Babies

Today I was determined to take the amount of zen I have been able to muster from sunny days, white beaches, and plenty of vacation self-help reading and make it last all day.

This was successful until the point where a man carrying a baby who obviously has lost the artful skill of actually looking both ways before crossing the street stepped right in front of my car, forcing me to slam on the brakes and swerve, which then caused the car in the incoming lane to have to slam on the brakes and swerve to avoid hitting me.

Needless to say, we were both pissed but ready to move on our way.

But no, the dad, a white dude dressed up in duds from Peru, had to yell at us something like "I've got a BABY here!".

Oh dear lord. While we both shot him the bird in unison for almost killing us because he lacks basic street-crossing skills, I leaned out the window and said "Fuck your stupid baby, and fuck you, asshole!" And then sped off to see him also flipping me off in front of his kid. Obviously, everyone was at their classiest.

But seriously, fuck parents who think that babies get them a free pass for forgetting the rest of us need to get about our daily lives. From taking up entire grocery aisles to being the first to get on a plane, I've had enough of the "baby pass" for just covering the fact that you are an idiot.

In the old days they used to sterilize retarded people because even they could figure out how to procreate. Babies do not make you smart or better.

Anyway, it reminded me of a post I blogged a long time ago when I had another blog, which was the product of receiving one too many baby mass e-mails from people I had not spoken to in years, who cared nothing about my life, and generally just irritated me to no end.

Here's my little rerun. Enjoy!

Babies

I realized recently that I don't really like babies.

I think part of this is that everyone (my friends, my family, society in general) keeps telling me that I have to like them, which is a disastrous formula for me because I never like being told that I have to do or like anything. In fact, it really makes me hate the thing I'm supposed to like. Sort of like people pushing Obama on me. Yes, I'm going to vote for him eventually, but I'm not going to do it because you told me to. Sheesh. And please stop handing your babies to me. Law school has atrohied my arm muscles and babies are friggin' heacy. I only feel like I'm going to drop them, and one day out of resentment I might actually do it.

I think another part of it is I just don't see the big deal. So, you had sex. It takes no great talent to do that (unless you're talking about doing it well, which in my case the talent borders on phenomenal). People have sex all the time. Most of it is meaningless. Ergo, babies are often the product of meaningless transactions which is not really a great start for any living creature. Abortions are more meaningful and premeditated on the transactional scale and I think we should have more of them.

Then you have those people who "plan." I actually like this sort better. People who "plan" tend to have things better organized so they aren't surprised by babies doing things like giggling, picking their noses, making undecipherable sounds, and all the other nonsense that largely comprises mass emails to every person who was unlucky enough to give you their email address about eight years ago and in whose life you only take only enough interest to be able to justify foistering your baby news upon them -- without of course taking into account that they've been getting about a dozen other emails like this every year and they are going straight into the "spam" box.

Planners have already spent so much time discussing every detail of their baby's life (from when the baby should start feeding itself solid food to its class rank in medical school) that they're frankly too worn out to really discuss it with strangers. Of course, the mental anguish suffered by planned children whose parents have (often unrealistic) expectations can at times be overwhelming, but I'm willing to risk that just to spare me the annoyance of baby talk.

And what is this about reporting every single thing your baby does? Besides, all your baby's physical and speech prove is that they're not handicapped. Actually, it doesn't even prove that. But if it does, I guess I should say "congratulations." Or maybe not, because that just makes the handicapped babies feel bad.

Frankly, I think dogs are a better investment for several reasons.

1. Dogs are fairly easy to toilet train. Babies on the other hand (who supposedly have brains that are five times bigger and as complex as a dolphin) continue shitting themselves on a regular basis for quite some time. Sometimes (according to Freud) just for the pure gratification of doing so. There is obviously something wrong with that.

2. Dogs are smarter than babies. Proof: when a dog sleeps with you in your bed and you roll around, the dog knows how to get out of the way in order to avoid being smothered.

3. Dogs die kind of early. You don't have to deal with all the teenage years. And you don't have to expect other people to deal with your teenagers. Nota bene, we don't like them.

4. Dogs love you unconditionally. Babies only really like them if you feed them. Take the food away and the baby is pissed. Where's the gratitude for all that pain it took to bring them into the world?

Speaking of which, I'm sick of hearing about that as well. American (and most of the Western world for that matter) birthing is a relatively painless, convenient, and efficient process. You go in the hospital, get a load of painkillers that would make a terminal cancer patient envious, and your doctor -- who doesn't bother to make you push because he's got a golf game to get to --simply slices, dices, and then the nurses apply several instruments (resembling the electroshock therapy popularized in asylums in the 1950s) to make sure your baby survives regardless of how bad your were eating, how much liquour you consumed, and how much crack you were smoking while that thing was growing inside you. I mean, why take responsibility for your baby's health when everyone else can just do it for you?

People have babies in fields, in huts, and without even the benefit of boiled water. Get over your martyrization already.

That brings me to my final point. Breast-pumping. I think "breast-pumping" is really just an excuse to make all of your co-workers work that much harder while you take 3 fifty minute breaks in addition to your lunch. Listen up, we did not decide to have a baby, you did. And frankly after having to hear about your baby about a thousand times a day, it's expecting a bit too much for us to do your work for you as well.

Of course, I have friends whose babies are wonderful or cute and totally undeserving of this diatribe against babydom.

Or so they keep telling me.

Love

I do not fall in love like the ordinary person. It's taken me a long time to accept this. While my friends have found people that make them glow, or that they are gradually starting to resemble (I believe from the large exchange of DNA that love elicits), my approach has been like a swordfish -- fighting every step of the way while being reeled in, and then, when finally in the boat, feeling slowly suffocated and getting ready to either a) leap out of the boat again or b) stab my captor in the eye.

Thus, I've sat through many fairy tale weddings, looking on with some perplexity as my friends said the lines that were (in theory, anyway) supposed to give themselves to the other person forever. And vice versa. And I have to admit, although the thought of trying on wedding gowns amuses me, and a sparkle on my left hand might be nice, I must eventually face reality: that I would immediately spill wine all over the dress, and the ring would make me an even larger target for the mugging that will eventually take place to break me into being a New Orleanian.

There was a boy I thought that I once very much wanted to have those things with. But he wanted to have them in Canada, and thus I found a much more suitable boy who understands that it is ridiculous to want to live anywhere where it is under 50 degrees more than two months out of the year. And I love him instead.

But this love is different. I've fought it off, the best I could. I questioned, interrogated, accused, put his TV out on my porch overnight and a variety of other irrational behaviors that I can only explain by my lame swordfish metaphor. I was fighting for my life, I suppose.

But lately, the boat hasn't been so bad, and maybe I'll think about it long and hard should I ever consider jumping.

And for me, that's about as good as love gets.

Work

I'm sure work is going swimmingly. I can only to venture to guess since I seem to have checked out mentally and only come back to life at the end of the day to read over something that someone of incredible genius authored and then conveniently stuck my name at the top so I get to hand it in, and log my hours, and go home and molt the last of two pairs of pants I can manage to squeeze into and crawl under the covers of my bed.

Winter and I do not get along. Looking at me, you'd find yourself in the presence of a (slightly chubby version) of a Nordic princess, but I think all the cold-loving genes ended up getting lost in some Viking's mattress. I hate cold.

But back to work. One of the hardest parts about being a lawyer is that you tend to be very neurotic and paranoid. Which makes working with other lawyers difficult because you know that in the same way that you are overanalyzing (and occasionally silently mocking) them, they are doing the same thing to you. This makes social situations with lawyers incredibly uncomfortable for me. Plus, we all tend to talk over each, and it's just rude, and I don't know why I keep doing it.

I think my attitude toward work is that it involves money, and unfortunately what many bright-eyed law students don't understand is that it's not that you WANT the money, you actually do NEED it. Yes, I could live without a nice car or my own condo, and actually pay my student loans off faster, but I've done the calculations and considering all the consolidations and graduated repayment plans, it's very likely Citibank will be digging up my body in 2051 up in a last-ditch effort to find some jewelry on my person with which to satisfy the remaining interest.

That would be the euphemism of the century for a first date:

Girl: So what do you do?

Boy: Oh, um I rob graves for Citibank...er, collect student loan debts from estates.

My life insurance policy (again generously granted by my employer) has been securely lodged in my sister's name, but I admit that I occasionally have fantasies of faking my own death and finding some way to collect, perhaps paying sis with a generous wiring fee. The problem is, of course, escaping the Citibanks, the Chases, the Wells Fargos and those greedy people over at the Banana Republic who keep giving me points. There has got to be a rock solid way to keep those proceeds out of their undeserving hands, and goddammit, I refuse to leave a place with a very large law library until I find the answer.

Money. Oddly enough, in the last year I've had more than I've ever had, and yet it's all I think about. It is giving me numerous grey hairs that I am still to cheap to fix. Oh my. Money.

About five years ago I lived in a loft apartment in Staromestske, smack in the center of beautiful downtown Prague. The place was 350 square feet, counting our rooftop patio. If friends came over to watch a movie, we all had to pile into bed together, which was somewhat sordid, but acceptable to twenty-something behemians. I lived there with my boyfriend and a dog. It was on the top floor of a five story building. There was no elevator. Each night, the wall right next to my bed would throb with vibrations from the night club in the basement. I wore earplugs so much, that I stopped being able to stand even ordinary noises as being too loud.

