Blood Sport

I feel… dirty.

It’s not even my fault, I had no control over it. 

If I tell you why, I’m doing so at the risk of having you view me in a different light, but I have to tell you because I don’t have anything else to write about this week. This has literally been taking up every single minute of my life!

I know, that sounds dramatic, but it’s true, every single waking moment of my life has been dealing with this, this… crisis I was thrown into.

I’ve been bitten repeatedly.

By insects.

Dirty, disgusting, blood-sucking insects.

They were in my bedroom, my private chamber, my pleasure dome!

Ugh. Yuck. Yeesh. Blegh.

I haven’t had to deal with something sucking so much blood outta me since my second husband. I think I’ve lost more blood the past couple weeks than after that one abortion I had. Okay no, I didn’t have one. Who only has one abortion?

I have bites all over my body, they’re everywhere! And when I say everywhere, I mean, everywhere. I found one on my filet… my filet! You know that part of the buttocks that’s right next to the crack and attaches to the back of the thigh, which is not so much muscle as it is a tender piece of flesh? That’s the filet.

Go ahead shove your hand down your pants right now and give it a squeeze, you’ll know what I’m talking about. They even got me on one of my shirt potatoes… I mean, my God, these fuckers know quality when they find it! I can’t remember the last time my nipple got sucked on like that!

My first thought was “Oh crap, they’re bedbugs!” but how did I get them? It’s not like I go around sleeping with the homeless. Although there was that one guy; his skin-tight leather pants looked as if they’d been plastered on him since 1986, and there was a slight,  hmm… how shall I say it, musk scent to his nether regions… but no, couldn’t have been him, he had a first and last name, a full profile on OneNightFriend.com, and a place to live. It’s not like he invited me over to his tent on Hollywood Blvd! 

Then I remembered that trip I took last month where I stayed in a cabin, and realized that must be where I had gotten ‘em, so I emailed the owner about it and she called me the next day. I said she was a dirty, dirty bird and how could she have done this to me and did she not realize how terrible and difficult it is to deal with those nasty things?! She was very apologetic and told me she got so upset after reading my email, she had nightmares, and all I could think was Lady, you may have had nightmares but I’m living one! 

No, I did not ask for monetary compensation because I’m not that type of person, I only wanted to bring it to her attention so she could prevent any of her other customers from getting them. And anyway my lawyer said there’d be no way to prove it…

ahem

so I let sleeping dogs lay… lie… and that’s when it struck me: dogs. Dogs get fleas. I don’t have dogs, I have cats, but the saying isn’t: Let sleeping cats lay… lie… and it was then I concluded they might be fleas, so I decided I’d better consult with a professional exterminator.

I was hoping the exterminator guy was gonna be hot because who doesn’t want a really hot guy inspecting your private chamber *snort *snicker

“Hey baby, want a piece of my filet?” *snicker *snort 

Unfortunately he wasn’t hot, but he was really good at his job because he determined right away they were fleas, and he didn’t try to “fleas” me by charging me for bedbugs. Get it? Fleece/fleas? Anyway, finding that out was kinda like saying: I got good news, and I got bad news. But I’d much rather have fleas than bedbugs, and I know that sounds just awful. I sound like a dirty bird and I’m not. 

I’m a fleabag. 

I have red, puffy dots all over my body and it looks like I have smallpox. I mean, who’d wanna sleep with someone that looks like they have smallpox?!…

…?

Hello? Anybody out there? I’m waiting for one of you dicks to raise your hand already, don’t leave me standing here like a dumbass.

I Wanna New Drug

*This was originally posted on Jan. 17, 2018

I had to make a trip to the post office, so I prepared myself for the inevitable long wait by getting some delicious cookies. 

The post office is the wrong place to be jacked up on sugar

I don’t know why I thought it was a good choice at the time, but I’m not even in control when it comes to sugar anyway. When I think about eating sugar, a signal is sent to my brain that something delightful is coming, and it reminds me of the anticipation I felt knowing I would be snorting some fat lines of coke on Saturday nights in the Eighties.

Yes, every Saturday night

Go ahead judge me, I don’t care. It’s not like I do it anymore… mainly because I have no idea where to get it, but also because sugar’s a lot cheaper.

Cheaper than sex too, turns out

Anyway, studies have connected eating excessive sugar to reduced performance in parts of the brain that deals with memory, so I really try to limit my consumption. However, these experts said the same thing about cocaine and that had zero negative impact on me …that I can remember.

A couple weeks ago, someone gave me a gift of white chocolate peppermint dipped Oreo cookies, and normally, I never eat those things. I know, they sound delicious, but I prefer really good quality cookies, something imported or gourmet. If someone handed me a bag of Oreos, I would say no thanks, but I decided to try one of these because there were dipped in peppermint white chocolate and who can resist that? It was ridiculously addictive. After one bite, I shoved the entire thing in my mouth then followed it up with a few more.

Sort of like shoving a line up my nose and immediately following up with more

As it happens, I was at this gourmet market and they had almost the exact same cookie. They were right near the checkout counter, conveniently packaged in a mini pack of two cookies, so I bought some before I left for the post office.

