Tag Archives: 365 Project

The Curses of Womanhood

17 Jun

I can’t stand body maintenance.

I am so tired of tweezing and plucking and pulling and washing and shaving and destinking and blotting and covering and moisturizing.

It’s even worse in the summer.  I’m the kind of person who works up a sweat just getting a glass of water, so heat and humidity are very taxing on me.  The last thing I feel like doing on top of all the other routine maintenance is adding an extra shower and deodorizing session just so that I can walk among other members of society.

It frightens me how much I’m beginning to empathize with hippies.

Scream

I feel ya, kid. Womanhood blows. Pic by 'jasonbolonski'. Click image to check out his Flickr PhotoStream

Men – when you look at a woman, no matter how attractive, it’s likely that she’s failing miserably at at least one of the above tasks.  There just isn’t enough time in the day to constantly monitor every one of them. Think about it.

Once we’ve traded hair for grumpiness and discomfort, we have to moisturize.  Because we don’t want to get flappy or saggy or ashy or wrinkly.  So we moisturize.  We do it at our desks, we do it after the shower, and we do it at night.  Serious followers will even wear booties and mittens to bed with lotion all inside them.  Because magazines and TV and adultery make us absolutely crazy and we sometimes feel like if we don’t wear lotion mittens to bed, no one will love us.

Lord, I would have appreciated being a boy.

The next step is a good high maintenance routine.  Hair, face, fingernails, toenails.  All of it has to be shellacked with something or other or we will wander the streets as pig beasts, frightening all those around us and causing us to remain indoors until we have enough layers of Spackle on our faces to negate whichever few natural beauties we had when we began.  

We have to sleep enough.  We can’t cry before bed or our eyes will be puffy and we’ll wake up looking like Senator Palpatine.  We have to drink lots of water.  We can’t eat things we enjoy without regret and constant talk of self-hate.  

And the real kicker is that all of it wears off.  All of it.  Moisturizer, makeup, hair removal – everything must be repeated. Over and over and over again until we die.  Women are crazy, yes.  They’re out of our minds.  Absolutely.  These are all the things we have to do simply because we were born women.  Personally, I can’t take it anymore.  I might throw in the towel.  

Call the hippies. Tell them I’m coming. ♣

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The Quarter Century March

16 Jun

I have begun the slow march to my quarter-century celebration.  

In less than one month, I will officially be in my mid-20’s.  Like, right on the dot.  Bam – mid 20’s.   At 24, one can argue early 20’s.  They’re pushing it, but they can at least try.  At 25, one has no excuses.  I will be smack dab in the middle of 20 and 30.  

I should probably do something amazing to finish out this first quarter.  Even if I live to be one hundred years old, there’s no escaping the fact that I’m finishing up the first leg.  If this were a marathon, I’d have to hand over the baton to the next runner.  

I don’t have any big plans.  Thanks to this Lollipop Tuesday madness, I’ve accomplished quite a few things that I would never have done before.  I can’t tell you how many years I’ve wanted to go ice skating but have been to afraid to try.   

At least I can check that one off.

National Gallery of Australia 25th birthday cake

Photo by "The Shopping Sherpa". Click the image to go to their Flickr PhotoStream

I ordered a drink the other night and one of my freshly graduated friends celebrated the fact that I carded.  He was elated.  He thought I would be too until he realized that celebrating my getting carded for me is kind of an insult.  I had to explain to him that since I wasn’t exactly 60 years old, getting carded was still kind of something I expected.  You know, being within 3 years of the legal drinking age and all.

When I greeted a visitor at work the other day, I was forced to make small talk until my boss was ready to take the meeting.  Part of the small talk was the visitor asking me if I had kids.    

What? Do I have kids?  I don’t even know what to say to that.  I had Frosted Flakes for dinner last night.  No.  I don’t have kids.  

So since society is going to go ahead and move me along in age and expectation, I should probably do some big, awesome act of rebellion.  Or celebration.  Or something. I should accomplish something huge, or go do something fantastical.  I’d go backpacking in Europe but I’m not likely to muster up that kind of dough without overnight blog fame or a hefty donation from a relative I have yet to meet.   And I’d imagine my boss would need just a bit more heads-up on that one.  

