Saddam

We're running, little hamsters on the hamster wheel. All worshiping at the alter of beauty and health. In skin tight leotards, or running shorts. Muscle tees or sports bras. All moving fast, travelling fleetly, getting nowhere.

And before us are our goals. Pop stars in form fitting dresses shaking their perfect asses to the beat. Rock stars in jeans so tight every curve of every muscle pops the seams. Our gods, our perfection, our unattainable goals.

And next to the screen pumping my eyes with a blond woman naked to the dawn is a picture of a man stepping up to the gallows, bowing his head to the noose.

A picture of a man who might be sleeping, but is really dead. A murderer. A killer. Murdered. Killed. Dead.

And we keep running.

Mele Kalikimaka

It's 60 degrees outside. People are ice skating in their t-shirts. Outside.

It's also two days till Christmas.

Luckily, I'm good at the warm weather Christmas. Growing up in Hawaii my Santa wore bermuda shorts and a hawaiian shirt. Our Christmas mornings were spent with a trip to the beach and a B-B-Q. We had sand, not snow. We drank iced tea, not hot chocolate.

So I should be perfectly able to get into the Christmas spirit in a tank-top.

But I'm not.

What I need, what I really want, is two scoops rice. I want manapua and guri-guri. Mix please. With the strawberry under the pineapple. I want ukulele's and na mele's. I want to stand with my friends and sing Surfin' Santa.

I want lumpia and poi. Lomi-lomi salmon and chicken long-rice. I want my Christmas pine to be a Cook pine, and I want my presents wrapped in hawaiian print. I want to sit outside on the lanai and talk-story with my ohana.

In short, if it's gonna feel like Hawaii, then I want it to be Hawaii.

I miss home.

Plastic Stocking

I love stockings. As a kid I adored my stocking. I liked that it had a pretty ornament sewn on just for me. I liked that my mother had painted my name on it with glitter. I love that she had spelled my name correctly, which when you're name is Kathryn is a big deal. I loved all the candy my Dad filled it with, and the fruit, and the fruit cake. I loved the nuts in their shell and the toys we'd get every year, yo-yo's and silly putty. I loved the little books we'd get (I always got a "Pokey Little Puppy" book) and I like the penny dolls, the jewelry, the hair barrettes. I even liked the socks and underwear that would find their way into my stocking. I loved all the little things in it and I loved that it would take me days and days to get through it. A week at least for the chocolate santa.

Now as an adult I'm the one who's carrying the stocking tradition forward. But my first attempts have not been as spectacular as my childhood memories. Often I'll forget the oranges, or the chocolate santa. I never really get the right mix of toys and candies, it's usually heavy on one side or the other. I often get more stuff than will fit in the actual stocking too...so stocking toys end up becoming under-the-tree toys and lose some of that stocking charm.

Worst of all I never have the same stockings every year.

Instead of the lovingly crafted stockings my Mother made us, complete with our names, our special colors and our special angels. Instead of that musty, old feeling on each one, come from sitting in a box all year. Instead of that feeling that you have something that makes you part of the family, something that's your own but connects you to everyone else. Instead of all that nostalgia and romance we have brand-new stockings. Every year. It's not by design. Every year I break out all the ornaments, old stuff from our parents, new stuff from our newly-wed days. All the same and familiar. The same lights, the same blanket under the tree. The same angel at the top. But even though I pack everything away together, every year the stockings come up missing. So every year I buy new ones.

This year I found a set that were not quite my norm. Instead of furry topped stockings, or lace and beads, I picked out a set of needle-point stockings. Each with a different character on it, and each lined in a different color. Blue for my husband, red for me. They were very cute and I spent a good deal of time trying to decide just which ones I truly wanted. A good deal of time being at least 30 minutes of comparing and contrasting each and every one.

Finally, deciding on the gingerbread man and the deer, I took my two dearly found stockings up the register. So close to Christmas I expect long lines at stores and it doesn't bother me too much to hang around, even if I'm already carrying tons of bags of stocking stuffers. But just as I got up to the register, it broke. As did the one next to it. I waited while someone searched for a manager. I waited while they discussed the fact that the manager was at dinner. I waited while they fiddled with buttons and stared at tape. And while I waited the line behind be grew longer and the bags in my hands grew heavier. So heavy, so hot and so tired was I that I finally gave up, left my stockings and walked out the door with a plan to get my stockings at Bed, Bath and Beyond like I do every year. Bead, lace and all.

And I did in fact go to BB&B. I looked at each stocking carefully. I found a set I really liked. And standing there, carrying a number of bags, filled with stocking stuffers, I lamented the fact that I couldn't justify buying a second set of stockings when I'd already purchased my needlepoint set.

And under this short-tern memory loss (induced I'm sure by going to a hundred different stores in less than two hours) I walked out of BB&B, to my car and drove home. And it wasn't till I was getting ready to make up my stockings with all my goodies that I realized I had no stockings to stuff.

This year we'll be unpacking plastic bags. I might write our names on them for nostalgia's sake, but I'm afraid Santa is shaking his head at this very moment.

Shame

Walking into my office building I start off well. My shoulders back, my spine straight, I step out of my car gracefully and strut myself up to the door. I look my best in the morning, my make-up is perfect, my hair curls just right, my clothes are pressed and fit just the way they should. I like the sound of my heels clicking on the pavement and the sound of my clothes swooshing as my hips swish. The beginning half of my walk from car to desk is the time when I really like being a woman, when I really feel confident and ready to face everything.

And then I hit the halfway point, and with it, George. George is an older man who works in our warehouse. He works the night/morning shift so when I'm coming in to work he's just about ready to leave. He takes his last ten minute break just a little before 8AM and he spends it standing in the hall with a cup of coffee and a comment.

"Well isnt it just my lucky day. Good morning beautiful."

"Good morning sweetie. I like that skirt on you, gorgeous girl."

"Now my days complete since the stunning Katy has come in."

And so on and so forth. Everyday there's George with another comment, another adjective for pretty, another crooked smile and another lascivious, but hidden, stare. And everyday the instant I see him I deflate. I feel my shoulders fall in an effort to hide my breasts. I try to walk on my toes in order to keep my heels from clicking on the floor. My eyes hit the floor, my arms draw in close and cover me. And for the rest of the day I have to fight from slumping down in my chair and hiding my face under my hair.

It's a feeling you can't name, but you know it's there. All George has ever done, to my face, has greeted me and given me a compliment. Every interaction we've ever had seems benign, safe, nice even. What woman doesn't want to be told that she's lovely? That she looks nice? Why on earth would I spend all that time with make-up and hair if I didn't want people to notice that I was a pretty girl.

And yet his comments make me feel small. They make me feel like hiding under my coat collar. Is it the way he looks at me, or in the way his voice sounds, something about the way he is always there that makes me feel frightened, little, incapable? Suddenly being attractive, even being noticeable, is a hindrance to everything. Not just to my competence, my intelligence, but to my ability to walk down a hallway.

Sometimes I think it's because I know what men say when women aren't around. I know what George talks about when he stops watching me walk down the hall and turns to his buddy. Sometimes I think that's just a cover up. The fact is I'm harassed, diminutized, violated - and it's worse because know one can see it. No one would ever know, or believe, how bad it feels.

And I can't blame them either. I've been that woman who scoffs at harassment charges. I've turned down my nose at girls who just don't know how to take a compliment, or worse, don't know how to play the game. I fear being the same woman I turn away from, I fear the fact that I could define myself as the "politically correct bitch" if I ever spoke up.

But after I smile shyly, say a hurried good morning to George, I feel my chest constrict and tears prick my eyes. I feel bound inside myself. It's as though he won some battle over my position, over my psyche. He even managed to influence my body - and he has never touched me. I can fantasize, outside of work, turning around and telling him to stop. Using my loudest, strongest voice to chastise him. Let him know it's just not acceptable, that I'm not his to look at, I'm not his to want. But in the building, he has me - there might as well be a gun stuck down my throat for all the words I can create.

So instead I go into work early. I look for his car when I'm walking through the parking lot. I wear big coats to hide in. I take the long way around the office to get to my desk. When I see him I panic, when he has his back turned I have to fight the need to run.

And it makes me more ashamed of myself than anything I've ever done. And even more afraid.

Those City Folks

Just recently my husband and I have been shopping at an organic market more and more. It's something we've both wanted to do for a long time. I like the fact that they get a lot of their food from local vendors and we both like the idea that our food is a little less "tainted."

We did occasionally shop at a small market in our old neighborhood - but having to drive all the way over there just to buy over priced food was a little more than our schedules could take. Luckily, MOM's (My Organic Market) has opened near our home and it's a very pleasant trip down to the store.

Amoung the many treasures we've found at the market, such as fresh baked breads, whole spices and grains, and beautiful, luscious, sweet and firm apples right from the tree, we discovered real milk. Milk that comes from happy, well-fed, well-treated cows near to our home. Milk in thick glass bottles. Milk that could have come straight from the bucket. Real-true-milk.

Of course we bought some. Whole milk, all the fat, all the goodness, true milk. The kind of milk you remember as a kid. My mouth watered at the thought of it and we both couldn't wait to break out the bottle as soon as we got home.

