Work is Bad for your Health

When I get home from work, all I want are comfort foods.

Peanut butter, cookie dough, if it's anything sweet and fatty then I'll want it. The battle is to refrain from actually eating all of it.

Apparently it's not just me.

hungry me: working is bad for my health... it makes me want to eateateat
hungry friend: me too!
hungry friend: i want cheese and fries
hungry me: oh yes
hungry friend: all day every day

While I'm at it...

Just so that you don't go thinking that I'm too happy and that I've lost all my snark, let me just tell you two things that I don't like lately.

I tried Coca-Cola Blak. Who invented this shit? It "fuses Coke effervescence with coffee essence," says the Coke website. But really, it tastes like Cream Soda effervescence blended with flat Root Beer essence.

Also, last night was the third week of Stephen King's adapted short story series, Nightmares & Dreamscapes. Not only is it not scary in the slightest, most of the stories just leave you saying, "what!? WTF!" And not the good kind of "what" like after you watch Donnie Darko.

The stories spend so much time on mundane things that add nothing to the plot, and then the end just comes abruptly. Imagine reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. You're reading the usual Harry at the Dursley's beginning, then he finally gets taken away to the Order's headquarters.

Then imagine that it just ends there.

You might ask yourself, "what was the point of this? Why did I just waste so much of my life?" And that is what I feel, too, after watching my third week of this nonsense.

I'll probably watch the finale next week...

And This is Your Life!

Work is going very, very well. I got some homework tonight; I need to learn how to give drug tests. Yippee!

As I was walking to the building today, I was struck by something. No, not literally.

I know that I have mentioned this many times in many different forms, but I can't help but be struck by how everything in my life right now is exactly the way that I had been hoping for for so long. Everything that was in my mind, all the things that I wanted and thought I couldn't have and might never have, are now realities.

I'm not used to things being the way I want them. I am not complaining, but I am used to only dreaming/fantasizing about things that either don't come to fruition or won't for a very long time. It's so odd... so so odd.

I still feel like I'm waiting for something. I feel like I'm holding my breath and tensing every muscle. Then on the walk to work today I stopped my usual ridiculous fast pace when I came to a corner, and it all hit me at once.

I'm not waiting for anything. I'm not in a holding pattern. This is my life!

Free Guitar Lessons for Animals

So, I've moved in with my boyfriend and started a new job. What is the next logical step? What is it that you would start wanting under these same circumstances?

Why, a pet, of course!

I have wanted a dog for a long time. My boyfriend and his family have always had a dog, and it's always been a golden retriever.

I have never had a dog. My family has always had cats; one cat, really. The cat is almost as old as I am. Eight years ago we got a second cat. She was supposed to be my cat, while the other cat was more my brother's.

Well, she's extremely sweet but not very bright at all. In this apartment complex you can't have a dog. Cats are a $500 fee due at move-in followed by $50 cat-rent each month. I love my cat, but not enough to cough up $1100. Plus, she's incredibly large... LARGE, I tell you! So maybe they would have bumped the fee to $2200.

So, no dogs and no cat. I decided to get a fish.

I had a fish my freshman year of college. His name was Disco, and he was a fantail goldfish. He lived maybe 3 months, and I was pretty sad when he died. I know that he was just a fish, but my first year was sometimes painful and it was nice to take care of something. But most fish don't do very well unless they have a filter.

My mom has had a betta fish, Phish, for almost five months. It seemed low maintenance and full of vigor. The pet store had a surprisingly great collection and everything was clean. Usually I remember fish sections as dank and disgusting. I didn't buy a normal betta; I bought a crown-tail betta. I don't know how they're different except that crown-tails have fins that look like dred locks.

You may recognize bettas from your office... people like keeping them in bowls with a giant plant sticking out the top. I recently found out that this is a bad idea.

Meet Gremlin!

