Hyperextended Joints

Rick Warren and Other Gay Matters

2009-01-28T11:22:00.001-05:00

I went to Intermediate School with Josh Warren. He was really nice, I wasn't close friends with him, but I would call him a close acquaintance. I remember him fondly as an open, accepting and fun person -- he makes me think of Tigger or Hobbes but that probably has more to do with his build and red hair than anything else. Back then his dad wasn't such a big deal -- he hadn't yet published The Purpose Driven Life, and Saddleback Church wasn't quite the behemoth it is now - with it's 20,000 weekly attendees. I knew Rick Warren (who was really just "Josh's dad" to me) had started Saddleback Church and that he was the minister there.

Saddleback was already really popular with the youth back then, the "Christian" kids always bragged about how cool their youth ministry events were. Tons of kids attended, they had live music, huge events. I seem to remember my brother talking about wanting to be part of their group, how they reached him on a level that San Francisco Solano youth ministry couldn't. I went to one of the large "cool" youth events once, I think I was a freshman in high school. I remember feeling like I had entered an oddly cultish situation. It was HUGE, held on the current grounds of Saddleback Church (120 acres), it felt like any big event, like a town or school fair or something. In my memory there were games like a climbing wall, and live music - but it's all kind of hazy. I don't remember anyone really talking religion, but there were tons of kids -- teens -- in Wildside shirts (the name for Saddleback's youth ministry - soooo cool). I remember feeling out of place and wrong. I simultaneously felt wrong because I didn't belong because I wasn't a "Christian" and also because the event seemed naughty -- like these were "bad kids" who were going to do something wrong because there were so many of us teens and so few adults and we were all outside together at night.

My girlfriend, Rachel, always laughs at me when I refer to "Christians" as though they're some sort of other (she's Baptist*). "Catholics are Christians", she always tells me. I know that, of course I know that, but I've had the idea that we're different bored into me for so long that it's hard not to think of "them" as an other. You may be thinking that my Catholic upbringing is responsible for this, that I was always told that Catholicism is the one true religion, that the other Christian religions were not true because they didn't fully follow the rules of God -- something like that. I might have learned a little of that, what made Catholicism different from other Christian religions, but that's not what made them seem like an other, it was them, the Christians. I mainly remember this from high school, but it may have happened earlier than that too. Maybe it's because I went to a Catholic high school so the "Christians" felt they needed to affirm their place as non-Catholics. I remember having many conversations about how we (Catholics) worship Mary and how that was so wrong because we acted like Mary was another God when she wasn't -- why were "we" so obsessed with her? So what if Catholics think Mary is important? She's the one woman that is held in any high position in Christianity, what, are "Christians" chauvinists? We can't have great respect for a woman? I also remember them pointing out that we have the crucifixion on our cross and they do not, or maybe it was us pointing that out to them.

I have since come to learn that by "Christian" what I mean is Evangelical, by which I mean Rick Warren's flock. I don't remember them ever calling themselves Evangelicals, just "Christians", as in, "I'm Christian and you're Catholic." Have you ever seen the grounds of Saddleback Church? It's HUGE. And it seems to get bigger every year. It's right off the Toll Road (241) in Lake Forest. Here's the Google Map satellite view.

View Larger Map

I can't get Blogger to paste it anymore zoomed than that but if you zoom in you get a good idea. I went in the massive main "worship center" once, when my mom's co-worker died. It seemed to me a strange place to hold a funeral service. Rich was a really good person, and had touched a lot of people in his life, but we seemed such a small and insignificant group dwarfed by the warehouse like size of the church.

There are some things about Rick Warren that I do like and respect. He is the creator and senior pastor of the eighth largest mega-church in the US and yet I'm pretty positive he still lives in the same house he did when I was in intermediate school. It's not small, but he does have three kids and it's not huge either. It's in a small gated community, not Coto De Caza or even Dove Canyon. If you ask me it's pretty run of the mill OC, just a little larger than average. Not the crazy mansions you hear about other mega-church leaders owning. It is reported that he donates 90% of his earnings and keeps 10% -- I don't doubt this. He also spends a lot of energy fighting AIDS and poverty and urging others to do so. There are many Evangelical pastors out there who could use to follow his example in these ways.

He also did some pretty good work for Obama during the election -- he brought him out to Saddleback Church to speak to his congregation during primary season. My mom, a liberal OCer, was shocked to hear diehard conservative Republicans talking about how good Obama sounded (I think they were shocked to hear themselves say it).

But then, for all the good, there's also the bad. It makes me sad, that a man who has so much power and influence, who works for so much good can also work to hurt others and spread hate. Rick Warren, in his own words, believes that homosexuality is not the right way, that certain parts are meant to "fit together" and that allowing same-sex marriage would be the same as allowing brothers and sisters to marry or older-men to marry children. He used his large influence in California to help Prop 8 pass when he released a statement in which he said, "Of course, my longtime opposition is well known. This is not a political issue, it is a moral issue that God has spoken clearly about. There is no doubt where we should stand on this issue. ... This will be a close contest. I urge you to VOTE YES on Prop 8 - preserve the biblical definition of marriage. Don't forget to vote!"

His clear message of love and acceptance of all God's children is well received by his congregation. I sent out an e-mail urging people in my yahoo contacts to attend the Join the Impact Prop 8 protest (my e-mail was purposely not preachy because I knew I was sending it to some people for whom this was a sensitive issue). I received this message in return from a man I had babysat for who happens to be a member of Saddleback Church:

If you want to protest something that Jesus is against this is your right as a person of free will. God's word states that homosexuality is an abomination to the Lord. Not all people Melanie are God's children as Jesus stated to the Pharisee's during his time on earth when he said that their father was the devil. That means Melanie that they were doing their fathers will while Jesus pursued His Father's will. Standing for something like you are doing is going directly against what my Lord Stands for. You do what you will but as for me and my house we will serve the Lord. Never again send your godless garbage into my home through email.

Yup, pretty sure he just called me the spawn of satan. Last time I checked tearing people and their lifestyles down is not a way of "serving the Lord", but that might just be me.

Then there's the sad fact that Obama picked Warren for the Inaugural Invocation. Plenty of people have written about this, so I'll keep it short. Yes, I understand that Obama wants to reach out to the conservatives, but really, just after he was so influential in passing Prop 8, which you called pointless, why does he get the most watched invocation of the whole week? Why didn't you tap him to do the closing invocation which less people watch? Or maybe even the opening invocation before the concert on Sunday, that way it wouldn't have been televised or even heard by half the people in attendance.

Caught on to where I'm going? Gene Robinson the openly gay Episcopal Bishop from New Hampshire was tapped to do the opening invocation after all the controversy when Warren was chosen. Robinson was told that he was already decided on before all the controversy and was not chosen to pacify people. Either way, and for what ever reason, someone (everyone is pointing fingers in the other direction) decided Robinson's prayer would not be included in the HBO coverage of the concert. Then, by some other divine miracle, there were sound system issues during his prayer so that most of the enormous crowd in attendance couldn't even hear him. So, the only way to hear Richardson's prayer is through a video taken by an audience member, very small, faraway and with bad sound quality. I think the video does not give due credit to the prayer, so here is the text:

O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will…
Bless us with tears – for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women from many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.
Bless us with anger – at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.
Bless us with discomfort – at the easy, simplistic “answers” we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth, about ourselves and the world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.
Bless us with patience – and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be “fixed” anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.
Bless us with humility – open to understanding that our own needs must always be balanced with those of the world.
Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance – replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences, and an understanding that in our diversity, we are stronger.
Bless us with compassion and generosity – remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable in the human community, whether across town or across the world.
And God, we give you thanks for your child Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.
Give him wisdom beyond his years, and inspire him with Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for ALL the people.
Give him a quiet heart, for our Ship of State needs a steady, calm captain in these times.
Give him stirring words, for we will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.
Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.
Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.
Give him the strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.
And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking FAR too much of this one. We know the risk he and his wife are taking for all of us, and we implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand – that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity and peace.

God of our many understandings -- Robinson made sure his prayer was inclusive of all people, a very rare non-Christain leaning inaugural prayer, and yet very few had the opportunity to hear it. While Rick Warren, heard by millions around the world went the other direction, and gave a resoundingly Christian invocation, even more Christian than the typical inaugural prayer as he actually used the name of Jesus:

I humbly ask this in the name of the one who changed my life, Yeshua, Isa, Jesus, Jesus (hay-SOOS), who taught us to pray, Our Father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

It is interesting to note that Warren also referred to Americans as being "united by our commitment to freedom and justice for all". I wonder if anyone has pointed out to him that same-sex marriage rights fall squarely under the heading of "justice for ALL"?

This has been a very long post, and it is high time I wrap it up, but I want to do so on a happy note.

I've heard tell from people with insider D.C. information that Obama will most likely not do much for "the gays" during his first administration but that he will probably tackle same-sex marriage and the rights of aliens. Meaning he will try to change the rules so that citizens can sponsor their same-sex partners who are seeking citizenship. Under current Federal law marrying a same-sex partner is grounds for revoking of the Visa. So if someone seeking their green-card through means other than marriage then gets married to a same-sex partner they risk getting thrown out of the country -- so they have to lie, of course, if they get caught lying they are thrown out of the country for lying (catch 22, anyone?). It's just a step, but one of big importance to many people.

I have evidence that Warren's OC stronghold of anti-same-sex rights advocates is dwindling. I recently joined the Facebook group Santa Margarita CHS, Alumni, two days ago (when I joined) there were 555 members and the second "related group" was California's Ready to Repeal Prop 8. There are only a few new members since then but it's no longer a related group, I don't know why that would be, but I am still encouraged that so many people who grew up and were influence Behind The Orange Curtain are against Prop 8. And my other proof is that I only received one "hate mail" in response to my Prop 8 protest e-mail, but that one e-mail incited an outpouring of love and support and dialogue from others who received the e-mail (he hit reply all - it was a huge list, the max number of recipients), many of whom are from or in Orange County. My favorite response was from my mom:

I don't profess to know the mind of God - I know Jesus left us two great commands - To love God above all things and to love one another as we love ourselves.

I don't know if my Catholic church is correct in denying same sex couples the sacrament of marriage - but when it comes to prop 8 it doesn't really matter - because prop 8 is not about changing my religious convictions - it is about denying equal civil rights to our brothers and sisters who are All God's Children - who are loved equally by Him who would leave the 99 for any 1 of them.

The only thing I am certain of is that in our democracy my religious beliefs CAN NOT trump another person's CIVIL RIGHTS. When this happens in the Middle East we wage war against the government and call it a stand for democracy - aren't we being hypocritical? Prop 8 does not affect your or my religious beliefs in any way - but denying the civil rights of any of our citizens diminishes us as a democratic people.

And finally there is an awesome new group called Yay Gay (yes I co-opted their name for my previous post) -- "a grassroots movement to foment positivity for all things queer and crowd out homophobia through outreach, organizing, community service, humor, and lots of kindness". I'm pretty sure the "kill them with kindess" approach is going to win the day. Join the Facebook group or e-mail them at project.yaygay@gmail.com. A movement like this is definitely needed in OC -- so this is especially to all you out there, join the group and start coming up with ideas!

I lied, one more thing. The ACLU of Massachusetts is putting on a conference on Reclaiming Our Civil Liberties. Sounds pretty good, and it's not expensive, I'm hoping to go. Find out more here.

Okay, seriously last thing. Join the Impact is doing an open letter signature drive to tell and show Obama that we remember his campaign promises and that equal LGBT rights are important to millions of Americans. Please click the link above to print out the letter, sign it, have as many people as you can sign it and send it in by February 16th.

* Yes, my girlfriend is a Baptist, but it's not what you think. This isn't Southern Baptist we're talking about here. She belongs to an extremely liberal Baptist Church. Two of the three Pastors are openly gay. The most recent gay pastor was ordained as an openly gay woman. If you're looking for a very liberal, open and accepting church on the North Shore, check out First Baptist Church of Beverly.

New Blog

2009-01-21T23:46:00.001-05:00

I've created a new blog with my three best friends from high school - the sexy bitches. Not sure if I will continue to use this blog as well.

I Simply Remember My Favorite Things...

2009-01-11T21:45:00.012-05:00

It's a new year! The last of the two-thousand ones. In no particular order, here are my favorite new things of 2008:

Rock Band - it's possible that I played this for 7 hours straight during my first encounter with it.