Now as a preamble, both of us grew up with some "farm" experience. My home had small animals, I raised chickens for eggs and ducks for...well being ducks. We had a goat for awhile and I took care of sheep for the neighbors. It wasn't a farm-farm, but it was "ag-land" as it's called in Hawaii and I did get my hands dirty. My husband grew up on a real farm, his mother raised horses and he has many a story about chasing the chickens and getting chased by the chickens. I don't know if he had cows or not, but there were a lot of large animals around for him to get his hands dirty too.

However, as you can imagine, it's been awhile. Years of city and suburb living (not to mention supermarket reliance) might have wiped out a little of our rough-and-tumble dirtiness. So much so that when we cracked the seal on our bottle of milk I went immediately to pour it into tall glasses...

And nothing came out.

I shook it, I twisted it...no milk. Gingerly I stuck my finger into the neck of the bottle and touched a white, somewhat slimy but very firm substance. I looked at my husband, and in my city-like ignorance worried that perhaps we had bought a bad bottle of milk.

He took over, hero that he is, he shook the bottle, he twisted the bottle - and nothing came out. He finally gingerly stuck his finger down and touched the same firm, slimy substance and looked just as puzzled and disappointed as I did.

"Maybe it's wax, like a seal." I suggested.

"Maybe it's just not mixed together." He suggested.

We both looked down the bottle. Finally, we reached for a knife and plunged it in, sliding it straight through as easily as a knife through butter.

Of course people who have lived with cows and worked on dairy farms know what it was. Cream separated from the milk and floating to the top.

Once we scooped out enough to pour we savoured the sweetest, smoothest, softest milk we'd had in decades. It had all the weight and flavor that milk should have. It went straight down our throat and slid satisfyingly into our tummies. Filling us up far better than any of that white water they pass off for milk at Foodland. It made you think of being in the sunshine, the smell of sweet grass and dry hay, the feeling of good, clean dirt under your nails and that soft calm of cows in the pasture, soaking it all up and making milk for their babies.

And you.

After a long discussion on the goodness and joy of milk we finally had to giggle:

What a silly picture we made, screwing up our sophisticated and over-intelligent foreheads over a glass bottle of milk. We'd make a pretty good joke for a real farmer; us and our city folk ways.

Purr

I'm a definite and decided "cat-lady". If not for my marital status and the amount of restraint shown by my husband in the face of cute, cuddly, fuzzy kittens with big soulful eyes and little mews I would be a "crazy cat-lady". And I'd probably be single for the rest of my life and I'm sure that when I died my cats companions would do me the service of eating my face before anyone noticed I was gone. (It's true, it happened to a friend of a cousin of a an ex-boyfriend aunt twice removed!)

Anyway, though I don't have a lot of real-live cats nipping at my heels and planing the big death-day feast I content myself with cat like things. Lots and lots of cat like things. In fact I have so many cat boxes, cat calendars, cat statues, stuffed cats, cat pill-boxes, cat pens, cat jewelry, cat vibrators (just see if your paying attention - I don't really have any cat-sex toys...yet) that my collection has over flowed beyond my home office, to my bedroom, to my kitchen, to my car and finally it's grow sneakers and hiked three miles to my office.

And I'm not alone, there are many of us who have cat like obsessions evident in our cube decorating styles. We're mostly boring-married-people and we are all women. We also are the most likely to coo over the latest picture of fluffy and mitzy chewing on a piece of string or looking quizzically at the toilet seat.

We're just that way. No one else is, they think were cracked. My bosses especially pick on our need to snuggle small furry things. Not a day goes by when I don't hear some disparaging remark about my feline proclivity. Likewise I never tire of hearing how "real men" don't snuggle little cats.

But I've found a way of including everyone in my cat fancy. In addition to the pictures and the figurines I have one giant, fluffy, white stuffed cat. She (because my one live cat is a girl I tend to refer to all cats as girls, I think it is the same with all pet owners) sits right above my computer on my "decoration approved" shelf and watches me type. She also has a secret, which everyone in my department is interested in. She holds my keys. The keys to my drawers, my files, and certain offices. She has them all deep inside her furry, cuddly belly.

So whenever one of my bosses comes up to get the key to such-and-such cabinet he can be seen giving the big fluffy white cat a hug while he rubs her tummy.

One of Us

When I was in kindergarten, before I really learned how to write a "p" with a pencil (I've always had trouble with 'p', I don't know why) I and my classmates were lined up boy/girl and trotted off to the computer lab where Mavis Beacon and the "alphabet alien" taught us how to type. This was back in the day when floppy disks really flopped and your choice of font color was orange or green. Later, in the third grade I, along with four other students who happened to be chosen as the "gifted and talented", were sat in front of the first five Macintosh's ever to live in an elementary school in Maui, Hawaii. There the "alphabet alien" turned into the "mouse alien" and we learned how to point AND click. I've been pointing and clicking ever since.

What I'm getting at here is computers have been an important part of day to day life for me since I was five. That's almost twenty years ago. I learned to type my name before I learned to write my name. Shoot, I learned to type before I learned to read. A computer, to me, is not some newfangled toy. Not some novelty that has come in to replace my calculator. It's is THE tool. If you really want to get along in the western world, you're gonna have to start using it. And using it a lot.

Which is why it annoys me that out of the 20 people in my department I'm considered the only "computer person". The term is thrown around with equal parts awe and disgust. As if it's a betrayal for me to know how to create a spreadsheet, and my pointing and clicking skills make me dangerous. I'm the new species, I'm the computer-kind.

Likewise, it's become common to hear people beg off tasks by saying "I can't do that - I'm not a "computer person". Again in the same tone as someone saying "I'm not one of those people. I would argue that I too am not one of those people. I'm not a "computer person". I happen to be a regular person. My brain is made of mushy stuff, not processors and chips. My bones are covered in skin, not cheaply produced plastic. And you certainly won't find a sticker anywhere on my body that says "Intel Inside". I am in fact a person who uses computers, just like the other 19 people in my department do.

I could accept the fact that some people have been doing this work for longer than 20 years. I can accept that at some point in the past the work I do now was done with pens and papers and adding machines. I know adapting to moving a mouse around in a virtual picture can take a little getting used too. My mother still has trouble looking at the screen instead of the mouse when she's "pointing and clicking". But I cannot accept that a person who uses a computer for various projects 9-10 hours a day five days a week cannot actually do computer "things". They use the computer - they are computer people. They live in the computer age.

And it's time to act like it. If you can turn on a computer, open a program and type in a command - you my friend use a computer. If you can input random data and use the computer to produce information from it - you are part of the Information Processing Cycle. If you can navigate your web browser towards some chicks random web journal - you my friend are a computer person.

You are, in fact, one of us.

Grown-up Lesson

As I stroll through the world of actual adultness I find that I am not as well equipped for it as I thought I would be.

As a child I was armed with those golden rules like "treat others as you'd like to bem to treated" and "always say please and thank you" and "don't eat food off the floor." I felt sure, as I grew older and older, that these little nuggets of shiny wisdom would carry me through to a happy and strife-free life.

However, now I find that all those little niceties are just that: niceties...and they aren't going to get me anywhere fast. In fact, in order to survive life without having your spirit crushed everyday you have to do the exact opposite of the golden rules (all except eating food off the floor...you can stick with that one.)

As I learned a week ago while I stood in a room of 40 or so women all prepared to learn the magical and mystical art of shaking ones body fat around. Or in other words: Belly Dancing Class.

I stepped up to the front row, unashamed of my lagging skills in hip dropping, and knowing that without my heels I'm a fair bit shorter than most women. And as the instructor handed out scarves covered in sparkly, jingly bells to those of us in the first row she warned that she "didn't have enough."

Well, of course everyone in the front row grabbed up a scarf or two. And while they wiggled and squirmed making their hips musical instruments I figured I would pass a few scarves back to those ladies who weren't in the front row and might not have the opportunity to pick one that suited them best. After all, it's only fair to share, right? I passed a few here and a few there. And when I was done I turned around to the last few left in the pile and reached down to pick it up...only to find that some other first row lady was also grabbing it in order to add it to her already jingly scarf AND jingly skirt.

"Oh." I said, "Did you want to wear this one instead?"

"Yes." she replied while snatching it out of my hands and failing to replace it with her first scarf.

I looked around. Everyone had a scarf except me. I danced my way through the class like the best of them, but I didn't make any music.

Until I got home. Where I whined to my husband about the lack of jingle scarves and my un-musical day.

"And what is the lesson from this?" he asked after listening to my probably over-dramatic account of the class.

"To not be nice?" I tried.

"Exactly."

Wish I had learned that one before belly dancing class.

Better Half

I swear, there are tons of very interesting posts swimming in my head right now, just begging to be written...

In the meantime, my husband has a blog now:

Zoom Zoom

So now you can figure out which one of us is the better half...

Math Motorcycle

Every once in awhile I find myself sliding into that disgusting comfort of stereo-types and I always hope that someone, somewhere, will be able to surprise me out of them.

Thankfully, I go to community college.

Every Tuesday and Thursday night I drag myself out to an obscure supermarket and hike my way past four different Korean barbecue joints and two tattoo parlors in order to sit for two and half hours and "learn" math.

My math teacher is exactly what one expects when one thinks of someone who essentially volunteers to teach higher-level math. I'm sure he can't be in it for the money...there is no money for community college professors.

In anycase, this man is tall, lanky, and awkward. He bumps into things that aren't even threatening to get in his way. His favorite trick is to simply stand still, and then suddenly hit his head on the overhead television. He has shoulder-length hair that is, indeed, unkempt. It's shiny though, and full, so it makes his face look that much more emanciated, which makes his eyes look that much more caffeine crazed.