These particular ones were called unicorn cookies because they had multicolored sprinkles all over them, which I don’t care about because it’s really just a marketing ploy. I don’t believe in unicorns, and even if I did, in my world they certainly wouldn’t be colored, they’d be pure white, like in fairy tales.

Hmm, does that sound racist?

I couldn’t get just one packet either, I had to get two… and eat all four of them at once. So there I was, sitting in my car in the parking lot, shoving these goddamn unicorn cookies into my face. I mean, I must’ve looked like some crazed drug addict. Then, once I got inside the post office, I couldn’t help but notice how bland everything seemed compared to my unicorn cookies.

The postal worker who assisted me, was really bland too, and he was talking me through the checkout process like I was a friggin’ moron and had never done it before. He instructed me each step of the way in this annoying monotone voice: “Okay, now you can put it in. Okay, now you can take it out.” (referring to my debit card of course), and it sounded just as perfunctory him saying it, as it does you reading it. If I ever questioned whether the rumor about postmen being really boring in bed were true or not, he put that to rest immediately.

Thankfully the entire process was over in about fifteen minutes, which I imagine is about the length of time this postal worker has sex…

…and the average time it takes for sugar to kick in…

…and the average time it takes to find the nearest coke dealer through my new coke app. You know, just if I ever decide to get off the sugar.

Nutballs vs. Cheeseballs

I really like Nutballs. 

Sometimes called Nutters, for short (Nutter being the British term for Nutball).

I don’t know what it is about them, but if someone is a Nutball, there’s a good chance I want to have them in my circle of friends. They’re slightly off, a bit nutty… but not as nutty as a Whack job. Okay yes, there’s a fine line between the two, but Nutball is the way to go; I always choose Nutballs over Whack jobs because Whack jobs are too extreme. Always eliminate Whack jobs out of your life, otherwise you’ll be miserable. 

Nutballs are fun, unpredictable and most importantly, hilarious. 

Not to say I love hanging out with Nutballs who take the nuttiness too far… again, there’s a fine line… and I have standards! Eh, they’re more like thresholds, but you know what I mean. Of course I have plenty of friends who are middle-of-the-road, but to be honest, it’s kinda boring, and I get bored quickly, hence the Nutballs.

What can I say, I like spiciness. Spiciness is the spice of life! I especially like spiciness in the three Fs: Friends, Food and Fu…n! You thought I was going to say fucking didn’t you? Nope, too obvious. Besides, the only spice I like in fucking, is vanilla. A girl can only take too much spice in the bedroom before she yells: Get off me you fucking freak!

ahem

Besides being a stupendous writer, I’m a really good conversationalist, which happens to be a dying art form. Yes, it’s an art form to engage in a conversation with another person, and part of the problem with people being unable to be good conversationalists is because they’re not aware it’s an art form. 

That, and they don’t know when to shut the hell up. 

Having a conversation is much like throwing a nutball back and forth between you and the other person. Sorry… not a nutball, a ball, a regular ball. You throw the ball to the person, they have it for a little while, and then they throw it back to you and you have it for a little while. And let’s put the emphasis on “a little while”… not thirty minutes, not an hour, capeesh? And there’s a rhythm to it; it should flow. Most importantly, when you’re a good conversationalist, you have a clear understanding that you cannot be the only person handling the ball.

Unfortunately, there are too many people out there handling their balls for way too long.

See, if you keep tossing the ball up and down into the air without passing it to the person you’re with, you’re not playing the right game. What you’re essentially doing is masturbating, and like I said, there are plenty of people out in the world masturbating, despite what the Catholic Church would have you believe.  

The point is, I like how Nutballs communicate; we speak the same language. 

I like the element of risk and uncertainty; you never know what to expect from a Nutball. You could be hanging out with a Nutball doing something mundane, like shopping in the grocery store, when out of nowhere they approach the cute, young checkout guy, slip him your telephone number while gesturing he could expect a blowjob if he calls you, then coyly asks where the bananas are located. 

Hahahahaha! That would never happen. No, no… not that he’d never call, of course he’d call… he’d just never get a blowjob. But you get the idea. 

Whereas with the boring person, you always know what you’ll get: Predictability. It’s boring. I want to laugh a lot, I want to have fun, I want a bit of nuttiness, because otherwise, what’s the point?

There is a drawback though. When you’re friends with a Nutball, you have to take the bad with the good, and there’s usually a lot of bad, that’s what makes them so much fun. But sometimes the bad is so bad, you have to sever the relationship for fear it’ll rub off on you. You have to be careful because you start to take on the habits of the people you surround yourself with. That’s why highly driven people hang out with other highly driven people, because if they hung out with people who had no ambitions, they’d be doing the exact same thing: Nothing. 

