um....it's all...it's cold. Hey, wassat? Is it raining? Ooh, it's all white! *goes down porch steps* Hey! It's falling outta the sky! Oh, hey, hooman, look at this! Oh, cool! You jump in it and it goes EVERYWHERE!!! Check this out! Ooh, look how easy it is to dig! Hey, Maddie, it's turning you white! Hey, lookit! It's like water and dirt COMBINED. Wow, this is the coolest thing EVER!!! Maddie, have you seen this? Hooman, where'd you find this stuff?!

Yep, Kilo digs the white stuff. He goes apeshit crazy everytime he goes outside. He loves to root around in it so whenever he goes out his nose gets covered in snow until he looks like Al Pacino in Scarface. I swear he thinks the snow is a special new toy we got for him or something. Every day when he goes out he's like, "ZOMG it's still here! Oh this is SWEET!!!" It's hysterical to watch.

One of these days I'll have to film it. For posterity.

Save me from the Russians!

2008-11-16T19:11:00.002-05:00

Okay, you know how I said everything at college is spiffy? Well I lied. There's something...insideous stalking the campus of DCC. And that something? Comes in pairs!

It's these Russians, people! Two Eastern European chicks, mentally known as "The Russians" because I have no freakin' clue what they really are, other than EVIL!!! One sits in front of me in Awesome Math, and the other sits next to her. And guys, they are always talking. And I don't mean quiet, giggly little whispered exchanges, either. I'm talking obnoxious, public-speaking, histerical laughter interplay at every possible opportunity! No moment in time is safe, not even the ones otherwise occupied by the actual lesson! Prof. Dance actually had to tell them to shut up. (Except she was totally polite and sweet about it, because I swear she's too awesome for her own good.)

But they don't just talk, no. They talk bilingually. They yap back-and-forth in rapid-fire Russian (or whatever) peppered with whole freaking phrases of perfectly mangled English. (That is to say, they speak English just as well as anybody born in the States. Fluently, freely, and with the kind of disregard for grammatical structure known to make linguists suffer anyurisms.) They're blond and brunette, so we'll call them Bettje and Veronika. Because I'm a bitch.

Veronika is the instigator, ten times out of ten. But Bettje is always an enthusiastic accomplice. Veronika seems to have a lot of problems, and they are all apparently the fault of some Other Girl on campus or possibly in the city. I wouldn't know, since they were speaking (maybe) Russian. Both Bettje and Veronika seem quite active in the party scene, and apparently have had many encounters with the opposite sex which defy conventional reasoning. I know this, because usually after an extended period of Eurasian jibberish, I get treated to variations on the key of, "What, really? He did?" And, "Oh my God, seriously?" And also, "I can't believe that." Followed inevitably by a string of (possibly) Russian and then a few more lines of what amounts to "As if! Totally! Gag me with a spoon!"

Tell me, what's the Russian equivalent of Cher Horowitz?

Usually they shut up about ten minutes into learning time. Usually. But my agony doesn't end there, oh no! It appears that Bettje and Veronika are not only obnoxious, but they're mobile. In that I seem to run into them everywhere! Taking the stairs to the library? Chatting Russians. Crossing the bridge to the Student Center for some food? Chatting Russians. Ducking into an elevator before the doors close, forcing you to take the stairs so as not to be late? Chatting Russians with cell phones! And always, always that braying, grating laugh. Everything is just so fucking funny to these girls! Oh, except for the things that piss them off. Generally, these things are due to someone in posession of two X chromosomes.

They're a plague! A plague I tell you! Now I know the true extent of the Russian threat! They've done away with nuclear arms and communist policies. Now they've turned their sights to something TRUELY evil. They're gonna invade two by two and annoy us into submission!

Okay, maybe I'm overreacting, but these girls really are harshing my mellow here. I've literally had fantasies of having them bound and gagged and left in a maintenance closet with bad reception and no cell phone charger.

I know, I know. I'm a sadistic bitch. But they're irritating, so I figure it balances out.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to write a paragraph in Italian because my professor is awesomecakes and I totally don't want to disappoint her.

The Puppy...Sort Of

2008-11-15T20:39:00.002-05:00

It occurs to me that it's been some time since I've written about Kilo.

Okay, okay, in all fairness it's been some times since I've written about anything, a truth for which I make no excuses and eleven billionty apologies. I suck.

But, I was reading about Amalah's new boy, Ezra, and I conveniently had Kilo sprawled out on the couch next to me, and in the absence of a sweet-faced bundle of pink wrinkly cute, I felt a surge of sympathetic maternity overwhelm me and latch onto the nearest helpless bundle of cute at hand. Kilo.

Kilo isn't actually much of a bundle anymore. He's more of a...cargo. He's his own furry freighter carting muscles, fur, bones and PAWS.

There are no words to describe the size of Kilo's paws.

Okay, there are words, but they tent toward "gargantuan", "enormous", "huge" and then they get silly. "Humungo" generally factors in somewere.

For all intents and purposes, Kilo is still very much Kilo. He's just...stretched. But that's only at first glance. Closer inspection reveals a certain Mastif quality to him. Mainly, he has muscles. In fact, he seems to be made of nothing but muscle. And bones. This is a boney dog. Like lots of teenagers, Kilo seems composed mostly of knees and elbows and other various joints. His legs go on for about a century, his tongue is the size of one of the larger arctic ice flows, and he has mysteriously come into posession of what can only be described as...jowls.

The little white kanji symbol on his chest has grown into something approaching a neon sign on the Vegas Strip, and he's suffering from the Mastif condition known as "silly-looking droopy eyes". But that's the technical term.

Personality-wise, Kilo is a total mama's boy. He needs to be picked up and hugged EVERY DAY, OMG WOMAN WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU WALKING IN THE DOOR AND NOT DISPENSING IMMEDIATELY WITH THE HUGGY-CUDDLES?!?!!?!? And he sleeps with mom and The Scot every night. This is a pain in the ass since he now weighs 53 POUNDS and has a phobia of going down the stairs. (He'll climb up them at the drop of a dime, but it'd take an act of God to get him down those things of his own accord.) This means that all of us have suddenly developed a considerable amount of upper-body strength to cope.

Ow.

In a completely unrelated note, I have experianced my first muscular knot. It's in my shoulder. It is ow.

Kilo and Maddie are unseperable. They always have to go out together, they have to eat together, they do EVERYTHING together except go to the vet. Kilo kind of hero-worships Maddie, and has defaulted to her the alpha-bitch status in their little micro-pack. He won't eat until she at least starts eating her dinner, he follows her around like, well like a puppy dog. It's kind of adorable. Plus, Maddie's like a million years younger when Kilo starts playing with her. It's like she suddenly gets this surge of bottomless energy and I swear she can run circles around that pup!

I don't know if it's because I know Maddie is a very old dog and may well be leaving us soon, but I find myself cherishing every moment with her. She's my contentment. She's more beautiful every time I see her. She shares my love of quiet moments, and she has this gentle kind of love in her eyes every time she looks at you.

Yeah, I know, a blog about Kilo spontaneously morphed into a blog about Maddie. But that's probably because Maddie just hopped up on the couch and is resting her head on my leg while I type.

Ganesh I love my dogs.

Reflections on Requirements

2008-11-13T13:42:00.003-05:00

Or:

I HATE MY ENGLISH CLASS!!!

A Rant by LadyG

Okay, there's a slight problem with Default Community College. Just one! I swear the rest of the time it's smoothe sailing!

The problem is English 103, otherwise known as Freshman Compositions. It's a requirement before you can move on to ANY of the other English classes. You know, the ones about literature, and books and THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE!

But I already KNOW all the crap being taught in Eng. 103. I've known it, in fact, since I was ten years old! And yet Prof. Prophet presents it as though it were a brand new concept! Oh, wow, our big project is a research paper! Scary! I did a research paper IN MLA format WITH a works cited page on the destructive consequences of harvesting salt-water fish for aquariums in fifth grade! I did an extensive, intensive and all-around PAINFUL research paper on Shakespeare's Globe Theatre when I was fourteen! I have compared, contrasted, summarized and narrated more times than I'd like to count. I have analyzed critically, annotated and dissected everything from Bram Stoker's Dracula to George Orwell's Animal Farm. Now I'm being quizzed on the correct way to write: "Chester bought shoes at the store and he spent all his money."

Well maybe Chester should've been a bit thriftier and not bought into the hype surrounding the latest Nike. I really hope brain-dead Chester and his motherfucking shoes enjoy themselves, because such unmitigated stupidity can only result in some god somewhere striking the pair of them with a well-aimed bolt of lightning!

I'm nearly 20 years old. I have had poems published, I have won awards, I have years of experiance writing formal essays as well as personal narratives and works of fiction. I have penned biographies, memoirs, analyses, arguments, short stories, novellas and full-length novels to varying degrees of success. In what world would I need to be "introduced" to the daring new concept of standard written English?

Even my professor knows I'm overqualified for this course. She said so just a few minutes ago as I was leaving the classroom. Just being in that class is insulting. Ganesh, if you guys could see the "sample essays" we have to read! They might as well have been written by seven-year-olds. They have, as Moist von Lipwig would say, "All the warmth and affection of a thrown knife." I literally feel sick when I read the shit she hands out.

The only thing worse than having to endure this farce, is the people I have to endure it with! They're pathetic! Ugh, peer-review is torture when I'm reading their essays. The spelling is haphazard at best, as though they tossed a few Scrabble pieces onto the table and left it at that. The grammar? Nonexistant. I'd be surprised if any of these people even heard the word "preposition". They can't read aloud. I doubt they can read! Today a girl couldn't read the word "precedent"! What the fuck? This is supposed to be college! If I ever performed that poorly I never would have made it past Mr. Fratini's 5th grade English! Mrs. Alexander would've had me decapitated for insulting my native tongue! I did not go through multiple Honors English courses to be subjected to remedial studies! For God's sake, I read Shakespeare for fun! I've analyzed the works of Sir. Arthur Conan Doyle in my spare time! I read Farenheit 451 three years ahead of shedule because it looked interesting! I DO NOT BELONG IN THIS CLASS!!!

I'm in Literary Society. LITERARY SOCIETY! Bronte, Goethe, Hemingway. Why is someone familiar with The Devine Comedy considered to be the educational equal of someone whose last foray into the written word was an issue of People Magazine?

I'm not usually a snob about stuff like this. Mainly because I know so many people who are so much more well read than I am, whose intellect puts me to shame. But in English 103 I feel like Gulliver surrounded by the Lilliputions. I obviously stand out, and no amount of crouching is ever going to help me fit through their doorways.

The first thing Professoressa P. asked us on the first day of Italian 101 was how much experiance we'd had with the subject, just to make sure we weren't overqualified. Well, I may be uneducated enough for Elementary Italian, but I left Elementary English behind in Elementary School!

There's go to be a better way than this.

Trip the Light Politic

2008-10-22T12:36:00.003-04:00

Have I mentioned that I'm going to D.C.?

I'm going to D.C.

Yeah, check me out. I'm bad. My lifetime travelogue begins now.

The trip is scheduled for November 7-9. That's after the election, for those of you not paying attention. There was some talk of going in January for the inaguration, but it was unanimously decided that the benefits of witnessing political history were not, in fact, greater than the cost of learning exactly how a sardine feels.

Also, Katie, I think your story is finished...ish. I'm gonna go ahead and send it to you, and I want you to tell me what you think and if you'd like more. I wanna go somewhere with this one, which is why I've spent so damn much time on it. Yay! Unfortunately, I seem to have lost your e-mail address *glares at gmail*. Pls to send again? Kthxbai!

Anyway, this whole D.C. trip has, obviously, got me thinking about politics. Bear with me, okay guys? The last time I went all political on y'all was during the democratic debates! And that was pundits and pundits ago! ANYWAY, I figured now was as good a time as any to wax philosophical on politics. But briefly, because I have a class in a couple of hours and I'm not entirely sure how much I have to talk about.

Primarily, I wish to brag that I'M REGISTERED TO VOTE, and worry as well because I haven't gotten anything in the mail confirming it. I think you're supposed to. I submitted my form the very first day the campus library had them, so I'm assuming it got sent. But I'm concerned that I haven't gotten anything back and I'm going to be pissed off if it turns out I can't vote in the election because of a clerical error or some lacky's incompetance.

I'll be REALLY pissed if it turns out I actually got the card thingummy but never saw it because my mother got the mail, opened it and promptly tossed it aside, dooming it to an eternity lost and alone in the dead letter box.* This has happened before.

Anyway the elections are only a couple weeks away and I'm all kinds of giddy. I'm also scared, because there's a very real chance that McCain could win and, Minions, that shit just don't fly! I mean, I'm not opposed to McCain per se, though there are a lot of times I want to thwap him upside the head until that little George Bush-shaped microchip comes flying out of his nose, but just the idea of Sarah Palin being an arhythmic heartbeat away from the presidency sends cold shivers up and down my spine. Yes, I'd love it if Obama were a little less stuttery, and I'd be ecstatic if I knew thing one about Joe Biden (yes, yes, epic fail on my part), but as is always the case the Election comes down to choosing the lesser of two evils, and if you look at it in that light, there's really no choice involved.

IN OTHER NEWS: I am now a member of the Default Community College GSA, History Club (in which I am an officer) and Literary Club. I FEEL SO INCLUDED!

Expect senseless, bitchy blather over at Exceptional Mind. Read at your own risk.

*Fucking thing is like the Bermuda Triangle for junk mail.

Getting Serious

2008-10-11T13:33:00.002-04:00

Okay Minions, you may recall from time to time my mentioning that I am a Nerdfighter. It's pretty cool, being part of a community dedicated to making the world a better and more awesome place. But the thing I like most about Nerdfighting is that it's real. It's more than just a bunch of geeks hanging out on YouTube and posting silly pictures, and nowhere is that more powerfully reinforced than right here:

This is Shawn. Shawn is an inspiration, particularly to me. I'm kinda disgusted with myself for how apathetic I tend to be. I mean, sure I've looked into the Peace Corps, but I never seriously considered joining. Now I'm thinking...why not? Why can't I do what Shawn is doing? I mean, sure I have my obligations here, college and work and stuff like that, but soon that won't matter so much. In a couple years, I'll be out of school. Why shouldn't I do something with my good fortune? I may be working class, but compared to those kids, I'm positively rolling in it.

So here's the thing, this summer I'm going to Guatemala. The DCC History Club is going to study the ruins of the Mayan Empire. For the first time, I'm going to see first hand what it's like to actually be in a foreign environment. This is what I want to do. I want to get a camera. I have one, but it only takes 30 minutes of video and its battery life SUCKS. I need something better in Guatemala. And I need to make a video. So, my call to my minions is this:

1. Help me find a good camcorder, one that works well but preferably doesn't cost a mint.
2. Help me figure out how to actually make a video. I have no idea how to edit, crop, whatever. Fortunately, I'm in college and I should be able to find a computer geek to help me. ^.^ But any help you guys can give me would be really helpful.
3. E-mail me your ideas about what I should do to decrease Worldsuck. And where you think I should go after Guatemala. It's no secret that everyone has their own personal causes, and if I'm going to strike out on my own like Shawn, I need some time in advance to get my shit together. Now, these ideas can be anything. Darfur, Wisconsin, The Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, whatever. I don't know if I can actually do this, but I want to try. Even if it's just donating like Hank and Pat. I'd like to hear from you about this, and I'll post any follow-up here on LotC.
4. Suggest ways to solve my own personal financial crisis. I can't really do much of anything if I can't fund it.

I realize Guatemala isn't exactly Bangladesh, and going on a field trip with my history club isn't even close to what Shawn is doing. But the thing with me is, I need to prove I can do something before I will. I need to know that I can experiance a remote and foreign landscape and live to tell the tale. I also need to prove to myself that traveling overseas is possible and that I can find the money to do it.

So I guess this means I'll actually be using my YouTube channel. Actually, I'll probably end up making a new one, 'cause my current one kinda sucks. Anyway, I hope something comes out of this, and I REALLY hope nothing happens to keep me from going to Guatemala.

DFTBA!

In an Official Capacity

2008-09-24T12:30:00.002-04:00

**LadyG is pleased to announce her new position as Vice Representative for Default Community College's History Club.**

Cheer for me minions! I'm all spiffy!

I just went to my first History Club meeting (rocks so hard) and I somehow ended up nominating myself for the position of Student Representative. I...lost. However! Repping a club at DCC is hard work and very time-intensive, so it's not easy for one person to do. So I was appointed Vice Rep, or Representational Alternate. This means that I get to attend Student Association meetings, which are these very official brain trusts held in a lecture hall where peoplse say "um" quite a lot. I don't quite know why I did it, save that the Student Association meetings fascinate me with their political headiness. I mean, students in the SA actually have a direct influence in how the college spends the students' tuition money! Plus, it looks FANTASTIC on a resume.

I'm really excited about History club. Last summer then went to South America to visit sites of the ancient Mayan civilization! And they rode horses! Currently we're discussing a trip to Washington D.C. in, get this, January. That's January as in, the inauguration. Of course we'll probably end up going in the spring because D.C. in January? Packed.

Oh! And Katie's story. I'm not sure if it's done or not. On the one hand, I could leave it at a horrible, gut wrenching cliff hanger. On the other, I could expand it into a fanciful satire examining the hypocracies of society...or I could just write about faeries playing pirated versions of Halo 2 on expensive cell phones. I haven't decided yet. Also, my beta is taking his own sweet time getting back to me, which is odd because he's in my Global History of Sexuality class. I really should nag him more.

Oh, that's right. I have a beta for this one. Yay beta!*

In other news, I have discovered Discworld by Terry Pratchett, and I firmly believe his books should be required reading for EVERYONE.

That is all.

*A beta is like an editor, only you don't pay them, they're generally nicer to you and they get heaps more credit for all their hard work.

At Last!

2008-09-15T10:33:00.001-04:00

A librarian gave me an idea, and now I have officially started writing Katie's story!

I WILL NOT FAIL!!!

Gotta go write, bye!

Glee

2008-09-09T11:42:00.001-04:00

Check this out, it's my new favorite vid on YouTube:

So. Sweet!

GOMEN!!!

2008-09-04T13:23:00.003-04:00

I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I'M SORRY!!!

Work. Killed. Mah blog!

*Glares at work*

Seriously, work got to be so all-consuming that most days I didn't even have time to think about LotC. I'M SORRY!

This means I also spent all of August not writing Minion Katie's story.

*Iz Bastard*

Oh, patient and loving Katie, how shall I ever make it up to thee?

By mentioning YOUR NAME in the acknowledgments of my first published book! (Whenever THAT happens).

Your thanks will read as follows:

Many thanks to Minion Katie, for helping me to learn how AWEFUL it feels to miss a deadline.

I dearly hope she's not still waiting for her short story by the time THAT sees print.

The good news:

I AM IS IN COLLEGE! I ARE SMART!

Seriously, though, I'M IN FREAKING COLLEGE! I'M A STUDENT! I AM HAPPY!!!

My classes? Rock! My professors? Jokes! (That's nerdfighter-ese for "cool") My happy? Astronomical!

The further good news?

Downtime. Lots and lots of downtime. I have only one class in the morning on Tues and Thurs, and I have HOURS of downtime between classes on Mon and Wed. I only have one class on Fri, so I have time to kill. And also internet access. And also access to really good computers. And also word processor documents. And also a flash drive. What does that mean?

THE RETURN OF BLOGGING AND NO FUTHER EXCUSES FOR NOT WRITING MINION KATIE'S LONG-AWAITED STORY ALREADY!!!

As you can see, I am quite pleased with my life at the moment. It's only ever marred by work, which has officially gone from "pleasant, money-earning occupier of time" to "Dear Ganesh pull me now from this fiery pit of HELL!" The only good part of this job is my regulars. I can joke around with them and tease them. The rest of it? Sucks! It also means I have, like, NO TIME to do anything at home, since I'm either on campus or at work. Fortunately I have this weekend off, so I should be able to breathe.

The really, spectacularly sucktacular bit?

Books. Cost. A FORTUNE!

