Fat Guy in a Little Plane

Wednesday, December 27th, 2006
Why can’t I ever sit next to some dashing young man on a plane? We’ve all heard those stories and about people meeting the love of their life 30000 feet over Des Moines or some bullshit- why can’t they ever be me? Why do I have to sit next to the most uncomfortable human beings in the world? This particular flight was a doozie, but of course it was my own just desserts for being so mean and hateful prior to the flight. I board the plane, and I have the first seat on the right hand side, in the aisle. Well of course there is someone sitting in the chair, and of course he weighs easily 400 lbs. So, I ask him if he is sitting in the aisle or window seat, and the stewardess, without any prompting from me or Chubs McGee, pipes up and says, rather loudly “Oh, he has to stay right there”, as though he has been a very bad boy, and seat 1A is his time out chair. I reply that my ticket seems to indicate that I need to stay right there too, so we have ourselves a bit of a pickle. She seems unconcerned with this, unlike the countless passengers who are now backing up in the aisle. I turn to my rotund friend and say I don’t care whether he takes the window or the aisle, but he needs to pick one. So he scoots in, sort of, and I proceed to move in front of my seat, knowing just through shear spacial relations that my ass will in no way fit next to his. Now, I am not a small girl, I think we can all be honest, but I do fit into my chair just fine. No so with my seat mate. He was easily taking up half of my personal space, and on an RJ, where there isn’t a lot of personal space in the first place, this can become problematic.

Here begins the most uncomfortable plane ride of my life.

For those of your who have never ridden the 9:59pm flight direct from Mpls to Wichita, the equipment provided is what is known as an “RJ”, which I can only imagine stands for “Ridiculously Junior”, because this plane is itty-bitty. It is only slightly bigger than uthose radio-controlled planes you see nerdy junior-high boys playing with in the park. Needless to say, you need to get cozy with your neighbor on the best of occasions, but on this particular flight I felt I would soon be able to trace 1A’s anatomy blind-folded. He was literally sitting on me, or rather part of his dewlap was sitting on me. Now, I’m not one to make fun of people for being overweight, and I actually felt quite bad for the guy as it was clear he was intensely uncomfortable, but at a certain point I gotta look out for number one, you know what I mean? So I’m trying very hard not touch him any more than is absolutely necessary, because it’s hot and sticky and I don’t like strangers touching me. I cross my legs, but that shifts my butt over into his fleshy leg. I stick my legs straight out in front of me, but that pushes my lower back so far out of alignment I feel like I’m doing a back bend. Finally I settle on kicking my left leg up high onto the bulkhead in front of me, while hugging my right armrest and keeping my right leg in the aisle. I look like some acrobatic contortionist, much to the amusement of the surrounding passengers, I’m sure. Of course, this means that every time the drink cart comes by, I get slammed in the knee, shoulder, what have you, without so much as an “excuse me” from the loud, obnoxious stewardess, who began the flight informing us that we were going to Tulsa. This same dumb bitch asked me 3 separate times whether or not my ipod was off, because I guess she is unfamiliar with the ways of electronics and did not understand that a blank, black screen equals off, no matter how many times I showed it to her.

Grrrr.....

So I am currently blogging from the floor of gate A10 in the Minneapolis St. Paul Airport, courtesy of Boingo online service, the wireless provider the airport sees fit to use. I am paying 8 bucks for the priviledge of reaching out to you people, which I will gladly pay to escape the ridiculousness that has become airline travel in this country. I know I've written about this before, but it behooves mentioning yet again. Everywhere around me, as far as the eye can see is mooing, grazing, glassy-eyed cattle. God, I hate these people.

Has anyone noticed that Americans approach flying like they are fleeing a third world country? Everyone seems to be wearing the baggiest, ugliest most shapeless crap they could dig out of their closets. They cart pillows, blankets, garbage sacks, babies, food, as though the khmer rouge was right behind them. Gate A10, my new permanent home, is no exception. These people are fugly. These people are Wichita. That's right kids, once again I am travelling into the belly of the beast, and once again my companions on this journey are the world's greatest collection of sideshow freaks. There's the 800 pound woman, the man with backwards legs, the World's Most Boring Human Being, and all manner of plain people of the Great Plains. What is it about a certain breed of woman- they hit 35 and it's all down hill from there: stringy disgusting hair, girth roughly the size of Texas, flowered sweat suit, too much perfume. Do they just give up? Kids, as an example of what I am talking about, at this very moment in my line of sight is a gentleman of roughly Methuselan age who is wearing a neon lime green polyester polo shirt, stain on the omnipresent beer gut, natch. Of course there are the requisite slacks, slung low under his manly belly. On the opposite side of that spectacle is a woman, a girl, really, who fancies herself Paris Hilton, without the trust fund. She is wearing a olive drab sweat/ lounge suit, also slung low on her decidely more svelte midsection. She is chewing gum like a cow chews cud, lazily, open-mouthed and loudly. I despise every little thing about her.

Thankfully, she does not have a dog. Seriously, what's with all the damn dogs? I have counted 5 dogs in little bag-like carriers in the past hour. Why in God's name do you need to bring your bishon frise on a cross country flight? The poor little bastard gets to ride around in his own shit covered pope mobile just so that you can have the pleasure of toting a living thing around like it was this season's hottest handbag? Screw you. At least I let the animal die before wearing it. You want to humiliate something for your own enjoyment, then have children like God intended.

What is it about travelling by plane that makes me so vitriolic? I'm catty as hell on my best days, but flying makes my sartorial judgement rival that of Anna Wintour. And it's not just clothes that get me, it's the existence of other human beings in general. Their mannerisms, smells, expressions, voices, breath... it all just irritates the crap out of me. I find fault with the smallest thing, I find superiority in the miniscule and ridiculous. Why? I'm opened to suggested reasons.

Kiss my Ass, Logic Games

I hate fucking logic games. I hate them. Please, for the love of God, someone tell me what the following has to do with being an attorney or the general practice of law (and this is completely as written in the practice book):

A science student has exactly four flasks-1,2,3,4- originally containing a red, a blue, a green, and an organce chemical respectively. An experiment consists of mixing exactly two of these chemicals together by completely emptying the flask into and of the flasks. The following conditions apply:

1. The product of an experiment cannot be used in further experiments.
2. Mixing contents out of 1 and 2 produces a red chemical
3. Mixing the contents out of 2 and 3 produces an orange
4. Mixing the contents out of 3 with the contents of either 1 or 4 produces a blue chemical
5. Mixing the contents of 4 with the contents of either 1 or 2 produces a green chemical.

What the hell is that? My mother's been an attorney for 28 years and never once has she had to prosecute the case of the Green and Blue Chemicals.

So when you hear me bitch about studying for the LSAT, this is why. In the actual test I have to do four of these, with 5 questions a piece, in 35 minutes. As rabid squirrels bite at my toes, while strung by my elbows above a rabid shark tank. Ok, maybe not that last part, but you get the idea.

Don't get me wrong, Logic Games have a definite place in the real world. Example:

Hala goes out on a first date 4 times a month. On any given evening the gentleman across from her begins to a)sweat profusely, b)hoot, c)check the score of the game on his cell phone or d) is an overbearing Russian creep-fest. Hala goes out on dates on either a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday, either in the day or the evening. The following conditions apply:

1. Each of the gentleman has at least one of the above conditions, and possibly more.
2. If Hala goes out with the hooter on Friday, she cannot go out with the Sweaty Guy on Sunday.
3. Hala will not see the Cell Phone Guy in the light of day
4. If Cell Phone Guy is also Sweaty, he will electrocute himself, necessitating a redo of the orignal first date.
5. If Hala has to go on another date with the Russian, someone will end up dead.

Now, if they made questions like that, it would be a cinch, because under no logical circumstances would I ever go out with any of those guys again. But alas, the world of Logic Games for the LSAT is not as simple and straightforward as the cavalcade of horrors that has been my dating history. *Sigh*.

I've Missed You!

So, it's been a while, huh? How have you been? I've been good. I went home for a while for Thanksgiving, have been studying a lot for the LSAT and delicately crafting my applications. Translation: I went home for a while for Thanksgiving, I've been staring at my LSAT prep book in the corner of my room pretending it isn't there, mocking me and my non-studying, procrastinating ways, while writing so many essays I can barely stomach the English language any more. Hence the lack o'blogging. Much English languaging to be done.

Discussion topics?
1. The Dems took the house and the senate, Rumsfeld was fired and George Bush is pledging to work amenably with the likes of Nancy Pelosi. Has Hell frozen over?- discuss.

Well, no I don't think Hell has frozen over, although I do wish the dems could have won on their own efforts, instead of the A-Triple B (AnyBody But Bush) philosophy that put Clinton in the White House. Whatever, we're here, we're unclear on message, get used to it. That's not how it goes, is it? I am excited that Nancy P to the Losi is the new Speaker of the House, because that is one tough broad. I really do think she'll be able to keep the party in line, focused, and on-message. As much as I crave to the bottom of my very soul a witch hunt for the bastards in the White House, I think she has it right in taking impeachment off the table and working to actively create change. We don't want to make the mistake of gloating, because there is way too much poor governing to fix. The top of the agenda should be the reinstatement of oversight, of actual honest-to-God checks and balances. Personally i think this will just happen organically because now the executive and the legistlative branches are from opposing sides, but still, i think a clear move in that direction is important. It's been a while since this happened, so I think my righteousness has abated a bit. Sorry, this should have been a lot more vitriolic... I'm sort of disappointed in myself.

2. Read Michael Pollan's book, The Omnivore's Dilemma. Do it now. Right now. I'll wait.

Seriously, Pollan is one of the most interesting, articulate and impassioned writers I have ever read. Let's put it this way: he makes industrial agriculture seem nuanced and intriguing. I'm a bit bashful to admit that part of the reason that I applied to Berkely was because Pollan lives there. I think it would be hard to casually bump into him at a dinner party, woo him away from his loving wife with my feminine wiles, and spend the rest of his natural life cooking me sustainable, locally produced gourmet meals if I remained in Minnesota. I stayed up half the night reading about his adventures in the belly of the beast, the beast in this case being the American Agri-Military-Industrial complex. Eesh... you want to be scared off of fast food, save yourself $9 bucks and instead of going to see Fast Food Nation get OD from the public library. How sustainable and green of you!

