[This post is supernBad right now becaue I took an ambirn so i cannot see teh srcreen, it is like advancing s w===iS I===o I will have to type tommorw to fic his blog becauer it his very bad norw.][OK: I'm proofing this right now -- Monday, 5:00 p.m. -- but I can't bring myself to delete the above gibberish in brackets, because I think it's the best thing I've ever written. I also woke up this morning and thought "I have to finish a Sunday Top Ten today," and was surprised to see that--OMG--I already did!!]
I don't think I'm going to have any actual worst nightmares or greatest dreams if I don't ever sleep. Carly and I were up all night on Friday for The Write-a-Thon, which we planned to start 'round 9 P.M., directly following the South of Nowhere viewing. However, due to a number of factors including the presence of Natalie my BFF from the University of Michigan ("We fell in love in English 125" is how the story begins), Vicky, and alcohol, we didn't start the write-a-thon 'til 1 A.M. Twelve hours and many pages later, Carly and I emerged into the brill light o' day and determined it was the brightest day of all time and it was possible we were no longer walking in a straight line.
It didn't help that everyone in my neighborhood is psychotic and was wearing things like bright yellow see-through tracksuits. I say something a lot like this right here.Anyhow, this is a continuation of what I got started earlier this week: an evaluation of my overused phrase "that'd be my worst nightmare," which's applicable to situations that're actually possible in real life and I'd probs not have an actual in-sleep nightmare about. Just things I'd call "my worst nightmare." Get it? Got it. Good.
When I was writing this intro on Saturday, I wrote: "My hair is so greasy right now, I could start my own line of hair gels and mousses simply by extracting natural oils from its silky strands." Now it is Sunday night, and I'd like to amend that: "I cut my own bangs today before I went to Cameron's wedding. I've had better ideas, but also worse."
SlumDay Top Twelve:
THAT WHICH I'VE REFERRED TO AS MY "WORST NIGHTMARE"
Installment 2: #5-#1
THAT WHICH I'VE REFERRED TO AS MY "WORST NIGHTMARE"
Installment 2: #5-#1
5) Spilling Something On my Clothing And Not Being Able to Change
I'm the clumsiest person I've ever known. Therefore, it's odd that I've chosen this neurosis, as I get stuff on myself all the time, but basically; when I do, outing over, I'm going home. Usually I don't wanna be out in the first place, so I'll force whomever made me leave the apartment to switch clothes with me if they want me to stay out. Surprisingly, this works. In other situations (e.g., work) I'll take a swing at stain removal or find a way to hide it -- borrowing a scarf, throwing on another top, etc., and I often bring back-up clothes for this purpose if I'm wearing white or eating anything tomato-based (which I'm not supposed to do anyhow 'cause I'm allergic to citric acid, but I like to live on the edge). I didn't do that tonight at the wedding, even though I wore a white shirt, 'cause instead I was just super careful. I realised it's really hard to eat food and not spill on yourself. How do y'all do it? Like, weird. You are all Jedi warriors.
Like those mortifying moments in Seventeen Magazine. Do you remember those? It was like, girls bleeding all over themselves with a big hole in the ass of their brand new jeans while singing off-key in the talent show in front of the cutest boy in school and his parents.
I actually switched "my drink" from vodka-cran to vodka-tonic to prevent impending spillage. 'Cause tonic is clear. Like windows. Not like doors though, doors are different. You can't see through doors but you can see through windows. You know where I learned that about the doors/windows? My Mom, when I used to stand in front of the teevee while singing/dancing and she'd say "Ree-Ree, you make a better door than a window." I was a dancing fool! Kazaam! [I'm running out of words, I swear, I need a new language, I'm running out of words and repeating myself like a broken record being sung out loud at the talent show by a beaten horse.]
I've been known to actually purchase new shirts post-spillage because New York makes it impossible to just swing home and pick up a shirt and this's probs one of the 50 million reasons that I owe Visa my first-born child and you probably do not.
4) Not Having Immediate Access to Coffee
Also, as soon as I get my coffee, I spill it on myself. Go up to "5" for what happens next.
3) Being Suddenly and Unexpectedly Without Internet For Extended Periods of Time When I Want to be Using the Internet
Last week, while battling zero phone reception and no internet at one of many resplendent temp jobs I've suffered through lately, I wondered when this changed for me. I'd always been slightly neurotic about being away from email for many hours 'cause I do so much professional correspondence on there. But last year on the cruise I was capable of not checking every day. Obvs this year I had to check compulsively--although part of that was because I was being cyber-harassed at the time blablabla you know what I'm talking about.
Seriously, I can't even get on the OurChart mainpage at this temp job! [Pause for the fact that I was trying to get on OurChart, which means that clearly I was scraping the bottom of the entertainment barrel without my typical entertainments available] It was randomly blocked there. That's a little weird, right? No OurChart? I can get on Gawker, but not on OurChart. You know why? Because everyone hates gay people.
Also Max: OurChart makes the DMV look user-friendly. Get your shit together already!
2) 10.11.06: From Email, Susie Bright was interviewing me about my my story "What Happened to That Girl," published in Bright's Best American Erotica 2007 ...
"Being in porn."
"Being in porn."