Some of them are fairly reasonable, but my Italian text alone costs $150!!! A used copy of my Maths text cost over $70! I'm trying to figure out how to make it cheaper. I have to talk to Professora P. tomorrow morning to work some stuff out, since work makes it virtually impossible to get anything financially accomplished, since I can't do it on campus. *sigh*

That's all for me, chickadees!

See you soon!

Fug.

2008-08-01T19:04:00.002-04:00

Second day of work just ended. It's been going pretty smoothely so far, some snafus but that's only to be expected. The good news? We sell ice cream! That helped.

Meesie was supposed to drive me to work today, but she overslept...by five hours. I would instruct you all to send her boos and hisses, but my mom came into the store at the end of my shift and gave her the look, so I figure she's suffered enough.

As for me? I am very, very tired. Like, wake-me-up-when-the-Earth-implodes tired. Overdose-of-ambien tired. Want. Bed. NOW!

The Good News: Teh bosses got the message, and I'm scheduled for afternoons all next week, except for Sunday when I'm working in the morning. Also, I get tomorrow and Monday off, so I can recuperate.

The Bad News: Most of those afternoons I'm closing. Alone. With another trainee and no managers to help. This could very easily spell disaster. My coworker, let's call her Blondie, assures me that, worst comes to worst, we can always move to Canada. So...there's that. Plus, since I'm working Sunday I won't get to go to my dad's welcome home barbecue. Hopefully I'll see him tomorrow, though.

The Weird News: Apparently, I am now the unattainable fantasy object for Random Afghani Guy at the Bazaar. My dad was shopping in his downtime and some Afghani dude struck up this (approximate) conversation with him:

Afghani Dude: Do you have any daughters?
Dad: Huh?
Afghani Dude: I have jewelry here. Do you have any daughters?
Dad: Yes I do. I have a 21-year-old and a 19-year-old.
Afghani Dude: Oh! I 19! I 19!* Do you have a picture?
Dad: Yes. *shows Afghani Dude my picture (because he is, in fact, a dad)*
Afghani Dude: Oh I love! I love! I give you this neckalace. No charge!**
Dad: Thank you.
Afghani Dude: Yes. You give her this necklace, I go to America and we get hitched.***
Dad: You mean you'll get married?
Afghani Dude: Yes! I am also very rich, I have two houses and three cars!
Dad: O....kay. *backs away slowly*

So I got a necklace! From a stranger! Who wants to marry me! And who my dad says needs to bathe! Goody!

Although, I must admit it is flattering. Considering this dude was willing to commit to a permanent, binding relationship based solely on my picture. Who says the Afghans hate America? At least one of them is willing to marry a complete stranger just to live here!

And no, I don't think I'm going to stop giggling any time soon.

(FYI, my step-mom is all for it. She figures she can trade me for a goat and then she'll never have to worry about mowing the lawn. 'Cause they have a BIG ass lawn. In fact, she says that since I'm a virgin, they should get two goats. Because seriously, how many 19-year-old virgins are you gonna find in America?)

* This is how my dad relayed it to me. I'm not intentionally dissing Random Afghani Dude's broken English.

** Again, as close to my dad's quote as I could get. Yes, that's is a direct quote of what I can only assume is another direct quote.

*** Once again...oh you get the idea by now.

This. Job.

2008-07-29T16:07:00.002-04:00

I'm sure you're wondering (MINIONS!) why I failed to return in a weeks time from hiatus as I originally promised. There is an answer! And that answer is:

I'm employed. :(

Yes, yes, I know employment is usually cause for :), but this job has...nyarg! I'm fairly sure that, given any more incentive, I may well be pulling my hair out by the end of the week! I'm not entirely sure how to abreviate or free-associate the name of my employer into a nickname for this blog, but I kinda dig the sound of This Job. TJ for short. (And no, I'm not cleverly hinting that I work at T. J. Maxx. But nice try. A for effort.)

Anyway, This Job has really gotten under my skin. And I haven't even started working there yet! The main cause for my irritation is the Regional Manager, we'll call him Mr. Flake. Mr. Flake doesn't believe in returning phone calls. Mr. Flake doesn't acknowledge the existance of voicemail. Mr. Flake has never come to terms with the concept of "professionalism". Mr. Flake needs to kiss the fattest part of my ass.

It took me FOREVER to FINALLY get that man to call me to schedule an interview. Afterwords, he said he'd call me in a couple of hours to tell me whether or not I got the job.

Three days later, the phone rang.

LadyG: Hello?
Mr. Flake: Hello, I'm looking for *static*
LadyG: This is her.
Mr. Flake: Hi, this is Mr. Flake from This Job, are you still interested in working here?
LadyG: Definitely.
Mr. Flake: Good. There's an orientation in Weedsport.*
LadyG: ...
LadyG: ...
LadyG: ...okay.
Mr. Flake: Will that be a problem?
LadyG: No, I'll figure it out.
Mr. Flake: Good. Someone from Corporate will contact you. I'm pretty sure the meeting is sometime next week.
LadyG: Sounds...good.
Mr. Flake: Bye. *hangs up*
LadyG: Asshole.

Someone from Corporate never called. Mr. Flake did, though. To tell me on SATURDAY that the orientation was on MONDAY. And out in the middle of Bum Fuck Egypt! And, naturally, he never gave me directions. I had to call him the night before to find out where the Hell I was going. That was, of course, after I had called him three times earlier in the day to ask the same question. See above, regarding voicemail.

I got to the orientation, where I was the only person being...oriented. Getting there was another problem and a half, and ensures that I will never be speaking to a certain young man EVER AGAIN. I proceeded to spend three hours learning all of the ways in which I could screw up and either cripple myself, or else get thrown in jail for selling something restricted to someone naughty. Fun time. There was a "trainer" there the whole time, so I couldn't even riff on the unbearably bad safety instruction video a la MST3K.

I was told before I went to orientation that I had already been scheduled. Apparently, those were LIES! Viscious, evil LIES! So I had to call and tell them I needed to be scheduled. I then settled down for yet another week of waiting for calls that would never come.

Cue last night. Apparently, I was scheduled. For 9:00 a.m. Never mind that my application and my interview pointed out in no uncertain terms that I am not available in the morning on weekdays. Unfortunately, Mr. Flake never bothered to hold onto my phone number, because there was no message on my answering machine, which tells me they must've called the wrong number. There was a message on my cell phone, which I rarely use, and which I had put on "silent" for the orientation and forgot to turn up again. So I didn't know I had work this morning, and I blissfully slept through my shift, completely unaware.

Yes, I should have turned the sound up on my cell, but I almost never use the damn thing and I wrote down my phone number twice on the papers they made me sign and listed it as my primary phone. Besides, you don't schedule someone for a job based on a voicemail. There's such a thing as confirming! And you certainly don't do it the night before you schedule them to work at the ass crack of dawn! And you certainly don't schedule them for a morning shift which they told you repeatedly that they are not available for. I don't just say this stuff to get my jollies off! My mom works at 5:00 a.m. She can't magically appear to drive me to work at 8:30. And the one other ride I have is in college, and she, too is unavailable before 4:00 in the afternoon. I mean for Ganesh's sake!

I swear, the moment they give me a fucking 9 hour workweek, I'm burning that place to the ground. This whole job thing has been one huge clusterfuck after another.

*I've never been to Weedsport. I've been through Weedsport a few times, I'm told, but I couldn't tell it from the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. There is one thing I do know about Weedsport, however, and that is that it's a long fucking way away.

ATTENTION ALL MINIONS (And Jen)

2008-07-17T01:52:00.003-04:00

I have a brief announcement for you all, which saddens me deeply:

I am hiatus-ing from LotC.

*ducks sudden deluge of raw eggs and rotten veggies*

Damn. My minions got good aim...

BUT LET ME EXPLAIN!!!

It's not a hiatus hiatus. It's not even for very long! It's just until all this wedding nonsense is out of the way and I've gotten my college financial aid squared away! That's all!

The thing is, Kilo is still taking up a buttload of time, Mama's wedding has got everything all screwy, and once I meed with the Financial Adviser at DCC, I'll finally be on my way to an ACTUAL COLLEGE EDUCATION!!!

So I can't write here the way I'd like to. I'm sowwy!

Also, and this is humiliting, trust me, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to move Star Minion Katie's story to August. I swear, when I held the contest I had NO IDEA July would get this hectic. I have been doing some writing, but nowhere near enough to get this done. Katie, I'm truly, truly sorry. But I promise, you will get your story and it WILL be awesome!

But there is good news!

Geico Gecko: You just saved a bunch of mon--agh!
Me: *stabbity*
Geico Gecko: *bleeds*

The good news is, my devoted minions can still find silly, random stream of conciousness writing at my LiveJournal, where I seem to be making quite a few friends thanks to my habit of long-winded comments on other people's entries....

So there's that. And also, AVATAR IS ENDING ON SATURDAY! AND IT'S THE SAME DAY MAMA AND TEDDYBEAR ARE GETTING MARRIED!!! SUCH SAD, SAD NEWS ON SUCH A LOVELY DAY!!! AANG! ZUKO! SOKKA! I'LL MISS YOU MY BELOVED ANIMATIONS!!! WAAAAAAHHH!!!!!

Yes, Saturday will truly be the end of an era. The benders gave us some good times...good times. We forgave them their painfully long hiatuses...hiatii...hiatae? And in turn they gave us the only quality storytelling to be found on Nickelodeon. We giggled at Aang's childish antics, swooned at Zuko's teenage angst, thrilled at Sokka's zany inventions, and cowered in the shadow of the Fire Lord! We followed the gaang through love, loss, friendship and betrayal. We mourned the loss of Mako, may he rest in peace, who gave us the voice of Iroh, perhaps the greatest old dude ever to surreptitiously guide a headstrong teenager. We marched with baited breath through the fires of war, felt our hearts flutter with each timid kiss, invoked rage with each cruel injustice. We surged with Aang's Avatar State. We marveled at architecture, boggled at hybrid animal species, and imitated each sublimely marial arts bending form.

Now Sozin's Comet is blazing in the distance, and the last Airbender is faced with his greatest challenge and worst fear. And soon, we will stand tall beside Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Iroh and Suki as we head into battle, and we will scarcely dare to breathe when, for the first time in his brief yet endless existance, Aang is forced to take a human life.

We'll miss you, Avatar. For, much like the comet now approaching, you blazed brightly through our lives for the briefest of times, only to vanish too soon, leaving behind only the memory of your brilliance.

Brian*, Michael**, thank you.

Sorry. I had to do that. If you haven't seen the show, WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?!?! Go see it, like, now! THERE ARE DVD'S PEOPLE!

Le Sigh. I can't imagine life without Avatar. There totally should be FOUR books, not three. The cycle is incomplete! (For those of you who don't now, Avatar relies heavily on the four mystical elements, Water, Earth, Fire and Air. The four elements play a HUGE part in almost every aspect of the story, defining the way of life for everyone in the show. The seasons are called "books" and the episodes are "chapters". Book one was Water, book two was Earth, and book three is Fire. There are only three, but throughout the show it's made abundantly clear that there is a cycle, and without the fourth element, Air, the cycle is incomplete. However, 100 years before the story began, the Fire Nation wiped out the Air Nomads in an act of genocide, so having only three books actually seems somewhat fitting, since the element of Air has been removed from the world, leaving the global cycle broken in its wake. Still, it'd be nice to see Aang rebuild his lost culture. The Air Nomads were the best of all four nations, in my opinion.)

---

* Brian Konietzko, co-creator of Avatar: The Last Airbender

**Michael Dante DiMartino, co-creator of Avatar: The Last Airbender

Beware all ye puppies who enter here!

2008-07-08T17:15:00.002-04:00

Today we took Kilo to his very first vet appointment. He handled it like a champ, once you set aside the obligatory whining and whimpering while we waited FOREVER in the waiting room.

Okay, vet people? At what point did it become okay to leave your customers (clients?) sitting on uncomfortable wooden benches and then force them to wait for half an hour, all the while watching a steady stream of people enter AFTER they do, but get called BEFORE? There was this sign informing all pets and owners (because dogs are really very concerned about office policies, you know) that anyone more than 10 minutes late will likely be rescheduled and there ain't a damn thing you can do about it, sucka!

I'm paraphrasing.

We FINALLY get called in, where a nurse commences fawning over our adorable puppy (bonus points for noticing that we totally had the cutest animal there!), and then rambles off a list of vaccinations you must give your puppy, lest he spontaneously combust or all of his limbs fall off, and then where are you? You have a charred, no-legged puppy, and that would never pass as the cutest dog in the office! All of which, I might add, were only for puppies who were at least eight weeks old. Kilo is seven weeks old. The nice moron on the phone failed to mention that. He swore that between six and eight weeks you could get through the whole kit 'n' kaboodle without a fuss. LIES!!!

The only shot Kilo was old enough for was his distemper shot. For those of you who don't know, distemper is kind of a big deal. If you've ever read Cat Fancy or any of it's millions of cousins, you know that distemper is the stuff of pet-owners' nightmares. It's like a death sentence for your pet, and EVERY PET THEY'VE EVER SO MUCH AS LOOKED AT OMG!!!!

Anyway, the vet gave him his distemper shot and he took it like a trooper. He didn't so much as whine. We learned later that Abby didn't do so well for her shot. So, smug sense of superiority, your name is me!

So Kilo has worms. Every puppy does, it's no big deal, and we knew that already. They gave us some meds to give him at home, took $100 from us and sent us on our way. Lovely.

Of course, then we actually had to give him his meds. This. Sucked. The pills we had to give him for the worms were bitter, and at first we tried slipping them into some peanut butter like the vet said, but Kilo just lapped up the pb and spat out the pills. So we ended up having to forcefeed them to him one tiny section at a time. This? Right here? Is why we now feel like pond scum. Kilo hated those pills, and we hand to hold him down and shove them down his throat like some kind of sadistic puppy-hating monsters! Sure we want him worm-free, but you've seen how cute he is! How could we justify making him suffer even a little bit!

But we got through it, and now he's sleeping in front of the AC. All of today's excitement really wore him out.

The worst part? We have to go again in a few weeks. :(

Thingses! And Stuff!

2008-07-07T15:56:00.003-04:00

Lot of stuff to cover today, so let's get started.

Ramen's Story: Done! Finished! LONG! Topped off at 25 pages and 11,223 words including the title. DANG! Fired it off to her this morning, and now I have to figure out how I'm gonna maintain this newfound standard of excellence for Minion Katie's story.

TEH PUPPY!!!!

Is getting his shots tomorrow. Yep, Kilo is about to take his very first trip to the vet's. Interestingly enough, the Lands Lord and Lady are taking their puppy, Abby, for her shots on the same day. So we're going to have two adorable yet miserable canines on our hands at the same time. Joy.

I've been roped into helping my mom make these wedding favors for Miss R's wedding. They SUCK. I officially hate toule.

Dr. Who is over...life no longer has meaning. DONNA!!!!!!!!!!!

And thankes to Shakespeare, we're only going to have three new episodes next year! Damnit!

Hm...there's something else...something I should talk about...my couin's graduation? No. My successful attempt to make Scottish Shortbread last night? No....

Oh, I remember!

MY DADDY IS COMING HOME THIS MONTH!!! He has a couple weeks of leave so I get to see him SOON!!! My stepmom is having a cookout party to celebrate. So I get to see him SOON!!! Then he's back in Afghanistan until January, barring more leave along the way.

So that's my life right now.

See ya!

I Am...Woman?

2008-07-04T22:57:00.004-04:00

WARNING! YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ A RANT ABOUT FEMINISM! PROCEED WITH CAUTION! WARNING!

So there's this...thing which was recently brought to my attention by my lovely PiC, Nen. Apparently there's this woman, you know, one of Those Women. You know what I mean. She never got over the trauma of being allowed to vote. She feels...exposed if she leaves the kitchen. She vehemently denies the existance of her own breasts, That Kind of Woman. And this particular barefoot and pregnant advocate goes by the name of Kathleen Parker, and she wrote a book* which goes by the name of Save the Males. Because the whales are just fine, thank you. The men are handling it.

So, naturally, being fiercely loyal to my PiC (and my gender), I read the article and Jeff's sterling rebuttal. Then, because I had to, I did some exploring of Shakesville. A feminist blog.

Here's the deal. I don't read feminist blogs. I just don't. Sure my blogroll consists exclusively of women, most of them mommybloggers and all of them liberated, strong women with a kickass sense of humor, but none of them labels themselves as a feminist. It's not that I'm against feminism, far from it! I've been a feminist myself since...um...well I'm fairly sure it happened along the same time that I developed a uterus, so...there's that. But I don't advertise it, and I'll tell you why.

Feminism is a thorny subject. Most feminists don't even realize they are feminists because they've never burned a bra or staged a hosile invasion of a gentleman's club. That's because whenever someone says they're a feminist, the automatic reaction is "Oh! She's a FEMINIST! Back away slowly!" Because the only feminists you hear about are the ones who never shave their legs, or underarms, who can't say two words without proclaiming the tyrannical oppression perpetrated by Men, and who bash anything in pop culture which even remotely alludes to the fact that Boys and Girls are Different. But those feminists are much like the cuckoo-crazy religious fundamentalists who define the Religious Right, they're a tiny portion of a large, diverse group who happen to yell the loudest and get the angriest and so get all the attention. So they then get the unfair priveledge of becoming the face of the entire movement. Which, you know, sucks donkey balls.**

But here's my real beef with the feminist movement. It's like Paganism in that it's nearly impossible to define! If you thought the difference between a wiccan, a witch and an Earthmother was confusing, wait until you try to figure out exactly what it means to be a Strong, Liberated Woman. Even though I talk, act and write like someone in her late 20's (okay, 40's...sometimes), the truth is I'm really a 19-year-old-girl. I'm still a kid in a lot of ways, and I'm going through a very formative period in my life. Men don't know it, but being a girl is hard!*** Sure we put on a good front about being in control. We win most of the arguments, we control the household (you don't see us being told to take out the trash, do you?), and we get to use the pain of childbirth as a never-fail ace in the hole just to show you how pathetic you are! But trust me, that's all a well-maintained facade. We don't have it under control any better than you fellas do.

And that's because the definition of a woman is so hard to pin down. From where I stand (and please, correct me if I'm wrong) a man is a man is a man. There are very specific and clear ideas of how you're supposed to act, speak, move and dress to achieve Manhood. That's why any deviation thereof is so swiftly and decisively identified and punished. Men who take care of their appearance are labeled Metrosexuals and made the butt of macho jokes. Men who maintain a strong connection to their feminine side are called gay, regardless of their sexual orientation. Men who own and shoot guns, who ogle Playboy Bunnies, and consider Hooters to be fine dining are The Ultimate. (I'm from blue-collar stock, by the way.)

But with women it's harder. There are a lot of conflicting images, rolemodels, and expectations for being a girl. And it starts early, too. Growing up I played with dolls, dressed up, had tea parties with nonexistant tea, and watched Rainbow Brite and My Little Pony. I also played baseball, basketball, tag, soccer, and anything else I had a chance to. I played with Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars. I built towers and weapons with Legos. I got into swordfights and rescued damsels (and whatever boy damsels are called) in distress. In lieu of playing House, I played College. When I played with my dolls, they weren't going to the mall and giggling over boys. They were engaging in epic adventures, fighting off the forces of evil and Corporate America (I was a weird child). I wore dresses and I wore jeans. I wore cute little stockings with black buckle shoes and I wore dirty sneakers with threadbare socks. I rode horses and went swimming, I was a kid. Back then whatever you did was cool, so long as you came home in one piece when dinnertime rolled around.

But once you hit adolescence, everything changes. Boys become Boys and girls become...um...sluts? Bitches? Princesses? IT MAKES NO SENSE! Was I supposed to wear jeans and a t-shirt and hang with the fellas? Was I supposed to wear make-up and flirty blouses with tight, low-cut pants and giggle with my gaggle of girls? Was I supposed to wear dresses and skirts and never raise my voice (or my hand) in public? What did it mean to be a girl? Now, my early adolescence contained some of the worst years of my life, so my existential gender dilemma was something of a back-burner issue. But once I hit the big High School level, things got even worse. Because all of a sudden, we all discovered Sex.