3. I'm a-takin' that there LSAT on Saturday. I hope I can get me sum of that edumacashun at a fancy lawyerin' school.

I don't even really want to talk about this, but I think it bear mentioning. You all probably don't, as the majority of the readership of this blog are my friends, and you all have heard me bitch ad nauseum and ad infinitum about the LSAT. Well, come saturday, that will be no more. Then you can hear me bitch about waiting for my acceptance or lack-there-of letters to come. Hooray!

The End of Rumsfeld: A Play in One Act

An artist's rendering of how Rumsfeld's Resignation went down:

Bush: Rummy, here's your resignation form- heh heh heh.

Rumsfeld: You insipid little twit, I made you!

Cheney: Fuck off, Rumsfeld, we need a scapegoat for this whole democrats-taking-the-house-and-senate thing,and no one likes you. You come off like Grandpa Apocalypse.

Rumsfeld: That's nice coming from a guy that shot his best friend in the face for sport.

Bush: I hate it when mommy and daddy fight. (He sticks his fingers in his ears and runs out of the Oval Office.)

....and SCENE.

My personal love letter to voting

Dearest Voting,

I love you. I love how you make me feel, like I am special and important, like my voice is heard and I matter to you. Thank you for giving me agency. Thank you for the privilege of helping me participate in our democracy, and for reminding me of the struggles that others have had to endure so that I might be able to exercise my wishes towards the future of our country. You give so much and ask so little, Voting- just that I show up, spend a little time, and pull your lever on occasion.

I love what happens when we hang out, Voting. I love going to your polling place, greeting all the little old ladies, getting my crisp white ballot and filling it in with firm black pen marks. Most of all, though, I love the little red "I voted!" sticker that I get on my way out. I wear it proudly throughout the day, a badge of honor that declares our very special relationship. I love the way people see my sticker and want to give me free things, like Chipotle burritos, dessert and gas. I feel so joyful and rewarded through my involvement with you.

Most of all, though I love how open our relationship. I am happy to share you with anyone and everyone, and I love how open you are to that possibility. Sometimes I know I talk about you so much that my friends get sick of hearing about you, but you are just so important to me and I think you should be important to everyone. I don't want you to go anywhere, ever, and I know that the one way to make sure you are never taken away from me is to keep in touch, let other people know how great you are and really take the time to get to know you.

Love always,

Hala

October 17, 2006: The Day America Died and King George was Crowned

"On October 17, 2006, President George W. Bush signed the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which does away with Habeas Corpus and makes it perfectly legal for the government to secretly arrest any American citizen, strip him of his citizenship, hold him indefinitely without charges, try him in front of a military tribunal, and execute him in secret." I don't know what to say. And apparently neither does the rest of the country because they don't even know it happened. I didn't even know this happened until well after the fact, not because I am ill informed but because it got so little coverage in the general media. What the fuck, America? Now they really are giving away our civil liberties, burning them with the bodies of our soldiers on the funeral pyre for all that was good about this country, offering them as tribute to our glorious ruler George W. Do people understand that the executive branch now holds all the cards? This is about to get 18 times worse than the McCarthy trials- at least Joseph McCarthy couldn't unlawfully imprison citizens without telling them what they were being imprisoned for. He drove people to suicide with the blacklist, but as wrong as it was at least they knew what they were being accused of. Without Habeas Corpus we are all at risk. This is not an overstatement- we are now without the right to a trial by a jury of our peers, a limit to how long we can be held without that trial if it is granted to us, and most essentially the right to know what we are being accused of. This is supposedly only in regards to enemy combatants, but who decides what makes an "enemy combatant"? This mystery tribunal? Are we in a comic book all of a sudden? Where is this administration cribbing from- Battlestar Galactica? What happened to reasonable people in this country? Why aren't people rioting in the streets? In Hungary a politician says that he lied about some economic statistics and people are setting fire to the governtment buildings- we can barely keep ourselves from changing the channel. Perhaps part of the problem is that most of our citizens didn't know what Habeas Corpus was in the first place. It's exceedingly easy to dupe an unsuspecting public- how can the miss what they didn't know they had? Being uneducated about our government and our history is now costing us our most basic freedoms, possibly our lives. We are better than this America. We are better. We can do better than these people and their duplicity. We have become lazy and silent and overfed and comfortable but the comfort is costing us something much more dear- our souls. No amount of comfort and personal security is worth sacrificing this American Experiment- this great exercise in the will of the people. We have become a joke, the democracy without demos, the people. Even as a representative democracy we have failed- we do not notify our representatives of our wishes and we do not hold them accountable for their poor choices. We must do better, or we will perish. The United States will remain, but it will be a vastly different place than our forefathers imagined. It will be a place familiar to the Ray Bradburys and George Orwells and Margaret Atwoods and Kurt Vonneguts of the world- a nightmare of control and oppression disguised as personal choice. It has happened before- the Romans had their bread and circuses, we have MickeyD's and American Idol. Think about that for a second, American Idol. Idol. As in idolatry, as in worship. We are worshipping celebrity and excess while our leaders are quietly and quickly dismantling the constitution. We have become our own Nero, fiddling while Rome burned. Please, protest this. I don't care how you do it- call a congressional leader, a senator, write a letter to the editor, for God's sake vote on November 7th, but do something. We have to do something, we cannot be complacent- complacent is complicit. Keith Olbermann is right, history will judge us, and it will not be kind. Where were you when our constituition became just a piece of paper- I pray to God you weren't watching Dancing with the Stars.

The Hooter

What is it about men?

I mean seriously, what the fuck is it with them? I know much has been written on the subject.; women are from venus men are from mars or whatever bullshit is marketable to women who watch Oprah in elastic pants. But really, when it comes down to it, they are just plain, old-fashioned weird. It started in grade school, some bully on the playground pushing you into the teeter-totter, fracturing your pelvis and laughing, all because he liked you and didn't know how to take the funny feeling in his pants and articulate it in a non-violent manner.

Things are essentially still the same.

Case in point: tonight, I travel with two of my girlfriends (I'll call them Amber and Maureen because that's what their parents named them) to a new favorite hang out, the Town Talk Diner. I know every single person in this joint, mostly because once upon a time I worked as a concierge at the same hotel in which the owner used to manage a restaurant. The grammar in that sentance was horrible, but I'm a wee bit tipsy, so begrudge me the poor English and move on. Anyway, it's like old home week- I feel like someone is going to yell Norm when I walk through the door. However. There is a gentleman, and I use that term loosely, sitting at the bar who I do not recognize. He looks to be about 37, not bad looking, but nothing to write home about. He smiles at me and winks, like he knows who I am.

Gentle reader, he does not know who I am. I do not know who he is. But for the next two hours he unleashes a campaign of oddness that even wild gorillas attempting to attract a mate would be ashamed of. He does the whole catch my eye and wink thing like seven times before I order my first drink. He's elbowing his buddy like it's third period French class- I keep waiting for him to pass me a note. I would find it flattering, if it weren't so damn creepy. There is a very thin line between flirting and stalking, and this guy has not been aquainted with it. At a certain point in the evening he takes his two first fingers, dips them in his drink, sucks them (all the while looking right at me) and proceeds to hoot.

I'll repeat that for effect: hoot. As in hoot and holler. He lets out a wail that some hogcallers might be interested in hearing. Then looks at me again, leeringly, as though the hoot was what I was waiting for. Oh yes, be still my heart. All my life I've waited for a hooter. Take me, I'm yours, hooting-man.

Who hoots? This guy, that's who. Now please, someone tell me why this was a logical response. When I find myself drawn to a young man, I do not bellow at him like some creature from the Black Lagoon. I do not wink at him like I'm having an epileptic seizure and stare while he is trying to enjoy a perfectly decent grilled cheese sandwich. No. I smile, bat my eyelashes, perhaps even stop by his seat at the bar on my way to the restroom to have a casual chat. I do not hoot. This guy, again, not bad looking, could have come over to me, said, "hey, how you doing", or even, *gasp* pulled out the old chestnut of buying me a drink. But no. I attract men that think putting their hand in a cocktail and licking it off like some bad Jenna Jameson impression is the way to win my heart.

So I return to my earlier question: What the fuck is it with men?

Kids With Mullets: Why?

Upon arrival into the Minneapolis/ St. Paul International Airport I took the 8 mile trek to baggage claim and was greeted by one of the most horrific sights in Christendom:

The kiddie mullet.

This little boy, I'll call him "Cletus", was probably no older than 7 years old, and was running around the terminal like he'd just been given his first 8-ball (cocaine, not novelty item). Of course, cocaine is a high class drug, so maybe it was crystal meth. Anyway. Cletus was sporting faded denim jeans, high top sneakers, a Starter jacket (I didn't know they even made those for munchkins)and some manner of stain covered sweater- in all an exact replica in miniature of his daddy. Now, on top of all of this was a mullet that would have done Billy Ray Cyrus proud... it was super short along the back and sides with a litte tufting at the top, some spiky front bangs, and a series of curly ducktails eminating from the bottom of his skull like horrible fingers of sartorial ugliness.

Now I know what some of you are thinking: "The kid's parents are probably dirt poor you callous bitch." And you are probably right. But I don't fault them for shopping at Goodwill or keeping Cletus warm and clothed. In that they should be commended. What I don't get is the fashion haircut. Those sorts of styles, not matter how ugly, cost real money. So wouldn't it be better for all involved if you just cut junior's hair with a bowl and called it a day? Given a choice I think the world would rather look at Moe than Mel Gibson circa 1987.

This sort of hair choice on a child just defies all understanding. It's complex, it requires upkeep- even product in some extreme cases. The more hair you have on a kid the more you have to hogtie them to wash it, and you just know those little tendrils are going to pick up dirt from God know's where. And furthermore, why would you want your child to look like a diminuitive Nascar driver? Is it the red state equivalent of dressing your daughter in a tutu to make her want to be a ballerina or giving your son a basketball in an attempt to make him into the next Michael Jordan? And what if Cletus ends up like Martina Navritalova? She had a mullet too. Do you think his parents would be happy then?