At first I thought he was just the latest addition to a long line of strangely behaved pets. Bettas are also known as "fighting fish." If you put two in a bowl together, they'll tear eachother up. When I hold a mirror up to Phish's bowl, his gills puff up and he starts darting around. When I hold a mirror up to Gremlin's bowl, he just looks at it very inquisitively and follows it with his head.

But finally Gremlin has started acting like a fighting fish. I put him on the kitchen counter, and in the morning when I first turn the light on he sticks up his fins and darts around. So maybe he's a real betta after all.

It's nice to have him. We're turning into quite a motley circus in this apartment.

New Faces, New Places

drop out of law school - check
move to one location instead of three - check
finish temporary summer job - check
enter the full-time world - CHECK

Today was my first day of big kid work... the full-time job: no summer vacation, no "I don't feel like it today."

The first part of the day was hilarious. Everyone crowds on the metro not talking to one another and listening to their ipod or reading the paper.

My new workplace is nice. I have my own office, i.e. awesome. I have a nice view down to the bustling street below. It makes me want to submit it.

The people I work with are all very friendly and personable. It's a smaller office. I'll get to work on a lot of different projects and pick up a lot of information along the way. It's definitely an adjustment. I'm not used to being so tired at the end of the day. And the prospect of having no summer vacation anymore is a little daunting. We really do spend so much of our lives working; it's a little scary.

But it sure as shit beats attending law school and living the life of an attorney (at least, the life that I would have had with it... public service job, no money, assloads of loans, working 500,000 hours a day)! We've been down that road enough, don't you think?

Also, my new neighbor across the way needs to realize that it's not a good idea to pull down your pants and check yourself out in the mirror unless you close all the blinds. Leaving all your blinds open plus having all the lights on while hundreds of other people could be (and are, in my case) standing out on their balcony will only lead to embarrassment for you. Yikes.

I Have an Eye for Eyebrows

Tonight I had quite a heated discussion... about eyebrows.

George Carlin once said,

Here's how much men care about your eyebrows: do you have two of them? Okay, we're done.

We all have our little quirks and peeves. I have a "thing" about eyebrows.

When I watch a movie, the eyebrows are one of the first things I notice about a celebrity. When meeting a woman for the first time, my eyes go straight to the eyebrows. If the eyebrows irk me, they'll probably be the only thing I'm able to notice for a long time.

I've only had a pedicure once in my life. I felt awful almost the whole time. There I was, sitting high and mighty in a chair with a magazine on my lap and a remote control in my hand paying a Vietnamese woman, who only spoke a little English, to clean, buff, and polish my toenails. I just can't do it.

So going to get your eyebrows waxed might be a little less demeaning in that the person isn't kneeling at your feet, but you're still paying someone to peel a small area of hair away from around your eyebrow. I know that huge amount of women have this done; I think I was maybe one of two women in my law school class not to have it done. I just wish I understood!

Don't get me wrong, some people need a little help. Unibrows are really unacceptable in 2006, even though some celebrities love to sport beasty moustaches of eyebrows. I am not alone in thinking that Jennifer Connelly really needs to tone down the forest on her face. She has even been asked about it in interviews:

Q: You have very distinct eyebrows. Do you get asked about them all the time?
A: No, no one ever asks me about my eyebrows.

Q: Really? They're not regular movie-star eyebrows, like, say, Julia Roberts's.
A: You mean the "Oh, my God, anything can happen at any moment" look? I do have a bit of a stern brow. Sometimes my husband, Paul [Bettany], will think I'm quite cross and I'll say, "Honey, it's just my face."

I'd be scared waking up next to that mess if I was her husband, too.

Of course, the opposite effect seems just as bad to me. Why the tiny line porn star look? I understand that slimming down eyebrows can soften the look of your face, but do they need to look pointy and drawn on?

A friend of mine informed me that some people even get their eyebrows removed and then tattooed back on. I ranted and raved about this practice for a while, until he informed me that his sister actually did this. Whoops, this topic almost always gets me in trouble.

