---

As of this moment, I'm officially on hiatus [read: vacation] until Tuesday, August 6. Try not to break into my house and steal my underwear just because you miss me, OK?

So I've been thinking about what weird and traumatizing tidbit I should leave you with [you know, food for thought]. It occurs to me that I mentioned my previous brushes with the law, but never really elaborated. So I'm now going to tell you all the sordid details of the last time I came close to getting hauled to prison.

I was waitressing at this cheesy italian place that used to be on the concourse level at Market East [next to the Gallery Mall], and I got to be good friends with this guy named Steve. Steve taught me how to cook teriyaki chicken and gave me advice on my busy love life.

So one fine day in January I am hunkered down in my bed, recovering from the flu. I get a call from Steve. Steve has met some positively tasty little snack named Mark. Mark has invited him to Atlantic City, but Steve doesn't know Mark very well. What if he's an axe-murderer?

As I counsel Steve, he gets this bright idea that I should come along as buffer. Sort of like a possible cock block if the need should arise. I resist, pointing out that I am barely conscious as a result of the flu recovery medication. But I am in a weakened state and Steve talks me into it.

"Be ready at 6," he says. "We'll be by to pick you up."

Mark is not quite my type, but then again I am not a young gay man. Steve is wiping the drool though, so who am I to judge, right? Mark is driving a car that smells of lubricant and I have to sit in the backseat. Yuck.

About halfway to Atlantic City I totally pass out cold. I wake up about 9pm when Steve shakes me awake and tells me that he and Mark are going for a romantic moonlit walk on the beach. And then they leave.

You know, I guess I should have been worried for my safety. There I was, a cute and nubile young blonde girl passed out cold in the back of a crappy car parked on the streets of Atlantic City. Have you been to Atlantic City? It's a slum!

Anyway, the next thing I know I am rudely awakened by someone hitting me in the knee with something hard. What the hell? I open my eyes and someone's shining a really bright light in my face.

"Miss, will you exit the car please?"

That's right -- the cops. I was totally confused. When I got out of the car I was in the middle of a camping park and the whole area smelled of pot smoke. I glared at Steve.

After being quizzed for five minutes, they arrested Steve for possession, and let me and Mark go with a citation. And since Mark had a suspended license I had to drive this big ass car to the police station to spring Steve from the pokey.

And that's when I got the whole story from Mark, who was crying like a little girl. Apparently the two of them smoked on the beach and then came back to the car and decided they were hungry. So they stopped at a grocery story and got some steaks and a bag of charcoal, and then looked around for the nearest camping park so they could use a grill.

They got kicked out of the park by a manager because it was about midnight [ie, after hours], so they just drove deeper into the park thinking that no one would notice someone grilling at midnight. So the manager called the cops. And that's where the story picks up.

So anyway, we waited at the jail for about two hours until Steve was released, and I had to drive home to Philadelphia in Mark's car. I think Steve was putting the moves on Mark in the backseat.

That should be the end of the story, but it's not.

I had to appear in court. Steve and Mark were also supposed to appear in court but both of them flaked so I had no way of getting there other than public transport. So I took the bus to Atlantic City, and then caught another bus from there to the courthouse which was out in the middle of nowhere. I thought about bailing too, but a no show means a bench warrant for your arrest. No thanks.

So I made an appearance at court, and wore the most upstanding and innocent thing I could find. And then I threw myself on the mercy of the court. "But I was asleep," I wailed. "I had no knowledge!"

They took pity on me and dropped all charges. That's the closest I've ever come to having a real police record. Isn't that the dumbest thing you've ever heard?

---

As a typical American I can barely begin to imagine what it's like to live in a place where there is an active war going on around me. I can't imagine trying to go on about my life, like Angua and others do every single day.

I would imagine that you get used to it, or deadened to it. A bombing in your school's cafeteria would be freaky, but one of those things that just happens. It's crazy to think that you could learn to live with something like that, but how else could you even function?

Hate masked as religious zeal doesn't make a lot sense to me. Whether it's the Hamas or the crazies here in the States that murder doctors who are willing to perform abortions, it's all the same: stupid.

I'm so sad.

---

I read Turning on the Girls last night. I couldn't help myself! And I really liked it alot -- it was hilarious in spots. I've always wondered what would happen if women took over the world, and I now I know one scenario. And the porn! Heeeeeeeeeeeee! A highly recommended read to all and sundry.

It's been really hot all week, which always puts me in mind of my least favorite summer job. That would be working at Sesame Place. You know I'm not a fan of children, right?

So how does someone who dislikes children get a job working with children? Well, the pay is good. And I wasn't actively working with kids -- I was working in Group Sales. So I had to deal with their parents, which is almost worse. I can forgive a kid for being stupid and inconsiderate because maybe they just haven't learned anything yet. But when an adult throws a hissy fit because his or her coupon expired three years ago and I refuse to honor it, well....it isn't nearly as forgiveable.

At face value the job sucked simply in terms of uniform. The polo shirts were bright yellow, the shorts were kelly green, and the belts were super red. Oh, and did I mention the fabulous kelly green satin jackets? Right off the bat, it's just a bad situation.

Oh, and then there were the morning calisthenics we were required to perform in front of the entry point...you know, to show the salivating kids and parents waiting to get in that we were just rarin' to go, ready to serve. It's always fun to do 50 jumping jacks in a polyester uniform when it's 110 degrees with 80,000% humidity.

I felt relatively lucky -- I rarely worked inside the park. I was almost always in a booth just outside the entrance. Inside the park was like hell on earth. Parents fighting with each other, fighting with the characters, fighting with their kids, fighting with the food service people. It's almost an exact replica of Dante's Inferno, with each ride being a different level of hell. The pee-infested waters of the Rambling River, the vomit inducing Vapor Trail, the constant scene of drowning that is the Teeny Tiny Tidal Wave....all are reserved for a different brand of sinner, and I was sort of the gatekeeper.

That summer may just have sealed the deal for me in terms of my rabid dislike of children. And I'm convinced that the park is some sort of evil joke -- last year some parent actually physically attacked one of the characters. How sick is that?

---

I just blew a small fortune on new reading material.

Here is the list of reads:

Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris My Little Blue Dress by Bruno Maddox Our Lady of the Lost and Found by Diane Schoemperlen Turning on the Girls by Cheryl Benard Irreverent Guide to Rome from Frommers

Any reviews?

I seriously miss being able to read maniacally. Working full time, going to school part time, and working on art-related stuff leaves very little time to read. But since I will be lying on the lovely shores of LBI in less than 48 hours I can read and read and read, and read some more.

Christy met me for lunch and came with me to Borders for my book purchasing extravaganza. Eric dumped her, and she's sad. The funny thing is that she was never serious about Eric and never considered herself his girlfriend anyway. But she's sad anyway.

What's fucked up about the whole situation is that he broke up with her because he misses his ex-girlfriend. I was under the impression that the whole issue with her was over and done with. So Christy feels even worse because he broke up with her for someone else.

And she's weirded out because Eric hangs out with colleagues of hers from work, so she is now left wondering if they're all discussing it behind her back. See, that's why you should never date someone you work with or who hangs with people you work with.

I'm not a sympathetic person, which kind of sucks for Christy. She says that she just wanted to tell someone, just to get it out of her system...but she really wanted to get some sympathy. My response when she told me the whole sordid story was to laugh and demand details. No, I'm not comforting in any way.

---

Am I the only one totally excited for this evening's American Idol cheese-a-palooza? It's Seventies Night, you know!

I'm sure that Tamyra and Justin and Kelly will all do fabulous, so it's really only the less talented bunch that I care about. What will RJ sing? Will he look like he's surfing when he's dancing? Will Christina sound like a telephone? Will Little Bo Peep storm the stage in search of her lost sheep? Will Nikki manage to hit some notes? Will Ryan manage to wear something that doesn't look like it was stolen from Hulk Hogan's line of clothing?

I will admit to loving most of the music from the seventies. I love disco, soul, rock, even pop. So in my own perfect world, here is what we'll hear tonight....

Tamyra - Don't Leave Me This Way by Thelma Houston or Dim All the Lights by Donna Summer
Kelly - Son of a Preacher Man by Dusty Springfield
Ryan - Paint It Black by The Rolling Stones or Highway to Hell by AC/DC
Nikki - Sunday Girl by Blondie
Christina - Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves by Cher
Justin - Maggie May by Rod Stewart or Hot Child in the City by Nick Gilder
RJ - Maybe I'm Amazed by Paul McCartney or Rock with You by Michael Jackson

Yes, I feel like a preteen for obsessively thinking about American Idol, but it's just so funny! Wait until next week -- the Eighties! Someone has to sing some Rick Springfield!

I've heard alot of talk recently about how music in the last year or two hasn't really produced any standout songs, and I wouldn't necessarily disagree with that entirely. I mean, it's really been the Year of the Boy Band/Britney for the last few years. But I've heard even more people talk about what a wasteland the eighties were for music...and that is just false.

Yes, there was some uber-cheesy music, but there was also Depeche Mode, REM, B-52s, and lots of utterly fantastic new wave music. I will always have a soft spot for Echo and the Bunnymen.

Speaking of favorite bands, did anyone see the spot on Comedy Central that's been running about Henry Rollins? Apparently they are airing one of his spoken word shows this weekend....I fervently hope I can get Comedy Central at the shore house or heads might roll!

---

Amber and I just went to grab a coffee. On the way over to Dunkin' Donuts she told me the harrowing story of her Planned Parenthood appointment over the weekend. When she made the appointment they actually told her that she needed to "refrain from putting anything in your vagina for 48 hours before your appointment".

Heeeeeeeeeee! I think I need to work for Planned Parenthood just so I can tell people that. 'What do you do for a living, Nicole?' 'Oh, I tell people to refrain from putting anything in their vaginas.'

What worries me is why there would be a need to say that particular phrase. It's not "refrain from having sex" or "refrain from using tampons"....it's "refrain from putting anything in your vagina. I now have visions of women coming into the Philadelphia Planned Parenthood the morning after exploring their sexuality with wooden bats, small rodents, or toy soldiers.

---

On a break last night during Logic class I wandered into the ladies room. I was adjusting my doo-rag [give me a break, it was my day off] when a movement under the soap dispenser caught my eye.

That's right about the time I screamed like a little girl and fled the scene.

No, it wasn't a dead body or a random body part. It was a roach the size of a small dog.

Temple University is in the middle of the North Philly ghetto. I lived on campus for two years and if there is one thing I've come to know, it's that the roaches are plentiful. But this was Temple's Center City campus -- it's supposed to be clean and pest-free. And so I was seriously grossed out.

It seems all of my bug-related trauma is all tied up Temple U. [go Owls!] I had never seen a roach or a rat until I moved there. I was welcomed to Philadelphia by a massive troop of roaches in the women's bathroom on the 9th floor of Johnson Hall -- they did a little dance for me and then formed the words "Hello there!" OK, not really, but just about.

And then there was the time my roommates and I accidentally kicked a hole in the ceiling of our room [912, Johnson Hall]. The hole appeared and then we were running for our lives. Apparently there must have been some toxic waste in the ceiling because there was a whole batallion of flying cockroaches that came streaming out of the hole. We were afraid for our lives, I tell you!

When I lived in Temple Towers, it was a whole different experience. Since we were drunk or drugged about 70% of the time, it became a weird game of delayed reaction to see who could kill the roach the fastest. As I'm sure you can imagine, this sometimes lasted for hours.

I'm seriously squicked by roaches. I know they can't really hurt me, but yuck! Have you seen those commercials for Orkin where it all starts out like it's a commercial for bath products and then this roach crawls across the television screen? I'm about two seconds away from suing Orkin for mental trauma. Ick!