So, Am I Moving to New York?

No.

Oh, you want more?

Ok, so, I loved New York. It was an amazing trip, it was terrific to see Melissa and Ben and to have a break from the daily grind of flyover county. The apartment was nice sized for the area, although my bedroom would have been so small I couldn't have taken any of my stuff with me, including my bed, or my shoes. Or my underwear- anyway I expected that, and that wasn't the reason, at least not entirely. I am an only child, and having lived on my own for a while (albeit with a roommate but in very large apartments) I think it would be a very hard transition to sacrifice so much personal area. I didn't think I would be happy because I would be uncomfortable in my home, something that I'm not sure I could handle and know I haven't enjoyedin the past. I can do it, but it makes me want to peel off my own skin. And all those things they say about New York are true too. It's dirty and loud and crowded and smelly and fast. And fabulous, of course. I feel at home in the city, with the fast-pace and the direct people, not rude just busy. It's the way I operate, and it's not exactly popular in the Kingdom of the Passive-Aggressive. When I'm talking to people, thats when I want to live there most. It's the most alive city I've ever been in, but it's a desperate, screaming type of life that can take a bit to adjust to. The truth is, I think New York is a miserable place to live if you don't have money, and I wouldn't have any, not a job, not the prospect of a job. I know that I said before that it didn't matter, but it's one thing to say it siting comfortably at your desk in Minnesota and another to be confronted with the day in and day out reality of living sans paycheck in one of the most expensive cities in the world. It could be done, but why would I be doing it? I suppose to say I could. Well, now I know I can; the question is, do I want to ?

I have to admit that returning to Minneapolis was like putting on an old, comfortable coat, but one that makes you look good and never goes out of style. I had an amazing first night in New York, but I woke up the next morning feeling strangely ill at ease. Part of it was a hang over, part of it was the knock-down drag out fight I was having with my dad, but most of it was homesickness. There was something refreshing about coming home last night, rolling the windows in the car down, driving along the freeway and seeing the sky, wide and open. You don't get that wide open space in New York, unless you go to Coney Island, or the Hamptons. Which is fine, but I think it's in my blood, that need for space, for being able to see for miles. I have run from Kansas, and some how it keeps pulling me back, if only spacially.

So I won't be moving to New York, at least not now. How could I, when Minneapolis and St. Paul are entering the height of haute cuisine and hipster trendiness? If Brooklyn's the new Manhattan, can Minneapolis really be that far off?

Probably, but for now it remains home, and for now that's entirely fine.

Audrey Hepburn is Doing Approximately 8000 RPM in Her Grave

Do you think in a million billion years that Audrey Hepburn, easily the most graceful and classy movie star to grace the silver screen would be advertising for the Gap? What the hell is her estate thinking? I can't think of two more incongruent things than Audrey Hepburn and bargain denim. The woman made a career on looking elegant, and the Gap makes a quick buck on dressing down America. It's sick.

Bend Over- Meditations on Flying in America

I have heard tell that once upon a time, in a land of promise and prosperity known as America, travelling by airplane was a thing of glamor and beauty. Families would don their Sunday best and be escorted through a shiny terminal to the destination of their choice accompanied by well-trained and tempered service professionals who would procure for them blankets, beverages both alcoholic and non, four star meals and reading materials of their choice. The compartments were spacious, the companions delightful and the children heavily tranquilized with liquor.

No more.

Flying today resembled nothing else so much as being on the bus in the movie Speed. You're hurtling through the air, cramped, unable to escape, and the person you must intrust your life and luggage too is too busy hating you to care whether you live, die or need and extra pillow- not that you can have an extra pillow, because there no longer are pillows. Pillows, blankets, magazines, snacks, and apparently the souls of most flight attendants have gone the way of the dodo due to "budget cuts". What budget are they cutting? Northwest has declared bankruptcy, is fighting with it's unionized workers, and is basically hemorraging money left and right, and yet they continue to fly all their newly-hired workers to Minneapolis just to get a urine sample. I'm sure you couldn't find anyone to do that testing in DC, or Alaska, or wherever the hell you live. And the executives certainly aren't taking the hit- you would think they could find .50 cents out of their gi-normous paycheck to front me some f-ing peanuts, but no. I now have to pay anywhere from $2-$5 for some lousy "snack-box" during my three and a half hour flight.

I was flying Northwest Airline (aka NWA- Norwegians with Attitude)to New York City, and while it wasn't the most hellish flight I've ever been on (that was American to Chicago when they stranded me at Christmas), it certainly was up there with voluntary dental surgery. First of all, there is the routine full body cavity search you are subjected to at check in- now I've spoken before about the TSA and how I feel about people with GEDs being the only line of defense between me and Crazy the Shoe Fire bandit, but now things are even more out of hand. Before my flight I was very responsible and checked the FAA website for the list of things one could take on board and what needed to be in check luggage. Here's a run down:

4 oz of KY Jelly- totally fine
Gel Filled Bras- a-ok
Cigar cutter- no problem
water- um, only terrorists and commies drink water (seriously, I saw TSA make a child pour out their sippy cup before boarding a flight... because a tiny Japanese tourist baby is going to be packing heat)
toothpaste- Oh, SWEET JESUS, hide the kiddies!

Sooooo... apparently you can have one helluva rockin' orgy on the plane (what are you doing with a half of a cup of KY jelly? How long is your flight?), but absolutely no fresh breath or moisturized skin. Martha Stewart should get involved in this craziness- she could develop a whole line of makeup and skin care products based on personal lubricant. Who knew KY was such a great hair gel?

Moving on from that ridiculousness, we are met with the flight itself. Now, American asses are getting bigger, anyone can tell you that. But planes are getting smaller in conjuction, to meet up togethger in the perfect storm of uncomfortable. I have actually read an article that stated that for shorter flights Northwest is looking to develop a standing "seat", ie a plank of wood onto which passengers will be strapped in like Hannibal Lecter. Does no one else see a problem with this? How can that be safe? We aren't astronauts, this isn't space camp, let the people sit down for God's sake. Of course, we'll have to pay top dollar for the priviledge of being lashed to our "chairs" like Odysseus avoiding the Sirens.

At this point I can say with all seriousness that the experience of riding the New York City Subway was far and away a more enjoyable one than flying pretty much anywhere. At least on the subway i can listen to my iPod without fear that I'm going to bring the plane down. How can anyone really believe that? How is listening to the Postal Service on the ascent of a flight going to jam the circuts? The thing is self contained, it doesn't receive or emit a signal of any sort. Are the electronic systems of most modern aircraft so delicate and fickle that they can be brought to a crashing halt by something with less communicative power than a walkman?

Excuse Me Stranger on the Street, But Did I Mention I Might be Moving to New York?

I just love the way that sounds. I like the way it rolls off my tounge, the nonchalance with which I say it, as though I might move to New York or I might go backpacking through the Himalayas, it just depends on which way the bohemian wind blows. Most of all I love the way people get that excited look in their eyes, like "man, I wish I could do that." I find myself bringing it up for no particular reason, sharing it with perfect strangers, finding any reason to fit it, however awkwardly, into conversation. I actually got dressed up to go to a play not because I wanted to see the play, but because I had gone to college with half of the cast and just wanted to casually mention to them that I, say it with me, "might be moving to New York."

What's with that? Am I so insecure I have to use geography to justify my existence? Is the possibility of living in the Big Apple supposed to be my entre into another, more exciting. and glamorous life in the eyes of my peers? Or is it just the exilaration I feel being able to finally admit to myself and those around me that yes, I do want to leave the comfort of my midwestern onclave and try my luck in the biggest city of them all? I tried for so long to deny that I wanted to live in a place like New York, tried to pretend that it wasn't important to me whether or not I ever made it in one of the toughest cities in America or was able to tell my children that once upon a time I hung my hat in the city that never sleeps. But once the seed of the idea was planted, once a series of events came into being that made it seem not only possible but probable I realized it was just fear all along. After I hung up with Melissa and was laying in bed, there was an absolute moment of clarity that came over me in which I realized that this whole time, at least since middle school, I really had wanted to live in New York, and that at some point I had tamped that desire down, trying to starve it to death. I hadn't wanted to go because I was afraid I would fail, that I couldn't hack it, that ultimately I was more wheat fields than skyscrapers. What brought on this fear? At what point did the little girl who was taught she could do anything start to believe there was an addendum to that statement, that I could do anything but x,y, or z? And what else is on that list? What else have I been suppressing deep down, telling myself I don't really want because admitting that I do want it might open up a potentially painful can of worms? That's a scary question, but one that I think is important to ask. What have I not given myself permission to want because the wanting is too hard?

I think part of it comes from growing up in Kansas. Despite the healthy ribbing and outright contempt I often express towards the 'Ta, I'm proud of my Midwestern and even my Southern roots. But with that environment comes a certain stoicism and pragmatism, and to an extent I think that living in the Midwest breeds a self-affacing quality into people, as though we must be humble, must not attempt to aspire too far or get "too big for our britches". I don't know if that comes from the cold, or the solitude, or the Teutonic/Scandinavian sense of character-building deprivation, but it's there. Ultimately it's as much our own doing as it is the doing of the coasts, we let them make generalized assumptions about those of us occupying flyover country. We play into their hands by voting Republican so fucking much and trying to put "Intelligent Design" into the state curriculum (Kansas, I'm looking at you).

I'm shaking off the fear and embracing uncertainty. Convention and routine haven't been working out for me too well lately, and to continue pursuing that direction would seem to be madness. I'm sick of feeling afraid all the time, of worrying that my life is passing me by while I try to make up my mind about who I want to be when I grow up. At this rate by the time I figure that one out it will be too late, so I might as well just do what makes me happy from moment to moment. I believe that the Universe (God, Fate, what have you) has a path for me, and as long as I continue to listen to that still, small voice I'll be able to find it. Where did Mary Tyler Moore go after leaving Minneapolis?

Note to Blog Readers

I accidently disabled comments for the past 2 months without knowing about it. Sorry. Please comment again, I have fixed the issue.

