~parade wave~

Things I've Learned by Blogging Every Day for a Month:

1. I'm tenacious. Not as many people kept it up as I thought would. When I first saw over 2000 people on the list I was like, dammit, that's too much competition. But then I started reading some review blogs and discovered tons of people had dropped out or failed to post every day. And I say, people! What the fuck is the matter with you? There were prizes! I would punch an orphan for a prize! Crazy people. I'm the laziest shit there ever was and I did it! Prizes!!

2. I do have some creative juices in my head. Granted, I'm like a lemon. You have to roll me across the counter a few times to get it out of me but give a good squeeze and flow I does! Wait, that didn't come out right...um, anyway, despite a little writers block a few times I just let it happen and I'm very pleased. I tried not to try too hard and honey, I apologize for that one tantrum I had last weekend.

3. No matter how many times I go visit that god damn randomizer thing my blog will not come up and some stupid people come up twice in one freaking day!!

4. My blogroll is ancient and my template is poop. Purple poopy poop. Boring lame poop! Both of which will get updated in short fucking order, I tell you what. It's going to be snazzy.

5. I'm linked by more people than I thought I was, which is tres flattering. Funny thing though, they use all kinds of different tags. Princess Crankypants, Tastes Like Purple, Bitter Betty, and There is no Vodka in this Kool-aid. All of which I'll happily answer to. I'm just surprised I didn't come across Foul-Mouthed Harpy on anyone's links and find my own page pop up, although one can hope...

6. I'm positively addicted to Hershey's kisses. OK, that has nothing whatsoever to do with what I learned about blogging for a month and it's a lie. I didn't discover that through NaBoPloMo, I always knew I was a chocoholic, I just think it's kind of impressive that I've eaten half a bag while writing this entry alone. And also I feel sort of tingly.

7. I've thought so much about posting and did that lemon squeezing thing to myself and now I have entry ideas coming out of my ass. This is all Mrs. Kennedy's fault (thank you thank you thank you, by the way.) But how in the world am I going to get through airport security tomorrow with a saved draft bulging from my pants?

8. There are some...ah...interesting blogs out there. Lid for every pot I suppose, or pot for every teenager, cat for every crazy lady, kid for every mommy, yada yada. Whatever blows your dress up, right? That's what makes the internet great. That and on-line shopping.

9. I didn't have nearly the time to read as many blogs with awesome bloggers (yes YOU) as I wanted to let-alone the regular ones I enjoy because this was the worst possible month of the year to juggle everything I'm juggling and circumstances beyond my control have made Betty a very busy Beotch indeed but I still had a crapload of fun and I intend on doing a lot of reading when things calm the fuck down because there is some great shit out there.

10. Best of all A #1 thing I learned, my voice is appreciated and I seem to make people laugh. Which is a gift for me more than know. To take the time to read my blah blah and comment or smile or spit tea out your nose melts one tiny icy corner of my little frozen heart. Really and truly.

Now you can each have one kiss. I SAID ONE!!

And then...

Some moons ago at about this same time of year I made the trudgingly awful odyssey on a variety of public transportation to visit my folks. Braving shuttle busses and air travel with infected children and surly flight attendants, getting strange germs all over me. STANDING in LINES. I was a trooper.

But it was all worth it. Getting to spend quality moments with my mother so she could tell me my jeans were saggy and my hair dull, and watching my dad in the yard screaming throughout the neighborhood at the dogs to hurry and go potty, come on, go potty. GO POTTY!! ARGH!! Good times...good times.

But I actually did have a pretty good and rare experience that trip and one day in particular was very special. Well, it was that and a wee bit typically injurious because fuck if I can't move more than 2 feet in any direction at any time and not wrap a knuckle on a piece of furniture, brain myself with a shoe or zip my nip up in a sweatshirt.

For a little background, my parents live in Big Sky country with access to Yellowstone National Park mere yards away (which I will still drive to because this bitch, she don't hike.) Here's one memorable day with my dad. Enjoy the splendor with me...

I awoke to the morning sun peaking through the shades of my window. The snow that gently and relentlessly fell throughout the previous day had left our world blanketed in white. Which was in vivid contrast the clouded skies that had turned once again to bright blue. When I later ventured outside the temperature was a chilly 28 degrees but the brilliance of the early afternoon sun instantly warmed my face.

My dad suggested we go for a ride in the park to get out of the house and see what we could see. I gathered my things together and off we went in his beloved dirty pick-up truck with the broken radio and four inch layer of silt on the dashboard. We sat in comfortable silence. Just the hum of the tires against the road. No need for conversation, just me and my dad, together. Windows cracked a bit to breathe in the fresh, mountain air.

I was enjoying the scenery, watching tall pine trees dusted with yesterday's snow whiz by, the river moving gently down stream, and puffed-up geese floating effortlessly against the current. We stopped to see our first creature, a beautiful, healthy, sandy colored coyote who was cruising along the side of the road. I was excited to be this close and leapt out of the truck to snap a quick picture and was amazed to see that the coyote seemed calm amidst the cars pulling quickly over. As he fearlessly looked back at me I got my snapshot and jumped back in the truck.

And then I rolled my hair up in the window.

I turned my head my head to look up a hill and discovered that my skull was attached to the door. After I let out a hearty yelp, and when my eyes finally stopped watering from the shooting pains going directly into the depths of my brain, I released myself from my glass prison and we continued on down the road. More sparkling river to transfix my gaze, more fallen snow across the giant rocks that tumbled down the hillside however many years ago.

I then spotted a lone bull elk lounging in the golden grass, his body heat melting the frozen ground cover away. He was giant and magnificent. Unconcerned with his humanvoyeurss. His huge antlers a sovereign crown on top of his head. We decided to keep driving in hopes of seeing perhaps a group of animals to observe and marvel over.

At last we came upon a large herd of bison across a rolling meadow on the other side of a small vein of the river. There were animals of all sizes, enormous males with long bears, females with deadly horns and sharp eyes, but what caught my attention was a speck of light brown among the dark coats of the other animals. It was a rare late summer birth. It must have just been born, it was so tiny. I had to get closer. I got out of the truck and began quickly walking to a safe but nearer distance away.

And then I stepped in Bison crap.

After assessing thedamagee I spent a few quality minutes scraping my entire right foot against a small rock. Then I moved closer, armed with my binoculars and camera. Having the opportunity to experience a spectacular, wild animal in its natural habitat is a gift that I don't take for granted and seeing a newborn was a treat. The baby was walking on new, shaky legs, obviously tired from the day, and plunked down in the soft weeds for a nap.

The herd was completely uninterested in their human observers. Even as they gazed back at me I felt like I was the one being watched instead of the other way around. It was their territory, their land, their hood. I was merely a guest with limited permission. I felt respect and awe. I felt that I'd invaded their space long enough and carefully headed back to the truck and jumped back in.

And then I smashed my head against the doorframe.

After the the dizzyness subsided, I checked to make sure that all my teeth hadn't been rattled right out of my head and I was not bleeding profusely down my neck, we decided to head back home which is anything than a boring voyage. You never know what you might see when you reverse direction in this part of the country. The elk, bison, eagles and such can move from their previous hiding places, the sunlight changes position and everything seems to take on a new quality. You see everything with a fresh pair of eyes.

And this was such a serene time of year. Not many tourists, not much car or foot traffic. I watched the steam rising from the thermal pools letting them transport me to another time and another space. Imagining the landscape as unchanged for millions of years. I squinted into the sun as I looked at the tops of the mountains, beautiful in their majesty.

We pulled into town, back to civilization. My too-short journey coming to an end. I was calm and at peace, ready to relax for the remainder of the afternoon, spending some time alone with my thoughts of the previous few hours. I took a deep breath of contentment and smiled as we turned onto my parent's street into the driveway.

And then my dad hit the brake too hard, my body snapped forward against the seatbelt, and I swallowed my gum.

It was good to be home.

Yea, what of it!

This is what I think about today.



A big fuck you! Fuck you Tuesday! Fuck you traffic. Fuck you acid reflux burning a hole in my throat! EFF YOU!

Fuck you stupid postal worker woman fucking up my stuff. Fuck you dark meat turkey leg that no one wants sitting all useless in my fridge. EFF YOU!

Fuck you work! Fuck you nasty arrogant stupid customer who wouldn't let me get a word in edgewise inbetween your griping and sniping and not listening then hanging up on my ass! You crusty crotchity crapbag bitch! EFF YOU!

Eff all of you!

Well, except not you or you, or you over there. You guys are OK. But that other chick, FUCK YOU!

Bow CHICA!

The bedroom is a multi-faceted thing. It's a place of rest, a haven, a room where all your dust bunnies go to die. It's also where some pretty strange things happen and entities take over and stuff goes on that, well, doesn't really transfer into certain contexts. But it's all good. Oh yea, it's allllll good.

For instance, when you and your mate, significant other, Friday strange are gettin' it on people change. Forces grab hold. Strange, nasty, naughty transformations take place. Possessions of the prurient kind. Wild. Salacious. Weird.

Just look at porn. In the bright light of day it seems so lame and contrived and there's no way you'd do or say the things those faking sex addicts and paid whores would do and say, now would you? No way Jose. How dumb. Like you'd really screw the pizza boy. Pft. Who needs lacy thongs? And you would never make a face like that no matter what anyone was doing to you.

Until you're in the middle of it all and body's are slamming and things are heated and You. Are. Into. It. Without warning you are foul-mouthed and dirty and you find yourself saying things that make no sense whatsoever but they sound good. Oh so good. Oh yea, baby, that's good.