Horizon's for Homeless Children- one of the best decisions of the year. I spend two hours a week playing with babies and toddlers living in a homeless shelter - they are always happy to see me and give lots of love. Sometimes it's tiring, but it's always rewarding.

Shazam- this iphone application has driven me to greatly desire the trendy gadget. Shazam is an application that "listens" to music and tells you the name of the song and artist as well as additional information about the artist

The house I live in in Rosi Square - it's red and beautiful and three stories - a dream come true

Rachel's folding bike - I use this puppy soo much more than she does. It makes my life so much easier - bike to T, fold bike up, board T, get asked questions by interested strangers, unfold bike while on T, depart train, ride to school. So much easier than waiting for two buses and the T.

Houseplant Christmas Tree - I don't know why I hadn't thought of this before but it is the perfect easy way to celebrate the season

Avatar! - I know this show is for kids but I looooove it. You really have to watch to understand the glory of it - Ang is so cute.

The Party Log- after taking hundreds of polaroids at my house parties Rachel convinced me to start a party log to display the fun without having to hang 5 cork boards - genius!

Having a dishwasher - even though it doesn't work well it comforts me to know it's there

Cold composting - easiest thing ever and it makes me feel good too

Clothing swap parties - I had been to one before, but I had never hosted. Getting rid of lots old clothes and obtaining a few new useful pieces is one of the best reasons to have friends over - this will be an annual installment
Eating very little before a double header football game my best two games in 4 years of playing, it was as if I had taken speed (I think)

Chilaquiles- easy to make, healthy, and delicious - triple score!

Yogi Tea - love it, thanks for introducing me Jessica

Glass jar water bottles - I've broken a couple, but they're healthy and so much less trouble when they're lost

Not being a nanny - I make so much less money, but I feel so much better about myself. Not that the fact that I was a nanny made me feel bad...

My new tattoo - even though some people think it looks like a dirt smudge

Most of my family knowing I'm gay - Prop 8 pushed me to tell them, and I'm glad

Gay rallies- wish I could have gone yesterday

Guerilla Queer Bar - tons of gays taking over a straight establishment, dancing before midnight, cute gay boys everywhere

Happiest Toddler on the Block - so many awesome tricks and tips - if you have a toddler or work with them, get this book, it's revolutionizing

Bekka and Dirty as my "wingmen", I'm not sure this is new to 2008, but I really love going out with these two

Doc and Janet - Two favorite new friends of 2008. Makes me happy every time I see them - which is why Doc needs to return from Ireland!

Kyle my hair dresser at DeKwa- he is gay and wonderful. Last time I went in and was very vague and he gave me a great and fun cut-love him

Definitely better than "wellies"- Dirt bike riding with my dad, we always talked about it but finally started doing it in 2008. Scary but also very fun.

**** How could I forget? Monthly Info- this site has changed my life - I enter when my period starts and it tells me when my next period will be. It also gives you all this bonus information, like how many days you average between periods, and when you are ovulating. It's incredible and I love it, I almost get excited when my period is starting so I can enter the info - almost.

Simply the Best

2008-12-22T00:30:00.003-05:00

So yesterday I spent an embarrassing amount of time reading through old posts to eliminate any full names I may have foolishly included. In doing this I re-read some of my favorite posts and found myself crying with laughter at some of them, so, I have added the label "best of" to all of my favorites, it's over there on the right, check them out!

An hour or so ago I was completely tired, but then I found out school is cancelled AGAIN tomorrow and I got a surge of energy and now I'm wide awake....what better way to spend my time than updating my blog again?

I know I have too many labels. I was up all night making them, I don't know why, I just did, oh well...

Things I need to accomplish before I can post

2008-12-20T14:38:00.005-05:00

I don't know how frequently I think about posting, it's probably something like once a fortnight*. I always tell myself that I can't, that I need to use it as a reward, that once I've accomplished some things on my list then I can post. But the things on my list are still there, months and months later, and instead of posting I've wasted my time on Facebook - what is it with me and these social networking sites???

So I've decided that's dumb, I like posting, it's cathartic (is that the correct use of the word? I make a hobby of inventing new uses for words - I also make up words - like blipy - that's my newest one, it means light and infrequent, anyway...). So I'm going to try to make a habit of posting when I think about it.

I'm starting by posting my to do list on here in an effort to shame myself into doing some of these things:

1. Locate insurance info and find a PCP / gyno

2. Locate dental insurance info and decide if I should go back to Dr. Krown or do Tufts

3. Take care of the "great fun" credit card problem

(it is really, really shameful that I need to do these things still)

4. Rachel's gift

5. Scott's gift

6. Gifts for others

7. Holiday cards from Project Bread

8. CLEAN!!!

9. Shovel/ salt

10. Look into grad programs

11. Prep for food and fun

that's enough for now...

*This term should be used more often, and incase Doc reads this - "Love you!"

“Lot’s of free time”…

2007-11-12T12:13:00.001-05:00

…hahaha, what a bad way to leave my blog. “Yeah, I have lot’s of free time, I’m just choosing not to use it updating you.”

I’m back, maybe. I’m not going to really announce that I am updating this again, although I did just change my f-book status to “a blogger”, because I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up about regular posts. I can’t really promise anything.

BUT, I am no longer a nanny, I quickly learned that it did not allow me much free time, and I believe that I may now be able to semi-regularly update my previously defunct blog.

Currently, I am searching around for money by temping here and there and babysitting (if you know of any temporary work in the Boston area, let me know), until I return to California for a couple months in December. I am also trying to clean up my car and sell it before I leave (again, if you know of anyone in the Boston area that's looking for a used car- 3.5k obo, let me know). And my final shameless plug, if you know of anyone looking for a place to live in Boston for December and January (600/ mo obo) let me know.

Okay, time for a quick update:

I was a nanny from January until October for a 7 year old female only child. Her dad just co-authored a book.
I was rejected by UCLA, I decided it was not meant to be.
My cousin got married in May and I went home for a quick weekend and had my first bridesmaid experience
I went to p-town and stayed in town for the full long weekend, it was crazy, involved way too much drinking, and a lot of pretty funny girl drama
I met an amazing woman who works perfectly with me and we have been together for 6 months now (sorry for the mush, no, I did not meet her in p-town)...I am 25 and this is the first relationship I have ever been in that is still completely functional after 6 months.
I went to Pakistan for 2 weeks to celebrate the wedding of my good friend Sadaf- I landed myself in the hospital for 2.5 days while I was there.
I saw Regina Spektor in concert
Rachel (my girlfriend) and I went up to a B&B near Burlington, VT. We hiked and dined in Burlington and the B&B was wonderful- if you are ever looking.
I donated 10 inches of hair to Locks of Love
I attended my first peer baby shower
My football team just made it into the semi-finals!

Well, that's everything in a nutshell. All of the above topics work as blog posts, so if any of you actually read this, let me know what you're interested in reading about and I'll give a more detailed report. If I don't hear from anyone I'll just work my way through the list anyway.

Oh There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays!

2007-01-10T13:51:00.002-05:00

I SENT IN MY APPLICATION!!!

I am done and freeeeeee! Hopefully I will get in, I'll let you know.

Now, I know that everyone wants to know what it is like to be a nanny, and I will tell you, but not today. What I will say is that it affords me lots of free time, which I will be using to update my blog.

But, right now, I'm going to write a post of been thinking of for a while now: Christmas in So Cal.

I consider myself a seasoned traveller, a veterane if you will. I've had it all happen to me: plane turned around because something wasn't working, been put up in a hotel two or three times (who can keep track?), almost missed countless flights, waited outside in the rain for a bus from Newark- if it sucks and it involves public transportation it has probably happened to me. This is because hillarious mishaps follow me (the reason I started a blog) and since I have been bi-costal for going on seven years now- I fly A LOT.

Knowing all of this I approach flying and travelling in general in a very casual way. I know how long it will take me to pack, how to pack, what to pack, how to keep my bag from weighing too much and how early to leave for the airport. I'm usually that girl who is settled into her prime terminal seat, reading her book and laughing to herself.

Not this time!

I flew out of T.F. Green, which is in Providence RI, at like 7 in the morning or something ungodly like that. This would have involved getting out the door of my apartment before 4 am. Thankfully I have two beautiful friends who live quite close to Providence and they let me crash at thier place.

At 6 in the morning I got into my freezing cold car and started it, I was careful to let it warm up for a while because it had died on me the night before. Everything seemed fine so I put the car in drive and rolled out...about 5 inches. MY CAR DIED! I HAD to be at the airport in twenty minutes and my car was dead. I texted Mia: Do you know how to jump a car? Her response was to throw on some clothes and drive my idiotic ass to the airport. How awesome is she??? And she was totally nice about it, and thanked me for giving her an opportunity to see the sun rise. Mia is seriously an awesome awesome lady!

But my adventure wasn't quite over. I was still too late for a holiday flight. So I did what my experience has taught me to do. I got in the curbside check line. I paid close attention to the time and when it was 35 minutes before my flight and I was still halfway back in the line, I asked to people behind me to watch my bags and went up the one of the guys. I explained my predicament and he asked if I was a good tipper. "Of course", I replied. He motioned for me to come closer, lowered his voice and said, "Get your bags and meet me in the hallway". He checked my bags on the DL and I gave him 5 bucks.

Success! I made my flight and even got a window seat. Nice

This will be continued later. I need to go pick up Alison from school now.

Handcrafted holiday gifts....they're fair trade!

2006-12-18T17:38:00.003-05:00

Last week I volunteered ("interned") for the Cultural Survival Winter Bazaar. Cultural Survival is a non-profit organization that works to promote the rights, voices and visions of indigenous peoples around the world. They have many bazaars throughout the year two of which are held in Boston and Cambridge around the holiday season. I found out about these bazaars two years ago from my friend Bekka and have done a lot of my holiday shopping there since then. It is a really awesome way to get original holiday gifts while supporting a very worthy cause and you get to chat with interesting people. The only problem is that since they are fair trade the prices are usually out of my reach, and I end up spending way more than I can afford to spend.

This year my roommate let me know that Cultural Survival recruits interns to volunteer at the bazaars and offers them 40% off the merchandise. So on Sunday, December 10th, I boarded a bus at 10:30 am and headed to Hynes Convention center to work from 10:45 to 7 pm and earn my 40% discount. Unfortunately I decided it was a good idea to get very drunk the night before...oops.

I woke up at 5 am asleep on a couch wearing jeans, an underwire bra and a belt. I figured out where I was, my friend Natalie's apartment, took off the bra and belt and fell back asleep. I woke up again at a normal hour and after being poked fun at and ingesting pain killers and water, I took off....Wait, where are my keys? We searched in vain for a while and I was forced to accept that I had left them at the party (why had I even brought them to the party when I wasn't driving?). So my friend Amy drove me to the hosts house (I don't actually know her), I got my keys, and she drove me back to Natalie's apartment. I had not allowed enough time for this excursion, so, I raced to my apartment, threw together a bag of stuff and ran to the bus stop. I got to the Bazaar just in time....

Hmmm....I probably needed to shower, my hair is kinda dirty, I hope it's not smelly....Wait, did I brush my teeth?...oops, at least I didn't throw up last night. Did I put on deodorant?...Oh shit! Oh my God, I totally forgot, Paco peed on my jeans last night!!!

Yup, that's right, I worked for over eight hours with dirty hair, unbrushed teeth, no deodorant, and jeans with Chihuahua pee on them! It's a good thing I was mainly surrounded by hippies.

I performed a few different tasks for the Bazaar. I handed out fliers and kept track of the number of patrons, I assisted people in raffle entry, I held people's shopping bags when they went to the restroom, I checked people's receipts and tallied how they heard about the Bazaar, but surprisingly enough the most enjoyable job was fliering outside.

The flier

When the beautiful woman with the dreadlocks asked me if I would go outside and hand out fliers to the pedestrians I was a little nervous and wanted to explain to her that based on past experience I knew this would not be the best job for me. But I said "okay", and another girl and I headed out to work the streets together.* At first, I was just really there to keep Emily company, we chatted about school and work and Boston and she made her pitch to passers by and we both held our hands out. She told me it was okay that I wasn't saying anything and that it would get easier once I "found my line"- I highly doubted this. But then, something amazing happened, I found my line: "Handcrafted holiday gifts....they're fair trade!"

I did a good job if I say so myself. I was very upbeat and cheery and got a lot of people to take the little flier and I'd like to believe I convinced at least a handful of people to go to the Bazaar. Emily even commented about how I was doing better than her by the end. When Emily suggested we head back I was kind of sad because I was enjoying the work and the company (she was totally interesting, really into consignment clothing and a Second Time Around employee).

