Tag Archives: Humor

Happy Primary Election Day, PA! (A Canvassing Tale)

24 Apr

Photo Credit: Beezwaxxx on Flickr

Hey, I’m posting on a Tuesday.  What could that possibly mean?

It means it’s Lollipop Tuesday y’all.  Strap in, cuz this one’s uncomfortable.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, jump on the bandwagon by clicking here.  Or just be lazy and keep reading.  You’re bright; you’ll catch on.

I must admit I’ve been rather lax about my Lollipop adventures as of late.  Last I checked in, I entered the macaroni and cheese contest (and surprisingly, took first prize).  But that was quite some time ago and without the challenge to do something new and uncomfortable, I’ve been getting settled in my old, hermity ways.   That’s probably why the idea to go Canvassing scared the bejeezus out of me.

You want to know what Canvassing is.  Basically, you go knock on people’s doors and ask them a few questions keyed toward the campaign you’re representing.  You can also call, but I went balls to the wall on this one.   I went representing the Obama campaign and the Obama folks wanted an answer to four questions: are you going to vote in the primary, who will you vote for, do you have a valid ID, and are you interested in volunteering.

To understand the sheer terror coursing through my veins at the thought of such a task, you have to understand that I don’t even answer my own front door.  When I order food, I ask Dave to answer the door and pay.  When the the adorable 3-year-old boy upstairs comes to knock on my door to ask Dave to come out to play, I don’t answer it.  True story: I saw my landlord pay the complex a visit last week and since Dave wasn’t home, I ran to my bedroom and turned the music all the way down on my laptop.

Needless to say, it was going to take some serious willpower to work up the Jackie Mojo to knock on the front doors of 60 strangers’ houses and try to hold a conversation with them.  I had no idea what to expect or what I was doing.

I showed up at the location at 11:00am and was greeted by some Obama enthusiasts (let’s call them Obamathusiasts). I signed in and was given a packet with a map of the neighborhood that pinpointed houses of registered Democratic voters.  It also contained a script and a list of everyone’s name, age, gender, and address at those houses. Creepy.

Before I knew it, I was seated and talking to a Obamathusiast veteran who was role-playing a front door scenario with me.  I was pretending she was Cara Brentley, Female, 48 years old.  I got the main points of the script and improvised my way through a pleasant conversation in which I answered the questions required of me and everything was glittering with unicorn sparkles throughout.

It’s times like these that Acting degree really pays off.

But I knew it wouldn’t be all unicorn sparkles out in the field.  People are mean.  And they don’t want to be bothered.  And they certainly don’t want to talk about politics.  Did I mention this was on a day the Penguins had a crucial playoff game? I was going to get stabbed by some anti-patriot hockey mom hermit and never going to be seen again.

When you’re afraid of the outside world, every encounter with humanity has potential to end in your death.

The Obamathusiasts broke us up into teams (one for the even side of the street, one for the odd), generously loaded us up with granola bars and water bottles, and drove us to our starting locations.  They were very generous with the food.  So generous, in fact, that I started to wonder if I could get stranded and die out there.  My volunteer shift was only four hours.  Why did I need so much food?  I chalked it up to the likelihood that someone would kidnap me and torture me with hunger in their basement and headed out into the Great Blue Yonder.

Only about one third of the houses actually have someone answer the door.  One was a 92-year-old lady who told me she wouldn’t vote because she’s too old to get out of the house.  I reminded her to get an absentee ballot for November, but she was mostly just concerned with me being sure to close her gate when I left.  I didn’t blame her: leaving it open would eat up at least an hour of her day.  

Surprisingly, for every person who wanted to kick me off their porch to get back the Penguins game or wanted me out of their face because they’re tired of what a joke the political race has been so far this year, there were people who were truly grateful people were volunteering their time to make sure people go vote.

I was about to leave house number 1494 and leave a peel-off sticker to show I’d visited when a woman shouted from her balcony that she was indeed home. I told her I was there with the Get Out the Vote Campaign and that I just wanted to make sure she had all the information she needed to vote in Tuesday’s primary.  She said she planned to vote, we discussed what to do about her concerns with updating her address, and I reminded her that in November she’ll need a valid ID to vote so she’d better bring it along Tuesday to work out the kinks.  She thanked me wholeheartedly and told me I was doing a good thing by giving information to people. I thanked her,  reminded of her polling place and the hours it was open and went on my merry way.

Glittering with unicorn sparkles.

We headed back to the staging area, and I tallied up  my total number of houses versus conversations held and added my sheet to the stack to be reported to the head office at 4pm.  While I sat around wondering if I was done for the day, the Obamathusiasts closed in, trying to get to know me and pushing for me to come out and volunteer again. I stressed that this was a one-time thing and that I just wanted to know what it was like.  But after politely declining several times, I decided it was best to just come clean.  I fessed up to having a blog where I try new and uncomfortable things and that I ventured out that day because the idea of it sounded like death.  I emphasized that this was something like my 60th new thing and if I joined every team I happened upon, I wouldn’t have been able to come Canvassing because it would have conflicted with Scottish Country Dancing up on Mount Washington.

They were surprisingly supportive and lovely.  They asked all about my blog, and told me how to get involved by signing up online in case I ever felt like revisiting this adventure.   And then they all stuck around to pull another shift.

The thing is, they don’t have a whole lot of volunteers.  It’s hard to get people to go outside their comfort zone.  It’s especially hard to get them to give up four hours of their time on a Sunday when they could be home watching the Penguins game.   And though I may not repeat Canvassing, I’ll probably repeat getting involved in a campaign.  There’s something really cool about seeing where polling results come from and there’s something uplifting and encouraging about digging in to the political process and doing work on the ground that gets reported in the media.

When I got on Facebook later, the Obama Campaign’s Facebook page uploaded pictures of volunteers all over the country who knocked on doors to remind people to vote in the Primaries Tuesday.  I also got an email from the Obamathusiasts, thanking all of us for our time and individually noting everyone by name.  My shout out?  To have a Happy Lollipop Tuesday.  They even included a link to my site so everyone could tune in to see what I thought of the day.