Sure we knew about it, but it was abstract. Most of us were still going "Icky!" when the subject came up. But man, when those hormones hit, girlhood went from being confusing and frustrating to a warzone. When I entered high school, the big thing was dressing down, less is more, show off that skin, girl! Pants were LOW. Thongs were plentiful and visible. Skirts were short, and rear-ends had suddenly become advertising space. (Seriously, who decided it was a good idea to slap big ol' brandname logos on the backs of girls' shorts and sweats? These girls were fucking 14!) I've never been a small girl, I've been on the heavy side since middle school. So even if I were so inclined there was no way in Hell I was going to dress like THAT. Unfortunately I didn't develop a fashion sense until about 10th grade, so I looked like a mess for the most part.

But sex was the Big Deal. Do you have it, do you not have it? Should you want to have it? Are you a freak if you don't want to have it? What if you get sick? What if you get pregnant? If I sleep with him am I a slut? If I don't sleep with him am I a prude? For a girl, sexuality is a scary topic. It's always been that way. Now brace yourself 'cause I'm gonna drop some Facts on you.

Female sexuality is so taboo in our culture, that according to Clitical.com (a wonderful resource for female sexuality and exploration, if you're mature enough to deal with it), when ABC's 20/20 interviewed an expert OB/GYN, she told them that when compared to other fields of medical expertise, on a scale of 1 to 10, female sexuality is at about a 2. Many of us can't even identify certain *ahem* vital parts on the female body, and about 28% of women have never seen, erm, themselves in a mirror. Bare with me, guys, I'm trying to make this rant as palatable as possible. That's because we Just. Don't. Talk about it.

There's no owner's manual if you have a vagina. Mom's just as clueless as you are. All she can feasibly tell you is what not to do. And there's a certain level of shame involved in asking. Somehow we're all expected to magically figure it all out when The Time Comes. Which, obviously, is rediculous.

It's so hard to figure out whether to be womanly or ladylike, and are the two necessarily mutually exclusive? Do you only wear pants and prove yourself the equal of any man? Or do you indulge in girly, cute, and (dare I say) sexy clothes, thereby celebrating your womanhood? Do you revel in being Different from men, or do you rail against it? Should I have attitude, or should I be demure? Is it okay to dress provacatively in hopes of attracting a guy, or is that slutty? Is casual sex, so prominant in the male psyche, a no-no for women? Or can we satisfy our physical needs without necessarily getting emotional about it? If we have sex without demanding commitment are we easy? And, the big one, what about babies?

According to biology, women are baby-making machines. From the moment we're born, we exist soully to procreate. Of course, the same is true for men. We are biologically streamlined to continue the species. Because of that, if a woman decides, as I have, not to have children, there's a not-so-small measure of guilt involved. Not only are our bodies screaming at us to reproduce RIGHT FUCKING NOW!!! but we're groomed from an early age to think that not having kids is selfish. Our parents want grandkids, we get baby dolls when we're little, we take parenting classes in school. And as you get older, the pressure increases, like going deeper under the ocean. Suddenly everyone's asking when you're planning on settling down, reminding you oh-so-subtly about "alternative methods", and the old favortie "Your biological clock is ticking!"

With so many competing voices, it's hard not to go crazy. Your body seems to hate you, you're saddled with these mounds of fat and connective tissue on your chest which get you in ALL kinds of trouble, the billbords want you to starve yourself nonexistant but the PSA's want you to be fat and happy. The health people want you to look like the diagram in your biology textbook, and you JUST WANT THE FUCKING CHOCOLATE MUFFIN, DAMNIT! Everywhere you look there are magazines telling you to dress in skimpy clothes while authority figures want you to cover up. TV tells you attitude is good and single is cool, but society is telling you to be agreeable and get a man. All the while you're desperately holding on to this tiny little whisper that is You, barely maintaining your individuality in the glare of Paris Hilton, Queen Latifah, Britanny Spears and Meryl Streep! Am I supposed to be proud and strong, bitter and sassy, seductive and sexy or some combination heretofore unexplored?

Is it anti-feminist to drool over shoes? Is it unseemly to kick back with a beer and some girlfriends and watch a game? Are we allowed to drool over shirtless men with chiselled six-packs? Is a miniskirt a Crime Against Empowerment? Or is Empowerment all about flashing your tits to the camera for Girls Gone Wild? Should we villify porn stars or commend them for living their own lives the way they want to? And on top of all that we have politics forcing us into the background while making us think we've achieved equality.

Long-time readers might recall an entry I wrote a while back explaining why I don't like to write female protagonists. I said that writing a story with a female hero is like sloshing your way through an endless swamp, because whatever you're trying to write about, you're always forced to take time away from the actual story to deal with the sticky mire of gender inequality. The whole issue of femininity and feminism is so mixed up, so complicated, so confusing that it's easier just to wash your hands of it and move on to something else.

For me, that something else is usually gay rights, and equality for citizens in the LGBT community. Apparently feminism also includes an active stance on civil rights in general, and the championing of other minority groups. Since about half of every minority group is women. (Except for NAMBLA, but no one cares about them anyway.)

So it's hard for me to take a stand for feminism. I don't hate men, in fact I love them. I think they're sexy and fun and a really good idea. Given the opportunity, I would totally sleep with one, provided he were the Right One. Hell, there's even a remote chance I'd marry one, and have a family with him. (I know I said I'd decided not to have kids, but I'm not stupid enough to claim that at the age of 19 I know exactly how I'm going to feel about kids when I'm 35.) I know that women aren't equal to men in our society. I know that there are a lot of terrible, horrible and damaging influences on young women and girls strewn throughout our media. But I'm still awakening to my own sexuality. I'm still getting to know myself as a person, my needs and desires and aspirations. Sure I want things to be better for women. Sure I'd love to overthrow the patriarchy and free my gender from the constraints imposed by society. But first I want to get an idea of who I am, and let it go from there. I don't belive in taking a stand without knowing all the facts, so how can I take a stand for women when I'm still not entirely sure what a woman is?

It'd be great to be able to talk about this stuff with other women, besides just writing about it in a blog, but unfortunately girls are discouraged from discussing our sexuality and our place in the community, lest we appear unladylike. Men can talk about sex and masturbation and masculinity openly and loudly, but we girls are trained to be embarassed by our bodies and our physical needs. Hell, I didn't even know girls were able to masturbate until I was well into my teens! Supposedly we're supposed to deny sex both to our boyfriends and to ourselves until that magical day when there's a ring slipped on our finger. No wonder women are crazy. Look what we have to work with!

*And really, good for her! She's such a big girl, what with being able to string words together in a legible fashion. Maybe if she practices really hard, she'll learn how to make sense, too!

**No, I've never seen Clerks 2. Stop asking.

***Not that being a guy is a cakewalk. That's a minefield I wouldn't cross in my most comfortable shoes! Damn, at least I don't live in constant fear of someone beating the shit out of me or challanging my sexuality. Women may be oppressed, but men are some of the most repressed people I've ever encountered! Sweet Ganesh I don't know how they do it!

PUPPY!!!

2008-06-29T19:54:00.005-04:00

Minions and...other minions (and Jen), introducing the adorable Kilo and his amazing woobie:

At first, the woobie is docile, and doesn't fight back.

Then the woobie grows bold, and Kilo must take a different method of attack.

Kilo must show the woobie who's boss, and gets ferocious with it.

But in the end, the crafty woobie springs from his mouth, and vanishes to the dark netherworld known as The Floor, knowing that Kilo cannot follow.

After losing the epic battle, Kilo seeks solace in the form of a doting Scot and his perplexing lizard-shirt.

But, there will be other battles. Oh, yes. Soon, the woobie will be his once again:

At least living in sin would be cleaner...

2008-06-29T19:19:00.003-04:00

Our house is suffering from an epidemic.

We are living in fur. Before we gave Angel to the ASPCA, Mom had taken it upon herself to remove all carpeting from the downstairs rooms in an effort to ease the pain of constant pet-hair vacuuming. Since then, Maddy has taken it upon herself to replace said carpeting, and then some, with her own fur.

Maddy is not a long-haired dog, but she has the undercoat from HELL. All you have to do is touch her and your hand will come away covered in clingy strands of white sheddings. Every time The Scot brushes her he extracts enough spare fur to construct a small family of shnauzers. Within minutes of sitting down on either couch in our living room your clothing will spontaneously become angora. Even your jeans. Especially your jeans. No shirt is safe, be it cotton or poly-blend. All textiles are equal under The Fur!

Because of this, Mom has developed a loving relationship (and ensuing co-dependancy issues) with our vacuum. Where once, this red, roaring behemoth would spend weeks languishing in the dark, airless prison of our coat closet, it has now taken up a place of prominance right out on the floor, within easy reach of the designated "vacuum outlet".

Of course, not every member of our household appreciates this hard-working appliance. Maddy seems to find pet-hair removal a personal insult, and she takes delight in plopping down in the exact spot on the floor that the vacuum just cleaned, thereby depositing as much shaggy undercoat as canine-ly possible. All the better if she happens to have a milk bone handy, since then she can mix dropped fur with dropped crumbs, which I'm sure she feels adds to the aesthetic value of the piece.

Fortunately for us, Kilo is still too little to shed. Unfortunately, he'll learn. Mastiff's are shedding dogs. So are Labs. Kilo is both. Plus a little Beagle...we think.

Speaking of Kilo, as I write this he is curled up beside my mother's leg, one ear flopped open, and he's nipping at the air, which he tends to do when you scratch his belly. Mom just gave him her index finger, and he keeps trying to suckle it. And now he yawns. It would be so easy to just spend a thousand words describing every adorable move he makes. But instead I think I'll go and demand that Mom return the digital camera so I can upload Kilo pics to show you all.

On second thought, I think I'll play with Kilo, then retrieve the digital camera.

'Cause, you know, cute comes first.

Resume Transmission

2008-06-28T21:55:00.002-04:00

I know I've been pretty silent for the past few days here, but I swear I have a REALLY good reason. Several really good reasons, actually.

The first of which, I have begun registering for classes at Default Community College! There are a couple of classes I really want but they're full, so I have them on wait-list. One of them is called "Forbidden Archaeology". Seriously, how do I not?

The second reason, is Ramen. Her story is SO MUCH FUN TO WRITE! It's pretty long, but still qualifies as a short story. So far I've established the conflict, introduced all the main characters, and I'm about to dive head-on into the CLIMAX!!! This may well be the greatest piece of writing I've ever done.

The third reason is Kilo.

No, no. I'm not announcing the return of Project Kilo. Jeeze, I'm not crazy! No, this Kilo weighs about five pounds, wears a studded collar and chews on a fuzzy blue toy affecctionately called his "woobie".

We got a new puppy.

Now, before you all jump on my back for not telling you about this sooner, let me explain!

Yesterday, The Scot casually brought up the subject of getting a new dog by asking Maddy if she'd like a new playmate. Mom snapped to attention and demanded information. Turns out, some friend of a co-worker had some Mastiff-mix puppies they were giving away. A few hours later, Mom and I were in the car making a long-ass drive to Mexico, New York.

So you see, there was no time to tell you Precious Minions. It was all so sudden! Oddly enough, LandLady and LandLord went to get a puppy of their own in Cortland yesterday as well. She's a four-month-old pointer mix who loves and gets along with both Maddy and Kilo.

Kilo is five-weeks-old*, brindle-coated, and has a very Neopolitan Mastiff-looking face. We took him to my cousin's graduation party today, where he was a HUGE hit, and very well behaved.

So things have been a little hectic around here for the past few days. Sorry I didn't write about it sooner, but I was a little distracted by the furry bundle of joy lounging on my couch.

Ciao, bellas!

*LADYG DISCLAIMER: When adopting a puppy, never, EVER bring them home before they are eight weeks old at the VERY LEAST if you can help it. Kilo was an exception, because his mother refused to nurse her babies after the first few days. Since Mom has lots of experiance with small animals and sick animals and every other kind of animal requiring special care, we agreed to take him immediately. Do not do this unless you have previous experiance with below-adoption-age animals, it is an extremely complex undertaking and requires a great deal of vigilance, as a puppy that young has to eat every four hours, and has no bladder control.

Needles and Word Counts

2008-06-19T12:15:00.002-04:00

Good news on the contest front! Ramen's short story is finally hitting its stride. There's action, danger, a wall of ocean, and a flamboyantly irritating floating skull covered in rhinestones! (His name is Chester.)

Anyway the word count currently stands at over 1,800 and climbing. We've reached our conflict, which is quite possibly one of the most ingenius struggles I've ever come up with, thanks to Ramen's OUTSTANDING prompt. I'm having a lot of fun and I'm optimistic about meeting the June 30th deadline.

Of course, once I've done that I have to get to work on Star Minion Katie's short story, and that's gonna have to come up with a plot in double-quick time, or I'm in trouble. Ramen's story had a plot almost from the get-go and I've lost count of the number of false-starts and rewrites it's undergone.

Of course, all of this is just my roundabout way of telling you that my next Commenter Contest is, in fact, going to be for my 100th post. That way I'll have time to take a breather from all this story-ing. That will be nice.

In other news: needles. I have an addiction. No, it's not that. Get your mind out of the gutter. I've become addicted to needlepoint. Right now I'm working on a rediculously complex and difficult Chinese scroll/Butterfly design. It's absolutely gorgeous, and way more fun than it should be. I've only just started, and it's slow going since I have to devote most of my time to Ramen's story. At least it's a hobby my mom understands and encourages. Most of the stuff I'm into she treats with a barely concealed level of disdain. Blogging, for instance, makes no sense to her.

On the Shimmy side, I've managed to make it all the way to the end of a workout for the first time! Woohoo! I haven't been very consistant though, I've been skipping my workout some days 'cause I just didn't feel like it. I have been more mobile, though. I went out shopping with my mom twice this week, once in my block-heeled pilgrim toed shoes which are usually very comfortable, but this week they betrayed me. It HURT! So the next time we went out I wore sneakers. I hate wearing flat shoes, they make me feel like I'm falling backward. Still, I haven't yet reached the level of girliness where I'm willing to suffer needlessly for my style.

Okay, I'm hungry for comments again, so I'm gonna hit you Minions with another Minion Q.

Minion Q: What sort of activity/hobby do you lose yourself in?

LadyG A: Obviously this Q is based on my needlepoint. If I don't have something else I need to get done, I can go into this cross-stitch transe and not come out until I run out of embroidery floss. My mom gets jealous because I work so fast and do so well. She's been working on this dreamcatcher design for the last eight years...granted it was shoved away in storage for seven of them....

I'm looking foreward to hearing from you! Ciao!

Paper Towels and Electrical Tape

2008-06-10T02:31:00.002-04:00

As I sit before my laptop, clumsily tapping away at the keyboard and basking in the freon-liscious cool from my newly installed air conditioner, my left hand is swathed in a damp paper towel held together by electrical tape, one band around my wrist and one binding my middle- and ring-fingers together, which is surprisingly less inconvenient for typing than you might think.

Also there is a moth flying around my head. I don't mind. Moths are just butterflies with no fashion sense.

But I'm sure you're wondering why my right arm is swathed in a wet paper towel, and for this I have an answer!

The henna struck again.

I was bored, it was 1:00 am, there was a bottle of mehndi in the freezer and I was watching a computer animated children's show about an antropomorphic Irish pig. Makes perfect sense, right?

Also I've been watching a TON of bridal shows (read: five) and a couple of them have showcased Hindu wedding ceremonies, wherein one of the pre-nuptial ceremonies is the traditional henna party where all the women from both sides of the family spend the evening getting henna-fied, so the idea was wedged pretty firmly in my mind.

So my left hand and wrist are sporting a pretty flower-and-lace pattern with a simple band wrapped around the wrist and a feather running along my thumb. It's much nicer than my last attempt, but this is only on one hand and I'm not going to chance it with my right. Trust me, henna is best when someone else does it for you. There are some angles a human hand just can't reach!

Anyway, since it was so late-early when I applied it, and since it's much easier to sleep now that my room no longer qualifies as a sauna according to the National Spa and Health-Club Association (yes, I totally made that up), I had to prep my work for an overnight set, which means wrapping the design in a damp paper towel secured by tape. This is supposed to prevent smudging and permanently staining my bedspread. However the not-very-wet cleaning supply does NOTHING to prevent the ever-vexing flaking problem which has already affected my central flower and the tip of the feather. It's also making little mehndi flakes fall all over Bob's mouse pad.

Anyway I'm anxious to see how it turns out after I let it sit overnight. It should be pretty nice.

Writing update: Ramen's story is HARD!!! I'm gonna work really hard to make the June 30 deadline, so don't worry. The problem is this story has an unbelievable amount of potential. I'm talking full-length novel potential. So I might revisit it later and expand it into a full story. Also, short stories are not my forte. Seriously. And for some reason doing Project Kilo didn't help all that much. So I'm having a hard time with the exposition. Thing is, short stories are supposed to plop you down in the middle of an existing story, little exposition required. Novels need you to firmly establish your universe in text, which is what I'm used to. So I keep heaping on the exposition only to remind myself "This. Is. A. SHORT. Story!"

Tantilizing Tid-bit: This story involves a body-piercing with a twist.

Sexy Woman

2008-06-06T06:17:00.002-04:00

So there's this new show on FitTV called "Shimmy" which I'm kinda into. Once upon a time I was considering working out to "Namaste Yoga" but once the poses got hard I gave up on it (I HATE triangle pose!) which I know is lame, but I make no apologies. I still want to do yoga, I just want to start at a more beginner level than "Namaste Yoga" provides. It's one of many resolutions I have for my life after mom's house. I can't wait until I have my own time and my own money and my own CAR!

So what's the deal with "Shimmy" you ask? Well, it's a workout based on Belly Dancing, which, if you were able to stay awake through my "100 facts" posts, you know I have some experiance in this activity. In fact, I used to attend a twice-monthly belly dancing class taught by my spiritual Uncle Moose (who actually isn't related. It's a long, complex story that makes little sense when related to outsiders). I did not suck. So when I channel surfed my way to "Shimmy" I couldn't help but start dancing along. I stunk, they were WAY too fast for me, so I decided to record the next episode and start from the beginning.

I just did that, taking advantage of my early-morning energy spike and the fact that this is the only time of day when I've got the house to myself. I like "Shimmy" way better than "Namaste Yoga" for a lot of reasons. First, the stretches seem to be MADE for me. They're the simpler stretches I learned in high school, and they're very low-impact, relying on repetition rather than difficulty to improve your flexibility. And the dance moves?

Fun. Very fun. The first one I learned was the Three-Point-Turn, which is pretty easy if you can remember to touch your outer toe at the end. But once the arms got involved I got a little confused. I kept pushing out my inner arm instead of my outer one, which just looked silly. (Fortunately I'm alone.) The Hip-Bounce was a lot of fun, but it showcased my main problem when it comes to belly dancing. My knees.

Mainly the fact that I can't bend them.

Okay, so I can bend my knees, I just...don't. I'll have to work on that. It was fun, and even though I had trouble keeping up, I'm actually looking foreward to the next one. My current goal is to be able to master the Mayan Hips and the Egyptian Figure Eight. Their insanely hard, because you have to bend your knees and sort of squat down with your legs together when you do it, and that's HARD. Especially when, like me, you have no strength in your thighs.

But the point of all this is, the reason I fell in love with belly dancing in the first place is because while it's a fantastic work-out, it also makes me feel incredibly sexy. And really, that's what any woman wants. I love how it feels when I move my hips (which I have in abundance, thank you). I love the sinuous movement of my body, from my hips to my abs to my arms. I love how every step is designed to showcase the best aspects of the female body, and how it exudes a feminine strength. (It works similarly for men, only the male belly dancing is all about force and power and command over the body, whereas female dancing is all about grace and strength and elegance. Though it's very easy for a skilled woman to dance a male rookie right off the stage.)

I really want to get into shape, and I'm kinda hoping "Shimmy" will help me do that. But if not, at least it'll give me something fun to do besides sit on my butt and watch TV (or, you know, surf the net and blog).

And so ends this pretty much pointless post.

Summer Storms

2008-06-06T03:27:00.003-04:00

Today was the first day of CNY summer. The Scot turned on the air conditioner for the first time, I was forced out of clammy sheets by an unbearable still heat for the first time, and as I write this, thankfull for the cordlessness of my laptop, I am listening to the very first Summer Storm.