Overall, it was a great day. I bought over a hundred dollars in merchandise with a seventy dollar discount. I got to see "Traditional Indian dancing by Hersheta" and I caught some "Traditional Lakota singing and drumming by Tim Swallow, known as Brave Elk- a member of the Teton Lakota band of Crazy Horse". I did good work, I met and talked with interesting and kind people and I even led around a seeing impaired woman and helped her to a cab.

I sent Cultural Survival my resume; I'm hoping they will take me on as a spring intern. If not I'm going to try to find Emily at Second Time around, I feel we should probably be friends.

*I know what you're thinking. Didn't your smelliness scare potential patrons away? No, I had a coat on, I'm thinking in the outdoors you couldn't really tell....I hope....

Welcome to New England. Don't like the weather? Wait 15 minutes.

2006-12-08T14:35:00.004-05:00

I encountered this phrase pretty much the day I moved to New England over six years ago (six years? really? wow? I'm only twenty-four, that’s a fourth of my life!). New Englanders love this saying, AND for good reason- it's totally frickin' true!

On Monday I rode my bike into work (by the way, I LOVE commuting via bike!) and it was the coldest day I have encountered thus far- 24 degrees. Since this is my first time bike commuting I am still trying to figure out what conditions are acceptable for riding and what gear I need to wear for what weather. On Monday I discovered that in sub 30 degree weather I need two layers of warm gear on top and on bottom, neck gear that can cover my whole neck and up to my nose, and my snow mittens. I wore my snow gloves and they just didn't cut it, I was a little too cold. I may also need a full-on face mask, but that might only be necessary for sub 20 degree weather- I haven't decided yet.

Then yesterday morning I woke up and looked up weather.com, forty-six degrees! What? For some reason I still wore my winter gloves while riding, but half way through my hands got too warm and I took them off and rode with bare hands the rest of the way- and I was fine!

My beautiful friend Bekka, who lives really close to my work, had invited me to sleep over. So I rode in with a backpack full of work clothes for two days. I planned to leave my bike in the indoor racks at work (nice and secure) and walk to and from Bekka's. On my walk to Bekka's last night at 7:45 it was a balmy 50 degrees out (a note to all you southern Californians: 50 degrees at night in Boston in December is waaaaaarrrrmmmm), so I left my hat at work and just wore gloves (I wanted my hair to look nice for Bekka).

Foolish Melanie did not keep the old saying in mind, and this morning when I began my short walk to work I was in for a rude awakening. It was somewhere in the lower 20s (note that it was not really early in the morning or anything, it was after 8:30, the sun had been up for a while) and snowing and windy!!! My poor ears were so cold and painful that it took a good half hour in my warm, warm office for them to defrost and stop hurting me.

Then I made foolish decision number two. I asked my friend Mike (hi Mike, he is a blog regular) if he wanted to do lunch near his work (he works less than two miles away). See, Mike always comes over here when we do lunch; because for some reason it is always on days when I don't have my bike and would thus have to pay $1.25 each way to reach him via the T (he has a monthly pass so it does not cost him any money). It wasn't until after he accepted my invite (I had expected him to decline) that I decided to check the weather. The prediction was grim but doable, windy and snowy until 11 am, but the noon forecast showed no more snowing and didn't mention the wind.

A little after 11:30 (this time was chosen purposefully as it is closer to noon than eleven) I put on all my biking gear and headed downstairs. Things started off a little rough, I left the office and was immediately hit by the bitter cold- weather.com had informed me that it was 22 degrees but that it would feel like 5 degrees (keep in mind, since I rode in the day before I am missing some key sub thirty degree elements such as the neck gear). But I said to myself, "it's not too far, I can do this." Then I turned a corner, more wind, and more snow. Then I turned another corner, even more wind and snow. THEN I hit that stretch of Tremont St. that runs a long the Common. Have you ever walked through a part of the common with very few trees on a cold and windy day? It becomes a barren wasteland of high speed wind. I was freezing cold and the wind was making every effort to push little 128 lb me and my light weight road bike in directions that no bike rider wants their bike to move! So after seeing a mental image of the wind pushing me and my bike over and considering what would happen if I ended up with my bike on top of me in the middle of a downtown street, I got off of the street and hopped off of my bike.

The resulting walk back to work was bitter cold and miserable. I let Mike know that I would not be making it for lunch, and he told me to stay warm.

Suffice to say I am making a HUGE sacrifice and leaving work early today so I can take my bike on the T (you are not allowed to bring bikes on the T during "high commuter hours" which start at 4 pm).

What's the BBC?

2006-12-07T14:57:00.003-05:00

Hello loyal readers, I'm back!

First, a note to my regulars:

Sorry I have been gone for so long, my mother was right, I was using myspace instead of "imparting liberal wisdom". Thank you for enjoying my blog enough to bug me to bring it back, makes me feel special.

A note about grad school apps:

I found out they are not due until Jan. 8th. I am currently working on my statement of purpose. But I did a lot of writing at the laundromat last night, and I will be at work for like 4.5 more hours because my downtown engagement does not start until 8 pm and I am too lazy to go home and come back. So, I will do more work then. Claire, I am applying to UCLA, it is the only place I want to go...will you be able to deal with me being so close?

Now, onto the post...I'll restate the title incase you forgot: "What's the BBC?"

The past two Falls have taught me that flag football season is my busy season- it is pretty much the only time of year when I get any action, and I usually get my fill for the rest of the year (the "dry season").

I was just starting to make "A map of my life" part Duex and actually post it on here because unlike last year this one only involves kissing- no sex, and kissing is innocent and can't hurt feelings, right? I thought better, so again, if you want to see it, ask in a comment and I'll send it to ya, err, maybe I'll put a blog e-mail over in that side panel thing, if I can figure that out I'll do it.

So this "season" I made-out with no less than four women. Of those four women, three were actually interested in me, and of the four I was/am actually interested in two. To me this is a lot of people, to the cast of Sex and the City it is probably a small enough number to cause panic, but I am not in my thirties yet (I'm not sure if that actually meant anything).

More general stats about the four women:

I did more than making out with one of them
One of them slept in my bed....twice
I went to three of thier apartments
I made out with two of them in bathrooms...one of them involved multiple kisses and being locked in a stall
I went on one full-on date, which involved me answering my door in a towel (maybe I'll explain that later), being driven to the restaurant, and letting her pay for the meal
Two of them played in the Boston Women's Flag Football League
Three of them were my age (graduated college in 2004 or at least should have graduated in oh-four, but took an extra year)
One is turning thirty next saturday
I communicated with all of them via text message
So far I have hung out in a datish sort of way four times with three of them

Haha, that last bullet was hard to word, and seriously it is because the lesbian dating scene is really odd, especially when it involves people around my age, I'm twenty-four in case you didn't know. I have been out on actual dates with two women in the past year, one was twenty-six (I think) and one is thirty. So what about the three women around my age? How do you define what I did with them? Well, one of them I just hooked up with, plain and simple...actually, not that simple, I may explain that more fully in a bit. The other two? Well...we "hung out"/ are "hanging out". I'm serious, that is the term everyone throws around. I used this term when trying to describe my love life to Cameron (my ex) and she made fun of me. But really, there is no other way to define it.

Hanging out:

We're not dating because we're not going out on actual dates, not really. We just text each other, and request each other on myspace and send flirty messages and e-mails back and fourth and then every now and then we get a chance to "hang out". Hanging out includes but is not limited to: meeting at a bar to watch a sporting event, meeting at an apartment to watch a sporting event or movie, meeting up at a club, attending a party together, meeting up with friends for a drink, making out in bathrooms and cars.

Rules to keep in mind while hanging out:

It's not really serious, so don't get your hopes up and try not to let her get her hopes up. It is safe to assume that the person you are hanging out with is also hanging out with other people, I mean, hey, you are too, right? Text messaging is a lot like IMing used to be, it's just the way people who are hanging out should communitcate and just because a person text messages you a lot does not mean that she is very interested. If you become uninterested in someone or if someone becomes uninterested in you, all you/ they have to do is sloooow down the texting. You pretty much stop texting them altogether and when they text you, you just send short responses that elicit no return response from them. I'm currently texting and semi-hanging out with girl number four of the season and I think I have figured out the game now. You just have to stay mellow, not too interested but not uninterested, just somewhere in-between, go with the flow.

The hard part of it all is what comes after one of you realizes that you're not really interested. Along the way with all of this "hanging out" you have probably gotten to really like them (whether or not that's in a romantic way) and thier friends. How do you get to a place where you can establish that it is cool that you're not "hanging out" anymore, but that you'd still like to be in thier life, as a friend, because you enjoy spending time with them and thier friends? It must be possible to do that without actually saying it and thus making things awkward. I'm still trying to figure this out with pretty much all of the girls, except for the one I actually hooked up with, I think she may be avoiding me altogether, which I have decided is another story for another day.

So what does the title have to do with anything? What's that you say? You've been reading for a long time now and still don't see what any of this has to do with the BBC? It's a story, a related story. It goes a little something like this:

Text from Girl Number Three: Hey, what are you up to tonight?

Response from Me: Not sure, I've been invited to do a couple of things, I'm still trying to decide which I'm going to. What are you up to? (note that the responder is making an effort to show that she is unavailable for "hanging out" this evening and is making no effort to include the texter in her evening plans)

TG#3: It's my mom's birthday so I am spending time with her, then I think I just want to relax and stay in and watch a movie.

RM: Cool. Oh hey, I found another good lesbian movie, Tipping the Velvet, well it's actually a BBC miniseries but it is rentable, you should check it out. (note again that the responder has not accepted the bait offered by the texter and has made no indication that she may like to ditch her plans in order to join the texter in these new plans)

TG#3: Do you want to watch a movie with me? (Responder's jaw drops when recieving this message. How could she have not picked up on the very well put hints that I would NOT be interested in joining her tonight?)

RM: (I did not have time to respond before the next text came through)

TG#3: What's BBC? (This text plays over and over in the responder's mind. Each time she utters the phrase with more and more wonder and amazement at the question...she fully realizes this makes her a snob)

RM: No, sorry, I already have too many plans tonight. British Broadcasting Coorporation. (note that the responder was careful not to add in, but I'm available....or we should do it some other time....or even maybe some other time.)

TG#3: Ok. (at this point the responder's notes that the texter made no mention of having already known what BBC meant).

.End scene.

My friends and I discussed this, and it was decided there are just some lines, some things, that you cannot accept unless you are very interested and invested. Not having any knowledge what-so-ever of the BBC, that is just one of my lines. So now it is a catch phrase to be added to "making copies" (making out), and "the drain is clogged" (that guy (person) is hot). Here is how is works:

"Eh, I don't know if it's gonna work out. 'She asked what the BBC was.'" (of course the listener will know that she didn't actually ask what the BBC was but that she revield that she is unaware of or uninterested in something that is vitally important to you, or that you simply expect someone who you would be interested in to be knowledgable of).

It works the other way too, this is an actual quote (I haven't gotten a chance to use it in the above way yet, but you better believe I will as soon as I get a chance):

"Yeah, I'm not sure what happened. We hung out the other night, I thought it was fine, nothing wonderful, but not bad either. But, she has slowed down a lot on the texting and e-mailing. I think 'I must have asked what the BBC was'. I don't know when or how I asked it, but I must have."

That was a really long post! Am I forgiven?

A hug and a kiss and a kick in the pants...

2006-11-22T17:27:00.003-05:00

...that is the title of a book my mom read about disciplining children when I was a child.

Anyway, my mom wrote me this e-mail recently:

Hi Melly,
Finally have decided that you need a kick in the pants to get your blog going again - what's with the Katrina one for EVER!
I look there frequently and find it frustrating that you have not done anything new - get up - get past the myspace stuff and write some liberal wisdom!
Love,
Mom

It's kind of scary how well she knows me. So I'm gonna get on it, just as soon as I get my grad school app out I will be back with liberal wisdom for all.

Happy Mountain Day!

2006-09-26T13:07:00.002-04:00

Oh Mount Holyoke we pay thee devotion....