---

Have you ever heard of a pickle on a stick? It was all the rage at Knoebel's Grove amusement park on Saturday. If it's really just a pickle, why does it need to be on a stick? Does spearing a pickle with a skewer make it tastier or somehow more festive?

If it's more than a pickle on a stick, what is it? Over the past few years at the Bloomsburg Fair there has been this weird surge in making odd things deep-fried. Like pickles. And Oreos and Snickers...yeah, batter-dipped and deep-fried. I'd like a coronary blockage for one, please. Oh, and yuck!

I've never understood the draw to eating things that just shouldn't be eaten. Don't get me wrong, I'm an adventurous eater -- I like snails and frog legs and sweetbreads and all that stuff. If I've never tried it I won't turn up my nose. Unless it is eating a tequila flavored lollipop with a freeze dried meal worm in the middle of it....or eating pickled slugs. No thanks. I shudder to think what the next big "delicacy" will be at the Bloomsburg Fair. Maybe something like chocolate covered pig snouts...

---

I'm playing hooky today. I woke up, took a shower, and decided I'd be better off at home trying to figure out my Logic homework. And, of course, I just didn't feel like going to work.

I have a few art projects coming up that I'm working on too. I'm doing an art journal collaborative based on color, so I'm working on getting my journal ready to go, and I'm also doing a second art journal collaborative with my friend Andi -- this one is going to be based on voodoo, which I think will be really excellent. I'm totally intimidated, though, because Andi is such a great artist I'm afraid that my pages will look positively amateurish next to hers! I'm also doing a tarot card deck collaborative that I need to design three cards for. I'm doing as much art as I can to counteract the effects of Logic on my feeble brain.

With Christmas so close at hand, I have one present out of the way. I told my grandparents I would take all of their loose photographs and make a nice album for them. Little did I know they'd have 4 Xerox size boxes full of photos! So this is going to be their Christmas present because it's going to take me until Christmas just to make the 4 or 5 albums I'll need to house them all! It's a huge job, but it's been fun to see all of the photos!

Because I don't have cable on the third floor in my studio, I'm watching Jerry Springer. Where do they get these people? I make it a habit to avoid watching this kind of trash, but it's like a train wreck. I would hope that they are professional actors and actresses...no one's life could possibly be that cheesy. What the hell is a "DJ slut"?

---

Craig and I made plans to have breakfast with Kristi and her current snack, Brad. I dragged my ass out of bed at 8am and we were at May's Family Restaurant by 9:30...Kristi and Brad were absent.

Nothing makes me crazier than not being prompt when you're meeting someone. Especially when I'm on a schedule -- things to do, people to see, towns to escape. They finally showed up at 9:45. Argh.

Kristi had talked Brad up when I saw her Friday night. Of course, she was just impressed because he has both ears and his tongue peirced. It takes more to impress me than a few peircings, and I was less than enamored. He's semi-pretty, but can barely string sentences together. Sometimes I think Kristi needs to get out more.

The ride back to Philadelphia was uneventful. And I almost cheered when I saw the skyline. It's good to be home!

---

I knew it would come up and be an issue, and I was right. My mom started to bitch about Bush today while we were eating lunch [to which I always reply: "You didn't vote, so you have no right to complain"], and I mentioned that I had gotten so wound up that I wrote him a letter about the Pledge being ruled unconstitutional.

Ed chimes in with, "Yeah, that really drives me nuts." I just looked at him and said, "I would bet that our views on this are completely different." And then I went on to say that, while I don't think the Pledge should be ruled unconstitutional, I don't believe the phrase "under god" should be included. I don't think Ed knew what to make of that -- so he told me that there should be more religion in the country. When I asked why he said that this country is lacking "morals."

"So you're equating religion with moral fortitude?" I asked incredulously. He got a little flustered and muttered, "Well yes."

I must have gotten a gleam in my eye, because Ed looked scared and backed away slowly. "I'm not religious. Does that mean I lack morals?" I asked. "No," he bleated. "But you just said that religious beliefs and morals go hand in hand," I said. Ed sort of looked stricken and ran the other way.

Craig is highly allergic to something at my mom's house. It might be pesticides they use on the corn fields behind the house, or maybe it's my mom's perfume. Everytime he visits he gets all bleary eyed and sneezy. So do I, but for different reasons: I just miss civilization.

---

Here I am in Berwick. Already this morning I had to plan an attack on the maniac who woke me up with a chainsaw at 5am. I know that there is that whole "early to bed, early to rise" and "the early bird gets the worm" mentality, but 5am????

I'm convinced that every inbred moron in the world descended on the Allentown Service Plaza on the Northeast extension of the Turnpike yesterday while we were there. It was probably a planned sneak attack. Every mullet wearing idiot within a 50 mile radius decided it was a great time to hit the Roy Rogers. Considering these people can't seem to walk and make decisions at the same time, it's a minor miracle they could get a license to drive.

I just had to buy something on Ebay for my mother. It's not complicated, but she and Ed are convinced that it's rocket science.

I'm ready to escape already. Help me. Must. Resist. the. Draw. of. the. Slack. Jaw.

---

I am having an uberboring day. The brains in IT decided it would be a brilliant move to switch us all over to a new database the day our new campaign starts. The problem is that the new database doesn't really work the way it should, and even though the database we're currently using is the biggest piece of shit in the world [it's DOS based], no one wants to stop using it because the data is going to be screwed up in the new database.

So today I have my list of 2001 donors and I'm checking every gift [including their history] against my own fundraising database, just in case something craptacular happens in September. I need to make sure that I have the correct data. Hopefully I will be long gone when the shit hits the fan, but I want to be prepared just in case.

I'm really antsy to get the hell out of here today...luckily that will happen in about an hour. Let the countdown begin!

---

By this time next week I will be deep sea fishing for fluke or blue fish off the coast of Long Beach Island, NJ. I'm not a great fisherwoman or anything like that...in fact, I hate fishing. I refuse to put bait on a hook and, in the event that I actually catch anything, I can't bring myself to remove the fish from the hook.

But I like deep sea fishing. First of all, there is very little chance that I will actually catch anything. Last year I caught a sea snail. And then there is the fact that the bait is squid, and squid is already dead so I can handle baiting the hook. What I really like, though, is just being out on the ocean for a few hours.

I have this weird relationship with the sea. I could dismissively just say that it's because I'm a Pisces, but there is a lot more too it than that. Maybe I was a fisherman in a past life or something like that, but I am unexplicably drawn to the ocean.

The smell of sea water and feel of salt drying on my skin makes me content. The sound of seagulls and water lapping at rocks is a lullaby. Being on a party boat as it fights its way through the chopping waters of the inlet is more fun to me than just about anything.

Obviously I'm really looking forward to this vacation. The house we stay at is right on the bay. Literally I could walk out the front door, take 5 steps and fall into the bay. There is a dock where Craig and I sit every night and watch the sunset. In the morning I wake up and do yoga either at the end of the dock or on the bay beach. I feel more creative when I'm within earshot of the ocean.

I've often told Craig that I'd like to live on LBI one day, but the truth of it is that I'd never be able to have a real job. The ocean makes me dreamy -- I'd get caught up watching dolphins swim across the shoreline and never make it to work.

---

Philadelphia is famous for several things, chief amongst them is the cheesesteak. I know that people who have never been to Philly think that a Steak 'Um sandwich on a hot dog roll is the same thing, but au contraire, mon frere!

There is something special about the Philly cheesesteak, and you can't get one anywhere else that even comes close. Trust me, I make it a habit to test the waters whenever I travel domestically. Seattle has great salmon, but the cheesesteaks are abyssmal...Denver's cheesesteaks are seriously subpar...and don't even get me started on the atrocity that passes for a cheesesteak in San Francisco!

Most true Philadelphians can argue over where in Philly has the best cheesesteaks, but there are three main contenders: Pat's, Geno's, and Jim's. I'm a Pat's girl....there's something about the grease that is tastier.

I've long held the belief that it's all about the grease when it comes to cheesesteaks. A cheesesteak isn't a cheesesteak unless it's made on a skillet that hasn't be de-greased since the beginning of time. Oh, and you have to have local bread -- maybe it's the polluted Schykill River water that makes it so good?

Now, there is a right way and a wrong way to ordering a cheesesteak. Pat's actually has a sign next to the window explaining the subtle nuances. I myself have written a technical writing paper on the correct procedure for ordering a cheesesteak.

One of my favorite online sources for the procedure is here...this guy doesn't believe in the "one way to order" procedure, but at least he explains why you should order a certain way. He also isn't overly fond of Pat's, but I'll let that slide...but I do agree with his assessment of the Provolone Wit.

I'm kind of hungry....

---

Everyone in the office is running around freaking out. The Executive Director just called a meeting to let everyone know that the agency has been forced to downsize, and they laid off a bunch of people today.

It's really not that big of a deal. I've been through downsizing before. People get wigged out, thinking they're next, but the reality of it is that they will just have to assume the work of those let go.

None of this really touches my department -- fundraising is such an important part of what we do that it would be ridiculous to cut any of us, particularly the major gifts fundraisers [like me]. A few marketing people got the ax, and some finance people, and one administrative person.

The good part of all this is that we are, after all, getting raises. Unfortunately they will not be retroactive. I'm sorry for the people who got the boot today, but I'm delighted that I'll be getting a raise.

It takes more than a little downsizing to shake me up. I think what made everyone really nervous is when our Executive Director got teary eyed. I mean, it's nice to know that the administration loves us and thinks of us as more than just dollar signs, but send me a memo and spare me the warm fuzzies.

---

Pop up ads make me violent. I sit here at work surfing the web, as all bad good employees do, and the thought of snatching my PC monitor off the desk and hurling it out the window goes through my head each and every time a pop up ad rears its useless head.

Nothing prepared me for the latest pop ad sneak attacks though -- instead of regular annoying pop up ads, I am now faced with pop up ads that zip across my screen. They dare me to chase them across the screen with my mouse in an effort to close the ad. Just 15 minutes ago a dancing Elvis mocked me on the Lycos site.

Those ads represent all that is evil in the world. I hereby proclaim that I will not purchase any product advertised in pop up ads. Join me in my quest! Damn the man! Damn the man!

---

Combine a dirt poor college student with an easy way to make $20/hour and what do you get? You get me pimping myself out as Barney the purple dinosaur.

I'm so ashamed...I only did it that once, and it seemed like it would be innocent fun! Really! I didn't know I'd feel so dirty, so violated, so......stupid.

In my college years I was hard up for money. Paying my own way through college while having nothing more than a work study job at the Financial Aid office didn't cut it. And so through this abject poverty, I came to know the horror of being dressed in a Barney suit handing out string cheese at the mall. And not just any string cheese -- fruit flavored string cheese.

Uh huh, you read correctly: fruit flavored string cheese. I remember the bizarre taste vividly...there was strawberry, banana, and strawberry-banana. It was disgusting and smelled like fruit scented gym socks -- inside the Barney head.

I perservered for two terror filled days of being mauled by drooling children, beaten about the head and shoulders by passing teenage boys, and assailed with that gawd awful smell of mall disinfectant and smelly cheese.

The money was nice but the trauma I suffered still lives on. Just last night I had a dream that the Barney head was stuck on my shoulders for eternity. I woke up screaming.

---

So I'm making a visit to Berwick this weekend -- that's my hometown that's in the middle of No Man's Land, Pennsylvania. I couldn't wait to make a quick exodus after graduating high school, and I still get the heebie jeebies when I have to go back.

Berwick is a very strange place -- during the holiday season there is this thing called the Christmas Boulevard. It is basically about 10 or 15 small plots of grass in the middle of wide street that get decorated with all manner of cheesy wooden and even cheesier animatronic Christmas decorations. Oh, and Santa hangs out to collect letters and hands out bags of potato chips.