So I’ve decided I’m going to hang out with the people who lie somewhere in the middle of Nutball and not-so-Nutball: Cheeseballs! They’re not as nutty as Nutballs, but they’re still a hell of a lot of fun. Who’s never had a good experience with a Cheeseball? No one. Have you ever heard someone say “Look, you don’t want to hang out with so-and-so because he’s a Cheeseball and they’re nothing but trouble.”? Of course you haven’t, no one’s ever said it.

I realize Cheeseballs are often covered in nuts, but they’re not nuts through and through like Nutballs. Cheeseballs have that soft, cheesy center, which is what you want when you’re hanging out with a lil’ cray-cray.

Cheeseballs have that right amount of irreverence that makes them fun, without their being over-the-top. Maybe they won’t approach the guy at the checkout and promise him you’ll give him a blowjob, but they’d say: “Wouldn’t it be funny if I did…”  and that’s just the right amount of Nutball for me!

Okay, not really, but they’re a good way to wean me off of the Nutballs.

 

 

 

Pussy

This post was originally published November 8, 2018. Enjoy!

I have two cats.

Plus, I’m single, every so slightly chubby, over 50, and living with two cats (I think I already mentioned that), so I guess I’m that stereotype people are always talking about – that I’m the weird cat lady, which is bullshit.

Jackson Galaxy is the fuckin’ weird cat lady, not me.

I’ve never been a parent (or apparent… snicker, snort) but I do consider my two cats my babies.  

You can have great affection for your pets and not be weird, okay? I think it’s weird not to have great affection for them. After all, they love you unconditionally. Dogs… dogs love you unconditionally, cats do not. Cats love you because you feed them and they can take advantage of you. You’ll never gain the respect of a cat because of this.

They can turn on the cute when needed and they’ll let you adore them but you have to earn it and once you do, it’s only temporary because then they’ll shun you like yesterday’s breakfast; they play hard to get, which is why they’re called pussy… cat, pussycat. Or just pussy. You fellas know what I’m talking about.

I think it’s normal to love one pet more than the other one too, don’t you think? To all you parents out there, you know you love one child more than the others. Yeah you do, and if you’re denying it, you’re lying. Don’t worry, it’s natural to feel that way. One of your kids will always have something about them that annoys the fuck out of you because it reminds you of a character trait you have that you don’t like about yourself, so just admit it. The sooner you accept the fact that you have something about you that’s disgusting and not easy to like, the easier your life becomes, trust me.

For instance, the girl kitty… she’s adorable! She’s so pretty, with beautiful green eyes and super soft fur, but she’s a bit chubby. Okay, fat. She’s got that flappy-flap thingy on her belly that waddles when she gallops and it’s kinda gross. Plus, she’s always hungry and crying for more food which is really annoying to me. You see, I’m always hungry and can eat with an astounding amount of gusto so that’s probably why I get annoyed. I don’t have the flappy-flap thingy though, although I can’t say other things don’t waddle when I run.

I don’t run.

Oh sure… when babies smear food all over their faces, eat with dirty fingers and lick the plate clean, it’s considered adorable, but when I do it, I’m considered some sort of a pig, is that it? Well that’s a double standard.

Anyway, the boy kitty is my favorite because he knows how to manipulate the heck out of me and I guess I just respond to that more. Not that I would put up with that shit from an actual man. I would never take that baloney! Okay well I have in the past, but that’s history, I’m a much stronger person today, so now I can look manipulation right in the eye and say “Um, okay but only for a moment.”

ahem

When the boy kitty comes sauntering in, I immediately shove the girl kitty out of the way so I can pick him up and give him lots of gentle strokes and kisses and he starts purring right away, which is how a pussy is supposed to respond if you know what you’re doing. Most of you don’t know this because if you did, why you’d be absolutely drowning in pussy!

Am I right, Tomcats?

 

 

Shhh… They Might Hear You!

I’ve been thinking about how uptight we’ve become as a society, particularly as it pertains to humor, and it’s downright annoying. I would venture to say nowadays most people feel they can’t say anything without worrying about being negatively labeled.

Okay, maybe we don’t worry about everything we say, but we definitely worry about saying something that isn’t deemed “politically correct”, which is an oxymoron by the way. Have you heard the things that come out of politicians’ mouths? Politicians can say the most vile, racist, divisive, ignorant statements I’ve ever heard!  Well that’s not true, I’m a stand-up comedian, I hear vile, racist shit all the time and some of it is friggin’ hilarious.

See? That right there… that last statement. I probably shouldn’t have said that because I’m not even supposed to admit I laugh at those kinds of things, so let me say sorry for admitting I laugh at vile, racist jokes.

I’m not really sorry… sorry.

Let’s take a look at the following:

The reason Mexicans are the best people to work in the fields is because they are generally shorter and don’t have to bend over as far to pick the vegetables.

Maybe you were offended by this. I was offended by how bad it was, but is there some truth to it? Of course, so why is it offensive? Is it because it singled out one type of race – Mexican, or is it because it singled out one type of stature – short? 

It’s not my joke, by the way, and even if it were, I wouldn’t admit to it because it’s so bad. If you’re gonna be racist at least be really funny. Okay, if you laughed I can’t hold it against you because what you find funny, another person won’t, so that’s when tolerance comes into the picture. 