Suddenly you're gritting your teeth and hissing four letter words and things get lightly slapped and hair is pulled and flesh is grabbed and a voice in the room, your voice, starts to say, yea baby, who's your mama, who's your dirty little mama, baby, who's your DIRTY little MAMA who folds your SOCKS!?! You like it when I fold those socks, don't ya? DON'T YA, BABY!! Oooooo, Ahhhh, YEA. Mama FOLDS those SOCKS real good, doesn't she? Say it! SAY IT! You tell mama what she folds! THAT'S RIGHT, BABY! YOU SAY IT! SOCKS! SOCKS! SOCKS SOCKS SOCKS!!

And you know what? It works. Because he looks you right in the eye with that steamy stare, grabs you by the back of the neck and says the word SOCKS and it's hot. Oh yea, lover, it's fucking HOT! Because you're in that moment. That time. That place. And it works.

But try to leave it there, OK? Don't take it someplace else. Don't bring it to the mall, or the dry cleaners or the dinner table. Because I'm telling you, it's not going to work there.

Pass that butter! Oh yea, you PASS that butter. You dirty little BUTTER PASSER. PASS IT. That's right, pick up that dish and PASS THAT BUTTER!! Dirty little BUTTER PASSER!!

Just like you can't casually ask someone over the salad bowl if they like that cock. Excuse me, honey? Do you like that cock? Should baby give you more cock? How are you finding the cock?

See? Just doesn't work.

Takin' it to a whole new level

When did this become OK?



Because it's not.

It's not OK. It's not even near OK. It's around the corner 4 miles down the road through the back door at the bottom of the creepy stairs into the musty windowless basement beyond the washer and dryer at the far end with the cobwebs and moldy camping gear above the shelf with the rancid canned meat behind the boxes with unknown contents under a decomposing smooshed rat caught in a trap your grandfather set 2 years ago.

That's how far from OK it is.

Day twentymillion

I am drinking, dammit. My 4 day relaxing, ha! not bloody likely, weekend has been a non-stop extravaganza of driving, shopping, line standing, thinking, shopping, thinking, worrying, bitching, crabbing, spending money, line standing, driving, obsessing obsessing obsessing! I'm vowing to put a cork in my own self now before I kill my awesome fucking Christmas fucking spirit!

I'm still tired from my (very stupid) idea of getting up at 4:30 yesterday to see someone's wizz down the side of a wall and hurt my back trying to lift a 200 lb box containing a sub-standard fake tree. I swear, I get energy expenditure hangovers as if I went on some drunken college co-ed weekend to Palm Springs where I consumed nothing but room temperature jello shots and slept for 2 small hours in a cum-stained couch.

Which reminds me, I actually did spend a weekend in Palm Springs with a pile of insane girls one long holiday weekend many moons ago but it wasn't nearly as fun as getting drunk and puking off the second story balcony of the Radisson and getting finger-banged by some hot guy you met at the pool.

Nooo, I had to hook up with 7 of the squarest most holy-roller fat chicks in my dorm who's idea of a good time was seeing a fucking movie and sipping wine coolers alone while we bonded in a Motel 6 after one bitch's car died on a lonesome highway and all of our extra cash went to fix her fucking radiator so no nice accommodations for us.

I nearly put my fist through the face of our one tea-totaling chick after she'd harassed us all for hours to share are innermost feelings, then dramatically grabbed my arm, put her cherry chapstick lips dangerously close to my face and said in the most patronizing tone, "But how are you, Betty, how are you really." As she glanced down at my bottle of booze. Man, that was a lame time.

Anyway, I guess I've sacrificed my Thanksgiving weekend so I can be done with the crazy stuff and I'll be able to enjoy the last few weekends in December including the long Christmas weekend after having all this mayhem behind me. Presents purchase, packages sent, cards mailed. And of course I've already volunteered to host thanksgiving for my whole family next year so I have that relaxing time to look forward to. Gah!

I did go riding this morning and had a really good time. It's a lot of work but it's fun all the same. However, I agreed to go shopping at a new mini-mall with one of my riding buddies after our lesson and even though we only went to 2 stores, it took 3 hours. 3 hours! And did I buy anything for anyone besides me? No, I did not.

I have a rule for Christmas; one present for you, one for me, but um...I'm a little ahead of everyone else. Heh. Oh well, I'll make up for it next weekend when I fly to San Fran for MORE shopping. Call me Glutton.

So, since I've burned the candle at both ends for 2 days now I'm having a glass or 3 of wine, dammit, posting this and going to snuggle with my honey on the couch. See ya tomorrow!

Black Friday of death

Never again. Never EVER again.

NEVER!

AGAIN!!

Never, ever, no way in fucking hell I'd rather have a pap smear with a dirty popsicle stick given by Kevin Federline on a stage in front of 100 prison inmates than go shopping the day after Thanksgiving.

At five oh my god clock in the morning.

What was I thinking? I'll tell you what I wasn't thinking. I wasn't thinking that half the fucking people in this fucking city would also be stupid like me and getting up at the insane hour of 4:30 to hit stores opening at 5:00. That I didn't count on.

And I certainly didn't imagine in my wildest, retarded dreams that people would be camping out at some of these stores all night waiting to save $29.95 on a god damn off-brand computer monitor! I thought the only freaks who still did that were hard-core music fans trying to get some coveted concert tickets and nerds waiting for the newest version of whatever gaming device being released that would insure their celibacy and large waistlines for another year.

I'm am stupid. That's all I can say. I AM STUPID. So, so stupid. Stupid like I need to wear a helmet, stupid. Stupid like if everyone in a 10 miles radius screamed "YOU ARE STUPID" in unison then took turns bitchslapping my face I'd take it because it's well deserved today.

After going to bed a little before 1:00 this morning I kept waking up all 4 freaking hours I was in bed, in anticipation of needing to get up early for this little shopping plan of mine because that's how my stupid brain works. At 4:30 I gave up and got up. I splashed some water on my face, got dressed, said goodbye to the cat who had a "wtf are you doing up" look on her face and set out into the darkness.

My eyes could barely adjust and my body kept saying, "Why? Why are we up? Why aren't we in bed you stupid, stupid woman? I'm going to make you pay for this later, stupid" My first stop being Best Buy to hopefully get a little 15" flat screenTV for the kitchen. Because that's what one should be spending their money on at Christmas.

I AM STUPID.

And I knew they only had 10 per store. I knew that. I knew it would be a crap shoot to actually get one. But please, I couldn't even get into the store to find out that I was stupid to think there was a chance in hell there would be one left on the shelf. There were so many people lined up when the doors opened they had to have multiple police cruisers to control the crowd. Iknew this because I heard one say to the other "They only called us over hear to control the fucking crowd." He wasn't happy about being up either.

I decided to give it a try anyway so when my "group" was finally let in I took about 10 steps into the store, saw my TV was long gone and got the hell out of there. I made my way past the trash and piss left by the campers and headed for my next stop.

I AM STUPID.

Now it's 5:40 and I'm standing in line, in the dark, with other people in front of Linens-n-Things to buy a fake Christmas tree. Which I hurt my back trying to haul into my cart and even after a nice man helped me I ended up ditching the whole thing in the bedding isle because when I saw the fake Christmas tree I didn't like the fake Christmas tree as the lights were not strung to my standards. Because when I'm investing in a fake Christmas tree I don't want the illumination to look like it was done by a drunken, blind toddler. My priorities are totally straight.

I AM STUPID.

After I took care of my red gas light I headed to Target. The sun was coming up but since I feel physically sick at the sight of any sunrise, because my body knows I should be asleep in bed and punishes me with nausea, I didn't care. Again, evidence of campers was strewn across the ground. Blech. When I walked in there were no carts to be had. No carts? Don't they have like 1000 of those things? And that's when I saw the check-out lines. Oi vey. That's all I can say.

I decided to stick it out for awhile because this is my house of worship and I knew I could find some things I needed and hopefully find some presents. I was meandering around when I spied a sales tag for a DVD player for the astounding price of $24.97. But of course since 8 million people had been there for 29 minutes already they were all gone. Dammit.

That's when I spied a lone cart with no obvious owner sitting in front of the soap with one of the cheapy cheap DVD players in it. Oooo, I thought, I WANT that. I have to HAVE it. So I hung around for a minute trying to look all sly and innocent, intently studying the Dove body wash until I thought the coast was clear.

Then I threw my stuff in the cart and took off. HA!! I got it! I totally snaked someone's cart and DVD player. But it had been abandoned anyway, right? HA!! I got the last one! I RULE. Or so I thought until I was on my way to the checkstands and saw a GIANT stack of the damn things sitting by the fucking candy.

I AM STUPID. And apparently a thief.

I made a few more stops and after having an hour-long hotflash in one store decided to hit my last retail establishment of the day and go the farg home. A new Bed Bath and Beyond had opened up somewhere in my town and armed with the semi-confusing map I'd gotten in the mail I headed in the direction I thought it was. Please notice my use of the word "thought". Also, see my post from 11/22. I was not lying.

After driving around for a half an hour, making an illegal U-turn and attempting another one in front of the cop, I finally pulled over to see if I could figure it out or just bail and go home. And that's when the officer who'd obviously seem me and my stupid ass driving in circles pulled up along side my car and rolled down his window.

