The End of the Week from Hell: I Got Everything That a Girl Could Want, I Got All I Could Ever Ask For

Sunday morning was the beginning of the week-long Spaz-a-Thon. Here is my story, in pictures.

I wake up on Sunday morning and ask myself:

So I decide to go back to the laundromat, where I last saw
my beloved driver's license.

He doesn't have it. Then I realize I will be sailing international waters in a week and I have no ID and not even a passport and then I start to really freak out.

So I hit the web. It turns out Canada is not the Canada it once was. Canada wants my passport, and Canada doesn't care how nice I am. I mean, I clearly am soooo not a terrorist. Look at me! I'm BLONDE! And CUTE!

After realizing I will not receive a driver's license in time for the trip, I begin to
investigate the passport-acquisition process. This is not so easy.

I really start to freak out on Monday night. I continue freaking out for about 24 hours, until I find the nice people at abriggs. They can get me what I need, she says. There's only one little problem:

But I get my papers in order and head over to the "authorizing agent" at the post office, feeling nervous and panicy and I know it's all worth it because:

But--~!!!! I need a witness. Yeah. 'Cause I don't have a license, they want like, someone to testify that they know me and that I'm not like, trying to escape G.W.Bush or like, blow shit up. Which clearly I'm not. I just want to go whale-watching and frolic in the forest lushlands with Haviland!!!

So I wake up at 6:30 AM (totally haven't woken up that early since like, HIGH SCHOOL) and meet Cameron there in the morning.
"I did it because I knew if you didn't get this taken care of, I'd have to listen to you talk about it all day at work. Being your witness was much less painful."
TRUE DAT. But seriously, Cameron saved my ass. She's the best agent EVER.

I shipped it out. Thursday morning I wake up and see that the $120 shipping charge doesn't actually guarantee the actual shipping of your actual goddamn item on the actual time you actually fucking paid for them to fucking bring it there, bitches!!!

But they say they will proccess it on Friday.
I wake up, check the abriggs passport site, and see it is done.

Then, at about 6:30pm, the most patient nice lady in Ohio ever emails me to give me my tracking number. FedEx is bringing my passport tomorrow. And it's gonna be so fucking foxy, y'all will just DIE!

Sunday Top Ten: Gay Pride, White Party, iNano, Web-Radio, etc.

Sunday Night Top Ten.

Bang Bang Bang.

10. Hot like Darlene
Last night, shescape hosted NYC's first White Party. Haviland, Tara, Lainy and I partied like Jem and the Hollograms, except older and more fucked up.

Okay. So, if this was Miami--and it's pretty clear that it isn't--there would be no gross bitches at this party who were not wearing all white. I mean, like-- Haviland and I are always trying to turn non-costume parties into costume parties, so I really don't understand why anyone would go in not-costume to a costume party? Unless they wanna perpetuate stereotypes like the one about all lesbians being fat and unstylish.

There were enough hotties there to inspire this statement, from a girl who was wearing white but was also super-dumb: "You and your friends are hot! I think all lesbians should look like us, but instead they all look like John Goodman!"

Raise your hand if you think, of all the people on Roseanne, it's in fact Darlene/Sara Gilbert who looks most like a lesbian (because she IS, holla!), NOT Mr. Goodman.

9. Is that a Banana in your pocket, or is it Pride?
Lo left me this banana before going to Florida for the weekend. I wanted to keep it as a little keepsake, but bananas rot, and I'm not Superman.

8. The Ipod Nano: THOMAS THE TANK-ENGINE OF PORTABLE ELECTRONICS.
I have dropped my ipod nano at least a million times, including three times this weekend. It still works. I mean, wow.

7. MTV radio.
The "First Ladies" station provides an endless rotation of classic tunes from so many of my favorite artists, including Kelly Clarkson, Britney Spears, Gwen Stefani and whoever sings that "don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like me?" song.
Side note: someone needs to make this shit work on a mac.