Oh, and I was totally broke. But happy. I ate cabbage soup for a month straight. But I didn't owe any money to anyone AND I was skinny.

All that to point out that sometimes things don't fall out the way you thought they would when you have to live on the bank's dime. Because it starts getting too easy. Then you find that instead of enjoying your work for its many challenges, as you did in the past, you start simply to see it as the means to an end.

That is why I don't really know what goes on between 9 and 7pm when I finally leave. I've blanked out like Amanda Knox on haschisch, except I have better skin and haven't fingered my boss for murder (yet). I need to start enjoying my life again. All of it. Even the part that pays my bills, and be goddamn grateful that I can.

(last three sentences to be read to self in mirror each morning while straddling a heater in an effort to find a will to live, or at least go outside)

Diet

I am now on the path that leads to redemption: I have admitted that I am swiftly becoming a lardass. Time to take action.

Step One:

Smoke.

Everyone knows that cigarettes cut your appetite, keep your mouth and fingers busy, and supermodels do it and god knows they're thin. Of course, there's always more of a health risk for overweight smokers, but if you increase your intake from one to two packs a day, you'll reach your goal weight in no time!

Step Two:

Add more fruits and vegetables to your diet and avoid wheat.

That means instead of beer you should go for a little cranberry in your vodka, or a bloody mary. The antioxidents also cancel out any potential adverse effects of the alcohol. In fact, you can actually see it working. Have a couple of martinis with extra olives and look at yourself in the mirror naked. Damn! You hotty, you!

Step Three:

Get more physical exercise.

Give your signed letter to your secretary instead of calling her to make her come get it. This will also have the added advantage of no longer being the only lawyer at the firm whose secretary is skinnier than she is. To that end, give her lots and lots of dictation tapes full of your babbling that she has to spend all day typing and tell her aerobics are really bad for the elderly. It's likely this last comment may drive her to eat something fattening.

Step Four:

Find inspiration.

This one really tripped me up. I mean, there's so much to choose from when searching for inspiration to get skinny again. Alas, pasting photos of supermodels and JCrew catalogs everywhere are not doing it for me. Nor do I feel like investing in one of those devices that oinks when you open the fridge. And frankly, the fact that my pants always leave marks in my new flesh folds no longer do the trick because these marks seem to have become permanent and my pants just sort of snap into place like legos.

Thank the gods for this video. It not only provided me with the inspiration to get moving again, it gave me an idea for other lucrative careers once this whole legal thing goes in the can.

Lull

I've been in a bit of a lull lately. I've been feeling domestic, while avoiding doing anything particularly domestic, so this basically equates to me staying at home watching old movies while fruit flies breed in my sink.

Sigh.

I'm not sure what my deal is. What makes it worse is pretty much everyone around me is attributing my unhappiness to the practice of law. I can't really agree with that. There's definitely a lot of tedium involved, and I'm not one of those people that gets off on confrontation (although god knows I'll rise to the occasion if need be - or if need not be - like if you're just ticking me off). I also like winning. So far my record's pretty good. As in, I haven't lost yet. Go me.

I need a change, I think. Or maybe a vacation. If neither comes soon, I'm bound to make some irresponsible purchase, like a designer couch, or a massage chair, or perhaps a neti pot.

Hm.

Weight

It was recently pointed out to me that by far my most passionate and effective legal writing happened to coincide with the period from last November through last February, when I was blogging heavily in order to impress a potential mate with a panopoly of wit and truth.

Mission accomplished, so I stopped blogging and the writing part of me got lazy and now it takes me five minutes to write a sentence in a brief because I can't seem to find the correct adjective. And even thesaurus.com, my old friend of yore, yields nothing these days because I can't even think of what I want the synonym for. So, such gorgeous phrases as "Defendants' so-called 'very real' defense boils down to nothing but a mumbo-jumbo of misplaced monikers and stonewalling strategems"* have dwindled into obscurity, only to be resurrected (hopefully) with a positive end-of-the-year review.

After landing sought-after mate, my need to be witty in a form that could hang out in the public sphere in blog form and be read by perhaps not all of the people I want reading it, but who I might have mistakenly (drunkenly) given the address to, seems to have faded. Let's face it, I was getting the attention I craved. I was also getting laid, and I've noticed that this can tend to direct the mind to other more (re)productive things.

Also, I got fat. That made it hard for me to type more than my job requires. If blogging were a job, I would've applied for disability.

I'm really not kidding about the fat part, and I'm definitely not kidding about all the offensive things I am going to say about fat. See, there is a very cardinal rule in my family about fatness, which is pretty much that you should be left on the side of a mountain to starve until you read an acceptable weight and may return to the tribal grounds. It's about Darwinism and a strong need to propagate washboard abs which appears on our family crest right next to an abstract rendering of dysfunctionality. In short, my family is somewhat sizest, although we would term it "aesthetic."

When I returned from Asia last fall after getting dengue hemorrhegic fever, I was a very skeletal 122 pound 5'8 waif of a thing, about 13 pounds under my normally small frame. I had to admit that I really liked the attention. I totally got what the point of anorexia is -- it's that barely disguised envy when your girlfriends tell you that perhaps you're a "little too thin." But I'm a nice person, and I didn't want anyone to feel bad and my work clothes fit me like garbage bags, so I did the sensible thing and consumed as much food as possible in order to get back to 135.

This involved a lot of ice cream.

But at 135, I was still a "little too thin," so I indulged everyone once again (and myself with more ice cream) and made it to 140. And somehow forgot to stop eating. And eating. And walking distances longer than 50 yards.

I now weigh 166. No fucking joke. I have gained more than a quarter of my original body weight. I am carrying 125% of myself around like some pussy ant. I am officially overweight according to the BMI. My sister called looking for a temporary home for her Size 8s and I had to decline because even Banana Republic 10s are threatening to give everyone a crack peep show at work when I sit down. I swear I even hear the seams creak when I breathe.

I have been boring my friends to death with all this talk of fat -- so much so that one of them finally convinced me to do something about it already and join a gym. Also, I could stop eating about 6,000 calories a day. Just a suggestion.

I'm glad she intervened. I was starting to have nightmares that I would be on one of those featurettes with "America's Growing Obesity Rate" and then a street shot with a bunch of fatties waddling down a street with their faces blurred out. And there I'd be, and everyone would know it was me because I haven't yet learned to walk like I'm fat so I'd be the only one galloping as my BR Size 10s swish swish swish their way into a hole between my thighs resulting in eventual second-degree chafing.

Truly, it's bad. I think I just disgusted myself into going to the gym again tomorrow. Besides, our gym has those nifty treadmills where you have your own TV, so today I could watch videos from all over the world where drunk people fall on train tracks and miraculously survive. As if that was not enough to make me appreciate a heart that wanted to explode and a body that would ooze stinky sweat and fat bouncing everywhere at the same rate as my suddenly huge boobs (I'm talking about being grateful to be alive, which I, like, so totally am), they then did a MONTAGE of the same shots in rapid replay. It was like being at a rave featuring near death experiences.

Maybe next time a different channel.

*Extra credit for the alliteration. Take that, Matlock!

Home

This video put a long- awaited smile on my face on the way in to work this morning. The smile made my face hurt, since those muscles have somewhat atrophied lately.

Time to hit the road in vibrant colors.

Diligent

I am a very very hard worker. I spend hours at hard work stuff.

Like this.

Song(II)

And another one....



Back to the grind!

NOLA(II)

New Orleans is like the main hive for weird and unconventional conventions. Aside from the annoying way tourists can never seem to figure out our convoluted downtown one-way street system (okay - I have never actually figured out our convoluted downtown one-way street system, but the constant brake hitting from the beat up car with the Oklahoma tags is still annoying), I usually appreciate the business and the amusement.

During my law school years I led a fairly sheltered life Uptown, and had few occasions to hit the CBD / Quarter and its amazing magnetic tourist field. Of course now that I work in an office with a god-like view (from which I have often taken the occasion to make god-like pronouncements while standing at my window on a Saturday at work), my tourist exposure is sure to give me some sort of cancer at a later stage of my life.

My first exposure to the convention season happened as I was walking back to my garage one night after a long day at work, and who happened to stumble out of the cheesy tourist bar across the street, but Jack Sparrow himself. Well- Jack Sparrow after the hard living had caught up to him, but yeah, a genuine pirate nonetheless.

Unfortunately, he must have sensed my penetrating and mocking gaze because he wheeled around so quickly our faces were about five inches apart. At which point, hoping desperately he had left his cutlass behind, I grinned amicably and said "hi."

"Argh!" he growled back.

At that point I noted two things. One, pirates do not smell very nice. I always thought pirates smell like Old Spice, but it's really more like a combination of cheap rum and body odor. And two, I needed to get my head checked -- particularly when I walked into work the next morning to find the entire food court covered with Jack Sparrow's shipmates.

At some point later in the day, I was informed (by a co-worker who was admittedly not a licensed practitioner of medicine) that I am still probably nuts, but yes, there ARE a bunch of pirates running around New Orleans right now because the Pirate Convention was taking place that week.

Since then I have been exposed to the Vacuum Inventors' Association, the American Dental Association, the Keystone Club, the Red Hat Society ... you name it. And all were fairly tolerable.