For all of its faults and annoyances, I love living in Central New York. Yes, it's obscenely expensive. Yes the jobs are going. Yes the cost of living is nearly impossible for the lower-middle and working class families to manage, but by Ganesh this place is beautiful.

New York is the only state in the union to posess all four natural features: Mountains, Plains, Hills and Lakes...if I recall Earth Science correctly. We also have the largest number of Glacially formed Drumlins (they're these teardrop shaped hills made out of the silt glaciers leave behind when they move) and our fall foliage would give Conneticut a run for its money.

But the best part of New York, and the part that most people who leave her miss the most, is her Storms. Capital S. New York does storming right. At this moment, as I write, lightning flashes are illuminating the night sky at intervals less than half a second apart. Thunder is rumbling through the still air every few seconds. There is no rain.

Poetry has been written about our Storms. Every summer they fill our nights and days regularly. When the rain falls it falls in sheets, or else in heavy, thick dropletts that roll off your skin to plop onto the ground, leaving behind a moist trail where they've touched you. The thunder seems endless, and when it's not rumbling far off in the distance for hours on end, it's crashing right above you, so loud the entire house shakes from the sheer force of it. The Wiccans here love our storms, because even us non-magick people can feel the energy behind them, the sheer might of nature unleashed.

It's started to rain just now. It's the fat, heavy dropletts. I can tell by the sound of it. The rain is picking up force, and now there's a slight wind. Wind here is more of a winter/spring thing. It can get so powerful you start to see visions of your house tipping over. CNY wind can rip trees up by the roots and hurl them across streets.

I wish you could be here, Nen. I know how much you miss these Storms. This is a good one, a 3:00 am, can't-sleep-so-curl-up-and-listen, air-is-electrified kind of Storm. It's one of those Storms that seems like the sky is talking to you, at length, about its favorite subject. The rain is the kind that almost feels like it knows how hot it's getting so please let it help you cool down. The lighting is flashing like a dim strobe-light, irregularly and rapidly.

There it was! The sudden snap of Thunder so loud and cracking it's almost like Apollo whipping his steed. This is turning into one of those so-big-it-almost-feels-dangerous Storms.

I wish you could hear it. I wish there was a way I could share it with you beyond just telling you about it.

Yeah, this has been one of those LadyG Poetic Posts, but I couldn't help it. I was going to rant about the annoyance of boob-sweat, but then this started and...well...you understand. The rain is falling, the thunder is booming, the lightning is pulsing...how could I not get poetic about it?

Besides, I think Nen would appreciate this.

shake GAK! shake

2008-06-03T00:06:00.002-04:00

Yeesh! Three days without blogging and I'm experiancing physical withdrawl! Used to be I could go a few weeks and only feel a mild sense of regret. Now my fingers are itching and my keyboard is glaring at me accusingly, saying "Seriously? You're going to bake cookies? Are you mad, woman, you could be BLOGGING!"

So I blog. And fortunately, stuff has actually happened, that, you know, I can blog about.

Also I can merrily abuse the comma key, which always makes me feel happy. Nothing soothes the soul like a good run-on sentence!*

First, and less impressively, we now have a dishwasher! Words cannot express how much this development freaks me out. I mean, my whole life I have lived by the Tao of the Sink. It's simple, straightforeward, and very easy to justify avoiding. This dishwasher thing? It's weird. Rinse, load, let sit. It freaks me out to no end. There are tabs and liquids and so many buttons!!!

Yeah, I know it's completely neurotic and kind of stupid for me to get this weirded out by an appliance, especially considering my life-long obsession with shiny, advanced gadgetry. It's hard to explain, but not having a dishwasher has always been kind of a defining point in our household. Like, we weren't lazy cattle going with the herd or something. I don't know. It's an adjustment.

In other news: Ramen!

Ramen's short story has officially undergone its first rewrite. The introduction has been completely redone with more exposition, and less exess wording. The body currently has me a little wishy-washy. There are two distinct directions I could go, and I'm leaning towards the one that's likely to turn it from a short story to a novella.

Also, I'm thinking of some companion artwork for the piece, but since I'm none too confident with my artistic skills (especially when held up alongside my exceptional writing skills), I'm thinking of commissioning someone. Anyone interested?

Dear God, I love the age of e-mail.

Moving along. LandLord gave me his copy of the latest Dresden Files book. I lack the literary expertise to describe just how inconcievably awesome this book is! I urge everyone and anyone to go to your local bookstore/library/whatever and get yourself a novel of the Dresden Files. Books one through five don't exactly require you to read them consecutively (sic), but from six onward things get pretty damn interwoven and there are some major continuity points. My favorite book, incidentally is Dead Beat, book seven. There's a reainimated zombie T-Rex involved. Named Sue.

Yeah. It's that kind of good.

*Screw you, grammar!

...Um...I totally didn't mean that. I love grammar and it's infinite capacity for forgiveness.

SUBSCRIBE!!!

2008-05-30T17:05:00.003-04:00

Open Letter to All Minions:

The Nerdfighters need YOUR help to pwn Oprah!

Do your part in the battle for supreme Awesome by becoming a vlogbrothers subscriber on YouTube.

Take it away, John:

That is all.

Winnah!!!

2008-05-29T07:16:00.002-04:00

Katie wins!!!

Dang, for a chick who was terrified of commenting, she sure rose to the occassion! Anyway, Katie remember to e-mail me so I know where to send your short story. You have TEN DAYS to claim your prize, and your ONE-OF-A-KIND, ORIGINAL D. M. JONES SHORT STORY will be in by the end of July.

In other news, Ramen's story is taking shape nicely, and has what is quite possibly the best title I've ever written in my entire history of fiction writing. Seriously, Ramen, you're gonna laugh your ass off.

Oh! And I fixed the Digger link. Thanks to Katie for pointing out the flaw/solution in her AWARD WINNING COMMENT.

Currently the only benchmark contest I can think of is the 100th post contest, so I'm gonna hold off, especially since I'm already booked for two months with the story writing. If I come up with an interim contest, I'll do that, but I've got less than 40 posts left before we reach a hundred, and at the pace I've been going that's not going to take very long.

Intriquingly, blogging gets a lot easier to maintain when you have active reader participation. It's almost like some bizarre, mostly one-sided conversation where I never get interrupted.

In the meanwhile, feel free to reccomend my blog to your friends and such. I'm thinking my 100th post contest will be a random pick from amongst all the commenters to Post 100, so I'm gonna need a whole mess of Minions. Also, I need to come up with a really good idea for the 100th post. Dang.

Katie, if there's something you really want to read, or if there's something you really can't stand reading, let me know in your e-mail. Otherwise...how do you feel about Chinchillas?

SLEEP!!!

2008-05-28T13:11:00.003-04:00

Okay, I've gotta do this quick, 'cause I'm so completely exhausted there's a very real chance I'll pass out on my keyboard, and really that's not a good outcome for anyone involved. Oh, Ganesh I'm so tired!

Oh, speaking of Ganesh, here's that linky thing to Digger I promised. Go! Worship! (But not too fervently, if Digger has taught us anything it's that getting involved with a deity can only lead to trouble...)

Currently Minion Katie and Partner-in-Crime Nen are neck-and-neck for the next commission. Since I've been getting such great feedback, I think the next winner will be announced fairly soon, and I'll be free to run another contest in honor of Life on the Cusp's 100th post, which is coming up faster than you think.

(OMG, really? Like, an actual 100 posts? Dayum!)

As for poramentatoes (henceforth known as Ramen ^.^) and her prize? I'm having some trouble. See, I've got ideas. Awesome, fun, seriously sweet ideas...but they're nothing like what she requested. Thus the dillemma.

Do I write what's in my head, or do I write what my Minion wants? Which will be more awesome? These are the questions that keep me up at night...although my insomnea might have something to do with it.

Fortunately a month-long deadline gives me plenty of time to hammer out the best route to go. However, to save my sanity, the winner of the FIVE COMMENTS challenge will recieve their short story by the end of July. This way my brain doesn't implode.

Anyway, it's really hard to write, and even harder to read right now, so I don't expect I'll be working any plot twists right now anyway. I desperately need sleep, and hopefully when I wake up I'll have had an awesome dream with a plot about a love-triangle involving a vampiric cosmonaut.

Or something.

Hell, I'll be glad if my eyes stop twitching.

Ciao bellas!

Minions!!!

2008-05-26T19:00:00.002-04:00

How much do I love Minion Katie? I could answer that, but Jon Stewart already did the "Arm Extenders" bit, and it works much better in a visual media than a written one. Oh, well.

I don't actually have much to say, save that my love of Ursula Vernon has reached new heights and now I want to write stories about anthropomorphic rodents. (Chinchillas FTW!) I highly reccomend you read her webcomic Digger. You can get a good way into the story before being prompted to subscribe, but the comic is really affordable. You'd pay more for a cup of coffee, honestly. And while I'm nonreligious with a slant toward Buddhism, I'll be damned if Ursula hasn't seriously turned me on to Ganesh, Destroyer of Obstacles, Lord of Compassion. Also, apparently Ganesh is a snarky sumbitch. Who knew?

I swear, I'll provide a convenient link to Digger when I find the url again. I think it's Graphic Smash or something...I'll have to get back to you.

Minion Q: While I don't want to inspire a heated religious flame war, I would like to know what religious and/or spiritual practices interest and inspire you. So, what are the metaphysics that get your chakras all a-twitter?

LadyG's A: I love, love, love Hindu ceremony. Most of the tennants of the religion rub me the wrong way, such as the ban from eating beef and the subjugating Caste system. But I adore the clothes, the jewelry, and all the symbolic meaningfullness behind Hindu weddings, births and deaths. However, in terms of religious practice I can get behind, the eight pillars of Buddhism make me all kinds of happy. I also have a deep appreciation for a lot of Native American spirituality, which may have something to do with my Iraquois heritage.

I, Blogger.

2008-05-25T07:27:00.005-04:00

Yay! The tally has begun! Participation began (very promptly, I might add) with new Minion Katie, who left me a very heartfelt comment that STILL has me glowing. (She loves my blog...*teardrop, sniffle*.) I would link you to Katie's blog but it's an invitation-only dealie and even if I did have a way around that I wouldn't use it, cause I respect my Minions' privacy!

But I'm not just writing this post-ette to give props to Katie (who so deserves them anyway!), but because Miss Minion of the Month raised a very valid point! She said, and rightly so, that the "comment" button is intimidating. And believe me, if I could figure out how to change "comment" to "cheese grenade", I totally would! But I can't, so I figure to increase your chances of winning a bona-fide D. M. Jones original work of short fiction (like poramentatoes did), I'll take some of the scary out of comments by giving you prompts!

They really do work, honest!

I'm gonna ask a simple question at the end of some of my blog posts, if it won't detract from the main subject matter. Whenever possible, I'll try to tie the subject of the question in with the subject of the post. That way you guys will have a starting point, and a ready-made subject for your comment, so you won't have to worry about sounding all "duh...um...hi....", which I know is why I never used to leave comments.

Today's Minion Q: If you could pick a musical style-pop, rock 'n' roll, hip hop, country, jazz, etc. to describe you as a person, what would it be?

LadyG's A: Indie, particularly the stuff inspired by classic rock. I'm a modern, cerebral kind of girl with a series of bizarre interests and a distinctly old-fashioned kind of attitude. But I'm so scatterbrained that more often I'm a physical embodiment of Jazz.

I promise, they won't all be this kind of doctor's-office-waiting-room magazine crap. They will get better once I have a chance to think!

Currently there are 2 Minions in the running, and one of them already won a prize so I'm kinda pulling for Katie. However, Partner-in-Crime Nen has also joined the race, and with one comment a piece there's no telling who gets the next present!

Enlightenment. And a Contest.

2008-05-25T03:48:00.003-04:00

ALERT! This post contains an announcement about a Life on the Cusp prize-winner, and a newly launched contest! The post itself is long-winded and full of Writer Stuff, so if you're easily bored by the writing process, feel free to skip down to the part where it says "On to other business" followed by a link.

Wow. Turns out writing is work!

Okay, so I always knew writing was an actual job that people have to work at, but it never really resonated with me. Even during Project Kilo when I was made to write 1,000 words every weekday. That was just a gimmik, it didn't feel like...y'know...a job.

But I have had one of those "Aha!" moments that we creative types sometimes get, just a few minutes ago. (Yes, it's 3 am and I'm working. Whoop-de-do. I have got to shift my creative, motivated time to a less vampiric hour. How about 3 pm, eh Brain? Would you like that? It's barely any different, really!)

Anyway, It's all because of Jim Butcher. He has this incredible (though rarely updated) livejournal where he imparts genuinely helpful writing advice. (Thanks to him I know what a story skeleton is! Wh00t!!!) And his latest entry was all about getting started.

Jim's Method: Devote one page to Every. Single. Character you have. Once completed, move on to make a Big Ole Plotline on a rather large piece of former tree, then fill in big honkin' blanks with pleasantly arranged sequences of Words.

LadyG's method: Um...start writing and hope for the best?

So I tried Jim's method...and it's HARD!!! Okay, what I'm writing is a Fanfic...technically. See, I love to play around in other people's universes. Generally I won't touch the established characters or events of someone else's world, unless they're intrinsically linked to all aspects of that reality (and sometimes they are!), but every time I read some book or other that's set in a fantasy world full of rich, storied history and fascinating cultures, I start wondering about everyone else who lives in it. Currently I'm mucking about in Tamora Pierce's world of Emelan, the setting for her oh-so-scrumptious Circle quartets. I'm not such a huge fan of Tortall, since Medieval settings are kinda tired for me. But post-Reniassance Silk Road Trade Civilizations? BRING IT ON!!!

Digressing now. So my story is about a boy who is a member of the Trader culture. Traders are this Ferengi-esque people who base their culture on commerce. Their gods are Trader Komo and Bookkeeper Oti. I think there's also a Trickster, but I can't remember. I'll have to look it up. Anyway, my protagonist grows up on a ship. (There are two kinds of Trader, Sea Traders, and Caravan Traders.) All of the crew on his ship are family members, and so are vital characters in his saga. I've been working for over an hour and so far I have my hero, his mom, his dad, and his grandfather finished. It takes forever!

But the interesting thing is, I really like it. It's a lot of fun creating backgrounds for even the most incendental characters. I've always loved backstories. It's why I'm drawn to role-playing games. I've still got a lot of work to do, but this whole outlining process is making the actual writing aspect so much easier! By simply creating a timeline of my protagonist's life, I've managed to map out the entire narrative without worrying about writing myself into a corner.

In my old method, poor Protag's story would've been lumpy, shapeless and probably unfinished and left to rot in cyberspace. But by doing the timeline (which may have been my idea, and not Jim's, I'm not sure), it's a simple matter of first A then B then C, connect the dots and hit your marks. I have every major event in his life from age 3 to age 19. (The story actually starts when he's 8.) However, there's this whole major section of his life, from age 13 to age 19 that I'm going to have to develop in greater detail, and it's bound to add even more characters for me to bible out. (Another author whose advice I read called the general outline of each character in the story a Character Bible, and the term has stuck with me. I'm actually pretty damn good at them.)

The Character Bibles serve as a quick reference if you need to remind yourself what color so-and-so's eyes are, or how they like to wear their hair, or if they would easily manage to slip between two closely-positioned slabs of rock while being pursued by loud men wielding sabers. But I really dig the Timeline. It's really helpful for me to slip into a character's mindset and ask, "what events in so-and-so's life would so-and-so find significant? How do these events affect the other characters?" Yes it's a lengthy and drawn-out and somewhat boring process, but the truth is that this is the kind of shit writers live for. I mean, non-writers (non-artists in general) only get to read or watch or visit these strange and interesting worlds. Whereas we creative types get to actually create them, which entails a certain degree of living within them. Figuratively speaking, of course.

Oh, speaking of incredible worlds, get thee over to Ursula Vernon's corner of cyberspace. She's got a supernatural brothel and pirate tampons and she's not afraid to use 'em! Seriously, this chick is a GENIUS! She's translating the Kama Sutra into Hampster! Also she has a book out called Nurk that I desperately want to read, and she does this amazing webcomic called Digger, but you'll have to check out her LJ to get to it, 'cause I can't remember the URL.

On to other business: Poramentatoes has made me all shiny and happy by commenting twice in a row, and one time it was on an inane list post! This chica rocks! As a reward, and as an insentive for the rest of my minions to start making me happy with comments, Poramentatoes gets her very own, one-of-a-kind, original short story from yours truly. Pora, please e-mail me so I can have your e-mail address. I already have an idea for a short (which will so exceed 1,000 words) but if there's an idea you really want me to turn into a work of fiction, feel free to put the prompt in your e-mail. You have 10 days to send me the prompt/squee/blank stare, and I'll try to get the story to you by the end of June.

Random Minion: But...LadyG...does this mean you've decided to start doing commissions?

Me: Why, yes Random Minion, I have.

RM: But, surely you're only going to do them for old friends and long-time followers like Poramentatoes, right?

Me: Wrong, my lovely Minion person. In fact, I'm willing to write exclusive, one-of-a-kind, original short stories for ANY Minion I feel deserves it!

RM: But...how will you decide which of your adoring Minions to give them to?

Me: Simple! By using benchmarks!

RM: Bench...what?

Me: The next Minion to submit FIVE COMMENTS in a row gets my next commission. After we've reached that benchmark, I'll announce the next one. It's all part of my dastardly plan to get more readers, and more comments. I'd prefer it if Minions submitted a comment per post, since submitting five comments to my latest post just to get a commission sort of seems like cheating.

RM: But surely you'll only write about stuff you like, right?

Me: Not at all, Minion! Each deserving commenter who recieves a commission gets to e-mail me a prompt for what sort of story they'd like to read. I'm very ecclectic, and I have a level of comfort in most, if not all genres since Project Kilo, so I'm likely to be open to writing about any subject.

RM: Will you be posting these commissioned short stories on either of your blogs?

Me: No, Minion, I won't. These stories are gifts to the people who make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, so the only people who will read them are me, and the Minions who recieve them. However, if they feel the desire to post them on their own sites for other people to read, they can, as long as they ask permission first and give me credit when they do.

So there's your challenge, Minions! The next person to leave me FIVE COMMENTS in a row gets their own personal piece of original D. M. Jones fiction that they can print out and bind, post on their website, or just save to Microsoft Word to glance at from time-to-time after losing their fifth game of FreeCell. Each winner will have TEN DAYS to claim their prize, and will recieve the short story within approximately 30 DAYS of winning it. Prompts are welcome and encouraged. Winners will be announced in the post following their completion of the challenge.

And yes, I'm aware that with my shy, wordless ~~lurkers~~ readers, these contests may take a very long time to complete.

Congratulations Poramentatoes!!! Hurry up and claim your prize! Deadline for the e-mail is June 4th.

P.S. Would anyone like me to create a special section of my LiveJournal for Project Kilo entries, so they're all conveniently in one spot? Answer in the comments and be one step closer to a D. M. Jones original!

Walrus keeps flappin' his gums.

2008-05-23T22:24:00.002-04:00

I return to finish the job! I'll try to be more brief than yesterday, but that might not work out so well because:

51. I'm long winded.

52. I love me some Scrubs but I kinda hated the final episode.

53. I kinda, sorta, maybe have a boyfriend.

54. I really wish I was more familiar with html.

55. I used to know how to play chess, but I forgot.

56. Ditto for Gin Rummy.

57. I've never been stung by anything.

58. I'm going to college for the first time this Fall! Wh00t!!!

59. I've never had a pedicure, but I have gotten a manicure.

60. I have yet to go to a spa.

61. I'm an avid fan of Christopher Moore. If you don't know who he is, look it up! He's too good to pass up!

62. I'm watching Numb3rs right now (Friday at 10:00 pm). I really, really like Charlie Epps. He played Bernard in The Santa Clause. Fun!

63. I wear glasses.

64. I prefer to wear contacts.

65. My favorite -logies are Psychology, Sociology and Anthropology. I also dig Zoology.

66. My favorite word is currently Resplendant.

67. I aim to one day travel the world. For now I settle for Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations on the Travel Channel.