"Being in porn would be my worst nightmare. I'd die. Sex and the naked body and female pleasure and male pleasure are great, there's a huge "feminist friendly" porn industry totally growing right now, especially
1) Reading Something Old And Realising I Haven't Really Changed That Much in Three Years, or Sometimes Like, 15 Years
I was often "awarded" "Most Improved" as a little girlchild, which I despised. It's not a real "award" obvs, it's simply a recognition of how bad you were when you started. It was easy for me to win this; I was desperately shy and awkward and the unfurling of this social anxiety had a way of manifesting itself as something resembling "improvement." My walls, under proper circumstances, might dilute to reveal a more brilliant, palletable and talented Marie at the end of the summer theater camp session or soccer season. But rarely had I truly become better at anything, I just became confident enough to actually take the ball down the field all by myself or to actually emote.
I was going through old livejournals in Carly and I's hunt to uncover the funniest jokes we've ever made (there's a point to this, I swear) and what struck me was how little I've changed, after all.
November 2003:
I'm sick, it's turning me into a little girl. It's a funny thing, being taken care of. Wanting it, not wanting it.
I think sometimes we all just want a break from holding it all together.
Sometimes, Natalie and I just lie on each other. And go--ohh.
I guess I don't know if I'm little or big at all these days. If I'm excited about graduating or dreading it. If I even care right now that my body is aching and I can't stop coughing, or that I'd rather just no-show tomorrow than have to call and deal with our insufferable managers?
One of my roommates, Megan, just broke off her engagement, and tonight she was talking about it, and she was like, but now, where does this leave me, I had my life all set up for me and now here I am with no place to live, no resume, no place to go, no job, nothing, and then Natalie said me too, and I said look, me too, and Celesta said me too, and Deena said me too, and it's true, it's all of us, none of us have a clue what the fuck we're doing. And all those e-mails from the career center are mocking, in their own way.
There's a center in all of us we can't live without, and I want to fall in love with mine again, and sometimes in pure moments I do, and sometimes I don't know who I am. sometimes I'm irritated by the quantity of reading we're forced to do, when all want to do is watch movies, sit in Barnes & Noble (see, not Borders, cuz they are evil right now) and read the first five pages of every book in the place. write postcards to people that I owe postcards to. Write stories, or write anything at all. Call my grandparents.
Tonight feels almost as bad as the night I realized there was something v.wrong with my body, which prompted me to go to the doctor and get diagnosed with fibro....it goes in and out and eh, maybe I'll just take some Vicadin, and forget about hurt altogether.
**
18th August 2004:
Seriously: I don't know anything right now. I don't know what I want at all but I'm not sure I'm ready to be an adult. Any opinion I have is a phase, a whim, a concept, an unfinished idea.
Why does uncertainty seem so new each time? It feels completely unique, as does that trite truism disguised as epiphany, promising to lead me to breakthrough but apparently I 'd prefer just to sit at the edge of breakthrough forever. Like it's the dock of the bay.It seems like I've been battling the same problems for a few years now, and it seems like every time I advance somewhere, I take a few steps back in another area. I get on top of love but lose my money, I get on top of my writing but lose my friends, I get on top of work but lose my mind. You know? Like: I'd like, sometimes, for everything to just get up at the same time and come to the middle of the room. I'd like to rally all my troops.
I always freak out this time of year: I get heart palpitations and've been known to quit jobs, move apartments, drop or re-gain friends/lovers, cut my own bangs. [I also generally get one year older around this time of year too.] It might be related to the fact that I'm used to starting a new school or totally new school-related situation every September and now I just attempt to recreate that panic artificially, sans school.
Cameron, my agent/friend got married tonight. Her husband, Jay, is awesome. They are awesome. They should give everyone hope [they did]! We boarded the Lady Whitmore at the Chelsea Piers:
Stephen: Marie, I gave you very specific instructions on how to dress.
Marie: Wha? You said you were wearing a suit and tie. I couldn't find a tie though.
Stephen: I said a dress would be good for women.
Marie: I'm wearing a blazer! You said Don was wearing a blazer.
Stephen: [sigh]
Marie: Are you not gonna talk to me all night 'cause I'm not wearing a dress?
Stephen: You look great, Marie.
Marie: I won't steal any girls from you.
It was beautiful; the weather was amazing, the vows were lovely, the Rabbi was lovely, the sun was lovely, your girl is lovely, Hubble. I almost cried, honestly! They truly do have an inspiring partnership. Also they closed the ceremony with 'Love Song' [The Cure]. HOT.
J.Jackson [another agent from our agency] said: "She has so many bridesmaids!" and I said "I'm gonna have five." And she gave me a surprised look, since all night I'd been displaying nothing but cluelessness on all things "wedding," but what's funny is that's the only thing I know. I know fo' sure it'll be Krista, Natalie and Haviland, but the other two spots have changed and changed again, we'll see, I know how I am. Besides, Natalie and I might end up getting married, and then I'd need someone to take her spot. We always said we'd get a commune in Vermont together if no one else was willing to spend the rest of their lives with us. Which is likely. She has a boyfriend though, he's very patient and lovely also.