6. I'm a Tank.
Seriously, sometimes I can put a lot of substances into my body and still do amazing things like run into traffic, inspiring amazing jokes/pick-up lines (detailed in Hav's blog). But it's not like I jumped out the window 'cause I thought I could fly. (That's what all the adults tell kids will happen to them if they take a lot of drugs. but it's not true. Seriously, most people who jump out the window are not on E, they are just depressed, which as Hard Harry said in Pump up the Volume, is part of being a teenager and surviving is the point. Got it. Say no to drugs! (JK!))

5. One week from now, I'll be drinking cocktails at the pool deck of the Norweigen Star.

4. Just Fix Me
My ANTM-esque quality makeover (from traffic-stopping in a bad way to traffic-stopping in a good way) is owed to the fine people at Rubann Salon. Since I look so good right now, I've been asked who made me look so good quite often. If you live in Michigan, then you should go see Nicole at Marshall Fields in Briarwood Mall, she saved me when I lived there. Then you should have a Mrs. Fields cookie and then you should have a CINNABON and then you should go to the Thomas Kinkaid gallery and buy me a painting of a fox in a meadow and mail it to me so I can laugh at you, punk!

3. Cliff Notes for Fun
If you were like, tearing apart your apartment searching for your drivers license (which you never found, inducing waves of panic regarding future cruise vacation), during the Pride parade, then you'll totally be jammin' to the pride weekend photo summaries offered at Queerty. It's like those videos at Bar Mitzvahs but with naked adults instead of naked bay-bays. (that's Long Island for "babies")

2. Gender Blender
Aside from stupid chicks who couldn't dig up a single item of white clothing (um hello hanes wifebeaters size small 3-pack for 7.99, I have about 100, I wish I was kidding, I'm totally not kidding at all), something else that would've made the White Party better would be Da Lipstyxx. If I was having a Bat Mitzvah (in which case I'd be 13 and rancid, but whatevs), they'd totally perform at it. Hav and I tried to do some Da Lipsyxx dance moves but it would've been cooler if they'd been there too. They aren't even lesbians or girls, so that's like, a pretty significant compliment coming from me, a hyper-exclusive semi-bitch.

1. Just Another Manic Monday, I wish it was Sunday
Let's not kid ourselves, obviously I'm finishing this blog entry on Monday because yesterday I was googling the fuck out of the internet to find out about my photo-ID situation so I didn't finish this. Normally I'd just pretend like it's still Sunday, but I have to announce the following piece of info: I WAS ON TIME TO WORK TODAY. In fact, I WAS THE FIRST ONE IN THE OFFICE. Anyone who knows me will know that this is like, probably a lie, but: 1. it's not, 2. i'm a butterfly!

How Do you Replace a Lost Drivers License in Ten Minutes Flat?

This isn't the Sunday top ten.

This is a plea for help.

So, let's say--just like, totally hypothetically--you're a hot girl in the city of New York and you just lost your drivers license (it actually was probably stolen, as it was in my back pocket, and people always wanna get their palms near my ass, but that's another story) and you were traveling to Alaska and Canada in a week. Which means you kinda need your drivers license.

So say this hot girl DOES have a social security card, an expired passport and a birth certificate.

Say this girl's license was actually from Michigan even though she no longer lives in Michigan ...

What would you do?

Besides just freak out.

Orange Hair and a Broken Computer: Be Proud to Be Out of Your Mind and Out of Control

Seriously, the fact that I am still alive is an actual miracle. As an actual scholar/Rabbi/theologist said (a.k.a., not Ani DiFranco, Angela Chase, Lainy, Lewis Jacob Lyn Bernard, Me, etc.):

"Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy."
(abraham heschel)

I'd like to make that statement on my behalf and also on behalf of Sparky McStanostien, my Jewish computer.

So, my reading rainbow friends, lets hop an overpriced gypsy cab with Marty McFly and do a little backwards-time-thing, like they did in that movie Memento. (I own that movie on DVD, bitches!! It's on my shelf. That's how visitors know I'm smart, which is why I'm a PIMP.)

4am, Wed. June 21st:
I'm totally in my room right now, and I totally just tore apart my room when I was having a mental breakdown. And I'm ON MY COMPUTER!! I put in new memory, too, so it's like greased lighting.