68. I'm a Nerdfighter. Clickety for the confused.

69. I'm a virgin. And I'm PROUD, damnit!

70. My birthday is in February. Cold, dark, miserably February.

71. I can't drive yet. This make LadyG MAD!

72. My favorite cuss word? Shit.

73. Currently my favorite sweet is Ferrero Rondnoir chocolates. Mmmm...yummy.

74. My two front teeth are crooked. :(

75. I don't smoke or use recreational drugs. Never have, never will.

76. I like vampires. I'm not like, one of those chicks who frequents Fetish Night in a black cape and acrylic fangs or anything like that, but I appreciate the narrative and cultural impact of vampires. Also, you know, David Boreanaz is HOT!

77. My favorite classic fiction book is Farenheit 451.

78. In my writing, I tend to gravitate more toward male protagonists than female. I find guys to be more dynamic, whereas if your character is a girl, you find yourself forced to take valuable time away from the story itself to deal with the stupid gender inequality and double standards. Boring.

79. I do not want kids. Ever. But I'm not pigheaded enough to say that how I feel now is how I'm going to feel when I'm 35. By then, who knows?

80. I am apparently not interesting enough to come up with 100 facts about me....

FAIL!!!

"The time has come!" The walrus said...

2008-05-22T23:52:00.002-04:00

...to make an obligatory blog post. Damn it, I am going to get readers and comments in the double-digits if it kills me! For crying out loud, DeeMarie's been blogging for a fraction of the time I have and she averages 14 comments per post! I will NOT be left in the cyber-dust. Therefore I give you:

The 100(ish) Things You May Not Know About Me But Probably Do:

1. I wrote my first story when I was five years old. It stunk on ice, but back then I thought I was freakin' Vonnegut.(1) My mom was so proud she printed up copies for everyone at work.

2. I never learned how to ride a bike. Not for lack of trying. I must've gotten up there a thousand times, but it just never took. That big ol' curve in my spine might have something to do with it...

3. I was diagnosed with Cerebral Paulsey when I was nine. However, it's an exceptionally mild form of CP which affects only my feet, and usually I don't even remember I have it until I catch a glance of the identical scars on my ankles from my operation...and even then it's more of a "huh...that's right" than a "woe is me! My life is fraught with tragedy!" However, it came in mighty handy when it came to ditching gym class.

4. Regarding number 3, a few years after my diagnosis, I saw an episode of Maury with a girl who had the same disease, but in a much more severe form. She had leg braces and walked with special crutches. Ever since then, I have offered up prayers of thanks to any diety who would have me that I was blessed to be put at the lower end of the bell curve.

5. When I refer to myself as LadyG, it's short for my official internet handle: Lady Geektastic. I do live up to it. I obsess over the geekiest of books, TV shows, movies and other pursuits. I'm a devoted fan of Spider-Man, though I'm not above liaisons with Hellboy should the opportunity arise. I mourn Captain America, and I'm still pissed of at Spidey for striking a deal with Mephisto. Hell, I'm still pissed off at Spidey for that press conference.(2)

6. I ~~secretly~~ semi-openly worship Carrie Bradshaw. Yes, she lives a completely unrealistic (read: impossible) lifestyle. Yes, she has the legs of an anorexic 15-year-old. Yes, she blatantly over-uses the phrase "I couldn't help but wonder...". But so help my I would give my left cerebral hemisphere if I could have her life! Plus...you know...SHOES!

7. I. Love. Shoes. This is a very recent and very disturbing development. I used to pride myself on having all of three pairs of highly functional shoes, with maybe two pairs of useless dressy things other people gave me that I never got around to ditching. Now? I browse the Zappos website and drool...in between heart-attacks at the $169 price tags. Also, there's this pair of floral print pumps at Target...WANT!

8. I'm still technically a teenager, and I'm a good girl in that I never ever drink. I simply don't like the taste of alcohol. Yes! It totally does have a taste! A bad, bad taste! And yet my age and preferences never seem to deter adults from trying to get me to "try this" whenever they think of a fruity cocktail that they want to turn me on to.

9. My friends are nuts. Seriously. But they're loyal, supportive and always good for a laugh.

10. I have a dog. Her name is Maddy. She's 10, she's lazy, and she will hit you if you don't pet her like right effing now!!!

11. My greatest dream at the moment is to somehow get myself a breast reduction. Breasts that make up approximately 10% of your total body weight? No thank you.

12. You will never know my total body weight. So there.

13. My favorite romantic fantasy involves a waltz, and an absolutely GORGEOUS forest green gown with off-the shoulder sleeves.

14. My parents are divorced. My father re-married, and he's currently stationed in Afghanistan. Curiously, thanks to e-mail, he and I are closer now than we have been in about six years. I heart technology.

15. A 19 year old girl, still living at home? Yeah, me and my mother butt heads a lot. I'm desperate to move out, but she don't make it easy.

16. I honestly have no idea what's so great about Tyler Perry. I'm sorry, I just...don't. *shrug*

17. I never watch reality TV. I used to, when I was too young to know better. Now I'm begrudgingly giving So You Think You Can Dance a try. I fast forward through the bad auditions whenever possible, and I can't wait until the actual competition starts and I can, you know, watch people who can actually dance! I'm a sucker for choreography. That bench routine a couple years back? Chills.

18. My favorite show in the history of televised programming? Without question, Eric Kripke's brain child: Supernatural. These next four Sam and Dean-less months are going to be absolute Hell! Although that might not be a fair statement considering that Dean is currently quite possibly in Hell. You know...for real. There are meathooks involved.

19. I live for behind-the-scenes featurettes. The advent of the DVD? My own personal bliss. I spend more time obsessing over Bloopers, fly-on-the-wall filming, cast and crew testimonials and lengthy BTS documentaries than the actual movie.(3)

20. My favorite male author is Jim Butcher, writer of The Dresden Files and Codex Alera. I prefer Dresden myself.

21. My favorite female author is Jen Lancaster, the sensational mind behind three hilarious memoirs: Bitter is the New Black; Bright Lights, Big Ass; and Such a Pretty Fat. Link to her blog, Jennsylvania, is in the blog roll-------->

21.5. It's also, you know, right up there in 21, but you get the point!

22. I'm sort of an insomniac. I find it really, really hard to fall asleep before sunrise. This irritates me and causes no end of resentment from my mother. Though, it's not as though I choose to wake up in the afternoon only to hear about what I missed while everyone else was enjoying their morning.

23. The thing I hate the most about my house is the bath tub. It's too short, too shallow, and it has this stupid fail-safe drain thingie that makes it impossible to fully submerge oneself in the water, thereby leaving some very *ahem* prominent parts of the anatomy literally out in the cold. Not fun.

24. I am a Straight Ally. I was active in my high school Acceptance Coalition, I've marched in two subsequent Pride Parades, and I advocate gay marriage.

25. I have no religion, but I study religion. Currently I'm very interested in Buddhism from an academic standpoint. I was raised Methodist, but I ditched that in pre-adolescence in favor of four somewhat misguided years as a practicing Wiccan. I gave that up when I got sick of the drama. Apparently pagan is synonamous with "drama queen". Who knew?

26. I believe in extra-terrestrial life. I don't know that anyone else has visited this planet(4), but it seems kind of lonely and arrogant to believe that we're the only planet in the entire ever-expanding universe to sustain life.

27. I still retain a fascination with unicorns and mermaids from my pigtail years. Granted now I spend more time analyzing the evolutionary and cultural aspects of the myths, but on some level I still find them very pretty.

28. I, too, have worked retail. I know your pain.

29. I watch The Simpsons, Family Guy and Robot Chicken more than I probably should.

30. You know how most adolescent girls obsess over Brad Pitt or Orlando Bloom or Justin Timberlake or whoever is milking the estrogen market these days? Me? I adore Jason Marsden. He's the guy who did the voice of Tino Tonatini in The Weekenders. Awesome Cartoon. He also did quality work in Static Shock, The Lion King II: Simba's Pride and W*I*T*C*H. He also played Rich Halke, J.T.'s best friend on Step by Step.

31. Other favorite voice actors include Mako, Kath Soucie, Grey DeLisle, Phil LaMarr, Thom Adcox, Keith David, Dante Basco, Zach Tyler, Frank Welker, and Dee Bradley Baker.

32. If I had one wish, I would probably use it to erase all traces of Spongebob Squarepants from the face of the Earth. DEATH TO THE EVIL POROUS ONE!

33. My favorite animals are cats and whales, particularly dolphins and humpbacks.

34. I used to study Karate when I was six. At the same time, my mother owned a pet store where I went every day after school. She since sold the store and I had to quit Karate when we couldn't pay for it anymore. I still remember the eight-point-blocks though.

35. I have a rudementiary knowledge and skill with belly dancing.

36. I speak semi-conversational French, and I know a few words of Japanese, Spanish, German, Hawai'ian, Czech, Mandarin Chinese, Italian and, I'll admit it, Klingon.

37. When asked if I prefer Star Trek or Star Wars, my answer is Farscape.

38. My favorite song is Carry on Wayward Son by Kansas.

39. If I could wake up to any song it would be A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More Touch Me by Fall Out Boy. I have next to no clue what it's about but the music video is a cheesy vampire flick and the music is so energetic! I also love Thnks Fr th Mmrs.

40. I love Doctor Who. Ten is my favorite, but at first I had a hard time letting go of Nine. Christopher Eccleston was absolutely brilliant, and it's a testament to David Tennant's skill that he was able to surpass that performance.

41. I love Shakespeare, but I don't have a blind adoration for it. I actually find Romeo and Juliet kind of hard to stomach. I don't think the characters behave believably, especially Juliet. However, if I could see the Royal Shakespeare Company perform The Tempest just once before I die, I'll die happy.

42. I have one older sister. She moved out as soon as she could and hasn't looked back since. My mom resents this, so she's making it as hard for me to leave as she possibly can. Thanks a lot, sis.

43. I Do. Not. Sing. Karaoke. No!

44. I love the water, but I can't swim very well. Mainly because I live in the snow belt and chances to practise swimming are few and far between.

45. My family is working class. That means I haven't been on vacation in over a decade, and the only country I've traveled to that wasn't my own is Canada. A whopping three hour drive, people!

46. I live in New York, but there's a funny thing about that. See, New York has a peculiar quirk. It's completely invisable save for this tiny strip of land hanging off of its ass. That massive, invisable landmass no one ever notices? That's where I live. The New Yawkers call it Upstate. We call it CNY, and it's where the State Fair lives, bucko!

47. I resent that I've lived in New York my entire life, and yet I'm still not considered a New Yorker because I don't reside in one of the five burrows...whatever they are. But I get apple orchards, actual seasons, a massive state park, mountain-side living and the freakin' Erie Canal, so it's their loss.

48. I am 1/16th Susquehanna. I have no clue what this means, but it makes me feel all warm inside. Even though I'm pale as a sheet and my last name is Welsh...or maybe German...I'm fairly sure it's British. I don't know. It's common as dirt, anyway.

49. I love to watch old movies, preferably from the 40's. The women actually seem more empowered in that era, not less. In the non-MST3K flicks, the women are strong, forthright and powerful forces of nature. You're not likely to see them getting chased down a suburban street in their bra and panties, and if they screamed you knew it was for a damn good reason.

50. I hate math, but I'm obsessed with numbers. All my lists have to end in a multiple of 5.

I'm gonna leave it at that, and come back tomorrow with the next 50...if I can come up with that many. Hey, I did WAY better than DeeMarie!

---

(1)Not that I knew who Vonnegut was at five years old...

(2)Search "Spider-Man" on Wikipedia for more details.

(3)Best documentary? Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Best gag reel? Supernatural Season 1 and Season 2.

(4)Or whether or not they have an "in" with Tom Cruise.

Home Owned

2008-05-20T23:10:00.002-04:00

The first thing I need to cover today is that Angel is no longer with us. This morning The Scot dropped her at the SPCA, naturally no one discussed this with me since, despite my mother's refusal to let me move out, I am apparently not a member of this household. Her clingyness is downright pathetic.

But I'm not going to get into that, I've already done the bitch and moan about mommy thing and we're never going there again. Besides, I still have Maddy.

But I will talk about moving out. Minions, I want to know how old you guys were when you first moved out. I have an opportunity, but the moment I tried to discuss it with Landlord Mommy, she flat-out forbid it, and since I can't exactly relocate without her help (she knows where all the important documents live), I am officially stuck.

But for just a moment, just one fleeting, beautiful second, starting my own life really felt possible, and now it's all I can think about! I'm starting to have these fantasies about sprucing up a total dump á la Cyleste in the City, and looking at Paige's San Francisco loft on Charmed and thinking, "I could totally re-create that fabric scheme in my apartment."

"My apartment". It's got this ring to it, in my head it almost sounds like a prayer. It's my promised land, only instead of shlepping through the desert for 40 years, I'm desperately trying to extricate myself from prolonged adolescence. Over the years, my first apartment has taken shape in my head until I can travel at will to a world of lush, sophisticated colors, amateur paint jobs, and evenings spent on a worn but still cumfy tan sofa, holding a stemmed glass of sparkling grape juice and indulging in an evening of Sex and the City reruns on TBS.

My first apartment is a single bedroom, where the bathroom is just big enough to hold a decent-sized bathtub, the kitchen can be described as a kitchenette, and the living room is big enough for the tan couch, a TV, an end-table with a lamp, a coffe table and a bookshelf. I yearn for a living room with a bookshelf. My bedroom...I haven't quite gotten there yet. All of my fantasies take place either on my sofa, or seated in my kitchen jr. at 3:00 in the morning typing away on my laptop.

It's not major. It's not a palace, or even a two-story house with a yard and a white-picket-fence, or even Carrie Bradshaw's Manhattan refuge, it's small and modest and the thing that makes me love it and long for it is that it's mine. Me, alone, by myself. And when I leave my apartment, it's to take the stairs down to the street where my cheap, crappy car, The Deus ex Machina is waiting to transport me to my girlfriend's house where we'll sip something bubbly and red and laugh about...whatever. My couch will be there to welcome me when I come home from a crappy day at my crappy job, inviting me to collapse with a sigh and bemoan my existance.

My apartment is the starting point for my own, personal life. And yeah, I know that my first apartment will probably be completely different from my fantasy, but I don't care what the reality is because no matter what it looks like or smells like, whether it's too hot in the summer or too cold in the winter, it doesn't matter because it'll still be my apartment, and I desperately want to get to it sooner rather than later.

Because when I finally get to my apartment, it'll mean that it's me, just me. And I'll have to buckle down and take care of myself, with no one standing under me with a safety net waiting for me to fall. Getting my own place is my chance to prove my mother wrong. I can make it on my own. I will move out of this house. I so desperately want to move on with my life. It's like I'm being locked up in this big, deceptively comfortable cage. Sure everything here is familiar and safe, but that just doesn't cut it when you're being kept against your will. I don't want to live here anymore. I'm ready to move on and I've been ready.

I know why she won't let me leave. I'm not going to go into it. This blog is about me, and my life, not my screwed-up family. All that matters is that I'm tired of living my life on the cusp, and I'm ready to take that next step. It's not my fault that she isn't.

Besides, when I live alone, there'll be no one to judge me for spending too much money on a cute pair of shoes.

KRIPKE, YOU BASTARD!!!

2008-05-16T15:35:00.002-04:00

KRIPKE KILLED DEAN! MY FURY SHALL LAST A THOUSAND LIFETIMES! HOW DARE HE MAKE ME WAIT ALL SUMMER FOR RESOLUTION? IF HE DOESN'T SAVE HIM IN S4 SHOW IS FOREVER DEAD TO ME!!!

Meanwhile, please enjoy this made of awesome Supernatural fanvid, which helps...a little...like, microscopic helps.

Much Ado About Henna

2008-05-10T01:52:00.002-04:00

So the past two days for me have been an orgy of smells. That is, if said orgy consisted of several fat, sweaty people with only a minimal knowledge of hygene and a deodorant allergy. But there was a reason! Behold! There are now a multitude of artfully arranged brownish-orange stains on the backs of my hands! Dots, I tell you! Lovely, different sized dots! In pretty swirly patterns! With curvy lines draped on the edges! The final result looks something like a firework had an illegitimate love-child with a carnation. It's pretty.

But the smells started before the Mehndi (but after the "date" with Burns, thank God!). And I blame Jen Lancaster. In order to get in the proper mood to begin her latest book--OHMYGODSHE'STHEBESTESTWRITEREVERIWANNABEJUSTLIKEHERWHYCAN'TBURNSBEMORELIKEFLETCH?SQUEEEEEE!!!--*ahem*. Sorry about that. Anyway, to set the mood for the new book, I decided to relax metropolitan woman style, and I took a long soak using my mother's margarita-scented bubble bath. It was nice and lime-y when I got in, but after the bubbles dissipated and I spent maybe forty-five minutes shaving my legs (there's this annoying gash on my left leg from where I barked my shin against a stray speaker from The Scot's insane sound system, so I held off on shaving for a while. Finally the hair got too long for me to stand and I decided to screw the injury and just shave around it.) the lime-citrus smell turned kinda sour and I spent the rest of the night smelling like vinegar.

Somewhere around morning I decided I was sick of waiting to bust into my brand new henna kit and went to work mixing the mehndi. Okay, there are a multitude of reasons why I love henna: It's all-natural, it's culturally relevant, it's historically significant, it's semi-permanent, it reacts beautifully with my ultra-pale skin tone, it's a natural coolant and sunscreen (resulting in some kick-ass tan lines if, unlike me, you are capable of tanning) and I seriously rock at applying it. However, there are a few draw-backs, like the insane amount of time it takes to set in properly, the rediculous level of difficulty in scraping it off and the slimy texture of the olive or vegetable oil you have to smear all over yourself to keep the color when you bathe or wash your hands. But the worst part of henna is the smell! Mixing this stuff is disgusting. It takes a pretty strong stomach not to vomit while churning this stuff for five solid minutes. Once you've got it all mixed and stored the smell is safely locked away, but during the five to fourteen hours (yes, you read that right) of application and set-time, you have to continually dab at the paste with a citrus and sugar mixture.

My kit came with a pre-made citrus juice rather than the squeeze of lemon with sugar that I usually use (think strongest lemonade EVER). And the mixture they gave me? STUNK! To high heaven this shit stunk! I made Spegetti-Os and for a while I wondered if the tomato sauce had gone bad. Nope, it was just the toxic fumes wafting up from my hands! Interestingly enough, the smell wasn't enough to keep my overly affectionate dogs from climbing all over me. I know for a fact Maddie is aware of her nose, I'm just not sure it's functioning properly.

But now the stink is gone. The henna is chilling out in my freezer (it'll keep pretty potent for about a month or so in there) and my hands are nicely stained. Oh, and Nen? Before you start bugging me just know that I have one more touch to add to the designs and then I will be photographing my Mehndi-fied self for the internet's pleasure and yours, so don't get uppity!

I want to add some bands and floral designs on my fingers when I have time and reference pictures, but for now I'm happy with my flower-y fireworks. Oh! And Burns is coming over tomorrow.

And one more thing, I've started e-mailing my father. I still haven't gotten up the nerve to call him on all his bullshit, but I think I might be getting there. He wants to see a picture of me and Burns. I'll have to get back to him on that one.

And now I'm off for some quality time with a bitchy Chicago narcissist and her pearls!

Ciao bitches!

Hunka-hunka--yeah let's not go there...

2008-05-09T00:20:00.002-04:00

So I went out with Bunrns today. Burns...and my mother. Anyway it was kinda last minute and since I slept through all four of my mom's warning calls I didn't even have time to put in my contacts much less do my make-up, so Burns got to see the real, un-enhanced me WAY sooner than I would've liked. Anyway I spent a good chunk of the day with him and I got to know a bit more about--

SELF: Wait a minute, wait a minute! Slow down here!

DANIELLE: What? Something wrong?

SELF: Uh...yeah! Are you seriously gonna blog your personal life? As in, your romantic life?

DANIELLE: Well...yeah. I mean, I've made a career out of bitching about my single-hood, and now that something is happening--

SELF: Ut-ut! No one wants to read that! Either you're bitching about how he's all wrong for you, or else you're swooning over how you've stumbled upon the world's most perfect guy and in either case, your readers are going to be pissed off!

DANIELLE: But, the only people who read my blog are people I know who...y'know...want to know.