Oh please oh please, I prayed, don't nail me for my burned out brake light. But I got lucky and he didn't. He knew I was lost and was a totally nice guy and didn't make fun of me when I told him where I was trying to go. I finally made it, hit my shopping and energy wall and went the hell home. I got a few good decorations, a few things we needed, a few presents, and big fat lesson on what NOT to do EVER AGAIN.

I've felt like shit warmed over the entire day and was finally told to GO TAKE A NAP by whitey when I was on hour 2 of whining and aimlessly wandering around the house bugging him because my brain turned into moldy cheese sometime around 9:00 this morning. Now it's going to take me all damn weekend to get back to my normal but first? I'm doing it all again tomorrow. Because...

I AM STUPID.

Givin' thanks

A nice day doing nothing.

Napping.

Eating.

Loving.

Relaxing.

Pouring through every sales flyer stuffing today's paper to catalog all of the things I'm going to try and buy tomorrow and mapping out my shopping route because the obesession with Christmas has reached threat level red don't get too close to me or you will have a santa hat shoved on your head and a bow tied around...something.

And this? Is all mine, bitches. Alllllll mine.



Hope you had a good one.

Pre-holiday hall pass

I had another post up but it's too heavy for a holiday weekend. I'm disappointed about something a "friend" did but meh, it's turkey time and I have a whole pumpkin pie in the freezer all for me. So, instead I will do a meme that I stole from someone who got it from someone else and I know these are relatively lame but it's Thanksgiving, y'all! And a 4 day weekend! And I'm tired! You'll read it and you'll like it! Plus I cut out more than 80% of the questions because they were stupid.

There wasn't a title for this one so we'll have to assume all of these question are preceded by "Have You Ever...", or "Are You That Dumb To Have..., " or perhaps, "Get A Fucking Life You Boring Loser if You Haven't..."

1. Snuck out of the house: Only once but I was old enough to have walked out the front door but my retarded friend Dawn thought it would be "cool" for me to sneak out my window by wrestling the fucking rusted stuck screen off and hurdling over the bushes underneath that subsequently ripped my favorite pair of pants and scratched my virginal vulva.

2. Gotten lost in your city: Are you kidding? I live in one of the largest cities in the country. There are towns and neighborhoods I've never heard of and I've been here for almost my whole life. I've gotten so lost I had to knock on someone's door and have them drive their car with me following in mine to the nearest recognizable street. Tres embarrassing.

3. Been to any other countries besides Canada: Only Mexico which hardly counts since they're practically South California now. (Ooooo, controversial.) I'd love to go to Europe but that would require getting a passport which would take, like, effort, and crossing the ocean in an airplane. And until United Airlines lets me travel in a drug-induced coma I'm not going.

4. Had a serious surgery: 2 of them. My gallbladder in college and my thyroid a few years ago. I spent Spring Break of my senior year having my guts torn out which I still tell people to elicit the mandatory sympathetic "awws" but truth-be-told I would have spent the week playing solitaire at home in front of the TV and fighting with my worthless boyfriend and not flashing cute frat boys in the Bahamas. The thyroid, she was cancerous, and had to come out.

5. Been in a fist fight: Funny thing, I really haven't. As much as I adore intimidation, I don't like physical violence. Usually I have this psychotic reaction to it and start laughing like a crazy person. And the few times I've gotten so mad I could have literally ripped someone's head off and shit down their neck I went blind with fury and scared the crap out of the person I was mad at so they tucked tail and got the hell away from me. My eyes actually change color when I'm that mad, which I've been told is also scary. The only time I could classify an altercation as a fist fight was with my x-husband. I'd been out of town for the weekend and my soon to be ex mother-in-law was watching my dog, or was supposed to, she ended up being out of town too and my crazy soon to be ex-sister-in-law was doing it. My soon to be ex-husband went over to their house and threatened to keep my dog. I hauled ass over there and busted my way through the front door where he tried to tackle me and throw me out and I punched him in the face with my car keys in my hand. Then he picked me up off the ground and kept saying "you hit me, you hit me" and I roared "YOU'RE GOD DAMN RIGHT I HIT YOU NOW PUT ME DOWN!!" Which he promptly did. I pointed my finger in his bleeding face and said "That's the last time. You will NEVER touch me again, motherfucker!" Then I took the dog and left. I was shaken up but it felt great. Kapow! Right in the face. Take that, fucker.

6. Swore at your parents: Oh boy. Here's an uncomfortable memory. There weren't any bad words said in my house. I probably heard my parents swear a handful of times my whole life, well, until recently and now they're semi-potty mouths. Every now-and-then my mother would say someone was an ass, but she didn't and still doesn't say it right and draws out the "a" all wrong. "He was such an aaaaaaaaaaass." It's weird. I always knew that cussing would get an explosive reaction so I didn't do it, until I was about 23. It was Christmas and I was home from college and my dad was out of town, which meant my mother's alternate personality was out and about. The one she reserved just for when we were alone and her set of rules were in force. We got into a YOOG fight over something or other and she crossed the line and said a very hurtful thing to me, as usual. We were already yelling at the top of our lungs so the only trump card I had was swearing, so I screamed, "WELL, MERRY FUCKING CHRISTMAS!!" Then her eyes popped clean out of her head, which was exactly the reaction I wanted, and I stormed out of the house. 1 point for Betty.

7. Been in love: I thought I'd been in love before. But it could only be categorized as crushes, infatuations, insanity, flings, or deep affections, until I met whitey. This is the real deal and my heart still stops when I see him. My stomach does a flip when I think about him. And my soul is full when I touch him. And he has a nice ass.

8. Been skydiving: You are fucked in the head if you think I'd ever go up in an airplane and then jump out of it. Fucked. In. The. Head.

9. Shoplifted: Um, no? Oh, alright, yes. There was a time when I was in high school where I had some pretty sticky fingers. But it was all candy and make-up. Skors were my drug of choice at the time and they were so easy to steal. And I had one of those reversible ski jackets with pockets on both sides. So I'd grab a lip gloss or something and slyly stick it into the inner pocket thinking that if anyone caught me and asked me to empty my pockets I'd pull the big Bambi eyes of innocence and turn my front pockets inside out, showing them they were totally empty. Then I'd be all indignant and pissy and tell them my dad was a lawyer and I might sue from the injustice of it all!! Which was a total lie and so stupid because all they had to do was have me take the jacket off and the shit would fall out onto the floor. So dumb.

10. Slept with a co-worker: Without going into dirty details, yes, a few years ago pre-whitey. It was the intern. 10 years younger. Go me! Ha! Although he sucked at all of it and refused to let me be his "teacher" thus ruining that fantasy for me. Little asshole.

And one for good measure.

11. Fired a gun: I have and I liked it. I've actually fired several different kinds including rifles, but I liked the 38 revolver the best. One day with rednecks in the mountains shooting full cans of beer and clay pigeons and you'll be a convert if you don't like guns now. They are very powerful but also empowering. Just make sure you don't point the thing right at your fucking kneecap when there's still a round stuck in the chamber like someone, that could have been me, did. Will scare the piss right out of you. AND DON'T KILL ANIMALS! OK? OK.

And another...

It was just sitting there. In the dark. All alone on the counter. To the right of the fridge, downwind from the coffee nips hidden in the cupboard and in front of the decorative plastic rooster napkin holder. A good distance away from my television-watching parents in the living room and resting in the kitchen blind spot.

I had to have it. Just a taste. A mere spoonful wasn't too much to ask for.

My eyes had turned into devilish pinwheels of glee and my tastebuds were tingling. I knew that if I snuck down the hallway real quiet-like, a pre-pubescent chubby mouse if you will, I could possibly be stealth enough to silently glide past the back of my mom's head without her seeing me since she was the force to be reckoned with. God knows I could do jumping jacks with a wolverine on my head in front of my father and he wouldn't notice a thing.

I kicked off my shoes and in my rainbow toed socked feet shuffled to the edge of the dining room, held my breath, sucked in my tummy, and tip-toed around the corner of the bar past the dang phone hanging on the wall that I brained myself on every god damn day, and into the kitchen. Just a few more steps and I would reap my major award. Ha! No one could see me now, no one could stop me, I just needed to be very, very quiet.

I gingerly leaned over the glistening white tub and stared at it for a minute in awe. And as my eyes adjusted to the dim light I saw the glorious words written across the top. COOL WHIP. Oh, the joy of an unprotected tub of creamy delight. I didn't remember my mother buying one of my very favorite treats recently but no matter. Dad had eaten all of the ice cream and this was better anyway!

I put my little fingers on the edge of the lid and oh so silently and carefully bent it upwards, then as gently as if I was handling a new born baby bird, lifted the top off and noiselessly placed it on the counter. The frothy white goodness beckoned to me. It called my name. It dared me.

I raised my hand above my head, thrust my pointer finger to the sky with silent triumph, then dipped it into the container all the way to the bottom scooping up as much as I could. I opened my mouth in sweet anticipation of the sugary treat I was about to eat...

And much to my utter horror and shocking nasty gagging surprise I discovered that the fucking Cool Whip tub was fucking filled with white fucking paint.

Photo play and a haiku

From color to not
No more cleaning, Betty beat
Fuck you silverfish

Call me killer

Another day in the garage cleaning out shit. I actually managed to get dirtier this weekend than last, but another metric ton made its (unlawful) way to a local dumpster. 2 car trips, again. Felt great. I found something I've been looking for and didn't find 2 others. I fear they're gone for good. Which is a bummer but what are ya gonna do.