Yes, that's right -- potato chips. Not candy canes, or Christmas cookies, or even fruitcake -- potato chips. One of the largest Berwick employers is Wise potato chips and so the Berwickian Santa hands out Wise potato chips. Aside from this bizarre annual ritual, there really isn't much to do -- watch the grass grow, tip some cows, or breed kids to play football.

If I had my way about it I would never set foot in Berwick again. But my mother requires at least one or two visits every year in order to keep the peace. Craig and I will leave the comforts of urban living on Friday afternoon after work and drive the 2 hours to get to the freaky land of country kitsch that is Berwick.

And then Craig and I will pack up as possible on Sunday morning and escape back to civilization. And another visit will be over.

---

My lunch at Morimoto was insanely delicious. We shared an order of the rock shrimp tempura and that was spicy and crisp and just fabulous. I had a bowl of miso soup and the nasu shigiyaki, which is eggplant, chicken, and red miso gratin. The tofu in the miso soup was fresh and unbelievably good, and the gratin was heavenly. Believe it or not, I was too stuffed for dessert...but I was dying to try the chocolate fig cake.

I'm normally not that crazy about restaurant decor. But Morimoto was gorgeous -- everything is frosted glass that changes color in a very subtle way and a beautiful ceiling [I know, why would anyone notice the ceiling?]. Even the ladies room was beautiful.

I give Morimoto two thumbs up for sure. I probably would have squealed like a little girl if Morimoto was actually there.

---

I used to think I was marketable.

At the time I thought so, I was. I started off my illustrious career as a secretary and moved up to the position of administrative assistant. Some serious money can be made as an administrative assistant if you're willing to put up with all of that bullshit.

Somehow I got roped into professional fundraising. Development professionals can also make nice salaries, but the burn out rate is high. Who wants to hit up all their friends for money every year? Who wants to beg strangers for money?

Because I haven't finished up my Bachelors degree yet, I'm not officially qualified to do much of anything. Experience-wise, I can do just about anything. Most things I'm even remotely qualified for I just don't want to do.

This is so whiny -- where are all the creative jobs? I think I'd like some whine with dinner, thanks.

I've been trying to come to grips with the least amount of money I'm willing to make in order to try to figure out something I can do that involves bookbinding or something else similarly creative.

Argh...I'm so very sad and pathetic today.

---

Heeeeeeeeee! The Philadelphia Gay News has an article on the front page today about mullets! The headline reads, "The Mullet: a Hair-do that's a Lifestyle." Bwa hahaha!

Philly chicks are tough, that's all there is to it. If you've been paying attention to all the child abduction stories you know that 7 year old Erica Pratt was abducted two days ago. Yesterday afternoon she gnawed through the duct tape she had been wrapped in, found her way up the cellar stairs, busted through the cellar door, and then busted out the front window of the house to call for help. Girl Power! She should be on a Wheaties box.

If you watch Iron Chef, you might be excited by this -- I get to have lunch today at Morimoto. Since I do watch Iron Chef, I am falling down thrilled about it -- we've been trying to get a reservation for months! I'll have a full report later today.

Instead of obsessing over my Logic homework last night, I watched American Idol. As much as I absolutely can't stand to hear RJ or AJ sing, that trailor trash Ryan Starr has got to go. Way to sing something with lyrics, sweetie! Tamyra sang the hell out of her song though.

---

I just had lunch with some friends at Logan Circle near the Swann Fountain. I feel very fortunate that two of my friends from college work around the corner. We always have funny things to talk about, and it's always a funny time.

I see Christy all the time, but I rarely see Dave. Dave told me today that he loves me because I understand why A Flock of Seagulls is significant.

We were talking about Christy's snack, Eric. Eric is a few years younger and has no idea why the ticket counter guy with the Flock hair in The Wedding Singer was so funny. So Dave and I talked about what Flock song is the best -- Dave likes "Wishing" but I like "Space Age Love Song." Christy thinks we're both insane.

I'm so lucky to have good friends. I really and truly do have some wonderful friends.

Dave likes to tell the story of how he met the two of us. Christy doesn't remember very much, but I remember vividly because he and his roomies were the first people from the other dorm we met. One day Christy, my other roomies and I were dancing in the dorm room...Christy and I may have been practicing some dance for cheerleading, but everyone else was bouncing around the room like idiots too and not worrying that our window was open. And then there's this knock on the door.

It's Dave and his two roommates who happen to live across the way in the other dorm. They saw us freaking out from their room and decided they had to meet us. We've all been friends ever since.

Sometimes I miss being able to meet people by doing silly things like dancing in front of your window. Dancing in front of my window at home would only earn me an audience of drunk slobs with mullets from the bar next door. I'm sure I could meet them, but it wouldn't be fun.

---

It's now pretty much a given that I will, in all likelihood, flunk my Logic class. I had my first test last night and I mostly guessed at 75% of the questions. I'm perfectly capable of constructing truth tables and figuring out truth functionality, etc, etc....but 75% of the test was deductive reasoning based on questions about the rules of formation and transformation.

And what's worse is that my idiotic instructor can't grasp the fact that some of us might actually need some instruction on how to answer these questions. He keeps saying things are "ridiculously simple"...which is a surefire way to jinx me.

I'm taking this Logic class as a way to satisfy my upper level mathematics requirement. My brain rejects all that is math-related. I can barely add and subtract, let along do algebra and calculus.

The moment when I rejected math is still very fresh in my head. When I was in the sixth grade I got the chicken pox [don't believe it when you hear you can't get chicken pox more than once -- I've had them twice] and missed a week or two of school. I think we were learning really rudimentary algebra, and you know if you miss the formative stuff you're screwed because it all builds on the basics.

My sixth grade teacher was Mr. Ricci -- he looked just like a chipmunk. He stayed late with me after school to catch me up on everything I had missed. I was still not feeling great, and I was just dead tired and didn't feel like learning anything. Mr. Ricci got fed up with trying to teach me algebra when I wasn't in the mood to learn and yelled at me. He called me stupid, and told me that this math was "ridiculously easy." See a pattern?

I don't blame Mr. Ricci for dooming me to a life of math stupidity, but it didn't help my situation. And now here I am, almost twenty years later, hoping that the Logic test will be graded on a huge curve.

---

A-humpin' and a-pumpin'....

That is the phrase my mother actually used when my former stepfather [John] caught me and my boyfriend [named Scott] having sex one fine day when I was 17.

It's not like there was anything kinky abnormal going on...just straight vanilla sex that most teens have. John had the decency not to interrupt right then and there, but I suspect that he would have videotaped it if he could have. John was a perv.

So later that day, I get summoned by my mother to have a chat. I had no clue that I'd been snagged, so I was unprepared when she said, "John came home from lunch today and ran into you and Scott having sex in your bedroom. He was so embarrassed that he went into our bedroom and shut the door, but there was all this a-humpin' and a-pumpin' going on."

In my house we never talked about sex, so to hear this come out of my mother's mouth was bizarre and surreal. Plus I had to bite the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing.

Nothing much ever came from it -- I think I got grounded for a few weeks and my mother took me to have my first gynecological exam at Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood and I have a long and illustrious relationship, which is why I am such a big proponent of their work.

The episode was never referred to again.

I kept waiting for the big Sex Talk when I was younger. Hey, I read Judy Blume books and all manner of other teen and preteen literature. I knew that it was just a matter of time before my mom sat down with me and explained the birds and the bees. It never happened.

My mother and I have a weird relationship -- we don't hug and kiss or ever say "I love you." We're just not close. I don't ever remember being touchy feely with anyone in my family. But you don't have to be close to get the Sex Talk.

I will now reveal to you the wonderment of what amounted to the whole of information received from my mother on the topic of sex.

Are you ready?

When I started getting my period at the age of 11 my mother left a medical encyclopedia on my bed with a menstual pad as a bookmark. It was bookmarked to the section on menstruation.

Nothing like the personal touch.

But again, because I had been reading Judy Blume books I was well prepared and already knew what was going on. But yeah, I learned everything I know about the technical aspects of sex and contraception and childbirth from a medical encyclopedia.

Sometimes I wonder how I turned out to be the fine upstanding citizen that I am.

---

I don't know, but I think I may have been schnookered. I went over to the nail place and ended up with a silk wrap. The nail tech assured me that a silk wrap would be stronger than regular acrylics.

I'm generally not a high maintenance girl. Or at least that's what I tell myself. In reality, I guess I am...kind of. I get my hair trimmed and colored every 5 or 6 weeks, my eyebrows waxed every 3 weeks, my nails done every 3 or 4 weeks, a pedicure every 6 weeks...I was getting my legs and underarms waxed every 4 weeks, but I stopped for the summer [letting the hair grow out in shorts is just embarrassing], and I have a couple of facials and massages every year. I love to buy every new type of makeup or hair product.

Maybe I'm a closet high maintenance girl. To look at me I look relatively low maintenance -- I'm a jeans, tank top, and doo rag kind of chick. I hate high heeled shoes with a fiery passion usually only reserved for boy bands.

And yet I can name all of the OPI nailpolish New York colors.

---

Here is a conversation I just had...

Me: ...dialing the phone number of City Nails...
Nail Tech: Hellooooooooo?
Me: Is this City Nails?
Nail Tech: Yeeeesssssss. What you want?
Me: Um, I'd like to make an appointment for a full set.
Nail Tech: When?
Me: Today around 1pm.
Nail Tech: OK, 2clock.
Me: Uh, is there any possibility of getting in any earlier than that?
Nail Tech: OK, 1:30.
Me: Thank you very much. I'll see you at 1:30.

I have to ask myself why I get my nails done at this place -- the Nail Techs are all rude and bitchy.

Beauty is pain, man.

---

Last night a had a dream that Craig and I were having dinner on Delaware Avenue with 3 other couples [who I don't know, but was very good friends with in the dream]. Craig was meeting us down there, but he never showed up. So I called him and he was crying like a little girl because he had gotten jumped at the train station by a gang of roving thugs and beaten up. He was being treated in an ambulance as we spoke.

So the other three couples and I walked over to the train station to collect him, but the gang was still lurking. They tried to steal my purse and kidnap one of the women I was with. They followed us to Delaware Avenue [which was full of shops and restaurants in my dream, but isn't like that for real] and kept picking on us. Finally we got to the restaurant, which was on a ship. We were about 10 minutes late for our reservation, and the host wouldn't seat us because there was no seating after 9:30 pm. I got into a huge argument with the guy and we all left.

When we went back outside the gang was waiting for us. I ended up getting into a knife fight [actually, it was more like a scalpel fight -- we were both wielding scalpels] with one of the chicks from the gang and I stabbed her in the leg.

And that's when I woke up. What was bothering me thoughout the whole dream is that someone else I knew had gotten beaten up at that same train station, but I couldn't remember who. After 20 minutes of serious thought, I realized that it was my ex-boyfriend Dave. But then I realized it had to have been a dream because the train station in my dream doesn't exist on Delaware Avenue.

So really, the train station has now become a reoccuring symbol in my dream life, much like a house that I dream about often. Maybe I'm just really completely and criminally insane.

---

I got some wonderful news over the weekend -- my student loans have been deferred for another year. There is just something so fabulous and mood-bolstering about getting unexpected excellent news.

It's unexpected because I didn't apply for a deferrment. Apparently anytime one of their loan-ees goes back to school they review their status for deferrment. So now I get to keep an extra $85 every month. Mine, all mine! I know, I'll spend it on my tuition bill! Suddenly, $85 extra doesn't seem so exciting....

There was a man on the subway this morning with massive man-boobs. He needed a bra more than I do.

I understand that when men get overweight they, generally, develop man-boobs. And being pissy about man-boobs is the same as being pissy about women with mammoth ankles. For the most part, it's something that just happens and can't really be controlled too much. That said, why would anyone with man-boobs wear a tank top?