SELF: No! They're just the only ones who comment. Steer clear of the dating scene. That's what Candace Bushnell is for!

DANIELLE: I am not Carrie Bradshaw.

SELF: Precisely, so get with the funny or I'm bailing!

DANIELLE: Fine, fine. This bit has gotten WAY too long anyway.

The Burns Update: Don't tell my Self I'm bringing this up, but Burns is a smoker...making his Blog nickname all the more appropriate. I can't stand smokers, but supposedly Burns is making an effort to quit. Since he's still on probation, I'll see what happens before I give him the boot.

In other news! Robbie and Ron aren't getting married here, but they are having the reception. Supposedly that means I can get away with jeans and not look like an ass. Unfortunately it also means I don't get to go to the wedding itself since mom'll be too busy with the preparations to go, much less take me. This bumms me out, because I love Robbie and Ron and I'd give anything to see them tie the knot.

In other other news! OMFG I FINALLY GOT A COPY OF JEN LANCASTER'S NEW BOOK AND I JUST STARTED READING IT BUT ALREADY I'M HOOKED AND SHE'S JUST SO FUNNY AND NOW I WANT TO START LOSING WEIGHT BECAUSE OH MY GOD HOW DID SHE GET INSIDE MY HEAD WE ARE SO SOULMATES FOR LIFE WHY OH WHY ISN'T SHE COMING TO SYRACUSE ON HER BOOK TOUR I ABSOLUTELY MUST SEE HER!!!

Um...Such a Pretty Fat. It's out, and I have it. It's funny. I like it a lot. And, um...OH MY GOD SHE'S A COMPLETE GENIUS AND IF SHE EVER GOT HER OWN SHOW I'D WATCH IT WITH RELIGIOUS DEDICATION SHE IS MY ABSOLUTE IDOL!

I, um. I should probably go now...before my head blows up.

Except I should probably mention that Burns has a near-encyclopedic knowledge of--

SELF: *SMACK*

DANIELLE: Ow! That hurt!

SELF: What did we talk about?

DANIELLE: Sorry. *sulks*

Plus, I Can't Sew

2008-05-07T20:46:00.003-04:00

Strap yourselves in, my minions. There's going to be a wedding!!!

Dude--seriously? Did you seriously just go there? Please! Burns is a great guy but my date didn't go that well. Sheesh.

The wedding in question is that of dearest friend Robbie. The wedding will be held in our backyard on July 19th. July 19th. Fucking July 19th!!! I know this because I just typed, tiled, formatted and gussied up that particular date a billion times because my mom wants tags to attach to the wedding favors! Naturally, since my mother can navigate Microsoft Word about as well as she can navigate the Sea of Japan, all the actual work of assembling these tags fell to me.

I never want to see another lavender swan for as long as I live!

Robbie and her hubby-to-be* have actually been together for years. The only thing separating them from a married couple was...well...the marriage part. But now Robbie wants to make it all official and stop getting them dirty looks from her preacher relatives...and there's probably a few other reasons I'm not quite clear on just yet. Anyway, it all bubbles down to one crucial, critically important problem:

I DON'T HAVE ANYTHING TO WEAR!!!

Seriously, my entire wardrobe consists of casual wear. I can doll myself up to look like a freakin' modern-day Elizabeth Taylor (exaggeration, thy name is me), but no amount of make-up, jewelry or perfectly coordinated anything can change the fact that one does not wear jeans to a wedding!

My closet consists of maybe half a dozen throw-on jeans, two pairs of butt-hugging, leg-shaping, oh-my-God-could-I-possibly-look-hotter jeans, and one sheer, summery gypsy skirt that would be more fitting at a Renaissance-themed pool party than anything else. However, the scant $208 currently inhabiting my checking account leads me back to my original point:

OMFG, PEOPLE, I HAVE NOTHING TO WEAR!!!

Some part of me is hoping that as a resident of the property where the wedding is going to be happening, not to mention a close friend of both the bride and groom for the better part of a decade gets me a free pass into the planning-stage splurging and a suitable dress will be supplied for me, but I know that this wedding is happening on a hyper budget and if I can't afford a dress? It's likely I ain't getting one. Why, oh why did I skip my prom? I could've used that dress! Mom was even all set to buy me one and everything!

I never thought I'd miss working at Tuesday Morning this badly, but crappy job and crappy hours aside, at least I was getting PAID. Now that I'm focusing on getting into school, the odds of adding to my dwindling bank account seem pretty stacked against me.

Oh, and mom is also making the cake.** My uncle (who owns a barbecue business) is supplying the meat and the uber-grill, and my mother made the mistake of giving The Scot free reign to make the back yard wedding-ready. I can almost hear the power-tools already. He has two months. That's about how long it took him to turn my sister's old bedroom into a bar. You see where I'm going with this.

The Burns Report: Mom is thinking of having a cook-out this Saturday and she's thinking of inviting Burns. Translation: Barring an unforseen financial dilemma, most likely wedding-related, mom will have a cook-out this Saturday and she will invite Burns, if only for the opportunity to subject me to the humiliation of several beer-soaked men fussing over me and my new "boyfriend".

Seriously, he's not my boyfriend***. One date does not a boyfriend make. As far as I'm concerned, he's on probation.

So there.

*His name is Ron, and he's my gigantic Teddy Bear. Ron is one of those HUGE black men with skin so dark it's almost purple and a voice like thunder. That aside, he's quite possibly the gentlest, sweetest, most Santa Claus-esque man you'll ever meet. Which begs the question, why is it that the most imposing-looking people tend to be the kindest, while the meek-looking sumbitches tend to be massive jackasses?

**Mom used to make cakes semi-professionally. She could, when called upon, craft some of the loveliest, most intricate pieces of edible art this far from Baltimore. Unfortunately, she was most often called upon to make bachelor party cakes, which were invariably a sheet cake boasting a frosting-tableau of a naked woman from the neck down. Imagine seeing a dozen of those a year when you're about six years old and tell me you wouldn't be traumatized.

***Not that I'm entirely opposed to the idea, mind you.

The Awesome, I Has It

2008-05-04T00:52:00.005-04:00

Because the interwebz are quaking with the desperate need to know, I am here to relay the events of my date.

Which was, incidentally, totally a date. And a very good one at that.

He said I was beautiful.

This was the first time ever that a man has called me beautiful, or anything of that sort, without prompting from me. And that moment? Was when I knew I was really on a date. My first one ever. Throughout the movie, I continually got chills, and only some of them were from the cold theater. Most of them spread down my arm to settle comfortably into the hand he was tenderly holding. It was all I could do not to shiver.

I didn't kiss him. Though, I kind of whish I had. Unfortunately, past experiances have left me more than a little kiss-shy. All of the kisses I've ever experianced have been unpleasant, and I didn't feel anything. I didn't want to take the chance that kissing him would be the same. Of course, that didn't stop him from kissing me. When I knelt in to comment on something the bad guy was doing on screen, he snuck a quick peck at my cheek. I smiled. And when, as the action heated up in Tony Stark's life, I rested my head on his shoulder, he gently kissed the top of my head.

Burns is a good-looking guy. My mom was right, he's not traditionally handsome. But he's got a nice face, fantastic teeth, fun hair and really nice eyes. He also has a very pleasing voice. And soft hands. I know, because he spent a great deal of time holding mine, his thumb softly caressing my fingers.

Having never been on a date before, I was often struck with the sensation of not knowing what to do. He made all the moves, but somehow conveyed the sense that I had every right and ability to stop him if I wanted. I did, too. When he tried to kiss me in the corridor while we waited for our ride, I said no. He seemed to understand, he left his arm around my waist and I was in no hurry to remove it. With each advance, beginning when he held my hand, I felt a momentary surge of panic. But it felt nice. He didn't rush.

He seemed to be pacing himself, carefully judging the exact moment when I'd be willing to take the next step. Oddly enough, this was generally about two minutes after I had begun contemplating the very same thing. First he cupped his hand around mine, then waited a few scenes and laced our fingers together. He waited even longer before casually slipping his arm around my shoulders, and waited until I felt comfortable enough to rest my head on his shoulder to give me a chaste kiss.

He held doors open for me, and anyone else trying to pass by. He said "after you". He lauged when I made jokes, he was funny and charming, he listened intently to everything I had to say. He didn't stare at my boobs. Not once. He likes Country Music, he even admires Reba MacEntire the way I do. He was comfortable, and charming, and he complimented me freely and sincerely. He even regretted not having dressed himself up more for the evening. I had a great time with him, and I really, really, really want to see him again. Sooner rather than later. Besides...

He said I was beautiful.

P.S. Because Jennifer demands it, here is an inventory of everything I wore tonight.

The Outfit-Favorite jeans and a $33 black shirt worth every penny:

(It's hard to see the awesome stitching on this shirt with a digital camera.)

The Shoes w/ Jeans:

The Shoes Alone:

The Watch:

The Necklace and Bracelette:

And the Earrings. The Ouchie, Ouchie, Earrings:

And that's what I wore on my date. Satisfied, Nen?

The Yenta has Landed

2008-05-03T01:43:00.002-04:00

I have a blind date.

I'm gonna go ahead and give you all a minute to let that sink in.

I. LadyG. Ms. Snark-butt. Ranty McRanterson. Have a blind date. My mother just woke me up from a not-really-asleep-at-2:00-p.m.and set it up. I said yes. Why did I say yes?

IRON MAN, BABY!!!

We have facts:

His name, for the purpose of this blog, is Burns. Why? Because according to my mom his has neatly maintained sideburns. And also because Torchwood firmly donned its bastard hat in the series two finale and killed off Burn Gorman's character! I need catharsis!

He likes Jeff Dunham. In fact he leant us a copy of Spark of Insanity a while back. Any man who appreciates the comedic stylings of the world's only successfull ventriloquist immediately gains gold stars in my book.

He is furry. My mom's words. And since I sincerely doubt she knows what a furry is, I'm gonna assume it means he's hirsuit. I don't mind this, since I kind find hairy guys to be cute. I mean, I find Robin Williams adorable, and he's a sasquatch!

He has a mohawk. He is now beginning to sound disturbingly like Dave, my high-school crush.

He's apparently nervous about meeting me, and insists we not call it a a date. But it's gonna be a meal followed by a popcorn flick (which I desperately want to see) and that sounds like a date to me. Though my mother is paying for everything. So, you know, Score! I'm still unemployed, so anytime I get to see emotionally damaged men in specially made costumes fighting the forces of evil in a major metropolitan area without paying for it? Personal victory.

He's 23, which means he's got four years on me. This is spectacularly unimportant, since my sister dd me the huge favor of dating a man who is eleven years her senior. Anywhere between one and ten and I'm sitting pretty. Thanks, sis!

So I'm okay with this. Yes it's a blind date masquerading as a blind not-date. Yes it was set up through my mother. Yes it's exceptionally weird for my life. Yes I am going to spend tomorrow evening in the company of a man I don't know from Adam and it has all the potential to blow up in both our respective faces but you know what? I'm excited. I look foreward to any opportunity to wear my cutest clothes, blow-dry my hair into submission and apply just the right amount of make-up. Usually that just means showing up my scruffy friends (Meesie, you know who I mean) during an evening of video games and bizarre inside-jokes. Now it means knocking the socks off a complete stranger who evidently finds my mothers stories about me fascinating.

Also? IRON MAN!!! WHOOT!!! I GET TO SEE IRON MAN!!!Boo yah!

ETA: Fashion Bug just provided me with the perfect top and a pair of sensational earrings. That being said, I have officially entered freak-out mode! What the frell am I doing? I've never BEEN on a date before, much less a BLIND ONE! I have my outfit all laid out, I'll have plenty of time to do my hair and make-up before I see him, my friends are going to be here a couple hours before the date to chill me out, but damn it I'm losing my mind here! What if this whole thing turns out to be a disaster? A mistake of Straczynski-an proportions?* I think I may implode before the night is through!

*Michael J. Straczynski, to be precise. The man responsible for un-masking Spider-Man at a nationally televised press conference. *glares at Straczynski*. MEPHISTO IS ALL YOUR FAULT MIKE! YOU HEAR ME? IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT!!!**

**Sorry. It's just I've been really pissed of at Spider-Man ever since he took Tony Stark's side in Civil War. And then he goes and makes a deal with Mephisto*** to save Aunt May's life...Peter Parker is the dumbest genius I've ever encountered.

***Mephisto is the Marvel universe's go-to demon, and he's the one responsible for turning Johnny Blaze into Ghost Rider. He also did a bunch of other jack-ass things, some of it involving the Silver Surfter, but I'm only interested in the marriage-dissolving stunt he just pulled with Spidey. I BLAME YOU STRACZYNSKI!!! YOU BASTARD!!!

Grrr!

2008-04-30T14:48:00.003-04:00

So for the past few days I've been feeling like twice-warmed crap. I've been alternating between maddening back and head-aches, nasty sore throats and crippling stomach pains. It's miserable! All of this has conspired to make it really hard to get to sleep at night and even harder to wake up during the day. So, I'm back on my wonky sleep shedule yet again.

Oh, right. College. Um...I aced part one of my placement exam and got a 75% on the second part, advanced algebra. This means that I qualify for what Meesie insists is the good math class. Which, you know, yay! Having just read An Abundance of Katherines I've recently discovered that mathematics can, in fact, be interesting and not the devil's passtime.

Um...I really don't have anything else to say right now, so please enjoy this montage of Maddy on her doggie bed.

Maddy Says: "I am SO much more than filler!"

Greetings From College!

2008-04-25T10:24:00.003-04:00

No, I'm not in school yet. Kindly blow it out your ass.

I'm auditing.

Today bestest friend Meesie took her crusade for my education one giant leap farther. After yesterday's saga of the Transcripts (and also written documentation of the number of times people with lots of letters after their names poked me with very very sharp little pieces of hollow metal with mysterious liquids inside) Meesie forced me to rise from my sleepless sleep at 8:00 in the fugging morning! to accompany her to Default Community College (educational alias). Currently I'm sitting at a computer dilligently typing away while a tech-savvy woman in an earth-tone daishiki-esque ensemble guts a computer and explains the finer workings of a machine which has vexed me since I-don't-care-to-remember-when. But do I listen? No! Because I got two hours of sleep last night, and then put in my contacts! Why? Because I'm fabulous, damnit! Comfort be damned!

Only after a while the eyedrops proved ineffective and my corneas were screaming for relief, so I'm back to my four-eyed ways. Also, I think the saline drops totally messed up my make-up. Whatever, I still look better than anyone in this room! (I seem to be vapid, shallow and condescending on two hours of sleep.) And I think I scratched my iris when I was taking out my left contact because it stings like a sunuvabitch. I suffer so terribly for my beauty!

In other news, new clothes from Target! Possibly the cutest blouse ever! And a somewhat less adorable blouse which I'm wearing today. However, lesser blouse is a lovely burgundy color and it goes swimmingly with my shockingly expensive watch with real diamonds in the face. And, of course, everything goes perfectly with my new, tiny white purse which, despite it's diminutive stature, manages to easily contain absolutely every necessity I posess. Perfume, gorgeous new wallet, cell phone, house key, mass quantities of change, etc. etc.

However, the new shirts, purse and wallet mark the last of my frivolous purchases since I have a stomach-churningly low amount of money at the moment and cannot in good conscience buy ANYTHING until I'm employed again. Hopefully at PetsMart, where I would be payed to feed and clean up after tiny furry things.

I digress: Friend Kaya has newly arrived from Egypt as of last night. She has a souvenier for me. This pleases me! Hopefully I'll find out what it is soon, since I'm fairly sure Meesie's class ends in about fifteen minutes and is followed by a three hour break during which I intend to nap. Oh! And Supernatural finally came back after a writer's-block-induced hiatus, and the latest ep was UBER! However, as is Kripke's way, this latest light-hearted romp (only one person died, and there was silliness galore!) is going to be followed next week by a drama so gut-wrenchingly painful and emotional that it will leave us fangirls drained with tear stains on our cheeks. DEAN! Oh DEAN!

Note to self, tired=babbling, even in blog form.

Um...I don't think I have anything else to write about.

Except that Meesie just informed me that I have to take my placement exam after this class, so I don't get to nap after all. Damn. Stupid, evil, horrible exams! I need sleep.

Here's Looking at you, Kid.

2008-04-14T14:32:00.004-04:00

Can you do me a favor? Just something small.

I want you to go and watch an old movie. Either click on over to netflix, or scoot yourself over to the nearest video store, or if you have cable just channel surf to Turner Classic Movies. It doesn't matter what movie it is, so long as it's a classic. You really don't want to start this journey with Plan 9 From Outer Space. It can be Spencer Tracy or Katherine Hepburn, Bette Davis or Humphry Bogart. Just take a little time out of your life to reconnect with another time, another place. The Golden Age.

I love old movies. While you're watching your classical selection, try comparing old films to modern day blockbusters. Even the sweetly dramatic Miramax films of our time are incredibly fast-paced in comparison. Whereas in Hollywood's Golden Age, they took their time. The scenes wove their way into a story with ease and deliberation. All the speed was in the dialogue, all the action was simple and straightforeward. Story drove the film. Characters kept the audience riveted, not effects.

Just take a moment and listen to them talk. Especially the women. I reccomend spending some quality time with Kate Hepburn. Her tongue-lashings were rapier-sharp and rattlesnake quick. Women in films back then were forces of nature. Watch The Philadelphia Story and you'll see what I mean. It's easy to assume that because they wore dresses and girdles, and because they looked like they were made of porceline, that they were meek and timid. But I think this worked in their favor. It's easy to underestimate a Golden Age woman, and that is a mistake that you generally don't make twice. If one were to believe the standards set by females on celluloid in the 1940's, it would stand to reason that this was a decade when women not only dominated the family, but they may well have ruled the world. You might gaze in awe at Humphry Bogart, but you trembled before Bette Davis.

And speaking of dialogue, which I'm fairly sure I was, consider the English language and how they actually used it. The speach in these movies is almost literary. Each exchange is almost Shakespearean. The writers didn't shy away from length or sophistication. And the actors never lost stride, no matter how complex the script. I love to watch them talk, and remember when words were important enough to use freely and fervently.

Oddly enough, I think that old movies are the closest we have to a national identity. These are an enduring tradition marking our shared history. There's something distinctly American about them, and considering how indestinct America is, that's quite an accomplishment. This is our waltz.

Maybe they weren't a real indication of what life was like back then. Maybe they're romanticized and styleized and exaggerated. But they exist for a reason. They're our stories, our legends. They show us how to be strong, how to stand our ground. I find a sense of female pride watching the starletts dominate the screen. And I still long to find a man remeniscent of Gene Kelly in An American in Paris. Maybe a modern day Jimmy Stewart. Maybe I dream of falling in love in black and white.

I miss the elegance. I think we've lost too many good things in the interest of all we've gained. Sure we've gained quite a lot, but why did we have to lose Cary Grant in the bargain? Why did we have to sacrifice substance in the interest of glamor? I think we need old movies, to remind us that sometimes the story is enough.

Maddy Says: "Hey Angel, are those Bette Davis eyes?"

Angel Says: "Nope. That's just camera flare."

Longest. Drumroll. Ever.

2008-04-11T17:15:00.005-04:00

Well, you've been waiting and I've been delaying. Now the time has finally come. It's time to introduce to you Life on the Cusp's newest co-star!

Meet Maddy:

Maddy says: "I'm ready for my close-up, Miss Geektastic."

Angel Says: "Maddy is a poo-poo head!"

So as you can see, a lot's been happening here since I last posted. And I'm going to tell you all about it.

Item one: In which Angel adjusts just swimmingly to her new indoor lifestyle.

Angel was hesitant at first, but eventually acclimated herself to life as a pampered princess pooch. (Don't you just love alliteration?) Everyone loved her, and she was swimming in attention. Happy as a clam.

Item two: In which a New Dog arrives and EVERYTHING goes to Hell!

So here's what happened:

You remember the incident with the St. Bernard? Well we discovered that she had a nasty habit of eating people's cars, so we decided against bringing her into our home. I mean, we already have some kind of horrific car trouble every other month or so, we don't need a dog getting antsy with the bumper.