I ran into yet more disgusting, vile, putrid, unholy silverfish (why, God, WHY?) and discovered that little baby ones are white. Which you might think would make them less horrific but in fact it makes them more a product of Lucifer himself and I discovered that the volume of my squeals are directly related in an inverted fashion to the size of the hateful little fuckers. The smaller the bug the louder I scream. Bleh.

We also discovered a lot of stuff with chew marks. Paper, stuffed animals (grrr) boxes, old tennis shoes (again, why the fat do I keep that shit?) However, I didn't see much evidence of critters so I'm praying to the Universe and a few other deities that whatever living things that might have made their way into my garage, messing with my personal things, infringing on my life are gone, never to return. Because I might be a lover of furry creatures, but nobody fucks with me or my stuff and gets away with it.

Observe...

You're Cute Now Die

A few years ago when I was living in my last house, which happened to be a tri-level awesome kick-ass pimp pad, I was minding my own business with my doggie in our large kitchen and before my eyes I did see scurrying across the dark wood floor was a little gray mouse.

"Oh, how cute." I said to myself.

Then I said "hey, wait a minute, I'm on the third floor, how the hell did little Mr. Fuzzybutt get all the way up here?" "I know what I'll do. I'll ignore it."

And that's what I did. Until Mr.Fuzzybutt showed up with his buddy Sir Shitsalot with his gang of Shitters and Harem of Reproducing Whores and now we were in trouble.

But first, I was stupid.

A couple weeks after the first sighting and after spending those weeks pretending that I didn't have a problem, I found mouse poop in the cupboard under the sink. That's when I decided I probably needed to do something about this small little inconsequential issue I thought I might have.

Not wanting to kill a living creature I opted for a humane trap. I bought a sturdy little cage that wouldn't snap any necks, placed a little peanut butter on the trigger thing and set it under the kitchen sink.

It didn't take long and I heard a little "clink". Wow, that was quick, I must be some type of mouse whisperer. How cool am I? Problem solved, done and done. I opened the cupboard to see twitching whiskers and a shiny black nose staring back at me.

"Oh, how cute." I said to myself.

Then I gently carried the trap outside and across the street where there were no houses and flung Mr. Fuzzybutt into the bushes. Go have a nice life you little sweetie. Then I put the trap away since I wouldn't need it any more.

A few days later I was again in the kitchen and before my eyes did I see but a little gray mouse scurrying across the wood floor.

"Oh. Shit." I said to myself.

I retrieved the humane trap from the garage and set it up again. 2 minutes later I heard the "clink". I went outside and once again deposited Mr. Fuzzybutt into the bushes scratching my head and wondering to myself how the hell did he get back into the house.

A few more days after that before my eyes I did see but a little brown mouse scurrying across the wooden floor through the doorway and into the dining room.

"WTF?"

"Uh. Oh." I said to myself. That was not Mr. Fuzzybutt.

And that's when I knew I was retarded and it wasn't the same mouse I was ditching out of my house but god knows how many had set up camp in my walls.

I live-trapped mouse after mouse after mouse. Cleaned up mouse poop that got in places I still can't figure out how they managed to cram their little asses into. And finally, the trap stood empty.

For about 2 weeks.

Know what the average gestation for a mouse is? About 2 weeks.

Sitting in my kitchen, blah blah, what did my eyes see, yada yada.

"Fucking hell shit damn. Oh. My. God."

I think I trapped about 13 wobbly little babies until the trap again went silent.

For another 2 weeks.

Rinse. Repeat.

And just when I thought I was in the clear, one night I was watching TV in my bedroom, 2 full floors below the kitchen, and before my eyes I did see?

ANOTHER FUCKING MOUSE SCURRYING ACROSS THE FUCKING FLOOR 8 INCHES IN FRONT OF MY POOR ELDERLY DOGS FUCKING NOSE.

"AHHHHHH. FUCK"

Get out the live trap, BLAH BLAH!! FUCK!

But this time the little assholes were too smart for me and the trap remained empty.

Then one night, about 1:30 in the morning I was woken by a curious noise.

"Clang clang crunch crunch clang."

I got up to try and figure out what the hell that noise was and to my utter disbelief and consternation, those little bastards had stolen a gigantic chunk of dog bone left on the floor and hauled it into the fireplace in my room and were banging it away against the metal fire wall while devouring it like the pig bitches they are. Mocking me. After shutting them up by jamming my blow dryer into the crack they were hiding in, I knew what I had to do.

You mess with my sleep and your ass is mine. Motherfuckers.

The next day I bought RAT poison and killed them all.

The End.

Gyno daze

Oh, lucky, lucky me, it's that time of year again. Time for the tit smash, the cold duck bill and the industrial-sized tube of lube. The reminder card has been sent and received and I'll make the call on Monday. Yes, Monday. I'm sure I'll dial the phone on Monday. First thing. Yep. I can't wait.

And since when do doctors send reminder cards? The only ones I know who do this are dentists and gynecologist. Dentists I understand. They are sadistic by nature and love nothing more than diving into your mouth with sharp sticks and drilling holes into your skull. You'd think full-time twat-lookers wouldn't be so eager to look at all manners of lady parts day after day. I mean, really, have you ever perched low over a hand mirror? It looks like an industrial accident down there.

I get into such a resigned mood when I have to do this. When I was a teenager and in my 20's it was no big deal. But the older I get the worse it is. You'd think it would be the opposite but noooooo, it's even more nerve-wracking now. Maybe because I know how crappy it's going to be or that for years and years I've manage to not rip one in the doctors face and I know my luck will eventually run out. Because then I will have to kill myself with a tongue depressor right then and there.

The whole thing is so bizarre. Hi, I don't know you, would you like to see my vagina? And it's bad enough you already have a paper gown on the size of a McDonald's napkin but when you finally put your feet in the stirrups they make you move down, move down please, move a little further, down a little more, just a little more, scoot just a little more. Until you're positively sure you're cooter is right on top of the doctors nose and your asshole is winking to the beat of My Sharona in anticipation of the big poopshoot invasion.

Nakedness, weird positions, boob handling, finger bangs, spreading legs, gallons and gallons of grease, and not even dinner first. WTF?

Ever since I was diagnosed with cancer I have to get mammograms too. Now that is an experience. Hi, I don't know you, would you like to fondle my tits? Someone asked me once what it felt like and I instructed her to take her top and bra off, lay down on the floor of the garage, get her husband pull her tits across the ground as far as they will go, then slam the garage door down on top of them about 5 times each. That's about it.

The first time I had the pleasure I told the technician, "listen, lady, I like it rough but this is ri-goddamndiculous." Thankfully she laughed. I tried that same joke last year on another tech and Atilla the Bunned didn't even smirk, and I think she pinched my nipple on purpose.

But we know how important it all is. Women have to stay on top of these things and take control of their health because most of the money is going to the drug research companies making sure dicks can stay hard for 3 straight years and to perfect the transfer of knuckle hair into head hair. But that's a soapbox for another time.

So, we all know it sucks and you walk out of there leaving snail tracks down the hallway, your boobs spend a little time looking like a flesh-cake, and a virtual stranger gets intimate with your crinkle star, but you gotta do it, alright? You GOTTA DO IT. Take care of your pussy, don't be one.

I am calling on Monday.

Oops?

Things you don't want to hear when getting your teeth cleaned;

"Wow. That's a lot of blood."

Oh, alright. I'll take it.

So. Mr. Clooney is once again People's choice for sexiest man alive.



OK. I get it. He's been in my top 5 for a looooooong time. He's charming and unapologetic and can smell a dumbass from a mile away through that perfect little nose of his that rests on top of a manly chiseled chin which rounds out his handsome, always slightly smirking face. But come on. People totally launched a soggy softball with this one. I can think of quite a few others a tad more deserving of this completely vapid yet entertaining contest.

For example:

Patrick Dempsey. Who , by the miracle of time and good genes went from this:



To this:



I'm pissed like a wet cat that I didn't get on the Grey's Anatomy bandwagon and now I'm desperately out of the loop and refuse to watch any episodes from this year until I borrow the first 2 seasons on DVD from my friend and park my tryptophan-ladened ass in front of the TV over the 4 day Thanksgiving weekend and get at least caught up until I can watch reruns of the news ones in the Spring. Doctor McDreamy and a pumpkin cheesecake all to myself? Talk about multiple orgasms.

And what about this guy?



He a man. He a real man. He real dirty man, but no bother. He's fricken hot! And funny! And manly. I would have liked to see Mike Rowe grace the cover of People with a tuxedo and a pile of dead fish. So he hasn't started a global campaign to fight a deadly disease, he's still hot. He'd make you laugh until you peed then he'd clean you up because he it not afraid of a little pee. He's not afraid of a giant elephant-sized tidlewave of pee. You just know all of his t-shirts smell like sweet sweat and expensive cologne. (And hopefuly not pee.)

Of course the editors of People could never, never, ever, EVER go wrong with the one and only numero uno crush of my life (besides whitey) beautiful perfect talented smoldering could sip hot soup from my bare hands man. ~sigh~ Hi, Johnny! Need I say more? No, I needn't.



Even though I'm not jumping for joy over the choice of The Clooney, I'll put on a brave face and gently finger through the magazine when it gets here on Friday and give every single male on every single page my utmost attention. It's the least I can do. Right? Right.

Speaking of crushes...I've had my fair share. I appreciate a nice face, a thick pair of thighs, and a kick'n personality, as we all do. Whitey has his porn girls and I have my entertainers. Occasionally I'll foray into another medium, like reality TV stars. Mark from the original Road Rules still blows my dress up even though he's probably working at Home Depot when he's not on some ridiculous MTV challenge, he's still fair game for the inner teenager who runs at least half of my brain.