2am, Wed. June 21st:
I was inside a brand new space-station on 57th street called The Apple Store. I've spent many tortured hours at the Soho locale of this popular spot for Whiners (e.g., Tourists carrying cracked laptops in paper bags, scrawny models with dysfunctional iPods covered in crack) and People like me (People With Real Problems with like Actual Goddamn Computers).

I must say--the 5th avenue store at 2 A.M. was not only serving as a recording and gaming studio for many of the city's intellectual elite (and by that I mean--rascals!), the Genius Bar had a total wait time of--um--NO MINUTES!! WHAT??!!

First my computer didn't work. Then he hooked it up to something. This is how that went:

Me: So, do you ever like, turn on someone's laptop and see a bunch of porn?

(I look over his shoulder as he reads the following exchange on a post-it note on my desktop:
Plaster: he wants to give us X and watch us fool around
Nads: yeah, who doesnt
Plaster: good point
and then this one:
"You know what I could do? I could become a shop teacher. Teach all the retarded kids to make birdhouses." (Matty))

Him: Um, nope.
Me: I'm just trying to gauge your like--weirdness factor.
Him: (Gives me a look that says: Woman, I work at the goddamn genius bar. You wanna talk weird? How about the fact that in ten minutes I'm going to have an actual conversation with another so-called genius about why I'm wearing pants instead of shorts and the reason will be that I was too lazy to put on a belt.)

OK, but seriously: he totally saved my computer. It took about two hours. I pranced around the Apple Store, wrote emails, and felt like I was going to pass out from hunger and despair.

Best invention of the year: The 24 hour genius bar in the apple store, midtown.
Second-best: The dude who put his pretzel stand right outside the genius bar in the apple store, midtown, at five a.m..
Third best: Twix bars with peanut butter filling

11:30pm, Tues. June 20th:
I am on Haviland's bed, on my--I mean her--new MacBook, trying to find a solution to the fact that my computer won't turn on. She's being super nice even though I am crying, screaming, and moaning in despair, which is Not Hot.

10:30pm, Tues. June 20th:
I arrive at home after a nice evening, proud of myself for getting home early to write some storylines for a project I'm doing with J-Nads. Buzzing with ideas to send to J-Nads, I try to turn on my computer.

I see a folder. A question mark. A blue screen.

I proceed to lose my goddamn mind.
(Sub-note: my phone was about to die, and I'd left my charger at work.)

2pm, Tues. Jan 20th:
I stride out of the salon on Madison Avenue, blonde hair glistening in the summer sun: I am poor....but beautiful!

10:30am, Tues. Jan 20th:
Me: "Janet, just tell me what you think, honestly."
Janet: "Marie, anyone who told you that your hair looks good is trying to sabotage your life. You look like--like--a shiny copper penny! But it's not even like, even!"

11pm, Mon Jan 21st:
Lo comes home to look at my orange hair. Well, ok, I call Lo and tell her she has to come home and look at my orange hair. She tells me it's not orange. Not orange is good, but I'm looking for STUNNING. I'm also IMing Lainy (who rocked the MCats), Haviland (ALASKA!), and J-Nads (my partner in impending fame.)

Here we see me with orange hair. YES.

9pm, Mon Jan 21st:
Since I've already had such a fantastic day, I decide to do something fun and different and dye my hair blonde. Anyone who knew me between the years of 1993-2004 are aware that this is a judgement call I am prone to executing at relatively improper moments. Some highlights (no pun intended HA HA):

July 27, 2003 (from my ex-livejournal,ohhowgooditwas): I'm still wearing the hospital bracelet, after 3 maddening hours waiting for someone to tell me why my neck is red and my ears are swollen, which is, of course, because i tried to highlight my own hair and then, when i failed, decided just to die my whole head dark brown. which people seem to like, but i miss being blonde, although in some way i like being terrible. which is what i think of myself when i look in the mirror these days.

followed by....