Maybe I could whip up a book real quick.  Or hurry up and start my own small business with zero money.  Or begin construction on my puppy amusement park.  Maybe I could do a bunch of craft projects I’ve always wanted to try or maybe I could just withdraw all my money from my savings, kill a man, and drive to Mexico.

Maybe not that last bit.

But you get the idea.  So here we go – I’m up for suggestions.  What should I hurry up real quick and do to finish out my first quarter of life like a real champ?  We should probably steer clear of things that are illegal or costly.  Pretty much anything else is up for grabs.   Hey, maybe that will be my fantastical act.

“When I turned 25, I put my fate in the hands of strangers”.  ♣

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The Homecoming

15 Jun

The world returned my cat to me at approximately 8:05 yesterday morning.

I was getting ready for work and could have sworn I heard a mewing coming from somewhere.   I stopped everything and listened as closely as possible – as if the slightest movement could spook the sound I could have been imagining.

I thought about the blog.  I thought about you all telling me to search the walls, search the ceiling, the trash can, the inside of the couch – everything.  My mind was absolutely overwhelmed with possibilities.

Luckily, Dave was much more clear-minded and opened a window to look outside.  There, he found our little Hobbes, sitting below the window all wide-eyed and mewing at the top of his lungs for someone to pull him out of the big, bad, outside world.

When he excitedly called Hobbes’ name, it was my cue.  I immediately threw on whatever the closest body coverings were (which happened to be a native american patterned shirt and a leopard print blue mini skirt – no joke) and sprinted out the front door with wild abandon.

Unfortunately, there is a bus stop directly outside my apartment.   There’s nothing like a braless, native-american-themed hoochie mama sprinting out her front door to really spice up the cubicle conversations for the day. 

I consider it a service to them.   

I found my little Hobbesinator right below David’s bedroom window, where he crouched into a little ball of feline frustration and continued to mew his heart out all the way back inside.  And up the stairs.  And into the apartment.  And in the middle of the living room.

Oh right – food.

I was so gosh golly excited to see the little furball (and in one piece!) that I seemed to overlook the fact that he might be, oh I don’t know – hungry?  

He crunched and crunched and slept and slept all day.   He’s even endured my poking, prodding and flea-hunting.  What a champ.

And so the great kitten mystery is over.  I spent my entire day smiling and celebrating his homecoming and thinking of how many concerned readers tuned in, left encouragement, and offered to send thoughts and prayers.  And while I can’t prove whether all ya’ll’s concerns and prayers were the reason he returned, I’m pretty darn sure they were.  

Thank you.  ♣

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Stop Acting So Stupid

14 Jun

Photo by Tom Raftery with ever-so-slight alterations by yours truly. Click the image to check out his Flickr PhotoStream.

I’m writing this blog from the comfort of my own apartment.

Bam.  Just like that.   Because just a mere 30 minutes ago, I set up my own Internet.

Happy Lollipop Tuesday, folks.

Hey, I admit that when I saw the options on Verizon’s web page to either self-install or to hire a technician, I was tempted to hire the technician.  After all, when it’s $100, it must be difficult, right?

To assume so is to assume that all expensive hookers are worth it.  Or that all expensive clothes won’t look like junk after one wash.  Or that pets from breeders are better than pets that aren’t.

Cost does not imply worth.

This is what I’ve learned.  You know, I think I’m starting to blow the top off this whole thing.  Seriously.  Every single day I am more and more aware of the incompetence of those around me.  I know very, very few people that I would employ if I owned a company and yet most of them have jobs.

I’ve regaled you time and time again with accounts of stupidity in the workplace.  I am utterly baffled as to how these people get through the system.  And yet there they are – swimming along with you and I in the intellectual pond of life.  What’s more shocking is that you might be giving some of those people your hard-earned money to do something you automatically assume you can’t do yourself.

I admit – if the price tag on having a service technician were something like $19.95, I would have assumed it was much easier and done it myself without worry.  It’s that 3-figure thing that made me think it might be a bit beyond me.   And it’s because everything in this world is so specialized.  We live in a time where you need to have a four-year degree in anything to be considered for it.    After all, why would I hire you to recruit people when I could hire Joe Shmoe who has a 4-year degree in Human Resources? 