Most of the time I have good taste. Make rational choices. Pine over decent people. All perfectly innocent, mind you, since it's all fake, daydreamy stuff anyway that we all do. We admire Brad Pitt with long hair or short, Matthew McConaughey playing bongos in the nude, and Taye Digs with his rock-hard abs. All good, yes?

Well, sometimes I, um, lose my mind a little. I get a teeny, tiny bit crazed over a questionable icon. A very, small, miniscule, hardly noticeable obession. Now and then I might pay a lot of money to get as close as possible to a very embarassing person I have, for reasons unknown to me or anyone else on the planet except elderly ladies, those from the South or gay men, a microscopic adoration for.

And perhaps, once in awhile I might purchase a t-shirt and a poster then wait outside a venue until the special person finally comes out 2 hours later to ask for an autograph I don't even want watching him scribble the wrong name because I couldn't form a coherent sentence when they asked me, on the aforementioned poster just so I can come within a few scant feet of the person.

Occasionally, I'm insane.

But I get over it! OK! I GET OVER IT!

I SAID I GOT OVER IT!!

I totally got over it.

Shut up.



"Keep on dancin', Buddy"

Winking wankers

Fucking winkers. Don't wink at me. I don't know you like that. We don't have an unspoken thing. There's no secret. No telepathic inside joke. No simpatico, you fucking freak.

You trying to be sly? You attempting to give me some kind of hint that I'll know what the fuck you mean? Just what are you trying to tell me? Little Jimmy fell down the well? The eagle has landed? How yoooooou doin'?

What is that? Who does that? The sleezeballs and dorks, that's who. But whatever it is I don't care. I don't want to know. I want no part of your creepy, patronizing, 70's porn star insincere facial tick. It's weird. And icky. And frankly, it pisses me off. You might as well pat me on the head, of which you'll pull back a bloody stump, you smarmy fucking bastard.

Unless you have tourette's or a twitch, ENOUGH WITH THE WINKING!! You just leave that winking eye alone, Winker Winkerson. Blink like a normal person. Both eyes at the same god damn time.

And sweet fancy Moses, don't pair a fucking wink with double fucking finger guns. Fuck!

My quirks are cute

Perfectly reasonable normal rational understandable ordinary healthy natural typical regular totally and completely sane fears.

That I have.

Which could kill me.

Yes they could.

Drowning
Plane crash
Car accident
Headless horseman
Murdered
House fire
Falling off cliff
Spontaneously springing over high-rise balcony
Tripping off subway platform and run over by train
Ron Jeremy
Eaten by grizzly bear
Water heater explosion
Choking on food
Asthma attack
Bumping into Courtney Love
Killer bees
Rattlesnake bite
Roller coaster derail
Cave collapse
Trampled by mob at Nordstrom anniversary sale
Cancer
Losing eye walking past sharp clothing rack arm
Possessed scarecrow
Boulder rolls onto my non-dominate hand while hiking
Credit card debt
Poisoned after accidentally using Tilex as shampoo
Cell phone triggered gas pump explosion
Aliens
Zombies
Michael Jackson
Giant squid
Stroke
Snapped elevator cable
Flesh eating disease
Earthquake
Tidal wave
Giant man-eating house spider
Thing under my bed
Silverfish
Clowns
Crazy-eyed hospital orderly
Lake monster

And now THIS!

Sunday dane bramage

For the life of me I can't think of a decent topic to write about today. I'm so distracted and into this organizing/pre-moving/cleaning-out stuff that my brain was put on auto-pilot at 5:30 this morning and I didn't snap out of it until I realized that I'd trapped myself inside the guest room by piling up garage sale shit in front of the door. And I still kept going and going and going until my back said, "hey bitch, SIT DOWN."

I was going to finish up and spend the rest of the day relaxing but here I am, three hours later and I'm finally taking a break. But it all feels good. Well, almost all. Dropping the fucking printer on my toe and getting the sliver of glass in my pinkie didn't feel good. Although, despite my self-injurious nature, I got a ton and half done. My mother would be so proud of me. For at least 5 whole minutes. Heh.

_______________________________________________________

Why do I come across and watch the same 20 minutes of the same movie playing 5 times in the same weekend? How does that happen? What is the universe trying to tell me? That I'm being punished for being naughty with stupid movies as my only choice for my day off or that I'm being rewarded for some good deed I've undoubtedly done by seeing Brendan Frasier's oily pecs circa 1999 fighting mummies with a bullwhip? Eh, I'll take the latter. Thanks, Universe!

_______________________________________________________

Since this is rather lame and skimpy on the content today I will give you a movie review.

Last night we watched Nacho Libre starring the comic genius that is Jack Black, whom I adore. I had mediocre hopes for this flick since I've heard both good and bad things about it so I figured it would fall somewhere in the middle. Not a bust-a-gut, not a shit hole. More of an occasional laugh outloud, a few guffaws, and long periods of silence. And for the most part I was right. It had all three but more periods of long silence than I thought it would.

I'm not sure what Jack was going for, besides the obvious hilarity, but this one falls way short. Before the movie starts you get a big flash of the Nickelodian logo so I knew right away they were catering to kids more than anything else. Kids who like wrestling and farts.

And hey! I like farts too! Well, I don't like farts but I do think they're funny. A well-placed ripper is always worth a laugh from me. (Except When they're launched by a certain someone in a silent-but-deadly sneak attack in the confines of my garage where it hits me in the face with full-punch force and doesn't disapate for 10 whole minutes.) But a whole movie can't rest on gastrointestinal eruptions alone.

The bad things about this movie: It wasn't near funny enough. There was some stupid, weirdo crossed-eyed old guy they flashed on in audience scenes about a hundred fucking times and you never knew why or who this stupid guy was. (So annoying.) Jack's wrestling partner guy was painfully fugly and hard to look at. And there were lame-ass sound effects added that never, ever work unless they're in an actual cartoon. Ix-nay on the aim-lay oises-nay. Okay?

The good things about this movie: Well placed poots. Jack does manage to make you laugh outloud more than once and one time I was pretty loud about it. It makes you appreciate his talent. Um, I can't think of 4 good things so you'll have to be satisfied with 3.

All-in-all I say don't even get this on Netflix, Pay-per-view, or at the rental store. Wait until it's on HBO or regular TV. You won't be put off of Jack Black for good because of this 65% stinker, but anything less than 50% funny shouldn't cost you a dime.

Jack redeems himself here. Be careful, there's a-cussin' in this one.

As time goes by

I just spent about 3 hours cleaning out a portion of my one car garage. My one car garage that has enough shit in it for a 3 car garage, minus the cars. It was dirty and smelly and why, God? Why the silverfish? What purpose do they serve other than eating my precious paper memories and making me squeal with revulsion.

I'm fairly certain one of them made me have a seizure.

In anticipation of putting my condo on the market in January (we've chosen Portland, OR since I keep forgetting to mention that), my condo that is also stuffed to the hilt with crap, I decided we needed to make some room out in the garage before we can do a crap transfer from the house to the garage. (That was one weirdly awkward sentence, sorry.) But before we even got started on that, and despite my ~cough~ debilitating illness, I was up early enough to drag whitey out of bed and to a local discount center we'll call Hellmart to buy more large storage containers to put said crap in. I have been very industrious today for a sick person.

It needed to be done anyway but several factors this week in particular has put the idea of moving as a definite thing. A co-workers husband rendered himself paralyzed from the neck down last weekend from trying to ride a neighbors crotch-rocket motorcycle and after a day of drinking. And another teenager done got himself killed driving his car too fast and into a tree a couple of miles from my house.

After getting the devastating updates about co-workers hubby, and driving past the killer tree every day and seeing hundreds of flowers and kids slumped over on the median crying over their friend, and from sitting in the god damn fuck ass traffic for an hour and a half every night to try and make the 18 mile trek home from work, I've had enough. Time to suck it up and stop being a sissy girl and take the plunge.

I came home on Thursday and said, "Baby, we're going. We're moving just as soon as we can get this house in order and sell it. We're cleaning out the the garage on Saturday working our way through everything else. We're going to Portland sight unseen if we have to. I love you and life is too short. We need a change. We need to carve out a better life to be happier. To be in the position to have the things we want. I need to do something that scares me. Just wanted to keep you in the loop." Then he laughed and said, OK.

And speaking of scary, back to the garage. Let me tell you, it was gee-roce. I threw away a lot of stuff that I could probably sell in a yard sale or give away or keep, but it was so covered with icky garage gunk from sitting there for the last 8 years that I gingerly picked things up with my garden-gloved covered hands and tossed them into garbage bags. And even worse than that, some type of critter (I'm praying it was a bunny) used my space as their own personal penthouse and the, uh, evidence was everywhere.

I'm convinced I now have hantavirus.

I knew what a lot of the boxes and bags contained but after so much time you forget what's really there. It was fun to come across my coveted Barbie camper, which I stupidly covered in stickers thus ruining it because my brain was made of cheese, and the United Barbie's Friend Ship airplane that no other little girl I knew had. I was such a pimp.

I revisited a few of my stuffed animals, thanks for eating the nose off one of my brown bears, "bunny." And found a box of my old school papers and such, complete with report cards. Man, I was a shitty student some of the time. Putting in effort when I felt like it. I'm not dumb, but I can make some lame decisions. I had A+ papers right next to F's. No wonder my parents gave up hounding me about school. What a turd I was.