If I'd been giving a toast, I woulda talked about when I realised I needed to get a new passport in three days because Alaska is now, apparently, accessible only via international waters, and Cameron went with me to the passport office to be my "witness" at five in the morning just so I'd stop annoying everyone talking and freaking out about it. And she had to attest she'd known me for three years. She coulda gotten deported if they'd uncovered that lie, obvs. JK, like they never woulda done that. OR I'd talk about when we got stoned in the office and then she went to the gym and had the best workout of her life and I went on a date and made up a bunch of weirdo stuff to see if I could freak him out, and I mos defo did.
I realised, sitting on this boat in the water watching the ceremony, that none of my friends have gotten married yet, but I feel like I'm at the age where that ought to start happening, right? I've only been to a few weddings in my life: a half-cousin, a cousin, a half-grandmother and two commitment ceremonies: my Mom & Susan, my friend Marc from The Macaroni Grill & his boyfriend Mark.
Is it just us -- 'cause we're too picky, or career-obsessed, too restless, too "progressive," too busy -- ? -- too dysfunctional -- too gay?
I remember when I was 18, I had a 27-year-old boyfriend and the age gap seemed insignificant, we were at very similar places in our lives: fingering unpredictable futures, feeling time was running out to make those choices. I mean, we met as servers at The Olive Garden. My Mom didn't get pissed I was dating an "older man," she said I'd always been "very mature."
Was I a remarkably mature 18-year-old? Or is this constant grappling specific to the conflict between pursuing art/pursuing sense/pursuing the perfect scowl about the word "art" to begin with? Or is it possible that I'm simply an immature 25-year-old? [Totes.]
Not like having no fucking clue what you're doing with your life is something only done by the incredibly mature; but that at 18, I was already thinking I had to know all that, and soon, and feeling absolutely that no-one'd make that choice for me, or even encourage me in one direction or another. I started freaking out about this stuff when I was 14 and haven't slowed down since, except for when it made me sick [see: fibro] and I literally couldn't physically move anymore until I got my shit together.
Sometimes I wished a parent or boyfriend or girlfriend would say: "Marie, you need to become a schoolteacher or something pronto," or "Time to run the Fisher Funeral Home with us!" or "Move to Idaho!"
This is almost twenty years ago!:
I would totes wear that dress still though, it's so Margot Tennenbaum! Also I just gave myself that same haircut this afternoon. See what that is? That's "bringing it back around in the most suprising way ever, even to Me, and I wrote it."
I want my wedding, if anyone ever dares to spend the rest of their life with me and announce this intention in public, to be just like the one in The Muppets take Manhattan. Like when I walk down the aisle I want all the muppets to be there, singing. "Somebody's getting married ..."
Also, this is funny. Look how much I've changed since Apri 17, 2004:
37 comments:
Spilling food on yourself reminds me of my flatmate. She spills everything. At work, her bosses make her sit on a different table from everyone else when shes eating because she always spills the gravy.
We also found out recently that she doesn't use toilet facilities the same way as other people. Shes convinced that her parents taught her everything wrong on purpose, just to make adult life harder.
It's like when I was younger I thought it was only my family that took off all their clothes to bathe. Because you never see other families in the bath. So for years I was convinced that being naked in the bath wasn't a normal thing to do. Kids have crazy thoughts.
I've never had the first post before. Yay!
I hate spilling stuff too.
I haven't had a passport in forever and I LIVE in Alaska. it's probably that your cruise involved international waters, not that it's inaccessible by anything but international waters, because there's the air. I've never gone to or from AK any other way though. Which's a weird thought. Because I've come to and from plenty of times. Just always very expeditedly. Like: it was 4 hours, I slept through it, or watched the same stupid in-flight movie flight after flight.
Did you seriously cut your own bangs? *cries*
I'd go for a whole year older, or five, actually, at this point.
I can't relate as far as the whole I don't know what I'm doing with my life thing goes even though I can because I don't but I know enough to not be freaked out. I know I like cutting hair and I know that I'll be able to get a job doing it and if I'll be able to earn enough at that job to feed myself shall be determined at some later point.
I get worried and freaked about stuff like that a lot though, that's why I always make plans, I have Plan A and usually B and C and D and then I change my mind a lot "No, I want to be a writer." Six months later: "No, I'm gonna be a lawyer." six months later: "No, I'm gonna move to Germany, with my dad." Any opportunity to get thousands of miles away for a while or even just to stay, indefinitely, always comes off extremely attractive to me. I'm really skilled at running away. But I usually end up running away from what I run to and find myself back where I began.
I'm jealous of your needing coffee. I wish I liked coffee. It kills me when people swoosh in at work looking like hell on wheels, peel off their coats with grunts/groans/the like, and then gulp down the brown stuff, because they instantly revive! They glow! They gush! It's so irritating!
I thought I'd like coffee as soon as I'd be grown-up, the same way I would wake up knowing how to walk in heels.But I still hate coffee. Green tea is for pretentious twats and doesn't work anyhow; and thus the coffee-free life continues, bleary, gruesome, unexciting. "You don't drink coffee? How healthy of you." "I get so jittery on all this caffeine".
It's not health reasons, it makes me puke. Love the smell. Also it breeds love and understanding and conversations, like periods for girls in high school. If you were a late bloomer you missed so much.
But French coffee is not American coffee, is it? Your stuff is diluted to da max. Makes me wonder why Starbucks has invaded the Capital of Capitals.
