Go Shorty

IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!
My mother always told me that someday I would look upon my birthday as a curse, a sign that the hand of death creeps closer to my neck to claim me back to the dirt. At the ripe old age of twenty-four, I see no signs of this happening. Instead, like an over-eager elementary school kid, I'll announce given any kind of context that it's my birthday. I don't do it to net myself gifts, just adulation. I don't feel the hand of death because I'm too busy screaming "it's my birthday!" to anyone around.
I woke up late, read in bed, and decided to get my lazy ass out of bed at 10:30 and prepare for a day of shopping. I went downstairs to get a bagel at Dunkin Donuts (and a donut too, because it's my birthday) and a small brown package was sitting by the door. I walked by it, figuring my roommate bought something on eBay again. Then I realized the dimensions were similar to that of an iPod box. Then I saw it had my name on it.
I slammed my foot into the door that was closing behind me, grabbed the box and ran back upstairs. "YEEP! YEEP!" I crowed to no one. Since my iPod was in Anchorage yesterday, I didn't figure to see it until tomorrow at the earliest. But here she is next to me, slowly uploading my mp3s onto the beautiful little gadget that has my name engraved on it (spelled correctly, I may add). Now I need to buy it a dock, some worthy speakers, and socks to keep it from getting scratched to shit like the last one.

Where in the World is... (an update)

Just checked the fine FedEx.com website. Turns out my iPod landed in the good old US of A at 9:55am today. Barely. My iPod is now in Anchorage, Alaska.
I hope it's sitting on a pristine lake, it's white earphones dangling in the cool water. Take a picture to show me on your color screen when you get here, my precious. We will be united soon. And we shall celebrate my birth belatedly with Jay-Z and the Indigo Girls. Imagine that party...

My Kingdom for A...

I don't ask a lot of my workplace. I ask for a desk to put huge piles of paper upon, the occasional stash of Pop-Tarts or Oreos (real ones, not things labeled "Hydrox Cookies"), encouragement to grow and be the best production worker bee I can be, and diet Coke. Office coffee I can do without since it makes me have to poo after I drink it (goodbye, readers!) and makes my stomach gurgle, so I usually shell out $1.75 for an iced coffee at the Mecca-like (I pray several times a day towards it) breakfast place across the street. But around lunch time, when my body is going into hibernation mode, I need an extra pick-me-up, without all the sugar and teeth-rotting capabilities of regular Coke. I need diet Coke.
My office is full of women. Sure, there are some dudes, but my coworkers are mostly of the female persuasion. We sit all day so we don't need the extra calories from sugar. We are not hummingbirds. But we need caffeine. I live off the stuff. I begin my days with caffeine and end them with beer. I think many of my coworkers do the same. The future of America's liberal arts college students (shut up, they're people too) depends on the fridge being stacked with diet Coke. I want to be able to replace my cubicle walls with stacks of flats of diet Coke.
For the past few days, our office Coke fridge has been without diet Coke. There's lots of regular. There's regular ginger ale. Iced tea? Got it. But diet Coke? Diet Dr. Pepper? Nothin' doin'. I walk into the small kitchen, see the fridge barren and without diet Coke and I stop my feet. I actually bought a diet Coke today. The situation has become dire.
I don't know if the soda company is to blame, or the admin assistant is channeling his anger about being called whenever the photocopier eats my manuscripts and passive aggressively exacting his revenge. All I know is that I haven't heard the refreshing "pop-SHHICK" of a diet Coke being opened, my face is all broken out from drinking regular, my waist is growing, and I've got a headache from withdrawal. So I'm putting it into the universe-- please send the soda guy to my office, ASAP.

Where in the World is...

my iPod?
Per FedEx, it didn't begin its journey in sunny California, where Steve Jobs lovingly engraved my name, by hand, on to my misantrope device. It has been shipped from Shanghai, China. I hope it brings back some good food and won't be like that episode of the Simpsons when Bart gets some kind of Asian flu when he orders a product.

From China, with Love.

Updates to follow. And, yes, I am still employed. For now.

What 1,000 Burning Suns of Hate Looks Like

But Mitt, isn't cloning wrong as well?

I hate Mitt Romney. It started out with a mild dislike, but with his absentee governing of Massachusetts and thinly veiled hatred of abortion has turned me into a ten-year-old boy who wants to leave flaming bags of poo on the doorsteps of people who've wronged me. And with the veto of the morning-after pill, Mitt had better keep hope I don't find a dog turd somewhere.
It does wrong me when I don't have the option to choose what to do with my own body. Luckily, I've never had a scare with pregnancy (knocks on all available wood surfaces) but if I did, I want the option to take the morning-after pill. I want to be able to walk to CVS, hair greasy, my stomach about to crawl out of my throat with nerves, and have a second chance to prevent a pregnancy. I am an adult woman. It's my choice whether or not I want to give birth because it is my body and my life.
In today's Globe, Mitt writes an editorial explaining the reasons for his choice. Interesting how he's made himself so available to the media recently. Also interesting that he wrote the editorial for the Globe and not the conservative Herald. This is totally for the unborn babies, and not to court conservatives in the Red States, y'all. I really like it when Mitt makes his feelings known-- when he testified against gay marriage in Washington a year ago, he basically called kids not raised by two parents of different genders damaged goods, which, technically speaking, I wasn't. Let's reveiw the plea to the dirty liberals who read the Globe, shall we?