Wikipedia refers to tattoo eyebrows as Permanent Makeup:

Permanent makeup is a cosmetic technique which employs tattoos (permanent pigmentation of the dermis) as a means of producing designs that resemble makeup, such as eyelining (eye shadows and mascara) and other permanent enhancing colors to the skin of the face, lips and eyelids. It is also used to produce artificial eyebrows, particulary in people who have lost it as a consequence of old age, disease, such as alopecia, chemotherapy or a genetic disturbance, and to disguise scars and white spots in the skin such as in vitiligo. It is also used to restore or enhance the breast's areola, such as after breast surgery.

Notice that Wikipedia offers that permanent makeup works for people of old age or who undergo chemo. It doesn't say for twenty/thirty/forty/fifty-somethings with perfectly nice and normal eyebrows.

Breast implants? Dangerous and sometimes ghastly looking, but sure, most women at some point or another have probably wished for larger breasts.
Nose job? I think Michael Jackson clearly exposed the dark side of this procedure. Yet again, it may have its place.
Botox? Sure, inject your face with poison to keep it firm. I can see how celebrities who have always relied on being youthful are probably terrified of wrinkles, right?
Tattooed eyebrows? Anyone?

I don't think I've met anyone yet who shares my staunch outlook on eyebrow waxing, but hopefully at least someone thinks the tattooing is a little over the edge. Just to be on the safe side, I won't hold my breath.

Also, Internet, just so that you can't call me some kind of eyebrow denouncing hypocrite, here is one of my eyebrows to stare at you as you finish this post. And for my new anonymous friends, please imagine it piercing you with flames if you even think about posting blog spam.

And finally, I regret that the integrity of this blog (cough, cough) has been ruined by the posting of Paris Hilton's image. I apologize for any permanent damage this may have caused you.

A Fun Video for a Happy Friday

I, too, would like to dance my way around the world.

Happy Friday!

It's sad, really

Yesterday I was made victim to the fearsome practice of blog spam (some religious code type comment), and today a lot more spam followed!

And I really hate the security features against this such as comment moderation and word verification. But I suppose I hate, "you are nice... and so is your blog!" comments with unrelated links attached more.

So, disregard anonymous comments on this blog. I'm far too lazy to go through and delete them all. At least, not all at once. From now on this blog will be using word verification, because it seems to be the least obnoxious of the security measures.

What do you do when you get blog spam?

I Never Thought of it That Way...

This is from an interesting interview/article on nytimes.com: Dismissing 'sexist opinions' about women's place in science.

Q. What about the idea that women are too emotional to be hard-headed scientists?

A. It is just patently absurd to say women are more emotional than men. Men commit 25 times the murders; it’s shocking what the numbers are.

Dehumanizing Our Enemies

Last night, while working hard to kill time and slack around, I started surfing Myspace. I've talked about Myspace before, and you know, Internet, that I do not have an account. I wasn't trying to look up anyone in particular, I would just find one person and then browse their friends until I found the next person that I knew.

I wound up reading a lot of people's profiles who I haven't spoken to since high school, and even then we did not speak very often. These were people that, for one reason or another, I didn't get along with.

Many of the females I always thought were stuck up jerks, or airheads, or whatever else you want to say about "those kinds of girls." It was middle school and high school; you know how that works.

As I read about where life has taken them I was surprised. In high school I thought I was smart and they were stupid. I thought about "important things" and they thought about the mall. I respected people and they used them. But the profiles I read last night reflected nothing of the demons that I had created.

These people were doing things with their lives: they were in trying to maintain steady and loving relationships, they were working in health clinics or fighting for the United States in Iraq, they have a very sick parent who almost died and they are concerned... they have their secrets and their darker moments, too.

From one person's,

its really weird all the things that go through your head when youre in a situation like that. i just remember thinking all the time how i would never be able to go fishing with him again, how he'd never be able to hug me, or we'd never get to talk again, and a million other things that would never be able to happen again. i kept replaying in my head past memories with him that i had taken for granted.... things like this just filled my head all day long for those couple months.

It was a powerful realization for me about compassion. I have no idea (and never will) what it's like to be them.