Oh, and lawlaws I used to think that my family was the only one to bathe naked! I'm very relieved I'm not the only one. When did you discover your mistake? Were you relieved?
Ollie, that is awesome. Everyone else i've ever mentioned that to has just laughed at me. I think it must have been when I was about 8 or 9 years old when I realised.
I wasn't relieved so much as just in awe of how stupid I had been for so long!
I started writing this comment telling a story about having to orchestrate a Muppet wedding for this TV show. But I just deleted it, it's too random, even by my standards.
I think you are truly fortunate if you can have five bridesmaids. I mean, that's a decent number of loved-ones to have by your side.
As a kid I always imagined I'd have four bridesmaids. Since then, I've had to retrench two of them. It's a logistical thing - all four won't fit in the cadillac I'm hiring for the drive-through chapel in Vegas.
lawlaws: Wait, how else could you bathe? I mean, if you bathe with your clothes on, isn't that basically called 'washing your clothes'? Which is something I know a lot about, as I'm often dousing my shirts in water to clean off ketchup stains. Ha. I think that'd be amazing if that was really what your coworker's parents did, and an purpose too.
*
merc: Oh yeah, totes international waters. 'Cause of the cruise. I think I said that in some earlier draft but then the sentence was too long and annoyed me, so I just stuck it in there.
I think this uncertainty is like, the hallmark of our generation or something.
I totally did cut my own bangs. I even thought "Rachel will not be impressed by this." I got positive reviews at the wedding though, so for now i don't need to rush off and get it fixed. I'll see what Haviland thinks. Ha.
*
ollie: You should really see what it does to a Sim. You know, like in the game "The Sims"? Their little green arrow shoots up out of their gut into the sky and it's very inspiring. I totally was a late bloomer too. Maybe it's cause of coffee, which stunts your growth, I hear. I drink Green Tea sometimes too, I feel like it's gone past pretentious to genuine now on the scale-o-annoying, but i totes know what you mean. They have a brand called Pure Tea or something here that has no sweeteners in it, which I la-la-love, because bottled green teas are almost always oversweetened.
*
Crystal:
HA! That's the most amazing reason to scratch some. I figure if I go that route, I could rent a large van like the kind serial killers use. Except I guess that wouldn't be very classy. But then again, neither am I.
Whatever you have to say about the Muppets, I am here to listen. Waa Muppets yay!
I just thought people wore underwear, or a bathing costume in the bath and shower.
Not like fully clothed, because you wouldn't even get a bit clean then. But I couldn't see why you would cover your private areas in public and not at home.
I guess I didn't see nudity and non-nudity as being any different. Or something.
I always spill things. I either spill things or get things in my eye. I find it impossible to eat without getting something all over me or worse over someone else. The funny thing is when I tell myself to be extra careful I end up making more of mess that usual.
I hate iced coffee. Maybe it's just black iced coffee thats horrible but I think it tastes like stale cigarettes. I have a nice cup of coffee with me now, in my stolen Starbucks mug. I asked the man how much it was to buy one and he told me to just put it in my bag while no one was looking.
I hate going long periods of time without internet. I was in Spain a couple of weeks back and nagged and nagged my parents everyday to take me to an internet cafe because I would simply die if I did not check my MySpace all week. Also I'm dreading not being able to have internet all day when I'm back in school and the school filters only allow like 3 fucking sites.
The Paris Hilton sex tape was so boring.
I've promised about ten people that they can be my maid of honor at my wedding although I have no intention of ever getting married. However if I do get sweettalked into it I would like 'Love Song' played. Or maybe'Everyday I Love You Less And Less' by The Kaiser Chiefs.
Also, have you seen the episode of The Vicar of Dibley where Alice gets married and has Teletubbies as bridesmaids. It's killer.
i don't think i've read anything that contained sixthly, seventhly and eighthly before.
you look like your dad.
your stuff is always best when you just start going off on tangents. when you don't contain yourself to whatever number you're on in your post. when you get outside the box and just write for a while.
which reminds me that i need to get my Web site thinkingoutsidethebox.com up and running soon. it's a tool for helping high school kids avoid teen pregnancy by showing them all the ways they can have "fun" without vaginal sex. thinking outside the box.
anyway, your whole, "it's hard to balance all the aspects (love, money, work, friends, etc.)of life" thing never gets easier, so you can get that idea out of your head asap. trust me. when you're 65, you'll be married and living in massachusetts, trying to balance the pains of menopause, writing your memoir, dealing with not being attracted to your 62-year-old wife anymore, and deciding between going to play bingo and watching murder she wrote: the next generation. life never gets easier, sweetie. the decisions just change.
and the idea of your wedding (gay men, lesbian women) seemed like something that wouldn't interest me, but if i can dress up as Gonzo, i'm there.
that fifth paragraph of my comment was awesome.