July 30, 2003 (from my ex-livejournal,ohhowgooditwas): hair disasters are over. i submitted to the hands of my hair-goddess, nicole, and now am v.pleased with short blonde hair. she reccomended the short part because most of the long stuff was pretty much destroyed. by me. and it would be better to get rid of it. i feel like i'm 18 again, with short golden hair and no meat on my bones.

December 21, 2002 (from my ex-ex-livejournal, veronicap): bad experience at hair-ladys at the mall. she messed up and then she (tried to) fix it. i thought that she had fixed it. after rewarding myself with a vanilla cream frappuchino and an overpriced t-shirt (i had a coupon!) because i endured 2hrs of hair color mistakes, i went to the bathroom and realized that my hair was gray. just the front, but arguably the front is the most important part. which means that *gasp* the starbucks slave AND the goofy gay guy at express were thinking *does that girl know that her hair is not only too short but also grey???*

i called chris and he told me i needed to go back and demand to be fixed. i told him that going back and asking for things from people that i gave money to made me feel like i was that old lady at wal-mart with the fanny pack who tries to return the loafers that she already wore. he said it's not like that, at all.

so i'm no longer greying, but i'm still somwehat confused about why i had to give someone 90 dollars to make me look worse than i used to.

humph.
i am goldilocks.

followed by...:

December 15th, 2002: suddenly quite drowsy.

got hair fixed by miracle-worker at marshall fields. worked a lot.

going to do great things some day.

Also worth noting: in the Traverse City Mall in 1998, Ingrid Greenfield and I mis-identified my hair color and I ended up with a head that was half red and half blonde. We then dyed the whole thing black. I didn't have to pay though.

7pm, June 20th:
I am walking on air! ACTUAL AIR! Hav calls to say an audience member she spoke to at her play reading that afternoon "loves Marie Lyn's work"! (My work?!!!) "Just though I'd brighten up your day a little," she says. HA! As if my day could get ANY BRIGHTER.

5pm, June 20th:
Lo calls with a story about a transsexual that made me LOL, but I can't talk about it here, cuz it's for Ladies Only.

11am-5pm, June 20th:
WAHHH!!!!!!!!! yipeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!
ALASKA ALASKA
I LOVE IT WHEN WE'RE CRUISIN' TOGETHER


10AM, June 20th:
I find out that I get to go with Haviland on Rosie's Cruise to Alaska. I almost have a heart attack. I'm not kidding. I literally tremble with joy.

Sunday Top 10: Always Comes Too Late But Friday Never Hesitate

It's time for the Sunday Top Ten!!

10. IN THE FLESH READING THIS WEEK
In honor of Pride Week (holla!), there is a Very Special Episode of the "In the Flesh" reading series on June 21st, and y'all should go. Unless you don't live in NYC or are a Homo-Hater or are busy (but really, how busy can you be if you're taking the time to read this?) (P.S. 90210 isn't on Wed. nights anymore) (P.P.S. Most Homo-Haters are closeted Homos, so you'd actually probably really like it.)

9.PHOTOS ARE MORE IMPORTANT THAN THE EVENT ITSELF
Anyone who blogs or updates their friendster/myspace profile more than once a week is totally aware of this. You can see evidence of this exact phenomenon here: last weekend's outing to Brooklyn Pride. Those photos are HOT HOT HOT! However---I don't know if we missed it or something, but Lainy/Haviland/Myself got out of the cab, looked around, and decided after ten minutes to go back to Williamsburg and eat dinner. This is a general pattern in my life (arrive at event, decide eating would be more fun, leave event).

7. DA LIPSTYXX
These dudes are fucking incredible! We saw them at a benefit for the Ali Forney Center. You can check out Hav, Karen and I rockin' out with all kinds of super-hot queens in my special collage below! Mario Cantone was funny. And Alan Cumming is like, my favorite ever! You can see Haviland's foxy body below atop the members of Da Lipstyxx. They brought back all my old feelings of wanting to sleep with femmy homosexual men.


6. MY -- I mean -- HAVILAND'S NEW MACBOOK
This machine is out of control.


5. WOW NEW YORK
It gets me every time: the goddamn skyline.
The Williamsburg bridge. From Manhattan to Brooklyn or back. Every fucking time.
This time: in Karen's BMW convertible, Haviland on my lap.
Screaming at all the perfect sped-up moments.