He wears tight jeans, a mistake for someone who resembles a green bean, and generally reminds me of gumby if gumby still had his mom dressing him.

He isn't really a teacher type. He mumbles and has trouble communicating simple concepts like "take one and pass it around". He rushes through his lessons without realizing people are in the classroom with him - just so he can get to something really obscure and strange - then talk about that in detail for an hour before he announces "But you don't need to know this, I just think it's neat."

In short he is a skinny, pale, gawky nerd.

Who, one day as I was getting out my calculator, four notebooks, three text books and numerous erasers, shocked me out of my plastic yellow chair by walking into the classroom wearing a thick Harley-Davidson motorcycle, his helmet held jauntily under his arm.

In truth he looked more like a modern Don Quixote than a Hell's Angel, but it was the fact that this is his normal mode of transportation - in the middle of November - that really shocked me.

He's still kinda a nerd...but he's a nerd on two wheels. And that makes life worth living just a little bit more.

Mr. Body

As I'm sure you've noticed I posted a picture of the remarkably human-shaped body that arrived on our front porch via UPS just a few weeks ago.

Okay...a whole freaking month ago.

And then I dissapeared. Where could I have gone? Could it really have been a human cadaver, sent to my home as a warning from my old gang sisters that I better start representing or face my fate?

Perhaps it was my handsome, yet insane lover from Italy who after years of trying to go on without me finally sucumbed to despair and sent me his self-mutilated body as a testament to his strong, yet now dead, love.

Hasn't he ever heard of black roses! Sheesh.

Or possibly the package was really a wrestling dummy bought by my roommate in order to practice his half-nelsons and full-nelsons and nelson-mandelas and etc.

Really, the body packaged in black cloth that showed up on my front porch was my mail-ordered virgin sacrifice for the feast of the mother of the divine purple cow. She is a demanding goddess who will settle for nothing less than aged, yet untainted meat.

Sadly the real story behind the mystery body may never be known - to people who skim through blog posts at least - and I'm sure conjectures about why it showed up on my porch a month ago and why it caused my lengthy abscence from my beloved blog will continue to haunt the internet for ages to come.

It'll be bigger than Snakes on a Plane. I swear.

UPS Delivers

body on porch
Originally uploaded by katydyd.

A recent text message to my husband after checking the mail:

"There is a body on our porch."

I blog therefore I bore

I've discovered the real flaw in blogging. It comes from boredom.

Recently I was laid-off and forced to search all over the DC/MD area for a new position. During my search I came across many interesting and odd companies and offers, including a porn distributor who was looking for someone to replace his daughter and write scripts for films and an offer to write the notorious "Nigerian Banker" type letters.

Dear Sir, I'm a poor widow from a country you probably don't know exists...I have money to give you...

In addition to the job hunt I also had a few months of hanging around an empty office full of disgruntled and depressed employees and rather petrified and chicken-shit managers and HR reps.

It was a summer bursting with good blog posts. My life was odd, fluctuating and interesting.

So I decided not to blog.

Now that I'm in a new job, going to school, and spending most of my nights rushing home to cook dinner then crawling into bed by 9pm...I am fingering the blogging pen longingly.

And that's the real problem with blogging. We have plenty of time and willpower to blog when our lives are boring and mundane, but when something really interesting happens - when a life event that can be engaging and relatable from people all over the world comes up - we're too busy, you know, living it rather than writing about it.

Let's be honest. We read blog posts in order to find that one line or moment that reminds us of our own little life. Then we share it in comments. We're looking for something that makes us feel - we don't really care what the blog author feels, or even says. As long as we can find a way to relate ourselves to it. Or get something interesting and new out of it

And unfortunately when my life is new and interesting and fresh - I don't feel like sharing.

But you can have all my boredom you want.

Double Standard

Packed up the boss. Put his stuff in a box, wrapped up his dead animals in bubble-wrap, organized the "pile-o-crap" drawer and moved his office, furniture, boxes, dry erase boards a hundred miles away in less that an hour. All while he talked on the phone and complained that he wasn't suppose to be there.

"I'm sure gonna miss you!"

"Yeah, have fun in ********. I'll send your assistant my files separately."

"You've been really great. I don't know what I'll do without you" He put his arms out in either a good impression of Frankenstein or a gesture of familiarity. Don't corporate "whores" shake hands? Isn't there some unspoken rule about hugging assistants thirty years younger than you?

Nope...I got hugged.

"I'll think about you, take care of yourself. This is so sad."

"Yeah...okay." Am I gonna have to pat your back too?

And then it was over. Thank god. Until eight hours later when he called on the weekend. Something about a dog.

"Yeah. Yeah. I'll take care of it."

"Oh thanks sweetie!!!"

Sweetie? I've worked for this man for a year. Never has he called me sweetie. Now he's half-way to the new office, carrying with him a semi-felt hug of mine and he thinks it's okay to call me sweetie. It is not. It is most certainly not. I am not sweet. I am not cute and adorable. I am not made of honey. I'm made of starch, and white-out. That's all.

Today I called the other office and talked with my cube-buddy. My favorite guy. The guy who I picked on mercilessly waiting for him to cry uncle.

He never did. This is why he is my favorite guy.

We went a few rounds. I almost got teary-eyed thinking how far away he was and how unemployed I'm about to be.

"So pretty lady, what do you need from me?"

He thinks I'm pretty...

"Aw sweetie. I miss you. Wish you were here keeping me in line."

Hehe...he called me sweetie...I'm blushing.

"You're lucky I'm not."

"Oh I have no doubt. But I need someone to cut me down a few notches. I miss you honey."

He thinks I'm honey too.

To him I'm nice. In the only way I know how...I tease, torment and torture. And he loves me for it.

Which is why he can call me sweetie and boss can't.

This all makes perfect, sober, sense.

Quotes you regret

When I was a lass I spent a lot of time being interviewed for things. Lots of volunteer projects, lots of fancy school commendations, lots of awards for theater and writing.

Having spent a lot of time talking with reporters (and unfortunately being the daughter of a well-known one) allowed me the chance to learn the hard way that you need to make sure you don't say something that can be edited down to the lowest denominator of dumb.

My biggest interview goof was a spot on television covering young local writers at a writing convention. In amongst my many comments on the lectures I mentioned that one of the speakers had mentioned that in modern writing "adjectives are useless."

Of course that's the one quote they kept in the whole spot.

However, I was 14 at the time. I'm often surprised that people my age now (ten years later) still come out with those kinds of quotes. Much less people far, far older than me, with much more experience - and in the New York Times.

My favorite from today's edition was found in the article Passing Down the Legacy of Conservatism:


"He [Donald Devine, lecturer and former head of government personnel in the Reagan Administration] lamented the prosecution of Kenneth Lay, the late Enron executive convicted of fraud, by asking, "Do you think it's possible for a rich person to get justice in the U.S. today?"


One can only hope that was taken out of context.

Philosophy

Perhaps it's age, or it could be residue from "The Navy", maybe it's that marriage thing; regardless - you start to forget. You forget you existed anywhere other than where you are. Oh you remember where you were. Tiny apartment in San Diego, tiny scrap of corner in New York, strange smelling hotel rooms, long car trips, long flights. You can remember running around in your underwear down 5th street and getting drunk night after night at McGuire's. But do you really remember where you started?

I forget. And then someone from a past life finds their way in - or I find them. Emails from the blue, sparks of recognition, vague memories long since fogged over by...

Hmm by what?

Probably that 20th beer at McGuires to be honest.

People my age tend to complain a lot about not getting enough information about people from high school and college. I wouldn't know. I don't keep in touch with people. I guess that's not true. There are people I've emailed monthly for years and years. But they are the people who aren't interested in passing on "Christmas Card" letters. We don't talk about what we've been doing or where we're going. We exchange fantasy lives, stories, pieces of our imagination that needs to be let out - "Today I killed a bug, let me expound on the subject of insect-cide for five paragraphs"

I like that. Screw exposition and openings and closings. Free exchange of ideas...puzzling paragraphs to chew on. I talk with these people all the time...I have no idea what the hell they are doing with their life.

And then you go and get crazy and start looking up the names you can remember from high school on MySpace. It's weird, looking at profiles of people you used to know. You know you used to know them, but now they have new friends and have cut their hair. Now they have new inside jokes with their roommates and boyfriends. It feels like they've become famous. And you can jump up and down and say "I knew them when!"

Of course they aren't famous (well some of them are) but it's because someone else has claimed them as a friend...and they aren't in the circle. The outer world has invaded my memories - foggy as they are - and now what I owned is public property. This girl who for years after high school was mine, my memory, my idea, my revisionism. And she went ahead and kept living...cut her hair...grew up.

It's surreal. Which is real, which is true? My memory of us trading juice boxes or her newest blog post about the lawn service?

See, it's easier just to forget. I didn't exist before, I just am. Here I sit, in my little space, and here I always was. At least I know that's real.

StatCounter

And now for another installment of "How did you get here?"

I just did a quick gander at my StatCounter "Came From" stats again - nothing incredibly strange this time. But it's odd that I've been popping out a lot of mundane posts about shopping and home life and somehow google seems to think I am a pornstar.

Search Query's that led here:

Google UK Search for "Big Boobs" (Well, we already know what I think about those

More UK people searching for "Orange Cichlid" (Mine was named Pumpkin and she died last August.)