It was hard work and DIRTY, (where's Mike Rowe when I need him?!?) But it was also fun. Especially when I came across a pile of old clothes and unmentionables that I have no earthly fucking idea why I was holding onto and whitey coined the phrase "20 year-old cunt stain." Let your imagine fly with that one. We're still laughing about it 2 hours later.

I got rid of the equivalent of 6 large trash bags of shit and it wasn't really hard to let any of it go. In fact, it gets easier every time I do this. It also felt good to be one more step towards organization, that elusive little bastard I'm always chasing. And most of all, it made me excited to move. To have a place all our own that we start out together, no one moving in with anyone else. To get our own special spaces decorated with our own personal treasures and to make the shared rooms exactly that way we want them. To make a new life in new place with the person you love. To create a home.

I'm positive this is the right thing to do.

It's beginning to look a lot like crazy

Oh dear. It's not even halfway past November yet and it's already started. It's been creeping into my psyche for a few weeks now, after a long, long absence. I can't fight it anymore. I used to be into it. Really into it. Then I wasn't into it at all and actually rebuked it pretty hard core. Then I became neutral about it. Until now.

I'm obsessed with X-mas. It's sickening. And I think it's going to get nothing but worse. I have a bad feeling the house will smell like pine before Thanksgiving and then we're going to have a pine tree/turkey aroma battle and that turkey is going to win and the living room will eventually smell like cold meat. I fear that flannel will find its way into my house. Things are going to be wrapped in tinsel.

I suppose this is a natural progression of things. When you're single it doesn't much matter if you simmer cinnamon potpourri on the stove or have a gallon of eggnog in the fridge. But when you have a significant other, or in my case a boyfriend, some psychotic girlfriend DNA is sparked to life at the first roll of holiday wrapping paper you see and you get all crafty, hand-making him a stocking decorated with glitter fabric pens and stuffing it full of his favorite things like skittles and porn.

You dress in red and green and don godforsaken necklaces adorned with mini wooden clothespin reindeers given to you by your crazy Aunt Agnes which would normally be a repulsive, suck-ass loser gift you wouldn't wear unless your mother draped it over your fresh corpse with that blackwatch plaid skirt you hate but now seems like a really god damn good idea. Which, it is not, but you're blinded by the ever-present twinkling lights and Christmas muzak pumping through the mall and exceptionally stupid things become, well, non stupid.

But, pft, I'm way past that kind of nonsense. I'm older now. I've done the hyper holiday hoor thing. I won't be spending any of the big celebrations coming up with family, it'll just be me and my man. And yet. I can't stop thinking about it. If I keep this up I'm on track to become some trash-mouth Martha Stewart making placecards for the cat's food bowl out of twigs and orange rind and sending whitey onto the roof to hang a string of blue icicle lights around an animatronic Santa's wang.

My advertisement saturation level is becoming astounding. Not only am I collecting every random catalog that I can get my hands on but I'm stealing them from work. Well! People shouldn't leave those things out plain-as-day on their desks. It's practically an engraved invitation for me to take it. And I'm pouring through every piece of drugstore junkmail stuffed into my mailbox. I've started a gift idea list for people I don't even like.

And, I'm ashamed to say, I've been making a game plan for shopping on Black Friday. A game plan. Not even a casual, maybe I'll hit some stores when I wake up, thing. I'm talking about checking out the multiple websites that (illegally, legally, I don't careily) get hold of stolen store flyers and post rumors of sales. All so I can map out the most sensible driving route and deciding if I want to wake up at 5:00 or 5:30. In the morning. Just so I can get a fake, pre-strung with lights Christmas tree for $29.00 dollars off the original price.

Poor whitey. He's starting to look at me like I've grown another head on top of the already crazy one I have. A head wearing an animal print Santa hat and jingle bell earings. He doesn't give half a wit about this shit but he's such a good guy that I know when I come skipping through the front door and spill a shopping bag full of glittery accessories and Christmacy crap at his feet he'll muster up a smile and give me his full attention when I shove the 4 foot dancing penguin with the knitted scarf in his face and he'll repeat, "yes, babe, it is cute."

No one is safe now.

Bass be da keeness peas

And so it started today...

~sniffle~

Dammit.

Snot running down

~cough~

Shoot.

Chest feeling tight.

~gulp~

Fuck.

Razors in throat.

~ow~

Shit.

Painful ear.

Crap. Crap. Crappity crap.

(That one was a comment not an action.)

I would like to know which non-handwashing bitch pig at my office put their infected hands all over the doorknob to the bathroom thus passing on their nasty germs to me. What rotten little ankle biter spewed their foul contagiousness into my refreshing clean virus-free air. Who poisoned me with their petulant putrid polluted pestilent plague.

When I find out I'm going to kick. Your ass. Or breathe on you. Or make you eat one of my used tissues. Just as soon as I get over this noxious scourge I'm undoubtedly coming down with. A pox on you, filthy illness passer. A POX!

~sneeze~

Order in the court!

I have several addictions. No, Betty, say it ain't so. IT'S SO! Or maybe it's a routine. Yes, let's call it that. When I get home from work I do a few things every day. I strip off my clothes including my medieval torture device bra, undies and socks and put on a t-shirt & yoga pants to free my girls and be comfy. I check my e-mail, eat some cheese, then turn on the TV and tune into something mindlessly entertaining before a few sitcom-reruns and until prime-time starts at 8:00 where I will have to invest energy because dayum, Lost is hectic and American's Next Top Model is too fabulously insane to be a zombie through.

What I watch during this un-wind time usually changes from year to year. For awhile I was into Wheel of Fortune. Vanna White is an alien, no mistakes about it, but Pat Sajak is funny as hell and you can just tell he's fighting himself every night from working totally blue with his jokes. Someday I would love to hear that he's finally busted out an f-bomb on air. "No you fucking idiot, you can't buy an S, can't you see there's already 3 fucking S's on the fucking board?"

And this is pretty much why I gave up on this one because it pissed me off every time some idiot would buy a vowel and unnecessarily spend money when it was so obvious what the vowel would be.

"TIM- WILL T-LL"

Some idiot; "I'll buy an 'E', Pat."

What? WTF? You bought an "E"?!? You idiot! You deserve to lose $500 for that move. Stupid idiot. Then I'd get all yelly and red and a wee bit beyond reasonably upset, so, I had to give it up.
Then I watched Jeopardy for a bit and was always so proud of myself when I knew an answer and the eggheads didn't. I will boast and tell you that twice, twice, in my life I got the big money final jeopardy answer correct and none of the contestants did. Yea, that's right. I'm a jeeneous. Then whatshisface's snarky mid-show interviews got boring and there's only so many times I can watch nerds get excited over Quantum Theories of Russian existential Poets Starting with 'Z'. So I gave that up, too.

Sometime this year when I started getting home earlier than I used to I got hooked on People's Court with Judge Marilyn Milian. She is brilliant. A feisty Latina of Cuban decent (she talks about this a lot) who's always hissing some totally bizarre Spanish saying when it's warranted, as she leans over her desk and points her finger right at a defendants face making them wince with shame. Then she tells you in English what she just said in Spanish and it never packs the same punch through the translation. "The hammer of the striker is always weaker than the nail of the hammers hammer, is." But she's still great.

As much as I love Judge Marilyn with her red lipstick and sassy ways, my heart belongs to another robed firecracker that I've been devoted to for going on 2 years now.

Judge Judy. Sigh. Judge Freakin' Judy.

I luh her. She scares the living piss out of me but I luh her a lah. You do not want to fuck with Judge Judy. She will eat you up and spit you out then put you back together than chew you up again and force you to eat your own mangled remains. She will sport laser beams from her eyes and burn holes into your skull. She will verbally kick your ass so hard your mother will feel it. She will make you suffa. She will make you cry.

I don't know who she thinks she fooling with that little dainty doily collar she's got on her robe because she's about as similar to a sweet old granny sitting in a rocking chair as a spitting cobra is to a baby bunny. And I cannot fathom why anyone would sign up for and voluntarily take their case in front of her. She doesn't care if you have a Matterhorn's worth of rock-solid evidence against the person you're suing, if you've done something dumb she will widen her crazy eyes, draw her head back then snap it forward at you and scream "YOU. AH. STUPID!!"

And if you try, oh my god, to lie to her she will rip your head off, put her high heel through it, take a crap into the open cavity then instruct Byrd to give it back to you. And speaking of Byrd, he's awesome in his own right too. It cracks me up the way he acts so fucking uninterested and unimpressed with every single dipshit that comes into that courtroom. The way he slowly saunters over to a plaintiff with a grimace of total distaste on his face then never, ever makes eye-contact while lazily outstretching his hand, just out of reach so they have to lean over, to take their evidence. Fargin' slays me.

Case as case after case it's the same thing. Unprepared people (Ah doan hab it wit me, ya onna) hicks who've made 5 kids by the time they're 22 (his father is one of 4 guys for sure, judge), and women giving loser men all of their money (but I loved him). And peppered in-between are a bunch of interesting suits that are so weird or juicy you can't wait to see how she'll rule, what she'll say, and who will leave the courtroom a bloody mess. It's fantastic!

And anyone who picks a book title like this one is a QUEEN in my world.

Pity the fool

Oy vey, eesh and ugh. There have been moments my life that are so embarrassing they make me wince and recoil and flinch causing me to draw my shoulders up in a posture of self-protection and my butthole slams shut. Then I make a face that looks like someone has just put a steamy turd under my nose and the essence of chagrin comes out of my pores and I shudder in the memory of some never to be forgotten regretful loser ass dumb lame didn't stop long enough to think about it before I did it thing.