4. OREO COOKIES
"God, I've been thinking about these all day," Lauren says,
dipping an Oreo cookie in a glass of milk.

3. BEAUTY BAG
So I'm going to be in this magazine article in September (I'm trying to avoid a google search result here ... so let's just say the title of the magazine includes my name, which is a total coincidence (or is it?) and if you don't know what i'm talking about, then you should crawl out of your cave, throw on a fur toga or whatever, and ride a mule to the 21st century and get a clue), for which I've been required to divulge huge chunks of my past (both true and gracefully fabricated). To thank me for my time (which is money people, time is MONEY!), the super-sweet features editor mailed me a beauty bag! Luckily I was four hours late for work on Thursday (this is--sadly--pretty typical), so I was home when it was delivered, which never happens in New York. I know! It's a miracle!

2.AFTER THE ARGUMENT, FOSHO
It seems that at least two of the arguments I referenced last week (when I was totally concerned about people fighting and stuff) have been settled! Just in time for ...

1. IT'S PRIDE WEEK, Y'ALL!!!!
As jack twist would say ...YEEAHHHAWWWW
As lainy would say ... LOLOLOLOL
As angela chase would say ... "It's such a lie that you should do what's in your heart. if we all did what was in our hearts, the world would come to a screeching halt."

We Gonna Sip Bacardi Like it's Lewis's Birthday

Today is my brother's 22nd birthday. This is a little bit crazy because:

1. I'm not a girl, but not yet a woman (Hav and I watched Britney Spears' big-screen debut in Crossroads last night, and so these big questions are on my mind) and he's like, not a boy, but not yet a man. Fuck. What am I talking about?

2. 22 is kinda old. I mean, I was 22 when I packed all my stuff into a car and drove out to New York City and then got stranded on a highway in New Jersey at 2 A.M. Which means Lewis could be doing retarded things like that too, which is scary. Clearly I just want to talk about myself.

3. He still has the skin and youthful vigor of a man half his age! (aw, Lew!!!)




(That's me and Lewis, a few years ago)

4. I totally haven't gotten him a present. One year Lewis mailed me a bunch of shrimp and crabs and Scot cooked it and it was delicious. I don't know how he did that though. I don't like going to the post office, because everyone who works there is semi-incompetent, so I'll probably mail him a less perishable kind of thing, like a card.

I thought I'd share this diary entry in which I relayed the events of Lewis's 8th birthday, which was, by my calculations, about a million years ago:

"We had chocolate cake for breakfast. We went to Major Magics for lunch with Marie and Tony. It was cool. It wasn't very crowded, either. I got 111 tickets! More than I've ever gotten. We ate din-din at the Great Wall, this cool Chinese restaurant."

Hey, seriously though: if tomorrow I woke up and had chocolate cake for breakfast and then was told I was going to earn 111 tickets (which is like, at least a stale candy necklace and a plastic cup) at Major Magics and have Chinese for dinner, I'd be pretty fucking happy. Like, possibly LOLOLOLOLO happy, and maybe even OMG LOLOLOLOLLL happy.

What the fuck happened to Major Magics? Chuckie Cheeses? Showbiz Pizza? I want to play the game where you hit the turtles that pop up in the little holes with a mallet. And Skee-Ball. Possibly like ... forever.

First Sunday Top Ten: It Would Surely Be that Sunday, The Day I Met You

My number-one prophet Angela Chase once said: "There's something about Sunday nights that makes you want to kill yourself." True 'dat.

So...since all my suicide-angst was used up on Kurt Cobain and the hot blonde girls in The Virgin Suicides, I'm gonna like, save some serious lives here with the weekly top ten on Sunday nights! Like Casey Caseum, but I'm cuter than him (usually). Normally I'd watch HBO on Sunday nights, but our Renter, who's clearly a Player-Hater, won't tell us how to find the previous tenants, wherever they're hiding (probably in a jungle, cave, rathole, India, Olive Garden, Duane Reade, etc.) to make them pay Time Warner whatever they owe so we can get some goddamn cable hooked up and never have to work again!