Blogger Search for "Women looking for men who score" (Everyone loves a winner.)

Google Blog Search for "Bra" (Not weird, but seriously...you were looking for blog posts about bras?)

Also blog searches for "Big Bra" and "My boobs have grown." (And I thought I was the only one who worried about this stuff.)

Google for "Hair Scissors Snip"

Blogger search for "Sexy high school girlie" AND "drunk out girls" (You are very, very dirty.)

Google for "Britishisms Bloody Fag" (Because bleeding over cigarettes is a big problem.)

Google again for "Hands grow bigger" (Which would be helpful, considering I now have more than a handful.)

Google again for "Writing a letter to your xboss after a long time" (My mother always told me that if you didn't have anything nice to say...say it in the car when your husband can't hear.)

Great one from Google on "I had a penis, I was a man"

Blogger search for "Tattoo Katy" (I got nothing...)

More UK Google for "Merekats sales" (I wouldn't...they make horrible salesmen...and they keep digging holes in the carpet.)

Blogger again on "Show me sexy girls" followed by a Blogger search for "Bad girls" (Yes I am, so spank me :P)

And finally, to link the bottom of this post to the top a Google search for "Pornstar"

Guess I really am more interesting than I thought...

Hmph.

This post sucks

"Like with all fieldtrips, we ended up being there about an hour too long." I summed up after detailing my weekend activities to Cary (not her real name - thank you) at work.

"You always do interesting things." She said. "My whole story was about the dogs fighting and reading a book."

"Sounds like a good weekend to me. You're plan was to relax."

"Yeah, but you guys always do something different and exciting. I'd never think to do that."

This statement isn't all that new to me. Before the great purging of our office our weekend update pow-wow's were more than just two women, and usually at the end of it my stories were met with shock and a little admiration. However, it was mostly women who were decades older than me and had children my age. Me being prone to indulge in some stereo-types when it fits my mood expect older suburban Marylanders to have boring weekends.

But Cary is 27 and single and drop-dead gorgeous. She's one of those girls I tend to fantasize about being. The perfect blonde who kept her looks and her popularity long after high school. Followed the straight and narrow, has a college degree and you know a job despite layoffs.

And she thinks my life is exciting. After I detailed a bus trip where we went around Pennsylvania drinking beer. Good beer, but still. It was beer on a bus, that's all.

It's odd feeling like I am somehow the bad girl amongst my fellow East Coasters. Growing up on a little island, with a father everyone knew, I rarely got into trouble. Actually I never got into trouble. During my prom I was invited to the infamous "after-party". But my date was gay and we both had to wake up early the next morning to do a mime show (I kid you not). Now as an adult a typical night for me is still staying home and watching t.v. Or playing on the internet. I do get drunk in public often. Usually the drunk in public thing is followed by flirting. That's about it. Oh, and dirty jokes, and swearing. But all and all it's tame. I'm really a pretty normal good girl.

Debauchery is such a word that deserves a little more...sin. Wild parties where you drink unidentifiable liquid in opaque cups and take unidentifiable pills from the sleazy guy with the silk shirt. Go home with an equally unidentifiable man or woman (or both) and wake up blissfully ignorant of why there is a picture of Hecate painted in red nail polish on your wall. That's debauchery. That's interesting. A story about how you found your underwear in the back of a white hummer limousine - now that's exciting.

Not a Thursday night spent at the pub.

So my status as the Bettie Page is completely unwarranted. I not only feel bored, I feel boring. My stripper exercise classes and my yoga just feel like normal things to me. Even dare I say a bit fad-ish. It smacks of suburban boringness dressed up. Like a housewife wearing heels. Ain't nothing to write home about.

Or write in a blog about.

Except that somehow all my friends tend to want to live vicariously through me. They want to hear all my dumb little stories. I guess when all their stories are about how they took out the garbage a day early and the racoon got it, my story about how we watched a spontaneous Argentine parade after the World Cup game seems somehow cool. At least to them.

Cary, who I secretly envy, envies me. And I think I'm boring. I think she's boring too, but at least she's blonde and boring.

Are my expectations too high or are the communities expectations too low? Do I just live in a boring place where anything out of the ordinary is strange and exciting or am I really the bad girl I've secretly always wanted to be?

Does this post sound too much like Sex and the City?

Maybe, instead of me actually being interesting and intriguing I'm the ordinary girl who is pegged as different because I am quiet and have red curly hair. Will the admiration and compliments slowly wear off and eventually turn into mob cries of "Burn the Witch!"?

At least then I'll have a really exciting story.

Mutant

I guess I should have seen it coming. There were plenty of signs. The way my bras were digging into my skin. The strange indentations on my chest at the end of the day. The bad looks I got at the gym. I know those looks. I've given them before. That look that oozes venom. The pointed stare at the bouncing girls that just screams disgust. It's like being in high school...only worse.

But I couldn't help it - I thought - I'm trying to run.

Of course the kicker should have been when my friend yelled in the middle of the office "How do you fit those watermelons in a size small?!?!"

Regardless, I didn't pick up on the signals. I didn't listen to the murmurs (though apparently it was quite the topic among the men) and I didn't see the stares. So when I walked into Victoria Secret I wasn't prepared.

I was in a strange mood for Katy. I wanted to go shopping. I felt like looking at stuff and trying things on. This is rare and it was exciting to go off on my own and indulge in pure girly-ness. Victoria Secret is my favorite. It smells good in there and everything feels nice. I like running around and coo-ing over the latest cute set. The fun and flirty thongs. The new corsets. I like being in a store that screams curves and sexy and flirt. I flutter from rack to rack, looking at the mannequins and drooling over the lace and sequins. FUN!

I went in armed with push-ups and push-togethers. Side straps and tube straps. Convertibles, invisibles, demi, full. Silky, lacy, skin. I had my favorites picked out and was ready to finally face the mirror - sure that one of them would give me the exact shape I like. Round, but perky. And all in a size 36C.

But something was wrong. For some reason instead of round I was getting slightly oblong. Instead of full and perky, my breasts looked strangled. Smushed. Like they were trying to escape.

No girls, we have to wear a bra...it's the 21st century...we can't get away with that free-hanging stuff anymore.

But try as I might. Adjusting and pulling and prodding, they would not stay in the cup. Help!

I bit my lip as the very tiny girl measured me. It'll be okay I thought. So what if I've gained an inch or two. I'll get a few 38's and then hit the row-machine. Back to 36 in no time. It's perfectly normal to grow a little.

"36!" She counted the inches. "Oh but you definitely need to be in a D cup."

"A what cup?"

"You're definitely a D. Want to try something with a little more support?" She asked helpfully. I personally think she sounded a little too cheery.

I tried it on anyway. It fit. It was perfect in fact. Full, round, comfortable. And big. Seriously...all I could see were the twins. Nothing else. I ceased to have a body or a head, I was just a inconsequential transport for two big boobs. I felt like a boob.

But I was game. I went out looking for all those cute things I liked before in my new size. I mean why not? Everyone wants big breasts right? Plastic surgeons make millions every year by giving women larger sizes. I got mine naturally. I'm lucky right?

I was until I noticed that I couldn't find D's in any of the styles I liked. No bra-tops in D's. No Ipex, no second skin.

"Do you need some help finding something?" "Oh, you have to look in the drawers for that size." The drawers? Previously the drawers in Victoria Secret were only needed to find the odd colors. Like passion-berry and hot-green. I didn't need a hot-green bra. Not that I wouldn't mind it. But still...it's hot green.

"Right, we don't have D's in this style. Are you sure you want a demi?" "So which color did you need...flesh or black?" I looked around. Everywhere the mannequins were covered in fun colors and flirty lace. Pink and red and purple. Colors I love. Colors I like to put on under boring work clothes and know to myself that I am wearing a purple and pink lace bra underneath...and it's my little secret. Then I looked at the small drawer of D's...in styles I used to see my mother wear...and colors that were as boring as my husbands underwear.

It was all I could do not to burst into tears.

Overdramatic? Maybe. But this idea that society puts pressure on women to be big-breasted is a bunch of bullshit. Show me the store where the mannequins are a full C-cup? Show me where in the mall a woman with full breasts and full hips can by a t-shirt that doesn't stretch to bursting over her boobs. Show me the non-maternity wear dresses that don't either smush or bunch over a round front. Show me all that and I'll show you a bridge I have for sale.

Gone are the fun colors and the flirty sets. Gone are the cute t-shirts and fun tops. Gone gone gone.

But I have plenty of breast to spare.

The Importance of Being Egotistic

Today I found myself stuck watching some morning "news" show while I waited in the lobby of my car dealer. The claim of the rental car girl that "They're bringing a lot of cars around front right now, " was slowly turning into "They're bringing a lot of cars around front sometime before noon." So I was sitting and dividing my time between Miss Mary Sunshine and her semi-attractive middle-aged co-star and the toy model of a BMW X5.

Some guy with a newspaper of some sort was watching with me, and snorting in derision while Mary talked about some potbelly pigs somewhere in Chicago.

"They really don't have a lot of news do they?" The woman who was sitting opposite newspaper guy said.

"I'm waiting for them to start talking about what's really important!" Newspaper guy cried. "This here will be the end of oil in America, they're taxing terrorists..." I only heard about half of his blather, I was too busy trying to crane my neck far enough to see the headline on his rag. And it was a rag...it even had glossy paper...no newsprint in sight.