Even though you both might be equal performers after one year of experience.

That’s right – my one-time experience installing my own Internet has opened my eyes.  I’m on to the universe and I’m not letting go of my unyielding common sense grip on it.  I literally got everything out of a box, plugged a couple cords in, and followed a step-by-step prompt on the computer.   It wasn’t even full of difficult things with funny names and strange acronyms.  It was just a bunch of reading (or ignoring) and clicking “next” and “I agree”. 

I could be one hundred hard-earned American dollars poorer right now if I hadn’t just had the guts to think I could do it myself.

I ordered a book case for the office and organized a team work day to put it together last week.  Do you have any idea how many people sat around staring at the box and talking about how none of us was qualified to do it?  There was all this doubt, which bred more doubt, which ended up in a group of folks coming to me and saying they couldn’t start until I was in the room.

I put one yes-man in the room with them to see what would happen and when I came to check on them, it was halfway done.  He had absolutely no experience.

So I’m done with this “I can’t” nonsense.  Sure, there are lots of things you can’t do.  There are lots of things you probably really suck at.  But there are lots of things you assume you can’t do that you actually can.  Or even worse – before you even try, you admit defeat and pay someone else do to it for you.

It’s all a big secret and I’m unraveling it.  The world is full of overqualified, insecure naysayers and if you break free and have a can-do attitude, you’ll save stress, money, and get a big fat dose of confidence.

I’m not kidding around.  Stop wasting your time and feeling like junk about yourself.  Go apply for a job you are almost qualified for.  Go sign up for something that you’ve always been embarrassed to try.  Read a manual and attempt something you’ve been putting off because you don’t have the money to pay someone else to do it.  Cook something ridiculous.  Pick up an instrument.  Go explore that spot in the gym you’ve never gone near.  Stop acting so stupid.

Wow.   Tuesdays are changing me.

And I’m only halfway through the year. ♣

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Oh My Darlin’ Clementine…

13 Jun

Day two on the homefront; my cat population is still cut in half.

Lola is loving it.  Absolutely soaking it up.  She’s rolling around, stark white belly fur to the ceiling and cares to the wind.  I keep trying to get the information out of her but she just stares at me.

I think she knows.

I’ve been thinking: maybe the whole rapture thing was kind of well-calculated.  Maybe it really did happen but a few weeks too late and it only applied to cats.   Maybe I’ve experienced some sort of cat rapture.  

Lola must be filled to the brim with sin.

It’s been suggested by one of your fellow readers that the drug lords have taken Hobbes.  Perhaps as ransom for my silence.  I’ve been waiting around for them to call me and make their demands, but they haven’t.  Maybe they’re trying to make me sweat it out a little longer.

I went the traditional route, too, you know.  I’ve been around the inside and outside of the apartment several times.  Too many times, probably, for someone who likes to think of themselves as sane.  Too many times for someone who is a licensed driver, anyway.   I remembered this one time when I was little that we lost my cat for like, a week.  An entire week she just wasn’t around.  Then one day my brother opened his sock drawer and there she was.  Scared the living bejeezus out of him.    It raised a lot of questions.  Like didn’t she ever get hungry.  Or was she only in there part of the time.  And why didn’t my brother need clean socks more often than once a week.

But I checked the dresser.  I pulled out all the drawers.  I’ve checked every tiny little place that he might be able to fit his tiny little head and there’s no Hobbers.  No Hobbesy.  No Hobbesinator.

So here I am, making light of it.  Not because I’m heartless, but actually because I’m incredibly distraught over the whole thing and I can’t seem to muster up a topic that doesn’t have to do with my missing cat.

Plus, it’s really just ripe for comedy.  I mean, I almost started off this post making a joke about how I’m only at half cat-pacity.  Ah ha! HA!   Heh.  *ahem*  But I didn’t.

At least I still have some wits about me. ♣

 

 

photo by "foxtongue" Click image to check out their Flickr PhotoStream.

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Amber Alert

12 Jun

photo by "foxtongue" Click image to check out their Flickr PhotoStream.

I seem to have misplaced my cat.

