Filed under: just sayin'
Having a young toddler in the home is greater than or equal to the smell and destruction of an alcoholic relative who crashes on your couch at will.
Friday, fifteen hours with my sig-o’s family and extended family and distant family and non-blood family, etcetera, for as far as the eye could see for a double funeral and the reception that followed.
Saturday, a mad cleaning spree and three dozen cupcakes for guests who came to celebrate one blue-eyed wonderchild’s eighth birthday.
Sunday, eight hours on foot at the magic kingdom. Some portion of those hours spent in the rain.
Monday, from bed to work to English 106 to this stellar bean and cheese burrito and cold Corona. When I could have chosen one of many mindless DVR options to decompress with, I forced my ass into this hard and unforgiving dining room chair for some sort of pathetic, minor and likely ineffective creative outlet. Because I’m fucken losin’ it, man.
The workload is all-consuming without a moment to breathe. The only reason I took a lunch hour today was to bang out 1.5 pages of key points from a short article by Malcom X to turn in at 6:30pm when I switched to student mode. Today, in conclusion to a loooong-winded e-mail, I told my boss, “I am very, very upset.” Which is corporate code for SO FUCKING PISSED OFF RIGHT NOW. But between anger and my usual tall order of discouragement, I’ll take blood-boiling rage that can only be expelled through proper e-mail because my mind and my feelings mean nothing without a branded signature at the end.
I framed and hung a huge Kraken rum poster in my dining room. It’s making me smile.
Of note, the music that plays on that website was reoccurring background noise in a number of nightmares I had as a kid. Eep.
More later. Lots.
-CJ
A tweet from Real_Simple:
Today’s thought: “I have no faith in a human critter who hasn’t one or two bad habits.” — Margaret Deland
Would you want to be friends with some flawless freak?
Me either.
-CJ
GEEK OUT: I got my annual planner today and filled in all the birthdays and anniversaries and upcoming events. I can breathe now.
I was listening to the This American Life podcast this morning (this one), and during Act 1, David Rakoff says (sarcastically) during an awesome poem:
You have to want something to feel rejected.
What you don’t hope for can’t turn ’round to hurt you.
Have you told yourself these lies too? It is silly to think we can evade the pain of rejection or disappointment. Our major malfunction as humans is in the lack of an on/off switch to our emotions. (Ooh, or a dimmer!) But it is in those helpless emotions that we do not choose to feel that we figure who the hell we are under our/my callous exterior, get to know our weaknesses and strengths, or find out who our peers are under what we believe to be the real them, when really, all we see is the projection they want us to see.
It’s easy to forget that no one has it perfect. No one even has it all that easy, when you account for their personal battles and the strength and tolerance with which they have the ability to use against them. We cannot manifest super human acceptance of the shitty hand we’re dealt. But I’ve won more than one pot with just a pair of two’s.
-CJ
Filed under: just sayin'
I could never deny a chocolate + vanilla + alcohol combination, but I remain perched on the WHATTHEFUCK fence.
The best part comes at the very end, where the girls are victim to their own concoction.
-CJ
ps, hey Red… how YOU doin’?
It summed up our relationship so perfectly. Josh and I were working in the backyard, hacking weeds and raking piles of debris. While he manuevered the edger atop the grossly overgrown jungle that has become our yard, I hosed the grass and dirt from the small cement patio area. I pointed the hose in his direction.
“Um, babe? I’m holding a power tool.”
“Then get the hell out of the way.”
-CJ
Aliens?
http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2010/09/27/bts.ufo.activity.cnn?iref=allsearch
Listen closely for the faint sound of a thousand heads popping delicately from tightly bound assholes…
Josh is passionate as all get out for conspiracies and UFOs. I love this about him. This morning he sent me a snipet from an article along with a rant that needed sharing:
The Wrights, who had pursued their research in the absence of a complete theory of aerodynamics, struggled on for several more years to convince a doubting world of the reality of their achievement. Although hundreds of people told editors they had witnessed their machine in flight, local newspapers refused to check out their stories. Photographs of the aircraft in flight were dismissed as hoaxes.
It was not until a special demonstration, organized by President Teddy Roosevelt in 1908, that the scientific and popular press finally conceded that the Wright’s “impossible” technology did, in fact, work as claimed.
(Source: http://www.themissingtimes.com/Boeing.html)
Josh: This is exactly what’s going on right now with the disclosure of ufo information. There are government officials on a major network, on a national televised event, and yet, people are still writing it off as nonsense. Even the cnn anchor that was covering the broadcast was rolling his eyes and making light of it. This is the absolute most important information that has ever come to light in the history of mankind, yet lindsay lohan’s drug use is given all the media attention.
I don’t love this about him in a pat him on the shoulder and nod kind of way. I love that does extensive research and watches numerous documentaries and reads books on the subjects for no reward other than his own broader mind and knowledge. And homeboy has opened my brain wiiiiide, lemme tell ya.
-CJ
I was ready to resurrect the skills of fifth grade calamity me and kick some ball ass for the recent tournament. We held one practice prior to the game and I showed up ready. And by ready I mean with striped knee highs under my Adidas shorts, a bandana to hold my new short hairs, and beer in a red Solo cup.
On game day, I was generally left to pick at my fingers and configure different pony tails to capture the newly shorn strays. The ball just didn’t come my way often. When it did, someone else (read: a boy) was quick to distrust my skillz as a vagina-wearing lady type and run in front of me. I play an excellent back up and was even complimented on it. But finally, once, the ball came my way. From high up, it rained down in red rubber and I was gathering speed to get under it, certain I could make the out. And then I slammed into the only other female playing outfield.