I try not to make fun of people for how their bodies just naturally are -- but what they wear is definitely an allowable topic of mirth.

---

Wine of the day: 1999 Conti Contini Sangiovese - really a wonderful red -- not too tannin-y and very blackberry-ish in taste. Yummy!

I should say so, since I drank 4 glasses while I was watching Inside the The Actors Studio with Mike Myers. So I'm [coincidentally, I would say, considering my first post of the day] a little tipsy as I write this, but I would conclude that it was the funniest Actors Studio ever.

One of my very favorite movies of all time is So I Married An Axe Murderer. And I guess you could say that I've got a slight crush on Mike Myers.

And oddly, considering that I'm an English major, Mike Myers is a descendent of William Wordsworth. At this disclosure, Craig turned to me and said, "Who is Wordsworth?"

My jaw hit the ground. Every once in a while Craig will say something to me that absolutely floors me. I can't imagine knowing someone who doesn't know who William Wordsworth is. It makes me want to pull out my Romantic poet anthology and read him a couple dozen poems. It's just bizarre.

---

I've been in my studio all day attempting to clean up. I hate to clean, but I can't let the studio go anymore. It is just covered from top to bottom with scraps of paper and bookboard and binding thread. I can't even find anything anymore, so my mess had migrated to the living room.

Things must change -- it is driving me nuts to walk into the house every day and see the living room in total shambles. But I can't move all my crap out of the living room until I clean up the studio...or it will just migrate back to the living room again. I would estimate that I'm about 75% done.

I hate cleaning.

---

I'm not a good drunk.

I've learned to respect my liver more often over the years, but there have been more times than I care to remember when I woke up in my bathroom with my cheek pressed against the cool porcelain of the toilet.

Probably the worst story in my collection of stupid drunk tales is a weekend the summer after I turned 21. Any story that involves partial nudity and police officers can't be good.

A group of friends and I decided to go to some beach in Delaware to see a band. My friend Brenda was dating the lead singer of this band [a local cover band]. So after the band was done playing we met them at a bar around the corner from the beach. I ate about 1 plateful of jalapeno poppers and about a six pack of Dos Equis beer.

Then we went to some cheesy ass dance club where some moron started feeding me shots of tequila. I had to have drunk half a bottle of tequila when all that liquor finally hit me.

Now the rest of this adventure is all second hand information -- I, thankfully, do not recall any of it. Apparently, I was much like the drunk girl character from Saturday Night Live...just falling over, slurred speech drunk. I threw myself on the drummer from the band. Literally. According to my friends I looked like I had grown several additional arms and all of them were molesting the poor drummer.

Luckily my friends were not as drunk as I was and pulled me off the guy. As we were walking back to the car, I jumped into the back of some stranger's van and tried to sleep it off. The girls got me out of the van and into the car.

They wanted to drive home from Delaware that night, but I had other ideas. For every two blocks they drove, I had to throw up. They stopped at a Wawa or 7-Eleven or something to get some water and crackers for me. Big mistake to leave me in the car by myself.

You know how most convenience stores have big glass storefronts? Well, let's just say that I wanted to change my clothes so I got out of the car and just stripped down in the parking lot. I flashed/mooned the entire Wawa, including about 5 police officers who threatened to arrest me for public nudity.

After getting me out of being arrested, my friends gave up on driving home and parked in grocery store parking lot overnight.

And that's where I woke up the next day, feeling absolutely wretched.

To this day I can't stand the smell of tequila.

---

I'm a news whore. I visit the CNN site, the Virtourist international newspaper links, etc. several times daily. I watch the local news at least twice a day. If I'm properly motivated, I actually watch CNN [but never Larry King, because Larry King is just pure evil].

My point is that I hear about all the crazy and horrible things that people do to each other, and I'm not really horrified much anymore by it. Until yesterday.

Apparently a couple in Burlington City, NJ beat their baby to death and then burnt his corpse in their fireplace. That's just disturbing.

What gives this story an almost black comedy twist is that they were arrested in Kissimmee, Florida. You know, home of Disney.

And so what I imagine is them getting interviewed....

Reporter: So you've beaten your baby to death and burned him up in your wood burning stove. What are you going to do now?
Crazy Couple [in unison]: We're going to Disney World!

On a less grotesque front, I heard back from the chick who is organizing the art retreat. It looks like she wants to go with my piano hinge book binding class and the travel journal class. So I guess I have an upcoming paid teaching gig! Woohoo! I'm really excited, but I don't want to get too excited until I have a contract in hand.

Today might just be a baking day for me. I've been having a wicked craving for caramel apple tart...and since the restaurant that I like isn't serving it anymore, it's up to me to recreate it as best I can. I'm such an "instant gratification" type of girl it might be hard to hold on!

---

Christmas is only 5 months away.

I am completely anal retentive when it comes to Christmas shopping. I usually start shopping at the beginning of summer. I squirrel things away in hiding places. I congratulate myself on starting early, getting things on sale, and generally avoiding buying into the Christmas rush.

It's a sickness.

It is with a heavy heart that I admit that I have not bought one single thing this year yet. I have my list made and I've thought long and hard about what to buy, but I haven't actually bought anything yet. You know what? I'm getting the shakes.

I do have a problem this year -- I have no clue what to get my mother and stepfather. Last year I bought them a bunch of little stuff in London and also a gift certificate to a bed and breakfast about 45 minutes from their house. The gift certificate doesn't seem to have been well-received. The two of them are total homebodies and refuse to travel [although you can hardly call driving 45 minutes to a B&B travelling], unless it's to attend something NASCAR related.

Did I mention that I think I might have been adopted?

Yeah, my family is a bunch of mouth-breathers with mullets. And my stepfather has an Amish beard.

So I'm now thinking about what I can get for them for Christmas that they'll like. What do you get for NASCAR enthusiasts?

It gives me the shakes just thinking about it.

---

The Fates have smiled on me today -- my meeting let out early. And I feel rather relieved for more than the obvious reasons.

Why is it that just as I've resigned myself to 2 or 3 hours of doodling at a meeting, the Vice President of the company always sits down next to me? It's a conspiracy designed to make me pretend to pay attention and pretend to care. Damn the man!

---

I've been having travel-related dreams lately. Last night I dreamt that Craig and I were flying to China. For some unknown reason, we didn't check the time on the tickets and just assumed that it was a late night flight [which is so unlike me -- I have OCD when it comes to travel details]. I needed to get my passport renewed and in my dream they did that at the airport. So we arrived at the airport around noon to make sure we would get everything taken care of.

I told Craig to just go to the gate and wait for me there and I would be along shortly. The middle of this dream is slightly muddled for me, but it involved crawling on the renewal counter and barking like a dog, visiting a friend in the hospital which was connected to the airport, returning to the renewal counter and acting like an asshole.

And then I found out that our plane had departed at 3am earlier that day. And that's when I woke up.

The dream from the previous night was even stranger. I dreamt that Craig and I decided to vacation in Indonesia, but we were broke so we decided to fly super duper cheap class. That means that the airlines now offered an option where they'd hook up a cot to the back of the airplane and strap you to the cot. Obviously there would be no steward service! So anyway, somehow while we were flying my straps broke loose and I plummeted to what would normally be my death. But apparently I was only in a coma because I woke up one day in our house sweating profusely. I had been rudely awakened by the sound of children yelling and running through the house. So I got out of bed and ran downstairs to see what the hell was going on.

As it turns out, I had been a coma for 6 years and Craig had remarried and had kids and stuff, but was still taking care of me in my coma. When I woke up I didn't know whether I should hit Craig or give him a hug.

At any rate, that's what I've been dreaming about.

In other news, I'm delighted it's Friday. Unfortunately, I have yet another long and boring meeting today. It begins at 9am and should last until sometime around noon. By then my ass will be sound asleep and I'll be ready to leap from the window [if management hadn't already anticipated that and cemented them shut, that is]. However, my day gets better from there. I'm getting my nails done after that and then I get to flee the building at 3pm.

---

My dad really is the worst parent in the world.

If you're a regular reader, you remember the early morning stupidity when my idiot father invited me to a shindig at casa de dumbass. Crystal emailed me today and told me a short version of the story -- basically, my little brother [who is 27] brought along some friend of his and my dad invited all of his dirtbag neighbors and the swell bartender from the club that he frequents...and then all of them sat around and got absolutely piss drunk. Keep in mind that Crystal is 17. I'm sure she isn't some innocent, but it can't be good for her to be around that kind of crap. Parents are supposed to be the responsible ones...

In addition, my drunk brother made Crystal drive him and his little friend to the local tattoo parlor at 2am so they could get tattoos [not Crystal]. Crystal doesn't have her drivers license or even her permit. She's not allowed to drive because she has seizures for no apparent reason.

So it sounds like it was a good idea to skip that shit -- I can't imagine what a travesty that would have been. My dad really has no concept of correct [or even acceptable] parental behavior.

Yikes.

---

Craig has only been to one concert in his entire life. Isn't that weird? I don't even think he's seen local bands perform anywhere.

My first large stadium concert was when I was in elementary school -- it was the J. Geils band. I went with my mom. Berwick isn't a hotbed of concert activity, so it's not like I was out seeing bands every weekend...I think my next show was when I was 15. I saw Richard Marx in Scranton. Yay! Oh hell, I thought it was cool.

I really didn't start going to shows regularly until I got to college. Philadelphia is an easy place to see a show. Strangely, the first show I saw in college was in Trenton, NJ at a small little warehouse in the crappiest part of Trenton imaginable. I saw Nine Inch Nails. After that, I started seeing shows regularly. My favorites have been NIN, Chili Peppers, No Doubt, Rollins Band, and Beastie Boys.

What's so strange about Craig not seeing concerts is that he grew up within 20 minutes of Philadelphia and really likes music. That is just unfathomable to me.

You know what concert he saw? Van Halen. Hmmmm....

---

I can't open up the paper or watch the news or even walk down the street without hearing something about Allen Iverson.

I don't know if it's like this nationally, or if it's just locally since he is on the local NBA team. I'm sick of seeing him, sick of seeing interviews with his fans who claim that he's being targeted because he's a celebrity and treated unfairly.

Let's review. Iverson participated in a home invasion and threatened someone with a gun. There are witnesses and evidence.

What normally happens when someone busts into someone's house and threatens the life of whoever happens to live there? That's right: you get arrested. Immediately.

And so I'd like to know how it's treating Iverson "unfairly" to let him hang out in his mansion for 4 or 5 days until his attorney returns from a European vacation before he's arrested. He even threw a party at his house the night before he turned himself in. He was kept separate from the rest of the prison population in order to ensure his safety. Yep, sounds really rough, eh?

Who really knows what happened that night...personally, I don't think I could care less. If he did what he's been charged with, he deserves to go to prison. I don't care if he can put a ball through a hoop.

If he didn't do it, it might be a nice idea for him to start acting like an adult instead of trying to pretend like he lives in South Central and leads a desparate lifestyle. Allen, listen up buddy -- you're not a thug. You live in Gladwyne in a mansion and you have a lot of money. Live with it -- stop acting like a moron.

I feel slightly better for having gotten that off my chest.

---

So I got to thinking last night about why I find people attractive. It was during American Idol, if that helps to point out my frame of mind.

It occurred to me that I don't find even one of those guys attractive. The majority of them look like they belong in some silly little boy band. Justin is remotely attractive, but only when he's sexing up the camera [which I didn't notice too much of last night]. But the hair! Holy Sideshow Bob!

Now I know that there are billions of little girls out there clutching pictures of these dorks to their budding chests and thinking how romantic it would be to marry one of them. I've been there [that was my Shaun Cassidy phase]. I know there are people who find these guys hot.