Free advertising, a group of nice, enthusiastic folk to try something new with, and I didn’t get murdered?

That sounds like a win. ♣

Hey! If you’d like to volunteer, you can go to barackobama.com.  Mouse over “Volunteer” to see a list of options.  Just sign up online for an event that you choose, and everything works like clockwork from there.  Turns out these grassroots deals run a pretty tight ship.  And to be fair, if you’d like to speak on behalf of another campaign, head to mittromney.com and mouse over “Get Involved” or ronpaul2012.com and  click on “Volunteer”.  Hey: vote for whomever you like.  Just vote. 

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There Is Definitely Such a Thing As a Stupid Question

18 Apr

You can find Bart and his mockery at giyf.com

If I could have a time machine to go back and stop any event in the world, it would be to back up and slap the face off of whoever said “There’s no such thing as a stupid question” before they have a chance to articulate it into the universe.

I know, I know: if I had a time machine, I should go back and do something far more grandiose and far-reaching, like prevent huge acts of genocide or help avert the deaths of major icons and leaders of thought.  But let’s be honest – if a time machine is made available to mankind, the first things everyone will go back and take care of are the major atrocities of our existence.

At least I hope so.  I’d really like to think they’re being taken care of while I tend this whole ‘no stupid questions’ fellow, who must be abolished because he is a downright filthy rotten liar and he’s ruined my life.

There are indeed stupid questions.  I get asked at least three every single day.  I think it’s because the whole ‘ask any question’ culture has gone a long way to eliminate shame in the asking.

I’m a fan of shame.  I think it’s good for society.  Let’s bring back the shame.  So here, for the reference of humankind, I offer you a sampling of totally idiotic questions, many of which I face on a daily basis.  Share.  Tell your friends.  Email it to a moronic office mate.  “Accidentally” send it to your boss.  Let’s start a shame revolution.  It will make us better people.  I promise.

Examples of Stupid Questions

  • Asking a place of business a question that was answered in the greeting.  Example: “Hello, thank you for calling Happy Llama Mart, this is Jackie; How can I help you?”   Stupid questions would include “Who is this?”  “Who did I call?” “What’s the name of this business?”
  • How to do anything on a computer that you haven’t first Googled.  I’m serious about this one.  So serious.  I can’t tell you how many times I’m interrupted at work just because I’m in my 20’s and everyone assumes I can fix any computer-related issues.  Google it.  Somewhere out there in the magical interwebz, someone else couldn’t figure out how to get their tabs to align or how to change their margins or get rid of that pesky blank page that haunts them on Word.   I don’t interrupt your generation’s workdays to ask them the lyrics of popular 70’s songs; don’t interrupt mine to fix computer problems. (My favorite place to send offenders:  http://lmgtfy.com)
  • Asking if you can ask a question. If you don’t see the problem here, keep trying.
  • Asking for the time.  There are few – very, few instances where this is not a stupid question.  If, for example, you left your phone at home and you’re trying to catch a bus and are without any time telling devices.  If you’re a nomad and you’re still honing your skills at telling the time of day by the position of the sun in the sky.  If you’re scurrying around on New Year’s Eve and trying to make sure you get the wine poured before the ball drops.  For all other unsimilar instances, please make an attempt to reference any of the hundred devices surrounding us at all moments of the day that tell us the time, including your own phone.

Now, in what may seem a contradiction of my rage, I would like to note that I still think it’s a worthy investment of our time as human beings to discuss legitimate questions before referencing our smart phones for the most commonly accepted answer.  Sure, I know the burning in your cerebrum is killer when you can’t remember the name of whats-her-face who was in the movie with the guy with the nose. But remember how good it feels to sort through those dusty old files in your brain and come up with the answer?   I’m pretty certain that studies two decades from now will show we’re less intelligent beings for having defaulted to the device in our pockets in favor of our memories. 

So enough of my annoyances: what are yours?  Tell me all about the questions that set you off.  Get grumpy in that comment section; let’s start the shame revolution.   We’re bringing back the belief in stupid questions. 

After all, I don’t think anyone’s making swift progress on those time machine blueprints. ♣

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Once Upon a Time: A Break Up Letter

11 Apr

Once Upon a Time on ABC: a big, teasing spiral of disappointment

Okay, Once Upon a Time.  It’s time to have a sit-down.  Because you have a really good thing here and you’re ruining it.  Actually, you don’t have “a really good thing here”.  I made that up to be nice.  What you really have is a promising premise, a handful of decent actors and an audience that desperately wants to support you.  So I guess what you have is potential.  But we’re something like 20 episodes in to Season One and you aren’t showing any signs of comprehension regarding the laws of addictive series-writing.

Now, I don’t have any experience writing episodes for television.  But what I do have is an overly critical mind, an adoration for excellent screenwriting (Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos), and  a blog.  This trifecta has been leading up to a candid and public assessment of your suckiness.  It’s time to break it down.

I really believed in you.  I thought an adult exploration of my favorite fairy tale characters being trapped in a small town and slowly

Look at Robert Carslyle bein' all like "me? the best actor on the show? why thank you."

being led to realize their true identities was a great premise.  I like complicated timelines and the potential for people’s true colors from their storybook past to show through in their boring lives in suburbia.  I like watching romances that are destined to be find a way to eek out in the midst of adversity and I really, really like Robert Carlyle as Rumpelstiltskin/Mr. Gold.   And you even have Giancarlo Esposito! The man rocked his role in Breaking Bad and then he came to share his awesomeness with you.   If you had a modicum of understanding for the concept of progressing a storyline, you could throw the entire thing on their backs and they could carry it away with ease, even while surrounded by the face-bashing awful performances of almost everyone else.  But you don’t.  

Listen: you have to stop introducing new character backgrounds.  Just for a few minutes let us get a handle on things, would you?  You’re flipping back and forth between fairytale land and reality, you’re giving people concussions and walking us through their memories, you’re moving along the fairy tale book, the queen’s heart collection, and Emma’s realizations at a snail-like pace, and just when I think I’ve got a handle on the shape of things, you run me down rabbit trails with the secret past of side characters and subplots that aren’t even remotely related to the reason I tune in.

