Thursday, June 28, 2007

Spice Up Your Life

Oh sweet merciful gods of music, my prayers have been answered at long last. Yes, that's right, ladies and gentlemen, the moment we have been patiently waiting for is here. The Spice Girls are reuniting for a world tour. Seriously.

Can you contain your excitement?

Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Number Four Can't Take The Heat

Part of Number Four's amazing ability to irritate the crap out of us was her struggles with food. One of our main problems was that whenever one of us went into our tiny ass kitchen to get a snack or a drink, she would soon join us for a similar reason. This is somewhat linked into her copycat behaviour, but that is an entirely different post that I will need much more energy for. Her issues with food I can handle now.
It began seemingly innocent enough; she mentioned that she liked to bake rather than cook. At first we thought, "Great, she will be baking lovely things for us to eat!" However. We were soon to discover what exactly that entailed. The first thing that we noticed was that Number Four had a lot of cookbooks. A lot. We had quite a lot of space on the shelf unit thing outside our tiny kitchen, so it wasn't much of a problem. It was more just odd for Orly, Pamala and I to see so many cookbooks in the possession of someone our age. The three of us are much more throw-things-in-a-pan-at-random cookers. We had very little experience with recipe-followers. Over the course of the year, the number of cookbooks increased. Number Four continually lamented that she had all of these recipes that she never used. We continually wanted to punch her in the face. Maybe that was just me...
The next thing that happened was the gradual expansion of her designated area of the pantry. There were four separate shelves in the pantry. We originally designated them by height; Number Four being the tallest, she had the highest shelf. Then Pamala and Orly shared the next highest, and then me. We reserved the lowest shelf for larger community items or heavy things that needed to be accessed daily, like soda. Pamala and Orly were fine with sharing a shelf since neither of them kept a lot of things in there. I took up the majority of my shelf with various boxes of tea. I had a lot of tea. At first, Number Four didn't have that many things on her shelf. Then her crazy mom (again, an entirely different post) began to give her various item that had been purchased at Costco. Huge boxes of all manner of food, which she didn't even eat. They just stayed up there, taking up space. In spite of her protests, her crazy mom continued to foist huge boxes of things on her, so she ended up taking over the lowest shelf too, as well as a goodly portion of the floor. It was kind of hilarious to look in our pantry and see two shelves with hardly any edible items on them, and then the other two shelves overflowing with gigantic boxes cereal, granola bars, those 100 calorie pack things, I don't even know what all. At one point she was looking in the pantry and comparing how much she had to how little we had, and she said, "What do you guys eat? You don't have anything that is actual food!" (Looking back, what the hell did we eat? We never had our areas in the pantry or the fridge full, but we sure did eat a lot.)
This isn't to say that Number Four did not eat. She regularly cooked random slabs of meat by putting them in a pan until they were brown and tough. She never used any sort of seasoning or sauce, just meat cooked to death in a pan. She ate the meat by itself too, no side dishes whatsoever. It was baffling, as well as making the kitchen and living room smell gross. She would occasionally be struck with the urge to actually cook something, and this was almost worse. The most memorable of these times was after she somehow acquired a crock pot. I don't remember if she had it to begin with or if she got it while we lived together. Now, I love me some slow-cooked food, make no mistake. However, the things that came out of that crock pot were beyond disgusting. There was some sort of chicken vegetable stew thing she made once. It ended up just a big vat of multicolored mush. The carrots melted. Literally melted. Into liquid. And it tasted like cardboard soup. Nasty.
By far the worst thing though was when Number Four baked something. It never ended well. She would invariably leave the kitchen with a fine coating of flour, in addition to which it took her days to wash the dishes. She made cookies, but she didn't let them cool before she put them on a plate and they all stuck together to create this giant cookie mountain. Those actually tasted alright, but it was incredibly difficult to eat them. You could either break off tiny pieces, or a giant group of like five cookies that had been glued together by their chocolate chips. One time, her weird brother was coming to visit, so she decided to make him a sweet potato pie. I don't know if y'all've pick up on it, but I have certain Southern predilections. I know from sweet potato pie. So I was a little excited that she was making one, because I would get to eat some. Well, it turns out that Number Four doesn't know how to make sweet potato pie, per say, so much as mashed sweet potatoes in a pie. I was very disappointed. Then came the Worst of the Worst. Pamala and Orly would on occasion make cornbread from a box. Normally, I do not condone box-food, but real cornbread is damn hard to make and this was fast and still tasted good. One day Number Four decided that she needed to show us how cornbread-from-scratch was superior to box cornbread. Which was kind of a moot point with us, but whatever. So she made a huge pan of it. I tried it first, and I can honestly say that it was about the worst thing I've ever tasted in my life. I made Pamala eat some of it, because if I have to suffer, she does too. She put a tiny piece in her mouth and immediately spit it out, screaming "It tastes like Death just crawled in my mouth and laid eggs!" For about a week, we took turns cutting pieces off and throwing them in the trash until we finally dumped the whole thing.