Also, I have a flight out to NYC scheduled for Sept 30th... so exciting! This doesn't mean I am definitely moving... it just means I am definitely considering moving. Then you can all say you have "people" in New York!

eek!

New York, New York????

My friend Melissa who I met during the Cornerstone Institute last summer in California just invited me to come out and live in the extra room in her apartment in....New York City.

New York City.

She said it to me, said, "come out and live in our extra room for $500 a month (which is like obscenely cheap for NYC). You belong on the East Coast." Of course immediatly I said no, I can't do that.... but as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I realized that it wasn't true. I could of course do that. Of course I could. Now is the perfect time, actually. I don't have a job I'm in love with, I don't have a significant other to worry about leaving, I could even possibly have someone take over my half of the lease.... I have my friends, who are incredibly important to me, but that's about it.

What's stopping me? And why does this idea excite me so very, very much? The thing that has always stopped me from going out to New York is that I didn't know anyone and I didn't have any place to live. Or a job, but you can always find a job. Hotels and banks are almost always hiring, and I have experience in both of those fields. But now, suddenly, those two other criteria were met. I have some money saved up, enough to make the move, I could sell my car and make even more, because who the hell has a car in New York?

It would be an adventure of the truly first class, and the more I've been thinking about it the more I realize that if I don't do it, I may feel disappointed in myself, as though I had somehow let myself down and been a coward. I'm usually pretty well-thought out, a planner, you might say, but suddenly I don't want to plan. Suddenly this feels like the break in the clouds I didn't know I was looking for.

Am I moving to New York?

Gobsmacked by the Cosmos

My Horoscope for Today: Those of us born under the sign of Cancer the Crab are sometimes pathologically self-sufficient. We can dole out love in abundance but be conflicted about asking for and accepting the love we need.

Ouch. That's cold. But I guess if the Universe can downgrade Pluto from Planet to Dwarf Planet, it can wound me too. Is that my problem, poppets? I don't know how to ask for love? So I run from it and seek it's polar opposite emotions, anger, fear, lust?

Comments and suggestions would be appreciated.

5 Years and a Day

Today is the day after the 5th anniversary of Sept. 11th, and it just so happens to be the primary elections for Minnesota. I can't think of a better way to commemorate the event then by exercising my right to vote. I hope you all join me.

At what point will this date just become another day? At what point will the wounds be at least scabbed over or enough of us be dead for it to be a dim memory, like Pearl Harbor Day is now? It's hard to imagine that will ever be the case, but in some strange way the certainty that it will provides some small measure of comfort. Not that we will forget the lessons learned on that day or in the aftermath, but that in some way the pain will lessen and we'll be able to examine it from the outside. I hope to live to see that day, so that I can see the men and women who have used September 11th as a buzz word and a campaign slogan villified as they should be.

We all have our "where were you on 9/11 stories", and there isn't much point in rehashing mine. I do remember that just a few months earlier I was lamenting to my father that my generation had no unifying event like Vietnam or the Civil Rights Movement to identify us coheasively and take us out of our little navel-gazing Paris-hilton obsessing bullshit. I didn't mean this, however. This was not what I signed on for. None of us signed on for the 3000 men and women dead that day, the additional 3000 American soldiers dead unnecessarily in Iraq, or the literally countless numbers of dead civilians we've been racking up like points in a video game in Afghanistan and Iraq. I sure as hell didn't sign on for the most partisan and duplicitous government since Nixon's. I didn't sign up to see Toby Keith use the American flag as a backdrop for racism and hatred, or the American government detain and torture people without due process of law, or our civil liberties chopped up into bits and served back to us as "Freedom Fries". I didn't sign on for the diversionary tactic that is the Iraq War, for the killing of innocent civilians who had nothing at all to do with the fight that was actually brought to our door. I didn't sign on to see the nation I love turn the clock back to the era of McCarthy and in a perverse twist, define patriotism like the communists did back in the day: blind obedience.

I could blame the government, but the people get the government that they derserve (vote!). Sure the government has a share in the blame; Bush, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Rove, they whole sinister lot of them are evil to the core of their shriveled black beings, but ultimately we are the collective idiots that put them in power, either by ambivalence, actually voting for them, or not getting the truth out there. I don't want to believe that my countrymen would willingly put these jackals in power if they knew the truth. I may not know the full truth, but I do know that you don't throw good money after bad, and you don't throw American dead bodies on top of other American dead bodies. The President keeps saying we are safer..... how can we be safer when we are at a two-front foriegn war, an internal domestic war for all intents and purposes, and 3000 people who weren't dead three years ago are now very much not alive? We cannot be safer when no other country has our back (and no, Georgie-Boy, Poland does not fucking count); we as a country took the collective goodwill of the nations of the world and literally pissed all over it in attempt to define ourselves as the "don't-fuck-with-me" nation of the New Millenium. We are at present the national equivalent of a steroid junky- so big we are beginning to destroy ourselves from the inside while simultaneously ramping up the hysterical aggression. That sort of behavior is why pitbulls get put down, and eventually we will too. In our quest to fight "terror", we have become terrorists ourselves. Or doesn't it count when the death toll is made of foreign civilians and our own national values?

I don't have any pearls of wisdom with which to end this rant. In the face of tragedy, disappointment, and outrage I think human beings have a need to fill in the gap with meaning and eloquence. In the case of September 11th we should resist that urge. Sometimes the dead shouldn't be covered up with flowers and poetry. Sometimes atrocities should be left as gaping wounds, much like the hole in the ground still left where the World Trade Center once stood. At a certain point you can no longer bury the dead. You have to face them. I can only hope that soon our nation will be ready to stop running from ourselves and hiding behind the guise of "the war on terror", and face the uncertain, but honest, future.

Knee-high Boots and the Meaning of Accomplishment

On sunday I engaged in a little retail therapy to recover from the weekend, mostly done at Target thank you very much. I found the Holy Grail of chunky-calved girls everywhere, the knee-high boot! And I found it in black and in brown! And in suede! I gotta tell you, before the boots I was feeling pretty shitty about myself. The night before I had gone out and done something so monumentally stupid and yet so clearly what I wanted that I had to be both punished and congratulated. So I punished my wallet and congratulated my closet with my two new pairs of boots. What was it that I did, you might ask? Well, here's a list of things, and you see if you can make out what it was:

Vodka Gimlets
Co-workers and soon to be ex-coworkers.
More Vodka Gimlets
Rides home

I have this horrible habit of putting my mind to something that I have no business putting my mind to and being able to pull it off with little to no effort on my part. But only when it's hooking up with completely inappropriate people or causing my enemies to have unexplained cosmic accidents (like getting laid off from the police force or breaking a limb) or getting everyone that I hate at work to quit or move to a different department. Never anything for the good of mankind or the curing of diseases. Why can't I use my power for good instead of evil? Why was I drawn bad?

Wait, i'm not Jessica Rabbit. I wasn't drawn bad.

I guess ultimately the lesson here is that I can really only accomplish things with Maciavellian expediency when I don't have a dog in the fight. When I have nothing to lose and really, nothing to gain either, that's when i am up to the challenge, when the gloves can come off and I pull no punches. When there are no stakes except my own internal narrative, I perform beautifully. So why can't I take that devil may care attitude and translate it into the rest of my life? Why can't I regard the LSAT with the same savoire faire as a Saturday night at the bar? Why can't I laugh off the pressures of paying my bills on time and in full in the same why I laugh at some random guy who hits on me? The easy answer is that it matters more, but does it? Does it ultimately matter any more? Are all things equal? Should I be able to go through life putting my mind to every task ahead of me with the same determination and yet lack of pressure that occasionally blesses my mental doorstep?

Should is probably the wrong word. I don't know how to turn off the caring. I don't know how to say that all things are equal, because I don't know if I believe that. I do know that every so often (and by every so often I mean about once a day) I want to shrug off the societal constraints of modern life and just do whatever the fuck I want- run away and join the circus, travel the world, take this very decent and well paying job and shove it, you know, the usual. Is it that I am selfish and morally bankrupt? Is it that I want to run away from responsibilty? Or is it that I want to do as Thoreau did and "live the life I've imagined", which in this case involves me doing whatever I want whenever I want. I suppose it could just be me being 24.

The problem with this is that there are consequences. I'm not Paris Hilton, there isn't infinite amounts of money available to me. If I drop off the face of the planet for a while and bum around Europe, I'm still going to have to get a job eventually. If I sleep with everyone that I want to, inside relationships or out, there are still emotions and other messy ugly stuff to contend with. The only way to live a truly independent existence is to live it independent of people. That way the only one you are hurting is yourself.

But is independence worth the loneliness?

My New Weight Watchers Meeting is Next to an Old Country Buffet

Seriously, that's just bad comedy.

Not that I would ever eat at an Old Country Buffet, but still... Welcome to America! The land of excess, binging and purging and a guilt-based diet culture. I should take a picture and submit it to the New Yorker. I just think it's cruelty, really, because a lot of people with weight problems also have budget problems, and enjoy a low-priced cornucopia in the vein of OCB. To me, that's the major problem with weight in this country, we make it too damn easy and affordable to put it on, and way too expensive to lose it. It's easy enough to say "eat less, exercise more", but when you live in Minnesota and working out requires a membership to an indoor gym 9 months of the blessed year, weight becomes a class issue. Fat used to mean affluence, but now it signals a lower standard of living, someone who doesn't take care of themselves and has no self control. That's an oversimplifacation of the situation, and it's quickly becoming an epidemic in this country. Our kids are sedentary and unhealthy, and our adults feel powerless to stop it. I have a suggestion:

Calm the fuck down.

Now let me unpack that for you, and trust me, I know whereof I speak. It's one thing to listen to Susan Power's skinny ass go on and on about "the insanity", but real madness is listening to someone who's been thin their whole life talk about weight loss. I'm not saying some who is thin can't have adequate perspective on maintaining a healthy weight and lifestyle, of course they can and do, but I'm talking about losing. And you can't understand losing if you've never lost, and never had to. What we really need is women like Wendy the Snapple Lady talking about weight loss. She hasn't been very successful, but at least I can appreciate her perspective. The nice thing about Weight Watchers is that everyone that works there has had a sustained weight loss for like, decades. I can trust them. So the first part of my CTFD theory is stop listining to over-pumped fitness gurus who do nothing more with their days then work out. You will learn nothing from them short of how to feel woefully inadequate, and that ain't gonna help, sunshine.