It's so easy to dehumanize the enemy.

Killing Time, Anyone?

My boyfriend/new aptmate is out for a little while, leaving me alone in the new place for the first time yet (we only moved in Sunday, remember). Am I spending my time well and unpacking/rearranging/organizing our things in the apartment? OF COURSE NOT!

Instead of doing anything remotely useful, I have (prepare to be disgusted):

watched The Love Letter,
watched Soapdish,
googled and wikipediaed trivia, goofs, and cast member info about both movies,
ate cookies,
caught up on lots of blog surfing.

I am officially a waste of space.

How do you like to waste your time?

I'm Baaaaack

Well, I didn't want you to think that I died, Internet. Although, I almost did.

I guess I forgot how awful moving was. Lugging around heavy furniture (hooray for sectional couches with a hide-a-bed inside... doesn't get much worse than that) in the scorching heat is pretty terrible, but there were some pitfalls along the way.

Namely, never rent a truck with U-Haul. Okay, I'd never had a problem with them before this weekend, but it was a pretty big problem.

To make a painfully long story a tad shorter, I rented a 14 foot moving truck for Saturday morning in Pittsburgh. They called me Friday night to say they didn't have it, but no worry, they'd give me a 26 foot truck for the same price.

GEE THANKS! I really wanted a 26 foot truck that I CAN'T FIT where I need it to go!

After much calling, complaining, and near crying, they finally told me that they had a 17 foot truck an hour away from pittsburgh that I could pick up at 2:30 p.m. Not the size, location, or time that I wanted, but I was backed into a corner.

The next morning we called any truck rental we could find. They didn't have what we needed. We kept badgering U-Haul as well, but they said they wouldn't search for new trucks in the area unless I cancelled my reservation. Well I wasn't going to cancel the only thing I had!

Finally we had my boyfriend call and ask about a truck. They found a 17 foot truck in Pittsburgh for him, so we went with that. Although I wasn't going to cancel the other reservation until he was actually sitting in the truck!

While he was on the way to pick up the truck, U-Haul called me about my reservation (the 17 foot truck an hour away from Pittsburgh). They said they couldn't give it to me because it exploded, but they had a 26 foot truck I could have.

Thank God my boyfriend's reservation came through. It was a mess... an totally, completely, horrifically big mess!
But we're all moved in to our new place now. It's very nice, and I feel like I'm living in a fancy hotel. We're piled in boxes; we just lost the energy to keep moving and unpacking. Yesterday and this morning I woke up hoping that the unpacking fairy had visited, but she's a damned bitch and didn't come!

Sorry, I realize that was not a short explanation.

For more information on U-Haul sucking, I unearthed the following webpages:
U-Haulsucks.com
U-haul doesn't care about your reservation
U-Hell

Happy Trails

Well, Internet, the time has come to condense three places of residence into one. I'm heading out to bat country.

If all goes well (Iaugh, laugh, laugh) the internet man will come out Monday and bring me back to life.

Have a great weekend!

Q: OMG When are you getting married?! A: OMG, Piss Off!

I have a good friend who has been dating her boyfriend for quite some time. She has been waiting patiently to be proposed to, and she gets pretty pissed off when people ask her some variation of, "When are you getting married?" or "Why aren't you married yet?"

I could see how these questions would be annoying, but it wasn't until I graduated from college that I fully understood it. And things have intensified recently.

For now that I have dropped out of law school, my parents, never without an agenda of their own, have decided that since I won't be a budding attorney I should instead jump at the chance to be a wife, homemaker, and mother.

Everytime I go home, my father asks, "So when are you getting married?" My mother has started buying Martha Stewart Weddings magazines. In fact, she stuffed it into my suitcase as I was leaving home last weekend. My boyfriend now probably thinks I'm trying to "hint" at something. Thanks, mom. I'm sure that this won't be the last time; she's decided to get a subscription.