I normally think of myself as relatively cool, but we have all had times like these in our past, right? RIGHT?!? SAY RIGHT!! Some verbal dysentery or written vomitosis that sprung forth from our being that didn't waft down from the heavens light as a feather landing delicately on the groud, but rather sprang across the sky like a trebuchet loaded with a shit bucket that splatters over the earth and everyone downwind gets hit.

Tripping up and falling into a puddle of poop when no one is looking is bad enough, but taking a flying leap into a pool of stupid in front of other people sucks. Of which we all recover from, I'm sure, and maybe I'm unique here, but I've done a few things in my life that never fail to make me positively cringe when I think about them. Which I theb have to put effort into stuffing them back into the far away recesses of my warped brain and soothe myself with chocolate. (Of course I "soothe" myself with chocolate if I chip a nail, so , there you go.)

In thinking about what to write today this was the actual topic I came up with since I love to tell a story because hell, why keep all of these humiliations inside my own brain? Why not POST THEM ON THE INTERNET. Then I remembered ~gulp~ a certain poem I wrote a few years ago that I had the ~bleh~ super idea to POST ON THE INTERNET so why not do that again? And the really weird thing? I wrote and posted it exactly 4 years ago to the day. I find that very spooky. And um, it does not make me a dork in anyway. OK?

Anyway, those who read it were cool and gave me props which is saying a lot for them because behold, it is spectacularly bad.

The Thief

I'm a thief, a swindler, a crook and a faker
A dastardly peaceful moment taker
I didn't ask permission to do what I did
I just went and I took it like a spoiled kid
A moment of calm for my stormy soul
To soothe my heart that has been so cold
I forced the sun to touch my face
And lift my spirits without any haste
I sat on a bench that wasn't mine
For it was about gosh darn dang time
To steal this second this minute this hour
And turn around this feeling of sour
I didn't care if the ocean was free
I stole a look anyway,
go ahead, sue me
I sneaked a peak at a lovers embrace
I didn't leave a mark not even a trace
I thought of my friends, the old and the new
And knew it was time to climb out of this stew
And thought to myself, it's gonna be alright
When no one's around
I'll hold myself good and tight
I took a deep breath and let my lips climb
Into a smile I ripped off from the sublime
I know there will be more times to get through
But I robbed something today from my ocean of blue
A feeling of peace that I sometimes lack
So, yea, I took it, and I'm not givin it back!

My god, how did I live with myself? I wrote that after a rough year of being dumped, then hooking up with another guy who was a jerk, thinking I was in love with him but it was all projected left-over feelings for the boyfriend who had broken up with me the year before. And I'd been struggling at a new job the entire year and was pretty darn lost. But jeezus, what possessed me?

I clearly remember feeling so proud and kick-ass and having a moment of positive thinking, which is always good, but damn, girl. Keep that lame shit to yourself. Not everything belongs on the net! That's why there are spiral notebooks because some shit deserves to be nowhere but under your fucking bed. Eesh.

Another smooth move I made can be blamed on youth, but it was humiliating nonetheless. I was in 8th grade and involved in the school play Oklahoma. I tried out for, but didn't get, a part that year which was already a huge embarrassment because I'd made a pretty good reputation for being a little ham a couple years before when I stole the show in Meet Me in St. Louis. But alas, I was stuck behind the scenes doing something crappy like make-up for a bunch of hormone-charged zitty pre-pubescents.

We got through the 2 weekend run of the show and it was finally closing night. The entire cast and crew with parents, etc. were going to have a get-together with the obligatory cookies and punch after the audience had left. I got the brilliant idea to recruit one of my friends to help pull off a big "surprise" for everyone which she readily agreed to because she was a full-time nerd whereas, apparently, I am a situational one.

The whole auditorium was full of kids and adults but things hadn't started rolling yet so the place was surprisingly quiet. My friend and I snuck onto the stage, creeped to downstage dead center, grabbed hands and screamed at the top of our girly high-pitched screeching lungs "LET'S PAAAAAARRRRRRTTTTYYYYYY!!!" Then we jumped off the stage onto the ground where I lost my footing, as did she, on the slippery linoleum floor and we crashed into a heap ripping skirts and gaining fat lips.

As you might have guessed...there was dead silence. Dead. Silence.

Dead.

Silence.

Not a peep in the house. No applause. No hoops. No hollers. No one coming over to see if we were OK. No laughing at the goofy girls. No joining in on some John Hughes movie moment before there was a John Hughes movie but you get what I'm saying. We had 50 pairs of eyes with 50 matching blank faces staring at us.

And after-the-fact I would have rathered someone say, "what the fuck are you 2 retards doing?" But you know what was ever worse? Every single person went back to whomever they were chatting with and completely ignored us like it didn't even happen. It was SO LAME it didn't even register on the something-to-pay-attention-to scale.

I don't even remember what happened after that except I needed to attend to my mouth that had been smashed by a bony elbow and I probably tried to redeem myself by playing it off like I was indeed cool but I was so not. So not. It's a miracle that stunt didn't make it around school, but like I said, it was SO LAME it didn't even matter. Small blessings. Ugh.

There is another totally and completely solidly wholly mortifying thing I did when I was a freshman, a scant year after that last debacle, that involved me and a sloppy patch of very slippery mud and a pair of unfortunate white pants, with me being a stupid smart ass chasing some birds to be "funny" during the all-school lunch break in the middle of the quad in front of, oh, about ONE THOUSAND KIDS. But my butthole is puckered enough for one day. Eesh.

Now, where can I find some chocolate?

Rub some dirt on it!

How did we survive it? How did our parents dress us in toughskin pants with matching jackets and send their precious children off into the world expecting us to return home in one piece? How did most of us not end up six feet under or at best hairless and scarred drooling through chipped teeth and blinking yes or no answers to our personal attendants with our one weeping cloudy eye?

Childhood is not for sissies, people. At least not the kind of childhood I had. And when I stop to think about it I'm stunned that me and my crew didn't end up being the subject matter for an after-school special on the dangers of playing with your fathers power tools in the pool. If Stone Phillips was around in the 70's when the hooligans on my street were in full-force we'd have been a weekly segment warning parents about things like the evils of empty boxes that do not make decent boats in rain storms to sail down slick iceplant-covered slopes with prickle bushes at the bottom.

I can't believe that only a few of us took trips to the emergency room to get patched up after doing something brilliant like trying to race down a giant kid-eating hill. It's a wonder there weren't more summers spent keeping a cast dry by wrapping it in plastic sheeting sealed with electrical tape.

I am pathologically accident-prone. Seriously, I should be studied. But I'm not talking about the clumsy mishaps and daily discomforts I suffer because the universe laughs at my pain. I'm talking about the death-defying risks kids take because their brains are made of cheese and the stupidest most unbelievable things seem like the greatest idea you've ever had when you're 11 and your parents are out somewhere and left you alone with your best friend who saw this cool thing on TV and he's sure if you get a sheet big enough it'll act like a parachute when you jump off the fucking roof.

By the way, 200 thread count flowered bed linens tied to a pair of your father's suspenders do not poof out with a billowy pop and sustain the air thereby gently floating a chubby child onto the ground. They in fact do nothing but land on top of you then you get in trouble for fucking up your mom's good sheets after you get home from the emergency room getting your broken arm reset and wrapped in plaster. (No, I was never stupid enough to jump off the roof with a sheet tied to my ass, give me some credit. That was my friend.)

I have a feeling things are different nowadays. I never see any kids in my neighborhood playing outside or by themselves very often and riding your bike to the store to get candy on a Saturday afternoon? Forget it. Mom will drive you. And I understand that. There are too many crazies and too many people and like I said in my previous post, I'd be such a nervous nelly if I had kids they'd be tethered to the couch swathed in bubblewrap and wouldn't be allowed to make a move without checking with me first.

But when we were kids it was a free-for-all of danger. We did handstands on skateboards and put together go-carts made from rusty nails and old shingles then sailed them down our driveways and across the street without even checking to see if cars were coming. We had rubberband fights and kick wars and let's tease the dobermans then run up onto the swingset before they eat our faces races. (Alright, that one was me.)

We played red-rover red-rover, which I still bear a scar from, and smear the queer and some twisted game called statue maker where one kid would grab you by the arm and swing you around as fast and hard as they could, sending you sailing across the lawn where you'd tumble and sputter eating a mouthful of sod until you finally stopped catapulting across the yard and you'd have to freeze in whatever broken heap you'd landed in becoming a hilarious "statue" with a broken collar bone.

We tried to jump ravines with our Huffy's and dared each other to eat stuff out of our mother's medicine cabinets. (Don't get hyper, it was only laxative gum.) We set up a zip-line tied between 2 trees running across the creek and was a good 6 feet off the ground which held all summer long. Until I took a ride where I swiftly went crashing to the ground knocking myself completely unconscious while all the retarded kids I was with just stared at me. (They were so fucking useless!)

We had lawn darts and cars without seatbelts and spent all summer in the pool trying to see how high we could bounce off the diving board. We rode in the back of pick-up trucks, (My brother actually made me lay in the bed of his truck, covered me with a tarp and tied me in on a 1000 mile trip from Colorado to California when I was 15. Can you imagine?), and spent every moment we could traipsing through our rattlesnake-inhabited hills climbing enormous rocks and constructing forts in the bushes to hide stolen Playboys from our parents and smoke hallow twigs like cigarettes. (That was, unfortunately, also me.)