It was at dinner time last evening that I realized I had completely neglected to feed my cats breakfast.  For some reason it completely evaded me and I wasn’t given a reminder by the always-hungry Lola.   So after expecting both cats to come racing for their first meal of the day and then place a call to the Humane Society against me, I was surprised to find that Hobbes was missing in action.

He’s a pretty lazy cat, so I assumed he had moved to a nice cool space to sleep the day away.  That, or he was boycotting me and my affection since I have the ability to entirely forget to feed him.   But I couldn’t find him anywhere.  No nook, no cranny, no crevice.   He is nowhere to be found.  

I am truly boggled by this.  I have the door to my apartment shielding access to the labyrinth-like hall and then there’s another door that blocks the way to the big, bad, outside world.   In order to be completely missing, he would have had to get out the door without me noticing (which is difficult since I’m always right at the door when it’s open) and then somehow wander the halls without being noticed until he could slip out the main door as well.

There are a few options that could be at play here.  First, perhaps he’s still in the apartment.  I’ve checked every single negative space three times over.  Drawers, high surfaces, beneath furniture, inside totes, in the pots and pans cabinets – everywhere.    I don’t think this is likely unless he was suddenly incredibly sick and did that crawl-int0-a-tiny-crevice-to-die thing.  Which would be tragic.

Second – perhaps he was stolen.  Snatched in the night.  Maybe he sneaked out my apartment door and some neighbor who had always wanted a cat but not had the opportunity to get one saw it as a sign that he was meant for them.  Perhaps Hobbes is nestled sweetly on someone else’s bed eating someone else’s cat food, while the neighbor neglects to call the number listed on his collar.

Or third – he could have actually made it outside.  This is the least preferable.  Though he is a lover of the outdoors, he is such only by observation.  When we have taken him outside in celebration of his wildcat roots, he promptly lies down in the sun and is inactive.   The sun has a sort of koala-meets-eucalyptus effect on him where he is rendered passive and incapable of action.  But I have checked all immediate areas outside my complex and found cats of all shapes and sizes – none of which were him.

So I am minus one cat and truly baffled as to how it happened.   I’m trying not to be too sad about it right away – I put up a poster in our apartment so that if the second option was correct, someone might have a change of heart and return him.  If I don’t hear anything in a few days I will be so very heartbroken for his poor, incapable, furry self.  I would take solace in the fact that it’s springtime and he could be out getting frisky with the sexy neighborhood felines, but alas he is a eunuch.    So here’s hoping he returns.

And that this isn’t indicative of a problem I’ll have keeping track of my offspring someday. ♣

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I Am the Geek Squad

11 Jun

I’m breaking free of my Internetless chains.

For about a month now, I’ve been without access to the magical Interwebz within the comfort of my own home.  It’s been a lovely obstacle to my post a day adventure.

But I’ve had enough now.

This whole thing started because I got in a fight with Comcast customer service and decided I didn’t need their stinking Internet service.  Something about my rates constantly being hiked without warning, get routed to the wrong service center every time I called, and waiting 30 minutes to talk to a human just really turned me off to the world-at-my-fingertips thing.

Not that it was the Internet’s fault.

And there’s been something quite lovely about having to get out of my house every evening to go write a post, but it really sucks on weekends when all I want to do is sleep in, walk around in pajamas, and eat chocolate.   And since I’m thinking of showing up at the cafe with a bag of chocolate chips and PJs, I think it’s time I give in and get another service provider.   And I’m also really tired of not being able to look things up when I want to know them.   I never realized how many times I Google something in a day until I was suddenly unable to do so.   There are lots of random things I like to look up every day.  Like store hours, phone numbers, how long an entire frozen chicken takes to thaw, whether the mushrooms in the fridge are bad or just look bad, what movies are playing…  I need to know things.  A lot of things.  So yesterday I asked the folks at Verizon to send me some Interwebz.

…But I didn’t want to pay the service fee for installation so they’re sending me a kit.

That’s right – a kit.  In approximately 4 days, I will be buried in a list of instructions, cords, and hopelessness.  I will tell myself the same thing I tell myself when I need to construct furniture or do my taxes: millions of people have accomplished this all over the world.  And at least one of those people has been dumber than me.  And they succeeded.  Logic dictates that I can also succeed.