Except for the fucking Lutheran Youth Convention.*

Lutheran Youth everywhere - fuck you. I am working a ridiculous amount of hours and all I need every evening is to be stuck in the CBD for hours, missing my chance to cross intersections because you travel in hordes of forty, wearing identical flourescent t-shirts, smacking bubble gum, ignoring the walk / don't walk signs, blocking traffic and taking your sweet-ass time getting across the street. It's like you think God is on YOUR side or something.

After three days of this, this bitch had frankly had it. So when a group of about thirty young women decided to start across the street I had finally managed to turn onto while patiently waiting through THREE green stoplights while their cohorts performed a migration, I did what any reasonable 30-year-old attorney who never gets to see her dog or home would do. I accelerated, slammed on the brakes, blasted my horn and giggled with delight to watch them scream and scatter.

Yeah, if there's a God, he probably laughed too.

*Message to parents of Lutheran Youth: New Orleans is not really the place for young Christians. I observed that more than a few of your mini-WASPs definitely sneaked a hurricane or two in. You may want to avoid sending them our way again, lest they start turning into Sodomites or something.

Song

A ridiculously good one that is making even a Saturday at the office a tad brighter...

Ploy

I was a little confused today by a woman standing on the side of the road holding a sign. Besides the do-rag holding back her grey bobbed hair, she looked pretty clean -- not the type of person you'd find standing by an intersection holding a sign up. And her sign was not of the usual "Need employment/food/home/ride/drugs" ilk.

It simply said "Need ice cubes."

I think this was just a subtle way of getting money. It's not like people just drive around with bags of ice. I mean, usually if I see someone who needs food, I'll totally give them the crust of my sandwich bread or something, but this woman was not giving me the impression that she would accept me dumping the ice from my soda into her palm. So, the only way to help her out with the ice cube situation would be to slip her a five.

BUT the problem doesn't end there. Then she'll need transportation to get the ice from the store and then back to her house. So, you end up giving her a ride, because if you don't she won't be able to carry the bag, and the ice will melt and she'll just have water and she'll have to stand by the side of the road again until someone else comes along who is sympathetic with her ice-less situation.

But then the plot thickens even more. Because she probably doesn't have a house - so where is she going to keep this ice? Now you have two options. You can buy her a cooler (much more cost-effective) or you can offer to keep the ice for her in your home. But then you have a stranger going in and out to get ice.

And what if she is using the ice to make daiquiris? Then you have to get her a blender too. And probably all the ingredients since you'll feel bad making her make you daiquiris on her own dime when she's so poor she can't get ice cubes and all. But then with all the free cold booze around, and standing in the hot sun, and not having a job and all, she's just going to end up an alcoholic. And then you have to sponsor her for AA and shit, which is really time-consuming when you have better stuff to be doing -- like drinking drinks with ice cubes that you worked hard to pay for instead of standing by the side of the road hoping for someone to toss a bag of "Igloo" your way.

I guess, in sum, I'm glad I didn't help her out. People are so goddamned greedy.

Politesse

I'll be the first to admit that within my fine frame pounds the heart of a monster, but luckily I am often saved by revealing this side by the fact that I am ALWAYS ridiculously kind to those in the service industry (which people take to mean I am ridiculously kind, period).

The reason for this is quite simple. I, like so many of you out there who worked your little tails off to get where you are without mommy/daddy/grandma's trust fund bumping up you and your designer shoes to major in "Communications" and slide into the law firm your great-uncle started, have had the misfortune of working in the service industry.

It sucks. Because the majority of people have no class. And even those with class could occasionally use some fucking manners. (Like you, senior-associate-with-face-like-a-creature-that-eats-its-young who thinks it's normal to continuously snap at me when frustrated at the way the cookie is crumbling while wearing Prada shoes that impede you from making that three block trek to the courthouse unless a $20 taxi is involved.)

One summer of waitressing Cracker Barrel turned me into the Mother Theresa of customers. As long as you don't work for a credit card company's customer service or I catch you spitting in my food, you will be treated as if you were worth four times your salary. And I tip 20%.

The other night my landline rang. This is an unusual occurrence, and more unusual was the fact that I decided to pick it up. It was a young desperate sounding girl trying to do a customer survey about television programming.

I tried to gently let myself off the hook. "I'm so sorry. I really don't think I can help you. You see, I don't actually watch television."

But she started to beg. She told me about how this was her last survey, and the whole thing would be over in about three minutes, and she started reminding me of myself about 5 years ago when I was getting my license in phlebotomy which meant I had to talk 100 people into letting me put needles in their veins to practice, and my heart just melted. "Okay, okay," I said. "I'll help you out and answer some questions."

"Great! So, let me just read you the first question. Appriximately-how-many-times-per-week-do-you-remove-unwanted-body-hair-from-your-underarms-face-or-bikini-line-area?"

[Click]

Even ex-service industry folks have their limits.

Fortune (II)

My BF just pointed out why putting "in bed" at the end of fortune cookie fortunes is not necessarily all just fun and games.

Today's fortune: "A great man never ignores the simplicity of a child."

Gross.

Au-to-mo-bile

In a slight twist of serendipity recently, I found myself wheel-less. It happens sort of like when you discover that you have leukemia and three months to live when you just thought you had a belly-ache. So, the hotty 5 year old Sonata which has been sideswiped by deer, drunks and parking garage columns (they sideswiped me!!) and bumped and flooded and probably had a few neighborhood kiddies dry-hump it for good measure, went into the shop for what I thought would be a routine wheel alignment to correct the fact I had to hold on to the steering wheel for dear life to keep the thing from veering off the road. But alas! Apparently, the thing that covers all the car's vital bits had come off some time ago and the thing was rotting from the core like a sailor full of syphilis.

I had, on my hands, what my insurance company called "a total loss." Which was annoying because I had neglected to get rental insurance, and so was in the position to have to buy a car, really fast.

The good news was the insurance company thought my car was worth a helluva lot more than I did. My car had two redeeming features. It was about to be completely paid off, and it ran better than 95% of the cars in Louisiana. Had any of those agents climbed into the interior which still reeked of NOLA sewage and dog drool, I doubt I would've gotten as greedy as I did with all this cash falling into my hands. That is, instead of going for something nice and conventional, I had to buy the friggin' Volvo S40 with almost all the trappings. I did stop short of the T5, but barely.

This is an incredibly decadent move for a girl of my material sensibilities. Despite my astounding credit card debt, I am, for all purposes, a practical girl with her cash. Probably from having learned through astounding credit card debt. So, it just seems odd that I would suddenly unload so much cash on a car.

(This is the point where I gloss over the fact I paid sticker price (WITH an allowance), a fact the BF will never let me live down. I have never really figured out the car bargaining thing. I got a good deal. I think. Nah, I probably didn't.)

Anyway, it doesn't matter because I now have a car that will go fast and looks really pretty and has bluetooth and fold-down seats for the canines.

And who has managed to be a target for every massive bird gang shit happening in the greater Orleans area.

Today, I came out to be greeted with my sophisticated grey roadster covered in a massive shitting the likes of which I have never witnessed before. It was if they had attacked in a battalion. The shit punctured little white bomb craters all along the glossy veneer. In a panic, I looked around to see if I could give the bird (har har) to any remaining culprits. However, they all seemed to have fled the scene, save one - who, as I looked up at him, let loose a massize bird shit cannonball right on the door handle I was about to open.

Birds are overrated. I think we need less of them. Starting now.

NOLA(I)

When people ask me why I like living here so much, I just have too many things to say.

So I'll start with the obvious.

Get to google.

Type in "Orleans in forma pauperis concubine."

Read the selections under marital status.

THAT is why I love New Orleans today.

Vacation (II)

I thought to be really cute about the whole vacation thing, I'd let my boyfriend ask one question per day to get a clue about where it was. I got this idea from this consultant I work with sometimes, who's like 62 and looks like She-Ra and is thrice divorced so well in the position to tell me how to keep passion alive. Well, apparantly He-Man is not as sharp as my boy because on Day 3, tiring of this game but having to come up with something after I told him how lame I would think he was if I quit, he asked what the mayor's name was. Game over.

Lexington, it was.

Step two of any romantic weekend, after you pick the location and let your man discover it through the wonders of google, is to book a little romantic retreat. A home away from home, with a really large bed. Preferably historical. And that is how I came to book the bed and breakfast from hell. Because it had geese and ducks lightheartedly frolicking in the bedroom corners and I found that irresistable. It was going to be like making out in my parents' house except better because there was breakfast involved.

Vacation (I)

I decided to do me and BF both a favor and book a little romantic weekend in the tiny little town of Lexington, VA to get away from our crime-ridden high pressure legal existences.

Besides, I had some important unfinished business in regards to Lexington. When I was in college, my dad went on this crazy land-buying spree and we were looking at some mountain land not far from Leasburg. We stopped for the night in Lexington because they were supposed to have this uber cool "Ghost Tour," and Dad drove me and Moms out for a little pre-gaming dinner at this nice place out in the country.

Now, unbeknownst to my parents until this very moment was that my 17-year-old self had in my possession a very badly made New York State fake ID. Which I wisely decided to use at dinner that night to order a glass of wine. Thinking back, I probably did it to witness the moral debacle that ensued when my parents, ethical to a fault, had to choose between turning me into the local police or sitting there helpless as I slugged back about four glasses of red in an hour and a half. To their credit, I think they might have made me chip in for that part of the bill. But by the time we had gotten back to the car, the damage was done. I was completely and exuberantly wasted. And about 10 minutes later I really had to pee.