Now let me write it out a different way:

The reason short people are the best people to work in the fields is because they don’t have to bend over as far to pick the vegetables. 

Is this version better because it omits mention of a certain race? It actually takes a bad joke and makes it worse because it tries to soften the obvious. There is no difference to the meaning because the inference that a Latin American is doing the picking remains, and it does so because, when was the last time you saw anybody other than Latin Americans working in the fields picking vegetables? 

What if we took an extremely tall white person and put them in the field picking vegetables alongside a bunch of Latin Americans. Like say, Conan O’Brien, and he’s in a lot of pain because he’s bent over all day. He may have even done it already, I don’t know. But anyway, it’s funny because it takes a truth and turns it on its head. 

Italians aren’t good at politics, that’s why they invented pizza.

The inference is that all Italians make pizza. I’m Italian and I don’t make pizza. I don’t even eat pizza because cheese and I don’t get along. But pizza is, and forever will be, associated with Italians, just like the Mafia, Sophia Loren and cheaters. 

I admit, I’m intolerant and I’m preaching about tolerance, but it’s dairy I’m intolerant of, and if there’s anything one should have intolerance for, it should be food, like those friggin’ vegans. Vegans are just nutty… coconutty; they eat way too many coconuts if you ask me. And they’re really aggressive making their point about the food they eat, too. They’re the PETAs of the food world… snicker* You could say they’re PITAs… snort* snicker* snort*!

The point I’m trying to make is… is… what is my point? Oh yes, my point is there isn’t one person in the entire world who isn’t fully aware of another person’s cultural differences and considers that in their observation of them and perhaps even makes fun of them because of it. Except maybe Jesus, and he’s not alive anymore. If you say you don’t and claim you are not racist in the least and totally non-judgmental, then Jesus really did rise from the ashes.  

I was with a friend the other day and I made a comparison between the black plague killing 25 million people and the Coronavirus killing fewer than a few hundred thousand, and how we could do with losing 25 million people because the planet is overpopulated. I was joking (sort of) but she took it badly. So now I don’t know where I stand with her and it’s all because I think it’s funny that millions of people should be dying right now. 

Well that didn’t come out right.

Okay, I’m not saying we should go out into the world with no filters and just start saying whatever we want, that would be, well, it could actually be really funny (see above statement) but no, it wouldn’t be appropriate. I’m just saying we shouldn’t be so goddamn sensitive all the time. 

Can’t Touch This

I’ve always been interested in people’s perceptions, especially as they pertain to me. This is because I can weigh it against my own perceptions of myself and then come to the inevitable conclusion of how wrong they are. 

I mean, I could be wrong I suppose; I could certainly have a distorted perception of myself. 

Hahaha… hahaha… haha… that’s totally ridiculous.

Now, we’re all adults here and… I mean, I hope we’re all adults, because there’s a lot of R rated stuff in my blog, so if you’re here and under the age of eighteen, you need to leave immediately. Well, not immediately, read several of my posts first to make sure it falls under things you shouldn’t be reading on the internet… and make sure your parents don’t catch you in the process. If they’re really cool though and don’t give a shit, you could share my blog with them, I need the followers. 

Anyway, we’re all adults and probably know the definition of the word perception, but just for giggles, here’s what I pulled from the dictionary: The organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment.

First and foremost, our perceptions come from sight, if you’re a sighted being. We generally see things first before anything else in our day to day environments. That’s why images are so powerful and can sway you to purchase things you don’t need from places such as Amazon, but that’s an entirely different post.

We can create perceptions based on something else though, like for instance, let’s say you hear someone declare something about themselves; you can incorporate what they said into your perception of them, even though it could be an offhand comment. 

I went to perform stand-up at an open mic the other day and a comedian I know from the circuit was there and we got to talking about how ironic it was that everyone now uses bleach wipes to wipe the microphone down between performers, because that’s something I’ve been doing since the beginning. 

Microphones are disgusting harbors of bacteria because they’re shared by hundreds, if not thousands, of people, and in my perception, most people are disgusting, so I wipe down every microphone I come into contact with before I touch it. Anyway, he went on to say something about it being a good thing I had OCD. 

All you kids out there reading this already know that OCD stands for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder because most of you and your friends have been diagnosed with it, so I’m certain I don’t need to pull a definition from the dictionary for you.

So I thought, wait a second… me? OCD? That’s this guy’s perception of me apparently; I have it because I wipe microphones with bleach wipes. He’s totally wrong, of course, but anyway I responded “Hmm, I’m OCD? That’s interesting, I don’t see myself as OCD at all.” He went on to say that because I’m a germaphobe, I fall under the category of OCD because it’s a subcategory. Germaphobe, OCD, it’s basically the same thing. 

I’m not a germaphobe either, by the way, and I’ll get to that momentarily.   

First, let me start by saying this guy is really intelligent. He’s a professor and he uses a lot of words that, after interacting with him, I go straight to the dictionary to look up (perception, not being one of them) so even though I admire his intelligence, I did not agree with his statement. 