Monday, June 25, 2007

I've Got To Admit, It's Getting Better

I got back home about two hours ago. I had quite an unusual weekend, as only one spent visiting The Ex can be. It wasn't as awkward as I had feared, but the odd thing was that I was much more comfortable with his parents that I was with him, in particular his mom. She talked as much as ever, but I found it much more endearing than irritating, like I used to. I wasn't even all that irritated by his dad either, which is highly unusual since he used to make my head hurt. In fact, the only person I was irritated by was Chris himself. He just seemed to be in a funk the entire time I was there, always whining about something or other. All he wants to do is move back to England. He hates the heat, he hates the traffic, he hates California, he hates the U.S. He is only waiting on his funding to go through, and then he's headed back to England. Which, ok, fine, he can be a little depressed when he is stuck in that hell hole we grew up in when his girlfriend and most of his friends are in England, but come on. At least make the best of the situation you're in. I mean, I drove my ass three hours down there to visit him for the first time in a long time, and he was bitchy and whiny the whole time? No thanks. At least it did serve one good purpose, which was to completely and utterly destroy and vague lingering romantic notions I might have had toward him. We can be the kind of friends that email each other randomly and chat online occasionally, but that is it. What I find most amusing in all of this is that the only reason we are even friends in the first place is because he was adamant about remaining friends. It took me a long time to come around to the point where I am even able to be his friend, and now that I'm there, he could apparently care less.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Where is My Mind?

The other day I was talking to my ex Chris online when a funny thing happened. There was kind of a long pause in our chat, and then this popped up, "Hi Sarah, it's Cynthia..." There was more, but here's the thing. Cynthia is Chris's mom. Chris and I dated for three and a half years, so I got to know her pretty well. I always felt a little sorry for her; she lives in their house up in the mountains, a half hour drive from the nearest town, and her husband is gone a lot, and Chris and his brother are both living far away. So she's all alone a lot of the time, which would drive me bonkers. She's understandably a bit of an odd bird, as well as being very talkative, but as long as I can keep the conversation away from certain topics, she's kinda fun to talk to. Her favorite things to talk about are horses, birds, plants and sewing. And I pretty much have nothing to say one any of those topics. So she started chatting with me, but I could tell she didn't chat very much, because she was writing me paragraphs. At first she was telling me all kinds of stuff about some horse show in Vegas. A couple of crazy things did happen with that. She bought two tickets from two different people on ebay for the horse thing, and it turned out that the tickets were for seats right next to each other. And then one of the people that they sat near recognized Chris's dad from some class that he taught. I told her that I would have bought a lottery ticket or hit the slots, being that they were in Vegas.
Then we moved on to talking about this coming weekend. See, I've been trying to get Chris to come up and visit me before he moves back to York, but, Chris being Chris, he kept hedging and putting it off and now this weekend would be the only time for him to come up before he leaves that I will also be here, which is kind of an important part of him visiting me. So. Cynthia suggested that instead of Chris coming up here, I go down and visit them. I pointed out that part of the reason I wanted Chris to come up was to show off my beautiful apartment and how successful I am (it was a running joke between us that I would always make more money than him, silly History major), but then she started talking about "we could all go out for dinner" and "I've got the guest room all finished" and then offered to give me money for gas. It turns out that in spite of myself, I am a nice person on occasion. I could tell that she really wanted some company other than Chris and the horses. So guess where I'm driving to tonight? At least it won't be exactly the town I grew up in, it will be the town next to it. And up in the mountains too.
I must admit that I'm a little nervous about seeing Chris this weekend. We broke up almost two years ago, and we've talked and managed to become friends in the time since. However, I have actually only seen him once in those two years. I'm afraid that it will be awkward, that I will be awkward. Do I hug him? Shake his hand? Stand there and wave? Dance a jig? I guess we shall see when the moment arrives. It doesn't help much that I will get to his house after a full day of work and then driving four hours with only my thoughts for company. By the time I get there around midnight, I'll be a little delirious. And that could make for some awkward times.

Thursday, June 21, 2007

Oh, the Places You'll Go!