I don’t really have any data from which I formed this hypothesis.  Even if I could get the stats for how many people attempt those things per year and calculate approximately how many of them have less education or common sense than me, there’s absolutely no way to know how many of those people pieced together furniture that didn’t topple over the next day or do taxes that didn’t get audited.

I could make some really good fake pie graphs to make myself feel better though.

How hard can self installation be? I mean – they offer it as an option.  One would think that there are several people who look at the $100+ fee and look at the self-installation (free) option and think “eh… I’ll do it.”

I have a lot of faith that I can pull this together on my own.  Unfortunately, there will be no way for me to Google for common problems or search for advice while I’m undergoing the process.   And if it takes too long, the cafe will close and I’ll have no way to post for that day.  Note to self: go to cafe, write post, then attempt self-installation.

Giddy up. ♣

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Establishing My Alter Ego

10 Jun

I don’t trust brunettes.

I don’t mean any old brunettes.  I mean cute faced, nice-bodied brunettes.  The ones that can swipe on a little blush, run their fingers through their hair, and make men melt.

I used to think it was redheads I had to worry about.  I spent all my time wanting to be one.  I’m a pathetic shade of strawberry blonde and have always wished it were more strawberry than blonde.  So I’d occasionally turn to the bottle, only to have it fade or grow out and be stuck with my same, bland self.

But you know what? A knockout redhead is hard to find.  An all-natural redheaded sex vixen is a difficult thing to pull out of a general pool of genes that typically includes pasty skin, invisible eyebrows, and enough freckles to draw your own skin constellations.

Don’t get me wrong – if you find yourself a redheaded sex pot, she’s dangerous as hell. 

Sweet smile from a pretty girl

Photo by "tibcris" Click to check out his Flickr PhotoStream

I can’t help but wonder what it might be like to be a pocket-sized dark haired yowza.  I feel like I could rule the world.  I mean, I know the difference in how I’m treated when I put on makeup and when I don’t.  Imagine if I actually had something to work with before I put on the makeup.  I could rule entire nations.

I’m pretty sure that’s what Beyonce’s trying to get at.

Maybe I should turn to the bottle and try a dose of brunette.  I mean, nothing can be done for the pasty skin but perhaps the fact that I have bright blue eyes will help counterbalance my obvious disdain toward tanning.  Yeah – maybe I’ll do the cute brunette long bob thing.  You know – that thing where they walk around with their bouncy, short, brown hair and giggle and look like their entire lives are effortless and gorgeous?  I’ll get some kind of cutesy summer dress and work myself up an alter ego.  You know – try her out for a while.

Maybe I’ll name her Myra.

Then again, if I thought growing out slight shades of red was difficult, I’m sure trying to work through the blonde-roots-brown-ends thing will really pose a challenge.   Especially when paired with a too-long-bob. 

This has some serious backfire potential. ♣

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The Joy of Parenting (My Parents)

9 Jun
Nuclear parents

These are not my parents. But this is what you might expect of them. Photo by David Chartier. Click the image to check out his Flickr PhotoStream.

I think my favorite part of growing up so far  is watching my parents grow up.

You know, watching them morph from parents into people.  Real people.  People who occasionally cuss, share with me their ridiculous dreams and hopes, and frivolously spend on silly things, not just food and clothes and education for their kids.   It’s a grand old time.

I was the last of three kids and so I was the last to work through the trenches of their tyrannical parenting.  And when I passed the finish line, they let loose.

I knew I’d get to reverse roles with them someday, but I didn’t know it’d happen like this.  I thought I’d be changing diapers and trying to stop my dad from eating nothing but Pepsi and chips and driving his nurse to suicide.  And I’m sure that someday I’ll live out that dream. But I’m kind of surprised that there’s a sort of pre-old people stage, where I have  to tell my mom to put on some clothes and tell my dad to stop staying up all night and playing video games.  I didn’t see that comin’.

One of my favorite recollections of their middle-aged hilarity is when I asked my mom if she had a pair of shoes I could borrow and all she could offer that matched my dress were her … um…her…*cough*-me pumps.