Why? Why are you doing that?  Do  you not understand what your central story line is?  II’s your favorite part of having a series delving into complex backgrounds of supporting characters?  Or do you genuinely just not understand that I don’t want to tune in once a week to learn about something completely unrelated to the main plot line that doesn’t look like it has a tie-in for at least several episodes?  As a general rule, let’s just say that if it doesn’t progress the story line, you should probably throw it away, not air it on television to frustrate grumplepuss audience members like myself.   I kept hoping you’d figure this out.  I really convinced myself to hold out for a while.  After all, the first few episodes of a show are always a little wonky – it takes time for you to realize and embrace your potential, for the actors to get a good grasp on their characters, and for everything to start working as a well-oiled machine. 

But I’ve watched eighteen episodes of your premiere season.  Eighteen!  That’s a long time to wait for a plot line to pay off.  But at 45 minutes an episode, you’ve had 13 hours to convince me you’re going to take this storyline somewhere and you’ve failed. That’s half a day.  

In the amount of time it took the Addams Family kids to be converted to optimism by watching Disney movies back to back in a remote cabin, you can’t even convert me from a supporter of your show to a devoted audience member.  I’m disappointed in you.

So it’s time for me to let go.   It’s  not because I want to.  Believe me: I really hate to come to this realization.  I don’t like to be wrong about things and I certainly don’t knowing I spent half a day watching a badly done show instead of investing that time in my life’s calling to start a Puppy Amusement Park.  Maybe if the rest of America hangs in there for you, you’ll come around about half way through next season.  But with a meth lab that’s just blown up after the Mexican cartel’s ringleaders have been taken out on AMC, and a few baby dragons that have just been born during a young bastard prince’s grasp on the Iron Throne on HBO, it’s unlikely my attention is going to be able to revert to Storybrook.

I don’t think I’ve ever gotten the opportunity to say this in a break up before.  So allow me to indulge:

It’s over, Once Upon a Time.  It’s not me: it’s you. 

Puppies and Unicorn Sprinkles,

Jackie ♣

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I Can’t Love a Wrinkly Flesh Beast

4 Apr

Dave wants to shave our cat.

Technically it’s his cat. I had a cat when he met me, he acquired a cat when we were just starting out.  Thus, one is mine and one is his.  He wants to shave his.  Though both cats are, in theory, “ours”, the acquisition of the cats is important to keep in mind when sorting out who is responsible for clawed up furniture, broken possessions,  hairballs and bowel atrocities of all kinds.  Basically, we have joint custody until something needs cleaned up or one of them committed a crime.

Or until he wants to shave one of them.

I imagine it will be much the same when we have children.

It’s all my fault, I suppose.  I was jamming a needle full of Facebook status updates right into my artery when I noted that a mutual friend of ours was taking a poll on whether or not he should shave his cat for the summer.  It went something like “pros: cats not dying of heat in summer, no fur around the apartment.  cons: pissed off death rat staring me down while I sleep”.

When I passed along my amusement to Dave, I expected him to laugh along and perhaps weigh in on the poll.  Instead, he said it was a great idea and that he should shave Hobbes.

This is, of course, in retaliation to the Air Conditioning War of 2011, wherein the defendant, Jackie, refused to spend money on air conditioning to help carry the apartment through the sweltering hot summer.  The defendant cited the oncoming autumn, a pride in low electric bills and a general distaste for the unnatural as her exhibits.  The prosecutor solely cited the blistering heat and the insanity of the defendant.

We got through the summer without air conditioning, but not without throwing the cats in the refrigerator on occasion.   You know, just to make sure they survived the heat wave.

So it seems that Dave is gearing up for Summer War of 2012 and has pitted his threat to shave the cat against my unwillingness to invest in an air conditioner.  And honestly, it’s likely he’ll win.  I can’t live with a shaved cat.  I certainly can’t touch one.  Oh my good great grossness I can’t even imagine how I would drag my hand along its raw, stubbly feline exterior without instantly flinging it from my arms in disgust and fear.  How revolting.  I can’t love a hairless cat.  I can’t.

Remember the Friends episode where Rachel brings home a hairless cat and names it Mrs. Whiskerson?  She pays a grand for it because it reminds her of a cat from her childhood.  But Mrs. Whiskerson goes crazy and rips her to shreds and Rachel ends up giving it to Gunther.  

 

She had to wear oven mitts to hold it.  I don’t want to wear oven mitts to hold my cat.  

Sometimes my cats surprise me in the morning by staring at my face until I open my eyes and promise to feed them.  Right now it’s cute because they’re furry and adorable and they need my love and my kitty food.  When Dave shaves Hobbes, waking up to him staring me down will be so traumatic I’ll have to go to therapy to recover.  I can’t wake up to this:

*Shudder* I mean, I know it’s not its fault but look at that wrinkly gathering of flesh around its neck where a ball of fluffiness should be. I don’t think I could ever sleep again, knowing this beast is slinking about the place.  Just thinking of it brushing up against my leg gives me the heebie jeebies.  I would probably involuntarily kick it.  Like a fight or flight thing. Listen, I can’t be held accountable for what my body does when confronted with great disgustingness.

Of course, this is assuming Dave will be successful in his shaving adventure.  How does one even shave a cat?  Are you just supposed to lather it up and hope it holds still until you finish the job?  Do you give it a sedative, do the deed, place a bottle of liquor and a razor beside it and hope it wakes up and blames itself?  I mean, I’m an intelligent girl but I can’t think of a single sensible way to shave a cat.   In an effort to introduce sanity to the situation, I suggested that if he was going to get the cat shaved he should at least agree to take it to a groomer.   But then I remembered that the groomer returns our cats with enormous bows around their necks.  And being given a hairless cat with a bow around its neck seems more like a warning gift from the mob than a professional grooming service.  No; there’s no way to do this that isn’t nightmare inducing.

It looks like I’ve gotta give in on this one.