YESTERDAY I vetoed a bill that the Legislature forwarded to my desk. Though described by its sponsors as a measure relating to contraception, there is more to it than that. The bill does not involve only the prevention of conception: The drug it authorizes would also terminate life after conception.
...I have spoken with medical professionals to determine whether the drug contemplated under the bill would simply prevent conception or whether it would also terminate a living embryo after conception. Once it became clear that the latter was the case, my decision was straightforward.

Okay. I've tried to do some research on this argument, and the information comes from either Britain where the EC pill has been available for years, or from pro-life groups who veil themselves with neutral names but state that the cells may be dividing into a blastocyst-- the start of a baby. It is NOT yet a life, or a human. It's cells. Some people believe that's a baby, but cells are not a baby. A baby poops and cries and breathes. Cells divide. Cells can be lost, through either natural or artificial means. If the embryo does not attach to the uterus, it can't live. It is not a chemical abortion-- it prevents the cells from attaching to the uterus, so the cells stop dividing.

For all the conflicting views on this issue, it speaks well of our country that we recognize abortion as a problem. The law may call it a right, but no one ever called it a good, and, in the quiet of conscience people of both political parties know that more than a million abortions a year cannot be squared with the good heart of America.

Doesn't matter. It's between a woman, her doctor, her lover/boyfriend/whatevers, her God (or lack thereof). It is a very personal, private issue for a woman to decide. For me, I think it would be an easy choice. I can't give a kid a good life right now-- I'm broke, the bank's calling me at work to demand money, I don't own anything other than a big-kid bed and some shoes-- so I'd have to do something. Would I feel bad about it? Probably. I love kids, and someday I want to have a kid with the nose that's been handed down through generations on my father's side. But it's my body that would have to carry a baby, my wallet that would empty if I gave birth. It wouldn't matter what America's heart, good or otherwise, says. A good heart won't feed a family, Mitt.

Many women considering abortions face terrible pressures, hurts, and fears; we should come to their aid with all the resourcefulness and empathy we can offer. At the same time, the starting point should be the innocence and vulnerability of the child waiting to be born.

What? What about the person who is alive and actually has feelings? You know, the woman who is scared to death of what the cells in her womb are going to do to her? I completely don't understand why conservatives feel the need to protect the unborn while making women have kids they don't want, and cutting the programs that would help women raise their kids well.
And, here's the kicker:

I have also observed the bitterness and fierce anger that still linger 32 years after Roe v. Wade. The majority in the US Supreme Court's Casey opinion assured us this would pass away as Americans learned to live with abortion on demand. But this has proved a false hope.

THAT'S BECAUSE CONSERVATIVES WON'T SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT IT. God! When you create a hostile environment where people kill doctors who perform abortions, when you sneak your prolife propaganda into sex ed classes, when you veto legislation that will pass anyway because your pro-choice, gay-ass, second-rate state that you hate to govern wants scared women to have another chance before a far more frightening trip to Planned Parenthood and you sit down with every reporter-- who you know wants to fuck you because you're the hottest conservative, even hotter than GW Bush!-- to make as much of a national stink about abortion as possible for one self-promoting bastard, of course there is going to be bitterness and anger. You've ruined my morning coffee, asshole. I'm pissed! Didn't you read The Cider House Rules? Without proper doctors with training, women like me who want control of their bodies will be in back-alley establishments getting unsafe abortions, ending up in the hospital when they're botched, the state will end up paying the medical bills of the uninsured, and the women you've encouraged to give birth will end up losing programs that help them to pay for the botched abortions of other women. It's not yours to decide, Mitt. The choices should be available and, like the states whose rights you so diligently defend, the independent entities known as women can decide for themselves without the interference of a larger power.
I'd like to leave you with a quote from Margaret Sanger.

"No woman can call herself free who does not own and control her body. No woman can call herself free until she can choose consciously whether she will or will not be a mother."

Hey Mr. FedEx Man

Thank the Lord I lived another year. Thank the Lord I made it through half a year without an iPod. Because salvation is on the way. My mother-- to celebrate the fact that she was very pregnant with me for a very long time and I was a very heavy baby (10lbs, 2oz at birth, bitches) and because I was so big she was cut open like a ripe watermelon to get the juicy, cool wonder of Amy out of her-- has bought me an iPod. 20GB of freedom from uncomfortable conversation on the T in the morning ("Sorry, crazy tourist! I can't hear you over the angry shouts and wails of Tori Amos!"), the freedom from bringing my CDs into work one at a time and ripping them into my work iTunes and thus listening to Boys for Pele ad nauseum, freedom from long train rides home listening to the hyperactive daycare group screaming two rows back. I am to be free once the device shows up and loads my mp3s onto it's glorious hard drive, displaying the song and artist info in color, and it even holds digital photos. I can show people all the pictures of the kids, me in various states of inebriation, and do slideshows. But, most importantly, the music won't stop.
If you need me, I'll be updating FedEx.com once every ten minutes to see if the tracking info has been updated. You'll also hear me screaming when I find out nobody's home to sign for the package, and I'll need to get to South Boston or something to pick it up. I will once again be the life of many parties ("wow, Tom Waits, Sir Mix-a-Lot, and Destiny's Child. This party rocks"). Good times.