I'm so excited right now! Pamala and I are planning a trip abroad next year. I really want to take her to places in Ireland, even if she isn't all that keen on it. Of all the places I've ever been, Killarney was honestly the greatest. I think it had something to do with staying in the tiniest little hostel, which was run by a crazy Polishman who did Batman impressions. Or maybe it had something to do with the fact that Killarney has the highest concentration of pubs in Europe. Seriously. Five streets, eighty six pubs. It's amazing. And then we have to go up to Doolin, which is the opposite. Lots of sprawling countryside cottages, and three pubs. But they have amazing live music every night and the guy who runs the hostel sounds like Bono, and even though I hate Bono with a raging passion, dude does have an awesome voice.
We also obviously have to spend a great deal of time in London, doing London-y things. Museums and bookstores and Towers, oh my! Maybe I'll even get to go to Dali-world like I wanted to but never got to. Oh, and the parks!
Also high on the list is heading back to Italy, since I only got to spend four days there. Two of those days were spent getting lost in Venice, which was awesome. I would love to do Rome and be all touristy. And maybe we could hit up Nicole's family, they have a house in Tuscany.
Which brings me to Greece, where, wouldn't you know it, Nicole's family also has a house. Hhhmmm...
If we can get Orly to come with us, she would be great in Spain. After all, she did live there for a while. Who better to show us the best places? And I bet she still knows people there and we could crash on couches for cheap.
And Paris. We have to go to Paris. I never made it before, even though I lived in fucking Brighton for three months and could have swam to France. Because cheese...wine...bread...I need to go to France.
I also really want to go to Prague. I don't really know why, other than that it looks so beautiful.
So we are going to start saving our dollars and planning and narrowing down our plan and harassing Orly even though she probably won't come with us. I cannot wait to go!

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Upside Down

Apparently there is some sort of pheromone fog emanating from me. There have been some surreal things happening that I'm not used to dealing with at all. It started when I went down to Northridge for a training for my work. It took way less time than I had anticipated to drive down there, so I decided to take advantage of the spa, since it was open until 10 PM. I took the book I'm borrowing from Pam (The Book of Daniel, by E.L. Doctorow, I am not liking it very much) thinking to make a sizable dent in it. However, there was someone out in the spa already. I thought that seeing I had a book would deter any attempts at conversation, so I was still planning on getting some reading done, minus the small talk that everyone has to make when you are say, sitting in the same spa. The guy introduces himself and we chat, and he actually is very entertaining. And if you know me at all, you know that I love being entertained. And that I never shut the fuck up. So we talk a lot, about random what-are-you-like things, and then he goes for the closer, but the most ridiculous thing came out of his mouth. He looked over at me and said, "So, a guy like you and a girl like me..." I just sort of looked at him like "Excuse me?" and he realized what he had actually said. It was quite endearing actually. In fact, if he had managed to say what he was trying to say, it probably would have not gone over well. But the fact that he messed it up and got all embarrassed was cute. So long story short, we spent some more time together, and I told him that I would meet him the next evening after dinner with my friends who live down there.
Turns out that my friends are total cock blockers and we didn't even leave for dinner until 8:30, and I didn't get back to my hotel until nearly midnight. On top of that, my dumb ass cannot remember numbers to save my life, so I had no clue what room he was in. I did, however, remember that he told me where he works, so what did my crazy ass do? Yeah, I called his work and asked if I could leave my number for my friend that I was trying to get in touch with. I am insane. I never denied it. But good sign! He called me literally three minutes after I left my number, so I was able to explain that I hadn't stood him up on purpose, I'm just retarded. I might have freaked him right the hell out though. We'll see if he ever calls me again.
So that was one adventure. Here's where things began to take a weird turn. Later that night my phone rang and it said "No name?", which means that it was either people wanting money or Mama calling from Mexico. Since it was almost ten at night, I went with Mama and answered. I was wrong on both counts, it turned out to be Ricardo. I used to work with him in the Ucen kitchen, and pretty much the whole time I knew him I was trying to hook up with him. We went out a few times, but nothing really ever came of it. But here he was, calling me after I haven't seen or talked to him in months. And the reason he called? To ask me out to dinner and a movie! There's no real explanation for it...
Then when Orly, Leslie and Paul (the Big Spoon) came up, we had to go downtown to a club. We ended up in Sandbar for some reason, and Orly got us in for free by flashing (but not really) the bouncer. I love that girl. We get into the club and get some drinks and head out to dance. It's been a while since I've been out and I forgot what happens to me. I was reminded quickly, since what happens is that within about ten minutes, some guy starts dancing with my ass. Not with me, with my ass. This always happens, but I'd forgotten about it. Anyway, he wasn't scary or anything, so I got him to buy me a drink, fully intending to drink it and disappear, for I am a total bitch after all. But we started talking, and again with the inability to shut the fuck up. Probably it had something to do with the massive amount of alcohol I consumed, but he seemed interesting, so I hung out with him for a while. (If you are related to me or you are easily offended, please skip to the next paragraph) I ended up bringing him back to my apartment, after everyone I was with made jokes about how I was sure to have a good time, since the guy happened to be black. Calm down, that wasn't the reason I brought him home, I really was having a good time. Well, it turns out that the stereotype is wildly inaccurate. Not only did this guy not have a big dick, he in fact had the smallest dick I have ever seen in my life. I mean that in all sincerity. Dude was tiny. Like, maybe four inches. So after that awkwardness, I had to take him back to his friend's house.
The next unusual thing happened when I had to go to the grocery store since I had pretty much only pasta left to eat. I hit up Trader Joe's, because I would starve without that place I tell you. After I stocked up on orange chicken, I headed over to Albertson's for supplementary stuff. I was kinda spaced out, focusing on steering my wonky-ass cart without crashing it, so I wasn't paying attention. I heard somebody say hello, but I heard it in that vague background sort of way. Then I heard, "Ok, fine, don't say hi. i see how it is." This got my attention, and I love to eavesdrop, so I looked around to see what was going on. The cashier that I had passed on my way in was staring at me with a huge grin on his face and said "Are you gonna say hi or what?" I was like, "Me? Ok, hello." Then he smiled even bigger and I blushed and wandered off to find my groceries. Y'all, he was hot too. So I decided to go to his checkout line when I was finished. He said something like "Oh no, here's the girl who doesn't talk to anyone." Then there was some hardcore flirting action. It was nuts. I seriously didn't know how to act. I'm so not used to that. That sort of think doesn't really happen to me. I wasn't even dressed cute or anything. I was completely covered up and my hair was just kinda thrown up in a messy pony tail and I had some serious raccoon eyes going on.
Given all of these random and rapidly occurring instances with guys, I think that there must be some sort of pheromone just pouring off of me. What other explanation can there be?