I have it easy when it comes to "perfect" weddings/marriages etc. etc: I hate it all. That whole forever concept is so effed. I figure my life will be much simpler if I focus on the "me things" such as uni and getting an internship, going to the gym etc. Anything that involves another human being no longer interests me bc I feel that you can't trust anyone. Even when there's love.
that song from the muppets take manhattan... best song ever. together again! now we're here and there's no need remembering WHENNNNN... i just can't remember that you've ever been gone, it's not starting over, it's just going on! or something like that. it's up there with 'this used to be my playground' in terms of significant childhood movie songs.
i might be the only girl i have ever known who hasn't had a dream wedding planned since the barbie doll days. bridesmaids? huh? i don't want to spend time with anyone for five minuts, nevermind my whole life.
i have a lot of hoodies that i've bought on the fly.. nyc is awesome for random unnecessary purchases. then you have it and you're just like 'sweet, thank god there was an urban outfitters on the corner so i could drop fifty bucks.'
i just changed my mind. i want lozo at my dream wedding, dressed as gonzo. i will supply the chickens, camilla, etc.
word veri is tstvcykz, which is polish for testicles.
Reise, juggling life's responsibilities is fun and a challemge when we first go out on our own.But I found that over the years you get tired especially of the ones that involve money. That's what leads some to want steady income,so we know certain things are paid for and we have that place to nest taken care of.(lol) with electricity,water and food to eat besides Ramen R Us.
"Also Max: OurChart makes the DMV look user-friendly. Get your shit together already!"
I have never "tried" to frequent a site that you can't even get on most of the time. And then when you do get on you need to bring a bag lunch,because of the time it takes clicking your life away:(
Hey you look like your pops:)
verification" qcvemo (queer coalition vassar emotional hardcore?)
Fun Vassar Fact: In the Muppets Take Manhattan, they graduate from the steps of our dining center.
Fun Caitlin Fact: I have, on many occasions, bought new outfits and gone straight on to work/class rather than returning home to shower/change my clothes. one such instance followed a 21 hour editing session of my film in Prague. The other followed the disasterous houseboat party.
Quite soon, quite soon, I can watch you drink coffee in REALITY! (did that sound creepy? yup.)
Also- lozo- thinking outside the box is HILARIOUS.
Fifteen points.
The obnoxious part of me wants to say something about heteronormativity, but it has a squeaky little voice and the big guffawing laugh that the rest of me issued at your double entendre drowned it out.
LawLaws: I did wear a bathing suit in the showers actually at summer camp because we had community showers and I was a weird self-conscious weirdo. I think your view was very progressive/evolved for a youngster.
*
moonkiller: I also find it impossible to eat without getting something all over me or someone else. I like iced coffee only with milk. I do not even know what The Vicar of Dibley is but it sounds amazing. I saw about two minutes of the Paris Hilton sex tape and then I got boring and I got uncomfortable.
*
Lozo: Well, there's a first time for everything. And A sixthly and seventhly.
And: I do. We have the same facial expressions too.
There are many things in this comment that made me LOL, and also that warmed my heart.
The fifth paragraph was awesome. You should C & P it on your own blog. I just invented that, C& P. For "Copy and Paste." Someone else may've said it already, but I don't care, I'm reckless like that.
I love Gonzo. Flying into walls, that blind fearless ambition, etc. And the chicken.
*
Razia: Oh yeah obvs. I mean, I just had a really great experience with my last relationship, so I can't wait to get going on another one! Yeah! Go love! Bwaaah. I was criticised by my friends for being so Anti-Relationships for so long that I'm trying to be like "yay! go love!" lately. Hm. But also: sigh.
I think the part about marriage that appeals to me is that it means I won't have to date new people anymore, which's annoying and sometimes a massive waste of time. I also imagine my future mate to be out all the time. Once I was talking to this guy who had a terminal illness and when he told me he'd probably die before he turned 35, I was like "perfect, then I'll have lots of alone time." Then I was like, fuck, I just said that out loud.
*
Stef: I haven't ever had my dream wedding planned either, so you can count me in that group. seriously, all I know is the bridesmaids, 'cause I love my friends and would like to honor them. I guess I should just marry my friends, though they'd all get on my nerves ultimately. The rest of it always seemed so silly, but ceremonies of any kind have always seemed weird to me. I used to call Urban and Gap the gas stations of clothing, I constantly used their sale rack as a way to fix last-minute wardrobe issues and there're so many.
*
Latane_Blu: Luckily, I love Ramen!!! Yeah, steadiness sounds nice. I mean, in terms of a job. I bet Max does bring a bag lunch so he doesn't have to have weird awkward chicks-are-hot convos at Hooters with the rest of the boys from his rocket building company or whathaveyou. Hmm. It'd be cool if someone offered me a steady job, I might take it. Ha.
And thanks :)
*
caitlinmae: Nothing is creepy! Nothing is creepy! That is the best Vassar fact ever, aside from the awesome road-trip-for-Caleb-to-visit-Vassar webisdoe that will soon be added to the prestigious list Vassar's got going regarding new developments in famous films shot there.
I'm glad everyone buys new outfits instead of going home, I feel like I'm no longer alone in this reckless-budgeting. Go me. or US!
*
good call on keeping the brackets. personally i think brackets are amazing..
also, good call on the bangs, and if you can't find a job anywhere else, maybe become a stylist
i sent in a nightmare story to seventeen magazine once and was really upset when i never saw it printed.. looking back i don't know which is worse, sending it or the event itself
I am currently without reliable internet access, because the wireless network at my school is really unreliable, and the ITS guy still hasn't come to fix my ethernet connection. It took me a good ten minutes to connect to your blog; very frustrating
You should get one of those tide-to-go pen things to fix your spill stains.