It’s only Spring and the Summer War of 2012 is already over.   The defendant is found guilty of withholding sweet, manmade cooling winds from the prosecutor and when faced with the threat of one hairless cat, settled out of court.

One air conditioner, coming right up. ♣

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Sometimes a Punch in the Jugular Is the Best Medicine

28 Mar

I swore at some little kids the other night.

I don’t know how little they were, per se.  They were littler than me.  Adolescents, I suppose, is the technical term.   All I know is they were scrappy, yippy things and offended almost all of my sensory organs and so I dub them little kids.  Rascals.  Hellions.  Forged of muck, mire, and obscenities.

Granted, I’d willingly ventured into their pit of idiocy when I made my way out to the midnight showing of The Hunger Games.

Don’t judge me unless you’ve read the books.  Seriously, just don’t even start.  I’ll brawl.  Don’t think I won’t.

Anyway, I took the plunge into the hysteria about a week ago and openly admitted it in last Wednesday’s post.  My entire life was consumed with angst and every moment of exertion became just another thing I had to do before I could read again.   Since this led to devouring all three books in just a few days, I figured why not go ahead  see the movie.   I wouldn’t let Dave see it before he’s read the books and since I took the following day off work, I bought what I’m sure was the last ticket for the midnight showing in a 30-mile radius and ventured out into the wilderness of excited adolescents.   Alone.

I don’t really know why I go to the movies anymore.  I honestly can’t remember the last time I truly enjoyed it.   I suppose there’s that time I took myself on a date for a Lollipop Tuesday last year, but it’s important to note that in that scenario, I was the only one in the entire theater.  Maybe that’s key: I absolutely cannot have any other humans around me.  When I do have humans around me, I contemplate murder.

I think it’s safe to say that out of my myriad of pet peeves in this world, the one I hold near and dear to my heart is being rude during movies.   I don’t really know who the target audience is for those commercials that happen before the previews in the movie theater.  You know, the ones that feature some audience member being rude and ridiculous?  There’s the one of Steve Martin’s cell phone vibrating him off the seat.  There’s the one where people are watching The Notebook but all the dialogue is replaced with a story about puke, courtesy of the people having a conversation beside you.  I thought the target audience was the people who do those things, but those people still exist so I don’t know if it’s an effective campaign.  Oh, and there’s the one of the Lorax that played the evening I was trying to watch the Hunger Games, but unfortunately my offenders entered too late to notice it.  Maybe that’s the problem: rude people enter too late to see them.

To my surprise, I had secured a seat in front of an exit row, with plenty of leg room.  I had a big blank section to my left where no seats were installed in the event that wheelchairs were needed there, and had only one seat to my right, which no one had ventured to sit in, despite the fact that I had bathed that morning.  For the first time in a long while, I thought I might actually enjoy being at the movies – and one of the most anticipated movies in a very long time, even! A midnight showing! The luck!!

That’s when the gaggle appeared.

Just before the previews, when the lights were beginning to dim and the audience was settling into silence, a squadron of chirping adolescents piled up at the entrance to the theater.  Realizing that they were complete morons to have gone to the concession stand before scoping out seats, they found themselves unable to acquire fifteen seats all together and refused to watch this much-anticipated theatrical event in separation.  As they tried to balance their 6 dollar sodas and popcorns, they looked to the leader for orders.  That’s when she marched right over to the open (and chair-less) section to my left, and plopped down cross-legged on the floor.  Her minions followed suit, stacking into two rows in which they rested on each others’ limbs, greased with popcorn butter and reeking of trouble.

I almost immediately went to management.  Are you serious?! I went from having an almost guaranteed enjoyable evening to being the only person in the theater that has to directly deal with this group of doofuses.  I don’t even enjoy the movies when there’s only one seat beside me and now I’ve exchanged that one seat for 7.5 humans sitting on 7.5 other humans.  It was obvious to me that halfway through the movie they would get sore or tired of laying on each other and need to shift around.  Not to mention the chomping and slurping and chatting.  Oh, the chatting.  

But I told myself that it would be a great memory for them.  They could look back and reminisce about the midnight showing of the Hunger Games, when they broke all the rules and sat directly on the floor.   Stop being a bitter old hag, Jackie.  You’re only in your twenties.  Save the stifling of a younger generation for your thirties.

So I let them go.  

Five minutes in, my left ear had already been accosted by some of the worst obscenities in my vocabulary.  They were weighing in on what the movie was presenting versus what they imagined in the books, they were upset that Effie didn’t seem like they thought she would, and a variety of female characters had been likened to a slang term for a female’s genitalia.

I began to get upset.

I thought about the time I saw Alice in Wonderland in 3D and got so enraged at the girls who weren’t even making an attempt to use their inside voices in the front row that I walked over, crouched down behind their seats, and spat out that since they talked all the way through the movie, they could at least do me the favor of attempting a whisper for the rest.  I thought about the time I saw the silent film The Artist and a 60-year-old lady behind Dave and I read all the captions out loud.  (I still have scar marks from him taking out his tension by squeezing my leg instead of crushing her face.)  But above all, I thought about how they were seated where there weren’t even seats and by all counts should have already been ousted by an usher except by my good graces and my convincing myself not to be an old coot. And yet they sat there, carrying on.  

It was when Katniss finally got launched up the tube to the battlefield that I realized I could endure them no longer: something had to be done.  I didn’t devour all three books in the series and pull myself out into the wilderness of a midnight showing to have them banter and giggle through the most intense part of the movie.  No sir.  And honestly, I wasn’t sure that watching a movie focusing on taking the lives of adolescents was the best stimulus for me in my situation.

So I leaned over and abandoned my inside voice, saying  – Hey, do you think you guys could shut up for the rest of the movie? Seriously.  Thanks.

But there’s this amazing pretend shield that stupid kids think exists between you and their mockery of you.  The girl directly below me to my left was under such a delusion when she blatantly mimicked me to her friends.  There was some head bobbing, some finger wagging, and an exact replica of the tone I took with them.  

That’s when I called her a dick.