So today is Mountain Day at Mount Holyoke. That means Jo Jo (The College President) decided that today is the last beautiful day of fall. At Mount Holyoke is morning 2,000 women woke up to the sound of bells tolling, then they heard a random girl running up and down the hall excitedly yelping "It's Mountain Day!", some of them were probably still delirious from a long night of reading/ paper writing so they still got out of bed and walked into the bathroom where they finally noticed that all of the mirrors and stalls were covered with exclamations of "It's Mountain Day, GO BACK TO BED!". Most of those 2,000 smiled when the realization hit them and curled back up in their warm bed (many of them hadn't even gotten out of bed), and a portion of them were relieved that their gamble of not doing homework in anticipation of Mountain Day had paid off.

A few hours later the women of Mount Holyoke got up and decided what to do with their beautiful day of freedom from all responsibilities, the options were limitless: climb Mount Holyoke (this is what you're supposed to do on Mountain Day and most people do it at least once), sleep the day way, sun on the green, go to Northampton, go to Amherst, go canoeing on the lake, and the ever popular option of catching up on work.

This morning I woke up, managed to force my sore body to stand upright (after 2 football loses on Sunday and a boxing class on Monday my body is not so happy with me) and I went to the computer. I noticed that my friend Bates, who lives in Hungary had written on my Facebook wall- "Happy Mountain Day". Damn it! When I was in college a morning announcement of "Happy Mountain Day" was always followed with "go back to bed". But since I graduated this is the 3rd time I have had to trudge into work and try to be productive as a beautiful fall day wasted away without me. My inbox is filled with at least 20 e-mails from friends wishing each other a happy mountain day despite the fact that we are at work.

Mount Holyoke is a special place and I miss it and all it's quaint traditions more than ever on days like today. But I am also glad that my inbox is full of messages from fellow alumnae that I am still connected with and that we will always rejoice in the happiness of the students that we may not know by name but still know in our memory (or spirit? I don't know which).

So Happy Mountain Day to you all, Claudia and Jean and I (three of 5 Mount Holyoke Women who are all friends and all work within a quarter mile of each other) are going to get some ice cream to celebrate- you should too!

Happy (?) birthday Katrina

2006-08-29T11:57:00.002-04:00

I know people don't really like the pasted article blog updating, but as I've mentioned before I'm really busy but I do listen to news all day. I was listening to Democracy Now's War and Peace Report with Amy Goodman, and I was too shocked by what I heard not to post.

If you would like to hear the segment (it is actually a radio broadcast) click here for those of you who prefer to read I have pasted the transcript, with my own color changes for the things I found the most shocking and disgusting. I have also included some information on how to donate to MoveOn (which isn't discussed in the transcript) to help with on going relief.

AMY GOODMAN: Tomorrow marks the first anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, which ravaged the Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. The storm was the most powerful and expensive natural disaster to hit the U.S., killing more than 1,500 people in New Orleans alone, displacing some 770,000 residents and destroying over 300,000 homes. The federal government's response to the disaster was widely condemned. Images of the tens of thousands of New Orleans residents piling into the city's Superdome stadium, pleading for food, water and aid, became symbolic of the government's inaction.

In the aftermath of the storm, it became increasingly clear that the effects of Hurricane Katrina were made far worse by government incompetence and neglect. Warnings about the severity of the storm were ignored, and the levees, which were supposed to prevent New Orleans from flooding, were grossly inadequate. And, as investigative reporter Greg Palast reveals in this new Democracy Now! report, there were major holes in the city's evacuation plan

GREG PALAST: Welcome to New Orleans, whose motto is Â“The City that Care Forgot.Â” In fact, it's a city that everyone forgot.

GREG PALAST: Our president says he hasnÂ’t forgotten a promise he made here.

PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: I want the people down there to understand that it's going to take a while to recover. This was a huge storm.

GREG PALAST: Well, Mr. President, I think people down here know it was a huge storm. Over half a million of them fled the flood. It's been a full year, and only 170,000, far less than half, have come back, almost none to their own homes.

STEVEN SMITH: Stayed three nights here and one night on the bridge.

GREG PALAST: You were three nights stuck in the flood?

STEVEN SMITH: Right here. Yep.

GREG PALAST: And they weren't looking for you?

STEVEN SMITH: We had helicopters, but they -- nothing didn't pass. At least they passed over us. I'm on a roof, holding my shirt out and saying that we had babies back here.

GREG PALAST: This is Steven Smith. Like 127,000 others in this town, he didn't have a car in which to escape, so he was left in the rising waters. Stranded in the heat on a bridge, he closed the eyes of a man who died of dehydration after giving his grandchildren his last bottle of water.
What kind of evacuation plan would leave 127,000 to sink or swim? It turns out that the Bush administration had contracted out evacuation planning to a corporation, IEM, Innovative Emergency Management. I couldn't locate their qualifications, but I did locate their list of donations to the Republican Party. We went to Baton Rouge to talk to them.

These are the offices of Innovative Emergency Management. They were the ones that were paid a half-million bucks to come up with an emergency evacuation plan for the city of New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina. One problem is, I can't find the plan. So I'm coming here to ask them about it.

So when I showed up at their office, they would only talk to me from behind a glass wall. By phone.

Did you in fact come up with a plan, because it says it's urgent to come up with a plan? Did you come up -- can you just tell me if you came up with a plan or not?

We can't find your plan -- neither can FEMA -- that you were paid a half-million dollars for, that at least claimed to here. We can't find this plan. And it's kind of a problem. I guess it's kind of hard to evacuate a city, if you can't find the plan itself.

IEM EMPLOYEE: Can we -- she's got a lot of experience in evacuation.

GREG PALAST: Is it more true that maybe it was helpful that she gave a lot of donations to the Republican Party? Maybe that's the experience?

IEM EMPLOYEE: Terry?

TERRY AT IEM: Yes.

GREG PALAST: So that's when they called in the guards.

IEM SECURITY GUARD: Security has been called. We ask that you please leave the building now.

GREG PALAST: So, quickly, before security gets here, I just want to tell you that this is Innovative Emergency Management, and it's very innovative not to have a plan to manage an emergency.

I decided to look for someone with a little more experience in hurricane evacuation. LSU, Louisiana State University, they're just down the street from IEM. LSU has one hellacious football team. They also have the best team of hurricane experts in the nation. I met with Dr. Ivor van Heerden, deputy director of the university's elaborate Center for the Study of Hurricanes. I asked this renowned specialist about the reputation of IEM, prior to their getting the half-million-dollar evacuation exercise contract.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: I hadn't heard of them prior to this exercise, no.

GREG PALAST: The LSU scientist already had an evacuation model, but IEM and FEMA refused to use it.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: We had the science. We had really studied this thing. We knew what was going to go wrong. We had an enormous amount of information, right down to mapping where the gas tanks were and pipelines. Science was basically ignored all the way through the process.

GREG PALAST: The LSU professors warned, for example, that the IEM plan simply made no provision for people -- the old, the sick -- who couldn't escape in a car. I asked him the consequences of this oversight.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: Well, you know, 1,500 of them drowned. That's the bottom line.

GREG PALAST: Then the professor surprised me by saying that giving us this information put his job at risk.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: I wasn't going to let them -- let those sort of threats shut me down or any of the other sorts of nonsense that went on, because it was so important that we get out what had gone wrong and why.

GREG PALAST: Apparently, the heat from the university originated with a state official, who now works for IEM.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: We got a phone call from somebody in the state government who actually now works for IEM. But, I don't think that was his plan at the time. And he jumped all over me and said, by criticizing their work, I was putting the whole exercise in jeopardy, and if I did it again, I would be banned.

GREG PALAST: Back in New Orleans, former city councilman, Brod Bagert, a lawyer, standing in the gutted wreckage of his own home, did not think kindly of the concealment of van Heerden's warnings.

BROD BAGERT: Ongoing protection that should have been occurring was done -- it was done negligently. Not only wrong, negligently. And not only negligently, but reckless negligence, the kind of negligence for which an individual would be indicted, prosecuted, tried, convicted, and spend their life in jail. Negligence that killed people, lots of people. Reckless negligence that killed human beings. Old ladies watched the water come up to their nose, over their eyes, and they drowned in houses just like this in this neighborhood, because of reckless negligence thatÂ’s unanswered for.

GREG PALAST: There's an x on this house. It has a five under it. That means that five corpses were pulled out of here, five people who were killed. And they weren't killed by Katrina. They were killed by this, a levee, which was supposed to protect them from the waters of the Mississippi, and it failed. And they never told the five in there that they knew it would fail.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: FEMA knew at 11:00 on Monday that the levees were breached. At 2:00, they flew over the 17th Street canal and took video of the breach. By midnight on Monday, the White House knew. But none of us knew.

GREG PALAST: Back at LSU, van Heerden's experts warned the Bush administration about levees, long before Katrina hit.

DR. IVOR VAN HEERDEN: I, myself, briefed many, many senior federal officials, including somebody from the White House.

GREG PALAST: Without the warning that the levees had begun to break, evacuations stopped, until it was too late. But those that survived, where were they? This city is still half empty.

AMY GOODMAN: Hurricane Katrina flooded 80% of New Orleans, destroying the city's infrastructure, displacing most of its residents. A year later, only about half of New Orleans population of 450,000 people has returned. Many of those unable to come back are poor and African American. In the ravaged, mostly Black neighborhood of the Lower Ninth Ward, only 1,000 of the 20,000 people who lived there before Katrina have returned. This has drastically altered the demographics of a city that used to be two-thirds Black. Activists and residents have condemned the government's refusal to reopen the city's public housing projects and point out that while tourist areas are being developed, affordable housing is not being built. Many are asking, "Who is New Orleans being rebuilt for?" Here again, investigative reporter Greg Palast, from New Orleans.

GREG PALAST: We drove back to New Orleans to find out what happened to those who tried to return.
What's wrong, now?

DISPLACED NEW ORLEANS RESIDENT: They just messing all over us?

GREG PALAST: What are they doing?

DISPLACED NEW ORLEANS RESIDENT: Putting you out your own house. Now we ain't got nowhere to go. You called them back, saying we could come back home. Then when we get there, they got the police coming in there putting us out and others. They're harassing us. Oh no, this is not right. I'm basically between here and Texas, coming in -- you know, coming to see if I could get my house back. And I'm -- you know, but I'm in Texas, but I'm coming down here to see about my house. But they say they ain't letting nobody in and all this. But where we going to go at, though? Where's we going to go at?

GREG PALAST: What happened?

PATRICIA THOMAS: And then they told us to come back.

GREG PALAST: What happens tonight? Where are you going to go tonight?

DISPLACED NEW ORLEANS RESIDENT: That's what I want to know, mister. I don't know where I'm going, me and my kids.

GREG PALAST: Her friend, Patricia Thomas, was also locked out of her home in the Lafitte housing project. The next day, we helped her break into her apartment, barred by metal plates.
The city has sealed up almost all public housing. But these apartments were never touched by water. It was nearly perfect.
And this, it's been a year.

PATRICIA THOMAS: It's been a year, and my house looking good like that.

GREG PALAST: I think you and I together, just the two of us, could put your place back together in a week.

PATRICIA THOMAS: You see?

GREG PALAST: No problem.

PATRICIA THOMAS: No problem at all.

GREG PALAST: But they won't let her in. And this has nothing to do with Katrina.

PATRICIA THOMAS: Katrina didn't do this. Man did this. Katrina didn't come in my house and put these gates up on my windows and things. Katrina didn't have me walking out here looking for somewhere to stay. Man did this. This was manmade.

GREG PALAST: This is not what we think of as public housing in America. These places are gorgeous, two- and three-story townhouses with iron porticos. Why would the city spend thousands of dollars per unit to armor these places, kick out the tenants? Well, the answer may be over here. This is the downtown business district. We are halfway between there and the tony French Quarter. In other words, this is some very expensive real estate. For years, the city and speculators have been trying to get the tenants out of these apartments. Katrina, the perfect storm, was the perfect excuse. So what kind of New Orleans do they want?

GREG PALAST: This is the new New Orleans, stripped down, downsized, not too Black, just right for tourists. You could call it Six Flags over Louisiana.
But across the Mississippi, far from the Quarter, not everyone is thrilled with this brave new New Orleans of tourists and Mardi Gras.

MALIK RAHIM: It's two cities. You know? There's the city for the white and the rich. And there's another city for the poor and Blacks. You know, the city that's for the white and rich has recovered. They had a Jazz Fest. They had a Mardi Gras. They're going to have the Saints playing for those who have recovered. But for those who haven't recovered, there's nothing.

GREG PALAST: Malik Rahim is a leader of Common Ground, a grassroots recovery organization. He explains why Patricia and others are locked out of their apartments.