This is about the time I started dividing my attention between the toy X5, the potbelly pigs, and my new found need to classify reading material by their actual material. It's not really and newspaper unless it leaves dirty black ink all over your hands and is too cumbersome to read comfortably. Somehow my own personal fantasy about newspapers and the mess they make took enough time that I found myself suddenly alone with Newspaper guy in the lobby.

He looked at me. I stared at the pigs. He looked at me again. I glared at the pigs. He scooted closer to me.

I moved my purse to sit between us.

He got the message and moved back to his other chair.

Then he looked at me some more. "You're not really watching this are you?"

"Nope, they're just pigs."

He nodded and mumbled about needing to see the "real" news. He kept on about the end of oil in America and terrorists. His snorts were much louder and somehow much more pompous now that he was in control of the fancy remote control. He waved the news-thing around to make a point about how American news doesn't talk about the real important stuff. I caught stuff like "ignorant" and "biased" and "monkey" Meanwhile I watched to see what he thought was real news. CNN? Fox? MSNBC? CSPAN? Was he conservative? Liberal? Libertarian? Did he want world news or domestic? Was he a pure story guy or someone who only watched analysts? Did he enjoy John Stewart?

Probably not, he was wearing a polo shirt after all.

Instead he stopped on a channel with old pictures of Britney Spears dancing in various states of undress.

Which is obviously more important than the end of oil in America and terrorism put together. And way real.

Related

So with Independence Day once more upon us here in the U.S.A. there have of course been a plethora of documentaries, movies, plays and books about our Revolution and our Founding Fathers.

I love these stories. I get chills thinking about the rag-tag group of soldiers sitting in the cold, hungry, tired, defeated - listening to the words of Thomas Paine and Common Sense before they fight the dreaded Red Coats again. I always feel my shoulders rise a little straighter and my skin prickle when I hear the words of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Patrick Henry repeated over and over.

And of course:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Wow. Just wow. Maybe it's the way I was raised, or the things I've seen and people I've met growing up. No matter. Those words still cut straight to my heart.

This year, though, I've been struck with an whole different idea.

These men were the Founding Fathers.

These men were my Founding Fathers.

It is a humbling and strangely uplifting thought to know that more than 200 years ago a few men risked their lives to create a country that one day would afford me so many things that so many people around the world do not have.

These men didn't just give life to a new country with new ideals, they gave birth to a new kind of person. Great people who've followed of course. People who changed the world. But people like me too. And people like my husband. And that's something. Because maybe we aren't changing the world in a single deed, or even a single lifetime. But if I've learned anything from my family and ancestors, it's that it's not the huge things that matter - it's the footprints we leave.

Our Founding Fathers left a lot of footprints to follow. And a lot of room for us to find our own path. They are big shoes to fill. But the cool thing I realize now is that the shoes aren't meant to be filled by one or two men. But by all of us. Because we're Americans, linked inexplicably to heroes from centuries ago by a simple pledge, declaration, of allegiance. I'm in a way related to Thomas Jefferson and John Hancock.

And in that way I'm also related to anyone who believes themselves an American. Being American isn't about blood or heritage or parentage. It's about allegiance, in any form, to the same ideas that were put forth in the Declaration of Independence and The Constitution.

And that's a really awesome feeling.

Ramblings - Practice Roadtrip

This weekend, for the first time since we've lived in Maryland (almost 2.5 years), my husband and I had Maryland crabs that were not in "cake" form.

And we only had to drive to Virginia to do it.

Well okay, we weren't in Virginia. But we were pretty darn close. We were in that strange Bermuda-triangle-esque area called "Delmarva". A wrong turn in any direction would have taken us to either Delaware or Virginia. Through the 12 gallons of gas and over 300 miles of driving I wondered how they came up with the name Delmarva. Why that order? Why not Mardelva? Vadelmar? Delvamar? Mary Delva? Vir Delma? Why Delmarva? And why is Virginia recognized by it's two letter code but Delaware and Maryland have to have three letters? Why couldn't we just use one letter for each and keep it far.

"Yo. What's up? I'm hailing from the DMV yo."

Ooooooh....that's why it's called Delmarva...

Regardless. We went there. We went in search of ponies. Which we found on Assategue Island. We saw five ponies, seven deer, one bunny and three doves. As well a hawk that I saw while were driving there. It's a comfort to know that there is someone else in the world who goes as crazy happy over seeing bunnies and ponies as I do. Or he's good at pretending he does. While other people will simply shrug when they see a squirrel climbing up the tree, I can feel comfortable knowing that not only will my husband not think I'm nuts for pointing out the little boing-boing squirrel.

We're a good match. And now I have proof that we are a good match in the form of our new digital camera - with 12 pictures of ducks being ducky, 7 pictures of bunnies hopping away, 4 pictures of squirrels, 7 more of a swan and a whopping 27 pictures of a flock of Geese eating sunflower seeds. All coupled with 2 pictures of me looking at squirrels, 2 of me looking at the swan, 3 of me talking to the bunny.

This is what we are preserving for our posterity. "And this little C. and little K. is when your Father and I stood in the park and quacked at the ducks. Here you can see your Father doing the duck-dance."

Yes, as far as mini-roadtrips go this one was fairly successful. A few animals, a tank of gas, and only one semi-temper tantrum halfway through. (His, not mine.) Which all ended in the elusive Maryland steamed crabs.

I made my crabs talk and do a cure puppet show. Then proceeded to split their head open and scoop out their guts. We both got very good at making lots of noise with the mallets. Any food that comes with a hammer is good food.

Giggle

Right now I'm reading "A Popular Schoolgirl" by Angela Brazil. It's fun, I can't help but burst into a fit of schoolgirl giggles myself when I read it. It's so bubbly and cute and british.

It's topping - oops - there I go again *insert giggles here*

But on top of all the giggle-inducing phrases like 'right-o', 'topping', 'chuffed' and the like there are also a few situations that you can't help but smile at. For instance:

"You ought to help me with my exercises, though, Ingred," she wheedled. "Remember, it's for the benefit of the form. If you let me make mistakes, well--it's the form that will suffer. You can't call it _my_fault, it's on your own head. You know as well as I do that I simply can't spell, and it takes me hours to hunt up words in the dictionary. I'm looking for 'phenomenon' now."

"You certainly won't find it in the F's," laughed Ingred. "What an infant in arms you are! Here, then, go ahead, and I'll act as dictionary. You've only written half a page yet. You'll be a week of
Sundays at this rate."

"And I haven't touched my Latin or French!" sighed Fil dismally. "I wish I could go to a school where there isn't any homework, and that somebody would invent a typewriter that would just spell the words ready-made when you press a button."

"There's a fortune waiting for the man who does!" agreed Ingred. "'The Royal-Road-to-Learning Typewriter: spells of itself.' It would sell by the million, I should think."

Indeed!

The Ladies Who Lunch

Yesterday we said goodbye to a fellow assistant in our department. She's going on with the company, the two of us are being left behind. As a semi-celebration (I'm not sure of what) we all three went to lunch.

Being assistants we never leave for lunch. Our bosses will leave for hours on "business" lunches to all sorts of restaurants and bars. We make the reservations but we never go. Instead you'll usually find us slurping up iced tea and diet coke while nibbling on local deli fare. Going outside for lunch is a special thing - and rare.

So it was a surprise when the three of us piled out of the car and into an incredibly packed parking lot. It was even more a surprise to walk into the restaurant and find it near full with people. Mostly people is suits or "business casual" attire. All sitting down at a table with full plates of hot food...and no computers in site. I wasn't sure if I could eat a whole lunch without a keyboard in front of me. What would I do between bites? How would I occupy the time?

Then I remembered I wouldn't have to worry about that. Three women going out to lunch...don't worry...very little lunch would be had.

We started off right away with talking about diets. We oooh'd and ahhh'd over the appetizers, then promptly ordered waters all around and changed the topic to the conventional wisdom of not drinking liquid with meals.

With the bread was the discussion of Atkins and South Beach. When we ordered, which took forever, we all prefaced with "Mmm, a steak sounds good" and ended with "I'd like the rabbit food please. Dressing on the side." (Actually I had grilled chicken with asparagus.)

Then we talked about pills and diseases. I was certain it was because we were trying to ruin our appetite. Thyroid conditions, cancer, obesity, senility. One woman decided she must have thyroid cancer since her memory was slowly slipping away and her metabolism "wasn't working".

Then we ooh'd and ahh'd over desserts. We all thought cheesecake was the best thing. And just when our mouths started to water one of us brought up the story about the cheesecake filled with botulism or something.

Food's up!

I was given a little respite over the meal when the two older ladies discussed their children. As they gabbed about schools and clothes and soccer games I looked around at our suited co-diners. A lot of them had beers or hard drinks next to their steaks and burgers. Most of them had fries (I love fries). I wondered if their conversations revolved around the latest diet craze or who's best friend has a yeast infection. Did the regular restaurant lunchers sabotage their meals with talk of fat and death? Was the man with the bow-tie going to tuck into his porterhouse then commence a discussion of diabetes?

I finished my chicken just in time to get the grill over when I would have babies. We moved on to the hardships of work while our waiter tried to tempt us into dessert. He should have known it was a lost cause. I did.

We piled back into our car, indulging in peppermints and exclaiming how full we were and how we couldn't believe we ate so much food.

You always hear about those Matrons of Society who do nothing but lunch. Or about the Housewives of Rich Men who spend their mornings in the gym and their afternoons getting plastered on the decks of fancy restaurants.