And in the new millennium, God made the iPod. And misanthropes were good.

The Angel Gabriel

Uh... Johnny who?

That's it. I am going to meet Gabe Kapler. Soon. It will either be in the dugout/outfield of Pawtucket, or in Brookline. Because you know who loves Brookline? Gabe Kapler. Know who else? Me. From today's Herald:

``One of the things I missed most about playing for the Red Sox was visiting my favorite little Brookline eating establishments,'' said Kapler, who returned to the Red Sox organization this week after a forgettable stint in Japan with the Yomiuri Giants.
``My first order of business is to go to Zaftig's,'' said Kapler, referring to the acclaimed delicatessen on Harvard Street in Brookline. ``I miss having breakfast there.''
Any other hot spots?
``Anna's Taqueria,'' Kapler said. ``I'm telling you, I missed those places. They were like home to me.''

If you see a girl in a carbohydrate daze from eating bagels with lox, burritos and lots of sitting in wait for The World's Most Perfectly Sculpted Jew (apologies to Roommate and Youks), that would be me. I'll be his nanny, like Jude Law's nanny. I'll bring the kids to Anna's and cut their quesedillas into little pieces so they don't choke and I will love them and be paid in ogling Gabe time.
Seriously, I need to sit down. And I'm already sitting.

Random

• Son of a bitch. Three months ago, I organized a trip for the Ninjas of Love to go to a Pawtucket Red Sox game. I figured it's not JD or Tek, but at least we'd have Youks. Then Youks got optioned into Boston and I was sad he wouldn't hear me cheer for him (by cheer, I mean "Kevin Youkilis, you rock my socks off"). Then Youks came back to Pawtucket and I was excited. Then I heard rumors Gabe Kapler was coming back, and I dared to dream. Then he came back. And was playing rehab games in Lowell. Then I figured he'd be in Pawtucket on Saturday. But apparently that's his off day. Crap. I mean, I'm happy with the Youks and all, but I really looked forward to jumping on Kapler and humping him until removed from the park.
• This weekend will probably kill me. I've got plans with S this afternoon, drinking with a lover scorned later, will probably be woken up by the guy doing remodeling work in my Mom's bathroom at 8:30am, hanging with the Mom, going to Pawtucket, going to Providence, going to sleep, going to see the hometown crew which always leads to trouble (especially when there's a margarita pool involved) and dying of exhaustion Sunday night.
• I want to know what marketing genius at channel 7 started marketing my Pete Bouchard as the sexy guy of Boston. I haven't yet seen the commercial, but both KCee and TGIC have mentioned it to me. Apparently, it's some of Pete's great moments in weather forecasting interspersed with women talking about how much they love Pete. Let me tell you, if they wanted an interview, I'd give 'em one. "Pete Bouchard rocks my socks off. He's the hottest bald guy in Boston. Sometimes I write about him on the internet!"

So enjoy your weekend, kids. I'll be kickin' it Rhody-style.

A Letter to Terrorists

Dear Terrorists,

Stop bombing London. I don't know what point you're trying to make, but knock it the fuck off. Seriously. I love that old city. I love the Undergound, I love the voice saying "Change here for the Piccadilly Line." I love that it's New York with a better accent and worse food. I love New York, but London holds a special place to me. So knock it the fuck off.
And what do you think you're going to change by bombing subways? Tony Blair doesn't take the Circle Line. Anyone with any power over the way your countries are being treated isn't directly affected by these bombings. People like you, people who are just trying to get by, are the ones you're hurting and killing. Which is fucking stupid. You're just provoking more hate, more bombs, more pain for yourself. God knows I don't agree with these assholes in power very often, but I go and vote. I bitch and complain on the internet. I keep other people informed of stupid shit so we can peacefully figure out a solution. I know you feel like you've got nothing else, but bombing people who are just living their lives isn't helping your cause.
Just to piss you off, I'm going to ride the T home tonight. I am going to enjoy my birth control and my revealing clothes. I'm going to take advantage of all the opportunities I have in this culture of mine, fucked up though it may be.
Knock it off, bastards.

Sincerely,
Amy

Best Use Your Confidential Sources Now, Kids

"Hey, what can I say? I'm a fucktard!"

Now the President has set his beady little eyes on a reporter's right to keep his source confidential.
You know, back in John Coffee's World Since 1914 class, I wrote a paper about Adolf Hitler. I read a biography of his rise to power, and the most disturbing thing was the way Hitler systematically eliminated civil rights in the name of national security. I still have the paper at home, and the quote bears and eerie resemblance to the phrasing of this article. (I'll post it after my post-work margaritas.)
I'm going to start wearing Jim Taricani t-shirts all the time.
Also, I'd like to propose a one-word argument to the President's argument:
Watergate.

Thank you.