MALIK RAHIM: They didn't want to open it up. They wanted them closed. They wanted them poor niggers out of there, and they ain't had no intention to allow it to be reopened to no poor niggers, you know? And that's just the bottom line.

GREG PALAST: Malik's group isn't waiting on George Bush to get around to housing the surviving poor.

MALIK RAHIM: This is a unit we are getting together.

GREG PALAST: Common Ground is completing almost as many homes as the Bush administration, but who's left? And who will stay?
This is the Lower Ninth Ward, or I should say "was" the Lower Ninth Ward, an African American working class neighborhood. There's no potable water here. There's no electricity. There's no nothing. There's just no way to return, and a lot of residents feel that's exactly the plan.
This is Mr. Henry Irving, Sr. He has no neighbors, no water, no electricity, but he is not leaving.

HENRY IRVING, SR.: They want you to leave. That's what they want us to do. They want us to get discouraged and leave. So why leave? Where I'm going, then? I'm going to go to another community? I put all my life in this community. I'm going to stay here, and if God's willing, I'm going to be here long enough to see it come back.

GREG PALAST: So can it happen again? Another hurricane? Another flood? Don't worry, because the government has hired a consulting firm to analyze what went wrong with the response to Katrina. It's a little firm from Baton Rouge called Innovative Emergency Management.

AMY GOODMAN: Investigative reporter Greg Palast in New Orleans with producer Jacquie Soohen of Big Noise Films.

AHHHHHHHH- That last part makes me sooo mad....IEM? That's who they hired to analyze what went wrong? And why haven't I heard about most of this before????

Here is some information about a way to donate:

Just after Hurricane Katrina hit, MoveOn members and others stepped up to provide a roof, a bed and hope to more than 30,000 evacuees as part of MoveOn's Hurricane Housing effort.
Today, we're launching our new bookÂ—It Takes A Nation: How Strangers Became FamilyÂ—which tells the stories of the families involved. It's a beautiful book, featuring amazing and moving first-person interviews with Katrina evacuees and the donors who took them in, and evocative photos of the folks involved and the aftermath of the flood. Senator Barack Obama wrote the forward.

To commemorate Katrina, we're donating every cent of the profits to the progressive group ACORN, which is working to protect evacuees' rights and rebuild New Orleans right. If you donate $25 today to help Katrina relief efforts, we'll send you a copy of It Takes a Nation (which retails for $25) for free.

You can learn more about the book, check out some of the photos and interviews, and make a donation, at:

https://civic.moveon.org/ittakesanation/book.html?p_id=90&id=8602-6705908-4sUhBB81D88co6v_lLhvRg&t=3

Working at work?

2006-08-21T13:15:00.001-04:00

I actually have work to do here, amazing! Of course this means I have a lot less time for personal work like blogging.

I have had a few topics I've wanted to blog about- most notably my new found love for podcasts. But I just had 3,000 pounds of magnets delivered to me today, so I suppose I should concentrate on sending some of those out before we move to the 5th floor in two weeks. If you would like a magnet on Perinatal Depression in English, Spanish, Portuguese or all three let me know.

Right now I am listening to the Al Franken Show on Air America, and they are talking about John Prescott saying that Bush is crap. Awesome that our closest ally in the "war on terror" thinks our President is crap. Al thought it might be the word for a type of pudding in England (such as spotted dick), but that idea has proved false and apparently crap means the same thing on both sides of the pond.

That is the cool thing about the work I am doing right now, it is pretty much all number crunching for the distribution plan so I can listen to interesting radio shows while doing it.

The Devil and Melanie wears Prada?

2006-08-11T09:43:00.001-04:00

Nope, I didn't buy anything Prada. That would only happen if Second Time Around had a Prada item for under $50. What actually happened is I took a personality test, it was very thorough and came up with interesting results and suggestions. Click here to read the full report, and if you really know me tell me what you think because I am curious for other peoples opinions.

Anyway, the results group your different personality traits as very high, slightly high, average, slightly low, and low. My three very high traits were femininity (I can accept this since it gave me average masculinity as well), openness, and..... attention to style. It went even further to say:

You have a strong sense of style and value your personal presentation - friends may even seek your style advice from time to time.

Hahaha.... something went wrong there, I don't think anyone has ever asked me for style advice, it's usually the other way around.

"Hi, is Mr. (butcher last name) available?....Oh, he passed on last year....well...are you his wife?"

2006-08-10T11:50:00.002-04:00

That was my opening line when I was a telemarketer in the summer of 2001. I have had many, many different jobs, and telemarketing is in the top five of "never again" jobs. I worked for a company called Security Financial, we sold living trusts, which is why "oh he passed on?" was frequently part of my pitch.

I hated it, I was terrible at cold calling and always felt I was annoying people and it wore on me. Fortunately my boss really liked me, and gave me a position calling people who had filled out cards asking for more information. This was a great relief because it meant that people weren't entirely shocked when I called, I felt justified in calling them because they had requested information, and I got a little office all to myself. They also paid well, $11/hr plus bonuses for hitting quotas, which I always hit once I was on the cards.

Then in the summer of 2003 I found myself telemarketing again, this time for Zoots, the delivery dry cleaning service. This job really ate away at my soul, because the people I was calling were people that had stopped using Zoots. They had usually stopped with Zoots because they were not happy with the service, and sometimes it was because Zoots had seriously fucked them over. And here I was, representing the company they were displeased with- what a perfect opportunity to vent you anger! Ugh, that job also involved door-to-door sales- I won't even get into that!

Since then I have earned my B.A. and have slept soundly every night knowing that my days of telemarketing were behind me. So why do I find myself calling people whose names I don't know how to pronounce and being treated like shit by the people who answer? Why? Because people don't respond to their e-mails thus forcing me to call them!

Here's the voicemail I leave, since almost no one actually answers:

"Hi, my name is Melanie LaFav, I'm calling from the Department of Public Health, Christine identified (insert Community Health Center name) as an appropriate CHC to be sent some perinatal depression awareness materials we have developed. At this point I am working on the distribution plan and need to find out how many of these materials and what languages we should send to your CHC. If you could call me back at 617 555 5907 or if you'd like to e-mail me at Melanie- M-E-L-A-N-I-E dot LaFav L-A-F like Frank- A-V like Victor at... that would be great, thanks."

Sometimes I get a secretary and they frequently treat me badly and question me a lot because they assume that I am a telemarketer. And then sometimes the person I am trying to contact actually answers. Now, they are usually quite nice to me and are excited about the materials, but this morning I basically got a lecture about how they serve mainly Chinese patients (the materials are in 6 languages but Chinese is not one of them). Did she listen to my pitch? Didn't she hear me say Christine identified her CHC? I don't know anything about your CHC or the population you serve, if I did I would use my knowledge to just send you the materials without having to listen to you bitch me out on the phone!

Ugh, then the very next person I called was a woman I had talked to the week before. We had spoken on the phone and she was happy to receive the materials, I sent her the e-mail (it explains more and then she is supposed to give me the numbers- which the people I have gotten in contact with have been doing) and crickets- so I was calling to follow-up. I got her bitchy secretary who tried telling me that if Dr. Mullen did not reply then they do not need the materials. At this point something started to snap- "No", I explained, "she told me she was interested, she just hasn't responded and I am trying to follow-up. " She came back, "Well the best I can do is give you her voicemail, I can't give you the numbers." When did I ask you for the numbers? That's when it snapped, with a very biting tone I responded, "Yeah, that's all I wanted in the first place."

So clearly I am not making any friends in this process and I am maintaining the highest professionalism. But, seriously, these are free materials to raise awareness amongst your patients who you are supposed to care about. We as a team, and I personally have put a lot of time into developing and testing and re-working these materials and all I want from you is a number- how many do you want? The languages? Don't worry- I can use one of our databases to figure that out....just tell me how many you want! They're free, they're pretty, I promise they won't bite!

************************************************************************************
That was a very boring post, but I am frustrated and needed to vent.

Live from Jamaica Plain

2006-08-07T20:39:00.001-04:00

That's right folks, the computer has arrived. I promptly set up the
wireless and found a network to piggyback on. Of course the connection is kinda shotty so maybe one day Claud and I will get the courage to walk upstairs and ask the Mingo boys if maybe they'd like to share their network.

Hopefully now that I am freed from the confines of having to use the internet at work I will be able to get more things done- like posting ;).

Me and my 10 speed

2006-08-07T12:55:00.001-04:00

I bought a bike! It is currently the highlight of my life.

Last week I walked into Bikes Not Bombs in Roxbury and was met by a fidgety little bikestress (yes I just made that word up). She helped me pick out everything from my frame to my toe clips (which I didn't even realize I wanted) and in five short weeks I will have a refurbished bike that was custom built just for me.

Bikes Not Bombs is a really cool non-profit organization that recycles and refurbishes bicycles and send them to developing countries to provide people with an alternative form of transportation. They also train urban youth to either "earn a bike" or work in the bike shop. Anyway you can read up more on them by clicking the link above, but needless to say I was happy to shell out $200 for my bike and another $60 for my helmet, lock, and Boston bike map.

In my excited fervor I promptly put a Bikes Not Bombs sticker on my water bottle (I have recently started stickering my metal water bottle to keep people from thinking that it is a coffee thermos- which it technically is). The next morning I was in a meeting with my boss and purposely turned my water bottle so she could see my new sticker (I knew that she would recognize and be in support of BNB). Sure enough she took the bait and we chatted a little about the organization and how great they are. She asked about donating frames and I said I was planning on buying a cheapy bike off craigslist (if you have never checked out craigslist you need to pull your head out of the hole and check it out) and then donating it when my new bike was ready. At that point she protested my decision and told me to just borrow one of the many bikes that was not being used in her family- amazing! That night my good friends Chelsea and Maria drove me over to Karin's place and then drove me and my bike home (I was going to take the T-there and then ride home but my "big brother" Mike kept insisting that he would never see me again if I enacted that plan).

So I have spent the last 5 days riding all around Boston on my nifty loaner bike. I have biked to and from work everyday and to and from my practice and game. The work commute is 4.5 miles and for a good portion of that I am on the Southwest Corridor- a sweet paved bike path. Then I hit downtown Boston and I hop onto the mean streets. Now this may seem scary, but I find it quite exhilarating and I am taking all of the precautions that I can to make sure my father's worst nightmares do not come true (I wonder if my Mom has even told my dad yet). I found this great document on how to not get hit by a car, and much to my mother's chagrin it warns over and over that riding on the sidewalk is a quick ticket to hurting yourself (by allowing an unsuspecting car to hit you while you cross the street) and others (the moving target that is a pedestrian is not easy to avoid).

My commute takes me about 45 minutes and I save money (no T-passes) and resources (no gas, more room on the T for other passengers)- my old roomie Neda "Captain Planet" Sobhani would be proud!

Stay Tuned for:
Retail Therapy
Be a filter not a sponge Or Does anyone really know what to think about what is happening in the Middle East?

Follow-up to Queer Eye

2006-08-04T13:10:00.002-04:00

So I saw the show and was very pleased. I was a little worried, but they did a great job of making who Miles was approachable while still respecting the complexity (I think that's what I'm trying to say).

My friend Sarah informed me that it was not the first time that a trans person was on reality TV, but it was still exciting anyway, it is good to know that Queer Eye is not the only show that was willing to breach the subject.

Finally, I was also quite happy with how loving and accepting Miles' family is. I remember sophomore year we were hanging out in the library (did you notice the Vermont flag in his apartment- well that used to hang in "the fort" the space we took over in the Library) during finals and Miles was nervous about a wedding (I think) he was going to with his family. It was the first time he would be wearing a suit at a family function while his sisters would be wearing dresses. I don't think I ever heard how it went but I am glad to see where his family is at now.

Not that Frida was trans or that this is really related, but I just love Frida and that last paragraph made me think of her:

That's Frida in the middle :)

Queer Eye for the Mount Holyoke Guy

2006-08-01T12:49:00.001-04:00

I know what you're thinking. "Is this some J-show skit you were in?" (well maybe you were thinking that if you really know me).

Anyway, this is no skit people, this is the real thing- Bravo TV. Tonight at 10:00 pm Miles Goff, who started Mount Holyoke in '99 (I think) as Amelia Goff will star in Queer Eye for the Straight Guy episode 302: TRANS-FORM THIS TRANS-MAN.