I did.  I just dropped all pretenses of good Christian behavior and called her a dick.  In fact, I called them all dicks and told them to shut the hell up.  Because if they didn’t, I was going to have an usher scrape them off the floor and shoo them to their lonely little islands – seats beside old people, fat people, ugly people, gruff people, and maybe even in the middle of rows.  They’d have to navigate it all in the dark by themselves.  And everyone would stare.  And call them dicks again.

They didn’t talk for the rest of the movie.

I darted out of there the moment it was over, annoyed that I’d ventured out into society again.  I thought about how they’d all pile into their mothers’ cars and talk about the old lady that nagged them and called them names.  They’d leave out the part where they were using worse language than me even though they’re half my age.  They’d leave out the part where I already told them to zip it before I unleashed the Richard on them.  They’d leave out the part where they encompass everything The Lorax tried to prevent in the previews.

I burned with a fiery rage, kicking myself for paying 10 dollars to see something I could have rented on Netflix in a few months and watched in the comfort of my own home, where I’m safe from society and all the ways it makes me want to cuss and commit crimes.  I’ve told myself so many times that I’m done going out to the movies for this very reason.  I just haven’t come up with a good system yet where every time I’m tempted to go see something on the big screen, I have the better sense to punch myself in the face instead.

Maybe I should just start a service where for a free movie ticket, I will sit on a stool near the exit of the theater and if my ears or eyes are offended by the presence of anyone in particular, I walk up and deliver one solid slam in the jugular.  I get a free movie, people get a better theatrical experience, and audiences begin to be respectful out of fear.

Sounds more effective than the Lorax campaign to me. ♣

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Can’t Post; Must Read Hunger Games

21 Mar

It all started when I innocently Tweeted that The Hunger Games seemed like The Running Man or our generation.  (Hashtag JenniferLawrenceIsArnold.)

The Running Man, in case you are unaware, is a movie featuring protagonists in fantastically 80’s spandex suits, a man-made obstacle course where no one really comes out alive, and a host of villains that are crosses between pro wrestlers and science experiments.  Even if you aren’t familiar with it, you’re probably familiar with the famous Schwarzenegger phrase that was born from it: “I’ll be back”. 

The spandex unitard he’s sporting when he says it really drives the threat home.

This tweet automatically posted to The Jackie Blog Facebook page, where two Hunger Games fans immediately chimed in that I should read the books.  Typically when a post gets more than one reaction in less than a minute, it’s going to grow out of control.  And before I had a litter of Hunger Gamelings on me, I decided to calm the storm by suggesting that if they watched The Running Man, I would read The Hunger Games.

Challenge accepted.

I didn’t really want to read The Hunger Games.  I like to judge things before I have any idea what they’re about.  Sometimes I’m wrong, but I really only remember the times that I was right.  Like Twilight.  

But nothing can possibly be as horrendous as Twilight and I also thought reading The Hunger Games would make a pretty good Lollipop Tuesday.  If you don’t know what that is, there’s a link at the top of the page that will help you.  You can come back when you’re in the know and be all like “oh, I know what that is.  I’m so hip”. 

Anyway, I always say that I should read popular books before seeing the movie version of them.  I don’t ever actually do it, though.  Does anyone, really?  I started reading Harry Potter back before the first movie came out but then I figured it’s so long and the movie’s coming out soon so why bother.

I’m not big on reading, apparently.

But this time I was going to commit.  It’s 2012.  I’m a committer in 2012.  So I downloaded The Hunger Games Book I and went at it.  It’s young adult literature so you feel like a genius reading it.  It goes so quickly you get an ego boost just devouring the thing.  That, and it’s freaking fantastic.

No seriously.  It’s really good.  And I don’t usually like things.  Anything, really.  In fact, I’d say my trademark is that I’m just generally not a fan of things.  But a quick read about a tense political landscape that ultimately pits adolescents against each other in a grueling, descriptive fight to the death?  

That’s pretty awesome.

I finished the first book in 2 days.  Pretty much everyone who reads it says that like it’s an accomplishment or it’s supposed to blow your mind or something.  And while it’s a bit of a testament to how gripping the story is, it’s also a testament to just being literate.  It’s not like there were any challenging words.  Which is good because you need all the brainpower to imagine the brutal slayings. I’d have finished it sooner if I didn’t have to do things ever.  I actually started to get annoyed that I had to shower and brush my teeth because there was no way to read The Hunger Games while I was doing those things.  It’s probably best that I downloaded a digital version because I’m pretty sure I’d have attempted to take a book into the shower with me.  Slowly, everything I did was just something I was doing until I could read again. When I’d walk outside, I’d look around at the trees and sidewalks and think of how foreign they seemed.  My brain was on the ground in the Games. There were supposed to be people trying to kill me everywhere.  My Orthodox Jewish neighborhood seemed safe.  

Too safe.

At work, I got annoyed when the phone rang.  Well, I kind of always get annoyed when the phone rings because there’s usually a human on the other end who’s about to astound me with their idiocy and put another dent in my faith in the human race.  But this time I was getting annoyed because they were pulling me out of my daydreaming about The Hunger Games.  I had to remind myself that I could just hang in a few more hours, I could get home and keep reading.  It would be like a reward for working and pretending to be an adult.

My face has been stuck like this since I started reading. Just stare for a while. Right into the pupils. That's exactly what it's like, man.

Needless to say, I plowed through Book II when I got home today.  Our neighbors came over and asked us to dinner and while it’s usually hard to get me to go anywhere or do anything, it’s particularly difficult when I’m nursing an addiction.  I may not like much, but the things I like, I like fiercely.  I had to go to dinner so that Dave wouldn’t break up with me.  After all, he was with me through the World of Warcraft withdrawal of 2009 and I feared he was starting to see the beginning signs of a dealbreaker in me.  So I went, I ate, I came home, I read.

I read even though I had to post.  I read without shame.  I ate every digital page up with my eyes and packed it into my cerebrum with such elation that I was sure that if I could just keep reading forever, I wouldn’t need to sleep, shower, or eat again.

Katniss doesn’t need to.