Monday, June 18, 2007

The Golden Child

I am somewhat obsessed with pop culture, and with celebrities in particular. Any kind of batshit-crazy-downward-spiral-of-drugs-and-alcohol, and I am all over that shit. But there is a softer side of me. Shocking, I know, but there are some celebrities about whom I enjoy reading the good stuff. You cannot imagine the depths of my joy at seeing the lovely spread in People of Brad, Angelina and Da Bebbies. In particularly, I've developed a borderline-unhealthy obsession with Shiloh, no small part of which is the fact that one of my childhood dogs was a Cocker Spaniel named Shiloh (RIP). And, I mean, look at her! Amazing, right? Those eyes, those lips. I could just stare at her picture all day. And let's face it, we were all a little bit concerned about how this particular baby would look. The Wheel of Genetic Fortune can go horribly horribly awry when both of the parents are amazing works of DNA, but in this case things seem to have turned out perfect. As I said, I could be considered borderline-dangerously obsessed with Shiloh. So, what did I do? I wanted to see how much she looked like her parents. I mean, clearly the lips are Jolie-esque. But the eyes? The nose? Well, as it turns out, the eyes are from Dear Old Dad:

Like I said, I have a problem. I know that his picture doesn't quite match up with Shiloh's angle, but it was all I could find. And I looked for about an hour. Not that I really minded staring at pictures of Brad for that long, but this really was the best photo I could get. For comparison purposes... I was able to find a much better photo of Angelina to compare with Shiloh's:

As a matter of fact, the two photos were so similar it is almost eerie. I've shown these to a few of my friends, one of whom described them as "incredibly disturbing and yet hauntingly beautiful".

Friday, June 15, 2007

Dr. Sierra's Tattoo Lecture

I had a lovely complaining conversation with my dear friend Sierra about people who don't understand tattoos. Things like this conversation are why I am friends with this girl. She's paranoidkid85, I'm makeshiftylover, and we obviously had this conversation over AIM.

makeshiftylover: he didn't "get" tattoos
paranoidkid85: oh jesus
makeshiftylover: thats it
makeshiftylover: no more complaining
paranoidkid85: no, it's okay
paranoidkid85: but i must tell you, when it comes to those types i am NOT sympathetic, or nice... really, tolerant, at all
makeshiftylover: no i am so done with him
makeshiftylover: he turned out to be a liar and a manipulator
makeshiftylover: annd fuck that
paranoidkid85: good
paranoidkid85: if you like, i could kill him for you
makeshiftylover: nah hes riding a motorcycle around the country for two weeks
makeshiftylover: i think that should be punishment enough
makeshiftylover: but he seriously asked me to explain the purpose of getting tattoos to him
paranoidkid85: well i hope he gets a lot of bugs stuck in his teeth
makeshiftylover: i was like seriously?
makeshiftylover: you dont get it?
paranoidkid85: if you have to have it explained to you then you will never understand
makeshiftylover: exatly
makeshiftylover: c
makeshiftylover: wherever it goes
makeshiftylover: there is a c
makeshiftylover: so he asked what my tattoo that i have now means to me
makeshiftylover: so i told him
makeshiftylover: and he was still like and...?
paranoidkid85: "and i'm going to staple your lips together if you keep asking me stupid pointless questions"
makeshiftylover: i am going to start saying shit like that to him when he gets back
paranoidkid85: i hope you do
makeshiftylover: you know hes gonna see the new one and be all asking questions
makeshiftylover: i just need a miniature version of you
makeshiftylover: like with a pull string
makeshiftylover: malibu sierra
paranoidkid85: except not tan...
makeshiftylover: but blonde
paranoidkid85: and witty
makeshiftylover: and a cold-hearted bitch
makeshiftylover: "did you ever know that you're my heeeeeeero"
paranoidkid85: lol
paranoidkid85: honestly, if he gives you shit you can just be like
paranoidkid85: "look, i don't need to explain it to you. i'm happy to answer your questions but i stop short of trying to change your opinion of tattoos and tattooed people because frankly, i don't give a rat's ass what you think of them, and really, you're only asking me about them because you want an opportunity to share your opinion on the subject. so please, pull out your little cell phone and call someone who cares about what you think."
makeshiftylover: i love you
makeshiftylover: let's get married