The truth of the matter is that I'm not for one second attracted to typically "pretty" boys. You know who is on my top 5? Ice-T, Nicolas Cage, Busta Rhymes, Eric Stoltz, and Willem Defoe. I like men who have character to their face. It isn't just a face though -- they also have a certain character trait that sets them apart from other cute boys, and most of them are partial to a cause. They have intelligence.

Tom Cruise is someone that people drool over. I think Tom Cruise is really unattractive. For starters, I can't look at his mouth without wanting to vomit. While these days will soon be over, he has really ugly teeth. I can take icky teeth in a face that has character [like Steve Buscemi], but if you have a "pretty" face then you better have the teeth to match. He also seems kind of vapid and mean. Not attractive.

I seem to have a particular affinity for red-headed men. My first serious crush was on a redhead named Ben, which may explain why I'm so turned on by red hair and freckles.

---

No one can possibly know my pain right now. I've been sitting in a day long software training all day.

Any minute now I expect the trainer to bust out with "This is your mouse. This is how your use your mouse."

I'm running out of sexual fantasies to keep myself occupied. I need help.

---

I have a real problem with public spitting.

The other day I was walking down the street dodging masses of spit and loogies on the sidewalk. I looked around, wondering what completely farmhick was littering the walk -- that's when I noticed it: businessmen and street people alike all think it's OK to spit in public.

We all know that I am not miss prim and proper manners. But I would like it if I could walk down the street without having to listen to someone hawk up the snot to spit a loogie in the middle of the street.

I guess that people figure it's just spit -- it's natural, it's biodegradable. But aside from just being generally annoying, it's really unattractive.

Last night on the subway after class I was looking across the tracks to the Westbound side. Some really hot guy was waiting for the train, and [I'll admit it] I was checking him out. And then he spits onto the platform. I had to fight the urge to run screaming the other way.

So why do boys feel the need to spit? Do you have an overabundance of saliva and there's just too much in your mouth? Did you eat something nasty? What? I don't get it. Someone explain it to me, OK?

What I find worse is women who spit. Most women I know do not spit in public -- they have way too much regard for what they look like in public. Mostly the women who do spit in public are the standard farmhick and the typical ghetto fabulous superstar -- chicks who think they're tough, mostly.

Maybe that's it: public spitting is a form of asserting your manliness, your toughness, your street credibility.

Or maybe it's just rude and I'm obsessive.

---

I just had lunch with Christy, who had news for me about our former roomie, Ellen. I don't know too many people who like Ellen. She comes off really nice at first, but is really a screwed up pot of seething hate and stupidity.

I met Ellen when I was a freshman. She was a friend of Christy's from high school. If you don't know Ellen very well, she seems like a really nice girl...someone you'd want to hang out with. So when Christy and I moved to Temple Towers, we invited her to live with us.

At Towers we lived in a 3 bedroom apartment that housed 7 girls. Ellen in a room with Felicia. I lived in a room with Christy and Carole. Kathy lived in a room with Pamela. Oddly, the room I lived in was the sane room. Ellen, Felicia, Pam, and Kathy all had these huge issues that made them hard to deal with.

-Felicia made a pass at every single guy any of us ever brought home. We suspected that she and her dad had some bizarre sexual relationship going on.
-Pamela was in college to meet a husband, and that was it. She decided that she was the mom of the group and tried to keep us in line by punishing us. Once she took all of her utensils and cookware out of the kitchen and hid it in her bedroom because someone didn't wash one of her pots within the 24 hour time limit. She eventually stopped talking to any of us and sequestered herself in her bedroom along with the future husband.
-Kathy was a supermodel type who had a drug problem. We couldn't go out clubbing with her because we'd tell her we were leaving at 11:00 and she'd be ready to go, decide she hated her hair and spend an additional 2 hours showering and changing.

Ellen was a whole other story. Before I relay this story to you, you have to know that I have a fairly low tolerance for bullshit. When I was in college it was even lower.

The first thing that Ellen did to piss everyone off is constantly complain about her body. Ellen weighed about 10 pounds in the shower, and had absolutely no boobs or hips whatsoever to speak of, was about 5'9", had long blonde hair and blue eyes -- yet she was constantly bitching about looking fat or ugly. When it's 11pm and we're ready to go out, and we have Ellen literally crying buckets because she has this imaginary flab on her ass...well, we all wanted to kill her. Eventually we just started to leave without her and she got over it.

I understand that some people do not have any self-confidence. But Ellen's antics smacked of just wanting to hear someone go on about how pretty she looked, or how thin she was, or whatever.

She also liked to pretend that she was the most innocent virgin on the planet. Trust me when I say that Ellen probably slept with more people than any of us combined...she just liked to pretend that we didn't know about it. An example of how well she hid her activities: she was shacking up with our friend George, and I was sort of going out with his roomie Vince. They had bunkbeds -- I was in bed with Vince and Ellen was in bed with George. If someone is having sex, it was known. Trust me, Ellen and George were having sex. Yet to this day she denies that she and George ever had sex. Of course, George used to report back to us every day so we know that's not true.

At Temple U. there is this day long celebration where everyone just wanders around in a drunken fog -- it's called Spring Fling. I started drinking around 7am...I think I was drinking tequila and pineapple juice. Ellen wandered in around 9am from another fling. She was dating some guy who was a fraternity brother of my ex-boyfriend. She started moaning that he didn't really like her and that he was just using her. She wouldn't shut up about it. Ellen literally went on for 2 hours about how she wasn't good enough, she was fat, this guy didn't like her, blah blah blah. I was wasted and I'd had enough so I threw my glass of tequila at her [it missed] and screamed at her enough to make her sob uncontrollably.

In true Ellen fashion, she pretended like it never happened.

However, there is one episode that just speaks volumes about what kind of girl Ellen is. I was dating this guy named Todd and the two of us were hanging out in my room watching TV [no, really!]. All of a sudden I hear this gut-wrenching shriek coming from Ellen's room. I ran over to the room and Ellen was in the fetal position on her bed, clutching the phone to her miniscule bosom. And she was screeching at the top of her lungs, screaming "Noooooooooooooooooo!"

I thought someone had died, I really did. I finally got her to calm down a little and tell me what was going on. Apparently, the health services clinic had just called to tell her that she had chlamydia [you know, from all that sex she wasn't having]. Before I had a chance to say anything, she wailed, "Why me? It should have been someone like you! You sleep around -- it should have been you!"

I came pretty close to slapping her silly, but I just got up and walked out and we haven't spoken since. But again, I digress...

The news that Christy had was that apparently Ellen has cheated on her husband of one year already. And I'm supposed to be the floozy. Ha!

---

I kind of like riding the subway.

People bitch and complain about public transportation, but I love it. Let me amend that: I love local public transit. Riding Greyhound buses is a scary proposition -- on the few times that I've ridden with Greyhound I've sat next to men who look like mass murderers and smell like the dentist office. Who knows, maybe it was the same guy. But I digress...local public transit rules.

Most of the reason why I like to ride the subway revolves around people watching. I see the same people every day and I tend to notice their habits.

Like a woman I refer to as The Waddler. She wears the same blue flowered cardigan sweater everyday, and has a hairy upper lip and a mole the size of Texas under her nose. Or this other woman who I call Mrs. Brady....she has a kick ass body for a woman who must be nearing 50, but she has Carol Brady hair. She also wears the same purple wrap dress every Monday.

Today I noticed that half the people on the subway and in the concourse are wearing white shoes. No one has, or ever will, elect me to the fashionista, but I know in my heart of hearts that white shoes look like shit on everyone.

White sneakers are fine...they don't really count. I'm talking about white dress shoes -- whether they are shiny or matte, leather or pleather, flats or stilettos, white shoes belong on nurses only. There's just something about them that make me think of Barbie shoes. White shoes are just pure evil.

I have not owned a pair of white shoes since my childhood. From the time I was able to start picking out my shoes, I have refused to wear white shoes. There's something so "trailer park trash" about them...something that screams, "I only have half my teeth and these curlers in my hair aren't for show!"

I have real issues with fashion -- I basically stick to black. There's no way that I can mismatch something if it's black. If I gerber something on myself [which I always do], it doesn't show on black. I must own 30 pairs of black pants and at least 50 pairs of black shoes.

The sick part is that isn't an exaggeration. A few years ago I got curious and counted my shoes. I literally had 98 pairs of shoes....over half of them were black. Some hadn't been worn in years and years -- like the canary yellow pumps with the little crimped thingy on the front and the electric blue alligator skin pumps. Hey, I was styling in the early '80s! Don't worry, I donated them to a worthy cause. Right now there's probably a crack whore parading around in my flourescent pink slouch boots.

We've all been victims of the fashionista at one time or another. Hell, the '80s were one big faux paux for me. My worst crime was likely the flourescent purple sweat dress with the canary yellow belt and earrings that went along with those pumps I was talking about. I think that was circa 8th grade.

I know that low cut jeans are the "in" thing right now. I kind of like them because they fit me like normal pants -- those of us who are low waisted and short know how to work the trend of low waists and cropped pants, let me tell you! But the newest in the low cut jeans are getting ridiculous. I'd have to get a bikini wax to feel comfortable. And forget about sitting down -- chicks who insist on sitting down in super low waist jeans have an awful lot in common with my plumber.

---

I'm happy to say that my Busta love has been realized. Halloween Resurrection was, indeed, cheesy. But still entertaining and kind of funny in that pathetic slasher film way.

I have also finished all of my books with the exception of one. And the only thing I need to finish on the one is a chemical transfer, which will take all of 2 seconds. I'm really happy with the way they all turned out. And everything I made today scans much better then the books from yesterday.

Now I can work on the outlines and supply lists until Thursday.

---

Most of my second round of books are finished. I woke up at 8am and got to work -- so now I have two little travel journals with their own luggage [both journals of which I have to actually put art onto, and then I have to find a handle and closure for the second box], 2 albums [the first is completely finished, and the second needs to have the paper cut and then I have to bind it], and I have two piano hinge books [although I have to find 4 more skewers so I can finish binding the second one. The first is finished].

I feel pretty good that most of the real work is done. I just have to mock up some class outlines and supply lists. I think I will charge a $10 supply fee -- and then I can supply boards, spackle, bookbinding thread, etc.

I'm so obsessive-compulsive about all this. It's boring even to me.

I have had a fairly low key weekend, thanks in large part to the huge round of bookbinding that I've been involved with. Craig took me to Las Caszuelas yesterday for dinner and that is the only time I've left the house. I really want to go to the movies today so I can get my Busta love on, but I don't know that it's going to happen. Don't get me wrong -- I don't expect Halloween Resurrection to be good, but I do expect to be entertained by the sheer cheese factor. And then there's Busta.

It's been a news free weekend for me. On some level I feel free from stupidity -- it's nice to be completely ignorant of the foibles of our government every once in a while. However, I feel strangely sure that I have missed some vital information. It's a catch 22.

---

I'm happy to say that I have no completed the first run of book samples for my proposals. I still have to finish a collage on one book and so I won't post it here yet, but the other two are finished.

The first is a photo album. It has a hinged cover and is bound with a twig from the tree outside of my house. It is covered with handmade paper that has flower inclusions in it and has some skeletonized leaves attached to the cover. I kind of like this album...it's very simple. My next album, I think, will have a stab binding. That one will scan better because the book will lay flat against the scanner glass. This one is lifted a little by the stick binding. It looks like shit in scan.

The second is a journal with a piano hinge binding. The cover is texturized with spackle and then hand painted. There is a window cutout into which I have fitted a seashell from my last trip to Atlantic City.

I'm a little disappointed about how they look scanned. Both look much better when I have them in hand. I may buy some film tomorrow and take photographs to scan instead.

Tomorrow will mark my second round of books. I'd like to have several samples to show for each proposal.