I don't believe it. I don't believe that a group of women could get together and really enjoy a meal. I'm no exception. I could have gone to that restaurant at any other time and ordered potato skins loaded with cheese, a thick yummy steak and a big potato on the side. I'd have tipped back a nice cold drink and followed it with a big sundae. And I'd have loved every second of it. But surrounded by my female counter-parts I felt the need to fit the mold. Share my food-eating secrets, try theirs. I easily rattled off all the facts I know about this exercise and that, about these calorie counters and those. I know all about them. So do they. And we know that they know. And they know we know they know.

And we still have to compete. We compete over useless knowledge and who can eat the least and who can suffer the most. Who sacrifices the most? Who is on the path to being the skinniest?

Who is the lady who can lunch the least the most?

Tattoo

I'm approaching my 24th Birthday. And as I do my common birthday wish is beginning to creep back into my head. The idea is always there, it floats to the surface every so often, but around my birthday, around that personal milestone, the idea gets stronger, more compelling.

I want a tattoo.

I've wanted one for years. I want something small, simple, elegant. I want something pretty, something feminine. Something elusive. I don't want a big shamrock on my arm or some dumb butterfly on my ankle. I want something soft and dainty along my back...right in that space between the two dimples my hips make.

"Why," my friend said as his hand circled around my waist playfully, "would such a beautiful girl like you want ruin that by mutilating herself?"

"You sound like my Mother." I replied, rolling my eyes. We dropped it and went on to other topics.

But what I should have replied is that I want a tattoo because I am beautiful. I wear lipstick so my lips standout. I wear rouge so my round cheeks are noticeable. I line my eyes in black so my brown eyes will pop out. I brush my hair so my natural curl and wave will bounce as I walk. I wear a bra to make my breasts round and full. My clothes follow the line of my body. My make-up accentuates the shape of my face. My jewelry sparkles and draws attention to my neck which has a nice curve, my fingers with are small and delicate

It's all a game. A game I play very well. My friend probably wouldn't have thought I was "such a beautiful girl" if I didn't do a little primping. Dirty and messy I can sometimes come off as pretty, but not really. Dressed and dolled up I can attract a few stares.

And when I do it right I can attract those stares to the right parts. I look at adornment as a roadsign. A little sparkle to catch ones eye the right direction. Something flashy to make them look left rather than left.

I have a navel piercing. I like my stomach. It's not a six-pack or anything like that. But it's nice. I creates a flow. My sparkly piercing catches the light a lot. It pulls attention away from the fact that my abs aren't rock hard and more towards the fact that my stomach has a nice soft curve, and flow that, if you happen to be lucky, could be followed all the way down to a pair of nice full hips and a sloping waist. The nice dark blue gem in the middle on my navel is a nice contrast to my pale white skin, and it looks pretty.

In fact, it may be one of the reasons why I am "such a beautiful girl".

And my tattoo could do the same thing. I'm getting to point now where I really like my butt. It's a good butt. It's not that round, but it has a little fullness, and it moves nicely to my legs...which are very nice. And I love that dimpled area. I like it on me, I like it on other girls. I like looking at naked girls from behind because of it. I like the fact that pants ride so low simply for the fact that I can see that little swoop from the back to the butt.

I want people to look at my swoop. I want to adorn it and accentuate it. It's a nice swoop, it deserves a little color.

So I'm narsicistic. But I don't apologize. I like me. And someone has too...

/signed

"It is not bigotry to define marriage as a union of a man and a woman," said Senator Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas.
New York Times June 6, 2006

Okay it's no secret that I find the idea of defining marriage by gender is illogical. I just don't see why these two people can be in love and want to get married and that's okay with everyone, but these two other people over here can be in love and want to get married and suddenly a whole institution is being threatened.
Will my marriage be voided out and worthless because Mark married someone named Greg?

No.

But regardless where you come in on this issue this woman had a good point. If a Senator is going to attempt to define marriage perhaps he should know the standard definitions for other nouns as well. Like bigotry.

So I'm with Kathy. We should make sure our Senators know what they're talking about before they talk...or for that matter vote.

I've sent Senator Brownback the copy of Dictionary.com's definition for bigotry along with a copy of the article the quote is from (so he doesn't get more confused). And added a little of my own flare in the form of a large post-it note on the importance of vocabulary.

And I signed it Mrs. Katy ________.

Go here for more information about how to contact Senator Brownback. And remember to contact your own Senators and let them know what you think. Because I happen to know for a fact that Washington D.C. is far from any reality.

American Dream

I grew up in America where, from an early age, I was told that if I was willing to work hard I could be whatever I wanted to be. "You can be anything you want when you grow up, even The President of the United States." That's what they told me. My parents told me that, my teachers told me that, girl scouts told me that. Heck, the Muppets told me that! All I had to do was work hard.

So I have. I started with the good grades, with the ambitious projects and the extracurriculars. I volunteered too, trusting that the people I helped then would be just as successful as I would be if they just got an extra hand up. A little extra help and hard work and we'd all roll right along. We could do anything, be anyone.

Then I moved on to working. Come in early, go home late. Get everything done on-time. Finish it all early. Anticipate problems, fix them before hand. Be reliable, dependable, responsible and organized. Work hard and don't complain. Be honest, Be trustworthy. Keep your nose to the grindstone and you'll be okay.

I didn't just think these things. I didn't just hear the catch phrases "Apply yourself" and "Work hard" and think "Hey, there's something to try." No. I believed it. I knew deep in my soul that the secret to life was working hard. I trusted in my grindstone the way people trust in God. Just apply more of yourself and you'll be okay. I was more than a good soldier - I was a devout soldier.

Which is why when I come to my office in the morning - turning on the lights as I do - I feel a crushing weight lying in my chest. When I turn on my computer and see all the things that have been left for me to do as my bosses frolic in Las Vegas or Paris or the beaches of Thailand, the weight grows heavier. As I toil on reports and presentations at lunch, the weight crushes my ribs. When I find myself suddenly alone in an office creating a new contract when moments before I was simply showing someone how to use a program...my back threatens to break.

But worst of all is knowing that no matter how hard I work. No matter what I do at my job now, no matter how great my resume is, how wonderful my references are - there will soon be no work. No work because after all the big salaries and the big airplane tickets and the price of food and gas there is no money for me.

And as I train five people to take over my one position - the weight crushes my faith. And that makes me mad.

Maybe it's because I was naive as a girl. Maybe I just needed to open my eyes more and realize that those people who were down on their luck didn't need a helping hand - they needed a regime change.

It makes me mad that I can work my ass off as hard as I want and still get laid-off...TWICE. I can have the best resume ever, and I can send it to everyone and their brother. But I will never be called.

Because hard work doesn't work. Applying yourself just means getting caught in the sticky mess other people make. Being honest means being expendable. Being helpful means being weak.

I'm 23. I'm smart, pretty, jaded, out-of-luck, in debt, educated, worn out, faithless and pissed off.

Just a thought

It seems to me that you can watch the news every single day and every single day there will be a new story about the "Obesity Epidemic" in America. And invariably with every story there will be a little montage of people walking on the sidewalk who are overweight. Actually it's usually a montage of people's asses, and stomach, and legs, and usually one rotund woman stuffing her mouth with fries. Or some large man eating a burger in one gulp.

Ever wonder what it's like to be the guy shooting this stuff?

"Hey Mick! Go outside and film fat people."

"Again?!?!"

"Yeah, and make sure you get lots of butts. And a couple of people in shorts and tank-tops. The story is about cellulite - so remember - cankles sell!"

I'm sure when Mick was training to become a camera-man for a major news station his goal was to film endless b-roll of cankles. Miles and miles of cankles. Do they shell this stuff out to the interns? To the probby? Is it a hazing thing among the crew. You shoot good rolls of, well, rolls and you get move up to second position or something? And who edits this stuff? Whose job is it to sit in a dark room and pick just which cankle is scary enough to get the "Epidemic" message across, but not so scary that people turn off the t.v. during dinner?

Just wondering...

Look at all the people

I have statcounter on this blog, so occasionally I can check to see if anyone comes here for longer than a minute.

Don't worry...no one does.

However on May 27th I saw this weird huge spike in new comers. Spike being 108 people rather than the two returning.

Where did these people come from? Did 108 people collectively realize that kitties are awesome? Did some horrible world event happen to them to make 108 people depressed and incapable of wallowing in the pit of despair that this blog lives in?

No. Something even more incredible. A rather accomplished blogger linked to me. Under a listing of D/s blogs. Which fills me with guilt that 108 people clicked on the link and were collectively...disappointed.

So to them - I'm sorry.

And to the accomplished blogger, thank you. No really, thank you. I'm too chicken to post on your blog, but I've always liked it. And always will.

And to the rest of you suckers who wound up here first...go to A Creative Spanko Wench instead. Because it's more fun.

Anyway, that's where all the people came from. And probably where they went back to.

Shoe Santa

When one is in a class full of women who are wearing hard, plastic six-inch heels and rolling around on the floor, or climbing up poles, one is soon aware that eventually one is going to get a shoe to the face.

Especially is one is names Katy and has a history of getting kicked in the face.

One, well Katy-One, does not expect the shoe hitting her face to be her own.

But it was. A few weeks ago I was doing a particularly tricky tumble that ended up with me balanced on my right shoulder, arms out, head tucked and leg spread-eagle directly above me. It's a fun tumble and I highly recommend it for anyone who doesn't have a broken back...yet.