(Miles is in the back)

I don't know Miles well, but I know that he is a good guy and very kind and I'm really excited for him. He was at our reunion and we said something to him about his upcoming fame and he just sheepishly smiled and asked how we had heard about it. A number of the other friends that appear in the episodes are friends and acquaintances from Mount Holyoke. Needless to say Claudia (a fellow MHC alum) and I are having people over tonight to watch the episode.

This is the first time Queer eye has ever had a trans-gendered person on, and my friend Bekka has speculated that this may be the first time a trans-gendered person has been on a reality TV show. So tune in and check it out, and if you don't read this blog until too late, don't distress it's Bravo, here are the other show times: Tue, Aug 1 12:00 AM, Thu, Aug 3 8:00 PM, and Sat, Aug 5 1:00 PM.

Happy watching :)

If anyone at work didn't realize I was gay they sure do now!

2006-07-27T08:12:00.003-04:00

Cracked out and sad that less than 11 hours later I am back at work I put in my headphones and turned on some of the fine slam poetry of Kit Yan. First poem up- Straight Girls. It wasn't quite loud enough for me so I turned it up all the way. After about 3 minutes I realized that the reason it hadn't been loud enough for me was that the sound was not coming through my headphones. Yes, oh yes, I had plugged to headphones into the mic hole and had blasted Kit's anger over being jerked around by straight girls for all of the office to hear!

I am a genius!

I'm never leaving my cubicle again.

Here are the words that were blasted for all to hear in case you are interested:

Straight girls,
Like to date girls.
And then they go back,
To their boyfriends,
Who don't want them,
And then they go back.

Straight girls,
Like to make girls think they'll love them until the end.
And then they've got the nerve to say, "What? we're just friends."
And I hate that.

I hate girls.
I sound like a second grader.
But there's no better way to truly convey what I feel.
I hate girls.

I hate them because they lie.
And you know those shits that say, "boys lie."
Yeah well,
A better shirt would say, "boys lie, but girls lie to your fucking face and lead you on in an unexplainable way, and then leave you there with so many questions, you wonder if you're still gay!"

Okay, I got carried away.
But it's true.
Girls will fuck with you.
Feed you compliments,
Wear unforgettable scents,
Have deep, meaningful, and intense conversations with you,
Until the cows go home with them on their backs.

Ugh.
I fucking hate girls.
Because they do nice things.
Little things meaningful things.
And if I were a guy, I might not notice at all.
But there's the fucking problem.
I'm a girl.
But I hate girls,
Because I understand the bullshit they file away.
To feed the different girls, that they pretend to date.

"We need to hang out."
But we won't.
"Wow, I had a great time, I'll call you okay?"
And she won't.
"We need to talk."
And that's never good.
"Hey, we'll still be friends."
And we never should,
Have started this fucking piece of shit motherfucking crap to begin with.

No, I haven't lost my mind, just my vocab.
What? You think I chose this path?
My fucking life is like Attack of the Killer Lesbians,
Filled with some of the greatest actresses.
Or some nights it's like meet "Miss Right" on the Woman show.

Behind door number one:
The ever so beautiful experimental bi-curious straight girl, with a long term boyfriend and it was HER who asked YOU out.
Behind door number two:
The elusive bisexual girl, who at first glance, you thought you had no chance, but she hit on you while standing next to the guy she just made out with.
And behind door number three:
Your standard issue L-U-G. Lesbian Until Graduation, my favorite conveniently located at your nearest all-girls college.
Smith, Simmons, Wellesley, wherever.

But oh wait, there's more.
Who's the lovely lady behind door number four?
Ah, your regular old lesbian,
Fully equipped with all the tricks of the trade,
Now this is what a lesbianÂ’s made of.
Doesn't care,
Doesn't call,
Wants everything from you,
Yet nothing at all.

So go ahead, take your pick, but I'm fucking done.
You girls can play your game because you've already won.
And for the record, please don't call.

I'm at work- yes the time is correct

2006-07-26T19:42:00.001-04:00

I must have gotten into work late- right?

Nope, been here since 8 am

I must have taken a big lunch break- right?

Nope, I did actually leave the building to have lunch (something I dont do thaaaat often) with my friend Mike, but I felt really bad when I told my boss I was leaving and only spent like 30 min all told.

I really wanted to get to Ten Thousand Villages which closes at 7pm, so I left at 6 and now IM BACK!

On my way in I saw the doorman in his street clothes on his way home- he just politely chuckled at me.

How do you get in when the doorman has left you ask.

This is something I am quite used to- you go next door to the apartment building and show them your ID card. I'm used to this since I was here on Sunday, yup Sunday.

Why I am working these ridiculous hours you ask.

Because we have a grant due on Monday and I want to be able to take Friday off to go down to the dirty Jers and visit with my Batesy (you ready for me Bates? I'll probably be cracked out finals style!). So I will be here, at the office, working on entering in grant edits and making sure the endnotes are all in line- FUN STUFF!

But they did install my new PC today (the old one was over a decade old) and now I have speakers so I am having fun listening to everyone's myspace songs :). The only good thing about being in the office at ungodly hours- the head phones come off and the music is played out loud.

Moral of the story

If you feel like entertaining me do so! My roommate is afraid we may not get home in time for Project Runway (it starts at 10 pm). We gonna be here for a while!

Some things that are on my mind

2006-07-19T14:10:00.001-04:00

Grants are stressful especially when you are only given a month
I am sleepy, I am always sleepy. I think my mom is right, I think my reaction to stress is to fall asleep
I just dropped my red G2 into the toilet at work- that sucks
I need to finally decide that being single is best and stop letting my head get filled with girls
I wish Lucy Diamond would take me away to her secret lair (I just bought D.E.B.S)
I need to be better about e-mailing people- especially returning e-mails
I need a new job- I need to be working in education
I need to work on getting a new job and studying for and getting into grad school
I can't work during the summer
My hand is sore from falling on it
When Claudia gets back from being away tonight I'm gonna have to stop walking around naked in the apartment
I want to see the girls I think are cute
8 months is too long to go without sex
Again, I need to stop thinking about girls

This post became too personal, but lets be honest it will be awhile before I post again so oh well.

A heavy moment

2006-07-11T14:05:00.002-04:00

It is strange that I wrote that post yesterday.

After work I needed to get my hair off on my neck and had broken my hair elastic, so I decided to try French braiding it. I successfully French braided my hair for the first time ever and called my Lita to tell her the exciting news (I used to have her French braid my hair all the time when I was younger). She was happy for my and impressed at my new found ability. After chatting for a little bit she reminded me that tomorrow (now today) is the anniversary of my grandma Barbara's death.

Today last year I was with my family, holding my grandmother's hand and watching as her breathing got more and more labored.

She is the first person I ever really knew who has passed away. My grandpa Ben had died the year before and although it was sad I knew he had been suffering and he was just waiting for it to end. Grandpa Ben also lived in Mexico City since I was born and I had only been to visit him a few times, and only twice that I can actually remember.

A couple or a few (who can remember?) days after my grandma passed I was sitting in a funeral home listening to words she had written before her death being read. She wrote about me, about her impressions of me and about her regrets (did she use that word?) about not knowing me better. I sat with the congregation (is that the appropriate word?) and continued to mourn about the fact that I hadn't known her better.

In those last days of her life and the days that followed I learned a lot about my grandmother. I learned things that I wish I had taken the time to learn or notice while she was still alive. I realized through hearing other people talk about her that she had a lot of qualities that I admire and desire for myself. Most of all I learned that she was a very non-judgmental and easily accepting person, and that she held a very important place in the lives of all of the children she had taught. My grandmother continued to teach by helping my aunt in her classroom until the day her cancer caused her to be physically incapable of going on. My grandmother was almost 80 years old at that time. Also, did notice I said helping my aunt in her classroom. That's right, she had such a functional relationship with her daughter that she was able to go into her place of work daily and they worked side by side.

This is my grandma Barbara:

She is on the left with her eyes closed. This is at my college graduation in 2004. She was a beautiful woman. In their wedding pictures she and my grandpa look like some sort of celebrity couple.

I think I'm done now. I just wanted to take a moment to remember her.

My grandpa has an internet girlfriend and my grandma (lita) has a great sex life!

2006-07-10T13:39:00.002-04:00

In a previous post I wrote a blurb about the fact that my grandpa (my father's dad) has a girlfriend. Back in April my mother informed me of this, saying that my grandfather unexpectedly announced his relationship during dinner one night. This rocked my world- my grandmother had only been dead for a little over 6 months, and I just had a hard time wrapping my mind around the idea of my grandpa "dating". Apparently, this woman is the ex-wife of a friend of his and somehow they got back in contact with each other and decided that they didn't want to spend the last years of their lives alone.

This idea was still kind of hard for me to swallow, but I was accepting it, and then a couple of weeks ago my mom dropped another bomb. We were chatting about various topics, as we frequently do, and she mentioned that my grandpa's girlfriend was talking very seriously about moving in with him. I found this unsettling, but didn't even have time to react before my mom said, "We are trying to convince him that it's not a good idea since he hasn't seen her in 40 years." WAIT A MINUET....rewind.....WhAt??? Did she just say that? Confused and befuddled, I asked her what she meant. She went on to explain that the last time my grandfather had seen this woman was when she married a good friend of his 40 years ago. Somehow they re-established contact through the internet and had been communicating on-line and began to consider themselves a couple.

After my mom finished explaining I asked her why she had not told me this when she first told me about the girlfriend. She tried to convince me that she had, but we all know that's not true- a person could never forget being told that their 80-something grandfather had an internet girlfriend. In any case, my grandfather's internet girlfriend has been talking about selling her house and moving in with my grandpa. The family is trying to convince him that it is not a good idea. And you thought that girl who flew to Jordan to be with her myspace boyfriend was crazy....

...okay well maybe that's worse. But still!

On to more grandparent craziness. As you may or may not know, my Lita (my mother's mom) is currently undergoing therapy to reduce the amount of cancerous cells that have been found in her blood stream. She has already lived through her first bought of cancer- cervical, and is currently taking a new drug for survivors of cervical cancer whose cancer has returned. This new drug is currently in its testing phase and so my Lita is interviewed about her reactions to the medication during each of her medical visits.

I know this sounds depressing and morbid, but I promise it gets funny.

Not too long ago, at one of her appointments she was asked by the doctor, in front of my mother, how her sex life is. She responded by saying, "It's great." Now, let me explain something about my Lita, she lives at our home, where she has lived since I was 10, and before that she jumped around between relatives living with them. She was never officially divorced, but my grandfather left her before my mom had finished high school. Knowing this, my mother and the doctor sat there speechless, looking at her, not knowing how to react. She broke the uncomfortable silence by laughing and saying, "It's all in my head- it's great!" The next time she came in for an appointment and the same doctor smiled and asked about her sex life, she just smiled and responded, "You know."

So there ya have it, my grandpa actually has an internet girlfriend and my grandma has a great sex life in her mind.

I have 3 cell phones at home...

2006-06-26T13:51:00.001-04:00

...and my family has a lot more at our house in Cali.

If you are like us and have a bunch of used cell phones that you don't know what to do with you may find this article interesting. It is about the mining of Coltan, a mineral used in cell phones. Eighty percent of our Coltan supply comes from DR Congo, in an area where endangered gorilla's live. The article focuses on a company that has joined forces with US zoos to increase the recycling of cell phones- a process both helps the environment by keeping toxins out of the Earth and could potentially have positive affects on the gorilla population.

"Sometimes you wanna go...

2006-06-19T16:17:00.001-04:00

...where everybody knows your name."

As has been noted before on my blog, I live in lesbian, hippie central- Jamaica Plain. As also has been noted I am very, very happy with my new community. It makes me happy just to walk to the T in the morning and bask in the beautiful quaintness of my neighborhood. Last week I came to another important realization about my new home: for the first time since leaving Mount Holyoke I am actually part of my community.

Boston Pride was 2 weekends ago and since I live in lesbian central there was much going on in my community. The only event I attended was the JP women's block party (which happened to be like 2 feet from my front door). Maria and Chelsea (friends from MHC) and I had made plans to meet up at the block party but due to my poor communication skills they were not able to go until after I had to leave. And my friend Anastasia was also not planning on going until later. So I decided to do something I never do- go by myself. Then at the last minuet I got a phone call from another friend saying she would like to go- so we met up, paid our $10 donation to get into a roped off stretch of street with alcohol and ladies dancing on platforms- cowgirl go go dancers to be exact. While we were there I ran into at least 10 people that I know and even made a few new friends (and also got hit-on a little, including being told that I "Wear [my softball uniform shirt] well"). All told it was a very fun filled and community feeling day.