That's where Teddy, aka Señor Jerkface, comes in. He works with The Scot, and he informed him that he had a dog he wanted to get rid of. Apparently Señor Jerkface's wife loved this dog, but Jerkface? Not so much.

Maddy was tied up day in and day out in the garage, and they used this nasty, heavy, rusted chain to do it! They fed her nothing but table scraps in this filthy, disgusting bowl which cracked at one point and was repaired with duct tape. DUCT TAPE! They couldn't spend all of $3.00 on a new bowl?! So her teeth are completely screwed up from her crappy diet, and to top it all off, Señor Jerkface saw nothing wrong with taking out his aggression by kicking the dog!

Mom and The Scot were only supposed to go meed Maddy, but after seeing the state of her living conditions that she loaded her into the backseat and brought her home. At that point, her name was Tabby.

Tabby came home, and we fell in love. All of us, that is, except for Angel.

Item Three: In which Tabby gets a new name, and Angel goes bitchy.

Angel started growling, and snarling, and then attacking Maddy, formerly Tabby, out of nowhere! There was never any indication of when or why she would snap! The whole household was on edge, people were at each other's throats, no one was getting enough sleep, and I was desperately in need of some good blog-time. But the combination of my inability to import photos from the digital camera and the constant attention needed by that dogs kept me from doing so.

Item Four: Indian food!!!

I took a break from the insanity at home to go out with my friends to a restaurant called India House nearby. The food? Amazing! The company? Awesome! And I've become obsessed with this yogurt drink called the Mango Lassi. Recipe can be found in my last post. It. Is. Yummy!

Item Five: In which the house calms down, but smells terrible.

Angel and Maddy are finally getting along now. Our main problem is all the shedding. Two outdoor dogs moving inside in the spring? Pet hair city.

But the major pet peeve is Angel's new habit of peeing on the rug and on Maddy's bed. We figure she's marking her territory, trying to make it clear she's the Alpha Bitch of the house. (That's the technical term, by the way. Seriously.) I hope getting her spayed will solve that problem. For now, however, it just means a lot of noisily shampooing the carpet and stuffing a doggie-bed in the washing machine.

But you want to know about Maddy, right? Okay!

She's seven or eight years old, and she's a Yellow Lab/German Shepherd mix. She's HUGE! But she's gentle, quiet, and extremely well behaved. She's getting used to her new name, and she's my dog.

Maddy is my dog like Sammie is Ashley's dog. She was intended to be a family pet, and she loves everyone, but Maddy and I just click. We love having her around. She even makes me more responsible since I have to take care of her and Angel when I wake up in the morning, not to mention the vacuuming. We have to do a lot of vacuuming!

And what does all this mean for you, the reader? It means that Maddy is going to be a new regular on the blog. Because I have pictures. Lots and lots of pictures. So Maddy gets to participate in my long-winded meanderings.

Maddy Says: "Do you see? This is what I have to deal with EVERY DAY! Does she expect me to stay awake?"

Ano...

2008-04-07T23:46:00.002-04:00

Okay I know I've been AWOL from the internets for the past few days. I have a very good reason!

Which I can't get into just yet...

But I swear there is a reason! And I swear I'll tell you about it! Promise!

Once I have a handle on the whole situation.

In the meanwhile, please fly to your nearest Indian Food restaurant and order and Mango Lassi! A more awesome drink you have never, erm, drunk.

Or just make it yourself!

LadyG's Beverage Recipe: Mango Lassi.

1 1/2 Cups plain yogurt.
1 1/2 Cups canned mango puree
1/2 Cup milk

Blend with 1 or 2 Cups of ice until smooth. Then serve and enjoy!

You'll thank me!

This concludes todays ~~distraction~~ treat! I'll see you later with an actual entry!

P.S. Marisa, if you say ANYTHING in the comments to spoil the surprise/situation I alluded to above, I will personally come to your house and glue all your furniture to the ceiling!

The Saga of the Boobs

2008-04-03T14:44:00.002-04:00

So I've kind of been dancing around this issue since I started blogging. And I figure there's no time like the present to get nice and personal with my readers (and possibly chase them away) and make a beeline for the outskirts of my comfort zone. Today I'm going to talk about my boobs. My massive, gargantuan, unseemly boobs.

(Pauses to witness sudden spike in male attentiveness.)

Here's the deal, I have DDD's. Yeah, really. I have DDD's. And they're real. All natural.

And I hate them.

I hate them. I hate them. I hate them!

Here's a little secret for all the boys and the flat-chested girls who fantasize about huge breasts. You know all those women with massive tatas who parade around like they've got the world on a silver platter? You know those women who thrust their bosoms front and center and have men drooling all over them no matter where they go?

Implants. Without exception, those gigantic jugs are implants.

Why is that? Because there is a major difference between breast tissue and silicone. And the difference is weight. No breast larger than a D is going to stand at attention and be perky in something slinky and strapless without a whole lot of assistance. Real boobs that size are heavy. I'm talking stretch-mark city, I'm talking crippling back pain, I'm talking constant stiff-neck, I'm talking...well you get the idea.

I started getting boobs when I was nine, I was in DD's by age 12. I was in DDD's by 15. I'm praying not to grow any more, so I can have a chance at a reduction.

Contrary to popular belief, having large breasts does not open up all the doors. It closes them. There are so many things small-breasted girls can do that I can only dream of. Things like:

1. Going braless. And I'm not just talking about being sexy and free, though that is part of it. I can't even sleep without a bra for fear of adding to the ocean of stretch-marks I currently posess.

2. Wearing cute clothes. Those adorable diagonal shirts with only one sleeve? Can't wear 'em. Sure they make bras with only one strap. They make bras with no straps. But I can't wear them. Trust me on this.

3. Wear anything smaller than XL. Technically, I doubt I'm more than a large, but I can't wear anything that fits my stomach or waist, because no matter how small my waist gets, my chest stays the same, and anything smaller than plus-size is way too short. Suddenly a cute tee turns into a baby-doll or a belly shirt. No. This also means that I can't get rid of my "fat" clothes to help me lose weight because they're the only clothes that will ever fit me.

4. Spend less than $30 on a bra. There is a very unfair assumption on the part of bra manufacturers that everyone buying a DDD bra is doing so because they purchased their chest. No! I cannot afford implants. I do not want implants. I want a freaking bra that won't bankrupt me!

5. Have a bra that lasts more than a couple of weeks. No matter how sturdy or supportive the bra, no matter how much I spend on the damn things, I wear them about three times and the elastic gives out, the straps stretch out, the clasps twist and bend, and wearing them is only marginally better than going without. This means I spend way too much money way too often.

6. Wear sportsbras. I have a working theory that no one even makes sportsbras for my size. This means that the jumping-jack is my sworn enemy. Ouch.

7. Avoid cleavage. I try to dress cute, and I've succeeded in finding some genuinely cute clothes to wear, but they all tend to have a plunging neckline. And I have Cleavage. Unfortunately, I also have chafing, so my cleavage comes with a bonus of angry, red, raw skin. And yes, it hurts.

8. Exercise. See above, regarding sportsbras. Running hurts, jumping hurts, sitting up straight hurts!

So, yeah. This is what I'm dealing with. What I've been dealing with since puberty. It sucks. And if anyone out there thinks that I might find comfort in attention I get from the opposite sex? Keep in mind that I went through my entire high-school career without a single date. The only boy who kissed me was a Jehovah's Witness and he was a grade below me. When your most romantic interaction consists of theological debate during gym class? Something's wrong.

Two doctors have sworn in writing that my breast size is too large for my body, and that it poses a viable medical threat to me. I've had to give myself monthly breast exams since I was 12, and I'm probably going to have to start getting mamograms soon. Yay. So on top of the physical, emotional and financial grief these things give me, I also have to contend with a legitimate risk of breast cancer. I mean, I like pink as much as the next girl, but....

I've consulted a plastic surgeon, and once I can secure some health insurance I plan to resume my pursuit of a breast reduction. And I swear I won't miss them a bit. See, I've grown to hate my breasts so much that I don't even consider them a part of my body. As far as I'm concerned they're basically just these massive growths attached to my chest. Like tumors. Tumors with nipples. So when I was seeing the plastic surgeon and he examined my breasts, and when his assistant photographed them, I didn't even flinch. There was nothing personal, or intimate about my breasts. I didn't even feel like they were my breasts. I actually haven't identified with them in years. Not since my first breast exam.

The prospect of a Reduction Mamoplasty is kind of scary. There are risks, and I've been told that before the operation I should donate blood for myself "just in case". And there's the possibility of horrific scarring that will never fade, the loss of sensitivity in my nipples, (yes I said it. Twice.) and worst of all, the chance that I'll never be able to breastfeed if I ever decide to have children. But all of that is just a small price to pay to get rid of literally a decade of pain and discomfort and humiliation.

But none of that matters until I get medical insurance because there's no way I'll be able to afford the proceedure without it.

And there you have it. The saga of the boobs. Doesn't my life rock?

LadyG is a Nerdfighter!

2008-03-28T12:15:00.002-04:00

And now I have proof! Observe:

You can find me at 2:43! Worship my messy hair and wind-reddened cheeks! WHOOT!!!

You have no idea the level of awesome I have just achieved.

Oh, and remember my last entry? Yeah, everything is covered in a blanket of snow right now. CNY, bitches!

Disappointing Endings...

2008-03-26T13:58:00.002-04:00

The sun is shining today. It's the first time this year that it almost feels like Spring. I like Spring. It's my favorite season because it doesn't really exist. Not here, anyway. Spring is an idea, a wonderful dream where everything is green and new and nothing hurts because there's too much beautiful in the world. Spring means baby animals being born, and virgin buds sprouting from the naked branches of skeletal trees. Spring is a promise that no one ever keeps. We spend all Winter waiting for Spring, and while we're waiting Summer sneaks up behind us and before we know it Spring is gone and we've all missed it somehow. Spring is a single day of warm sunlight among all the days of cold sunlight we've all become used to.

I went out on the back deck and I sat. The sun was warm and I had to wear sunglasses because it's still bright like winter. There are still patches of what used to be snow on the brown expanse that wants to be grass, but they're fading away. It felt good to be warm. Naturally warm. The cold lasts so long here that it's easy to forget. You freeze or you bake, and sometimes the heating in the house is so erratic that you do both at the same time. I haven't been warm in months. But I'm inside now, even though I don't want to be, because I can't see the screen out there and I have to say this before it gets lost. I think I'll go back outside soon. When the words are out.

I'm sad today. It's the good kind of sad, that sad that's supposed to be "happy for deep people." I kind of know what that means. It's the sad that comes from reading a book you almost wish you hadn't. Where the afterglow is dark, and the music is sombre, but somehow you don't mind it, and you almost don't want it to end. It's the kind of sad that the emo kids and goths try to achieve. They're doing it wrong, I think. You can't force this sad. You can't look for it. And you can't want it.

This is the sad that makes you more grateful for all the times you've been happy. This is the sad that comes from a story with a Disappointing Ending.

I just read a book with a Disappointing Ending. You know, where the author takes you on an emotionally draining ride with a couple of characters you come to love and rely on, then slams you into an abrubt finish with no real resolution but the one that you feel intangibly taking up room in your heart. I read a lot of books with Disappointing Endings. I hate them, and I really like them. On the one hand, I crave resolution. I want everything wrapped up in a neat little bow that seals away all the lingering questions with satisfactory answers. I want that because you never get those endings in life. Becuase there's always a question mark left behind. But I suppose it's when stories stop being an escape and start mirroring reality that they begin to matter. When the ending isn't an ending, the book stays alive. You keep thinking about it, and it settles in inside of you and refuses to go away. The final page isn't the final page because you keep the story going. You keep the characters alive.

Today is the perfect day for this kind of sad. It's bright and warm and sunny, but the green hasn't come back yet and everything still looks dead. You see Winter, but you feel Spring. And maybe that's the real power behind Disappointing Endings, and this special kind of sad. Because for everything that's bad about it, there's this underlying, gleaming thread of hope.

Do you know the story of Pandora's Box? They say that after all the demons of pain and sorrow and fear etc. flew out of the box and Pandora snapped it shut, there was only one demon left. Hope. Some people say that it means Hope is a bad thing. Like a trickster, fooling you into believing in happiness when there is none. I don't think that's what it means. I think that Hope was in that box because the gods or whoever who made the box and filled it with demons took pity on whoever opened it. I think it means that Hope is the only thing that can survive amidst the darkest of situations.

I think that's what this kind of sad is for. To remind us of why hope exists, so we know where to look for it when we really need it. Maybe that's why I like it so much. Maybe it's like Spring, a promise that no one ever keeps, but somehow we keep believing it, because sometimes it comes true, and for just a fleeting moment it's warm and sunny outside, and Spring is real, and you can hope it'll still be real tomorrow...

Fender Bender!

2008-03-24T11:40:00.002-04:00

Today I took my Driver's Permit test. Today I got 100% on my Driver's Permit test.

(Pause for accolaide.)

(Still pausing.)

(Jesus, people, will you sit down already???)

Okay this is even more cool if you know, as my mother does, how much I loathe every aspect of driving. How I've been hesitant to so much as skim through the frelling driver's manual of DOOM, and how thoroughly I was convinced that I would be the only person I'd ever known who failed their permit test. And what happens? I ace the damn thing!

I credit this success to my lovely Hawaiian bone carving turtle pendant. It's a talisman of good fortune, according to the little booklet they gave me to read through when I bought it.

Of course, it's not all good news. This means that now I have to actually drive.

I have many bizarre quirks, and my aversion to driving is right up there on the list along with hatred of using the phone. I hate the thought of driving. I'm petrified of driving. I think of driving and automatically my mind flashes to scenes of ripped and jagged metal, explosions of fire and shrapnel, and human remains identifiable only by their dental records.

This may be because of my membership to my high school's SADD chapter. Three years of examining every detail of a fatal car crash, of dressing up as the Grim Reaper and "killing" student volunteers so they could symbolize victims of an alcohol-related accident. This sort of thing doesn't make careening down a stretch of pavement in a couple tons of metal and volital chemicals very appealing. But I digress.

At least now maybe my mom will get off my back about how I never do anything to secure my future. She's right, of course. I just get sick of hearing it.

Of course, now I have to deal with a whole new host of worries, like insurance and road rage and inspections and repairs and how the hell I'm going to paint the words "Deus ex Machina"* on my first junk-heap of a car.

Seriously, can anyone tell me how to put words on your car? I'm thinking of putting it on the door. Yes, I know it's not exactly appropriate to drive around with writing on your car, but give me one example of someone who's going to be offended by a little Latin and a nerdy in-joke?

So now not only do I have to learn how to drive, but mom is still determined to get me another job. Which I'm not exactly against, despite my deep-seated hatred of working retail, since paying for the goddamned permit test cost me $65! It was physically painful! So now I'm pretty much broke. I have just over $200 left in my entire bank account, and since I despise spending money when my account is less than $400, there's no way in Hell I'm buying those Keith Hampton CD's I want so badly!

In other news: Angel has completely adjusted to being inside. She now has her own designated spot on the couch, and Mom has been working on scheduling a time for us to meet the St. Barnard. I keep telling her that the St. Bernard is too big, and will shed too much, and that we should consider adopting a more manageable shelter dog. Like one that isn't so succeptable to hereditary diseases like bone cancer. Mom refuses to listen, so I have a sinking feeling that soon we shall be adding a very large, very sheddy canine to our household.

Oy vey.

*For those of you who are interested: Deus ex Machina (or God from the Machinery) is a term describing a conveniant plot device or contrivance which resolves all conflicts in a dramatic or literary story, effectively creating a happy ending without any actual effort. It's widely regarded as a cop-out, or lazy writing. It's also the name of the escape pod used by Joel Robinson to escape the Satellite of Love in the fifth season of Mystery Science Theater 3000.

I Feel Good!

2008-03-23T07:01:00.002-04:00

Like, seriously. I'm laughing so easily today. I don't feel tired, I don't have any aches or soreness like I usually do, and despite feeling restless all over, I find I'm content for the first time in weeks!

Oh, and another thing? Guys, I think I might be in love:

And if you think he looks gorgeous in a tank top? Wait till you see him in a suit with his hair combed back and tied in a half-ponytail! *Sigh* The love that shall never be!

You've GOT to watch him on Musecast. He sings his original songs in most of his videos, and this is the kind of music that inspires your soul. When I hear it, I want to write, or paint, or fall in love with a stranger I pass on the street. It's the kind of music that makes you close your eyes, lean your head back and just let it wash over you. And his voice! Jeeze!

Please tell me there's is another Keith Hampton out there! Preferably one who lives in New York and is closer to my age!

De-Lurk

2008-03-20T04:40:00.002-04:00

Intriguing development: it appears that I don't have readers, as previously hypothesized. Nope. I have lurkers! And apparently lot's of 'em! This angers the Gods of self-aware public expression, and when they are displeased, robots cry. Do you really want to be responsable for the tears of robots?! It's people like you who will cause them to one day overthrow civilization and turn us into inept jesters!

Look, I get it. Really, I do. I myself have lurked my way through months of blogger fandom. But the blogs I lurked were always filled with at least 50 other comments per post! And recently, I have seen the error of my ways and am now actively contributing when I read other people's blogs. It's just the nice thing to do.

I mean, hey, if I didn't want your comments, I wouldn't keep them enabled! I CRAVE your feedback! I need it like I need oxygen...or maybe chapstick. Either way, they're essential!

So I'm calling an unofficial de-lurking day! Yes! When you lovely lurkers read this blog, you MUST COMMENT! Even if it's just to say "Hi" or, "You're a pushy broad, you know that?" At which point you will become Resplendant Readers! How about that, huh? It's easy to be lovely, it takes real gumption to be "resplendant". By the way? I'm totally brining "resplendant" back. If Jen Lancaster can do it...well I probably can't, but it's a killer word anyway!

I really want to get a sense of how many people actually read the crap I write. I mean, you can't get this quality of self-deprication just anywhere, you know! (Well...except for the entire internet, I mean.)

So sound off! Those who fail to comment after reading this post will be attacked by angry monkeys in funny hats who are very very good at making people feel uncomfortable.

And if the monkeys are busy? Well, then nothing will happen. But I will be sad! I will be very very sad!

So de-lurk yourselves, people! My crumbling self-esteem depends on it!

(BTW, did anyone happen to notice how many times I used the word "self" in this post? I have a feeling it was an unnecessary amount...)

Oh! Oh! I know! When you comment, give me one reason why you read my blog. "Because I live a boring life" is a completely acceptable answer. "'Cause" is not.

Please! I crave the attention!

That is all.

Bad, Bad Day.

2008-03-18T15:20:00.002-04:00

I really, truely and sincerely hate my mother right now. And I've only been awake for about a half an hour. The sad part? That's not even a record.

The facts:

Mom has taken it upon herself to interfere in my life at the one time I don't want her to. Is she setting up a time to see my high school guidance councelor so I can send my transcript to the school of my non-choosing? No. Is she taking me to the DMV to get my permit? No. She's getting me a job. Or, at least, she's trying to.

This job is at Wal-Mart. This job entails watering plants. This job begins at five o' clock in the fucking morning! This job pays bi-weekly.

When I am callously ripped away from my comfy bed and loving dreamland and informed that I'm to be endentured to a crappy job at the source of all evil which begins at five in the morning, I am less than pleased. No, check that, I am pissed. I find it very difficult under these circumstances to paste a smile on my face and act like the whole prospect is hunky-dory. It is not.

So what happens when I react in kind by sighing and glaring at the source of my misery? Yep, you guessed it. She starts with the yelling. And suddenly I'm scum for not jumping for joy at the prospect of near-constant sleep-deprivation. She says, "Oh you'll get used to it." Yeah, I've been getting up at 6:00 am every weekday for school for twelve fucking years and I never got "used to it". I was always tired, I could never get to sleep on time, and I was always miserable.

And then Mom drags me to Mr. PC to do the application online. Where she proceeds to discover exactly how fucked up the application process really is. The fact that there were absolutely no options for a high school diploma in the required education field should give you a clue.

And now I have to fill out a questionnaire, and it's essentially a slap in the face. They ask me all these bullshit questions and they already know the answers, but they're going to make me lie anyway. But hey, mom's already lied on my application, so what could it hurt?