The endless emails from the career center are so annoying, and serve only to remind me that I am pathetically unemployed.
What freaks me out more than lots of people I went to high school with getting married is the even larger number of people that I went to high school with having babies. (I'm only 20!)
Like stef, I have never day-dreamed about my potential future wedding. I am also one of the only women I know who HATES to go shoe shopping.
I've commented anonymously before, but I just got a gmail account, so apparently I have a username now. It kinda freaked me out cuz I didn't know google owned Blogger and I didn't know how Blogger knew my name.
This is amazing and timely and I am, as Riese knows, about to attend, be the maid of honor for, and sing in the wedding of my "first friend to get married," this weekend in Ithaca.
Also, hearing a lot about A CATERED AFFAIR and thinking about the idea of weddings and how ridiculous they are...oh, it's just...so...
Riese, I can't wait to see the bangs.
Everyone, I will let you know how she did.
Or, rather, Samantha certainly will...
wasn't the chicken's name Camilla? did i ever tell you i've seen every episode of Muppet Babies? well i have. i think in half of the episodes, they'd splice in the scene from Star Wars where the Death Star blows up Alderon.
i've said too much.
Your slip up made me lol. I'm sure it wasn't so lol-worthy then but yeah...
Thats a really good way to look at marriage actually, just locking it in, I like it. It's awesome how you're trying to be positive about your future prospects, even if the game is rigged and the house always wins. And by house I mean misery.
Wow I sound v disturbed, I'm going to stop typing now.
Sometimes not changing much over time is a good thing. I look back at myself 2 years ago and hardy recognise who i was back then, ive changed so much in the last few years, i still have no idea what i want to do in life, but i know myself better, which is good, but sometimes i wish i was the same as i was back then, wish i didnt know things i know and that life was as simple as it was. Change can just make things complicated. And maybe you not changing much just means you are who your suppose to be, no change left to happen.
p.s in my head i got totally carried away with the idea of "star spotting" you and your friends.... i even created a points system!! This is weird i know, but once an idea's in there, it just kind of grows
I got an award in primary school for ‘trying to work quietly’ – the hyperactive child’s equivalent to ‘most improved’
I think I may be able to relegate you to second place for the clumsiest person ever. prime examples – the fall off the treadmill and the time at work when I almost slipped only to have someone catch me by the neck – which meant I looked like a domestic abuse victim for a week. I spill a lot too.
No internet kills me, because I know there's so much catching up ahead of me whenever I get it back. Online life is like a job.
Not having a clue makes sense. We're in the 20s. Lotta time left, kid. I'm at a "dream job" - or so everyone keeps telling me; I'm posting on this soon - and have no idea what the fuck I'm doing next. I just know it involves not being in Cooperstown after next summer. I'd rather have too much going on than too little, and that would be reasons 1-5 that I'm overextended right now. Go figure I just committed to relaunching the Jew blog. Stupid good ideas.
Oh, and PS-
The Kim Kardashian sex tape was more boring than the Paris Hilton tape times ten. At least Pilton did funny things like hopping off and crawling across the bed to answer her cell phone. ... I want that time back.
i'm thinking The Best Years is pretty much the O.C.: The College Years. Like, could they have one episode where someone does not get shot/robbed/fall off a roof/try to jump out a window/otherwise harm themselves? Please?
And Spencer looked adorable in SoN on Friday. For sure.
Btw, after all this talk of weddings on here yesterday. I managed to dream about choosing somewhere to get married last night.
I can add that to the list of dreams caused by auto-win. Which seems to be increasing weekly at the moment.
Cait: Brackets are the new non-brackets. Of course, the real question is: what makes more sense, my first paragraph (in brackets) or the brackets we discussed on Monday? Life’s big questions demand big answers. I always wanted something mortifying to happen to send to Seventeen. But then I’d end up too mortified to send it in.
*
Johanna: I’m writing this on a word doc with no concept of how I’m going to get it emailed to myself and then posted, as I’m once again at an internet-blocked job. It’s the company – they have to lock in secrets by prohibiting any external email servers. And um, OurChart. Good call on the Tide pen, I’ve been eyeing that at Duane Reade. I always used that Shout stick stuff?
*
Haviland: Totes. Also, I’d like to add to “plans for Riese’s wedding, would she ever have one,” an event similar to Jill’s bridal gown marathon hooha. Like, I just want all my friends to have to charge a TJMaxx or something like wild animals, and then pick out fun outfits from last season. Clearly what I want here is a party to tell my friends I love them. The partner is really just a side thought. Today I’m wearing a sweater vest over a white t-shirt and pretty much look like Davy Jones.
*
Lozo: I love that show. It was the only morning cartoon we were allowed to watch. Yes, the chicken’s name was Camilla. Gonzo was even cuter as a bay-bay.
*
Razia: It’s okay, I am obvs totes disturbed, OBVS. And he was a good sport about the whole “gonna die young thing.” He thought it was hil-larious. I guess you have to be, or something? Hm.
*
Dewey: Yeah, my friends/exes from college and high school like to tell me I’ve changed completely, I’m this new weirdo “Riese,” or whathaveyou, I think that’s what’s almost most alarming: though I’ve changed completely in terms of externals, my inner debates rage on, unchanged.