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Liar, Liar

So it turns out that Clay is a liar and a coward. And manipulative. And I'm so over it. I just don't even want to deal with him anymore. He left on his insane trip last Friday, and it has been so nice to go to work and know that he isn't here. Before he left a few things happened that let me know exactly what kind of person he is. Cher asked him what had happened that he and I weren't hanging out as much as we used to and he told her that there hadn't been a falling out but he didn't want to talk about it. Whatever. So then later that day he and I were leaving at the same time and we were joking around and whatnot when all of a sudden he goes "Can I talk to you?" Like that ever ends well. I say yes, because what am I gonna say, no? He then tells me what Cher asked him earlier and I had to pretend like I didn't know. Then I steered the conversation back to the issue at hand, which was that she was right, we hadn't been hanging out as much as before. He then proceeded to tell me that he was in fact purposely distancing himself from me so that I wouldn't get the impression that he liked me as more than a friend. There was a lot of "I like having you as a friend", "You're a great person" blah blah blah whatever. The thing that's so grating about that is that it seems that he assumed that giving me the impression that he liked me as more than a friend would warrant me wanting to date him, which is a bit disconcerting. Secondly, and even more grating, is the fact that his prior behavior gave that exact impression to many many people, not just to me. People actually asked him what he was doing, since I had a boyfriend and all. I mean, the way he was acting, that is not how you act toward someone you see as just a friend. Apparently, it was ok to act that way when I had a boyfriend, but now that I don't, it's not safe because there might be repercussions that he would have to deal with. It really just bothers me that he assumes that I would want to do something if I had the impression that he liked me. If that were the case, I would have already. I have to remind myself that he doesn't know me that well, but I think that he knows me well enough to see that I am a very aggressive person who will go after what I want. I could be wrong.
But here is what really tipped the scale against him. I was cleaning out me emails and I found a series of emails between he and I that were about an incident that took place about a month ago. What had happened was that he asked me into his office and said "Can I ask you a question?" A little freaked out, I said sure because, again, who says no? He then said "Am I being too obvious?" With sirens and alarms going off in my head, all I could think to say was "Obvious about what?" He then decided that me not knowing what he was talking about was proof that he wasn't being as obvious as he feared and refused to tell me what it was. I talked this whole bizarre incident over with Cher and Christina and we concluded that it had to be that he liked me, based on his flirtatious behavior and that wacky incident. So I tried to goad him into telling me, but he didn't give in and I got bored and dropped it. And then mostly forgot about it. But then, as I said, I found those emails again. So I sent them over to him saying "Hey look what I found when I was cleaning out my inbox! What was that all about anyway? Just curious" Since he had already established that he didn't want me to think that he liked me, this had two purposes. The first was that, if he was telling the truth, I really did want to know what he was worried about being obvious about. Second, if he was lying and he was only just now worried that I might think that he liked me, this was a way to call bullshit on him. In response to my query, he simply replied "I don't remember." My Bullshit-O-Meter almost broke, it was getting such a high reading off of that. I sent him back "Bah", which is my basic noise-of-discontent-and-disbelief, so then he sent me this: "Well, like I said, it didn't involve you, and I trusted you to be a neutral 3rd party. The upshot is that I was a little too worried."
Which a) doesn't make a whole lot of sense, b) is somewhat insulting, c) who the fuck is this third party? and d) clearly he did remember. Which I called out to him in my response: "So you do remember then. I'm just curious what it was, since I couldn't trick you into telling me. If you don't want to tell me, whatever. I was just wondering." His response? "Sorry." Sorry for what, motherfucker? Sorry for being a liar? Sorry for being an asshole? Sorry you couldn't trust me for some unknown reason? I mean, what the FUCK?
One of the...I guess beliefs is right. One of the beliefs that I follow in my life is that you judge a person not by what they say, but by their actions. "Deeds will betray a lie" is the exact quote. And with his actions, I have a series of conflicting deeds. Which only leads me to one conclusion. He is a liar. I can't say about what. He may have been lying in the past, just playing a game that has gotten out of hand for him and now he wants to stop. He may be lying now, having changed his mind about me, or who knows what. Either way, the facts line up and point straight to the big flashing neon sign that reads "LIAR".

Friday, June 8, 2007

Diversion

This looks like it was so much fun. Granted, they lose it a bit at the end, but it was still pretty funny. Anyway, check it out.

Thursday, June 7, 2007

I'm Sh-Sh-Shakin'

Oooooh I am hopping mad today y'all! Settle in, I'm in full on rant mode right now. Guys have done pissed me off. Why is it that guys think that it's totally fine to be complete and utter assholes? Is there some sort of chemical that gets released in their brains when they behave in a completely selfish and inconsiderate ways? If so, it must be some mutant form of serotonin, because they seem to do it whenever they have the opportunity. I'm thinking that it must be some type of addiction. Guys just can't be that stupid. Can they?