Second, I’m a sapiophile and find his brain very attractive, so needless to say, I’d totally fuck him, but that still doesn’t mean he’s not wrong. In fact, it makes me wanna fuck him even more because I imagine how hot it would be for me to be grinding on top of him while telling him how fucking wrong he is (totally hot). Except I’d need to keep my eyes closed the whole time because it’s only his brain that’s attractive. 

Kids, are you still reading this?! Okay good, because you need to know smart people aren’t always right.

Third, I didn’t argue with him because there’s no point. No, of course there’s a point, but I don’t wanna burn any bridges in case there’s an opportunity to fuck him, but anyway, here’s my point: Just because I don’t wanna put a mic to my lips before wiping it down with a bleach wipe after hundreds of filthy, disgusting comedians touched it before me, does not make me a germaphobe or OCD. 

Furthermore, most comedians, in fact, most people, don’t wash their hands after using the toilet, so if I’m being accused of being a germaphobe/OCD because I don’t want to indirectly touch your dick after you took a whiz, then went on to touch the mic without washing your hands first, that’s a huge error in your thinking. Maybe you need to consider there’s something wrong with you, not me.

But I’m the germaphobe… okay.

Okay I may have, possibly, did sorta kinda refer to myself as a germaphobe once or twice when I was wiping down the mic before my set, but still… that was a joke. I also can’t stand the thought of touching something that has germs on it, which is most things. So I’m being perceived as a germaphobe by really smart people and possibly a handful of dumbasses.

All I really want is to be perceived as sexy, funny, smart, and someone who likes to keep things really clean at all times because she worries about all the disgusting germs on everything because people do not wash their hands!

 

 

 

You Be the Judge

Timing is everything.

I’m one of those people who don’t believe in coincidences. I believe things happen for a reason, that there’s divine intervention. I notice it happening all the time and that’s really the best part; when you realize it’s happening and know the reason why. 

But timing is involved. It’s everything. If you don’t have good timing, none of those things will manifest. Not a believer in this? Well let me tell you what happened many years ago and you can be the judge. 

Back in the late 90s, I decided to become a U.S. citizen. Believe it or not, I wasn’t born here. I know, it’s hard to believe because you can’t hear an accent when I speak… uh, write. But it’s because I’ve been here since I was three years old. 

Italy. 

That’s where I was born. I knew you were going to ask. 

I’m Italian to the bone, but without excessive body hair and I’m not a thief. Well, not anymore anyway. Uh yeah, that thing about being a thief… I’ll get to that momentarily. For now, I have to address two things: I realize I’m stereotyping Italians by saying they’re all hairy thieves, which is not very nice, so I won’t do that anymore. 

The other thing is, I’m not 100% Italian. My mom was British, so I’m half and half. Basically I can steal your wallet whilst drinking a cup of tea. Okay I’ll stop with the stereotyping, I won’t bash Italians anymore… 

….except to say the men are total womanizers

…and their soccer team likes to cheat

… and,  

Stop.

And they’re thieves.

Stop!

Okay….

….I have a lot to say about the British, too.

Stop!

Okay, okay I’ll stop.

Lemme tell you what happened:

I applied to get my American citizenship, which was a lot easier to do back then; you didn’t have to wait nearly as long as you do now. Then I waited… and waited… and it was taking a really long time to hear back from them; it had been at least two months. 

At that time, I was a waitress at a diner and one afternoon at work, I overheard a customer mention to his lunch companions he was a judge at the immigration office and I thought “Oh my God, this is perfect! He could probably help me with my case!”, so I walked over to his table, introduced myself, and briefly told him what my situation was. I asked him if he would be willing to push my case through since it was taking so long. He looked amused, then he responded: “Well, I’m a judge and it would be biased for me to do anything to help you with your case.” 

Then I felt really stupid. Of course he couldn’t do anything. But then he said: “I tell you what, give me your name and I can at least check to see where your case is in the process.” I handed him my pen to write my name down but he told me I would have to write it down for him because he was sight impaired. 

I should mention that when I was younger, I was gooood lookin’ baby. I mean, I was hot, and I realize that probably helped. Yes, I know he was sight impaired but he wasn’t so blind that he couldn’t see a hot blonde standing in front of him asking for a favor! Why is his sight impairment important? I’ll get to that. 

A short time after that, I got a letter from immigration with an appointment date. I was so excited, it was happening! But soon I would find out there was a slight problem, and it had to do with me being a thieving Italian. Oh, and I lied too. 

I lied about a little incident involving a lipstick I had stolen from a department store and getting arrested for it when I was a wily youth. When you apply for citizenship, you have to fill out all this paperwork and answer a lot of questions, and one of the questions was, had I ever been arrested? I replied, of course not. Me? Arrested? Never.

The reason why I denied it is because I had that information sealed. Here in California, if you have only one minor offense, you are given a choice as a one-time thing to have your record sealed so no one can ever find out about your little indiscretion, so of course I answered no on the application. But when I met with my caseworker at the immigration office he confronted me about it.