There we were miles from civilization and me with a full bladder. This has never stopped me before. I will pee anywhere as long as I won't get arrested. So, I asked my Dad in the most sober voice if he would just pull over so I could go make a puddle in that church parking lot.

Well, realizing his advantage, my Dad told me he wasn't going to pull over because it was my own fault that I had to pee. And so I could wait until I got back into town.

This did not go over well. I don't like having to pee when I am in a moving vehicle and my kidneys are churning out urine like Industrial Revolution mill workers. I can't think about anything else. So, once again I asked nicely, "Kind sir, might I please have a bit of a tinkle behind those scenic pine trees?"

My dad was having none of it. After all, we were "only" 25 miles from town.

I started realizing what it's like when the bear goes mad in captivity. I started kicking the back of their chairs, chanting "I have to pee! I have to pee!" It was like the car was this time machine and I was regressing at the same rate my bladder was expanding.

My father drove placidly on.

At that point, I rolled down the window and started yelling at bike riders, drivers, locals, and cows that I was being held captive in the car with these two sick people who would not let me pee, and I had to pee goddamnit "I GOT TO PEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!"

When we got back to town, my dad would not speak to me. The ghost tour had been completely taken out of the picture, and for some time now I'd been wanting to get back to Lexington to finish what I started. And also, I was of drinking age, although in the end, that didn't matter.

Bad Dog

I babysat my neighbor's dog this morning while she took care of her mother, who hasn't been doing so hot. This is sad, because her mother, like my neighbor, is absolutely hilarious. My favorite quip from her today at lunch regarding Audubon Zoo: "Well, in my day they had dinosaurs in cages."

Unfortunately, my neighbor has pretty much the worst dog in the world. It's not that she hasn't tried, she has. He's just one of those dogs that is about 80 pounds of solid muscle, insane, and eats cheese that hasn't even been unwrapped.

I like to think of myself as Chip's fun aunt. Today I became Chip's-Not-So-Fun-Aunt-Who-Is-Generous-With-Application-of-Alumni-Magazine-to-Canine-Backside.

I realized what it must be like when you're a parent and you're put in the awkward position of having to discipline your kid's crappy friend. Like you welcome him into your home, give him oreos, and the next thing you know you're driving home from work and the little brat and your child have almost blown up your house because brat wanted to use gasoline to draw a pentagram in your driveway and then light it on fire. Except the bad kid is also humping your own kids, and they're not too impressed.

So. I thought, despite my neighbor's harrowing dog discipline stories (which I thought were exaggerated), I would be able to handle it. Not true.

Here is what he managed to do in the span of the first ten minutes he came over for a visit:

1. He peed on the jasmine at the bottom of my stairs.

2. He managed to leap on top of my stove (thankfully not on) and topple my dishrack (thankfully empty).

3. He ate all of my dogs' food, drank all of their water and then proceeded to slobber it all over my kitchen.

4. He jumped on me while I was cleaning and tore my back pocket out.

5. He knocked my little dog down the steep stairs to my apartment.

6. He peed on the jasmine at the top of my stairs.

7. He ate a bunch of potting soil and promptly puked it up on my just cleaned kitchen floor.

7. He started to lift his leg up to squirt on my kitchen cart, and when I caught him in the act, the motherfucker rolled his eyes at me.

My neighbor came back over to find her dog trussed to the post at the bottom of my stairs with three leashes so he could not move and fuck anything else up. I bet she's still laughing.

Ass Hat (IV)

Today an email from the exact same trampoline guy:

"I'll give you $20 for it."

That's it. No explanation.

I'm all for starting an Ass Hat website. As a first step, I'm having a contest for the person who can make the best picture of someone self-important wearing an ass on their head for my header. The more retro, the better.

The prize?

A trampoline.

Ass Hat (III)

The guy who's been torturing me about every little trampoline detail finally proceeded as predicted to attempt to bargain with me.

"I'll give you 15 for it," he says.

"That works for me," I say. "When would you like to pick it up?"

Not a word. I guess he thought transport was included.

Ass Hat.

Door

My office door has become the bane of my very existence. Despite having had the building manager and repair crew up twice to fix it, and a Catholic priest to exorcise any resident demons, the door will simply NOT stay open. This makes it difficult for me to leave my door open and appear "available" and "social," which is kind of important when you work in such a people-oriented field.

Maybe my door has picked up on the fact that I always feel slightly embarrassed that I know pretty much every detail of how the secretary-who-occasionally-sits-at-the-cubicle-in-front-of-my-office's mother is dying. Or kind of annoyed by it, because, yeah, your mother's dying, but do you have to yammer about it so loudly on the phone while I'm working on this brief?

Of course, the self-closing door does have the bonus of discouraging social "hoverers" when I am in the middle of an important project. Or surfing through youtube to find cool stuff to post on my facebook account. I need my concentration, people.

The eeriest part about the self-closing door is its penchant to slam shut on any partner like a Venus flytrap. This has not gone unnoticed. I am secretly paranoid that the partners who have experienced this phenomenon have grouped together to discuss whether I have telekinetic powers, and if so, how this will affect the firm's healthcare plan.

One partner actually has taken the pro-active step of calling the building people for me, to use his weight for urgent door repairs. It was appreciated, even if it did remind me of the fact I am but a minnow on the legal food chain.

My bosses all have different ways of dealing with the Little Shop of Horrors door. One partner just gently taps it back into position with one hand while drinking a coke with another. Another leans against it Sears catalogue style. One of the others has actually figured out that if he comes in my office, the door problem can be avoided altogether, but I feel sorry for him because then he has to look at my dying plant and smell the remnants of my at-desk lunch. Did I mention that my office is not really aesthetically pleasing because I have never bothered to decorate it? Considering its position at the entryway onto our floor, perhaps my door is closing out of a sense of courtesy to passerby.

The worst was this partner who actually started hitting and kicking it while telling me a story. Then it would rebound and it was hard to pay attention to what he was saying because I kept anticipating it hitting him violently on the head and him crumpling to the floor, a bloody mess with a violent concussion while I had the inappropriate reaction to laugh hysterically while giving him first aid, because it WOULD be kind of funny. Laywer downed by malicious door.

At least we'd know who to sue.

You'd better watch it, door.

Fitness

In a weird fitness phase I went through a couple of years ago, I was really interested in "rebounding" - that is doing aerobics on a trampoline, not moving from boyfriend to boyfriend in quick succession. I've done the latter, and it's not good for your health.

Anyway, I purchased a "jogging trampoline" which is now gathering dust under my bed. Lately, I've really been into getting rid of stuff (like garlic roasters and other really really specifically tasked kitchen appliances), so I thought I'd sell the thing on Craigslist for, like, $20. Really quite a bargain because you can fold it to store.

(I actually plan on just having whoever buys it come and pick it up from outside of my door when I am at work and leaving the check in the mailbox because 1) I don't want any financial interaction with strangers; and 2) I don't really care if they pay for it or not as long as it's going to a home where someone wants it.)

So, I put up an ad that said something like: "Good trampoline, cheaper than a treadmill." Astoundingly, I have gotten only one bite. Here is how the email exchange has gone thus far.*

Him: Is the trampoline still available?

Me: Yes.

Him: How big is it?

Me: It's five feet across.

Him: Is it round?

Me: Yes.

Him: Can you jog in place on it.

Me: Yes. It's mostly a jogging trampoline. I used to jog on it, then I got a treadmill <-----(complete lie and why stranger will not enter home to check)

Him: But you can jump on it as well?

Me: Yes.

And that's it so far. I would think this were even more hilarious if he were fucking with me. But I sense that he is not. I bet he's going to try to bargain next, and I hope he doesn't think I devalue my beloved trampoline enough to just leave it outside in hopes that someone will get it and leave 20 bucks in my mailbox.

*Also, it should be mentioned that according to his e-mail, he is an employee of Louisiana's Department of Education. Which explains a lot.

Love/Hate

As it seems that my first two series, entitled "Elevators" and "Ass Hat Awards" aren't really getting me anywhere, here is a new and slightly more generic (thus, hopefully more prolific) theme.

Things I love, and yet hate.

First in our series, inspired by the lovely Rachel:

Canadians.

I love that Canadians are so non-violent.

Yet I hate that they're so violently smug about it.

I love when Canadians end sentences with "eh?"

Yet I hate when "Eh?" is the entire sentence.

I love that Canadians have universal health care.

Yet I hate when I am forced to be exposed to their universal health care while in Canada. Because it sucks a fat one.

I love that Canadians are proud to wear their flag everywhere.

Yet I hate that they do this so to not be identified as Americans.

I love when Canadians point out that they burned down the White House in some random battle in the early 19th Century.

Yet I hate when Canadians forget that they were not actually doing that as an autonomous nation.

I love Strange Brew.

Yet I hate Canadian Bacon.

I once loved a Canadian boy.

Yet I hate him now. In retrospect, he was kind of a hoser.

I love that Canadians have the expression "hoser."

Yet I hate the fact that I can't use that expression without having to explain it.*

*I think it's important, in the spirit of international diplomacy, to end on a positive note.