Asshole Example Number One:
Susan* has been friends with this guy Mike* for a long time. For about the last year, we've all known that Mike is mildly infatuated with Susan, but she doesn't see him as more than a friend, with good reason. Mike is incredibly selfish, on top of which he's incredibly insecure. His insecurities manifest themselves in bitter and resentful behavior on Mike's part, as well as making anyone else's problem somehow all about him. It's actually amazing to witness. Well, Mike worked (until last week) for the same person as Beth*, who is good friends with Susan. Mike said some things about Beth to the boss that were so fucked up that the boss felt obligated to tell Beth what had been said about her. Among the things that he said were some very derogatory comments about Susan. I'm not going to repeat exactly what was said, since a) I'm not supposed to know, and b) that is for Susan to tell whom she chooses. Suffice it to say that I think that the two of them, or at least Beth, should press charges against Mike.
(*names have been changed to protect confidentiality)

Asshole Example Number Two:
My roommate has been seeing this guy Chuck for somewhere around a year, a year and a half. Now I am not one to judge another person, I have no delusions that there are not things on which I could be judged. But there are a number of things in this situation that automatically make me prejudiced against him, one of which is that he has a girlfriend who is not my roommate. The story is complicated (isn't it always?), things like they've lived together for five years and they have an apartment and a car together, joint bank accounts, they are basically married. According to him, he and the girlfriend never really have sex (seriously?), they are more like best friends. Long story short, he sort of has a pass from the girlfriend to have an affair, as long as he continues to live with her. He feels obligated to stay because she is apparently terrified of having to find an apartment on her own, or really be independent in any way. So he says. And perhaps those are his intentions. But whatever his stated intentions may be, in reality he is living with one woman and romantically involved with another.
Another thing is that he has continually behaved in an incredibly hypocritical way. This is really what turned me so much against him. The most recent occurrence of this childish and selfish behavior took place during the last week. His girlfriend went out of town for a week or so, which Dalyne was happy about, assuming that he would be spending more time with her while his girlfriend was gone, as Chuck had expressed his desire to do. On Thursday morning he mentioned that he might go mountain biking later that day. Thursday passed and Daylne didn't hear from him, which is unusual. And then Friday passed, and she didn't hear from him. Friday night she was nearly frantic. The thing is, Chuck is one of those people who somehow missed the memo that other people can be concerned about you, and he never takes his phone with him when his goes mountain biking. He also never has his phone turned on, nor does he regularly check messages. I cannot begin to expound how ridiculous I find this. I mean, he is purposely making himself unavailable, as well as purposely refusing to make good use of a tool that could, in fact, save his life should he find himself injured in the fucking wilderness. It's just blatantly stupid as well as arrogant. He is basically saying that there is no chance that he would need it, since he is obviously invincible and there is no remote possibility that he could ever get injured while riding a bicycle down mountain trails. I'm getting sidetracked.
Saturday passed and Dalyne still had not heard from him, however, her mother pointed out that there was no way on earth that his girlfriend was going to go three days without hearing from him, so even if he was lying in the wilderness bleeding, she at least would do something. This stopped Daylne from being worried, but it rightly incited her fury, as well as mine. How disrespectful could he be that he would call his girlfriend to tell her he was alive, but not call the woman that he supposedly loves and wants to be with? Who does that? I understand wanting to be alone for some time, but you tell people "Hey, I'm gonna go be by myself for a while." You don't just fucking disappear for three days and not tell the person you"love" that you are alive and ok. Not cool.
So. Last night he came over to our apartment. I was out in the living room watching some season two Boston Legal (thanks Nicole!) when Daylne called my into her room. I came in and she just turned to me and asked "How worried was I last week?" A little on-the-spot, but ok. I answered to Chuck, "Oh, she was a mess" which is true. Then he looked back at her sort of confused and said "Why?" And he was sincere.
Y'all I was speechless. I mean, seriously?! Motherfucker was gone for three days without telling her a damn thing about where he was and he says "Why were you worried?" Let's all take a guess about what he would have done in the reverse situation. If Dalyne had disappeared for three days and not said a damn thing to him, as well as the last thing she told him being that she was going to go off on a potentially dangerous adventure in the motherfucking mountains. How angry and worried do you think he would have been? And he says "why". Are you fucking kidding me?