When the parents aren't hard at work, my own friends have taken to asking wedding questions.

over-excited friend (9:49:46 PM): when are you getting married?
me (9:50:28 PM): we'll see
over-excited friend (9:50:55 PM): hehehe please let me know if you do hehe
over-excited friend (9:51:02 PM): i want to know!!
me (9:51:14 PM): don't worry, i'm sure you'll know

Yes, it's hard to escape the constant onslaught of questions. I can't imagine what it's like for single woman. I'm sure the questions for them are even worse, "When are you going to find a man?" or "Why haven't you found a man yet?" I think if I had to deal with those questions, things would get a little ugly.

Isn't it great that a woman's life revolves so much around finding, securing, and tying down a man? I read someone's blog the other day where they were complaining about feminists, saying that there's no inequality between men and woman and she doesn't know what women were always whining about. She followed the statement with an anecdote about why women are stupid.

I'm not so sure. In high school I complained a lot about inequalities between men and women. It tapered off at the end of high school and during college. I'm not sure why, I guess that I just didn't feel so angry anymore. But as I get older, those angry feelings come back to me more and more. In fact, yesterday I was watching the news and I realized that you never see an older woman as an anchor(wo)man. Old anchormen are all over the place, but what do they do with the older women? When they reach a certain age do they simply get fired or forced to retire? It's nice that once we lose our looks no one wants to hear us speak anymore.

Anyway, Internet, just relax. I'm sure that when I get engaged (and don't start counting down the days) you'll be (one of) the first to know.

And Then There Were None

The Facebook invite feature is quite popular this summer. In an earlier entry, I noted an invite from my cousin to go to her "Erotic Party." Today I received an invite from a girl I went to law school with.

For those of you that do not know, I have taken a job at the nation's capital and will be relocating the twenty-second of this month. That's next Saturday for all you geniuses that can't count. Therefore, I need to go out and be intoxicated Wednesday and Thursday night of this week.

So another one bites the dust.

I have mentioned this girl before, briefly. She used to make cupcakes for the class, cry, and tell us how proud she was of us. Notice also her "for all you geniuses that can't count;" law students are such nice people that I could spew all over myself.

Her Facebook also includes little gems such as:

I would like to announce that I HATE UGLY WOMEN! especially women who have never had a boyfriend, or are dating ugly men or have to practically hump their male best friends because no one would ever touch them sober.

It surprises me a little that she's leaving. Even though she was certifiable, she sure did love law school. She made a ton of Facebook groups with different "funny" law school inside jokes. She wore t-shirts with phrases like, "You Know You're a 1L When..." So I assume it must be another "below minimum competency."

That brings the total of below GPA 1L's that I knew personally to five. It amazes me. Way to keep the legal profession an exclusive group! Way to keep demand and costs high!

I'm afraid this is yet another Facebook invite that I will have to decline. If I was loud-mouthed and sassy like this girl, maybe I would make my own Facebook group titled, "I dropped out BEFORE it was cool!"

Intolerance Comes In Many, Many Forms

It's a big world. I'm interested in issues of women's rights, the environment, animals, globalization, the space program, education, poverty, outsourcing... and the list continues. I can't take up all these causes (even if you disagree, Internet), so I guess we have to pick our battles.

Something recently caught my eye in the news. It wasn't a front page story, and probably most people won't bat an eye. The article is titled: Wiccan symbol far from getting VA's approval. A Nevada Army National Guard member recently killed in Afghanistan wanted the Wiccan symbol, his religious symbol, on his tombstone. But the symbol is not yet approved by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, so they will not allow his wife to use the symbol.

The agency has recognized other emblems including one for Atheists, Humanists, Buddhists and for many Christian denominations.

Simply not enough people know what Wicca is. They know it from depictions in Hollywood; movies like The Craft, where bored girls go to an occult store, go crazy, and start casting spells and cursing eachother while flying around.

The symbol of the Wiccan pentagram is also frequently confused with the Satanist symbol. The Satanist symbol is an inverted pentagram... Wiccans don't even believe in Satan.