A Mile in Inappropriate Shoes

We've got Karl Rove and his aid Libby leaking the identity of CIA agents. There is a hurricane barreling towards Texas. I'm trying to plan my birthday celebration that I'd ideally have in two states on the same weekday. Yet the big controversy is flip-flops in the White House.
Here's my argument-- flip flops are comfortable. Walking around a city in heels is not fun. Heeled boots are one thing, but heeled sandals get all sweaty and your feet fishtail out of the backs of them and you're trying to be all smooth because you're about to meet the President but you've damn near broken your ankle, your feet have blisters about the size of your eyeball, and all you want is a cool drink and a chair. But you've got to stand for a photo op with the President.
Flip-flops and beer are proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. After the initial wearing the fabric softens up and rests against the delicate foot skin like a cloud. The firm sole keeps broken glass and small rocks from poking through and hurting the bottom of the foot. The shoes make a merry noise as the wearer walks. All in all, a great thing.
Also, we're worried about formality in the Bush White House? This guy refers to national security experts as "folks." Jesus. Flip-flops are the least of our problems.

Summer

As many people on the street, on the T and on the television have pointed out, it's hot outside. I spend all year waiting for the heat to kick in, and when it's finally here I'm sitting in front of a fan in a stinky tank top and ugly shorts, bitching about it. I walk down the street, my feeble lungs trying to wring some oxygen out of the humid air, and moan. Then, like a child raised in fine Catholic fashion, I feel guilty. I've waited through blizzards, monsoon-intensity rains and blistering winds for the time when my armpits have that smell when the deodorant starts to lose the fight and my shirt sticks to my back from the sweat. This winter I flew to Florida to have a taste of the sun on my skin. In short, this is why I live in New England. I love the heat since it's a limited resource for me.
Last week I got up and the air was heavy, the sun was burning through the haze to scorch Bostonians like bugs under a magnifying glass, but a breeze blew enough to make my window fan sound a transmission that needed shifting, and it felt like summer mornings when I was in high school. I worked as a summer recreation counselor, so I'd show up at the elementary school early in the morning on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays to bring the kids somewhere. Sometimes it was places that sucked to go to on a hot day, like Fenway or the zoo. Most times, we went somewhere air conditioned or with a large body of water. I was enough of a child myself at thirteen, fourteen, fifteen and sixteen that the trips still appealed to me. I'd show up in my Fakenstocks with my Wal-Mart Winne the Pooh beach bag, the sun just beginning to singe my skin, the air just beginning to get heavy, and prepare for the day. It was a great summer job for me. Being a counselor combined my love of the beach with my innate ability to relate to kids. Some of the kids, such as the girls in junior high with their Bonnie Bell cosmetics and shrieking laughs drove me insane, but the kids I spent most of my summer afternoons with meant a lot to me. I'd get my roster of kids to chaperone, usually the trio of hyper brothers, the eldest of which hit on me nonstop, the youngest of which was adorably earnest, the chatterbox girl who was furious if I ignored her (I was told by a friend that she reminded him of me), the younger brother of one of my classmates, my brother, and the brother and sister who lost their father only a month before.
My friend who teaches at my old high school told me that the boy who lost his father was recently talking about a girl named Amy who used to babysit him. My friend teaches high school juniors, which shocked me. I imagine that the kids ended up in the same vortex as the classmates I never see-- they're exactly the same as I left them in 1999. I remember the boy and girl who lost their father (he had an aneurysm in the shower) and how beautiful the kids were, the girl especially. She had almond shaped eyes that just seemed to understand everything they looked at with a perfunctory glance. My friend who was a counselor and I would marvel at how beautiful she was even at age six, and how mild-mannered she was. She wasn't a shrinking violet, but she got along with all the kids, which if you remember being a kid, is hard to do.
I remember my friend and I went to the trailer park where the family lived. The kids' mother was always nice to us when she picked them up, and it affected us both to hear about their loss. The mother planned to go back to school and get a business degree so she could get a better paying job, and she smoked the entire time as she confided to my friend and I how worried she was now that her husband was gone, how she didn't know how she could work, support the kids alone, and go to school. It affected me more, given the fact that the kids were about the same age that I was when my father died. My friend and I took the kids out for a while to let their mother have some time to herself. We went to the grocery store to pick up some things for her, and the kids spotted a package of pre-sliced cookie dough.
"Cool," the boy said. "Cookies."
His sister just smiled, taking in the cookies with her deep brown eyes.
My friend and I looked at each other, and we picked up the cookie dough and set it in the basket with a small package of steak. We cashed out, and reemerged into the steamy July air. We got back to the kids' house and gave the two bags of groceries to their mother.
"Thank you so much. This means a lot to me. How much do I owe you?"
"Nothing," I said.
"No, really. How much was it?"
"Don't worry about it," my friend replied.
"Thank you both so much." I could tell she meant it. It's odd how I wanted to pick this family up, save them from the small trailer, the noise of the state highway outside, to help them more. But in that moment, a package of steak and some pre-made cookie dough and a moment's peace was all they needed. I will never forget the look in their mother's eyes when we told her not to worry about the small bill.
There are kids I'll always remember from my adventures as a summer rec counselor-- the kid who ran full-speed into the wall of the gym, breaking his arm so severely that the bone poking up was visible under the skin; the little boy who got separated from his group only to find the bus with the help of three bikini-clad college girls who were carrying a large bucket of rocks he found on the beach; bitching about parents who were never on time to collect their kids; the trip to Riverside (Six Flags) at the end of the program when our boss would allow us to stay at the park when the kids were on their way home-- but what I'll remember most is the family that I felt I actually helped. I miss summers spent outside with actual interaction with people. As much as I enjoy my job, I crane my neck around to catch a glimpse of the world outside and sigh in the cool air, wishing I was outside bitching about the heat.