But then I realized I’ve got some new eyes in my blog following this week.  Quite a few, actually.  I don’t know where you’re all coming from, but welcome to the gooey insides of my brains.   Right now most of my brains are full of political rebellion, starving families, and children murdering other children.   It’s awesome.   And I’d love to tell you all about it but I have to go download and devour Book III.  Tonight.  It must happen tonight right now right this very moment.  I also have to look into a new Lollipop Tuesday idea because I just blabbered this one all out without waiting until Tuesday.  

After that I should probably check in with my Running Man readers- the ones who started this dangerous spiral. I still stand by my tweet, but I’m pretty sure they got the raw end of the deal as far as entertainment value goes and I’d like to devote a bit of time to laughing about it. 

But first: back to the Games. ♣

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I Should Have Been a Cat

14 Mar

It would be nice if everyone could just stop being so super awesome and successful at everything for just a gosh golly minute so I can gather myself and catch up.

Don’t you feel like you’re constantly being bombarded with news of other peoples’ awesomeness?  I do.  And it’s usually people my age being awesome.

Do you know who topped the Forbes list as the number one highest paid musician in the world?

Taylor Swift.

That’s right: the Swifty.  A girl about my age who picked up a guitar and started writing mediocre love songs is a billionaire and topped the Forbes List over a band like U2.   Or how about the Olsen twins?  Two chicks also about my age who are billionaires, icons, and own their own fashion line.  Or how about Lindsay Lohan?  Also my age, except unlike Swifty or the twins, she now makes money for being so awful at things.  

And for taking off her clothes and getting wasted and whatnot, but you catch my drift here.

In fact, some of you may recall my campaign to host SNL over The Lohan, wherein I compiled a list of reasons I would be a better host than her.  And you know what? I was right.  I would have been a better host.  But it doesn’t matter.  Because in spite of the awful reaction she got from people all over America when she hosted, her episode had the 2nd highest ratings of the SNL season.  She’s so successful at being unsuccessful that she’s successful.

How can I possibly compete with that?

I shouldn’t care, but I kind of do.  After all, how can I see list after list of people who are in their 20’s shooting into stardom because they made a Ryan Goseling tumblr or a site featuring cats who spell things improperly, or a page that documents what students say on hiking trails without somehow feeling like I’m missing some great calling to create something stupid and phenomenal that whips me into an Internet sensation? 

This cat sleeps for almost the entire day and is still currently more famous than me.

I blame the Twitter Machine.  It’s feeding me information so quickly about people who are young and fabulous and full of society-altering ideas and thoughts and it makes folks like me feel like they’re at the back of the herd.   I’m the limping, cross-eyed zebra of the magical Interwebz, where young, blossoming starlets and dashing entrepreneurs are tweeting the view from the front of the pack. 

I should probably just disconnect.  How can I possibly feel like I’m accomplishing anything when Twitter is throwing top 10 lists of awesome possums at me and Facebook is constantly updating with engagements, marriages, house/car/pet/job acquisitions, and (Lord help us) creepy sonogram photos?   When the world is constantly shouting at you the things that others are doing that are perfect and lovely, it can be hard to remember that we’re not all going after the same things and it’s okay to not be an OlsenLohanSwifty.

We just have to remember that we’re all on different paths.  Mine is to have a blog where I talk about how I don’t like to do laundry so sometimes I just buy packs of underwear instead.  Or how people leaving long voicemails makes me want to scoop my eyes out with a melon baller.  Or how life is too short to get nervous about pooping in public restrooms.   And while that’s not as profitable as a celebrity fragrance line or a TMZ headline or penning young chick country songs, it serves a noble purpose that only I can serve.

Because somewhere out there, someone has lots of packs of new underwear, a hamper full of dirty clothes, and reads my blog to feel better about it.

Keep on keepin’ on, person somewhere out there.  You’re doing just fine. ♣

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Warning: Online Dating Profiles May Lead to Flirt Messages from Your Dad

7 Mar

Well, guys who are old enough to be your dad, anyway.

As it turns out, I’m the world’s most recent member of MarriageMindedPeopleMeet.com.

The site is exactly what it sounds like and no, I’m not a willing participant.  My doppelganger signed me up.  You know, the one from California? I wrote about her some time ago.  Her name is also Jackie and her email address is separated from mine thanks to only one tiny, almost-indistinguishable period between her first and middle name.  And every time her classmates, favorite stores, and organizations overlook that tiny, important dot, I get sucked into her world.

She’s basically everything I might be in another plane of existence.  She’s from California, where my parents used to live.  She likes to hike and bike and accomplish various outdoor feats, the majority of which have confirmation numbers associated with them and are sent to me.  I can’t tell if she teaches or is just in grad school; I just know that one time I was sent an email asking for that day’s class materials to be resent.  She’s a class-attending, surfing, active California girl – the opposite of my pale, Central Pennsylvanian roots.  We’re two diverging shoots from the same name seed…I’m also in a steady relationship and she clearly is not.

It started with the account confirmation email.  I threw it in my Spam folder thinking it was just another runaway email intended for her but the correspondences kept coming.  My profile had been successfully set up, my matches were ready for review, and then suddenly: I had a New Flirt Message.

This is how I feel when I see I have a New Flirt Message

Since I already know so much about my doppelganger, I figured I might as well take the opportunity before I unsubscribe to see the sort of preferences she had locked in for herself.  I opened the email to find the faces of men in their 50’s with salt and pepper hair staring back at me, looking for love.  Her/my username? “Beachgirl” with some numbers behind it.

Figures.

The entire experience has been rather traumatizing.  Not just because the unsubscribe link sent me to the fifth circle of hell where I had to log in before I was allowed to unsubscribe, but also because 50’s men with salt and pepper hair is a category my own (married) father falls into.  And every day I’ve been receiving Flirt Messages from a group of fellows who could pass for his inner circle.  Their little internet portraits are lined up in a row and they’re all staring at me with lonely, wanton eyes. 

Of course like most oddities that cross my path, I considered leveraging it for the blog.  There were a variety of inappropriate uses that I mulled over, including a sidebar widget with my most recent matches.  Or the option of allowing my readers to fill out my profile and choose my picture. 