For more tips on what the social elite (e.g., me, my friends, Lindsay Lohan) are doing, please check out Haviland's Pluggin' myspace blog.


TEN THINGS THAT MAKE ME WANNA SHOOP THIS WEEK

10.TASTI-D SEASON
It's totally Tasti-D season, y'all! If you wanna get skinny really fast for swimming-suit-season, start shoving your holes with Tasti-D ASAP. Combined with ciggs and lots of Diet Coke, you can lose 10 pounds in 10 days! If you feel like you're about to die, close your eyes and think about Ally McBeal.

(Sub topic: When I see a dude eating Tasti-d out of a little blue cup with a little pink plastic spoon, I do not wanna be his lover. Um, ew. Get a protein shake or a sugar cone or somethin, Jesus.)
(Sub-sub-topic: Both men and women should get Tasti-d on cones and then lick it. It's HOT.)

9. CHELAINISM
Lainy: I'm like, the next Buddha.
Me: I'm in. I'm totally a Chelainist.

8. JANE DOES RIGHT FOR THE NEW POMOSEXUAL TEEN
I was feelin' dubious about Jane's sex issue, but after suffering through the retro-patriarchal-grossness of Cosmo at the mani-pedi place, I gotta totally give props to Jane. On an entire page of sex tips, they bust out with "your partner" and "your lover" and even a "he or she" (which is the only time they use gender-specific pronouns at all)! I feel your finger on the pulse of our politically progressive generation, Ms. Holley!

7. TASTI GUM
Trident Splash Gum, Strawberry-Kiwi Flavor.

6. JAW PROBLEMS
TMJ. That's what you get for chewing too much gum. But it's HOT. click, click.

5. PRIDE IS IN THE AIR
It's PRIDE MONTH!! It's not PRIDE WEEK yet, but it almost is!

4. OFFICIAL SUMMER JAM: S.O.S.
The official jam of the summer of 06 is S.O.S BY RHIANNA. I can't get enough!

3. THE MOVIE IS BETTER THAN THE BOOK: MERYL STREEP WEARS PRADA
I despised the book The Devil Wears Prada. I'm not even linking to it because I think it's total bunk (mostly because by the end the narrator, who has no character development whatsoever and is supposed to be real but is actually vacant and full of these actually quite machocistic behaviors that are never actually explained, throws away everything--including everyone who loves and cares about her--for an internship without any specific rewards for a magazine she doesn't even like. She's a totally unsympathetic narrator and ... ok fuck, I could rant about Lauren Weisberger all night, let me just say that this book ranks right up there with my Bunkiest Books of All Time with Pure by Rebecca Ray).

But the movie looks totally awesome! I mean, when does that happen? Like, never. I wanna see it real bad!

2. CUSTARD PIE AND FRIED SHRIMP
I was reading my diary from 1998 (I'm writing a book, so I get to research myself a lot) and I saw that I made a list of all my favorite foods--cause that's when I was like, Somalian looking, and always trying to eat all the time to put on weight hopefully in the chestage area. Some of these foods I haven't eaten in a while, so I'd like to mention them:
-Kraft Cheesy Alfredo
-#36 at Zingerman's Deli in Ann Arbor, no swiss, sub mozzarella
-Billy the Kidd Burger at Bennigans
-Mom's Meatloaf at Bill Knapps
-Fried Shrimp
-Mozzarella breadsticks from Ciceros
-Custard pie (what the fuck?!?!!)


1. STEPHEN DUNN, DUH!
So, in honor of the fact that I totally noticed that Lauren is reading Stephen Dunn, and that Natalie's boy got her a Stephen Dunn book, I want to write this Stephen Dunn poem here. Ok, hold up, I'm gonna be serious for like, a paragraph.

A lot of people keep fighting! (Not me though, Baruch Hashem!) Sometimes though you gotta fight, and sometimes you can't make up. But whatevs, just link to More Potato Products, the Blog Behind the Music to read a Stephen Dunn poem called "After the Argument."