---

I'm really bad at networking.

There, I said it. I am a failure at the typical young professional crapola -- pressing the flesh at a pretentious cocktail party is not my bag.

I had to work that cocktail party for my young professionals group last night and the first thing I did when I arrived is spill a glass of sangria down my white linen blouse. You all already know I'm clumsy as hell, but now everyone else does too. I'm a social leper.

So waves of young professionals invaded and I had to kiss the babies, so to speak. I have to tell you that I have developed a fabulous handshake. I guess that's the one good thing out of all of this.

I absolutely hate to shake someone's hand and get that little limp wimpy shake. Women are famous for it. They take the tip of your fingers with theirs and sort of let their clammy little hand rest in yours for a second before removing the aforementioned hand. When men have a limp handshake it seems just, well, creepy. Usually in addition to the handshake being icky, it's accompanied by a disgusting extra clamminess that is not easily forgotten.

I have a tendency to dislike people who do not own a firm handshake. I'm not saying that I want them to crush the bones of my little hand, but a strong grip and at least a little pump or two is appreciated.

Anyway, I got to practice the handshake last night and do the air kiss thing far too often last night. And then I ended up doing the fake laugh thing, and then I put on the "You're fascinating -- please tell me more" face. It generally works...of course, on the inside I'm making faces and calling people names.

All I wanted to do is come home and work on my book samples. Luckily that is what I've been doing all day. I have one completely done -- that's the travel journal that comes with it's own luggage. I have the photo album and the piano hinge book about 75% done. I plan to get all of them done tonight, and then I can make extras at my leisure.

---

I have an event at 4pm to work for my young professionals group. If you could see me I'd be heaving a gigantic sigh. I have book samples to make and instead of getting to work I have to hang out in a bar for 2 hours.

What will probably happen is no one will show up...or one person will show up. At least there will be the 5 of us from work. I forsee by 6pm it will be the sound of crickets. No one wants to come to happy hour at 6pm on Friday in the Summer....everyone is on their way to the shore by then. I know that's what I would rather be doing, that's for sure!

I came up with three really good project proposals to pitch for the art retreat. I think one that will definitely get chosen is the travel journal in a case....it's just a feeling I have. So I need to actually get my shit together and make the sample. Hopefully I will find that I have the right amount of supplies at home to make some good samples.

---

After yesterday's Russian theme park thingy, I'm beginning to think I may be going insane. Today I found out that Sesame Street is introducing an HIV positive muppet.

OK, so I understand that Sesame Street strives to represent all types of people in an effort to break down racial/ethnic/stereotype dividers in kids...but the idea of an HIV positive muppet seems really bizarre to me.

Maybe I'm failing to see and understand a crucial part of the plan.

---

The town that I grew up in is very very small, with maybe 5 police officers on the force. It was like living in Mayberry. Yes, there was the occasionally murder, but there was rarely anything illegal going on other than the rollicking drug trade.

And so, as a result, I have this naive complete trust in police officers. I've never had any reason to fear them or distrust them.

I've lived in Philadelphia for over 10 years now, and I know that police officers are just like anyone else -- some are bad and some are good and some are in the gray area in between.

That said, I still tend to be more sympathetic toward police officers. When the video coverage of this kid being slammed into a police car and punched came out, I automatically thought that the kid must have done something to deserve it. And then again, maybe not. I certainly don't know all the facts, and it's a given that the videotape doesn't show the entire arrest...only the part that makes the police officer look like a lunatic. Who knows, maybe he is a lunatic.

But I absolutely have no sympathy for the stupid guy who filmed the arrest, however. What dumbass makes a huge deal of claiming to be the one who videotaped it when he has an arrest warrant out and a prior conviction on which he skipped out? I laughed my ass off when he was yelling "Help!" in the back of the SUV when they arrested him. And now he's hospitalized...how much do you want to bet that he spent his time bashing his face against the wall trying to make it look like he was roughed up?

People like him make it worse for people who are actually in danger from bad cops. I saw an interview with his lawyers on The Today Show this morning before I left for work. Both of them were in the "righteous earnestness" mode of lawyerly presentation. One of them actually said [and kept a straight face as he did so] that the police punish people for coming to the aid of a black person.

I think I hit the side of my head a few times to make sure I was hearing things right, because that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. I'm sure before long he'll have Johnny Cochran representing him, and then the whole thing will turn into more a circus than it already is.

I readily admit that I have no sympathy for criminals. We have debates at work occasionally about whether or not criminals who grew up in a bad atmosphere deserve a break. I am always the one who points out that it isn't difficult to differentiate between right and wrong -- and if you do something illegal you deserve whatever punishment you get.

That's a righteous attitude, especially coming from me. It isn't like I've been a perfect angel at all times. I've done illegal things -- from shoplifting to assault to grand theft auto. And I'm sure, had I been caught and/or prosecuted, I would have thought I deserved some sort of special treatment because I'm me. I'm also the first person to admit that I quit being such a schmuck the second I turned 18 -- because if you get caught after that, you're screwed. And since I'm not willing to do the time, I'm certainly not going to do the crime.

I used to be all for the death penalty. If you kill someone intentionally or in the process of committing another crime, you should be killed. There is the whole "eye for an eye" aspect of it, but also the cost to taxpayer issue. Less criminals to house equals less cost to taxpayers. It's not all so black and white for me anymore -- lately I've been thinking that death may be too good for criminals who kill. Instead of being gang raped daily by big burly men, you're dead. The daily torture might be a better punishment.

The topic of the day in the office today, however, is who the cute boys in music are. I have serious Busta Rhymes and Ice T love...Brooke has Justin Timberlake love. It's a sad day in the office.

---

My day is now complete. Get thee to the Russian Bible-themed Park!

Now, supposedly this theme park is nondenominational, but then why is called a "bible-themed" park? It's a conspiracy, I tell ya! But hey, there must be some fun to be had: "A Canaan town will showcase the dances of the temple adulteresses." Woohoo!

The difference between reality and fiction is starting to crumble for me. I few years ago I got obsessed with James Morrow's books -- he writes wonderful satires with religious overtones that are just hilarious. He wrote a book called Blameless in Abbadon in which the 2 mile long body of god is found off the coast of Antarctica, bought by the Baptists, towed to the coast of Florida, and made into a giant theme park. I'm wondering if this isn't going to be next thing to happen.

If the 2 mile long body of god is towed to Russia anytime soon, I'm out of here.

---

It looks like the teaching gig is a go [although it is still not definite yet -- and I likely won't think of it as definite until I see a contract]. The organizer asked me to teach 2 half day classes, and has asked for a class outlines, sample scans, and supply lists.

So I'm going to work up 3 projects and send them to her for consideration. Heeeeeeeeeee!

I'm so excited!

Don't mind me -- I get really stupid when the oxygen gets cut off to my brain!

---

I thought there was going to be some good old fashioned street violence in my logic class last night.

I thought I'd have to duck and cover, or be faced with a cap in my ass, so to speak. It looked like a rumble was imminent.

My professor, who from now on will be referred to as Prof. Dumbass, crossed this weird line. I could say that he is French and that is his excuse, but he's been in this country for many many years now.

He said "dirty nigger" about a bizillion times. I cringe just seeing that term typed on my blog.

OK, let's keep in mind that this is a logic class...it's not the history of slavery or any type of African-American studies class or a racial diversity class. It's logic.

Prof. Dumbass was trying to help us understand the difference between object language and metalanguage. He used the analogy of a trial lawyer saying, "And this man said to you, 'You're a dirty nig...' " [geez, I just can't type it anymore] Meaning that by enclosing the sentence in quotes, the lawyer isn't saying those words, he is simply referring to the words of someone else.

He just kept saying it though. Every five seconds, there was just more badness. Temple U. is a very ethnically diverse school...and I know I wasn't the only one offended and pissed off.

Now granted, I will never ever ever forget the difference between metalanguage and object language. Maybe that was the idea...but I'm also stuck with those words coming out of this guys mouth over and over again.

It was wretched.

In other news, I haven't heard anything back from the woman who invited me to teach at the retreat. I emailed her this morning with a couple of concrete ideas for some classes. The one I'm most excited about is a piano hinge book class....not sure what I call the class yet. There are a lot of techniques I could teach though, involving the cover and the hinge and miscellaneous other stuff. I also suggested an altered book class or even a sort of bind-a-palooza where I just straight up teach as many bindings as I can in the given time period. Hopefully I'll hear something soon.

---

I'm really excited! I have a lead on a paying teaching gig! The organizer of an art retreat to be held in the Harrisburg area called me and asked if I might be interested in teaching at the retreat. I don't want to get too excited because that will jinx me, but I would absolutely love to do this.

Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Oddly enough, I also just got an email from one of my instructors at Artiology. She wants to call me about something...I'm slightly nervous about that....

---

Today is a day when I'm actually doing a little bit of work. I'm writing my solicitation letter series for the upcoming campaign. I kind of feel like a tool as I sit here, racking my brain to come up with the most manipulative thing I can say to make people dig out their wallets and send a big fat check. Yes, little Johnny will be brain dead all his life unless you, Mr. Moneybags, send me all your cash. Now.

I've just about had it with this job. How many years can you beg money from people for a agency whose mission you don't really believe in? And, of course, we're not getting our raises this year so my commitment to this place has plummetted to an all time low.

Have you heard about the pastor who practically beat a kid to death for misbehaving in bible class? Tell me again why religion is a good thing, OK? I'm sure they did it in the name of their god....because according to our beloved President, we're just a big country full of god fearing people.

And does anyone find it absolutely hilarious that Bush and Cheney are being accused of accounting fraud and other business transgressions in the midst of all this crap with Enron and Worldcom going down?

I can't tell you how much I will dance for joy when the other shoe drops.

---

I realize after reading yesterday's post, you may think I am a Domestic Goddess. Laundry, cooking...do I bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan? Well, yes, I do...but I'm hardly a typical haus frau: I haven't cleaned my house in 5 years.

Before you get grossed out, let me clarify: Craig cleans the house. I don't mind doing laundry or washing the dishes, and I actually love to cook -- but don't try to get me near Windex or furniture polish.

It's an aversion I grew into because my mother is a clean freak. I don't mean that she had OCD or anything [although there were times when I wondered], but she grew up in a family that was two steps away from being Amish and everything had to be cleaned every single day and it had to be perfect and reflection-full. In her freakier moments, I would come home from school only to find all of my bedroom dresser drawers pulled out and dumped in the middle of my bedroom floor because my mom didn't like the way I had put my clothes away. According to the Book of Cleanliness™ thou shalt put your underwear [folded in thirds and then in half, of course] away in neat, color-coded rows and thy socks shall be paired, folded in half, and divided into more color-coded rows. So the Mother says it, and so shall it be!

Running away from home and joining the circus is a thought I entertained more than once.

So yeah, I'm traumatized by childhood übercleanliness. Craig cleans the cat box, takes care of the trash on trash day [although I will take the trash outside], and cleans the house. In return, I am in charge of the dish-washing and clothes-washing, and I am the Official Cook of the household. I'd like to think it's an even trade, but I know I have the better end of the deal.

---

Mwa ha ha! This day has been well worth taking the personal day. By 10am I had already had a mushroom tart made, and the rice made for sushi, and a load of clothes in the dryer. And now at almost 2pm, I have the sushi made [about 4 dozen maki rolls actually], another load of clothes in the wash, and I just purchased my logic text at Half.com for the low low bargain basement price of $9.99. It's the right edition and everything -- take that, you dastardly thieves at Temple University bookstore!

You can't see me but I'm doing my happy dance. Trust me, it's really creative.