Then later in the week I walked over to J.P. Licks to meet up with friends for some yummy local ice cream. And of course, I bumped into two people from one of my softball teams. Finally on Friday I decided that since the weather was finally being cooperative I would go for a jog around Jamaica Pond. As I ran and people watched (the "pond" is 1.5 mi. around and attracts many the jogger and stroller) I decided that I was definitely going to see someone I knew. But I finished the loop and still no one. Then just as I was about to leave the pond Sally, a woman I know from football, came running over- Jackpot, my hypothesis proved.

That was when it hit me- community, real community. With neighbors and friends and even "free boxes" (a phenomenon I first discovered at Mount Holyoke- got something you no longer need that someone else might like? Just put it in a box with a sign that says free and someone will give it a new home. So far I got myself a spiffy new pair of sunglasses.)

*I'm not happy with the flow and structure of this post, but I can't think of how to fix it. Hopefully the point I'm trying to make came across.

Drinks after work = Hiding under table?

2006-06-13T17:11:00.002-04:00

So, now that this has been alluded to in a blog comment, I suppose I need to keep up my promise to tell this gem of a tale on my blog.

Last Thursday, I was trying to round up a group of friends to be pretend to be socially minded by paying the Jimmy Fund $7 to get ice cream belly aches at the Scooper Bowl. But, due to the unseasonably cold and rainy weather we decided to go out for drinks instead.

My friend Mike met Claudia and me outside of our work and we all walked over to the Beantown Pub. Now, I've been working a 9 to 5 for a while now, so clearly going out for drinks after work is not new fare for me. Claud and I have gone for drinks, Mike and I have gone for drinks, heck, Mike and I had even gone out to Beantown Pub before.

But there was one key difference between those outings and this one. At those outings, dinner had clearly been written into the plans from the get go- the drinks may have been ordered first, but that is only due to the length of time it takes to deliberate between a ruben and a hamburger. This time, there was no mention of food, and since food was never mentioned I merely rationalized out that we were only planning on having a couple of beers and then we would head home and cook an economical non-pub dinner. I later found out that Claudia rationalized out the same plan.

The night started out with a bang. There was talk of recent events: Mike would have been fine with Condi Rice speaking at BC at any time other than commencement; there were jokes about who owned which beautiful sports car that was parked outside; and once Gary arrived there was even talk of match making: Claud has a friend- maybe Gary's interested?

Then the first beer came and went. Claud finished before me and tried to put up a protest that with no food a second beer was not a good idea- she was quickly convinced otherwise. When I finished my beer I knew, and desired, better than to put up a fight.

Then the second beer was finished. Now, if you return to the original thought out plans- two beers was the limit and then home for dinner. But once that second beer had been consumed with no food in our bellies, Claudia and I forgot all about our plans. A third beer was ordered and then a fourth.

Nine pm rolls around and suddenly the conversation turned to relationships. Melanie (who to make matter worse was about to start her period) let the emotional flood gates open. While Gary and Claudia were involved in their own conversation (and busily drinking my fifth beer as to keep me from drinking it), I was talking to Mike about my past failed relationships and current single status. Unfortunately, I was also unable to stop crying and crying and crying.

With the night turned sour Mike decided it was time to head home. But by this time I decided I was unable to function and that the best option in sight was to sit underneath the table! Mike, sober enough to realize this was not the best option, helped me out from under the table and out of the pub. At this point I made the transition from overly emotional Melanie to paranoid Melanie (for those of you who were around during the summer I graduated from high school you remember both of these Melanie's very well). I suddenly decided that Mike was making fun of me, which he clearly had a right to, but I was not going to be made fun of, so I told him not to touch me and I ran away. (This is a move that I pulled frequently in that fateful summer of 2000, but I have no recollection of it happening since then). As I ran I could hear Mike in hot pursuit of me- I could not allow him to catch me, so I ran faster and faster and faster. And as I ran I had the logical thought that if I were ever to be attacked while drunk I would clearly be okay because I have an amazing capacity to sprint while heavily intoxicated.

I ran myself right into the T station and right onto a train. After riding for a couple of stops I actually processed what the speaker was saying: "Haymarket". You guessed it folks- I had already gone two stops in the wrong direction. So I got off and somehow managed to get on the train going the right way- this is when the moaning started. Yes, I was that drunk alone person moaning on the train. So, after a couple of stops I realized that people on the train were staring and laughing at me (and we all know I wasn't in the mood for being made fun of). Then another logical thought hit me- "they must think I'm homeless- why else would I be drunk and on the T by myself?" So, to keep myself from being further made fun of, and to dispel any rumors that I was homeless, I got off the T and promptly threw up in the station.

That's when I actually made a good decision. I left the station and I called one of the people who has been there for me in other crisis situations: Bekka. I slurred a story about losing Claudia and not having keys and asked if I could walk (their apartment was very close) to thier place and sleep there. Bekka and Allison welcomed me with open arms, and from what I was told the next morning, I entertained them for about half an hour with my stories of being homeless, my desire to have a serious conversation about Condi Rice, my unusually dry humor and my endless struggle to get the sheets covering me (it apparently involved a lot of flopping and frustrated grunts).

Moral of the story: never assume you can start drinking with no intention of ordering food! There are other morals here but I don't feel like writing them out...

Me and Mike on the crazy night in question. You bet your butt drunk pictures were taken and some how I made it through the night with out losing my camera.

Wiki What?

2006-05-31T15:53:00.001-04:00

Linds just posted a comment about this on the previous entry but it is too precious for me to let slip by.

Some how there is a Wikipedia entry for my high school and more than that there is a paragraph all about the Integrated Curriculum. Integrated Curriculum only lasted from 1996 to 2000, as stated in the article, does anyone recognize those years? For most of my friends and blog readers that is the four years we were in high school. Yes, I was in the first and last class of only 20 some students to graduate from Integrated Curriculum. Yet somehow it is the only program at the school that they take the time to describe in depth.

If you do read the entry don't be too impressed- that is what the program was like in theory- in reality it was a wild group made up of half students that bought into the program and half students that were told they couldn't attend the school unless the did it.

So how common is the whole high school on Wikipedia thing? Is anyone else's high school on there?

Two more pics (see post below)

2006-05-31T13:49:00.001-04:00

The hosts and the Po Po

The authentic high school back pack

Wanna Throw a Great Party?

2006-05-31T12:18:00.001-04:00

I think my blog posting usually serve some sort of purpose other than telling my friends about my life. But, my new roomie and I had an awesome housewarming party last week so the purpose of this blog posting is to let you know about a great party you can throw.

Come as Yourself in High School

It was amazing! Claudia and I spent our first weeks in our apartment settling in and decorating and then we decided it was time for the party. We found a door and Anastasia, the sculptor, helped me turn it into a beer pong table (complete with beer drainage hole), we bought lots of alcohol, Claud cooked up some goodies and the party started with a bang at 9 pm.

People came in all variety of outfits- everything from Miss. Big Spring(s) (Allison as her high school beauty pageant winning self) to tiny-tee jr. high Katie, Christine even came with her authentic patched-out high school back pack. There were people smoking clove cigarettes while playing beer pong, there were 12 90's music cds, there was Zima, and Boones, and Pucker being consumed everywhere. Somehow the party managed to rattle on until around 3 am and our medical machine using neighbor didn't ever complain. Most people have no idea how 6 hours of partying were spent (especially Claud and me) so we consider the party a complete success.

I could keep rambling on trying to describe the greatness but I think in this instance pictures certainly speak louder than words:

She said she wouldn't but Bekka came in full figure skater gear

Checkout the bangs on Steph...sooo high school

Oh man, the braids- I did that too!

And then out of no where a boy band appeared

At some point we ran out of food- that's when our Ikea coasters really came in handy

Chel is too cool with her cloves and Butterscotch Schnapps

Gary and my doll had some quality snuggle time

I think I have that exact Tee from Wet Seal

Newt is a couple years older- that's why she got to wear such amazing shorts!

Check out the beautiful beer pong table

And America's Next Top model is...

2006-05-19T13:00:00.001-04:00

Danielle

(cue cheesy theme music)

Yay! Danielle won. I seriously would have never watched ANTM again if she didn't. And with all the crazy misogynism (I think I made that word up) and racism this season I still may not tune in next season.

In the last episode the models had to do a commercial. Danielle was so nervous about containing her accent that she ended up sounding like she was shouting and her accent slipped out a bit at the end. So once again Tyra reprimanded her for not "turning off her accent". Meanwhile Joanie (the other finalist) let out a bit of a lisp during her commercial- but did anyone say anything about that? Nope!

I realized two things while watching the show: 1) It is ridiculous that the gave Joanie a dentist to take care of her snaggle tooth but told Danielle to just "turn off" her accent (as if people do not hire coaches to train them in that) 2) Since they chose Danielle despite her "accent problems" and despite the fact that they had no issues with Joanie, I have come to the conclusion that someone higher up must have pointed out that Tyra was favoring the Black women too much so she felt the need to start being racist. Or it could just be that old, "I did it so you can too" syndrome- does anyone know where Tyra is from?

Anyway, I'm happy and I'll probably send ANTM a letter that no one will read about how disappointed I was with the show this season...

America's Next Generic model

2006-05-17T17:02:00.001-04:00

Okay, so tonight is the season finale of Top model and if they don't choose Danielle this may be the last episode of Top model ever for me.

For those of you who have not been watching this season of Top model let me clue you in. Danielle is awesome. She is a completely normal person, she is not irrational or bitchy or too emotional, she is just normal and cool and basically nice and helpful to everyone- but not overly so. She is also beautiful- she has been taking great pictures since day one.

Danielle is also and individual and proud of who she is. In the first episode when there was a self proclaimed racist on the show Danielle stood her ground and told the girl why she didn't agree with what she was saying. Danielle also has a gap in her two front teeth and when Top model offered to fix it she declined saying it was her trade mark.

Apparently the people at Top model think that beautiful, strong women who are not afraid to be proud of who they are, are bad for ratings. After Danielle declined to have her teeth fixed she was berated by the judges who claimed she was "Leaving a gap for some other girl to fill," and who asked, "Do you think cover girl wants models with gaps in their teeth?" The ironic thing is that the only cover girl model that I can remember from those countless YM and Teen magazines I bought in high school is a model who had a bigger gap in her teeth than Danielle. And I don't remember her because it was ugly- at first I found it odd and then I realized how cool it was because she was distinctly different from the other cookie cutter girls.* Danielle consented to have her gap filled in BUT she would only allow the dentist to fill in some of the gap- thus continuing to assert her individuality.

Once that saga was over they started attacking Danielles accent. Danielle has a southern accent. But she doesn't have the acceptable white southern bell accent like Nicole who won last season. Oh no, Danielle has a deep south black southern accent. According to Tyra Banks, "Accents are beautiful because they show where we are from, but we have to be able to turn them off sometimes (if they make you sound black)." Funny thing is, they also made fun of Nnenna for her accent because she sounded to snooty- she has a Nigerian accent!

So in summation. If they get rid of Danielle and keep personalityless stuck up Jade, just because Danielle has an accent and a small gap in her teeth I may throw things!!! And then I will officially begin my boycott of ANTM.

There is clearly a lot more I could say about this but I need to go home...

*Next time I go home I am going to look through my collection of youth mags for that models picture, and then I am going to send it to Tyra Banks with a note about how odd it is that she decided looking generic is one of the qualifications to be a top model.

My little brother could be in Iraq

2006-05-01T13:29:00.002-04:00

I was just on myspace, because I am addicted, and I saw this bulletin posted by Erwin a friend of my little brother:

IED is a nasty thing I must say so myself. Last night when we did our patrol. I was expecting to be just a normal patrol. But all of a sudden a really bright flash followed by an enormous BOOM took out almost the entire vehicle I was in. I was knocked unconscience. Next thing I knew I was at the aid station checking me out see if i was okay. Man I thought I was dead!!! I got lucky. Just keep praying for me for those who care about me come back home alive and well.

Why is this young boy, who has barely begun to live still in a foreign country being shot at? Why do I have to keep seeing bulletin's he has posted about losing men? Why are we still over there? Does anyone even know anymore? Does anyone pay attention?

Not that I can talk- its not like I'm out joining demonstrations. I feel a little incapacitated and I gotta run so I can make it to the Mass Coalition for Youth Violence Prevention. Maybe I'll feel productive there for once- but I highly doubt it...