Next, stop with the low fat/fat free foods. I know this sounds radical, but seriously, fat tastes good, and if you are enjoying what you are eating, eating less of it isn't going to piss you off half as bad as it could. Also, keep in mind that some of that flavor must be replaced, and what replaces it is usually sugar, which your body turns into fat at the end of the day anyway, so you're screwed. I'm not talking about skim milk, but I am talking about fat free cheese. That's fucking card board, and cannot be good for you. Look at the label. If you can't pronounce half the ingredients, let alone know what they are, do not under any circumstances swallow it. Calm down, take a breath, and remember what your mama told you: was it, "eat processed soy product melted on your egg substitute and suck it down with some fat free bread while you are at it?" I'm betting not (and fat free bread? Seriously, how much fat is in a slice of whole grain bread, like .5?). I'm pretty sure it was something along the lines of "eat your veggies and drink you milk". Eat food, not food product. We get so excited about the next big low fat-no fat-food type thing that we forget that food's principle point is NOURISHMENT, not weight loss. When did we forget how to eat food in this country? I was in the supermarket today to buy some salad dressing, and all but the organic granola-eating-hippie salad dressings had high fructose corn syrup as the primary ingredient. When was the last time you wanted to pour some Karo syrup on your tossed greens? Yum. You know what's a no fat salad dressing? Balsamic vinegar. Lemon Juice. Even Soy Sauce. If you seriously don't want any fat, don't fill that void with the magic of modern chemistry. That's what gave us the A-bomb.

The third component of the soon to be pattented CTFD Theory of weight management is to slow down. Stop making life so f-ing stressful. We do it to ourselves, and we know it. We don't have to do everything, it is entirely permissible to sit on our asses watching bootleg copies of the Closer. But, while doing that all important ass-sitting, we can also be cooking a normal, food-only dinner, comprised of normal things like fish, vegetables, rice, whatever. The point is, when we are stressed out we make poor choices about everything. Our food choices under pressure, like a deadline, are the dietary equivalent of the complete fuck-up you walk out of the bar with at closing time. Your judgement is clouded by the time crunch, and what seems like a perfectly sensible decision at 2am makes your stomach turn a couple hours later. This nauseous feeling is true for both boys and greasy fast food.

Of course I started this all talking about the obesity epidemic with our children, and I think it's coupled with an overall epidemic of eating disorders, whether over or under. We do not have a healthy relationship with food as a nation, and it is quite literally killing us. I, like most American females, wish they would publish a list of the publicists, personal traners, chefs, clothing consultants, designers, etc. that help make our celebrities what they are. If they could just do that, I think I would get exhausted just looking at the list and feel sorry for the poor, beautiful creatures. But publishers don't do that, and so our daughters are growing up thinking it's perfectly possible, and in fact necessary to look like Jessica Simpson. We don't value health in this country, we value aesthetics, and if you don't fit into that aesthetic, well, hopefully you are smart. I don't understand how we got back here, obsessing about our weight and comparing ourselves with magazines, hoping a boy will notice us. What happened to Women's Lib? Even feminists these days are participating in strip aerobics and buying Us Weekly. And I guess that's their choice, but I feel that I know or know of far too many women my age who are just biding their time in their careers until they can nab a husband, and it makes me feel dirty.

What does that dynamic have to do with weight? Well ultimately what we are telling ourselves is that only thin people are worthy of love. I cringed inwardly at the moment in Little Miss Sunshine when Olive's father (played so on-spot annoying by Greg Kinnear) tells her that ice cream will make her fat and if she's fat she can't be a beauty queen. I cringed today when I was at Weight Watchers and saw an anorex-ercising mom bring in her daughter. The daughter was tall and maybe a little overweight, but clearly solid and in excellent shape. I overheard them talking, and the daughter was swimming 3 hours a day as the captain of the swim team! Why the fuck was she there? I hated that mother. I felt like smacking her I was so angry on behalf of that girl. What was it going to take for the mother to be proud of her daughter? What clothing size equals love? What did the scale have to say before she could be happy with the beautiful young woman she had raised, apparently in-between trips to the treadmill? So when I say Calm the Fuck Down, ultimately what I really want is for people to take stock of what is important in their lives. I think when they do that, really do that, their weight might become much less important, and once we stop obsessing about it, we just might be fine. The chatter isn't going anywhere, but no one says you have to listen.

Now, just file with entry under "if only Hala could take her own advice." I'll keep you posted.

I Got Schooled By the Homeless

So, four years of acting classes and tonight I had my performing ass handed to my by a bunch of homeless men.

Perhaps I should explain. I went to a workshop tonight that brought together homeless and housed people as a first step towards creating an original work for Homeless Awareness Week in November. Now, I have worked with all sorts of different communities throughout my shortish tenure as a theatre artist, and I have worked with homeless people before as well, although not in a theatrical capacity. But tonight, I who am never without words, was literally stunned speechless and thrown completely off my game. As one of the exercises towards the beginning of the evening, we were supposed to inact a "typical" scene of some aid workers trying to persuade some folks living on the street to come to a shelter. Since I was paired up with four homeless or formerly homeless men, I was of course supposed to be the aid worker. So I start to "get into character", trying to think up what I could say to these people to get them to come to my proverbial shelter, and in the back of my mind I'm thinking, why the hell wouldn't you want to come in off the minnesota february streets and into the warmth of the shelter?

Silly, bourgeoisie girl. As I went to work on my schpiel, these guys were ignoring me. Just flat out ignoring me. They were pretending to smoke a crack pipe, hit on me distractedly, drink, get a blow job (from an imaginary other homeless woman), but mostly just ignoring me. In real life they were being encouraging, telling me to keep trying, but they were trying to make a point, that out there is freedom, with no stupid bitch from the shelter telling them when to come and when to go, what they can have in their room and who can't be in their room. It may not be the most comfortable place to sleep, but no one can tell you what to do in the tent city. Even the cops avoid it.

I don't know why it effected me so much, but it was the first time in a long time that I felt truly out of my depth. I just had no frame of reference for this and therefore no tools in my acting toolbox. But mostly, I think it was the question that one of the asked me: "What would you be willing to sacrifice to get our attention." I didn't have an answer for him, for that particular scene or for my feelings about being an actor as a whole, and it totally knocked me on my ass. What was I willing to sacrifice? How far was a willing to go as a performer? I didn't know, but these men challenged me as an actor in a way I hadn't been challenged in a very long time. It wasn't that their performances were great, it was that their reality was so different from mine, and they were so completely willing to embrace the truth of it. There was no artifice, it was "in the tent city there are people shooting up and smoking crack and having sex with everyone around them watching, so if you really want to be heard little missy, you're just going to have to deal with it". They weren't embarrassed and they weren't trying to embarrass me- it was just their lives, and they weren't going to sugarcoat it. It was my responsibility as a participant in their narrative to meet them on their terms.

It had been some years since I had worked with the homeless, actually 10 years, to be exact. I worked in some soup kitchens and community centers on a mission trip to Chicago in the summer before my sophomore year of high school, and it really changed my opinion of the homeless. Before that, by virtue of living in Kansas where there are very few homeless people and a lot of vocal rightwing republicans, I thought that homelessness was a result of laziness and stupidity. I also thought that george bush senior had been a great president at that point, so you see how far we've come, yes? After speaking to many homeless people on the mission trip, mostly at dinners at soup kitchens and while baby sitting in community centers I came to realize that many thousands, if not millions of Americans are one paycheck or less away from homelessness. It's not about laziness, it's about circumstances, although every single homeless person at the event tonight said that remaining homeless is a choice. They believe that getting out of the cycle has to be your own doing, no matter what the situation. They respect that there are a lot of things in life that you can't control and that can contribute to sudden homelessness, but you also have to seek out resources and work at if you want to move on and out of shelters etc. This may have been a particularly optimistic group, but they seemed to have a good handle on why they were where they were, and articulately debated the causes behind homelessness, like chemical dependency, mental illness, and wanting to stay with ones family (a lot of shelters won't except kids under 18, so that splits up families, and many transitional housing facilities don't allow signifigant others or even married couples to live together). I was amazed by the educational and family backgrounds of the people in the group tonight. We had men and women with graduate degrees, 8 children, grandchildren, parents who were doctors and lawyers, recovering addicts and bible thumpers. There was a huge range of experiences in the group, and the saddest part was that most of them had jobs. One guy I talked to had a job and a car, but just couldn't get enough money together for first month and last month rent. Not to mention that even if people have the money, they may not pass the credit or criminal check. And how do you apply for a job when you don't have a phone or an address?

I was impressed with the people I met tonight. They were better informed and more well read than most of the housed people i know, and had a much better grasp of the socio-political situation of the twin cities, not just in regards to their own circumstances, but to the whole scene. They debated about why they were where they were, and how the community could collectively move up. They were funny and joyful, in a way that I don't know that I could be if I found myself without a home. I was grateful for the experience, and hope to work with them all again. And the next time you see a panhandler on the street, instead of pretending they aren't there, if you don't have the money or don't want to give it, just tell them that. Don't ignore them as though they do not exist. According to the folks I met tonight, they would much prefer you just acknowledged them, even if it is to say no. It's better than being invisible.

Ode to a Leprechaun

In true Irish fashion, I offer a Limerick of thanks:

There once was a wee man named Wayne
Whose Mac-ability garnered some fame.
He can't be understood
'Cause his accent's no good.
But man, can he fix a mainframe!

Thanks for taking care of my baby, Poodle.

The Day the Mac Died (or Why I Have Been Silent for So Long)

It's hard to talk about it. I still feel so raw inside, like a gaping wound the size of my whole body. I'll try to tell the tale however, so that others might be spared the horror I went through.