On top of all that, Cry Baby was on some movie channel today. I love John Waters -- the man is a genius. Who else would make a movie with Divine eating dog shit? Who is the Filthiest Person Alive? Ha! And Hairspray, my stars, what a brilliant movie! Ricki Lake should have stuck to acting -- the line "I feel like dancing!" has featured prominently in some of my odder nightmares. I wanted the roach dress for my senior prom but I couldn't find the right fabric.

So yeah, my day is complete.

OK, not really -- I still feeling like cooking. So I might make some pizza dough to have on hand. If I had apples I'd make pies, but it's too hot for me to leave the house.

Sometimes a good day off full of cooking is exactly what I need to feel better. That, and some good conditioner.

---

I'm playing hooky today. I ran out of conditioner in the shower this morning and just decided I couldn't face the day at work...so I'm taking a personal day.

Maybe I was just traumatized from my first day of logic class. It's a small class taught me a tall, gaunt man of unknown heritage. He has a foreign accent, but it's totally unidentifiable. He completely jinxed me by going on and on and on about how "ridiculously simple" logic is, and how [in a regular math logic class] what we're covering in 6 weeks would normally be taught in 2 weeks and then they would "move on to something more interesting."

So, of course, I'm going to flunk the class.

I hate being the oldest person in a class. What is making me feel even older is the 14 year old boy in my class. He might be older than 14 but he looks 14. He comes into class 30 minutes late in this total Catholic prep school suit, and stands around like he thinks we ought to stop and welcome him to class. And then he spends the rest of class making stupid and inappropriate comments.

What really has me bent out of shape, however, is the textbook. We have to get a book that was published in 1980...so we're talking about a 22 year old book, and it's $78.00!! So I'm spending some time online today trying to find it for cheap[er].

I'm going to go sulk now.

---

It's official that I am a pathetic person. I ran over to Temple Campus during lunch hour to pick up the textbook for my logic class [which begins this evening]. I took a look at the room assignment list -- I'm in room 314.

Do you know what my first thought was? Think real hard about Buffy and why that number would have significance. That's right -- season 4 and all that crap with The Initiative. 314 was the room where Professor Walsh was keeping Adam.

See what I mean now? Only someone with useless and exhaustive knowledge of Buffy would know that, and only a loser like me would put it out there for all the world to see. It's just sad.

Craig is ready to throw out my Buffy DVDs....he's sick of seeing them. I can easily say that I watched at least 30 hours of Buffy over the last 4 days.

---

So I spent some time in the car this past weekend, travelling to Craig's parents' house for a mini-visit [always a good time]. One of the radio stations was having the traditional holiday countdown. This one was the top 200 "Modern Rock Songs that Matter." Hmmmmm. Well, OK. Your know it's not going to be good when The Clash and Talking Heads get ranked below some silly ass songs by Papa Roach or Linkin Park. Not to mention that Bob Marley is on the countdown...and so is Rob Zombie. Since when are they "modern rock"?

I guess I should be thankful The Ramones ended up at number 1. But I can still bitch about the lame songs they chose in their Top 20. I hate countdowns....inevitably, they are wrong. I'll never understand why Jeremy always gets rated among the top songs. I mean, it's an OK song, but Pearl Jam has much much better songs. And that stupid Under the Bridge....I lurve me some Anthony Keidis, but where is Suck My Kiss or Taste the Pain?

Geesh....

---

My eyeballs are about to fall out of my head. The cloud of smoke from Canada has been hellish on my eyes this past weekend, and now I think there are ice crystals forming on my contact lenses from the frozen tundra-like conditions of my work cubicle. Seriously, I've been thinking of storing a parka, a team of dogs, and a sleigh in my cube -- it's that cold.

Do you think my company would care if I chopped up my desk for firewood and lit a bonfire in the middle of the floor? We could toast marshmallows and tell ghost stories by the light of the fire.

It's not like I'm half naked in my cube -- I'm wearing long pants, a knit tank top, and a sweater. The only problem is that I'm wearing Birkenstocks...so I guess it's my own damn fault that my ankles are cold. How can I be expected to work when my hands are so cold I can barely type or even grip a pencil?

Maybe it's some sort of test -- put me through extremes to see what my breaking point is. Or, since I get nappy when my body temperature dips below 80 degrees, maybe they're hoping to catch me asleep so they can fire me....in that case, please, fire me! I volunteer for the summer off collecting unemployment!

---

I've long thought that Louis Farrakhan is the stupidest man alive. He has gone on a "solidarity" mission to Iraq, and he said: "the Muslim American people are praying to the almighty God to grant victory to Iraq."

OK, so let's review. Farrakhan hates white people. He hates Jews. He basically hates everyone who isn't black. And he quasi-hates all black people who aren't Muslim. There's a lot of hate going on there. He claims to be the voice of the black Muslim, but many Muslim organizations do not support him.

And now he's praying that Iraq will win a war against his own homeland. What, does he think the leaders of Iraq are going to award him the United States because he's been such a good friend? Does he think that in a war with anyone, the opposing team is going to ask if there are any black Muslims in the crowd before they kill everyone?

My best guess is that Farrakhan has syphilis. Syphilis makes you crazy in the head, and he is just out and out crazy. I love reading The Final Call because it is so blatantly ridiculous. Where else can you find an editorial claiming "The woman is the man’s field to produce his nation. If he does not keep the enemy out of his field, he won’t produce a good nation. If we love our vegetable crops we will go out and turn up the leaves on that vegetable stalk and look carefully for worms that are eating and destroying the vegetables. We will kill that worm—right?" What woman wouldn't adore being compared to agriculture? Hey, that's straight up romantic!

I'm not so stupid as to dismiss him entirely. The man is dangerous. He talks endlessly about how he sees racism in everything, but he really doesn't want every person to be equal to every other person. He wants a divided racial structure. Farrakhan doesn't want me to have friends who are black or asian or latino -- he wants me stop spreading my "White" [yes, with a capital "W"] propaganda [whatever that is].

There are so many things to say on the subject, but I just don't have time to go into a full-fledged rant. Plus, he doesn't really deserve the time and effort it would involve. I feel guilty giving him so much thought as it is.

---

I'm glad that I had such a great time Friday night at the fireworks -- because seeing the fireworks at Penn Treaty Park was kind of a nightmare.

When I supposed that half my neighborhood would be there, I wasn't quite right: my entire neighborhood was there. And let me tell you -- the combined IQ of those present at the park last night [excluding Craig and I] wouldn't be enough to even qualify as "idiot."

I realize that in saying so I tend to look uncharitable and condescending. And I'm sure that, on some level, I don't give them enough credit. It all starts with the accent, though. And the mullet. For some unknown reason the entire neighborhood, both female and male, favor the mullet. You know what they say: business up front, but all party in the back.

More like mullet equals lack of brain cells. It's sort of like a distinguishing mark so others in the tribe will know their brethren. There were lots of parents sitting around swearing like truckers in loud tones, while their multitudes of offspring under the age of 5 ran around with sparklers and matches trying to burn everyone and everything in sight. So while Craig and I were huddled together trying not get run over or singed, the fireworks started.

We had a nice spot picked out. We had a great view of the bridge. Two seconds into the display three total morons came and stood immediately in front of us. I was so irked! I came up with several ideas of how to get them to move -- from flat out tackling them to shooting them in the calves with a BB gun. Finally we decided just to move. I'm not a wuss, but these guys had mullets and we were amongst their tribe. It would have just gotten ugly.

---

There's something to be said for simple pleasures.

I really wanted to see fireworks somewhere this year, but I didn't want to have to fight off crowds to do so. What can I say, I'm funny like that.

So last night at 9:30pm Craig and I jumped into his pickup truck and staked out a spot near Vet Stadium. There was a Phillies game last night after which there was a big fireworks display scheduled. I personally hate baseball -- it's the most boring sport on the planet to watch, next to golf and bowling, so I wanted no part of actually seeing the game.

We found a perfect spot, about two streets away, with an unobstructed view of Vet Stadium. I must not be the only one who hates baseball because within 15 minutes the street was packed with people who had the same idea. It was kind of funny -- we had our very own ice cream truck servicing the street, a passel of kids doing tricks on their bikes [we even had a bet going with the car next to us as to which little rugrat would take a header and need to be rush to the hospital], and lots of snacks.

I sometimes forget how fun it is just to lay in the back of Craig's truck with him and laugh our asses off. We looked at the stars and the flock of seagulls flying around overhead, and made fun of the other people around us. It was generally a good time. I'm so easy to please: my husband, a pickup truck, and a pack of strawberry licorice.

The fireworks started a little after 10pm, and they were spectacular. I would have to say they were the best fireworks I've seen in years. They were just so gorgeous and so loud and, well, just plain outstanding.

This evening we're going to see more fireworks -- I hope. There is a park near our house where we had our wedding pictures taken. The park overlooks the Ben Franklin Bridge, which is where the fireworks are this evening. We're going to hang out [probably with half our neighborhood] in the park and hope that we get a good view of the fireworks. Neither of us wants to go to Penn's Landing for a better view -- The Baha Men are having a free concert. Although, the concert area is likely to be deserted -- I mean really, who on earth would want to see The Baha Men perform? Even for free! No, uh uh, no way.

---

I don't mean to sound callous but if the shooting in L.A. was a terrorist attack, it's not much of one. Random shootings happen every day in the U.S....in order to terrorize me, you're going to have to come up with something a little more out of the ordinary, something scarier.

The shooting in L.A. doesn't really seem like the standard terrorist M.O. anyway. A man with a gun? Hmmmm.....

Yeah, I'm sitting here at home on a Friday. I tried to sleep late but it just didn't work out. And so I'm in the studio watching The Today Show. Now they're talking about Elizabeth Smart. It's a horrible horrible thing that she was kidnapped. The first thing I thought, however, when I heard about this story is "I wonder if she was kidnapped for a child bride?" I was recently reading an article about three women from Utah who escaped "child bride" marriages. They had been married off as young as 12 and 14. That's some crazy stuff. I would imagine that would really only happen if the Smart's are Mormon, but I have no idea if they are. I'm sure it's just something as simple as some crazed child molester, but I can't help what popped into my head. I hope they find her and she's fine.

Yesterday was quite a day. Craig and I decided to see Men in Black II at 11:30am. Since it was 110 yesterday, we thought it might be a nice way to escape the worst of the heat. The movie was OK -- definitely not as good as the first. It might be that I hate Lara Flynn Boyle. She needs to eat a fucking cookie.

After the movie I bought some art supplies and a copy of the Buffy Season 2 DVD and Craig's car died. Now that was fun! It's 110 and we're running around trying to figure out what's wrong with his car. After about 45 minutes of tinkering, Craig figures out that he needs a new battery. As luck would have it, there was a Walmart across the parking lot. Crisis averted.

We stayed in last night -- neither of us felt like fighting the crowds at the Art Museum for the Brian McKnight concert and fireworks. So we're going to Penn's Landing tonight to see fireworks.

Poor Sassy hates fireworks. Every time she heard a boom last night she started to growl. I realize that it's a little odd that a cat would growl, but she's a strange cat anyway. I mean, she's got zits.

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I can barely believe my ears. I'm listening to the news right now -- some idiots religious zealots in New Jersey have filed a lawsuit to stop schools from teaching evolution. Instead they want creationism taught.

I understand that this is probably a "take that" reactionary type of thing in response to the lawsuit regarding the Pledge of Allegiance. I have to wonder how many of the people behind the lawsuit believe, without doubt, that creationism is the final word in how we all came to be here. As much as I hate to acknowledge them, I know there are many people who completely disregard the scientific evidence that proves evolution.

Obviously, I am a girl of science [for the most part]. I really don't believe in [any form of] god, and I am completely against organized religion. But I was raised to believe in god and I attended a Methodist church every Sunday until I was about 13, and did the summer vacation bible school thing every summer until I was 10. I never gave the idea of religious choice a great deal of thought until I turned 13, although I don't have a clear recollection of what made me question it.