Morality

I am hardly the world's most moral or socially appropriate person, but oh dear lord how I love this guy for making me feel like Mother Theresa on valium. Thanks dear ex-prez for volunteering to take my place in line for hell. I hear it's nice this time of year.

Highlights emboldened.

Bush refuses to criticize Obama in Canada
Published: 3/17/09, 9:27 PM EDT
By ROB GILLIES

CALGARY, Alberta (AP) - Former President George W. Bush said on Tuesday that he won't criticize Barack Obama because the new U.S. president "deserves my silence," and said he plans to write a book about the 12 toughest decisions he made in office. Bush declined to critique the Obama administration in his first speech since leaving office in January. Former Vice President Dick Cheney has said that Obama's decisions threatened America's safety.

"I'm not going to spend my time criticizing him. There are plenty of critics in the arena," Bush said. "He deserves my silence."

Bush said he wants Obama to succeed and said it's important that he has that support. Talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has said he hoped Obama would fail.

"I love my country a lot more than I love politics," Bush said. "I think it is essential that he be helped in office."


The invitation-only event titled a "Conversation with George W. Bush" attracted close to 2,000 guests who paid $3,100 per table. Bush received two standing ovations from the predominantly business crowd.

About 200 protested outside the event; four of them were arrested. Some protesters threw shoes at an effigy of Bush, and one carried a sign calling him a war criminal.

Bush is unpopular in Canada but less so in oil-rich Alberta, the country's most conservative province and one sometimes called the Texas of the north.

"This is my maiden voyage. My first speech since I was the president of the United States and I couldn't think of a better place to give it than Calgary, Canada," Bush said.
The event's organizers declined to say how much Bush was paid to speak at the gathering.

Bush said that he doesn't know what he will do in the long term but that he will write a book that will ask people to consider what they would do if they had to protect the United States as president.

He said it will be fun to write and that "it's going to be (about) the 12 toughest decisions I had to make."

"I'm going to put people in my place, so when the history of this administration is written at least there's an authoritarian voice saying exactly what happened," Bush said.

"I want people to understand what it was like to sit in the Oval Office and have them come in and say we have captured Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, the alleged killer of a guy named Danny Pearl because he was simply Jewish, and we think we have information on further attacks on the United States," Bush said.

Bush didn't specify what the 12 hardest decisions were but said Iraq is better off without Saddam Hussein in power.

Bush was also full of jokes during his appearance. He joked that he would do more speeches to pay for his new house in Dallas.

"I actually paid for a house last fall. I think I'm the only American to have bought a house in the fall of 2008," he quipped.He also said his mother is doing well. Barbara Bush was released from a Houston hospital Friday, nine days after undergoing heart surgery. "Clearly he can't live without her," Bush said of his father and former President George H.W. Bush.

Bush seemed to enjoy himself even though the event started a half later than expected because of tight security. "I'll sit here all day," Bush said during a question-and-answer session. "I'm flattered people even want to hear me in the first place."

Math

Dear Geeks,

It has recently come to my attention that many of you think it an extraordinarily clever thing to label March 14th as "Pi Day." This has made it into countless facebook stati. There have even been some of you clever enough to have made pies, even though even a blind person reading brail can tell you there's 33.3~% more letters in pie, so it's not the same thing at all and if you want to bake a pie just make one. No one actually cares why you made it. They're just nodding so you will give them another slice.

I am surprised that given your apparent mathematical acuity, this need for precision escapes you. I, my friends, am infinite. That is my glory. I stretch and stretch and there's even some math bee out in the Midwest where home-schooled kids can come and vie to be the cowlicked child who can remember the most numbers after the decimal. And none of them have really done it justice, because I think they only have a maximum of three days to get all the numbers they can remember out. A true winner would still be chanting all my digits as we speak. But then he would die so ... there's really not a lot of point to those things anyway. Except keeping home-schooled kids away from drugs. And, more importantly, other non-home-schooled kids.

Anyway, back on point. Let me show you something. 3/14. There's a slash there. No decimals. Even if I indulge you and put the decimal in to be nice, it still looks like this. 3.14. Three~measly~numbers. Is that infinity? I don't think so.

Please stop publicizing these gross characterizations of me being the same as a date. Also, the calendar is Roman and am Greek. And 3 and 1 and 4 are Arabic numbers. I am not sure in what way you could offend me more. I hope you will be more considerate of my feelings in the future.

Sincerely,

Irish

I was going to have a quiet day today, seeing as for some odd reason I drank a couple of bottles of wine last night by myself after passing off my "Hip-hopping for the Handicapped" tix, and found myself stumbling to Miss Mae's to buy a pack of cigarettes and not very long after that continuously taking 5 minute "breaks" from my drunken phone conversation with my lurver to make myself vomit the entire contents of my stomach so the room would stop spinning when I laid on my bed.

Thank god I was in a sorority and could learn the delicate gift of making oneself puke up all alcohol at the end of the evening so as to avoid a serious hangover. I have a very special technique for fast and efficient results, but unfortunately I can't share it because some stupid pre-teen will think it's a technique for vomiting up food rather than toxic substances. And then I'll get sued. But I can offer the hint to not wait until the toxic substance has left your stomach because there's no getting it back after that point. I've known people who have mastered this technique so well they can actually empty and refill several times in the same evening. They are truly gifted.

But anyway, I got dragged out to see NOLA's annual St. Paddy's Day Parade in the Irish Channel. I could NOT care less for the St. Paddy's Day Parade because it's a lot like Mardi Gras, except worse because it's purely locals and pretty much everyone in New Orleans is an alcoholic. And they're not even those awesome kinds of alcoholics that can drink and drink and drink and never get quite drunk. They're more like frat-boy alcoholics and it only gets worse as the day goes on.

Last year I walked over and caught the tail end of the parade, and I kid you not, it was like being in the middle of a fucking military coup. People were lying all over Magazine Street passed out in their own puke (obviously ignorant of trick, supra)), people fighting for no reason and screaming, and mooning each other. At one point a riot police van drove down the street and people from a second story bar just started pegging it with beer bottles. And then they just started pegging beer bottles at other moving objects, like people. And then some anonymous fucker pegged me in the head with a potato, and that was the point where I decided it was either go home or hate human beings forever.

And then after all that, on the way home all these boys kept stopping me because I was "Irish" and since I get this a lot since I am very white I said "I'm not Irish" and then they'll say "What's your name?" and I'll have to make up a non-Irish sounding name like "Hezebiah" because my real name is the fucking Gaelic name for Ireland. But then one guy was all like "Can I kiss you? I want to kiss an Irish girl today." He was slurring so much that HE kind of sounded Irish. So, I just repeated that I wasn't Irish and I also have mouth herpes, so that was the end of that.

This year was much the same except I actually saw the parade. The one bonus is that the throws are much better than Mardi Gras throws. I got a pack of Ramen noodles. See, those are useful. If another hurricane ever sweeps through this city and I am stuck in my house avoiding armed rioters, would I be able to eat my Mardi Gras beads? No. I'd probably have to eat the ramen dry and like swish the spice pack around in my mouth or something. But still better than beads made in China with a potentially hazardous level of lead content.

So, I'm home now.

The funny part about the Irish Channel in New Orleans is that it's like 75% black. Most of the reason for that is that the houses are cheaper in that area and all got left behind when the schools integrated and whitey decided to head up the road to Chalmette, which is a very scary place. HUD also built the projects there, which is interesting because what better encouragement for underprivileged minorities to pursue self-sustainability than by placing them in a neighborhood named after a nationality who is very fond of the "n" word. And I'm not talking about using it in rap songs. But it's all okay, really, because people on welfare just love irony. That's why on the thankfully few occasions I have to speak to them I use a lot of sarcasm. They like it.

Walking back from this mossy-colored melee, I stopped in to a little Chinese take-out place, which is not great but is handy. In front of me, a stick thin woman wearing rollers was having an argument with the guy about how expensive the Combo meal was. I agree that $10.35 IS expensive, but buck it up. I pay like $13.00 for lunch everyday because that's how much a salad and a smoothie costs and god help me if I want yogurt in the smoothie. But I decided not to tell her that because I don't really know what it's like to have to live off of welfare, or the crack pipe, and she kind of looked like she had both of those going on at once, which was making her poorer than richer. So, she finally gives up and changes her mind and I almost think of cheering her up with a comment like "Yeah, probably a little cheap for your tastes," but she's already out the door and I don't feel like running after her. Also, I might feel bad for and end up buying her dinner. And $10.35's kind of frigging expensive for a first date with a crack whore.

Movement

In the spirit of blogworld, I feel it is only fair to let everyone know that this entry will not be about my bowels.

Sorry.

Rather, I'd like to talk about how absolutely annoyed I get when I have to stop the car to do something. Like get gas. Or get the dogs out to pee. Or get myself out to pee. Actually, with some finangling all of the above can be accomplished at once, and usually without too much police involvement, so that's not really the issue.

Ok, you know that saying about "the journey being half the destination" or the "journey being the destination" or the "destination is actually the journey" or "fuck the destination, all I want IS the journey"?* That saying is so my life philosophy.

I don't like to stop and smell the roses. The first reason is because a lot of other people have probably been jamming their noses into said flowers with nasal drip and I don't want to share. The second is that there are plenty more roses where those came from. Seriously, when have you ever encountered a "rose shortage"? I'm sure should I ever decide to follow your sage advice there will be plenty for me to smell. I'll probably buy my own though, just in case.