Also, tell me about this system, it sounds fabulous. Actually, now the idea is mulling about in my head …
*
Kate: I want that award. I was always told that I socialize too much. I’ve never fallen off a treadmill, I have to give myself that. That is something.
*
BB: EXACTLY. And heiren lies the problem – is it any good to work if when I get home I have to spend five straight hours online making up for all the time I missed while in the office and cant’ get anything else done ever? I want your dream job, whatever it is, and I look forward to your post on the topic. Maybe there’s no such thing as a dream job and we’re all just too picky? My dream job would be to sit here all day but be on the internets.
*
stephanie: I have yet to see "The Best Years' but speaking of teen shows in their college years, you know what ruled? Saved by the Bell: The College Years! That show was AWESOME!!!
*
lawlaws: Like I said, I dream about blog comments. So, there's that.
Wow. Yeah. I don't think I could handle the Internet being blocked at work. It'd be like life before Google Reader, and that was just ... *shudder*
I hope you mean "the job I'm actually dreaming of" as opposed to "the job I have people are designating as such," because the current one involves a LOT of baseball. I've been telling people since about April that my totes unrealistic dream job is to be a blogger who gets paid for it. I'm hoping the Jew blog is my in, but I'll settle for this as a side gig ...
For the record, the even microscopically possible "dream job" would be writing sports features for a national magazine, which in theory would give me massive amounts of time for the blogging. However, I could just write a book and make this all moot.
Perhaps I shall just "C&P" these comments when it's time for that post ...
modern technology says that you too can have this award...i'm sure it would be easy enough to photoshop your name in instead of mine. it really is condesending and great - a real talking piece, especially if you change the date to,like, this year or something
OK, the points system, it would be like you get more points for the quality of the spot. So, if you were part of the "spot", you'd get more points for it than it just being your friends, you being alone would get a different amount of points to you being with friends. Then the amount of points would also depend on where you were spotted, so if you were spotted at "Dunkin' Donuts", which was your "top tip" then you wouldn't get many points. If Haviland was "spotted" at McDs buying soft serve you also wouldn't get many, but if you spotted her as a street vendor, then it would be like, loads of points.
The reason for giving points is yet to be decided, like I have no idea what the point would actually be, what do you get if you have the most points?? Hmmmmmmm...... this still needs some thought.
Anyways hope that make sense, now that I've proved myself to be weird. To be honest though I'm starting to wish I lived in NY so I could play.
I really do feel this game would encourage stalkerish behaviour.
p.s I imagine when I said, "created a points system", you were imagining something more than this, like maybe numbers. Well sorry this is as far as the development goes, I have to stop myself otherwise I will totally just get really carried away with it and next thing you know there will be prizes and they'll be an award for, "spot of the week".....Hmmmm....."spot of the week".... actually not a bad idea.
I am considering only communicating via brackets. It's what all the cool kids are doing. Definitely your first paragraph makes way more sense then what we discussed on Monday, but also I have had conversations with 'campers' that made more sense than the original brackets. Does that make sense? It's early and my brain still hurts from last night.
Also, if we are really playing the Dewey point spotting game, I think I might be winning, just saying.. I can get super competitive.
I am famous for being a clutz with my clothing. Sometimes the incidents involve falling drunkenly into a swimming pool with no idea that I was still fully clothed; accidentally wearing a "soiled" *ahem* sweater to work the morning after the date of the evening before; and spinach dahl spilled all over my clothes in an office lunch room.
(All involved Armani in some fashion or another.)
I nearly die if I do not get coffee. Like seriously. I am trying to quit it, like I am trying to quit cigarettes, but you know what? Sometimes some things cannot be helped. Avoided. Whatever.
I also nearly die if I do not have the internet. Which is a problem of late, since I do not have it at home. I mean, at least you have it at home. *wink*
The first and last time I was filmed having sex was at good old Scary Lawrence. I could not deal. Sex has always been and probably always will be far too private for me to observe or share (I'll qualify, here: my own sex, at least; I could never be *in* it).
I am currently migrating crap over from my *gasp* LJ and paper journals and believe me, the line from that film "Dangerous Liaisons" pops into my head constantly as I am perusing the material: [obviously, I am paraphrasing] "The only thing that surprises me is how little the world changes."
Funny, huh?
BB:
I don't know what I did before Google Reader. I honestly don't. Did I just check everything? Because if something's not on my GR feed, i NEVER check it, like EVER. That would be awesome to be a blogger who got paid for it. Does such a thing exist, besides Perez Hilton?
*
kate:
done and DONE.
*
Dewey:
Re: the Gawker Stawker Points System:
1. Cait is obvs winning. I think "seeing Riese's slumbag of a street" counts for +20 ... and "participating in the production of Living it Out" as obvs, "Carly" bonus points. But ... does it count if planned? Interesting twist.
2. I'd have to add +100 points if you go to something that I'm in, or that Hav is in, or whatever.
3. And +50 points if you see any of us passed out drunk anywhere, or see Carly passed out (not drunk or drunk) on the NJ Path Train, hypothetically waking up when her head crashes into the window.
I think the award would be um, a date with Lozo obvs.