Monday, June 4, 2007

Wine-drinking, Cradle-robbing and General Devilment

Of all the things that I could say about Pamala, one thing I could never say is that this girl does not come through for me. Mere minutes after posting about my desire for some shenanigans, not only did she arrange for some, but she arranged for drunken shenanigans! For Pamala, this is huge. I was, in fact, the first person to witness Pamala drink enough alcohol to go and play in the ocean. Fully clothed. At two o'clock in the morning. And who was right next to her? That's right.
In keeping with our theme of wine, Pamala once again "procured" a bottle of wine from some work function or other. After she called me at the last minute to inform me that we were wearing dresses tonight (but neglected to tell me that we were still wearing flip flops) she told me to head over to Sara's house. Sara lives in I.V. still, on Pardall no less. It's pretty much the greatest thing ever. I hustled over there, anticipating having to park three blocks away and hike over to Sara's in my heels, but man did I luck out with a spot right out front. The night was in my favor I tell you. I was greeted at the door by Pamala and a wine glass full of some type of white. I never did find out what kind...and I still don't care. Pamala drained what was in the glass, looking for all the world like a pro, and handed it to me. I filled it back up for myself and, to my eternal delight, Pamala took the bottle from me and drank straight out of it! That's my girl.
After the three of us polished off the bottle, we headed out into the streets of I.V., decked out in our finery.
Our first stop was at some girl whose name I have completely forgotten's house on DP. Pamala and Sara were a bit tipsy from the wine, but I alas was far more sober than I wanted to be. After some difficulty, we managed to persuade the gate that we did indeed wish to pass through it. This would not be our only trouble with gates. Before we entered, Sara turned to us with a stern admonition that we were going to find Whatshername, say hello, go to the bathroom (what, we're girls, that's how we roll) and then bounce. As soon as we passed through that troublesome gate, I could see why. It was quite a crowded party, but there was an odd, almost stilted air to it. It seemed like everyone there had a very affected air, like they were all simply acting how people are supposed to act at parties, but there was no real revelry in the air. We made our way past the beer pong and the smokers to the inside of the house. I disappointedly surveyed a kitchen full of empty bottles. Then we found whoever that girl was. I remember what she looked like, but her name? Introductions all around, and small talk ensued. I sort of drifted off a bit when some guy almost ran into me, and some guy magically turned into Ryan Grandov, whom I hadn't seen or spoken to since Chris and I broke up two years ago. Awkward...In fact, Ryan and I only knew each other through Chris, double awkward. After the requisite how are you's, we jumped right into the only subject we have in common, Chris. I mention that Chris had called me the week before (true) and that Chris had gotten accepted into a Master program in Medieval Studies in York (also true, go Chris) and we chatted about how perfect that is, what with Chris wanting to be a Viking and all. See how much of this inane conversation I remember? Clearly I was too sober. At least I wasn't drunk enough to do something untoward with this guy I barely know while his Probably Girlfriend was hovering in the background. I said goodbye and found Sara and Pamala again, waiting for the bathroom in the hallway. It took us a few minutes of staring at the wall to realize that it was covered in post-it notes that the residents had written their special inside jokes on. As we were perusing these, a guy with some sort of hat and facial hair approached us to inquire if this was the bathroom line. We affirmed, and Sara told the guy that he looked very familiar. He told her his major, which was the same as Sara's, and she introduced us and then chatted with him a bit. Pamala was off in her own little world, amusing herself with the wall, and I was bemusedly watching her. The random guy and Sara finish chatting and said goodbye, bringing my and Pamala's attention back. He shook Sara's hand and then he kind of patted Pamala on the shoulder and said nice to meet you. Then he put his hand on my upper arm and leaned over to tell me that it was nice to meet me too, and slid his hand between my arm and my breast and slid his hand down my arm. Then, mercifully he left. I was shocked, but, honestly, what's a night out in I.V. without somebody getting molested? I was just taking one for the team here. Not that I didn't freak out about it outside, after we tricked the wily gate into letting us back out.
After some random events and only getting lost twice because Pamala couldn't remember the house number of where we were trying to go, and started combining the numbers of house we were going to with the house we had just left, we managed to make it to Tomer's birthday party. This house also had a gate, but lucky for us it also had a Gate Man, who let us in totally unquestioned. We are that awesome. The house had looked tiny from the front, and the actual house was tiny. But it turns out that it was only to make room for the biggest party I've ever seen in my life. There was a huge backyard area, complete with a full bar. Opposite the bar there were two huge storage shed serving as dance rooms, and in the back there was a patio with couches and the requisite beer pong table. We wandered aimlessly, searching for the birthday boy, and ended up by the beer pong. Needed a rest, we threw caution to the wind and actually sat on a DP couch. An outdoor one, no less. What were we thinking?
Time for some backstory. Pamala has known Tomer through Hillel for about a year. Until a few weeks ago, she'd never looked twice or thought about him at all. Then he asked her for her number, and Pamala gave him a total bitchface and asked why would he want it. Pamala does this thing, see, whenever guys hit on her, she is taken aback and creeped out, even if the guy is totally normal. So I forget what all happened, but she did end up giving Tomer her number. Big surprise though, he only invited her on Facebook and never actually called her. Sara and I gave her a fair amount of shit for that, because that's what we're there for. To call our friends on their bullshit. So since he didn't ever call, Pamala became a total girl and became intrigued. And that's pretty much how we ended up at his 21st birthday party.
Where were we? Right, sitting on the couch. After I decided that screw this I'm getting a drink, we all headed over to the bar. Pamala started texting to see where the next party we were heading to was, and I was strategizing how to get a beer. Suddenly someone yelled and ran up and hugged Pamala. She yelled "TOMER!" confirming for us that this was indeed the long-sought birthday boy. He was so excited to see her, it was adorable. She lightly admonished him for not calling her, and then he asked if any of us wanted a drink. This night kept getting better, I tell you. We sent him off to get me a beer, and then Sara chided Pamala to be nice to Tomer, since she had been so mean to him before. We seemed to wait a long time when we suddenly heard Tomer yell "PAMALA!" through the crowd. We called back, and he appeared from the crown with a lovely beer for me. I thanked him profusely and had at it, content to watch the show. And what a show it was, Pamala flirting outrageously with Tomer, and poor Tomer getting his signals all mixed up. After he scurried off, we had a laugh at Pamala's expense, since he's so very young for her to be flirting with, and headed back out to the next party.
The third party was really lame, and after we forced our way through the toughest gate of them all (what is it with you people and gates?), we found the person Pamala wanted to see, went to the bathroom and headed back to Sara's. We spent the next hour sobering up and making fun of Sara's romance novels.
The next day I remembered why I don't drink white wine. As I was recovering, Pamala and I spent a good four hours getting groceries and looking for propane tanks, so that she could actually have the barbecue that she'd invited everyone to. We had a good time at her place, and some good food. After everyone went home, myself included, Pamala and I made an amazing discovery. We both think that Tomer is hot.
Now this may not sound all that amazing to you, but here's the thing-Pamala and I never think that the same guy is hot. Ever. We have had discussions about it. We spent way, way too long looking at pictures of Tomer and marveling about how young he is and how neither of us is allowed to date him. Little does Pamala know, I have no morals.