When I'd make the semi-annual journey from France into Prague (and vice-versa) I'd take this 14 hour long overnight journey on a bus. It was actually a lot cheaper, faster and nicer than a train - I recommend it. It was always the same bus, with the same slightly mafiaesque looking drivers. And it made the same stops.

Halfway through our journey, we'd stop at some exit off of the German highway, and everyone would get off the bus. This was always at about 2:30 in the morning, and at that point (depending on the direction) I would suddenly awake and question (Paris to Prague) "Why am I still dating this guy?" or (Prague to Paris) "Why do I like this guy so damned much?"**

So, I'd wake up with this jolt of panic and self-doubt and existentialism, which I usually attribute to a seizure without all the weird burning smells and the bus would be stopped. I mean, it wouldn't be moving at all. There we would be, at some rest stop in Germany in the middle of the night and no one seems like they want to get back on the bus and get going. And you think "God! It's only Germany for fuck's sake! Nothing to see here people. Move along." And you start willing them to be magnetically attracted to the bus until their wills give in and they start clambering in.

It's at this point you start remembering that there are in fact some very nice things about Germany, like lots of streetcleaning, beer, and easy access to concentration camps to make you feel bad about being so whiny. And you also realize that you kind of have to go now that you've woken up. But that's the point where the bus driver puts out his fiftieth cigarette and cranks her up. And your soul settles back into complacency as the bus moves on.

I have suffered great disappointment ending almost in tears when I thought my train was finally moving out of the station only to realize it was an optical illusion and only those lucky bastards in the next train were escaping to their next destination (a journey). I have banged my head hard enough to bring bruises when I am stuck in traffic. I do not like to stop when I am in things designed to move.

And one of those things is me.

*Sorry to paraphrase, but I really only got that from a school poster that some friends and I stole when we smoked too many clove cigarettes, and then we drew some testicles on it or maybe it was a butt, because they kind of look the same when you are wielding the Sharpie that SOME of you (present company excluded) might have been huffing and then stuffed into a dumpster.

**The Paris to Prague was my last bus journey and probably why we are no longer still together.

Rejection

My preoccupation with the goings-on in facebook land are occasionally tantamount to my granddad's obsession with daytime television. Both involve a lot of projection of our own desires, fears, and paranoias onto the lives of virtual strangers. The only difference is that the film quality is a little better on facebook. And I don't talk to it. At least not so far.

I like to think of myself as a fearless woman who couldn't give a bird's poop about what other people think of her. This is why, for example, I have no trouble saying callous, hurtful, and inappropriate things in refined social situations while I am "networking." However, I've come to realize that this pooh-poohing of others' opinions is not true, and not only because of the Tourettes diagnosis.

Yes, sadly there will always be a little part of me that will still be bitter about the day I scratched my nose a little too intensely in sixth grade and all those kids started calling me "Ms. Gilbooger" and saying that I was eating boogers and I wasn't. I mean who eats boogers when you can put them on a plywood board and threaten to touch your younger sibling with them while they're sleeping like my deranged Uncle David liked to do to my father. But whatever, those kids were stupid.

Except now all the stupid kids want to be my facebook friends, and out of a sense of munificence (brought on mostly by the fact I am a big-time attorney and their job description is "my husband is a plumber which gives me the flexibility to be a full-time mom") I have agreed to their proposals. But which unfortunately ensued in annoying little griefs that I thought I had left fah fah behind.

The first came from this bitchy cheerleader girl. I remember two very important things about this girl. The first is that she had disproportionately large calves. The second, and most important, is that she told people I had lost my virginity at a party on someone's back porch swing. That last part is not true, and in fact not even believable since most adolescents can barely get it together enough for missionary style, much less moving surfaces. Anyway, she dated an ex of mine and they pretty much both hated me, and really, the story should end there. And indeed, I had long buried it until she "friended" me.

She then offered what appeared to be the peace pipe in the form of a "message" wherein she told me I looked beautiful, that she was amazed at my travels and how she always knew that I'd be a success (?). She then offered info in the form of having kids and invited me to look at her kid photo album. Okay, so I did because I knew she was looking for me to write back and say "Hey, you're also a success because someone put a penis in your vagina and nine months later things came out that can breathe. And they're adorable!" But I looked at ol' Ray-Lynne and Dewayne and I knew that I would hate myself forever if I ever in any way praised their aesthetic value. And yet I also hated the fact that it seemed like she had really tried and yet, there I was, being all petty. So, I hemmed and hawed and then noticed about a week later that she had "defriended" me. And to add insult to injury commented on another mutual "friend's" status that "her status wasn't as witty as some show-offs we know."

Okay, this is actually pretty funny but I am so sick and tired of people who don't respect what should be the cardinal rule of facebook. If you "friend" someone, you do not get to defriend them unless that person really wrongs you in some horrible way. Like kicking your dog. Or sucking as your partner in a clinic. But really, was I chasing you down? No. You wanted me, and you don't get to decide that you don't want me anymore. Or something.

Yeah, that didn't really make much sense. What I meant to say is: Fuck you. And Ray Lynne and Dewayne. And my only regret is that I didn't make that into my witty status for that day.

The second happened a little more recently and involves a girl I may or may not know. We have mutual "friends" but she doesn't look familiar except as a girl who may or may not have been in my math class (and of that I can't be sure because I spent most of my math classes absolutely panicking at the thought that numbers would ultimately be the downfall of me getting into a good college and the hell away from this redneck town). But, whatever ... accept, accept. Then the other day I logged on to find that she had nominated me as "most likely to come on too strong."

What the fuck? I don't even remember this girl, and yet somehow my encounters with her seem to have left such an impression that 13 years later she needs to put out just how over-the-top I was. I'll admit that I had a panache for getting myself in trouble (the strip poker in the hotel with the Beta Club president comes to mind, but we were just faking it, and when he leaned out the hotel room when you stupid people knocked he was only naked from the waist up for fuck's sake). I'll admit that at times it may have appeared that I was on more drugs than I actually was on. And maybe I didn't need to be so enamoured with Tori Amos that I also dyed my hair red. But you are not allowed to friend someone who hardly deigns to know you and take advantage of their goodwill by blessing them with a superlative that makes it sound like I hang out with a cloud of aftershave engulfing those around me as I lean into their personal space and make kissing noises. Fuck you also.

Wait, maybe I don't actually care. Maybe these ruminations are more of an effort for me to get inspired to blog more often. Except now I'm convinced that a colleague hates my guts. But then again, she's the type of person that's so uptight, when she reads microwave instructions that say "make a 1" slit on the top" she probably gets out the ruler. So, I don't really care what she thinks.

Or do I? Did I mention she had the nerve to defriend me at one point? After SHE friended ME?

Duh duh DUH!!!!!

Creativity

I haven't been blogging much because I kind of fell in lurv and a good part of my internet time has been spent researching sex positions. Actually, a lot of my work time, bath time, bed time and even dog walking time has been spent doing that as well. Such is lurv.

I also haven't been bloggin' lately because my only real exposure to people (with the exception of my lurver) has been those people who don't get my jokes, and I don't like being around those people because then I have to turn into serious girl, and apparently I have this very prominent worry muscle that only goes away when I drink. Or have sex.

I dread being serious. I am not even serious in court. Sometimes opposing counsel does something so ridiculous that I snort laughter, and then I have to start making it sound like an asthma attack so I look like the kind of person who respects the decorum of the court even though I spend most of time imagining what the judge looks like in a string bikini. Or wondering if I have something in my teeth.

On that note, NOTHING irritates me more than a so-called friend who neglects to inform you that you have something stuck in your teeth. My teeth seem to cage every scrap of food imaginable, most of it green. A favorite trap is the area between my front teeth and my teeth next to the front teeth (whatever they're called). I can't tell you how many fucking times I've had to go to this fancy business lunch or something and no one had the kindness to maybe hint that I had something stuck. Hey! Spinach is good for me and I need to eat it. If you don't tell me that there's something in my teeth, it's giving me a reason not to eat it. Then I'll get malnutrition and die and it will all be your fault.

Anyway, since no one's very helpful on this score and retreating to the bathroom is not always an option, my new method is talking with my upper lip curled around my upper teeth. This makes articulation somewhat difficult, but I usually don't have much to say at these things anyway since a novice lawyer is sort of like those kids in puritan times that were supposed to be seen and not heard, except that I don't even want to be seen since my teeth might have some anemones parked in them or something.

Ok, so there are a few friends who have proven their worth by letting me know - probably because I'm always the first friend to point out that their fly is down. Not that I'm a crotch starer or anything. But telling someone their fly is down is much harder than the teeth thing because you have to admit that some part of you is attracted to the vision of an open zipper and you have to tell yourself it's just that and not the fact that you may/may not be attracted to your best girl friend and will always remember the delicious afternoon you made your Barbie dolls do things that wooden puppets were not nearly nimble enough to do.

For crying out loud, teeth clearing hopefully does not give people the feeling that they are repressing homosexual tendencies (although maybe it should). But for those helpful folk, please make sure when you tell me which crevice the offending object is stuck in, you do it as my mirror image. Meaning if the spinach is stuck left, show me right. Don't do the opposite and get all exasperated when I keep digging in the other side and then baring my teeth at your questioningly. Remember, helping a friend clear her dentals sometimes involves being an aerobics instructor. It may feel weird having to do it the other way, but it's for everyone's benefit.