But I have limits, people, and fake-flirting with men twice my age in order to entertain my reader base is apparently one of them. 

Of course, poor Jackie California is over on the West Coast trying desperately to connect with this group of square-faced beady-eyed men and wondering why no one is flirting back with her.  And while I’m kind of quietly satisfied at this because she has failed to change her email address or to indicate to her contacts that the dot in its middle is crucial to delivery success in spite of my notifying her of my email interceptions, I’m also hoping she’s not taking it to heart that no one is getting back to her.  After all, she works out.  And tans.  And lives the good life we see on t-shirts in verse form.   I’m sure she’s lovely-looking for a middle-aged stubborn woman.

So if you’re out there and listening, Jackie California, know that this has nothing to do with you and everything to do with me not being into my dad.  One day, I hope you’ll understand. 

Until then, let’s finally change that email address of yours, hmm?  I’m not really the Stranger Danger type and These Flirt Messages are starting to give me panic attacks. ♣

P.S.  The Lohan hosted SNL on Saturday.  She got the 2nd highest ratings of the current season but also got some of the worst feedback of the season.  Apparently, a lot of people tuned in to see her fail.  Lesson learned: when seeking fame, one should just as well abandoning attempts to be awesome and begin attempts to famously suck. 

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Where’s My Fat Loss Hallelujah?

29 Feb

I really thought that when I reached my goal weight, it would be a little more like Jennifer Hudson with singing and magical fairies of fat loss and a little less oh, I don’t know – ordinary?

Mind you, I know not whether I’ve actually reached my goal weight.   It’s just that I’ve been jogging 2-3 times a week for about 5 months and I’m eating better and since I used to have macaroni and cheese and cheeseburgers twice a week and sat on my very cushioned tush every single day before that, logic dictates that I must have lost something. …Right?

The whole weighing-myself thing wasn’t going very well so I ditched it;  now I have The Naked System.  Instead of weighing myself, now I just stare at my pudge in the mirror every day.  I pinch it, I cradle it, I inspect it from all sides, and in the process determine my accomplishments.  If I’m overly soft, I get more motivated to eat and jog that day.  If I’m proud of myself, I decide it’s because I’ve been having pudgy naked time in the mirror every day and it’s working.  And if I stay the same, well, that’s because I check every single day and change is slow.

So I don’t have a number on the scale I’m looking for because I won’t let myself look.  I just know that 5 months ago I could take all the stomach fat in my hands and hold it in front of my body.  I was so married to it that I had considered a variety of Jackie Blog marketing tactics including a muppet, a voice, a variety show… But now the Pudge Muppet is gone.  I have forced my body to run against its will. It’s been months of jogging and eating better and having pudgy naked time and now when I wear my pants the second time after a wash, they scoot down my hips.

Photo borrowed from the magical fat fairy celebration parade.

I thought that was the sign.  I thought something epic like pants scooting down hips meant that  a fat version of me would burst out of the closet singing about the woman I used to be.  Then I could endorse a food establishment of my choosing and get a book deal and go on talk shows discussing the secret to how I changed my entire life and have nothing more important in my character than my ability to be fit.  Maybe I could even get my own google doodle.  (The o’s would obviously compose my former marshmallowy bottom).

But I even put on my skinny jeans the other day and there was no doppelganger bursting forth from the closet to sing a duet with me.  It was just me, singing in the mirror.  Naked.

It’s times like those that I’m glad my cats can’t talk.

I had sincerely hoped that by now people would start to notice, but the only one who’s said anything at all is the cleaning lady at work.  Either she’s  just trying to make me feel better or she’s the only one who I encounter in my daily life.  Neither is a preferable truth.

Maybe the change has to be more drastic.  Maybe I just need to get some better fitting clothes instead of walking around in my former fat suits.  Or maybe Angelina Jolie’s emaciated limbs at the Oscars made it impossible for anyone to look worthy of a fat loss hallelujah session.

I should probably just call JHud myself and see what it is that made her former fatty burst forth in vocal glory.   I want my nationally televised self-duet.

Until then, I’ll just keep rehearsing in the mirror. ♣

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Blue Ribbon Macaroni and Cheese

28 Feb

 

Did you think Lollipop Tuesdays had died?

They haven’t.  If you’re confused about why Lollipop Tuesdays aren’t every Tuesday anymore (or for that matter, why I don’t post every day), or you don’t even know what a Lollipop Tuesday is, you should probably check out the handy dandy “What’s Lollipop Tuesday?” header at the top of this page.  Now relax and strap in.  Because this week I entered a recipe contest.

As a homegrown mountain gal from Central Pennsyltucky, I felt like even though I’d never entered a cooking contest before, I could at least avoid embarrassing myself.  After all, when you’re raised in the roots cooking is just one part of a three-part formula for the perfect wife that some crazy hermit made up decades ago and is still being widely circulated in small towns with forks in roads: cooking, cleaning, baby-raisin’.  Hunting is optional.  I only ever really took to the cooking.

It also just so happened that the recipe contest was for Macaroni and Cheese, which was convenient since I just had my own Jackie Blog hunt for the Best Macaroni and Cheese in the Universe in December.  So I threw together my favorite parts of my favorite recipes and came up with a Jackie Blog concoction of cheesy awesomey goodness.

I wasn’t really sure what the rules were.  I went online and registered but I didn’t really get anything saying it was received and no one ever sent me criteria.  I didn’t even know what the prizes were.  I just knew that I had to cook up a vat of smokin’ hot mac and smack and take it to the venue by 1pm.  So I designated Dave my Transportation Manager, who threw me and my casserole in the car at 12:40pm and dropped us off while he parked.  With only 5 minutes until the entry deadline, I willed the elevator down with my mind, scurried into the judging room and plopped my casserole down: Entry #11.   It was precisely 1:00pm.

We then proceeded to wait ten full minutes for any late arrivals.    My tale of down-to-the-wire shenanigans weren’t quite as epic as I’d hoped.