Shit.

How the heck did they find out about it if my record was supposedly sealed, is what I wanted to know? The answer: This is the government, dumbass. If they wanted information on me, they were gonna get it. This was awful. Now my application to become a lying, thieving American would be denied! 

I gulped. Then I calmly explained what I just told you, that I believed my record was sealed and no one could ever find out about it. I went on to say that it was really embarrassing because I was young and dumb and not that person anymore. 

After letting me sit in the hot seat for a moment, my case worker explained that it wouldn’t be a big deal, I could just write out an explanation of why I lied and he didn’t see a problem with me getting approved. He smiled a big, toothy grin and it was then that I realized I was in on it… wink, wink. Get it?

As I stepped out of the office and started down the hallway, guess who I ran into? Yep, The Judge. The one who was sight impaired. How did he know it was me walking towards him in the hall, and how did he know I would be there at that time?

He approached me with a big smile and we shook hands and he asked if everything went well and once again, I was in on it… wink, wink… and I said yes, it all went well and thank you so much for everything, I really appreciate it, blah, blah, blah!

If I hadn’t been at work that day and met The Judge and had the audacity to ask him to, you know, push my case through, and if he hadn’t set things up for my appointment ahead of time, well… 

Wink, wink… timing is everything. 

 

 

 

Feeling Used

What are your thoughts on garage sales, Craigslist, etc? I don’t really wanna know, it’s just a lead-in for my posting. 

Personally, I don’t mind gently used items… including men *snicker*, *snort*

I have no problem with taking someone’s throw outs, it keeps more stuff out of landfills and if it’s in good condition, why not? During this lockdown tons of people have taken to cleaning out their houses and posting items for sale online or putting it curbside and there’s a treasure trove of stuff out there. 

I was thinking about how odd of a practice it is going shopping online for used stuff on sites like Craigslist and then going to this stranger’s house to buy what they don’t want anymore. One guy mentioned to me that I should never go alone to a stranger’s house because, in his words “There are a lot of psychos out there”, and I hadn’t really thought of it until he brought it up. You know, like the Craigslist Killer.

It’s not like I was worried though. I mean, who wants to attack an older, chubby lady? Yeah… I’m still hot though so maybe I should be more careful after all. The thing is, I live in the boring suburbs where I do most of my online shopping and to my knowledge there’s nobody like that here, and if there is a psycho killer living here, gimme his goddamn address, I wanna see what he looks like! 

He’d have to be pretty benign because look where he comes from. He’s been subjected to the mundane. If you’re a psycho, you’d probably come from the city where people piss you off every second of the day. The stench of urine alone could cause a mental break. Stuff like that gives birth to a psycho, not shopping at the mall.

A suburban psycho killer probably looks like the guy next door: He wears a flannel shirt tucked inside dad jeans with a pair of awful sneakers. I mean c’mon, that doesn’t exactly scream psycho killer, does it? He’s gotta look like someone who’s a psycho killer. Someone like… someone like…

The Unabomber! Now that’s a psycho killer.

What’s that you ask? Didn’t the Unabomber wear a flannel shirt tucked inside dad jeans? 

I uhh… ahem,  well I’m not sure. He may have had a beard or something, which definitely says psycho killer and… what’s that? The Unabomber lived in the woods and wore a flannel shirt and had a beard? Well how the hell was I supposed to know that? 

Anyway, I’m more worried about a dog than a psycho killer. 

Just the other day I was looking for a P.A. system (so I could go to malls and shopping centers and start screaming at people in a loud manner) and anyway, I found one on Craigslist and it was exactly what I was looking for. Well the person selling it happened to be a woman, so I wasn’t worried at all when I went over there, and when she answered the door, I noticed right away she was wearing a flannel shirt tucked into jean shorts.

Still wasn’t worried.

She asked me to remove my shoes before coming inside which isn’t a big deal because I do the exact same thing. Then her huge dog ambled over to say hello and I noticed his tail wasn’t wagging. That’s not really a good sign, is it? I mean, if a dog’s happy to see you, his tail would wag, right? I didn’t act scared or anything, I just started telling the dog he was really cute and patted him on the head and everything seemed fine. 

His owner took this cue to start agreeing with me about how cute her dog was because that’s what pet owners do, they talk about their pets like they’re the greatest if you say one nice thing about them. 

It’s annoying. 

Anyway, she brought out the P.A. and I sat down on the carpet and started looking it over. The dog naturally wants to come over to me now because I’m at his level and he wants to see what’s going on. So I started petting him on his head again but then he bared his teeth slightly… and his face was inches from mine… and his tail still wasn’t wagging. 

Okay, at this point, you’re probably thinking it would be a good idea to ask the owner to remove the dog. I didn’t really think of that… silly me. Instead, I asked the owner if this was Cujo’s way of smiling and being happy, and she said: “No, he’s kind of letting you know it’s time to stop petting his head. He doesn’t really like it.”

I know what you’re going to say because I was thinking the exact same thing: Why didn’t this woman tell me that her dog doesn’t really like being petted on the head by strangers instead of saying how great he was? 