I hate it when people make a choice without knowing the full details of something. So beginning when I was 13 I started researching religions. I even read The Satanic Bible because I wanted to be thorough. So I know the basic tenets of the majority of world religions. I even took a class in asian religions when I was in college -- I want to be able to say that I've made a choice based on knowledge, not tradition.

I fully admit that knowing what I know has made me question religion even more. Most religions are hell bent on the idea that their religion is the one true religion, and everyone else is worshipping the wrong the thing. If there was really a "one true god," I strongly suspect that there would be only one religion. One could counter with the idea of free will. But I need tangible evidence before I will commit my faith to something or someone...and so far, I haven't seen anything like that.

People have countered my argument with the idea of nature. Where do I think we came from, they ask. And how did the amoeba know to grow into a fish, etc.? And they are firmly married to the idea of god's hand setting things in motion. I will admit that Christian creationism and evolution can both be believed in without compromising the ideals of the other. After all, the book of Genesis doesn't say how long each official day was....you could take it with a grain of evolutionary salt and say that each day was millions of years long. You could say that god had a hand in encouraging single-celled organisms to multiply. I can see how you can reconcile one to fit in with the other. What I can't see is completely negating the overwhelming evidence of evolution in favor of a purely creationism view.

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Oh yeah! I'm official sprung for the next 4 days -- lock up your children! Not only have I officially begun my weekend, it is sans Craig! I love having the house to myself overnight every once in a while. The possibilities seem endless! What to do, what to do? Maybe I will watch Season 1 of Buffy on DVD all night....or I'll have ice cream for dinner...or I'll go to a movie by myself! I'm giddy with anticipation!

Of course, this whole weekend I have to avoid answering my phone. Yep, I'm screening so I don't accidentally have to speak to dear old dad. Who am I kidding, he probably has surveillance on my house. I always sort of associate the Fourth of July with my dad -- and with your garden variety dumbass [in which category my dad can certainly be included]. Aside from the various episodes during which he set off fireworks in his own hand [his friend Phil actually lost fingers because of some idiotic stunt they were pulling with M-80's], he also thought it was hilarious to give my brother and I fireworks and matches of our own to play with. It's a miracle that I have survived my childhood.

My favorite Fourth of July memory: when I was 17 my dad decided he wanted to meet my high school boyfriend [Scott] and play the dad for the holiday. So he forced us all to accompany him to watch fireworks from an alternative location: the quarry. It must have been the secret dirtbag meeting spot, because every loser from a 20 mile radius decided to watch the fireworks from the quarry. Scott and I sat there for an hour, all the while trying to avoid being set on fire by the firecrackers my dad was throwing at us. Ah, memories.

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I am, for the most part, indifferent to the Fourth of July holiday. I used to really enjoy it, but I've become somewhat cynical at the ripe old age of 30. Living in Philadelphia has sort of sucked any real meaning out of it.

Philadelphia -- birthplace of the nation, the City of Brotherly Love, the City that Loves You Back. That's right, you heard me: I can no longer look on fireworks without thinking of our mayor rubbing his hands together gleefully like Monty Burns, counting his big stacks of money. Every year Philadelphia has this thing called Welcome America! -- designed to suck in the tourists.

One of the things that has me livid this year is the sand sculptures at Liberty Place. It's a "tribute to international heroes of freedom." Now, it's a nice thought, but who wants to see the World Trade Centers sculpted out of sand? Out of sand, people! Does no one get the symbolic complexities?

OK, I know what you're thinking: get over it. If no one else feels infinite trauma from seeing the WTC sculpted out of sand, fine. Tourist dollars keep the local economy afloat. I should be happy I live someplace where I can see Colin Powell accept the Liberty Medal.

Sure, OK. But don't come crying to me when a local gives you the wrong directions to the Liberty Bell!

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It's "fry an egg on the sidewalk" hot today. Waiting at the corner for my bus this morning at 7:30am, all I could do was hang around and sweat profusely. It's a good look for me.

American Idol was more pure entertainment last night. Craig sat around and complained about his balls shrivelling because of the bad singing. And really, most of the "talent" from last night was just wretched. Oh, and the judges all did this silly choreographed near fist fight thing. Organized violence is just stupid, much like organized fun.

You know, it's sad -- my TV viewing habits are pretty much equal to that of a 12 year old girl. Not only did I watch American Idol, I also re-watched the musical Buffy episode last night. And the song that Tara sings to Willow actually made me mist up a little.

What's worse is that I have been spending an inordinate amount of time during the past two weeks looking for the least expensive Buffy Season 2 DVD box set. I'm cheap and I'm on a mission.

Of course, now that I have gotten a refund check from the IRS I can afford to just buy the damn thing. That's right, you read correctly: a refund check from the IRS. For $300, no less. They're telling me that I did my taxes wrong and I overpaid. Do you think it's a payoff to shut up? It seems timely considering I've emailed President Bush several times in the last few weeks bitching and complaining about various issues. Maybe I'm a threat....yeah, that's it: I'm a big threat to Bush's continuing Presidency! His FBI lackeys have discovered my little blog journal thingy, noticed the huge amount of hits I get [she says, eyes rolling], and are determined to keep me quiet by plying me with money. Well damn the Man! Damn the Man!

The heat has gone to my head.

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Apparently I and most of my friends should be schizophrenic. Considering I have, on occasion, partaken of a toke and most of my friends have joined me in a granny blanket bake, it is a miracle we can still function. Sorry, I'm not buying this one. Wouldn't most hippies from the sixties be raving lunatics by now? It just seems like propaganda from the "Just Say No" crowd.

I have become increasingly distraught over the accidental bombings of wedding parties and villages, etc. in Afghanistan. What is more disheartening is the U.S.'s attempts to turn the blame on those who were killed. I heard one army bigwig guy say that if you're having a wedding near where the enemy is storing guns, it's your own fault for getting blown up. Our government is not willing to take responsibility for its actions. I'm not the only one who feels this way. I'm not sure how I feel about the issue of the International Criminal Court, but I do think that Bush's reaction is childish and puts the U.S. in a very dangerous position. I've been thinking about telling people I'm Canadian when I travel abroad because I'm so embarrassed of how our government is behaving. I can only hope that, as a nation, we are smart enough not to vote for Bush again.

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4:30 yesterday afternoon the lights went out in Georgia. OK, not Georgia -- it was Philadelphia, and not all of Philadelphia, just a small quadrant. Really! The quasi-comical thing about it is that at the time I was reading an article about the al-Quaeda and their ability to wreak havoc with a cyber attack.

Yeah so I got to leave work about 20 minutes early. And thankfully I was stopped before I could post again yesterday. Sometimes I just go overboard -- it's a product of being bored at work and analyzing things way too much. Occasionally I get the idea that my powers of reasoning got stuck in the fourth grade. I'm feeling much better today.

Well, except for the fact that that I wiped out in the subway this morning. Damn sandals! I, being the blase urbanite that I am, nonchalently picked myself up off the floor [which reeked of urine -- yay!] and kept walking as if I meant to do it.

I hate it when that happens.

But the simple truth of the matter is that I am a world class klutz. If there's a wall to walk into or a flight of stairs to fall down, I'm your girl. I can barely walk and think at the same time.

The funniest thing is that I should be graceful: I was a cheerleader, dancer, and gymnast for almost 10 years. You want to throw me up into the air and hold me up by one foot while I do a heel stretch? OK, not a problem. Want to see me do a couple of back tucks? I can do that. But if you want me to walk down the street without tripping over my own feet, think again...it's never going to happen.

I used to think that it was the uniform. You know, I put on the cheerleading skirt and I am transformed into Graceful Girl. I learned the hard way that I was deluding myself.

I actually fell backward through a set of swinging doors in front of hundreds of people. When I was 16 I was cheering at a basketball game -- during the game there wasn't alot of space so we sat in the bleachers to cheer and occasionally two of us would do a cheer at the end of the court. So I was up...I had to do a cheer. And as luck would have it I was right in front two giant swinging doors. I did a jump, landed too low to hold my balance and fell through the doors, landing in a jumbled heap in the boys locker room.

That's not even the worst -- I've fallen up a set of bleachers, fallen out of a loft [twice], fallen down many many sets of stairs, had many a menacing bike accident...oh yeah, I am Calamity Nicole.

Maybe my goal for today should be to make it through without making an ass out of myself. It'll be tough.

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I will never understand why people get so freaked out about the idea of debating ideas. There is a question in the Monday Mission today about one's stance on the Pledge of Allegiance ruling. I've already ranted and raved about what I think, but I'm really curious about what others think. I am particularly interested since Newsweek did a poll claiming 9 out of 10 Americans want the Pledge kept as is [and so far the opinions I've read have reflected more like 7 our of 10 Americans want the phrasing removed].

So anyway, I've been looking at people's answers. I have a tendency to want to debate the issue -- I know that nothing I say will convince someone that the phrase ought to be dropped, but I would like it if someone tried to convince me that keeping it is a good idea. I want to understand why it's OK to tell me that Christianity is the religious sponsor of the United States.

People are getting crazy...I read someone's journal who basically accused Americans of forgetting September 11, and in remembrance of that day we should keep the phrase. And some one else said that all of us who want the phrase removed must have forgotten that god protects our nation. What I find so hilariously funny is that a lot of these people have threatened to remove any comments or guestbook entries that state an opinion contrary to their own on the subject. No wonder they don't believe in freedom of religion -- they don't even belief in the freedom of speech!

I wonder about people who refuse to hear the other side to an argument. Sometimes I think that maybe they are so shaky about their own beliefs that they worry hearing something contrary to their views may send them into a doubt spiral. It's worrisome. Of course, maybe these people are really young and/or don't understand the full story or the implications of having the phrase in the Pledge of Allegiance to begin with. I don't know the answer, but it's kind of scary.

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Imagine, if you will, that it is 6am and you are blissfully asleep, dreaming of sheep and dessert. Now imagine the phone ringing, jarring you out of your peaceful slumber and seriously ruining your good vibe.

Yep, that's what happened to me this morning. I, of course, practically pole vaulted out of bed to get the phone. Who calls at 6am unless something horrible has happened? After crawling around blindly ['cause there are no contacts or glasses at 6am] for a minute trying to find the phone, I answered in a panic.

And it was dear old dad. Bastard.

Oblivious to the fact that I am half asleep and panting in nervous panic, he leisurely asks me if I can come to a picnic at his house sometime this weekend and then tells me all the other kids will be there and we can get drunk! Hooooeeeee! Drunk with my dad -- there's a real selling point.

So I stutter for about 4 minutes and basically end up telling him I'll get back to him. You know, 'cause it is 6am and I can't think of a tactful way of telling him to fuck off. He finally let's me go back to bed, but not before telling me his whole schedule for the week.

It's worse than I thought: my dad is now inspecting carnivals.

I have always been frightened by the idea of riding a carnival ride that was put together in 10 minutes by a guy who probably didn't graduate from high school. But the deal has now been finalized: if my dad is the one inspecting rides for safety I will never ever ride one. Nothing says safety like a disoriented possibly drunk man prone to acid flashbacks.

Craig was livid over the phone call. It's funny -- for a long time he thought I was overexaggerating the whole issue of my father being an ass. My dad can fake being a normal person if he chooses to, and he acted fairly normal around Craig for a long time. Craig thought that my dad had not been a great role model while I was growing up, but he was making an effort so why not give him a chance? And then little by little Craig got the idea that my dad is to be avoided at all costs. He's manipulative and crude. And now Craig understands completely.

So I have to give a call later and make up some excuse. But I'm not going to let this bother me all day -- I refuse! Instead, I will focus on the fact that I only have to work 3 days this week. Focus, dammit!