We got hurt all the time and were persuaded by our friends not to tell anyone since it was their idea to play fight with pool cues and bare hands which resulted in a hearty thwap on tender knuckles. We would brain each other with pillows and snap wet towels right at your eye. We folded each other in half to see who could kiss their own butt, sometimes without permission from the butt kisser.

It seemed like our folks never knew where we were. We might have said we were going across the street to so-and-so's house but who knows where we ended up. Our mothers called no one and we were hardly supervised. Until someone started screaming or crying or there was an explosion. Then we'd hear footsteps thundering down a hallway where the door would crash open with a parent poking their head in the room and shouting "what are you damn kids up to?!?"

I carry the marks and memories of my youth, and my back never was the same after that zip-line debacle, but I wouldn't trade it for anything. Well, maybe I'd skip the time I thought it would be fun to lean 8 inches over a strip of roll caps and smash them with a hammer. I don't think my eyesight has ever been the same.

Good Sunday

Well, I just had a great weekend. Not perfect since I sort of hurt my back lifting a case of beer, although hell, beer! But it was great nonetheless. Today we traveled a ridiculously short distance so I have no excuse not to go there more often to the Wild Animal Park to see some critters and the hopes of seeing a new female elephant that was born on September 11th, of all fucking dates. Although anything good happening on that day is a welcome respite from the sadness so many of us still feel. Sigh.

Anywho, I was very excited to see this new little girl, since I've never seen a brand new baby elephant, and to trek around seeing some of the animals I love so much. And yes, dammit, get some fucking exercise OK? OK. We'd also heard there were 2 different litters of lion cubs that were just released for public view last week and we were hoping to get lucky enough to catch a peak at a few of them as well.

We decided to leave really early to avoid the famous San Diego tourist crowds that for so many months of the year royally fuck up any popular attraction we want to visit because my idea of a good time is not being smooshed ass to taint with Norman from Nebraska and his brood trying to shuffle through the shark encounter at Sea World while overhearing some dummy explain to her kid that "Shamu breathes air and fishes "breathe" water so sharks are "more like a" fish." That is not made up, by the way.

We arrived a scant few minutes after the main gates opened, got kick-ass parking and whipped right through the turnstyles. It was too early for any of the shops or eateries to be open so my fingers were crossed that we'd have the place somewhat to ourselves. We soon overheard an employee-type person say there were only 123 people in the park so far. Booya! That's what I'm talkin' about. Even though this place is huge there are too many times when you're clamoring with 200 sweaty people to look at anything.

I was bummed to see a sign stating the giraffe feeding was closed because, fucking A, feeding a giraffe is awesome. Do you have any idea how BIG they are? Seriously. I know you know that giraffes are big but do you know HOW BIG? Because they are BIG! Like, their head alone is as big as the trunk of my car. In fact, I don't think I could even get a giraffe head in the trunk of my car. I'd have to tie it down with a bunch of bungee cords and then everyone would see the giraffe head sticking out of my trunk and I'd probably get a ticket or something.

We decided to go find the elephants first but didn't see anything in the encloser thingy except people with giant shovels cleaning up giant poop so we headed down the hill to the Lion Camp. From a distance we could see a crowd (grr) and it was obvious something was out of the den so we scaddadled over there.

We were ecstatic to see that it was a mama lion and her set of triplets. Triplets! They were so cute I wanted to stuff one in my backpack, take it home and squeeze it then dip it in my coffee. There were 2 males and 1 female and of course the female was the brave one venturing away on her own while the little boys chirped and huffed when mama went out of eyeshot. Heh. And the mother was incredibly beautiful. She came right up next to the glass and was literally 2 feet from me at one point. I can't describe it any better than amazing.

And this is where I must explain something. I have a problem, a whopping big problem with a lot of animals that are captured and put into certain types of containment. Circus' (there I go again with the plural/apostrophe confusion again. Circus's? Curcussesses? Circi?) Totally deplorable, they should be outlawed. Private ownership? So not a good idea. Small unregulated bogus "zoo's" in someone's backyard or exploitive things like dolphins in a tiny tank in an off-strip Las Vegas bar? There's a special place in hell for people who own those.

But there are facilities and organizations that are doing wonderful things for conservation and endangered species and I'm privileged to live in a town that has a world-famous zoo with a reputation for being legit and for helping keep some animals off the extinct list who would otherwise be nothing more than a sketch in a history book or a muppet in a museum. It's a philosophical debate for sure, but anytime there is the right kind of progress done in the right way it should be supported and I'll do what I can when I can however I can.

That being said, we decided to tear ourselves away from the kitties and go find that baby elephant, which unfortunately required us to walk 10 miles straight uphill that threatened to pop my kneecaps off with a grizzly twang and made the temperate weather feel like Satan's asshole. But it was all worth it. We found that the herd with the baby was still in a gated area close to viewing and once again we got a good look of the tiny little girl.

She was so wee that I became a nervous wreck right away fretting that every time she flopped onto the ground underneath her big mama she'd get stepped on or worse. (I'd make such a horrible parent, encasing my child in a giant hamster ball to keep him or her safe.) And wouldn't you know it? She did get a little bit stepped on and let out a squeal that made the 3 adult elephants surrounding her jump like they'd been goosed in the butt and one old matriarch rushed over and scolded the mama elephant like a disapproving mother-in-law wagging an admonishing finger.

The baby was fine and she went on her merry way staggering around like a drunken toddler and testing her wiggly trunk trying to pick up a rock. It was so sweet I wished that in the Zoo's conservation efforts and research that they would please figure out how to make a special breed of mini elephant that would get no bigger than a large dog so that I may have one, thank you.

After we'd melted in the sun we had a very crappy lunch (these places are not known for their food) and went to the lorakeet bird house to feed them some nectar and lose some percentage points of hearing because those little fuckers are LOUD. We moseyed around a bit more, fed some ducks, pet some African deer (no plain-old goats in that petting zoo) then decided to head home. I didn't want to kill one single person the whole time so all-in-all it was a very nice day. If you're ever in San Diego I highly recommend it.

But make sure you...



...the sock puppets.

Um, ew

Listed under the short number of ingredients on a package of Tilamook Special Reserve Extra Sharp Chedder cheese;

No animal remnants.

Frankly, I'm disappointed. When I'm paying $7.99 a pound for dairy I'd expect a little extra something. Say, a random mouse ear or a thinly sliced cow eye.

Come on, Tilamook, it's the least you can do.

Save the drama for...me

Remember that creepy sister in Muriel's Wedding that would get a lecherous look in her eye, drop her head, screw up her mouth then slur, "You're terrible, Muriel" every time Muriel would get a case of verbal diarrhea and say something awesomely horrible?

This is what echoes through my mind when I'm being naughty. More often when I'm having naughty thoughts and then it echoes loudly in my head when I'm putting some of those naughty thoughts into action. I grow little horns and I get a flamey glint in my eyes and I'm sort of sure that a pointy tail pops up in my pants.

I don't just have a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other. I have a gremlin on the back of my neck and a fairy hiding between my toes and a big ol' bug up my butt. And that bug is a cheeky little scamp who can smell a Greek tragedy from a mile away and clamors for a front row seat.

In general I don't like big messy freak-outs and of course it sucks when I'm on the receiving end of a dickish dog-pile, but I have to admit that there have been times that I deserved a swift kick in the booty. And I'll freely confess that when someone else has more than earned a massive bitch slapping that I'll stand on the sidelines waving my flaming pom-poms happily jumping into the fray if I think it's my place to do so. Sometimes a person needs their ass kicked and I have several pairs of steel-toed boots just ready for a well-placed punt.

Most of us who weren't raised in an ultimate fighting cage were told to ignore the jerks. And in most instances this is good advice. When I get particularly spun-up about some fucker giving me shit or farting in the atmosphere for all to enjoy, I'm inevitably told to just forget about it, don't let 'em get to you, never let them see you sweat. But there are times when that dickhead has Crossed. The. Line. And then it's time for some whoop ass.

I explain it like this; if you and your posse had a standing get-together every weekend and one night a friend of a friend showed up, ran around like a maniac, insulted your dog and slapped your face, broke your favorite party platter then promptly took a shit in the punchbowl what would you do? Just smile and say, oh, nevermind, just push the turd to the side with the ladle, pretend it's not there. No, I don't think you would. And when that rude visitor makes their way into your shared space and does the same thing every time that crap gets beyond old and they deserve that befouled bowl poured over their head.

There are people who say manipulative shit that is polished to such a shiny luster most people who don't posses a keen sense of observation or who want to be snowed eat it up like candy. See: politicians. You know there's always that passive-aggressive goon in your office who just gets away with murder. And I'm starting to think the attention-whoring trolls on the internet outnumber the sane people 3 to 1. So it's a good day in my book when someone who gets away with bullshit on a continual basis has that big ball of crap shoved right back in their cake hole.

I think we've all encountered people like this, at least I know I do on a god damn daily basis, be it on the net or in real life. So isn't it great when a jerk or hypocrite gets a heaping helping of some rough justice. A good strong case of their own rancid medicine. A glorious smackdown that was a long-time coming. I certainly think so.

Although I'm not completely heartless, I do have mixed feelings about it and will always try to give any person an ounce of thought and understanding (unless you're a complete waste of space), but when bridges are burned and double-crossers leap over lines, that bug in my ass has a good time watching them get their comeuppance. And really, anything living up my butt should get a laugh once-in-awhile.

Sometimes I'm terrible, Muriel.