Then go buy all his poetry books, and then You, just like Chelain, can start your own religion!

The Revolutionary Language: Don't Speak, I Know Just What You're Saying

[Disclaimer: You know how The NY Times likes to publish stories that claim to discover and advance self-described "trends" that've already been discovered/advanced in other publications months (sometimes years) earlier? (See today's "Sunday Styles "cover story - The Lost Summer: "For a small but growing number of college-bound students, summer has become a time of resume-building,") This entry might be kinda like that, I think, but I'm too busy to find out for sure.]

Additional side note: Read "Please Sir, I Want Some More!"

THE BLOG BEHIND MY BLOG! NEWER, FASTER, WETTER, CLEANER, LONGER!

How We Talk Now:
When we're not super-busy whoring ourselves on myspace or sending text messages with the fury of hyper-social squirrels, my generation (and by this I mean my friends, because those are the only people in my generation that I actually, you know, "know") is marching dutifully into the history books, following the radical generations before us by developing our own "dialect." Me-bonics, if you will.

Sometimes a certain phrase magically invades our generational consciousness ... slimes its way into our everyday speech and remains there. We don't know where these things come from (like G-d, gravity, etc.), but they just come!

Some select phenoms:

1. "I feel like":
A few years ago, "I feel like" became the standard way to begin a sentence. I think it's because we want to distance ourselves from ever really standing behind anything we say. Often we also anchor our statements with "Or no?" or "Right" or "sorta." Far too often, we replace "I think" or "I know" with "I feel like." Girls do it more than boys, because girls are more insecure (this is a fact). Pictured below is the master of "I feel like," my best friend Natalie:



Further examples:

"I feel like maybe I need to go to the gym before I do my homework, do you think, or no?"

"I feel like if he liked you, he would have called by now."



2. "Which is Fine"/"But it's fine":

The meaning of this is very simple: "It is not fine." It is said quickly at the end of a sentence, or at a break in a sentence. People seem to be using this particular phrase a lot lately, which I think is because we all have areas of our lives that are not fine.

"So I was throwing up for three hours after all those vodka shots and then I had to go to work at seven in the morning and didn't have money for a metrocard--but it's fine."

"He's going to date whomever he wants but I'm supposed to like, stay home and wait for him to get back from his dates--which is fine--I mean, I don't have anyone else I'm like, super-interested in anyhow."


3. Insertion of internet-lingo into spoken language

Although I loathe the phrase "LOL" when speaking on "AIM" (which I pronounce as an acronym, not as a word for what you do with a Super Soaker, which p.s. I never had because my Mom wouldn't buy me toys that weren't grown on an organic farm), I love it when people use it in real life. My generation sort of missed the AIM boom by like, two years, which is why we can use these phrases with delightful irony and also speak on AIM itself as if we were 12 and perhaps--perhaps--also "blog" as if we were 12!!!

Or saying BRB. That's another good one.

I further explore the intricacies of LOLing on AIM in this footnote, on my new companion-blog, morepotatoproducts. This footnote/companion/additional boring stuff Blog is called "Please Sir, I Want Some More," and although more details on it will follow later, I must say: WHY SHOULD YOU ASK WHEN YOU KNOW WHAT'S IN STORE?

3b. Referring to human beings as their internet alter-egos

A lot of us are stuck with the screen-names we created for our imaginary-cool selves in 7th grade. I am one of these people.

A lot of us are still not actually cool. I am also one of these people.

In any event, I'm a big fan of referring to people by their screen-names, e.g., there was this girl named Allison who liked my boyfriend back in the day, but I always called her AllyBoo because that was her screen-name and I wanted to be as condescending as possible.

4. Oldies But Goodies: some more of our special dialect ...

"By that I mean" and "By that I mean not at all."

"Yeah, I did a lot of homework today and by that I mean I watched a Real World marathon."

"Yeah, that date with the random guy I met at the nerve party was hella hot...and by that I mean not at all."

5. This post would be incomplete without the inclusion of Lo and I's favorite verb ... blog-worthy!