So I stopped petting the dog. Then… well you’re probably wondering if I got bitten. 

No, I didn’t. Not by the dog anyway, but I can’t be too sure if I didn’t get bitten by something else because this woman’s carpet was filthy and I was sitting on it! I didn’t notice how filthy it was until I stood up. It was disgusting, and I sat on it. And I started wondering why the hell this woman asks people to remove their shoes before entering her home when she doesn’t bother to ever clean her carpet?!

The real threat about buying used items from a stranger online is not whether they’re a psycho killer, it’s whether their carpet is filthy and disgusting and their dog may or may not bite your face off. But the real lesson here I need you to understand is that I got the exact item I needed at a really great price from a woman wearing a flannel shirt tucked into jean shorts and I lived to tell you about it.

That style is so out of fashion. I hope she rethinks it.

 

 

 

 

 

SSSSSSSpray

The following was originally posted on June 21, 2018. Enjoy!

I wanted to get rid of some pesky annoyances, but it didn’t work because I failed to put on the proper man boots.

I’ll explain.

I had an ant problem. They got in everywhere they possibly could, even in my pants, where they definitely don’t belong… kinda like sand, or Republicans. I’ve been avoiding calling pest control because I don’t like poison and care about the environment… to a certain extent. I mean, don’t ask me to give up my plastic shopping bags, take-out containers, and fossil fuel or anything.

So I’ve been trying to keep them at bay, unsuccessfully. It got to the point where I finally couldn’t take it anymore and had to dig in deep to fight the bastards with everything I could (which is probably how Planned Parenthood and women’s rights groups feel under the Trump administration), so I called The Exterminator to get an estimate.

I envisioned a giant, robotic beast of a man resembling Arnold Schwarzenegger showing up wearing khakis and big, black boots with a fire-thrower slung over his shoulder, but all I got was a millennial, aka “home-dweller”, with a beard, sunglasses, and inked-up, scrawny body (look up millennial in the dictionary, that’s the exact description). I guess it’s fine, it is just ants, after all, we’re not dealing with Armageddon or anything. 

Anyway, he talked me into spraying the ant poison, which really wasn’t that hard considering I was at the end of my soap-on-a-rope, so he said he’d come back the following day and spray the perimeter of my house.

Now this is where it gets weird: I gave explicit instructions on where not to spray, because of my two cats, so when I got home, I could immediately smell the stuff he used, and it was where I instructed him not to spray. Okay, I was very clear in my instruction when I texted him a reminder in the morning… or so I thought. But I guess there’s a discrepancy in the way a bright, attractive, young(ish) woman and a scrawny millennial dude communicate through text: I use all my vowels, punctuation and emojis… and he doesn’t.

im sry i dnt mk mysf clr a*hole 😠

I was dumbfounded that he couldn’t even follow simple directions. As I was texting instruction on where he was to avoid spraying, I thought to myself, “Okay, he’s a man, so you gotta keep it really simple, don’t complicate things and it’ll be just fine.” You see, when you need to explain a job to a man, you have to put on your man boots; you have to think like a man would. That means you have to pare down any extraneous information, don’t make the language too flowery or cute, and allude to the possibility of sex afterwards if the work is done properly.  

ahem…

Anyway, apparently this reasoning was not enough, because you have to figure in visuals too. Why do you think all those stupid manuals have pictures in them? Because they’re designed by men, and men like pictures… Playboy, Sports Illustrated, Cereal boxes… I had completely forgotten to draw a schematic, silly me!

Plus, if I were really thinking like a man, I would realize the first thing he would’ve noticed as he approached my gate would be the bungee cord I use to hold the gate closed, because his thought process would go something like this:

See bungee cord… *grunt*

Bungee cord good… mmmm….

Me go to bungee cord… unga bunga!

Why do I use a bungee cord to hold the gate closed? Does that question really add any value to this one-sided conversation? I don’t think so. Please, let’s move on…

The only place I didn’t want him to spray was my patio area, which is a garden, really, and I instructed him not to spray in the “garden”. But then the damn bungee cord fucked it all up! A man sees a bungee cord and immediately thinks of strapping something down, consequently getting excited. The section of his brain that controls reason goes offline and the amygdala, or “serpent brain” kicks in (really, that’s what it’s called, I didn’t make that shit up). That’s the section of the brain that is the most primitive, in case you didn’t know, and there is a direct correlation between the word “serpent” and a bungee cord producing excitement in men, like ants in the pants.

I’m even getting kinda hot writing those words together.

So instead of putting up signs with giant lettering and arrows pointing the guy in the right direction, which I seriously considered, I failed by leaving the bungee cord where it was, assuming he would figure it out by the text. I can’t even say for sure that large signs would’ve been sufficient, I probably would’ve needed to completely remove the bungee cord from view; you don’t want to leave any temptation or distractions for the simple mind to get swayed.

So I failed to fully think like a man, which is totally natural considering I do not have a serpent in my pants. 

The Night We Changed Things

No Fat Chicks.