Friday, June 1, 2007

You Wanna Meet the Real Me?

I am in the mood for some shenanigans. I have been on some good behavior since I graduated, and I'm starting to get that itchiness that makes the trouble-causing start. I'm having the wicked thoughts and brilliantly evil ideas and general deviousness is afoot, ladies and gentlemen. So if you are down for some shenanigans, drunken or otherwise, you might want to be hanging out with me in the near future. My neurons, they are a-firing, my brain, it is a-scheming.
People always see me as the good girl, but those of you who have known me for a while (Hi Terra) know that this is so far off base as to be laughable. I am so the girl that says or does the shit that you only think in your head. And if you dare me? Oh, it is ON, bitches. I grew up with some hooligans and some crazy motherfuckers. I can roll out the badasserey like you would not believe. This only comes out in tidbits nowadays, being that I'm older and wiser. Things like walking across campus with Sierra and hearing children chanting some children song, and then hearing them bust out with Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and turning around and screaming "IT"S AUGUST!" at said children. They shut the hell up though. Don't tell me you've never wanted to do that. I know you have. Difference is that I will actually do it.
Ever since I was little, I've been that kind of girl. When I was about four years old, maybe five, we lived two houses away from this woman who had those cute little chickens with the feathers on their feet. Like this:
And so my little four-year-old-self went all the way to the back of our acre backyard, to the very end of
The Aqueduct of Doom, and through the fence into our neighbors yard. I then went across their acre back yard and climbed the fence into the next neighbors yard. One of those adorable chickens was running around, so I picked it up and took it home. When I got home, Mama asked me where I got the chicken, and I totally lied and said that the neighbor gave it to me. That is how I roll. She made me take it back, but the point is I was chicken-napping before I went to school.
The odd thing is that as I approached teenage-hood, I became increasingly shy. In sixth grade, I only talked to one person in my class. I knew everyone, everyone knew me, but as far as actual friends, I only had one. Junior High was just basically two years of really painful awkwardness, pretty much the score for everyone. I had the opportunity to change myself and I did, but I was so concerned with what other people thought of me that I didn't actually change into what I wanted to be, what I saw myself as. And at the end of those two years, I was once again without friends, this time not even the one.
I lucked out though. The way that the district was set up, I ended up going to a different high school than all but four people from my junior high. So once again I had the opportunity to change who I was. That time I did it mostly right. I was still concerned about how I was perceived, but in a different way. I wanted to make sure that people knew who I really was, what I was really about. So I started to speak my mind. And the most amazing thing happened. People respected me. Sure, some people didn't like me, but they still respected me. From that, I gained courage. I spoke out more, I dared more. And I really found out a lot about myself. It was hard, and I made some enemies, but I became myself in the process. I learned that fear was holding me back from doing a lot of things. I learned to conquer that fear often meant that I would achieve something or experience something that would make the fear just totally fade out of the picture.
So if you have something that fear has kept you from doing, for whatever reason, and you are ready to give it a try, I'm so your girl. Hell, I've probably already done it. And if not, I sure as hell want to try!