Determined to redeem my ass kicking skillz, I kicked a line drive up the third base line for an easy single. My honeyman was kicking after me and I had full confidence he would lead me to second. As the ball flew into the outfield on the second out, I knew to run no matter what and run I did, as fast as I could, from first base to… third.
So mayhaps kickball’s not my thing. I retain that I can still whoop some serious ass in rum consumption, speed reading and spelling bees ’round the world.
-CJ
My co-worker asked me if I knew what the ‘black Google’ was. (I can’t lie, I thought it was a crude way of asking if I’d heard of Gizoogle.) But I searched around and found Blackle.
Blackle saves energy because the screen is predominantly black. “Image displayed is primarily a function of the user’s color settings and desktop graphics, as well as the color and size of open application windows; a given monitor requires more power to display a white (or light) screen than a black (or dark) screen.”
In January 2007 a blog post titled Black Google Would Save 750 Megawatt-hours a Year proposed the theory that a black version of the Google search engine would save a fair bit of energy due to the popularity of the search engine. Since then there has been skepticism about the significance of the energy savings that can be achieved and the cost in terms of readability of black web pages.
We believe that there is value in the concept because even if the energy savings are small, they all add up. Secondly we feel that seeing Blackle every time we load our web browser reminds us that we need to keep taking small steps to save energy.
Even if the difference is so minor it’s undetectable, that last paragraph makes me think. I’m one of many that could use a small reminder to be more conscious. Just a thought.
-CJ
A web writin’ friend responds to a Facebook comment:
comment: Women of NY, I am begging you to please wear age and body appropriate shorts and skirts. I can’t begin to express how tired I am of being confronted with extreme jiggle and cellulite each time I walk out the door! Adding an inch or two to your clothing isn’t too much to ask is it?
***
dear commenter,
this group of humans we call “women”? they have fat on their bodies. this is normal and healthy and good.
this fat? it jiggles sometimes. and due to the influences of not only estrogen, but also catecholamines, insulin, and various thyroid hormones, in 90% of post-pubertal women, it manifests as cellulite. OMG WTF HELLA NASTY, RIGHT?
you, commenter, appear to be exempt from this universal female biology. you have a tiny waist and (i assume) cellulite-free legs. this much is undeniable: you are fucking beautiful. because of that, you are privileged in ways i will never understand.
your message is personal. i have cellulite. my thighs jiggle. i can’t always find clothes to harness, squeeze, and cover my fat in aesthetically pleasing ways. i’m sure you’re oblivious to this fact: when you talk shit on women’s cellulite, you are talking about me.
i am 5’11″ and i weigh one hundred and fifty five pounds (COLLECTIVE GASP OF HORROR!). according to the fashion industry, i am a BIG, FAT FUCK. they probably think i shouldn’t even be allowed to wear clothes, which is why they don’t make shirts long enough to cover my corpulent belly.
so you know what i do? i refuse to give a fuck about fashion, or propriety, and i put my energy into something more worthy of my time. i refuse to spend hours wading through the sweatshop-sewn wares of stores whose clothes don’t fit me anyway. i let my bellyfat peek through between my shirt and my jeans, which themselves are unflattering to my jiggly thigh fat. and i march my fat ass out the door, and i refuse to think about it for even another second.
commenter? don’t you dare tell me what i can and cannot wear – what i can and cannot do — as a result of my not fitting your beauty standard. don’t act like it’s some kind of personal affront when i decide to press my untanned flesh into a two-piece and enjoy a day at the beach. i think i look fucking hot, and if you don’t agree, well then you can go fuck yourself.
i’m so sick of denying myself the opportunity to live because i’m not yet skinny enough. i have spent my whole life trying to fit my natural frame into the mold of your waifish body. i have dieted, i have starved, i have fainted in the gym and in the streets. and you know what i realized? my body will not conform your beauty ethic, not ever. there is no runway model inside of me, waiting to jump out the moment i diet hard enough. i am just BIG.
so you know what? i quit. this whole idiot dieting game, this arbitrary standard of thinness, i refuse to play. i eat healthy food and i ride my bike for hours on end and then i work to accept the balance that my body chooses for itself. and it ain’t easy, because at every turn, i am bombarded with misogynistic messages just like yours.
if, for whatever reason, you think i’m skinny enough to be exempt from your attack, then you’re certainly talking shit about my friends, who i find sexy as hell because their bodies have curves. this message is for them, too, for everyone who has been told they’re “too big to be wearing that” by some self-righteous, skinny jerk like you.
facts: a full 50% of 11-year-old girls think they are too fat. 80% of 13-year-old girls have at one point been on a weight-loss diet. girls this young should be playing with their friends, writing secret-admirer letters to boys, climbing trees and doing cartwheels. instead, they’re consumed with shame and self-hatred, that for many of them will manifest as life-threatening eating disorders in a few years. and this, this is fucking bullshit.
commenter, i have an important message for you. every time you want to criticize anyone else’s body or fashion choices, i want you to SHUT THE FUCK UP. i’m dead serious, commenter: shut the fuck up. stop contributing to this toxic environment of body hatred. step outside your bubble of privilege and read some feminist writing on eating disorders, and when you think you’ve read enough essays, i want you to choke down a couple more. try to imagine how it feels to be me, or [any number of friends, names withheld], anyone else who doesn’t have a naturally “flawless” body, according to arbitrary magazine standards. try to step inside the mind of [friend], who is the skinniest motherfucker i know, but feels compelled to eat mustard packets to lose weight. think of us every time you want to pipe up with some snarky, misogynistic comment, shut the fuck up a little more.
i can’t in good conscience let a comment like yours go unchecked. i am angry, and it’s time that i stand up for myself.
I don’t know the person who made the comment, I only know the girl that reacted to it (who pens on a personal site under l’anguish) and blessed me with deep, deep sigh of content.
-CJ