But just as my legs were swinging up and out I hear a great big SNAP. No, it wasn't my back. It was my shoe:

Which after going SNAP decided to fly off my foot and head directly for my face.

The worst part was not the shoe-shape bruise I sported for two days. The worst part was have to use my pole boots:

for chair dancing class. Why is this the worst part? You wear knee high pvc boots in a small windowless room with no a/c or fan and twenty other women...then do five hundred squats.

So I've been upset. I like my pole boots:

for pole class, but I want my stripper shoes:

for floor and chair class.

What's a girl to do?

Buy more shoes of course. And I did. And they came in the mail today. It's like Christmas in July in June!

I just wonder if I can wear these:

to work?

Now that's a clear connection...

"Oh my god Katy, I'm 32 and I have tonsillitis!"

"Aww, Poor Jim! You're sick and you got stuck with me."

Jim is one of my favorite travel counselors. I am one of his most hated customers. Boss#2 does a lot of traveling and it's always complicated. The big joke is that the counselors screen for my name and avoid me like the plague. But apparently not like tonsillitis because Jim and I had just spent an hour hashing out three weeks worth of travel and now we're chatting about his penicillin dose.

"I know...I should have just jumped out the window instead." Jim says - probably jokingly.

We hang-up. I rub my throat sympathetically; glad I'm not the one working sick. But I've been really healthy, no flus, no colds, no near death emergencies. Generally I've been bright eyed and bushy tailed. I hate working sick, especially having to talk on the phone a lot. And I really hate being sick in the summer. Having a fever when it's cold outside is one thing, but having a fever when the heat has gone up to 80 and all you want to do is take a nap in the sunshine is just a cruel joke.

An hour after the call my throat feels funny. Sorta ticklish and tight. I attribute it to the Caesar dressing I had on my salad. I thought it tasted a bit more tangy that it should have.

Half and hour later I'm trying to force ice cubes down my throat before chewing them...just to numb the area. It feels good, but I keep choking. I have visions of lying dead in my cubicle and not being discovered till Boss#2 decided he needed another letter dictated. It both makes me sad that I'll die in a cubicle and happy that my Boss's lucky-bastard-gets-whatever-he-wants-cloud would burst.

I make it home anyway.

"You sound sick." My husband says helpfully.

"I'm not. I refuse to be sick. I will not be sick. Nothing and no one can make me sick 20 days before vacation. No!" Ah, hubris.

An hour later I'm curled under the blankets with a cat warming my chest and my head hidden under a pillow.

"Guess what!" My husband says cheerily.

"Mmmmmppphh." I respond.

"You're sick!"

But I was so healthy. I was surrounded by healthy people. I don't know anyone who has been sick or was getting sick. No one!

Except Jim. Jim with tonsillitis. Jim who I spoke to on the phone for two hours.

I have this memory of those commercials for a phone company: Reach out and touch someone.

But wash your hands first.

I AM

It's dark, it's loud, it's packed with over 100 girls. Some of them are naked, some are clothed, all of us are drunk. We're currently screaming at a classmate to do "Love It or Hate It" on stage while singles go flying every direction. I barely hear the guy behind me asking if he can sit in the adjacent stool.

So he asks again - only this time he taps my shoulder.

"Can I have this seat?"

I know that a lot of guys get upset when girls are sarcastic and/or bratty...but honestly...why do they make it so dang easy for me. Questions like the above are just screaming for a smart-ass response. Must-make-joke...must-tease...willpower-draining....

"Sure!"

Willpower restored. I am a nice girl...really.

"I'm Rich, who are you?"

"Katy" I blurt.

He shakes his head like he can't hear me, and he probably can't. He leans in closer.

"Julie" He leans in again, this time confused. His hand has suddenly found mine and is doing that strange half handshake, half caress thing. He looks like he can't decide if he want to kiss my hand or break my fingers. It's creepy. I yell into his ear "Mary".

"I can't hear you!" He yells back before leaning in close enough that I can feel his breath down my neck. I'm sure he's getting a good view of cleavage from that position. I'm getting a good whiff of too much beer. "My name is Lacy!"

And if you believe that I have a bridge I can sell you. I am a semi-nice girl...really.

"I'm from England. I don't really know how to talk to you American girls. I really want to tell you that you're hot...but I don't know how."

I can't really tell if he actually is English. He either has an accent or he's just really drunk and slurring his words oddly. English or not his hand is beginning to worm it's way up my thigh.

"I'm sure you'll get the hang of it eventually"

"I would really like to sleep with you."

See, you already have the hang of it.

"Aw, that's nice Rich, but I'm married so I'm not going to sleep with you."

"What if I was more aggressive. I could change your mind."

Change my mind? You have to be pretty aggressive to go back in time four years and tell an excited bride that in four years time some guy in a strip club is going to tell her she's hot and fuckable and that she'll be sad she was married so she should call the whole thing off.

"You couldn't change my mind even if you were attractive!"

I am an occasional-nice girl

"Why don't we go out tonight?" He grabs me by my hips and pulls me off my chair and into him. I quickly disengage myself from the drunk semi-British man and push him away. Vaguely I wonder if this will turn into a bar fight. I size him up...I'm less drunk than he is, but I'm also about 100 lbs less person than he is. Throwing a punch would not be a good idea.

But it'd be fun.

I am a slightly mean girl.

I walk away and re-join my group of girls. We automatically form the patented "Cock-block Circle" and everything is fine till I feel fingers scratching at my back.

"Why do your friends hate me?" It's Rich...duh.

"You're a man."

I am just a plain brat.

"I'm buying drinks for all of you. You'll come and talk to me now."

"No amount of alcohol will make me want to talk to you."

I'm a bitch.

"I can change your mind." His hand grabs my ass and the other slides down into my jeans. I move before his fingers find anything else to scratch.

Fortunately I move right into a bouncer. Who unfortunately for Rich grabs him by the collar.

"Did he touch any of you girls?"

"No no," Rich mumbles "We're just dancing."

"He touch you?" Says Rich's new friend.

Rich looks at me pleadingly. I feel kind bad cause he had a pretty tight collar on to begin with. Then I don't feel all that bad cause my jeans were pretty tight too.

"Yep. He stuck his hands down my pants."

And Rich was gone. In amongst admonitions of "You don't touch my girls and you don't touch these girls" I hear Rich with a real British type accent:

"You Bitch!"

No. I am an American Bitch.

Inconvenience

Living near the Capitol of my Country and the Residence of the Leader of the Free World, I expect a few kinks in the flow of transportation. I expect, when going down to D.C. and driving through the Diplomatic District that I may come across a few lags in traffic and possibly a closed road here or there. I am also used to finding the 95 has backed up the entrance to the 32 because our dear President decided to take his car out for a burger, or whatever it is he eats...puppies, small children, the dreams of small business owners...Oh wait - that's Dick Cheney.

Regardless, what I mean to say is I expect a little trouble to come into my life since I sometimes venture towards D.C. I can deal with this. Rather I be inconvenienced than have my country thrown into turmoil over a dead President. Take all the time you need to clear those streets boys...I'll wait.

However, I do not expect the President to muck up travel plans elsewhere. Like today. Today most of my supervisors were in some city in the Midwest somewhere. And all of them were headed home. Today, early. Operation Headed-Home was huge. Tons of people on different flights, all needing rides and tickets and directions and who knows what else. Everything was scheduled to the minute. From our command center on the East Coast we coordinated and moved 40+ whiny, picky, grouchy, timid little executives from hotels to cars to airports. And it was going swimmingly for a few hours.

When they closed the airports, and the freeways, and all the streets. And apparently Starbucks.

Why did they close all these very important things in a living, working, commercial city?

Because The President of the United States had come to town. He was gracing everyone with his prescence...and a speech on dining out.

I'd like to say that my company is important. I'd like to say that the work we do everyday helps people. I'd like to be able to say I'm a part of something important like feeding people around the world or distributing medicine. I would love to say that our company provides a service that is vital to the structure and economy of at least our country, if not the world. I'd like to say that, but it's not, I'm not and our goal is make money.

Or more to the point, spend it. On stupid things like meetings in Midwest Cities where everyone talks about dining out.

A luxury that a lot of people don't have.

And yet the President thought it'd be a good idea to disrupt commerce, airlines and my freaking Monday by talking about something that only effects the privileged few. Like he doesn't have anything better to do!

I got news for you jack...most of my bosses didn't vote last time...but I did...and I AM TAKING NOTES!

The irony of this whole thing is during the hub-bub and craziness of rearranging flights and hotels and cars I knew something that very few people get to know. Where the President is that day. Well I knew, and a couple thousand people who heard him speak. Yet, though I was privy to this special information, though I could say without a doubt what the Leader of the Free World, a man I have never met, was and what he was doing at that very moment....I lost my boss.

Poof.

Can't find him.

Left a few thousand messages, called his wife, called his dog, had a maid break-in his door. Still don't know where he is. And I bet he's screening my phone calls.

Bet the Secret Service doesn't have that problem.

Enter at Your Own Risk

Today I went to work in a pair of jeans and my sorta beat-up tennis shoes.

All so I could fulfill the "Other Duties" part of my job description. The "other duty" being packing all the files in all 90 of our file cabinets into little tiny boxes.