Finally, it was time to begin.  We met the judges: 2 owners of 2 prominent food businesses in the city and 1 genuine lover of pasta smothered in cheese.  We also heard the judging criteria: appearance, taste, and-I-have-no-idea-what-else-because-I-was-stuck-on-appearance.

Appearance.

How could I have watched Iron Chef so many times and not have anticipated this as a determining factor?  I should have had a custom-built shelf above my dish that had three beautifully-prepared plates with perfect Macaroni and Cheese portions specifically for the judges.  They should have had firecrackers shooting out of them and have some sort of beautiful font displaying the name of my creation.

But I didn’t.  In fact, I didn’t even remember to bring a serving spoon.   And as my eyes stretched down the rows of the competitors, I saw beautiful thermal Pampered Chef totes, shiny and new casserole dishes that had fancy lids, and classic foil holders with wired burners beneath them.

I had my mother’s hand-me-down casserole dish that she let me borrow once when I was in college and I never returned.

At first I was nervous.  I didn’t consider appearance at all.  And what were the judges supposed to do without a serving spoon: paw it out of the cheesy vat with their bare mits?  Yes.  I decided yes they would.  In fact, I decided that casseroles should only be served in secondhand stolen dishes and reminded myself that I was there to write a blog post, not to impress judges.

Still, I was nervous.  I know this because when the first judge approached my dish and began to fish out a taste of the pasta with her pathetic plastic spoon, I winced as she lost the battle to the broiled parmesan and bread crumb finish, which was settled happily on the top of my concoction.  I grabbed Dave’s arm and clenched it hard as a huge piece of parmesan hung on her spoon and she had to contort her tongue to lap it into her hungry mouth.  I analyzed every nod, every dart of the eyes, every stroke of the pencil on paper.

I had lost.  I surely had  lost.

Dave laughed as my sanity slowly unraveled before him and tried to distract me with Bejeweled on his iPad.  I was sure to pause the game each time a judge approached my dish.   When the judges were finished testing, the audience was allowed to serve themselves buffet style.  I watched to see who took bites of mine and was disappointed when I saw much of my dish remained by the time I reached it.  I returned to my seat and saw a flyer that had been placed in my absence: it was an advertisement for a catering company.

…I was competing against catering companies?

I had talked myself into a deep, dark loss when one fellow jumped up and B-lined to my dish to get himself a hefty helping of seconds.  I was so happy I almost squealed like a freshly born piglet.  I had my victory: someone wanted seconds.  I told myself perhaps I would jest for third place.  That’s when the judges returned and announced there was a tie for first and second and they needed to retaste the top dishes to determine the tie-breaker.   The host of the event promptly walked over and grabbed my mother’s hand-me-down dish.

I freaked.

I freaked so hard that I had little tiny tears in my eyes.  I tried to hold back the excitement from my body but I only bottled it up and shot it out of my eyes like laser beams at poor supportive Dave, who feared me a serial killer and tried to coax the crazy out of my pupils.  It was me versus the Pampered Chef Super Awesome Casserole Tote.  I was so thrilled to have third place locked up.

After what felt like hours of the judges lobbing around more cheesy goodness in their mouths, a winner had finally been determined.

It was me.

I was so surprised to be announced first place that I let out a sort of strange yip in front of everyone and tried to tone it down for a casual walk up to the front to claim my winnings: a gift card and a certificate, deeming my recipe officially award-winning.  The judges looked pleased with the cheesiness I bestowed upon them and the audience all got in line to finish up what was left of casserole #11.

I waited for everyone to get their fill, truly amazed that I had just shown up for a Lollipop Tuesday and taken the top prize from a room full of hopefuls.  I felt like an imposter.  If only they knew it was all for a post.

On the way out of the venue, I called my mom to thank her for raising me right and Dave got a hot dog at the stand outside.  The fella inside asked who won and I said I did.   He asked me what the story was behind it and I explained Lollipop Tuesdays to him and that I run a blog but it’s nowhere close to a food blog.  He seemed pleasantly surprised and for indulging me and acting like he would tune in to read, I tipped him a dollar on the hot dog.

Sometimes you have to pay for publicity.

That night I sat around basking in the phrase “Award Winning”.   I referred to myself as an award-winning cook and my macaroni and cheese as a first-place dish.  And just then I remembered telling my coworkers I was entering a recipe contest that weekend and being laughed at by someone.  They made a joke about Kraft mac and cheese and said I was too young to cook well. I told her she didn’t know the power of being raised in the sticks.

And just then, I took out  my phone to send a proper foot-in-mouth-inducing text.

“Boo yah.”

Signed, First Place Chef. ♣

Before you ask, here’s the recipe.  Thanks to thesinglecell, who provided most of the recipe for thejackieblog recipe contest:
 
1/2 lb pasta of your choice, cooked and drained
2 tablespoons butter, divided
2 tablespoons flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons dry mustard
5 oz. sharp cheddar, shredded
3 oz. Raclette, cubed
1/4c. Parmesan, grated (plus some for sprinkling)
1 3/4c. heavy cream
3/4c. milk
Paprika for sprinkling
Cinnamon for sprinkling
1 cup white bread crumbs cut into 1/2 in. squares
 
Preheat oven to 375. Spray a 9×9″ pan (preferably a hand-me-down) with cooking spray. Pour al dente, drained pasta into 9×9″ pan. Melt 1tbs butter and pour over bread crumbs.  Set aside.  Blend flour, mustard and salt together in a small bowl. In a saucepan over medium-low heat, melt 1tbs butter. Add flour, salt and mustard and stir until blended. Add milk and cream, stirring or whisking until dry ingredients are dissolved and liquid is hot, but not boiling. Add Raclette, stirring/whisking occasionally until cheese melts. Repeat for cheddar and Parmesan, stirring/whisking often so the cheese doesn’t stick to the bottom and burn.  Sprinkle in cinnamon.
 
Pour cheese sauce over pasta; add bread crumbs and sprinkle with Parmesan and paprika and bake at 375 for 25 minutes. Then broil until top is golden.
 
Eat with bare hands.

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