Hallelujah!

Boston.com is reporting that Bellhorn's on the DL, and Youkilis is being called up. While I am sad this will affect my ability to yell "Youks!" in Pawtucket on Saturday, I am glad he will get to do his big-league thing again. I keep hoping, as the dirty rumors swirl in the dirty water, that Kapler will be back before Saturday, somehow, to make my Christmas. Or Hanukkah, as the case may be. I hope that Youks is superman and I'll be cheering Bellhorn in Pawtucket. Yeah, Steve Brady, you heard me.

That's right, bitches.
Also of note: This made me ovulate four times. Slideshow is a must.
I promise I will write something intelligent soon. Please note you can now email me your hate mail instead of posting it in the comments section.

Keeping it on the Down Low

This is why I love Rhode Island. (Registration required.) A story about license plates is the second headline on ProJo's website.
If you've ever read a Don Bosquet comic strip (his wife was my high school librarian and she ROCKED, so hi, Mrs. Bosquet!) then you know the inexplicable love Rhode Islanders have with their license plates, especially the low-numbered ones. Unlike the "milk and bread" instinct, I'm at a loss to describe why people love the low-number plates. I can see getting bent out of shape over a vanity plate, although a vanity plate is a big neon sign to cops to remember your car. Just ask my high school principal (hi, Mrs. Christian!) about that. A ProJo piece about speed traps was published, and the car that got pulled over twice in one day was her Mitsubishi sports car with the dorky science-themed vanity plate. Endless laughter behind her back about that one.
I'm guilty of this attachment myself. From the time I was four until my Tempo bit it in 2000, we had FR. (There were numbers after it, but I don't want my mother to freak and barricade herself in her house figuring all the dregs of the internet will come mess up her new bathroom.) I begged my mother to keep the plates, but she turned them in in favor of using her initials on her new car's plates and forsaking my old friend FR. A little part of me broke along with the rusty lugnut that held the beloved plate to my bumper was removed.
But this is a bit extreme:

Plate 7
In 1986, car dealer Carmine Carcieri paid a Cranston man $25,000 to transfer the plate to him. After authorities found out about the sale, the state police confiscated the plate, which was canceled. It remained unissued until 1994, when outgoing Gov. Bruce Sundlun issued it to his then-wife, Marjorie.

I don't think there's a better example of the way things work in my home state than this story. Crimes, an attempt to set things right, then the government at work using the great system of nepotism, then divorcing the beneficiary. God bless my little state. All that's missing is Buddy Cianci threatening someone with a log, getting arrested, convicted, and then becoming mayor again.

Plate 234
In 1996, two men at a Pawtucket car dealership were charged with falsifying paper work to transfer the plate from Nancy Burdick, a South Kingstown woman whose family had held the number for more than half a century.

Perhaps this is why people love the low-number plates; the sense of history attached to them. What is just a way to identify cars in other states is a tin badge of pride in 'lil Rhody. That's why FR held such appeal to me. It was on my Mom's first "new" car, a nice black 1985 Escort station wagon to replace the brown one that never started and made me miss preschool more than once. The fact that she held onto it when she bought our first Taurus, which became my Taurus, which became my Tempo after I crashed the Taurus. The fact that it was with us through three houses, two deaths, a divorce and my becoming an adult can't easily dismissed. If I'd stayed in Rhode Island, I'd probably have kept the plate on my cars and would still have it now. I don't understand the appeal of getting the low plates now when you haven't always had it. Maybe to keep up the illusion of history for the newbies. But to my Rhode Island peeps, send in your name and hopefully you know somebody who knows somebody at the DMV and can put your name in the raffle twice and you'll get number 61 and be the envy of everyone.

Old Time

As someone pointed out in the comments of yesterday's post, Youks has been sent back to Pawtucket.

It hurts us all, Kevin. But mama will be in Pawtucket next weekend cheering you on, after "borrowing" a small child so I can get a Tim Wakefield bobblehead. Call my Mom, Youks-- she'll make you some mashed potatoes to comfort you. Don't let 'em get you down-- they'll be calling you back up when some other valuable member of the team implodes and they need your consistent ass to bail them out. Again.

Also, from the Pete Bouchard files:

If you read my body language (Queen) on television, you can probably see that I'm fidgeting over the weekend forecast. I wring my hands, contort my face, clammor for words and try to reassure you that it's not a washout we're facing, but a hit-and- miss-shower-type weekend.
Which is the better day? It's like asking what is the best 7 News alliteration of all time: "Pooch in a Pipe", "Donut Dilemma" or "Sandwich Scare"? For now, they're looking the same.
Punchy Pete

Since I give my channel 7 friend a requisite amount of crap for the neverending alliteration on their sensational news pieces, I'm glad Pete sees the stupidity of it all. Thanks for brightening an otherwise crappy day, Pete.