I immediately declined.  She thought it was hysterical.

But there really is something pretty awesome about the transition of my parents from folks to friends.  I find my mother absolutely hilarious and often ridiculous.  All the time, I’m seeing more and more clearly that I’m basically her, but with a big fat dose of crazy on top.  And I find my father incredibly charming.  He’s such a kooky little hermit of a man and the ways he goes about things never cease to amuse me.  I remember one night when I was growing up, he had decided for some reason or another that a tree branch in our backyard needed to be removed.  He promptly went to the kitchen, grabbed my mother’s biggest, best steak knife, and hacked the branch to little tiny bits until 4 in the morning. It’s memories like this that I look back and treasure, realizing that they were really this crazy all along and I was just blinded by my youth.

When I think about how I pieces of both these people in my genetic makeup, I’m genuinely frightened.  And honored.

Sometimes when I go home to visit and I’m out with them for an evening, I listen in on their front-seats-of-the-car conversations and am genuinely amused that they raised me.  It’s a wonder I have any wits about me at all.

Then again, I’m still a relatively young lass.  I’ve got all sorts of years over which to pace my steady decline. ♣

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My Slow Transition Into Old Fartedness

8 Jun
Old Lady (cropped)

Pic by "Greencolander" Click it to check out their Flickr PhotoStream.

Last night I set up a Twitter account.

You can check it out in all its glory on the right hand side of the page.  There should be some sort of “Tweet Tweet” nonsense I wrote and then some tweets posted and then a little place to follow me.

It took me an hour and a half.

An hour and a half.  No joke.  I’m in my 20’s.  There’s absolutely no excuse for that.

I remember back in elementary school when I got to go to the computer lab and play Oregon Trail.  That was some awesome stuff.  It was cutting edge – right at the tip of the tech-savvy iceburg.  Along with perforated printer paper, making celebration banners, and going to chat rooms.

That was back before they were all dirty.

I remember learning all the different territories in Canada and meeting someone from Canada in a chat room and being SO STOKED that I could tell them I knew all about their country.  I had an early hotmail account and then one of the early gmail accounts when hotmail wasn’t cool anymore.  MySpace, Blogger, blah blah blah. I remember when my college finally got Facebook (back when my parents couldn’t join) and explaining it to other people on campus so that they’d get on and see how awesome it was.   If it was on the magical Interwebz and it was trendy, I mastered it.

But then Twitter showed up.

I didn’t really get Twitter.  It’s really just a bastardized version of the Facebook news feed and I didn’t see the appeal.  I logged on back when it was blowing up the world and I remember creating my account and immediately dismissing it.  What was the point of just reading 140 characters or less about all of these people when I could just go to Facebook and do the same thing but also have access to pics, links, notes, info, and social groups?

But alas, my blog is growing (hallelujah, amen for people who like to read dribble) and apparently I need to Twitterize myself to be more accessible.  So last night I moseyed on over to greet it again.  I sheepishly apologized for dismissing it the first time around and pretended to not still carry disdain as I set myself up with a few modest accounts to follow, a pic, a bio, and my first Tweet.

It took me a hell of a long time.

What if this is just the beginning? What if I start to lose touch with all the new, trendy, young kid things? I don’t mean Bieber and Gaga, I mean actual catalysts for change in society.  I can’t tell you how many articles I had to read in order to understand what a meme is.  Now I know and I feel like an idiot.  I had to read articles to understand what a meme is?!  And when I first decided to fire up a WordPress blog, I can’t even tell you how much I had to read and click and search to put together something half decent.  I’m still pretty annoyed that I’m using a cookie cutter theme, but I’m just too old and dumb to figure out a snazzier alternative right now.  Could this be the beginning of me closing myself off to new experiences in technology and rattling off about the good old days when music wasn’t invisible and we actually had to buy cassettes?  

Yes, I am aware that readers of this blog can go back further than that.  Kudos to you, my friends, for being able to remember albums and managing to follow a blog.

I can only hope I’m as successful as you. ♣

Hey, while we’re on the subject of old farts, check out my favorite well-spoken old fart blogger at http://crabbyoldfart.wordpress.com. You won’t regret it.

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