*gasp*

At 2am on August the 18th, I was returning home from an evening out with friends, and poured myself a cup of water to keep by my bedside. Unfortunately, for reasons that escape me now, I was at less than my peak gracefulness and managed to spill the entirety of said cup of water onto the floor. On the floor at this time was my ibook G4, aka the Love of My Life.

*sob*

Frantic, I tossed towels, dirty clothes, the cat, anything I could get my hands on onto the floor to mop up the spillage, but alas, to no avail. The damage was done, and when I opened up Mackie all i got was about three seconds of light and joy before she was plunged into stygian blackness. Something was terribly wrong! So I did what any right thinking person in my situation would do, I woke up the Mac tech that happened to be living in my house. This is the real reason Wayne came into my life, not because of Amy, not because they're going to get married and have 17 rather short leprechaunish babies, but because the cosmos knew that my Mac would someday be in jeaopardy. It's like the end of Signs, when you finally understand why Mel Gibson's wife kept telling Joaquin Phoenix to "swing away". To Wayne's credit he jumped right into action and wasted none of the time screaming and cursing at me that I would have if some person had awakened me from my beauty sleep to tell them i had dumbassedly spill water on a glorified appliance.

The professional advised me to put Mackie on the baseboard heater to dry her out, and he'd take a look at it tomorrow. Tomorrow came, and she was still behaving the same way, still starting just fine, getting your hopes up, then crashing and making me want to cry. This was the most boyfriend-like she had ever behaved, and I felt betrayed. Those who know me know that I am obsessed with my computer. I love it. If it were human, I would marry it. It's reliable, beautiful, stylish, and efficient. So much better than most of the people I've ever dated. So this new behavior was very upsetting. I had come to rely on something, and it was letting me down in a way I never thought it would.

Later that day Wayne called me to tell me everything was fine, that she was all put back together and was just behaving badly. There was joy in my heart once again. I was elated. I felt so happy to be back with Mackie, it felt right, like old jeans and childhood stuffed animals. But then, just when I was getting comfortable, a second round of tragedy struck. I could not get her to turn on. She just went blue, no explaination, no warning, just kaput. Nothing. I was inconsolable. I felt jostled by the cruel winds of fate, a prisoner of chance and the Mac gods. It was a terrible place to be. Wayne went in, and discovered that I needed a new logic board. Would I have to get a new computer entirely? Would we not be together through the good times and bad that law school had in store for me? Would I never again feel the warm embrace of my beloved Mackie?

Well, as it turns out, yes, I would feel all those things again. For $469.00 on ifixit, I got my baby back. I have yet to see her post-op, but Wayne says she is recovering nicely and is even a smidge faster. I could turn this into a commentary on how dependent we are on technology or how computers have become so essential to our functioning in society, but at this moment I really couldn't give a shit about any of that. I have my ibook back, and I'm once again a whole person.

Countdown to the LSAT

I have officially decided to apply to law school. However, deciding to do something and actually executing the change are two vastly different things. How did I decide on law school in the first place, you might be wondering? Well. Hmm. Um.

As many of you know my mother is an attorney and I have always been very impressed by and proud of her accomplishments in this field. Growing up people would always ask me whether or not I was also going to be a lawyer, and of course I told them no... I was going to be an actress!

Ha.

So the whole acting thing didn't work out because I got bored, and the whole changing the world through art thing didn't work out because it felt like hammering my head against a brick wall day in and day out. A brick wall made of poor dirty hippies who live with 17 cats. Here's the problem with wanting to change the world: the other people who want to change the world with you are infuriating. These people are all about nice feelings and everyone being loved and not actually getting anything fucking done. There is so much in-fighting, navel-gazing and incompetency in most non-profit organizations it would make your head spin. They are lovely human beings, but I wouldn't trust most of them to lead a cub scout troop, let alone the last great hope of humanity.

Wow. I'm a terrible person.

Anyway, so I decided that if I really wanted to make a tangible and in any way, shape, or form immediate change in the world I would need to become a mover and/or shaker. Also, I really want to be like Josh on the West Wing, and he went to law school, so I figure this might be a good first step towards becoming a cutthroat lobbyist (kidding. sort of). The first step towards this first step is taking the LSAT. This will be my first standardized test since the ACT and the SAT, and while I did well on those there has been a lot of beer and pot consumed since I was a senior in high school. I may be really stupid at this point, who knows? And everyone around me is putting the fear of god into me about not having started studying for the LSAT around the time I was actually conceived. Why haven't I started studying, when the test is little over a month away, you might ask. Here's the thing: much like the President of the United States, i'm not a studier. I don't study. I never have, and I've always done pretty well with that plan. This is not to say that I don't work hard at school, I do. But I don't really sit at a desk with a test prep book and "study", in that traditional sense. I imagine the hardest part about law school for me might be the learning to study in that traditional sense. But I don't really think deep down its my inner ferris bueller or spicolli that is keeping me from studying, I think it's what Yoda would call fear (of failure).It's like if I start studying for this test I'm admitting that I am really doing this, that I am really going to law school and becoming a lawyer and will probably never tap dance on broadway. Not that I know how to tap dance really, but still....I know that I don't want a life in the theatre anymore, but it's still hard to let go of the nostalgia for the dreams I once had (sorry, I was watching Dr. Phil today).

It's so much harder to apply for graduate school than it was for college. First of all, i have no fucking clue where I want to go to school. I bought one of those Princeton Review books that goes through every school ever ABA accredited, but I'm barely into the Ns and I've been reading it since May! Before I went to college I literally had two giant plastic garbage bags chalk full of materials sent to my by prospective colleges just because I had been able to write my name on the PSAT booklet. Now I'm applying to schools based on a two page blurb that may or may not have been updated in the last 3 years. Of course, I can ask for prospecti, but after the fawning that I experienced pre-college it feels dirty somehow, like begging for attention from these schools. I'm definitely above that.

I'm so far above that I'm probably going to end up going to some non-accredited at night law school in a strip mall.

The other reason that it is harder to apply for gradschool is that I now have a job, instead of parents. Meaning that instead of being fed, clothed and cleaned for (to an extent) I am having to actually take care of myself, work a full time job and find another 40 hours a week to commit to the application process. I know I sound like a whiney baby, and I don't care. This is why I am going back to school. Real Life is hard. Boo.

So if any of you know of great, affordable law school programs, want to help me write up my CV, or just do my applications for me, let me know. I promise you free legal counsel in the future. Whether or not I'll be able to get you off, well, that's just a crapshoot I guess.

To the Person or Persons Who Wrote that I Was "Too Direct" in My 6 Month Review

Ahem.

Buck the fuck up you whiney little baby. It is not my job to be your friend, hold your hand, on in anyway give two little shits about your wellbeing other than in so far as you are another human being. And even that is pushing it. If you think I'm mean now, I can show you mean, and much like the hulk, you will not like me when I am angry. So go back to your little desk, you passive-aggressive fuck, and worry less about my performance and more about your own incompetence. It is not my fault that you're a dumbass, and I'm not about to start tiptoeing around your personal issues. The next time you have a problem with me why don't you grow a set and tell me about it to my face? Just keep hiding behind your anonymous reviews and I'll keep treating you like the intellectual equivalent of a 90-pound weakling that you are. Because no matter what you thought your review of me would make me feel, mostly it makes me feel sorry for a grown person that can't even speak up when they feel they have been wronged. Until you learn to do that, you're just going to keep getting pushed around by the universe, sunshine.

How's that for direct?

Why I Should Apparently Never Leave the State of Minnesota

I bring catastrophe and discomfort in my wake. The Fursts have had a long tradition of either slightly preceeding or following natural disasters: hurricanes in Florida, earthquakes in San Francisco, tornados all throught the midwest. But I have now become a personal magnate for my own particular brand of travelling horror. It's always on the way back, as though the universe were trying to tell me that being on vacation is where I'm meant to stay. I'm frankly inclined to agree with it, but there are these pesky things like bills and rent that have a nasty habit of asserting themselves whenever I want to take off and move elsewhere. This time I was travelling to Kansas City, and while the trip down was rough, that was completely of my own doing. I had made the absolutely stupid decision to go out the night before I was to make the drive (just so we are all clear, this is a 7 hour drive meant to be commenced at about 6am in order to get me into KC at check-in time at the hotel), and thought, ok, I'll just have one drink and catch up with my friend Maureen. The thing about me and Maureen is though that we are not so much friends as we are drinking buddies. We are friends, we chat and we lend emotional support, but mostly we go to happy hour. That's how we met, that's what we do. We're good at it. So I go out at about 10pm to meet Maureen at this club where she wants to see a particular DJ. Only when we get there the DJ is a no show, so I think, good news, we'll just be here for a little bit. Wrong. There are $3 well drinks to be had, so we have them. I'm about two gimlets into the evening when a couple of friends of mine from my previous career at the hotel come over and say hi. I had once had a crush on one of them, so of course we're going to be staying for a while. Skip to several more gimlets, me falling on the dance floor (in the most beautiful and elegant fashion, natch), and 3am at Mark's apartment. (Don't worry, nothing happened, mom).

So there's this noise in my ear, and I think to myself, why the fuck is someone screaming in my bedroom?

But sadly, it was not someone being disemboweled all Braveheart-style. No, the wiser among you have already guessed that it was my alarm, a scant 3 hours later at 6am. And of course, because I didn't want to have to explain to my parents that I was late reaching Kansas City because I was hungover I get up. Actually, they would probably have more sympathy for that situation than most, but still, it's an uncomfortable admission. So instead of calling them and letting them know I was going to sleep for another hour I dragged my ass out of bed and into the car.

The car without air conditioning. Why does my car not have air conditioning you might ask? Because repairing the air conditioning in my car will cost be $1,450.00, and if I had that kind of scratch I would use it for a down payment on a new car.