Wuss

Corporate crime sucks, y'all. Imbezzle the money, you'll find it ain't funny.
Check this headline out:

WorldCom's Ebbers weeps at jail sentence

Can you imagine this asshole? Martha didn't cry when she got put in the slammer and she's a girl. Boys don't cry, Ebbers. You can just hear the woman at the AP thinking "you pussy" when she wrote this article:

Ebbers sniffled audibly and dabbed at his eyes with a white tissue as he was sentenced.

He probably did so with his pinky finger raised, fanning his face with his free hand and murmuring "I told myself I wouldn't do this."
Also:

He [Ebbers' lawyer] described Ebbers as "a modest man" and an angel to many desperate charitable causes.
"If you live 60-some-odd years, if you have an unblemished record, if you have endless numbers of people who attest to your goodness, doesn't that count? Doesn't that count particularly on this day?" Weingarten said.

An "angel?" He wiped out the pensions of his investors, to the tune of billions of dollars. Unless this fraud bounty was routed directly into the accounts of AIDS-ravaged countries in Africa or widows of the Iraq war, I hardly see this guy as angelic. I think Weingarten is reaching, and not adding "I really hope it counts today, because this clown won't pay me otherwise."
I can also hear this Ebbers fellow bitching in his corporate prision, crying in his whole-wheat soy oatmeal that his cronies didn't get as much time as he will. "John and Timothy won't be in jail as long as I will. Boo hoo hoo." Even Martha, M. Diddy herself, is flaming the band of her tracking device with a creme brulee torch and yelling, "You're a fucking pussy, Ebbers. Suck it up, asshole."
...Unrelated, but I think Martha and I have the same taste in men:

"He was talking about me after I left, and — I have to say — Jon Stewart is even better looking in person than he is on TV," Stewart says. "I have such a crush on him."

Neat.

Goofus

I put to rest the neverending Goofus and Gallant cartoon in my mind promptly at 5:30 by hauling ass to the exhange place near my office and furtively cashing in the Canadian money. I got $73.71. Many thanks to the hapless Canadian who dropped their money-- I got to buy food and I think I'll give the ten spot to a homeless person tomorrow to try to atone for clutching my Canadian money like a golden ticket as I walked by the Anthropologie store with the "sale" sign calling to me like a siren. I'm taking myself out for a post-work mojito tomorrow.

Goofus, or Gallant?

I'm feeling like the brat on the left, quite frankly.

Okay so. It's three days till payday and since I decided to hang with the ex-W all weekend I ended up eating out a lot more than I'd wanted. I had all intentions of cooking large batches of nutritious food, but instead found myself eating the nutritionally void food from 7-Eleven. Also, Ikea. Upon checking my bank balance, I found I have negative money. Also, my extremely expensive birth control (gee, thanks, health insurance for covering twenty bucks of the cost for two months) needed to be refilled, so that was more negative money, and there's only so much pasta I can consume before my hair falls out and Dr. Atkins spins in his cholesterol-riddled grave, so I am going to need to buy food at some point.
Since no free food was in the office, to the point where the community ramen noodles have all been consumed, Kristen and I trekked out to Wendy's for a fine lunch from the dollar menu. Outside Wendy's, a pile of brightly colored paper was on the sidewalk. I didn't think much of it, but then stopped to check it out. It was a large pile of Canadian twenties. A really large pile. I picked some of it up, and another woman picked up a couple twenties.
"What's this?" She asked.
"Canadian money."
"Oh."
We all looked around, holding the money out in the open, looking for anyone who would come up and claim to have lost a large mountain of Canadian Monopoly money.
"This would be worth a lot of American money," the woman said tentatively.
"It would be less," Kristen and I corrected her in unison.
We stood there for a couple of minutes, my eyes twitching back and forth like the Grinch deciding whether he should enjoy the Christmas spirit or keep on running with the goods. It sucks to lose money, and God knows I'd want someone to return it to me. But it's not like it was on the floor of a business where someone would return. A bank was a few feet in either direction, but not a lot of banks dole out Canadian currency. An exchange place was a few blocks up the street. Nobody was looking for money. So the woman took a couple of twenties and Kristen and I, really hungry at this point, went to Wendy's for lunch with the rest of the cash (Canadian).
I thought maybe I should keep the money and look to see if anyone puts an ad on Craigslist, but how does one prove he lost money? He could give the amount, but the woman took some of it with her. It's not like a necklace or a wallet that can be described-- it's unmarked bills sitting on the street. I can take the money to the exchange place and get a pretty good sum of money to get me through the week and thank karma that I found it. But I fear the other shoe dropping on me to wake me up, find my identity stolen and be in even more debt than I already am. If I lost a pile of foreign currency, I'd go looking for it. I don't want any angry Canadians running around this fair city, angry at the lack of hockey and "u"s arbitrarily put into words and the lost money will the last straw, and their politeness will snap and they'll go around saying mean things to people. I don't want that. But I also don't want a big karmic debt and to be a bad person. Right now I'm thinking I'll wait until tomorrow, check Craigslist for a posting, and if I don't hear anything I'll cash it in tomorrow and enjoy a nice dinner of the people of Canada. Thoughts, anyone?