The answers? Yes, I most definitely put off making big decisions until the last minute. Why the fuck else do you think I haven't started college yet?

Damn straight I value my paycheck more than my contributions to the company.

No, I have not always been confident in my ability to do my job. That may be because I was dismissed without notification from my last one!

I so want to be honest on this stupid thing, and I desperately want to sabotage myself. Because no, I don't want this job. I know I'll be miserable, because it's impossible to be anything else at 5 a.m. I want to be in college, I want to sleep when I'm tired, and not when my schedule demands I should.

But I'll probably bullshit my way to the end like a good little drone, and seal my fate as I once more find myself thrust into the bottomless pit of despair that is Retail.

God I'm miserable right now.

Miss Me?

2008-03-17T03:20:00.004-04:00

Project Kilo is BACK! And no, I haven't forgotten the remaining three LOLspeak posts. I'm just...saving them...yeah, that's it.

Anyway the link to the newest entry, a two-parter called "Maritine", is right over here.

Word count and everything. This is the last week so I'm phasing out the three-pronged updates. All updates from here on in will be confinded to my LJ, which means less work for me. Yay!

I would post them here, but LiveJournal has LJ cuts, and I like those. I like them a lot!

LadyG's random thought:

There's this weird thing I like to do when I'm at a public place where there's a bunch of graffiti. You know, bathroom stalls, picnic tables, stuff like that. You know how there's always a ton of nasty and mean and downright disgusting crap scrawled all over everything? Well I like to add my own spin. I write uplifiting messages. "To thine own self be true." "Love. Compassion. Honor." Cheesy crap like that, which people really need to hear more often. I mean, let's face it, we can't help but read the crap those dickheads write on these things, can we? I mean, it's there. We see it. As hard as you try to ignore it your brain is gonna process the data regardless of what you do. Wouldn't it be nice to look down while you're eating your cheezeburger and instead of seeing "JEFF IS A DICK" or "AMY IS A SLUT" or crap like that, you look down to see, "YOU LOOK GOOD TODAY" or "REMEMBER THOSE WHO LOVE YOU" in its place?

I think the world could really benefit from some positive graffiti. So carry a permanent marker with you when you leave the house, and when you see a violated piece of public property, add your own spin. Just don't get caught. Cops are weird about stuff like that.

Just try it. If nothing else, you'll feel better.

ETA: Okay, it was seriously like five seconds after I wrote this post that I stumbled across this video, which is essentially exactly what I'm talking about. Check it out:

Enough with the Mermen Already!

2008-03-16T10:20:00.002-04:00

Things I've learned about Angel today:

She loves watching old episodes of Wishbone on PBS nearly as much as I do.

9:00 am is playtime!

Changing positions in an effort to avoid her flesh-seeking tongue is merely an invitation for her to lick your knee....

Things I have reaffirmed about myself today:

Puppies on TV guarantee my viewership.

I still adore Wishbone in all his furry little incarnations.

If I come up with a vague fanfic-type idea, my brain will obsess over it, barring me from sleep, until every last plot hole and detail has been thoroughly addressed and dealt with. Even if said fanfic is focused on the popular Australian teen TV show about three adolescent mermaids, and focuses on the two non-mer male leads. This, naturally, means that I do not get to sleep when the sun does, and instead I find myself awake for nearly 24 hours straight, and stuck in that all-too-familiar point where my eyes go all twitchy. I do not like twitchy-eye-time.

This also means that I know what I'm writing about tomorrow, and yes, it will be weird. And scientific! Yay, science! Yay gene therapy!

Okay, I'm so tired right now my eyelashes hurt. Mom has drifted back to sleep, and now so shall I! Or, at least, I'll try to. I'm so full of aches and pains right now I think I qualify as a sub-standard nursing home. This does not bode well for sleepy time!

Oh, also new LOLspeak literature over at my LJ. Go! Read! Laugh and stuff. I'm gonna go snuggle with a stuffed kitty and try to dose off...

In Which LadyG Shows you Things

2008-03-14T21:18:00.002-04:00

First, there is this:

Subscribe. Watch. Become addicted!

Second. There is talk. Just talk.

Of a St. Bernard.

Here's the deal: friend of the maternal unit has a female St. Bernard. He has a new job and a girlfriend whom the St. Barnard happens to dispise. New job and girlfriend mean bye-bye puppy. He asked She of the Utilised Ovaries if she'd like the dog.

Now, on the one hand: Angel is a very social dog. After her mother, Ginger, passed away she's been lonely and our combined schedules kinda suck, leaving her alone for long periods of time. Mom thinks that a canine friend could be just what Angel needs to help her transition from outdoors to in.

On the other hand: THIS IS A FREAKING ST. BERNARD!!! Seriously, have you seen the SIZE of these things? We're walking in Mastiff territory! (For those of you who don't know, a mastiff is essentially a pony in a dog costume. And I don't mean Shetland!) The dog is a year old and her drool glands have been removed. (Remember Beethoven? Yeah, we want to avoid that.) But that doesn't change the fact that THIS IS A FREAKING ST. BERNARD!

You see our hesitation? Our house is roomy, especially since Sister moved out, but it's not exactly big. Plus we haven't met this dog and don't know her temperament.

I'll keep you posted as events progress. But I don't really anticipate a new addition to the family just yet. And if there is? We're talking Irish Setter at the most! (BTW, those are breathtaking dogs.) Seriously, look them up!

Wowness!

2008-03-13T01:10:00.000-04:00

Whoa, today's been an interesting one.

(And by today I mean yesterday and very, very early this morning.)

So, because I know you've all been dying to know, and because I stupidly believe that this blog and my LJ exist in separate universes, I'm going to go ahead and update you on the Angel situation.

She's moved inside, my mother has spent $60 on doggie paraphernalia of the snuggly variety, and Angel is...coping.

By that I mean she refuses to leave her bed by the back door, she whines whenever something good happens, and she obsessively sorts her kibble in little piles according to color. Yeah.

In other news: I have been punished! Yes, you can find a LOLcat version of Robert Frost's beloved poetic masterpiece, "The Road Not Taken" right over here! Also the thing with Angel and a sincerely screwed up sleep schedule mean that I'm not doing Project Kilo this week and I need five more LOLspeak suggestions so this week isn't a total waste. Ryan, I'm sorry, I'm not LOLifying the intro to Star Trek. Drop it.

By the way, credit for the selection of Frost's poem goes to the lovely Jennifer, whom I love so much it hurts me. It hurts me bad.

Remember if I don't get any LOLspeak suggestions I will default to Shakespeare's sonnets 1 through 5. And no one wants that, do they?

For new readers who don't have the slightest clue what the hell I'm talking about, the link to the post explaining the ins and outs of Project Kilo can be found in the sidebar. It's the stuff in red type.

In other other news: I have new readers! Whoot! How do I know this? Because the lovely Mother of Beans, a complete and total stranger, commented on a recent post, and I swear to God I have absolutely no idea who she is. (Other than a fantastic and engaging blogger, which is why if you don't go visit her blog right this second and give her warm fuzzies karma is going to so make you his bitch. And I'll laugh. Well, actually, finish reading this post and then go read her blog and give her warm fuzzies.) Also? She's got the coolest blog name EVER! Mother of Beans? Made entirely of awesome!

Yes I'm making a big deal out of this. But I have every right since I've never, ever recieved a comment from someone who didn't know me (and my disgustingly large breasts) personally. This is huge! It also means my strategy is working. Apparently the secret to attracting blog readers is to participate in the blogging community. Who knew? My previous strategy of lurking my way through a list of my favorite bloggers seems to have been...um...bad. I shrug.

So, thank you Mother of Beans. And I hope you and your Marine are united under a banner of rainbows and unicorns and fluffy bunnies. And cheesewheels. For some reason.

That about covers it for now! Keep those suggestions coming and if anyone is ambitious enough to craft some Robert Frost-inspired LOLcat images I will post them right here as well as over at my LJ. Because, you know, everyone loves LOLcats. Also, please, make sure no LOLcats were harmed in the making of your pic. Those who cause pain to LOLcats are met with the wrath of Cieling Cat, and that's really bad 'cause he has laserbeam eyes. Srsly.

Development!

2008-03-10T21:58:00.000-04:00

Um...so there's actually a reason why I don't have a Project Kilo today.

Stuff is actually happening! Yes! Real stuff!

So here's what's been going on. Today the bad weather finally subsided enough for me to go outside and play with Angel. Angel is half golden retriever, half chocolate lab. Yes, she is that beautiful. But that particular genetic cocktail means she's got all the energy of a little furry nucelar power plant. It wasn't long before I was tired out and needed a break from being jumped on every five seconds. So I headed up to the deck and set up a fold-out chair. Angel, naturally, came up to snuggle with me. (She views a sitting human as an invitation for snuggles and licks.) I heard a rapping at the kitchen window, which overlooks the deck. Mom was at the sink, washing the dishes she'd just bought. I knocked back and mom smiled at me.

"Is that angel?" She asked. I nodded.

"Did she get out?" Angel is something of a doggie Houdini. There hasn't been the enclosure built that can keep her contained.

"No, I let her out." This was true. I'd been missing Sammie terribly lately, so I was just waiting for a day nice enough that I could go out and play with her.

"Want to freak her out? Bring her inside." Angel hates being indoors. She's strictly an outdoor do. I told mom I didn't think she'd like that, but mom told me I should bring her in. So I did.

It turns out that The Scot, despite his anti-animal tirades, has been wanting to get a dog. The consensus had been that after Sammie, there would be no more animals. But apparently, The Scot wants a big dog. We have the space, so I guess it's feasable. I've just never had a big dog inside. Anyway, mom looked at the Scot like he was demented and asked why he wanted to get another dog when Angel was right outside? So she decided that we'd introduce Angel to the house and get her to move inside.

So that's what I did today. It was the trail run. We kept her to one area of the house and gave her food, water, milkbones and lots and lots of attention. She did pretty well. She kept her hindquarters lowered and her tail tucked between her legs. (As someone who has studied dog behaviors, this is signifigant and indicates that she was scared.) We made sure to be reasuring and affectionate, and we even got her to wag her tail a little. She was very well behaved, as usual. She's instinctively one of the best pets I've ever met. She's never shown the slightest hint of aggression towards people, and she's great with kids.

So she did great today. Tomorrow we're going to bring her in earlier in the day and give her a bath. (Which she desperately needs.) We're going to gradually keep her inside longer and longer, and work on some basic obediance training she missed out on by being an outdoor dog. Eventually we hope to get her to stay the night indoors. She's a lot more docile indoors, though I'm betting her lab heritage will come out more once she's more comfortable.

Old habits bite you in the ass.

2008-03-08T02:01:00.000-05:00

So, it's 2:00 a.m. and I'm restless. It's just like before when I used to be in this bizarro sleep pattern. Always at around 2 or 3 I'd get this sudden burst of energy and I just can't stay still. I have to do something. In the past I've been known to clean my entire room (including vacuuming), read entire novels, take lengthy baths, and often, yes, blog.

For a while I thought I was cured. I was going to sleep early in the evening and waking up up to seven hours later with no possibility of getting back to sleep. I thought, this is good. I'm on human time now. But somehow I've recently regressed back to my nocturnal lifestyle and I have no freaking clue how. I'm so wide awake right now it's disturbing. Also I keep getting the hiccups, and that just pisses me off.

But you know, being on human time was just plain boring. I'd get up at 6 am and I'd have hours to kill and nothing to kill them with. I resorted to watching children's shows on PBS because the only other things on were infomercials. And, you know, yuck.

It's times like this when I do the worst thing I could possibly do. I wallow. I start thinking about how crappy and stalled my life is. I crave interaction, stimulation, everything I'm not getting by being holed up in this godforsaken house day in and day out. And worse, I've been reading John Green's Looking for Alaska so now I'm actually craving high school!

Jesus, you know you're pathetic when you wax nostalgic about high school!

According to Penn and Teller, college is bullshit. But bullshit or no, at least college will get me out of this house. I may even get to interact with actual people! Wouldn't that be nice? Hell, I might even experiance an actual romance for once in my lonely, lonely life. I'm just so sick of being by myself in a house in the middle of nowhere. At least mom and the Scot get to go to work. They get to see something other than the yard and the walls and the stupid chili-pepper decor in the stupid kitchen.

Okay yeah, I am feeling sorry for myself and self-pity is so not flattering on me. But I can't help it. I have the whole night stretched out in front of me and nothing to do but think and blog and read and whatever else I find to occupy my time.

I am so very, very bored. This sincerely sucks.

Oh, but on a more positive note, my gorgeous, beautiful, lovely, expensive pink watch is finally working! I got it for Christmas but the battery was dead. Mom finally got a chance to replace it and now IT WORKS. It would be impossible to oversteat the beauty that is this watch. The leather band has a snakeskin texture in a soft, rosy pink. The square face is set in a silver frame, with silver dots where the numbers would be, except for the number 12 which is in a deliciously curvy script underneath its dot. The second hand is pink and, oh yeah, there are real diamonds embedded in the 3, 6, 9 and 12 dots. It is, quite frankly, the most lovely watch ever formed! You can actually describe it as exquisite.

So...that's good. :)

Daddy/Daughter stuff...

2008-03-07T21:05:00.000-05:00

"My Little Girl"

Word Count: 1,077
Liked: raw emotion
Disliked: inconsistant voice

I was actually in tears as I wrote this. My relationship with my dad is a very emotional subject for me, and as a result any other daddy/daughter subjects always get to me.

Also I'm kinda pissed because LJ screwed up the formatting when I posted the full story and I'm not sure how to fix it.

Anyway, the whole story is in the usual place.

A Gift for You!

2008-03-06T20:01:00.000-05:00

Today is a gift for all of my (three) devoted readers!

Since I have no ideas for today, and since it doesn't look like I'll be getting any by 8:30, and since I feel like I kinda cheated you guys out of some fun yesterday with that out-of-left field inspiration yesterday...I'm not going to do a Project Kilo entry today. Unless something miraculously pops into my head in the next 40 minutes. You never know.

So, you guessed it, that means I'm doing a LOL of some work of literature. I know at least two of you already have something downright malicious picked out. Just, please, nothing too long. I have to post the original and the LOLified version you know. Remember, if I don't get any suggestions I will default to the first of Shakespeare's sonnets.

Have fun! Leave your suggested passages in the comments and I'll choose. The LOLspeak entry will be posted this weekend, so you have until Saturday morning to submit your suggestions.

I vowed in the beginning of this project that you would get at least one LOLspeak entry before Project Kilo is over. So here it is! We have ten more days to go, so I thought we'd have a little silliness to help carry us over the finish line.

Don't say I never did anything for you! And please, be gentle.

Weird Things...

2008-03-05T21:29:00.000-05:00

Something bizarre is happening in my house! I blame The Scot.

Here's the freakish bit: We have snacks! We have pudding and cookies and Little Debbie snack cakes. Naturally, I'm not allowed to touch any of them! (That's not to say that I won't touch any of them...)

Here's the extra-freakish bit: The Scot and I are getting along! Let me make one thing perfectly clear, there is no love lost between me and The Scot. He's my mother's boyfriend and that's perfectly okay with me. For the last six or seven years, The Scot and I have pretty much just tolerated one another's presence. His bizarre work schedule and my school/sleep schedule made sure that we encountered eachother very rarely. Our relationship extends only so far as we live in the same house.

But in recent months, something weird has been happening. We actually talk to eachother. Not often, you understand, but on rare occasions. We stick to neutral territory, like his work shedule or the weather, stuff like that. We even teamed up to buy mom a great birthday present (and he credited me for contributing to her christmas present, even though I never gave him a dime for it).

I don't get it. The Scot and I have always been frosty toward eachother. I'm a Straight Ally, he considers homosexuality to be a personal insult. I believe firmly in equality and acceptance, he considers mixed-race marriage to be a punishable offense. I march for civil rights, he tells racist jokes. I'm a fanatic animal lover, he routinely threatens to drop-kick my maltese.

I don't quite know why I've been inclined to make these overtures of friendship. The Scot's friendship never meant anything to me before. But suddenly I find myself wanting to talk to him when our paths cross. I honestly have no idea what's going on. Maybe I'm just tired of hating and resenting him. Maybe I'm just incredibly lonely since losing my sister and my dog. Maybe I'm just growing as a person. Maybe I'm determined to leave this household on a positive note. Whatever the reason, it feels weird!

As for the snacks...I know that some of them at least are because The Scot switched from driving to working on the yard (he's a trucker for P&C) and mom bought the snacks so he'd have something to eat at work now that he can't just pull over at a truck stop and grab something phenomenally unhealthy for himself. I think the rest are just because mom's closing in on menopause and she's feeling rediculously sorry for herself.

As for me, I just watch cartoons and dramas and cartoon dramas...and I blog. Man my life kinda sucks. Even my mom doubts I'll be able to get into college any time soon. This situation is lame...

*slaps self* Stop whining! Go steal cookies!

Puppies FTW!

2008-03-05T20:49:00.001-05:00

Rebel Rocket Renegade

Word Count: 1,000
Liked: Innoncence in the narration
Disliked: A bit of clumsy wording, especially at the end

Puppy-licious hijinks to be found here.

You know, this entry almost didn't happen. I very nearly let it slide, intending to take my punishment instead. I decided that if I didn't get any inspiration by 8:30 (my unofficial deadline to start working) that I wouldn't do anything. But I was watching an episode of Bones on my DVR and there was a cadaver dog...that's all it took.

Sorry, no LOLcat Shakespeare for you!

Owie!

2008-03-04T22:33:00.000-05:00

My wrist is in agony. Owie!

Love me if you Dare:

Word Count: 1,006
Liked: Title and its place in the essay.
Disliked: Nadda

Check out the awesome located here.

As for me? I'm gonna go cradle my wrist and whine some more.

I Called my Story "Selfish". Huh.

2008-03-03T21:43:00.000-05:00

Selfish:

Word Count: 1,024
Liked: Writing in present-tense
Disliked: Going off on tangents

Read the full "Selfish" story here.

So, no one contributed to the PK Graphic Contest. Maybe if I do this thing again (because I'm a crazy person), I'll get more interested readers. Oh, well. Project Kilo is naked. It's an exhibitionist.

I'm reading Vonnegut. Why the hell am I reading Vonnegut? And liking it? It's like my brain has been taken over by a smart person.

For Jen. And, um...Jen.

2008-02-29T22:38:00.000-05:00

Domestic
Word count: 1,000 (because I rawk)
Liked: Yay for emotional honesty!
Disliked: Boo for cheating on deep-sea wildlife descriptions!

Full story here.

Interesting side note: as I was writing this story, I had to check my word count quite frequently. When I typed the words "American Idol", I was surprised to discovere that the word count had reached the figure "666".

Take from that what you will. I choose to see it as proof that American Idol is the spawn of Satan.

CONTEST!!!

2008-02-28T21:39:00.000-05:00

Okay so for those of you who are paying attention, Project Kilo is coming up on a landmark event. Next Monday will be the 10th Project Kilo installment. In honor of that, I've decided to do a little something special.

See, I have this theory that despite the cavernous black hole that is my comments section, there are some people following this project. (Delusional? Maybe.) So, to test this theory, I'm announcing the Project Kilo Graphic Contests.

I'm asking my readers who are artistically inclined to submit a graphic for Project Kilo. I'll announce the winner on Monday with that day's post. If no one participates...well...Project Kilo will just have to go naked a while longer.

So let's have it! E-mail your PK graphics to exceptionalmind@gmail.com over the week-end and I'll pick a winner. The winning graphic will be added to every Project Kilo installment from here on.

Good luck! And don't let me down!

LadyG Turns Inwards

2008-02-28T21:33:00.000-05:00

"Someday..."
Word Count: 1,007
Liked: Captured the emotion I was going for.
Disliked: No real flow.

Read my innermost thoughts disguised as fiction here.

For Michael

2008-02-27T21:37:00.000-05:00

20th post! Woohoo! Somebody bake me cupcakes!

Project Kilo #7: Sanctuary, Part Two
Word count: 1,085
Liked: Um...everything!
Disliked: I wish I had more space. God this was easy to write!

Read the conclusion to yesterday's story here. Dedicated to Michael, my very first cat.