Since this is the summer that Proves Al Gore is Telling the Truth, not having air conditioning on a 7 hour drive in the a southernly direction quickly became my own very personal version of hell. Literally. Like a burning lake of fire with a pitchfork wielding demon included. I should mention that nothing puts me in a more irritable mood then the heat. The heat and traffic. So of course the ruthless combination of record temperatures and the dumbest fucking drivers in America mixed to give me one lethal bad mood. Seriously, what is wrong with drivers in this country? How is it legal for someone to watch a DVD while driving a motor vehicle at 85 miles an hour? And why has no one else gotten the memo that the left lane is for passing or at least driving a hell of a lot faster than everyone in the right lane? I swear I want to mount a bull horn to the hood of my car.I was ready to kill someone, and that was before the hangover actually hit me, which it did somewhere in Iowa. Iowa smells like pig shit, and is the largest, longest state in the entire union. I don't care what the map says, if they have disproportionately given priveledge to the northern hemisphere they have also scaled Iowa to like one-fifth of it's hog-waste smelling size. And I could smell it all, because hangovers hit me like migraines, everything is heightened, including my sense of smell and my hatred for all human beings.

So finally, after what feels like a literal eternity I arrive in sunny Kansas City MO. The time spent there with my folks, by the pool, etc, was terrific. But then come sunday, I had to make the drive back. It was 101 degrees by the time I left and I was in no mood to fuck around on the interstate with some Missouri rednecks who couldn't find their ass with a map and two hands. I managed to evade most of them, but still was sweating like a stuck pig by the time I reached Iowa. Of course, in Iowa being a stuck pig is a popular thing to be, so I felt right at home. I keep hearing noise on the radio about storms coming into Iowa and Missouri, and low and behold out of nowhere a whole sky full of storm clouds appear. I'm officially fucked. I'm in the literal middle of nowhere, I have no map, and therefore have no way of knowing where I am in relationship to the storm. Of course, this ceases to be an issue when the barometer dropped like a rock and the clouds opened up. I was looking around for an arc and animals in pairs it was raining so hard. Everyone had to pull over to the side of the road and just sit tight. I couldn't get cell service because of the torrential downpour, so I was relegated to listening to the farm and weather report on KIOA (say it out loud. Clever, aren't they those iowegians). Fun.

Eventually the weather cleared up about an hour later and I was able to get back on the road, having lost much in time and patience. It simply reinforces my theory that whether it's being stranded in Chicago with no flights home, losing luggage on a direct fucking flight or being caught in the storm of the century, if I leave home, people get inconvenienced. Usually me. Perhaps it would be best for all parties involved if I just stayed put for awhile, on a beach with a boat drink.

Can We Officially Make a Bomb Out of Anything?

File this under You Have to Laught to Keep From Crying:

A sports drink and some hair gel are reportedly what "terrorists" were using to create explosive devices on about 10 flights between here and Great Britain. I think it's official: If Gatorade and Pantene Pro-V can combine to make a nuclear weapon, every bored 9 year old boy in this country has a de facto license to kill. At this point it's just embarrasing- we spend 89 gadzillion dollars a year on weapons to defend ourselves and it can all be taken down with a approximately $3.89 and a CostCo membership. As per ususal, I'm less disturbed by the plot than I am with our response to it, which has been pretty much as ridiculous as ever. Our administration has no imagination. Their responses to these attempted attacks are basically just to restrict our rights to the point where any trip to Grandma's most closely resembles a chapter from A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch meets 1984. They leap into action like your third grade teacher- punishing everyone because one wackjob thought this would be a good idea. The shoe guy wanted to use his tennies to create a fire, so everyone has to take off their shoes. These cats were going to create bombs out of the contents of a Walgreens, so no one gets to take lotion, hair gel, water, makeup, anything on a flight. I don't know about you, but that puts a major cramp in my style. Airplane flights are notorious dehydrating, and I for one need to apply lotion, drink some water, smooth down the do, and usually put on some makeup towards the tail end to avoid emerging from the plane like some sort of diminuitive Yeti. Doesn't this administration figure that if they stopped the plot Al Qaida might move onto some new material?

Which of course leads us into scary, new territory ducklings: maybe our government is misdirecting our attention in an attempt to get us all to fall in line and give up some of those pesky personal and political liberties that have been causing Georgie-Boy so much trouble lately. I don't doubt that there are people out there that hate America (oversimplification alert)and want to destroy us. I don't doubt that there are madmen and zealots who will stop at nothing to crush that which they disagree with. What I do doubt is that any amount of security checkpoints, gel-less hair styles and flip flops are going to keep us safe. Lets face it, we have the modern day equivalent of Barney Fife performing the general operations of the TSA. I wouldn't trust the security people at airports to feed my fish, let alone with the last line of defense between me and some psycho. I don't think these people even have to have a high school diploma, and I'm going to trust them to stop a terrorist attack at 50,000 feet. Right. Your ass would be history, and we all know it. If a terrorist wants to get on that plane, they are getting on that plane, end of story.

So is this all a song and dance to make us feel more safe or less safe? Is it an exercise in pretending to be protecting us so we'll feel satisfied with our security, or is it an attempt by the powers that be to raise anxiety and create the feeling that we would collectively stop at nothing just to be able to relax again. You decide. I know what I think.

I'm a Bad Artist

So I just realized that it's been over two weeks since I posted something on this blog. How awful of me. I've probably completely alienated my fan base. I've definitely been keeping busy, if it's any consolation, with meetings and protests about Israel's ridiculous war, weddings, visits from the Mommy, and work-party boat cruises. Obviously some things were more fun than others....

There is something that I have been meaning to confess to you all, my gentle readers, and it is this: I am a Bad Artist. The Fringe Festival as once again come to town and once again I am overflowing with apathy. I could literally not care less that this is going on, which always makes me feel slightly dirty, as though my theatre degree is going to animate itself and kill me with a thousand papercuts. I'm proud to live in a city and a state that houses this awesome theatre festival, but man, I just don't wanna go! Every year I read a list of the shows that are playing, literally hundreds of different things, and not a one catches my eye. And so I have come to realize, even accept, that I am just a bad artist.

I don't mean bad like Carrot Top is bad, believing props to be a legitimate medium for expression. I do fancy myself a decent performer, director and *ahem* writer. I mean bad in terms of my committment to being a participant or spectator to other people's artwork. I'm not big on supporting others, lets be honest. It takes a lot to convince me a show is worth seeing, and I don't know if this makes me an aesthete or just lazy. The Pre-Raphaelites struggled with that distinction too, and they were brilliant artists. Shitty human beings, maybe, but the kids could paint. I think the problem is really that deep down I find nothing more abhorrent than bad theatre (ok, obviously that's not true, killing puppies or stealing from orphanages is probably worse, but unless you're Snidley Whiplash you're just not going to see as much of those things as you will see truly, deeply, disturbingly bad theatre). Now I speak from experience kids, I have been on both sides of some really horrible pieces of stagecraft. I remember one play in particular where I was overjoyed to have a huge speech cut because it meant I wouldn't have to expose myself to the public and give voice to the drivel that was masquerading as dialogue. Man, that was a bad play. For those of you not in the "biz", when and actor wants less stage time, you're in serious trouble. Trying to make those words sing was like playing a musical saw. Every so often you could hit a note, but most of the time you are rubbing metal on a jagged edge. See? The writing in that play was so bad the memory of it is making my writing bad. Lets move on.

I can't say which is worse, being in a bad play, or being subjected to it. At least watching jarringly bad theatre can be entertaining in it's punishing absurdity. The problem is that I tend to get serious giggle fits when presented with absurdly awful spectacles, as anyone who went to see the show "Tales of Djoha" can attest.I can't control myself when it comes to onstage stupidity, I just lose it. This may create a disruption amongst the more honest, non-schaedenfreude-seeking theatre-goers, but seriously, the only appropriate reaction to a woman pretending to be a demon having sex with an elf-puppet while the music from Pokemon plays in the background is stunned silence followed by horrified laughter. There is no other response that makes sense. I guess walking out might be acceptable, but not nearly as much fun. Plus, when you walk out you have to deal with the sad eyes of the performers, watching you leaving and slowly dying inside with the sheer shame of being in this worthless piece of crap just because they can't admit to their artsy friends that they'd rather be working a desk job then cavorting with low rent muppets.

This is the show I think of when it occurs to me that I am squandering my degree.

I Heart Miss Japan

Tonight, while stuffing our faces with roasted chicken Waymy (meaning Amy and Wayne, thanks Tai!) and I watched the Miss Universe Pageant. This was of course a completely accurate metaphor for American society as a whole (except that Wayne is Irish...anyway): sitting on the couch, gorging ourselves while watching anorexic foriegn women objectify themselves on TV. Ish. But, that being said, it was kind of fun. These women may have been smart, I don't know, but their profiles were like a competition in the Insipid Olympics. One of the them, i think it was Miss Trinidad and Tobago, listed "Meditating, Watching Movies, and Socializing" as her interests. The next, Miss Puerto Rico (and as an aside, why is there a Miss PR? Aren't they techinically a part of the US? I know they aren't a state, they are a territory... is this a trade off for not having representation in congress?) mentioned "Watching Reality TV" as one of her interests. And Miss USA, who I'm pretty sure was legally retarded, mentioned "playing with her Cat and Dogs". I think that was a euphemism.

The one exception to this was Miss Japan. She was a looker to be sure, I wouldn't have kicked her out of bed (ok, well I probably would because a) I'm not gay and b) I'd be really freaked out to wake up and have Miss Japan sleeping next to me), but this was what won me over: her short list of interests was "French Cinematography" and "Flamenco Dancing". This may not seem like much, but in comparisson to "socializing" she might has well have listed "Nuclear Physics". During the Evening Gown competition Miss Japan (or MJ, like I prefer to call her) was the only one wearing black, while everyone else looked like some sort of demented taffeta cupcakes. She came off as elegant, intelligent, and charming, while the others seemed confused and uncomfortable. Then, the piece de resistance: during the "interview" (or one idiotic question that your other finalists wrote in eyeliner while trying to remember how to spell) MJ was asked the question "If you could change one thing in history, what would it be?" Now, knowing MJ as I do, I thought for sure this Okinawa homegirl would break out with "Not having nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki would have been great", but she did one better. In the middle of a beauty pageant, in which her job is to be objectified by a panel of mostly male judges and the international public at large, she says that what she would change through time was "the history of men oppressing women." Boo-ya.