Meep

Sometimes, something is just perfect. Sometimes, some perfect things wind up in more than one place. Take the Boston Red Sox. There's Johnny Damon's perfect mane of hair, but that comes with his propensity to blather on about team politics, international politics and the politics of dancing (or something). There's Jason Varitek's humorless approach to baseball (growing grass is more uproarious than Mr. Tek) which made him the captain of this ragtag crew. Then there's David Ortiz.
Come on. He's a big ray of cuddly sunshine who hits home runs at the most opportune moments. He has grown men spoon-feed him applesauce like love-sick teenagers. Just look at this guy.

This picture should be in the dictionary to illustrate joie de vivre. In my opinion, he's not sexually hot, but I want to hug him all day long. I want to wrap my arms around his five-barrels wide chest and hold on while he goes grocery shopping like a baby koala to its mother. I'd probably kiss his forehead a few times and pinch his cheeks. This is what a man who earns millions of dollars a year to play a game should look like: happy. As Kristen said, some other baseball players could take a lesson from David Ortiz.
Here's the written equivalent of this picture, from today's Globe:

''Of course, as a human you get down," Ortiz said. ''Everything is not only happiness. Everything is not flowers and piece of cake. There's a lot of things in life that you see, that you have to face. That's life. But, otherwise, happiness."

I think, when the unpleasant proposition of Johnny leaving the Sox comes to pass (weeping) I will have to nominate Ortiz to my favorite player status. I loves me some Youks, but if Ortiz keeps that smile on his face I'll be powerless to resist. So thanks, Papi, for making my day.

Are You Paying Attention?

Sunday was spent, as all my Sundays seem to be spent nowadays, hungover. Which I'm not even certain was a hangover, but more of a "Pina Colada Slurpee, meet rum while eating mozzarella balls with salt and pepper since every restaurant is closed and all I have in the house is uncooked chicken at 2am after an Ikea run with the ex-W " situation. So, perhaps not hungover, but really, really fucking tired. We went to the ex-W's apartment with the intent of cleaning up and getting work done, but instead passed out from exhaustion and watched a show on PBS about Tupperware. This is my wild urban life, people.
The ex-W has an addiction to Google news. I'm more of a Yahoo! front page kind of girl, mainly because it's easy. But while he searched for news of bombings in Iraq, I noticed this juicy little tidbit of gossip. No, it's not Katie Holmes in a wedding dress. No, it's not the President choking on a donut. It's even better.
Karl Rove leaked the identity of former CIA agent Valerie Plame.

"committing federal crimes is a laugh a minute, hoss!"

Think about it. This guy is in a huge amount of contact with the President. He's in charge of policy. And he's leaking the identity of CIA agents. Federal crime. This is huge.
Now it's going into a "well, I didn't say her exact name, so I didn't blow her cover" debate that I'm sure will go on for months to come. Kind of like Clinton's "I tried it, but didn't inhale" argument.
Also, something I didn't know, courtesy of Wikipedia (another of the ex-W's online haunts):

In 1970, at the age of nineteen and while a protege of Donald Segretti (later convicted as a Watergate conspirator), Rove sneaked into the campaign office of Illinois Democrat Alan Dixon and stole some letterhead, which he used to print fake campaign rally fliers promising "free beer, free food, girls and a good time for nothing," and distributed them at rock concerts and homeless shelters. Admitting to the incident much later, Rove said, "I was nineteen and I got involved in a political prank." (The Nation).

Just a prank. Just like Voldemort-ing the identity of a federal agent. It's a load of fun being Karl Rove. I'd like to think he's going to get put away, or at least reduced to a talking head on CNN like the guys from Watergate, but he's a tricky son of a bitch and he'll probably get promoted. Just keep your eyes on this one-- it's going to take some political pressure on the President and others to stick to their promises and punish who's responsible for this crime.

Workin' For the Weekend

This is not already legal? Shit, I am in a world of trouble.

So is this person.

Umm...

Maybe now is not the time to get into a pissing contest with Europe?
"We're number one! Nobody dare attack us! Except... they already did."
(Thanks again to Yahoo!'s main page for pissing me off.)

Calling London

Yikes.