That was a popular phrase when I was a teen… a chubby teen. Fat, if you will. At least, that was how society and the media rated me, and I just love to be rated. One of my favorites is the “on a scale from 1 to 10” rating system.

Yeah, all women just live to be rated by society and the media (I meant love not live, but actually it works just as well). 

So I was fat according to a collective group of stranger’s opinions. 

Can I just say I hate that phrase? Hated it then and hate it now. I was shocked it became such a big part of pop culture here in Southern California. How come this idiotic phrase was directed at girls, but not guys? That was a question I asked myself repeatedly, because all of my guy “friends” were saying it, and saying it frequently, like it was a mantra or something. Funny how they considered themselves flawless.

I thought it was bullshit and so did all of my girlfriends; we were so pissed off at the injustice of it all. How come girls were only allowed to be loved and admired if they were “skinny” (a value that holds as strongly today as it ever did) rather than on our accomplishments, our characters, our strengths? As we sat around one night ruminating over the impact this was having on us, we decided to do something about it. 

We didn’t have any illusions about changing the world, believe me. How can a group of young girls change the ingrained misogynistic attitudes of boys, men and media in which we only orbited. I mean, it was (is) a man’s world, after all, and we were expected to just “fit in” somewhere. But I gotta tell ya, there’s nothing like the resolve of women who decide to challenge societal norms head on; it’s powerful stuff.

So we came up with a plan.

We armed ourselves with determination, a can of spray paint, and a camera. We had to do God’s work under the cover of darkness too, because it was that important. Okay, not so much important as it was risky; we were going to do something possibly illegal. Okay, not possibly illegal, definitely illegal. Look, no one said God’s work was gonna be easy. 

I hope law-breaking doesn’t offend your delicate proclivities like the phrase No Fat Chicks should.

Our first stop was a local strip mall, because if we were starting a revolution, we had to start strong. We didn’t need the spray paint just yet. That’s because this strip mall had one of those gigantic lighted signs containing removable letters that were used to spell out whatever it was the shopping center wanted to promote at the time, which also meant a group of girls could change the letters to spell out whatever they wanted to promote at the time.

And that message was:

No Fat Dudes. 

That’s right, fight fire with fire, Sister!

Speaking of sisters, mine was the boldest of the group, so she was the one who climbed up the sign and rearranged the letters to display our message of hope and solidarity. It was pure divine power that the sign happened to contain all of the letters we needed to spell out, too. 

We snapped some photos of the words lit up on this gigantic sign so we could remember and cherish our work. Then we headed to our next destination: The beach. A famous beach. A beach so famous, they made a movie about it.

Zuma Beach.

You may have heard of it.

This beach is met with swarms of people during the summer; thousands of hardy beachgoers are there every day. What a perfect location to spray our message. But we didn’t just limit ourselves to this one location, no. Along the way, we continued to spread our message of joy by spray painting it wherever we thought it would be most noticeable. For instance, on one of the tunnels you have to drive through on the way there.

We finalized our mission by spray painting the phrase on the exterior of one of the beach bathrooms. Scrawled slightly sideways, we made sure it was clearly visible and facing the ocean so everyone having to use the facilities would be sure to see it.

We drove home feeling victorious, like we had engaged in a battle and won.

We didn’t know it at the time, but we put something into motion that night. Something bigger than us, and something we never would have imagined in our wildest dreams. First we bragged to all our guys friends about what we had done, then we uttered the phrase as much as we could at parties and gatherings, or whenever we heard a guy say No Fat Chicks. We even had pins made up that said No Fat Dudes, in bold, colorful lettering, and we wore them every single day. Girls were constantly approaching us, asking where they could get one, proof we weren’t the only ones aware of the disparity between genders. It was amazing! 

Then to our surprise and delight, a journalist from Surfer Magazine happened upon the one we had sprayed on the beach bathroom wall, took a picture of it, and included it in one of his articles. You gotta understand something… this magazine was hugely popular in the 80’s, it reached hundreds of thousands of readers, and not just in Southern California, but nationwide. 

It was validation that we were having an impact after all, that how we felt mattered. We were looking at bias straight in the face and saying “We’re not putting up with your shit anymore, we’re neutralizing the destructive impact of your No Fat Chicks campaign, and we’re winning, assholes!”  

It was a triumph! 

I like to think we changed things that night, that we showed people how to challege a social structure that was put in place by a system that had no soul. I believe we did.

I have the photos buried somewhere amongst the many photos from my youth. I could’ve looked for them… probably would’ve taken me half a day to find them. But then I’d have to do something I’m not really ready to do: See photos of myself when I was young, bold, beautiful and full of life, then I’d have to face how much I’ve aged and I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to because I feel like I still am the same person, I just don’t look like her anymore… except maybe the chubby part.  

But you know something? I can close my eyes, take a deep breath and go inside myself to find her, because she’s still there; that innocent young girl who is bold and beautiful, who just wants to be appreciated for who she really is, and to not be devalued by how her body compares to others’ ideals. 

She wants to be loved, just like everyone else. 

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