Misnomer

I know I'm probably setting myself up for yet more jeering from those of you who like handicapped people, but I am actually attending an event this Friday with the unfortunate title "Dancing for Dystrophy."

Unfortunate because those fuckers rejected the pretty sweet suggestion of calling the event "Rubbing it In." I just feel like that has a much more positive feel.

My only fear is that real handicapped people might actually be there clogging up the dance floor with their wheelchairs and shit so I can't bust out my hot ambulatory moves. But there's a free bar, so that should kill the pain. As long as there's not a handicapped space in front of the bar, 'cause then things are gonna get nasty.

Handicapped

There is nothing that steams me up more when I am in a hurry in a crowded parking lot then to have to see three pristine handicapped parking spaces with no one using them. And then, after finally finding a spot somewhere down the street to see people with handicapped stickers parked right up front in a non-handicapped space.

This is entirely unfair, and I for one am not going to take it anymore.

The ratio of handicapped accessible things to the number of actual handicapped people is absolutely abominable. Do my tax dollars really need to pay for you to make it up that ramp to pick up your prescriptions from Walgreen's? I don't think so. Why don't you send that nurse of yours or something? I'm sure she'd be happy to get away from your handicapped ass for a few minutes because it probably makes her feel all guilty that she can walk and everything. I know being around handicapped people makes me feel that way and that is why I avoid it.

Also, if people are really unable to walk from a parking lot to a store, should they really be driving? I call bullshit on this baloney handicapped business. They get ramps and elevators and those chairs that go up the stairs. And let's not forget those awesome grocery carts. Enough is enough. Soon they'll actually be wanting me to move out of their way so they can get down the hospital corrider.

If handicapped people park in MY non-handicapped space, they should get a ticket.

How's that for fair treatment?

Southern

After living in denial for about a decade, I have finally come to accept that I am, in fact, one of those species known as a southern woman.

This has not been an easy path. I have tried desperately to pursue other roads : Grunge, Euro-trash, Australian (apologies to those who were with me on THAT road), but to no avail. The childhood videotapes do not lie. I did, and still do, say INsurance and not inSURance. And unfortunately I have to say that word a lot to Yankees. Who point it out.

I appreciate the recent observation from a fine man that I, like characters in many great films, have risen up from my southern roots to become a refined professional woman. Like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. Although I hold this fine man in high esteem, he seems to ignore the fact that I am hardly a refined professional and I'm pretty sure I was never a prostitute. But I guess I appreciate the sentiment nonetheless.

When I was growing up, I loathed the thought of becoming just another girl who wanted the boy, the big house and the baby. I loathed it so much I even started loathing the people who did want it, including some of my closest friends. Nothing chilled my heart more than yet another friend getting married or pregnant before the age of 18. Oddly, although they would be living with their parents for years, many of them saw this as a bonus. Probably because their parents had big houses and that rounded out the three lifetime achievements.

I'm a little ashamed about how haughty I've been. There's a part of me that wants to understand how happiness can consist of episodes of Top Model and dishes made from canned foods that have no nutritional value whatsoever. There's a part of me that would just like to step into the mind of the average family woman of my age rearing children and trying not to notice how the years are flying by and they still haven't taken a vacation anywhere other than Myrtle Beach. But I can't. I did, just like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, hoist myself up by my bootstraps, move on to bigger things and make a big fat success of myself. And NOT by sleeping with men for money.

But I am, at heart, a southern girl. I love the country with its neverending tobacco fields. I love bluegrass music, I love cookouts and boat rides and the way people who don't even know you call you pet names like "sweety" and "honey". I was in 4-H, and know how to help birth a calf. One of my best friends in high school had an old slave graveyard in her backyard. I know that the only tomatoes worth eating are those from a neighborhood garden. I grew up on SunTea and SunDrop. And I never go anywhere without brightly colored clothing during hunting season.

What's separated me from admitting my southernness has been a hesitation to admit that at one point I may actually want to settle down and have a family of my own. Okay, now I can admit that. Step one.

However, the bigger part of me that shys away from admitting to being a typical southern female probably has to do with the fact that they adore tragic situations and they adore praying. I do not love drama or praying. Actually, that is untrue - I probably do love drama on a subconscious level since I am always getting myself into situations that cause undue drama, but that's actually not my intention. That's just psychopathy.

I am not the type of person that sucks up people's misery with a shade of schadenfreude that borders on glee. I will never forget my sixth grade year when not one but TWO boys who sat next to me in class died and the girls in my class, probably like their mamas, were just falling all over each other to tell me the news. They could hardly contain themselves. It was truly disgusting. And the worst was they asked me to pray with them. I wanted to tell them I had already gone through the whole child death thing a couple of times, and so I know that praying does fuck-all.

These days, I like to live a secret life poised on the edge of tragedy, but I do not want to tip over because then I'll have to hear the dreaded words "I'll pray for you."

You'll PRAY for me?? Wow, thanks. How about giving me some money instead? Or better yet, develop super bionic powers to keep my child from almost drowning but now being permanently handicapped, my boyfriend from beating me, my son from becoming an addict, my daughter from being pregnant and my cable from going out. I'm sure prayer is going to stop the cancer from growing, the fibromyalgia from aching, and the hairdresser from picking out the wrong shade of blonde.

All this praying is taking up too much time while doing too little. I know. I've prayed, I think. At least I've closed my eyes and thought about God for awhile. Mostly what he'd look like dressed as a woman, but I'm sure that counts. In the end, I got the feeling that I had done something about as useful as making a wish before blowing the fluff off of the dandelion. And most of my prayers for other people have never really worked out, because well, they're just words. And I feel bad because it's like I've instilled a false hope or something.

But at the core I'm still southern. And when, like today, I learn of some crap roll of the destiny dice landing on a good friend, I do what a good southern girl always does. I sign the card "You're in my prayers."

And then lie my head on the table and sigh.

Mardi Gras

You have to understand, when you live in New Orleans the aspects of Mardi Gras that so obsess the out-of-towners are completely lost on us. In my little NOLA world, the pleasures of the old MG are a far cry from the sins the tourists seek. MG for me is simply a time to get a mini vaca, and to have a good excuse to leave work early because I live 3 blocks from the parade and have to get back at least 2 hours before or I get barricaded out or some freak parks in my spot. And the parades started Thursday and run through Tuesday. The downside is I won't be able to actually leave my block during that time period, but I'm stocked up and all the parties are within walking distance.

Work's slow anyway, and spring is coming.

I went to Khaos, Endymnion and Muses last night with my 55-year-old neighbor who's one of my closest friends. In the middle of muses, with teams of roller girls skating by she suddenly turned to me and asked "What's a cameltoe?"

This was not a random question. One of the derby teams calls themselves the Camel Toesteppers, and she had read an article in which the captain said she got the idea for the name when she tried on a pair of gold lame shorts that were too tight. Still, I wish the article had expounded on the meaning so I didn't have to end up giving someone almost twice my age and fairly conservative a lesson in fashion no-nos involving female genitalia.

But I bucked up and did it as nicely as I could. "It's when your pants are too tight so you can see the outline of everything underneath."

"Oh." Pause. "I always thought camels had three toes."

Jesus

I believe in him.*

*Not for real though. But it made a couple of people who read this blog happy so let's just leave it at that.

Sleepmailing

I stumbled upon this little ditty today.

I love how the last sentence says "may have been triggered by a prescription medication." Hm, wonder which one it was.

Oh come on! EVERYONE knows that when you pop the Ambien the weird prose just starts a-flowin'. Half of this blog has been written after I pop my nightly sleep companion, although I do come back in the morning to puzzle at what I've written and try to salvage it through correcting multiple grammatical and spelling errors.

And Ambien texting? Well, I happen to have a very fresh example, from a friend who's turned into an insomniac and decided to get a prescription, while scoffing at my wild Ambien tales.

Last night, 3:27 am:

"Ambien does not work to keep from going very bad things. Feel better we have been greatly equalized. Just don't make me leave mork."

Wow. And I hope this doesn't mean she TOOK it at work, because she's an ER doc and that would really suck.

I advise you kids that Ambien is a wonderful drug when you need sleep. BUT before you take it:

1. Turn off all electronic devices. Okay, you can keep the lamp on.

2. Turn all cells phones to "off".

3. Make sure your laptop is completely shut down.

4. Do not start listening to nostalgic music that reminds you of someone you needed to forget, nor think that sentimentalities will come across well in your state.

4. If you are going to take a bath, do it BEFORE taking the pill as pretending to be a mermaid underwater may lead to an accidental drowning.

5. Put the warning label about retrograde amnesia EVERYWHERE, because it DOES happen and pretty consistently.

I am not a (raging) alcoholic, and know when to stop before I "black out," but I guess being on Ambien is my black out. Luckily I keep myself locked in my place away from harm (except the time I went on a mini-gardening rampage), but then again the damage of telling someone that you want his children just ONE INNOCENT TIME will come back to haunt you forever. Because he will constantly remind you of it and ask when you're going to start working toward that goal and the whole thing just makes you want to take an Ambien and call him back and fall asleep on him while he's saying something meaningful.