It's funny how the dulcet tones of NPR can inspire fear in a person. Something about the calm voices being raised slightly louder, the less well-planned programming, the ever-so-slight tinge of concern entering into the smooth voices of the radio journalists freaks me out more than the snappy graphics and shrieking harpies on Headline News. It's also funny how the voices bring me back to 2001, when I stood in Starbucks with the boy I babysit, oblivious to what was happening in New York, but hearing a radio behind the counter turned on low; getting back to his house and his mother telling me what happened, realizing that the Starbucks was playing the news and I had no idea what was happening.
I woke up this morning as I always do-- two minutes before the alarm clock goes off, sitting up with my hair falling out of its ponytail, blinking and cursing the fact that I'm up at 7:30. I showered, and turned on NPR like I do every morning, expecting Rene Montaigne and Steve Insky. As I opened my laptop to check the weather, I heard the slightly shrill voice of Rene Montaigne announcing attacks in London. I opened boston.com, hoping that it was a small scale, single-station thing and that no one was killed. And I immediately felt selfish for complaining about getting up, complaining about the routine of my day. Suddenly it all felt much different, just like it did in 2001. What if I got on the train, just like I do every day, stood in the stairway by the door, took out my book and started reading, thinking about the boring mundane details of my day, and didn't make it to the other end of my trip? Those people in London got up expecting a normal day, maybe a lunch with the boss or a late start due to a doctor's appointment, and didn't make it.
Of course, this is one of those "live every day like it's your last" moments, but we can't always do that. If you wait every day for a bomb to take you out, for a plane to crash, for something to go wrong you'll never accomplish anything. It's not practical to live in this deep paranoid fear every day. We all pay lip service to enjoying each day, for thanking God or whomever we're alive and for our loved ones but in the shuffle of freelance projects that never seem to end, making plans for the weekend and working, we forget. It takes something like this, seeing normal people expecting a normal day in their lives being wounded and killed on the way to work to shake us by our metaphoric shoulders and say "you really should appreciate that you're still here."
I hope that everyone who knows somebody in London knows that they're safe. I just emailed an acquaintance I met the last time I was there to check on him. Hopefully he's all right, and ready to reply with a "I will be fine when you come to visit me in London, you sexy bird."

It Was All Yellow

I am issuing the call. Stop it with the cause bracelets. When you can buy these things for a buck at Claires, it's time to stop.
It started out as a noble thing-- albeit a bit self-promoting since Lance has worn the Tour de France's yellow jersey for longer than he was in diapers-- to raise awareness and money for cancer. Nobody loves cancer and people love people who beat cancer. It's an impressive feat, and I don't fault Lance a bit for raising money. But I wish he had not let loose the scourge of cause bracelets on the world.
Now there's Think Blue (for voting Democratic in the next election) which I actually own. There's be nice to animals bracelets. There's Red Sox Nation bracelets. I'm sure there's Republican bracelets, sick puppy bracelets, alcoholics bracelets, unemployed people bracelets, support the troop bracelets (don't get me started on the magnetic yellow ribbons), gay marriage bracelets, anti-gay marriage bracelets, save Katie bracelets, love Jesus bracelets... enough. It's great you have a cause. Can't you buy a t-shirt like a normal person? Eventually, causes will run out of colors and what one person thinks is a Red Sox bracelet will really be a Red State bracelet and nobody will be able to read a person by the bands on their forearms again.
Then you get the do-gooders who want to change the world by spending a few bucks on a rubber bracelet for every cause they see. When I was in New York, I saw a girl walking down the street with both of her arms encased in cause bracelets nearly up to her elbows. The girl was about thirteen years old-- how could she possibly have found that many causes at such a young age? I was too busy listening to Tori Amos and Alanis Morisette endlessly at thirteen to give a shit about poor people or lab rats or baseball teams.
End it. Stop. It's good that people care about things-- now if only they'd pony up some actual money instead of paying lip service to a cause. Go build a house for poor people or go see a Sox game if you care so much. Use your wrists for watches and normal bracelets.

Happy Fucking Birthday, Mr. President

"Hot damn! Y'all really like me here in this here country in Europe. That's the most hugest damn donut I ever did see! Wow-ee!"
So the Shrub is 59 today. Unbelievable that that crack fiend made it to this ripe old age. I guess the good do die young, while the drug addicts find God, reform themselves, nearly flunk out of college and still go on to lead the free world, looking like an idiot the entire time.
My hostility towards Mr. Bush is back at the surface because of the impending Supreme Court justice nomination battle. Nothing like the horror-inducing thought of a hugely conservative court having cases for reproduction rights heading their way. I usually just shake my head and say "as you like it, America," but the second I face the possibility of finding myself without birth control pills, without the option of abortion, with kids who won't know the effectiveness of contraception methods unless I tell them is when I put on a black cat suit and get my protest on. The fact that Rehnquist will most likely retire or die soon is also frightening. That's two openings for God-lovin', women-hatin', honky-ass motherfuckers to be making huge decisions in the next few decades.
Someone hold me.

Thank God That's Over...

Hey. We recently just had a weekend. Did you hear? It's a shock to me since I spent all the 4th sober. Stone cold. Not a drop to drink. I did have some grilled meats, but that's about it. I drank more than a guy who outweighs me by nearly one hundred pounds on the 3rd, but the 4th found us sober, surrounded by drunk parents and someone smoking weed on the Mass Ave bridge, asses numb from sitting on the pavement, wondering how Big and Rich are at all representative of Boston. The fireworks were impressive, especially with this year's advent of the "jazz hands" fireworks that explode out of nowhere, linger and twinkle like wiggling fingers, and disappear as quickly as they came.
The freelance work, as of 10am, is done. Now I just wait around for the payday, which can't come soon enough since I spent lots of money this weekend. It's funny how traveling even two hours outside of the city will cost you so much money. And, you know, living in the city.
Anyway, I'm going to reaquaint myself with the stove and cooking for myself instead of eating pizza for every meal. I will make my best efforts at writing more soon, but I should probably turn my attention to my actual job again.