Of course, MJ got second place, she was the first runner up, so in the event that someone finds inappropriate pictures of Miss Puerto Rico she might get a chance at that crown. But when she found out that she lost, she took her flowers and walked off stage. Didn't stick around to smile and cry and pretend to be happy for the winner like the rest of hypocrits, she just left, like "Screw you stupid bitches, I've got some French Cinema to watch." And I love her even more for that.

This is to replace my earlier, less articulate post on being a "QuirkyAlone"...I encourage you to read this one.

Now that I've actually finished the book, "QuirkyAlone", i think we should start with a definition of terms. As defined by Sasha Cagen et. al a QuirkyAlone, or QA, is a person who prefers to be alone rather than compromise their romantic ideals; who values friendships as their primary relationships and builds a family of friends; who can be in relationships but doesn't espouse the "tyranny-of-coupledom" mentality; who understands and lives the distinction between solitude and loneliness, and who are generally quirky, compelling individuals. I of course am a QA, but didn't realize it. I thought I was just a freak who didn't like babies and rejected the ideal of the picket fence for a loft and a vacation home in south beach. Case in point: everytime someone (usually a girl, lets be honest) has a baby they want to parade it around. I'm fine with that, good for them, they shoved something out of their body and they should be proud of that. However. They bring this thing for me to look at and they expect cooing and cuddling and all those typical girly behaviors, and I just can't deliver. I just don't get it up for babies. I don't get what the big fucking deal is. If I wanted something that pooped its pants and couldn't communicate in my life I would still be dating my ex (kidding....sort of). I get why people get all excited about their own babies and I'm sure I'll be the worst offender when I have kids (yes I want kids. It will be like a science experiment...kidding....sort of), but why do they expect everyone else to be all excited? They present me with this baby and look at me all expectant like I'm going to suddenly break out with the googoo gaga crap, and all I can think of is complete, adult sentences, like "my, what an articulate way to express your wants through the medium of the scream. What an elegant social commentary on the commercialism inherent in modern american life. I think i'll join you in your primal yell." Surprisingly enough, that never goes over well with the parents. I've lost many a coworker's trust with that routine. But to them I say, "no one told you to bring your fucking baby to work. This is where I come to do my job, make personal long distance phone calls, and write my blog. Now get your orangutan out of my face."

Ahem. I wasn't much of a babysitter, lets put it that way.

The fact of the matter is that ultimately I do want to be in a relationship and have a family, and I think anyone that spends at least 3.2 minutes with me can see that, but I want to be in a relationship that I haven't encountered yet. Every so often I'll see a kid out of the corner of my eye, and smile, knowing that someday I'll understand what all the hoopla is about. But I don't know if marriage is the right word, or partnership, or whatever. I'm not trying to be new age, I've just been thinking a lot now about what I want out of life, and what I should call the person that could accompany me on that journey. Right now I am loving being with my friends, and being with myself, in a way that I always have but hadn't given myself permission to enjoy. I always thought something was missing from my life because I didn't have a boyfriend (to put it like the junior high kids do), and while I felt fulfilled and loved, it was never enough. Then I actually got a boyfriend, and after much soul-searching and introspection realized that it was absolutely enough, and I was much, much happier without this freeloader taking up all my time and using all my gas to drive his lazy ass around town. I was much happier not being this needy, clingy thing because I thought that was how you demonstrated that you "really cared". I was so afraid of letting him figure out that I really didn't give two shits about his comic books and his beer brewing because I thought we would break up. After we did break up, I realized that if I was afraid to let him know I had no interests in his interests, it probably wasn't worth my time pretending to care and being resentful in the process. Since I broke up with the J-dog I have regained some of the confidence that went on hiatus when I started college and really let myself start to wallow in the joy of being single. I'm sad it took me this long to figure it out, but I think I had to go through all the bad, broken relationships, especially this last one, in order to understand that I'm the only person I can count on being with for the rest of my life, so I better be fan-fucking-tastic.

I don't know what's with all the f-bombs in thsi blog. I'm excited, I guess. I now officially know what to call myself besides militantly feministic and independent.

So what do QAs like to do, you ask? Well, this one likes to go to movies alone. That way no one can yell at me for talking at the characters, laughing too loud, crying, heckling, etc. I'm pretty much a movie-going nightmare, which is why I always reject it as a first date choice, unless I really want to see the movie and I can't afford to see it on my own (admit it, we've all gone on dates not out of desire for the person, but out of desire for a free meal when your cupboard and pocket book are equally bare....of course, this can backfire in the case of a dutch first dater, who is a dying breed because no one is going to sleep with a man that doesn't pay on the first date. I may be a feminist but I'm not stupid). I really like going to movies on my own though because it give me a chance to be alone in public, a hallmark of the QA. It's social, but not socializing, and it allows me to people watch to my hearts content. Plus, I can cry and laugh and engage with the movie one on one, which I find to be the best way to figure out how you really feel about it. You're not thinking about the person beside you, you're not gauging your reaction on theirs, you're just being you, watching a movie. And doing it in public involves some resiliancy, you have to be proud and know that people are watching you. I get dressed up, put on makeup, and open myself up to the possiblities of the universe. I know some people might look at me and pity me, but I think most people see the wry smile on my face and envy my confidence and self possession. And I like that too.

I also like going out to dinner on my own. Usually I'll do this with a book or a paper, but I always go with the hope that I'll get myself into a new adventure. There are a few restaurants that I go to alone so often that I've gotten to know the staff, the owners, the bartenders, and some of the patrons, of which many are doing the same thing that I am. I love eating at the bar at 112 Eatery because I feel like Norm from Cheers, but with much better cocktails and incredible food (Eat there immediately if you haven't already. 112 Eatery, 112 N. 3rd St in Downtown Mpls, 612-343-7697, ask for Nancy, she's the owner and married to Isaac, the chef. You'll probably need a reservation if it's going to be more than just you). I've made friends there, been asked out on dates, introduced important people in my life to other important people in my life, gotten drunk, had my birthday and generally had a whole lot of fun at 112 all because the first time I went there I was entirely, conspicuously and proudly on my own. People are attracted to me when I'm alone, they want to know my story and why I'm out without anyone else. It might start as pity on their part, but more often then not it turns into admiration. Hopefully I've inspired others to do the same. Some people are always going to think it's sad if you are out to dinner or a movie by yourself, but those are probably the same people that go to their 20 year high school reunion because that was the high point of their lives. So I'm usually able to turn that pity right back around.

So, lovelies, I encourage all of you, if you haven't done so already, to spend some quality, one-on-one public alone time with yourself and find out if you are a QA too. It's totally fine if you aren't, but if you find this action strangely freeing, read the book, and learn more.

Go See the Diane Arbus Exhibit at the Walker!

Last Thursday I went with my friends Sonja and Andy (who are married, in case it matters) to see the Diane Arbus exhibit at the Walker Art Center, aka the most confusing art museum in the history of the world. That's probably not true, I'm sure there are much more confusing museums, but this is the most confusing one I've ever been in, and as mine is the only opinion that matters, it might as well be the world. While Sonja and Andy didn't see what the big deal was (I believe the phrase they used was "scowling, ugly people being captured living bleak, joyless lives") I disagree. I thought there was intense, simple joy, and dare I say pathos in her pictures. These were ordinary people captured in seemingly ordinary and mundane settings that take on a greater social significance through the lens of time and space (Take that, cultural studies!). I craved the simplicity in the photos, in the raw nakedness and the lack of guile. Even drag queens in dresses, wigs and full faces of makeup seemed desperately, violently exposed, and somehow cleansed in the process. The picture and lives were dirty, but that grit made them seem true and pure in a way I can't really express. Go see the show; you'll see what I mean. Or maybe you'll think they're scowling, ugly people living bleak, joyless lives.

What made the exhibit better (and honestly, I'm not sure if I would have enjoyed it as much otherwise) was observing the other exhibit-goers observing the photos. It was two-pronged voyeurism that I really dug. I love people watching. Scratch that, what I really love is people judging, love looking at their clothes and their hair and their posture and their expressions and imagining a life around those things, which I guess when I really think about it, is what I loved about the Diane Arbus photos; her subjects were laid bare in her photos, exposed in all their minutiae, just as people are in real life, right in front of you. The people watching is always great at Art Museums. You of course get the requisite art students with their tragically hip trying oh-so-not-so hard to look accidentally fabulous; the middle age cultural elite, who will go to the opening of an envelope and wear their Walker and MPR Memberships like a badge of liberal honor; the clueless plebian tourists, but then there are the wild cards: the 12 year olds with their hippie parents, trying not to snicker at all the saggy, old boobs in the pictures of the nudist colony; the incredibly awkward first date where the guy is trying really hard not to look at these photos as pornography and the girl is trying really hard to remember why she said yes to the date in the first place; the guards, who are all artists themselves when they aren't trying to pay their rent (as an added bonus, one of the guards told me they loved my hair, so I will refrain from judging them at this juncture) and then everyone else. They are all remarkable.

I should mention that I have a love-hate relationship with people as a whole. I love watching them walk, think, choose, speak... and I am repulsed and yet attracted by much of what they do. In that way people are like a very bad train wreck- you just can't look away. Most people are so weird, so foreign in a fundamental way from each other and from myself, and yet in almost every person I encounter I find some behavior or article of clothing or speech pattern or gait that I want to try out, to emulate, to figure out how that element that so attracts me might be incorporated into the me-ness, like some characteristic magpie. Even with the photos I was trying to do that, catching my reflection in the glass and seeing the images reflected on my skin. How can I see myself through this image? I guess ultimately my desire to emulate them is really a desire to find that within myself- to understand how I and this other person are similar, and how we are different. I think that's what Diane Arbus wanted us to cull from her photos, that sense of difference and sameness living in the same space. As I walked aroung the exhibit, I could see people looking at the photos, examining them, and finding themselves somewhere within. Every so often I could catch the spark of recognition, as though they were seeing themselves as if in a dream, where you see your face but it isn't your face. You know that it is supposed to be your face, and somehow it all makes perfect sense. That was how I saw these photo, and the other patrons... these people were supposed to be me, and we all make some sort of weird, parallel universe sense.