And it's not that I mind either. I like doing physical stuff. Every so often I want to climb into the recess hole near the attic and search for old easels and files marked "Beef Confirmation 1997". I don't mind filing thousands upon thousands of reports into boxes. As an organization fetishist I enjoy looking at large piles of brown boxes all in a row. It's like a garden, a garden of spreadsheets.

But for some reason my cube is always the basis of operations for things like this. And because all the boxes and lids and pens and copies and rulers and coffee ends up on my desk, so do all the mismatch things that can't fit or don't go in the pretty storage boxes.

My cube is where things come to spawn and die.

This morning I had a few expense reports, a couple of lunch trays, and a few contracts.

This afternoon I have a dry-erase board, a lamp-shade, four cups of cold coffee, three copies of "Introduction to Access 2002", photocopies of "Powerpoint Intermediate 2002", seven Employee Handbooks from five years back, a book of Company Profits - also from five years back, someone's jacket, a book on leadership, a broken printer, ten expired markers and a box full of foam peaches.

And a partridge in a pear tree!

Well hopefully not.

Yet, as I continue to work at this desk for the next 30 days I'll just leave all this crap in here. And gain more, accumulate this and that and the other until finally my boss will come barge in, trip over the kitchen sink and crack his skull open on the sharp edge of the page holder that has no pages in it.

One can hope.

New Trick

I discovered a new trick last night. I realized, quite spontaneously, that I can tap dance in knee-high, 6-inch heel boots. Not just tap dance, but do a traveling triple time-step AND a little soft shoe.

Sometimes life throws you a good surprise.

Flirt-Power!

As a young girl of hormonal-age I was surprisingly not boy crazy. I was so "not-boy-crazy" that my Father, of all people, would often throw his hands in the air and cry "I sure hope you get interested in boys soon!" I'd often get thrown by this comment. Was I supposed to be interested in boys already? What was there to be interested in? What was the whole boy draw? As far as I could tell they spent most of their time jumping off things and blowing stuff up. I was so worried that I wasn't into boys that for awhile I thought I may in fact be a complete and total lesbian.

Interestingly enough, my girlfriends did the same things my boyfriends did - meaning they all jumped off things and blew stuff up - I'm not sure if that means I'm naturally attracted to pyromaniacs or that my significant others were naturally attracted to girls who had a morbid sense of entertainment.

Now, however, at the age where I should have a handle on my hormones I am decidedly boy-crazy. Not just boys, but men, older, younger, tall, short, dark hair, light hair...if it moves...I'm interested.

I'm not sure where this came from. I'd like to think I found myself. Tapped into that inner female-ness that makes men want to crawl through the mud. To get to me - of course. I'd like to think that my self-confidence has allowed me to open up, be brazen and guilt-free about my attraction. Through my growth as an individual I have accepted all facets of my personality, both intellectually and physically. I am woman, I am sexual, hear me roar!!!

I'd like to say all these things - but I'm probably just a narcissistic flirt.

Not that I'm going to apologize. Because it's fun. And honestly I've gone too many years being quiet and shy and reserved. Unsexual and undemanding. If I think you have a cute butt...I'm inclined to make my preference known. Probably by pinching it.

Deal with it.

This is all by way of an announcement to the participants of the Spring Micro-Brew Festival this Saturday. To the men with the Honey Beer who thought I was a stripper, to the boys selling t-shirts who were overly interested in the pockets of my jeans, to the guy who thought I should be buying an xtra-small pair of panties (yes, that's what I said!) rather than small, and most importantly to the pirate who liked my smile and had a very nice...dagger:

It wasn't the beer, it was all for you. You go ahead and keep looking at my boobs boys, I'll keep looking at you!

New Rules for Work

Dawn Marie posted about some story involving mice and cheese. I really like that story - thanks Dawn.

But that reminds me of a place my husband hatched the other day. From here on in all office should have mandatory naptimes. Preferably on those bamboo mats we had in Hawaii. (I like those mats.) But regardless of sleeping arrangements naps must be had.

Followed by juice.

Apple juice.

And cookies.

And now cheese too.

Today at a very serious interview when I was finally stumped for a question to ask like "So what would my expense account be?" or some such crap I was tempted to ask:

"Do you have nap time? And is there anywhere to keep my Shera Thermos of apple juice cold?"

I am two hands, two feet, one nose, and two ears old. I am alllll grown-up!!!

Transient

What are you going to do?

That's the question that invariably slips past every persons lips now a days. As we start to count down the days till we are officially all "Laid-off" or "Asked to Leave" the nail-biting is starting. My co-workers come and whisper at me trying to find out my plan. Someone them just want to gloat because they found something, some of them want to know if I have any leads but can't bring themselves to ask. Can't bring themselves to beg. And some of them are just glad that there is someone else out there as miserable as they are.

What am I doing? Same as always. Pack up my stuff (a F1 Poster, a model of a Mini Cooper and a peach shaped stress-ball my boss gave me last month) and move on to my next job. It's not like I haven't done it before. This is the way it's always been. At least to me. Find a job, make some money, then leave. Whether it be a company decision, or your own, nothing is going to last.

But here, on the East Coast, in this company - everything is different. No one leaves, whole families live in the same town. No one leaves the state. And they work for the same company for years, for lifetimes. My cube mate is ending a career of 22 years with our company. He thought he'd be here forever. Some people have been here longer. I can't imagine living in the same state for 5 years, much less with the same company.

Who is the naive one here? I don't believe anything will last, I don't think that the companies I work for will be around for very long. Or if they do they won't need me for long. They're sand-castles paid with seashells. I want to grab up as many shells as I can before the exchange rates go down. But here, the steadfast Marylanders believe that a Corporation is a thing of stone, a mountain that will not be moved.

Is it because my generation is used to change? We grew up using virtual tools. Everything we had was ethereal, intangible. Friends were made of text and relationships were lightening quick - and fleeting. Even in the real world we grew up knowing that marriage wasn't forever, parents didn't have to take care of their kids if they didn't want too, and home wasn't safe. Nothing inside or outside of technology was lasting, so of course as adults we can't trust that our livelihood's would be guaranteed.

Or maybe it's because my generation is used to surplus? Yes this company is growing smaller, is replacing me with lower-wage workers in India and an intelligent software that can talk. But no matter, there is work elsewhere. I'll get a job. It will never be a good job, I'll never be able to hold a good salary, but I'll have work, and money and proceed to spend it on my car payments. For every business that fails there are five more willing to take their place. And when they fail more will come in. There is always more.

And yet, maybe it would be nice to have less, but have it for longer.

So then I might know what I was going to do.

Our Chinese Lady

I don't know why this is but for some reason when life is getting to that super crazy point fate has to give you that one little thing that is so utterly disturbing and absurd that you can only just stand there and think "Why me".

Our life has reached one of those points.

A few weeks ago my husband, spending sometime at home while he was recuperating from such and such thing and currently between jobs came downstairs in his boxers to get himself a soda.

Instead of finding a beverage he found a small chinese woman sitting on our couch eating cookies.

The call I got at work went something like "There is someone in our house." "Like one of "Roomates" friends?" "No." "Well did you call the police." "No." "Who is it?" "She doesn't speak."

In fact she did speak, she spoke three words of english and a lot of chinese. But yeah, she didn't actually say anything, no matter how nicely my husband and my roommate entreated her.

Then she picked up some shopping bags she had brought with her and left.

The cops, typically, showed up two minutes later.

It was a tense and rather absurd day that broke up the rest of our tense and not-so-absurd life. And we puzzled over it a little while till life popped back up and started to bury us again. My looming unemployment, my husbands new job, taxes, bills, health. All the things that you end up doing while life is happening elsewhere. Like laundry.

Till today, tired and grouchy from a long day at work I drive into my garage and see someone standing in my front door.

It doesn't look like anyone I know. And it's not.

It's a small chinese woman walking out of my house with a bunch of groceries.

I had a brief moment of ridiculousness as I jogged alongside her down our driveway trying to get an answer from her.

"Hey, hey, wait, do you need help? Want me to call someone? Need a ride somewhere? Hello? Can you hear me?" I'm panting and realizing that she hasn't even looked at me. It's as if I wasn't even there. I'm not sure I could simply ignore a woman running in heels and yelling at me like that. Especially if it was a woman who happened to live in the house that I had just invaded.

Regardless we got the end of the driveway and she walked past me. I could really justify chasing her down the street.

When I returned to the house I asked my roommate who the woman was.

"What woman?"

I was going to answer him, but really can I be certain there was a woman? I doubt she could be certain there was a Katy.

Instead I just showed my roommate how to lock the door...again.

Sheesh - Why me?

Vague

When I was ten years old my friend Ellie who was very tall and had very long, very red hair showed me a strip in a comic book.

It was a big, coffeetable sized anthology of some Japanese graphic novel partially translated to english and there was a boy antagonist who was doing strange Japanese type heroic stuff that antagonists do in Japanese graphic novels.

Anyway he and his cohorts of unknown species found an egg. A big egg. And it hatched and this dragon-y thing came out and said "Zilla!"

So they asked it a bunch of questions like what is your name and how many fingers am I holding up and it kept answering "Zilla!". So the boy hero, who now that I think about it had blue hair, asked the monster:

"Are you a god, Zilla?"

And then there was something about directing the monster to a big Tokyo-like city to get some food.

I don't know why I thought of that...

(As a side note when I spellchecked this post the checker suggested I enter "Silly" instead of "Zilla". Not really sure what that means either.)