[cait:Totes makes sense. I could go for a zip cord right now. ]
Atherton: That swimming pool thing sounds AWESOME. I used to go to the OG with massive spillage all over my clothes everywhere.
I have so many things I should quit right now I don't even know where to begin. I think I'm avoiding going to the doctor for precisely this reason.
I would die if I didn't have it at home. I might just die.
I like that line.
i just realized that i'll never leave your google reader as long as i mention you in a post.
I can't seem to move on from this worse nightmare thing. I felt like if I commented I would just sound like a peeved wet blanket because I can't seem to get past all the global nightmares going on right now, but then I thought hmmm, Reise just went through something quite spectacularly nightmarish so maybe she's being inane to try to get back a sense of normal nightmarness. So I decided to come back and just list some of the more spectacular ones I've lived.
Worse nightmares past listed chronologically.
1) I'm ten and my parents move us to the US not realizing that they were wrenching me away from everyone I loved and counted as family—aunts, grandparents, nanny, cook, driver, playmates and that they were the least important because they spent so little time with me. I become an angry sullen thing and later write my book because of this trauma.
2) High school counts as mostly paradise because it's all girls, some of whom attempt suicide (unsuccessfully), but I'm oblivious. Freshman year of college I fall in love with my first real female lover and she holds my journal hostage because I lent it to her boyfriend who came looking for her and asked me if he could read it. I call the cops on her and we live high drama for the rest of the year, but I never get the journal back.
3) I drop out of college because my parents get divorced and my father makes it clear that a degree in theatre arts/Eng. lit whatever isn't going to get me anywhere. I wander in the desert of multi-culti, queer isolation convinced that no one understands me, but I manage to get my bachelor's degree, anyway, at a lesser school that I can pay for myself. I pick the least painful degree that might get me work. It takes me 8 years all told. A year after I get a job in my chosen field of graphic art, I realize that this is a really shallow way to spend one's life. One night I start writing my memoirs and declare to everyone that I'm a writer.
4) Being a writer keeps me in a state of bliss for quite a long time and I fall in love with a woman (14 yrs older) who believes that I'll actually publish. During the five years I live with her, her teenage son is diagnosed with schizophrenia turning our lives into episodic nightmares as he travels the West Coast and attempts suicide from various cliffsides. Meanwhile her "good" son checks himself into AA. Her youngest is already seriously retarded so no worse can befall him unless he drowns, but during our relationship she has to put him in a group home. I stick by her through all of this and then she has a clandestine affair with someone I introduce her to.
5) She moves this woman into our home under the guise of rescuing her from a bad relationship. I fall in love with her too out of self-preservation. When I find out the full story, the incoming lover ostracizes me and refuses to speak with me. I offer to drive off a cliff, taking the schizophrenic son with me. His mother/my lover knows I'm kidding and says "don't take him". I write some spectacular poems and send them to all our friends. She considers me healed and asks me to leave. The poems are published in a scholarly dyke journal.
6) I live in a run down house with 6 housemates, one of whom defaults on the rent and gets us all evicted, but I'm gone by then because of #7.
7) An attractive woman appears at work and flirts with me. I deem her a gift from the goddess. We fall in love despite her being married. We spend a summer of bliss and angst as her husband reconciles the situation by aquiring a lover of his own and moving her into their home. Then I move in, too, on account of #6.
8) We grin and bear it, with this arrangement for a year, while husband and girlfriend look for their own house. They find one and we acquire a roomate to offset the mortgage. She wrote a screenplay about a pregnant single woman who is taken in by lesbians. Our roomate is not pregnant; she's a borderline personality who sucks up copious amounts of psychic energy and becomes the roomate from hell. Finally she leaves after her diabetic cat dies and she no longer needs me to help look after him.
9) I inherit $30,000 from my 92 year old grandfather at the height of the stock market boom. I "invest" it in brilliant young start-ups with sexy business ideas (much like yourself, heh, but their annual reports don't make nearly as good reading as your weekly ones). I loose all the money and end up with the same as I had before, thus proving the rule about those who win the lottery. I am demoralized because I thought I was so good with money and never had any credit card debt like my friends did. I take a course on how to invest in the stock market to learn the error of my ways. I drive myself crazy watching the market and when it came time to file my taxes, it's a total nightmare because I have to reconcile all the capital gains and losses on three pages of stock trades only to have to face up to the fact that I was still loosing money. The irony is that the very idea of the stock market goes completely against all my anti-capitalist beliefs. I become a more sympathetic person towards the human foibles of others.
10) My father dies of pneumonia after a year long bought with cancer. He leaves everything to his third wife, including the Bay Area house I grew up in, now worth close to a million. The wife reports to my family that I was an uncaring daughter when it was she who asked me to make him do things he didn't want to do because he was such a bad patient. This change in my financial security leaves me feeling completely betrayed, but I am secretly glad that he died because he was such a manipulative, negative person who plotted against everyone and worked for the defense industry. Thus stripped of my safety nets I set about to make an honest living (not that I wasn't before, but now I'm just more anxious).
There that's ten nightmares I am seriously glad are behind me. Life seems really sweet after all that. I know it was kind of heavy to lay all that on you in a mere comment, but I wanted to fill you in so we could continue to enjoy this unbearable lightness of being.
Post a Comment