Zolpidem, comme je t'aime!!

Award

So, my "Elevator" series just isn't living up to my expectations because as soon as I got excited about it, interesting stuff just stopped happening on the elevator. Mostly it's been the usual shit, like I get on the elevator, retreat to my little corner where I lean against the brass bar with my foot crossed in front of my leg, foot perked up on the toe in studied poise, then get off the elevator, and then repeat until I reach my final destination. When I am going down, I push my heels firmly into the floor of the elevator to make sure it passes the floor where Sucre guy lurks or I stare at my blackberry, or I do both simultaneously.

Once in awhile, some old man talks to me about the weather. Or I'm stuck with an awkward acquaintance - like the lawyers from the firm that I didn't take the offer from and who were kind of jerks about it. Where Sucre guy works. I pretty much hate that floor. Although, in retrospect it does make me feel better that Sucre guy only got that job because I decided not to work there. Ha!

Anyway ... I thought instead, I'd start a new series called "The Ass Hat Awards."

Why? Because "Ass Hat" is one of my new favorite expressions. I also like "Ass Clown" but for awhile it was the entry on my cell phone for my ex and so now it is not as gender neutral as ass hat.

Anyway, the premise for this is very simple : I am often surrounded by ass hats and it's obvious to me that they need some recognition for all the extra effort they put into being outrageously obnoxious.

No, I'm not talking about those people who breathe down your neck in line, or who don't put the little bar thing down on the belt at the grocery store so your produce gets mixed up with theirs, or the people that never learned a turn signal. These people all need special training of course, but none of them quite get to the level of "Ass Hat."

Why?

Because an Ass Hat is someone that is so completely in need of the adoration of others and power that they become ridiculous caricatures that no one in their right mind would ever respect, be friends with, or sit next to on the plane without earplugs. Pomposity, self-importance, delusions of grandeur ... you got it.

Ass hats are mostly harmless, unless you realize that they will, in fact, suck hours of your life mercilessly away in trying to attempt to impress you. In my case, this is quite serious, because there is no way in hell I can even fake being impressed with Ass Hats, which usually means they won't fucking stop. Or once they give up they'll tell everyone I had sex with my science teacher or something as revenge for me not being impressed.

Today I did a favor for a friend who is still in law school, and volunteered to judge an appellate competition downtown. This is my first time doing such a thing as a real live attorney, and as I had done a few of these competitions myself, I knew what it was like to stand in the competitor's shoes. I also knew that I had fuck-all experience with anti-trust law (the case), and so planned to be respectful, courteous, and direct in my questions while in my role as judge.

Enter Ass Hat. Ass Hat is a girl who went to school with me. I actually thought she was kind of nice, but apparently the six months that we have been licensed to practice law have turned her from a shy chubby girl to a condescending smug self-important jerk in a very tight Banana Republic Suit. She was downright nasty to the competitors, asked me snidely if I had a job yet, turned up her nose when I named my prestigious firm, and commented at least 5 times during the competition how her partners kept calling her, and she really needs to get on her secretary more often, and she had to take a client to lunch. It was an awful lot to come from a girl who I knew didn't even graduate with honors. I was also nice enough to not point out that her firm had attempted to hire me, and I turned them down. Probably another job opening I created.

So, this is obnoxious. But the part that makes her the Ass Hat for this particular day is that during the entire time, while we were sitting in the actual Federal District Court, in the judge's seats, during a competition where public speaking and intricate argument was the main focus, the bitch was smacking loudly away at a wad of gum.

Ass Hat.

Elevators (III)

The South is notoriously good about always letting women off of the elevators first. The only people who do not seem to respect this code seem to be manual laborers from the North, but we don't get too many in my glass tower, so most of the time the fact that I will get out of the elevator that much more quickly is so satisfying.

Until I realize that the real reason is so that the men who are left behind can check out my ass.

I become increasingly convinced every social nicety includes covert evil. Or sex.

Fertility

No, really. Stupid stupid stupid bitch.

Television

I got stuck in a radiology department today because my doctor's office had failed (twice) to remember to fax over orders and found myself eerily glued to the tragedy that is early morning television.

Unlike retards who think the Price is Right equals memorable television, my childhood consisted mainly of reading novels. There was something inherently eerie about the plastic cheerful people who told us both empahtically and nonchalantly that a serial child rapist with a machete was on the loose and then would switch to talk of a what a celebrity's baby was wearing. I have no taste for it. I still don't.

I would've gone for reading material, but all they had was Cosmo. After reading an article wherein the likes/dislikes of some nobody television actress were laid out in detail (she likes the beach and her dogs, she doesn't like bad people and her biggest fault is drinking too much coffee) the TV seemed like a way to swerve imminent death by head explosion. Mistake.

Things I learned from watching television from 8-9am:

1. People are morons. But I learn that from about a gazillion other things, so let me be more specific.

2. We prize women who are bright orange. This reminds me of a girl I went to school with. She had platinum blonde hair and bright orange skin - one of the finest examples ever of every surface of your body being aesthetically altered by a bottle of chemicals. Normally I wouldn't hold this against her, but she was kind of a bitch. I didn't know those anchorwomen, but they were bitches too.

3. During the commercial breaks these commercials came on for what to deliver to your sweetie on V-day. One was for a teddy bear and the other for a pair of pajamas.* In the ads, a girl receives either of the above items in the office. All of her girlfriends are extremely jealous and say affirming things like "I wish I had a boyfriend like that."** The next scene is then the girfriend clicking champagne glasses next to classy guy who sent her that classy package and then the door suggestively closing with a "Do Not Disturb" sign. Final pan: the boys in the office scrambling madly to order their own teddy bears. I'd like to think this ties in neatly with the first scene, and that the jaelous pumpkin women will soon be getting their own deliveries and lots of intra-office sex violations will ensue, but maybe that's just kind of lobbing them one. Also, the whole thing was porn quality.

But sadly, I suspect that many fine Americans have found themselves drawn to that website today in order to charm the pants off of some shallow office girl who worries more about looking good in front of her office mates than whether she should REALLY be having sex with that guy.*** Alternatively, the website probably does pretty good business drawing in shallow office girls who aren't having sex with anyone but still need to impress their colleagues by having things delivered to themselves. Actually, I have a lot more respect for the latter category.

4. Coldplay won a Grammy. Okay, whatever your feelings on that (and really, do you need to have any?) I have complete and utter contempt for awards of any type. I'm a little tired of the "everyone should win so let's invent more and more types of awards so everyone who's licked some serious arty ass can get something." To be fair, this extends to other types of awards as well.

Anyone who knows that Amsterdam won a Booker Prize knows that the people who pick these winners are getting drunk and doing the following: 1) They load a revolver with one bullet. 2) They put all the names of the nominees (who were selected from a fishbowl filled with every "edgy" person who wrote a book whose title is only one word) on a target in some back room of the Library of Congress; 3) they pass the revolver around to each person who takes a shot at the name they want to win (usually based on the amount of syllables in the one-word title rather than reading it); 4) the person who gets the bullet in a name wins; 5) if no one hits a name with a bullet, the prize is then based on the choice of the person who might have stuck the gun to his head during the whole process to be funny.

The Nobel Prize? Yeah, there's a lot of humanitarians' wives that are basically screwing their do-goody husbands to the top.

5. Apparently, peanuts are really important. So we get kind of upset when we can't have any due to a salmonella outbreak. So upset that we send the FBI in on them wearing bullet-proof vests because it's not like the FBI has anything better to do than scream "Hands in the air!" to a bunch of peanut warehouse workers. Also, really dumpy women who run food banks are now worried children will starve. My question is why are children eating primarily peanuts? I'm sure this fine country has lots of other staples to offer them. Like corn syrup. Or all those long words on the side of the candy bar I'm pretending not to eat. Did the woman have to get that upset that private donors will not be shipping her disadvantaged children gallons of peanut butter? Unless ... yeah, she's probably been eating all of it.

Not that I don't feel sorry for her. I once got really addicted to peanut butter this one summer. I really have no idea what the deal was, except that I was swimming 3 hours a day and like to eat things out of jars with spoons.**** It got to the point where I started packing on pounds and my father had this intervention where he kept taking it away and hiding it (because he couldn't live without it either - takes one to know one) and I kept finding it and eating it and putting it back. Then he would find the empty jar and get really upset - worse than when the cleaning lady found that bottle of vodka under my bed - and I'd have to hear a long lecture about how much of a good thing is not really good. All of this was ineffective until we got mice and Dad started using peanut butter on the mouse traps. That pretty much cured it after I almost broke a finger or two.

On another side note, things have not being going very well for me lately (not in tragic events - just mounting daily annoyances) and today I tried to commit suicide by Reese's peanut butter cups. It did not work, probably because that's not really peanut butter. My taste buds know the real stuff.

*This disdain does not extend to those cakes you told me you were going to have delivered to my office when you were in NOLA last weekend.
**It should be noted that all of these women are orange.
***Although if she knows she should be having sex with the guy, looking good in front of the office mates is clearly alright.
****I am aware that the Booker Prize does not apply to Americans, so you can see just how much this winner-selection is completely arbitrary! I mean, why not have it somewhere slightly more British?
*****Like many others, I have also experienced this same issue with Nutella and it took an entire 12-step program for that one.