You can call Wiccans spaced out, quirky, eccentric, hippies, or treehuggers, but you can't call them Satanists or dangerous. Their most basic code says that you may do what you will as long as you don't hurt anyone else. Hurting people, or even attempting to hurt people, would be completely outrageous to any Wiccan. The religion revolves around celebrating the changing seasons (winter - death, spring - rebirth) and the cycle of life.

Sure, sometimes they want to wear flowing robes or flowers in their hair; they may even dance around in a circle. And it's true, their religion doesn't revolve around Jesus; they worship the "Goddess" (Mother Nature) and the "God" (her consort). The Wiccan God and Goddess are complements to eachother, and they represent all aspects of the universe. It's different. In middle America's suburban homes we look askance at people who don't mow their lawns enough, so of course this tradition will look odd and off-putting.

I'm not saying this religion is without faults. I'm not saying we should all run out and buy cauldrons and wands and commune with nature. But is it an offense? No. Should Wiccans be barred from having their symbol of faith on their tombstone, especially this man who lost his life while representing the United States in Afghanistan? It's ludicrous to me.

If this is the first time that the Department of Veterans Affairs has had a request for a Wiccan symbol, then maybe they were hoping that they would never have to deal with it. But after this man's widow requested the symbol, anything less than immediate approval is truly unsettling. It's the year 2006, certainly it's time that this religion received some recognition instead of being treated like crazy degenerates.

Perhaps if Wiccans felt that they could be open about their religion, rather than hiding it for fear of being called a Satanist or devil-worshipper, it would seem less scary and weird to those of us who won't take the time to understand it or open a book.

For more information on Wicca, check out what Wikipedia has to say.

Monday Mash

It's going to be a busy week, so please forgive me, Internet, if I'm somewhat unreliable.

Several months of living in limbo and I'm finally about to move all my stuff and myself to a new location. Finally, after scrambling between three cities and living out of a box for longer than I'd like. I can't complain; I actually kind of enjoy being a flexible nomad. But I am ready for some permanence.

I saw the new Pirates of the Caribbean yesterday. I think it's further proof that you really can't listen to movie critics. Sure, maybe it didn't have the heart of the first movie. But it was a sequel, and you can't expect exactly the same quality out of a sequel. I enjoyed it. It's what you'd expect from a summer blockbuster.

Today on the way to my summer job I was listening to a piece on the Diane Rehm show about Myspace/Facebook/Friendster. I've heard these things before. They talk about how bad these social networks are for kids, how dangerous they can be and how sleazy the kids dress. But today I heard someone say that it harms a kid's development. I don't know that I agree with this. Kids are going to spend time on a lot of things that could be considered a waste, but I'm not sure that I see how these social networks inhibit their social development.

p.s. Diane Rehm looks nothing like I had envisioned

Minimum

This blog is probably at its best when I'm talking about law school. It makes sense; I started it to help me make the decision to leave.

This week my best friend from law school returned from a trip out of the country. It's nice to have her back. We hadn't really spoken since I left the city. But of course it brought the conversation back to law school.

My law school was really small, and I didn't have many good friends there. Of about the five people I talked to on a daily basis, I was told that three of them got below the minimum GPA and need to petition the school to be allowed back. I don't know where a school that only has a small number of students gets off kicking out a good number of them... but, sure.

I'm at my parent's house for the weekend. I have already been told that I disappointed them. My father isn't really able to look at me for prolonged periods of time. I am fallen. I am not their lawyer daughter. I am the law school drop-out daughter who came out of it with poor grades and is living in sin with her boyfriend.

Advice columns will tell you to leave that bitch-ass parent in the dust. You can live a-okay without them. People tell their parents to fuck off all the time, but how many times did Dear Abby tell her parents to suck it?

On America's Birthday, Come to DC

Usually before the fourth of July, some friend or another would call me up with grand and fancy plans. These plans would include going somewhere to see "fireworks" and getting together with "tons of other people."

Let's face it, these plans never worked. We'd drive around looking for fireworks and we wouldn't find any. And apparently the "tons of other people" did find them, because we certainly never saw them. The best fireworks I had ever seen at home were at the baseball stadium. They were impressive, but they cost a pretty penny.

There were also a few Independence Days where I was in the mountains. Both times I saw pretty decent fireworks... once because we snuck onto the property of an expensive resort, and the other time was at the local yokel high school where they set off all kinds of things right over our heads.

But I have never seen anything like I saw last night. From the balcony of the apartment where I'm staying you can see the entire city... from Catholic University to the Capital to Southeast to Bethesda, MD. It's the best view in the city in my opinion. And last night it truly looked like the apocalypse had arrived. Everyone in the city was setting off fireworks. As far as you could see, large explosions and clouds of smoke filled the sky. We could also see the official fireworks down at the Mall. Lightning occasionally struck right down the middle of where those fireworks were coming from, and at one point the smoke from those explosions eclipsed the moon. It was spectacular.

Apparently tons of people knew we had a good spot because the crowds just kept coming and filled the parking lot of the high school next to the apartment. Of course, this also involved very small children setting off very illegal fireworks. I thought for sure that either someone down there or I would die.

Next July 4, don't waste your time going down to the Mall in DC with thousands of your closest pals. Find someone who lives in the city, lives on a hill, and has a tall apartment with an amazing view. Then throw some hotdogs on the stove and break out the beers... because I promise that unless you were in World War II, you haven't seen anything like it either.

Happy Fourth

The essential principles of our Government... form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty and safety.

Thomas Jefferson

Kids, Cousins, and Beer Lead to Barf

I sure wish that I could talk freely about my job without fear of being dooced. Today I would have a mouthful of rants and raves to pass on. Let's just say, I try to teach elementary age children things... and elementary age children do their thing.

In other news, I finished the Harry Potter series (or what's out so far) last night. Life is sad without looking forward to these colorful and intriguing stories every day. If you live under a rock life me and haven't read them yet, you really have to. I scoffed at the world for getting so crazed by these books, but now the scoff is on me.

In other-other news, once upon a time I wrote an entry about Myspace. I do not believe that I mentioned Facebook. In case you don't know, Facebook is like Myspace light. You have to be registered in college at some point to join Facebook, or at least you did when I joined. Also, while on Myspace you're likely to see pictures of kids crying in dark corners, Facebook showcases fratty kids laughing with a beer in their hand.

I am registered on Facebook, and I'm proud of it. My cousin who is still in college, and who I barely have a relationship with, is also on Facebook. We are Facebook "friends." Today she sent me a Facebook invitation. Apparently the rest of her family, my aunt, uncle, and other cousin, are leaving the country for a few weeks. So my cousin, kind soul that she is, invited me to a raucous party at my aunt and uncle's house.

Name: Beer B Q
Tagline: Everyone's going to X for 2 weeks.. but me.
Type: Party - Erotic Party

Description
An intense day of drinking, grilling, and music.. most likely to be an entire weekend event.

While perhaps this invitation would entice me if from a friend, something like this from my cousin simply makes me shift uncomfortably in my chair. I don't like to think about my cousin having erotic parties or engaging in underage drinking, especially alone and unsupervised at my aunt and uncle's house. Perhaps this is another sign that I'm getting too old, but I think I always would have reacted this way.

From things I saw in college, underage drinking generally leads to someone falling down a flight of stairs, 911 being dialed, and young kiddies trying to climb out windows to hide in trash cans. Other incidents include someone drinking at my apartment and telling me, "I can handle it! I drink like this all the time!" after they finished a 40 oz. of Hurricane Malt Liquor in under 60 seconds. And yes, I did find them unconcious in a driveway later that evening.

Thus, even underage supervised drinking generally leads to some stupidity. Anyone who says, "I can handle it," clearly can not. I love the occasional drink, but I guess I've been blessed by always knowing my limits well in advance of any shenanigans. And drinking has always been more fun for me if others in the vicinity are just dancing with vigor or talking and squeaking animatedly and not barfing in my hair or climbing out windows.