Won't you take me from Funky Town?

2006-04-28T13:56:00.002-04:00

Thank you Claire, for that much needed slap into reality.

Ever since I got back from Spain I have been in such a strange funk that I just can't shake. Its like I have suddenly found myself at this place in my life where I'm just sitting here. I'm waiting for all of these things to happen but they're not quite happening yet and so I go through each day in a complete daze and I find it impossible to get the small things done. Seriously, this needs to stop because it is getting really annoying.

This strange state of mind is affecting my work as well, and that is not a good thing because eventually someone is going to notice that I am getting nearly nothing accomplished in the "7.5 hours" that I'm here every day. Somehow myspace, friendster and facebook became the most important things in my life- they're not reality folks!

Anyway, one of those things that I've been waiting for is finally going to happen: I'm moving to Jamaica Plain, otherwise know as JP or if you ask Po GayP. Yes ladies and gentlemen, I am moving to the official lesbian community of Boston. Wow, sometimes I'm so gay: I just realized that I communicate with more men through my blog than in real life (mike, you are pretty much the only male that I actually talk to in person on a regular basis); I went to a women's college; I've played softball all my life (yes this is a stereotype- so what?); I play on a gay football team (not that women's football needs to be called gay to be gay); I just joined a slow pitch softball team in the Boston Alternative Women's league (BAWL); and I am moving to GayP.

This is JP (Not Funky Town)

I am also moving in with my friend Claudia, and just Claudia. The two of us are going to make our beautiful two bedroom, with dinning room, living room and enclosed balcony apartment into a cozy home- a real home. We even have plans for a room that is decorated entirely with art work by our friends- so if you have anything you want displayed in a stylish 20 something apartment send it our way.

This is Claudia and me (Don't worry I don't let
her touch my rack until she's paid me first)

Anyway, this wasn't really a post of substance- that is lame after such a long break- but I am just emerging from my coma so you're gonna have to give me a minuet.

PS. my grandpa has a girlfriend- that is pretty much all I can say about that...

Pity Party

2006-04-16T14:57:00.005-04:00

Being single can be really good sometimes and it can really suck sometimes.

I was just reminded of one of the things I hate the most about being single: there is generally no one waiting for you at the airport when you arrive home from a trip. There have been a few times in my life when someone has been there, someone who has truly missed me while I was away and would never dream of waiting a moment longer to see me. On those occasions that person usually came up to me and gave me a huge hug and a kiss and took my bags for me and drove me home.

I lied, that hasn't only happened a few times. That is also what happens every time I fly into California- and sometimes there is even a lita (grandma) and a puppy there to greet me too, and if im really lucky there's a little man (my brother). But almost without fail my mom is there with a big smile, a hug, a kiss, a new hair cut and eventually a comment about my unwaxed eyebrows. (Remind me to be more apprecative of this on my next return to the golden state)

Today, instead of all this loveliness, I flew into Boston and was confronted with the realization that once again I forgot to ask a friend to come pick me up, my clothes are not warm enough, my bag is too heavy, my cell phone is completely dead, and I have run out of tissue to blow my damn sick ass nose with!

Thank god my work is right off the blue line (airport line) and I can access it on the weekend. So here I am, updating my blog in the hopes that claudia will call and come rescue me. If not I have a bag full of warm clothes to change into and a desk that I can burden with some of my heavier articles. Thus solving most of my problems- warmth and a lighter bag; the bacterial cold and lack of hugs, kisses and a ride home are going to take longer to solve...

by the way- Spain was great, more on that later.

¿Hola, que tal? ¡Estoy en España!

2006-04-09T14:48:00.001-04:00

Hello everyone!

I am currently in madrid with all of my most avid blog readers: Leilani, Lindsay, Priscilla, and Carolina.

We are having a great time and acting like crazy spanish people staying up all night dancin (6 am in the clubs baby)

running out of time in the internet cafe bye

Lessons in Apartment hunting

2006-03-29T14:36:00.001-05:00

"Take your imaginary boxes and paint and get out!"

(I couldn't decide which title to go with)

Claudia and I found an amazing gem of an apartment. It was a bit of a fix me up but the rent was only $1000 (lowest we have found by far) and it was in a great part of JP and we would have had our own yard. I was getting really excited about the prospect of this place! Then this morning I was talking to my boss about it and I started getting even more excited (she had friends that used to live on the street and was raving about the great potential).

By the time I got to work (I had an awesome advisory committee meeting this morning and didn't get to the main office until 1 pm) I had already had apartment painting parties, moved in, had a house warming party, started a garden, had a couple BBQs, bought a bike, biked around to games and other various events, participated in block parties, and lovingly live in my apartment for a couple to a few years. Unfortunately when I sat down at my desk I found this e-mail:

Hi Melanie. We had several people come to the apartment

last night and it was taken right away for April 1.

Good luck in your apartment search!
Samantha

Claudia pointed that "the bitch" didn't have to be so chipper about the whole thing. She also (as the seasoned apartment hunter) told me that you cannot "mentally move in" before you have paid your deposit (let alone before you even see the place).

Lesson learned, lesson learned.

I'm taking and things and mourning my loss and looking for a new love to take my lost loves place.

I should be stripped of my blog!

2006-03-28T12:20:00.000-05:00

You know how they can strip generals of their titles for dishonorable conduct (like being openly gay) er something- I should be stripped of my blog for never updating.

Things are just so crazy at work all the time, and when I'm not traveling to interview care providers or putting together information for presentations, I'm looking for apartments.

Yes, apartments. Claudia and I will soon be co-workers and roommates. Okay, so I know being roommates with friends can be a bad idea, and I know living with a co-worker can be a bad idea. But I am hoping that we can make it work anyway. We have already decided to be in contact as little as possible during work (of course our boss really likes putting us on projects together....). I am just so ready to live some place that feels like home, I feel like I haven't really had a home since I left orange county 6 years ago.

In any case, I am excited! We are looking for two bedrooms in JP (with maria and the gays), Brighton, and Cambridge/Somerville, we're even checking out a place that sounds too good to be true in the South End today. We are traveling all over the city this week to check out really cute places. May 1st is our anticipated move in date- for those of you that live in the area be ready for us to bribe you with beer and pizza to help us with the moving process :). Also, start getting together your outfits for our "come as yourself in high school/ jr. high" house warming party!

Okay done with apartments. Now, my good and sexy friend Lindsay is brining my old old old old (but still functioning) laptop to Spain from OC, and then I will take it from Spain to Boston and then I will be able to use the computer from home. Then maybe I can actually update on a more regular basis, and I can re-earn my title of blogster (er something like that).

Ciao bellas (and mike)

Lessons in Dating

2006-03-18T19:13:00.002-05:00

1. Don't count your chickens before they've hatched

2. Listen to your instincts, if you get the feeling they're not too interested you're probably right.

3. Don't broadcast dates because you're just gonna have to tell all those people when it ends.

4. Don't be serious before it's serious- just have fun.

5. Don't convince yourself you like someone just because you are excited about the prospect of dating.

*******************

These are all good things to learn since as said before I have very little experience with dating.

Mike, I know you're shaking your head right now- clearly I have a lot more to learn from you.

Happy Evacuation Day

2006-03-17T13:05:00.002-05:00

You though I was gonna say St. Patrick's day didn't you. What is Evacuation Day you ask. It is a holiday that government employees and schools get off in the city of Boston (no where else)- it is the day the British left the city of Boston in order to attack other cities. It had something to do with an artillary that was placed to face the city- thus intimidating the British to leave- we didn't even beat them in a battle or anything. The British "evacuated" the city on March 26th, 1776, but the city of Boston celebrates the holiday on March 17th. Hmmmm... funny that a city with tons of Irish pride and a basketball team called the celtics decided to celebrate a historic event 9 days early on St. Patricks day.

Anyway, due to this false holiday I can update about my dates with Vicky.

Here is my update:

I LIKE VICKY! And last night we danced all night and then I kissed her, and then she drove me home and then she kissed me. Yay!

And I am going to a Mutiny (her football team) fundraiser on Sunday and I am nervous cause all her football friends will be there.

I feel like a little girl. It's great!

(I can't spell check this and I am a terrible speller, c'est la vie)

First dates are so gay...

2006-03-10T18:29:00.002-05:00

****I started writing this entry on Monday...oops, took a while to finish it!***

Due to Claire's extreme enthusiasm and the lack of more than one vote/ title and the fact that this topic is filling my brain to capacity right now- it wins.

Sooo, if you know me, you know that I refrain from using "gay" as an insult or a term reflecting negativity. You may wonder then why I chose this title and what it refers to. Well, I'll tell you. I am gay, and I just went on a first date. And first dates are very much not gay. What I mean is that the last actual first date I went on was in 2003 with Jess.

This is Jess, she will probably hate that I put this picture of her up here, but it is the only digital picture I have from when we were dating. Jess and I dated for 4 months, and I pretty much lived with her and her two cats the whole time (despite the fact that I am allergic- sometimes I'm crazy!)

Anyway, our "first date" went something like this: We met at a party and we were both interested in each other, at the end of the night Jess asked me for my AIM screen name. Then the next day she IMed me and asked if I wanted to go play pool with her in the Student Center. Not what you would think of as a typical first date, more like two people who might be interested in each other "hanging out". So for my most recent typical first date we have to go allll the way back to the fall of 2001 and a girl named Kirkley.

This is Kirkley.

Now, to be fair, this is Kirkley on her way to Drag Ball senior year (yes, Drag Ball- I went to a women's college, what do you expect?). Kirkley is actually the most "feminine" woman I have ever dated (meaning that we went out on dates, err, a date), and has since gone back to the dark side of dating men. I just enjoy this picture.

Anyway, Kirkley was my first girl crush, and everyone knew that we were interested in each other and everyone was talking about it except for us. So one day she came up to me after class and said, "Everyone is talking about us. We should go to coffee and talk to each other." I of course eeked out a nervous "yes" and was very excited about my date. What I didn't realize was just how much of a date it was.

On my way to meet her my friend Suzy informed me that she had borrowed a cashmere sweater and an expensive sports car from her friend, and that rather than getting coffee as originally planned we were now going out to dinner (or desert or something- I think it was after dinner, but still!).

Kirkley and I had a weird relationship after that 1st date, but the date was one of my best ever. We talked so much that the waitress had to come by multiple times to ask us for our orders and then she left a massive tip which I thought was very cute. At the end of the night she walked me to my dorm and gave me a hug, then I bolted upstairs to gush to my friend Minelly.

So, the point of this quaint trip down memory lane was to highlight that it has been almost 5 years since I have been on a typical first date, and that even then I didn't know it was a first date until like 5 minutes before it started- thus there was no time to stress. In those 5 years I have dated 4 women and with the exception of Jess none of those relationships started with a first date.

Meet Vicky:

(Not her usual dress, she bet against the Steelers and lost)

Vicky and I met a couple of weeks ago and she promptly asked me out. Thus beginning my first date pondering and stress. After she asked me out she was diagnosed with two inner ear infections- so on Monday we went to lunch together. It really wasn't very datey since we both had to get back to work and she was sick.

So, a couple of days ago I e-mail asked her to a movie tonight. As I type she is on her way to pick me up at work and we are going to go see Failure to Launch. So here are my questions (which clearly no one is going to answer in time since she will be here in minutes- but oh well):

Should there be a kiss and how will it be initiated?
Should I invite her "up" and how do I do that and does that imply that I want to have sex
I have more questions but my mind is too muddled to think of them....

Okay...now I have to spell check and then I'm off....wish me luck :)

Out of the Office

2006-03-03T13:28:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I do very little here, and then sometimes I have to leave the office to go to regional commitments multiple times a week and on the days I am in I get slammed with all the work that has piled up while I was away.

Well the Maternal Mortality (sounds fun doesn't it?) case files are all in the mail on the way to the reviewers. So I have a little more time on my hands... I will try to post on another topic before I leave today.

Here are the possible titles (I stole this game from Claire):

Melanie's Olympic Highlights
Grizzly Man
First Dates Are So Gay
My Mother Wishes She Could Still Buckle me in

If you still read my blog, post a comment to cast your vote on which title you would like to see come to life :)

Choose a band / artist and answer ONLY in the titles of their songs: Jackson Browne

2006-02-22T15:49:00.001-05:00

1. Are you male or female:

Our Lady of the Well

2. Describe Yourself:

I’m the Cat

3. How do some people feel about you:

Late for the Sky

4. How do you feel about yourself:

A Child in these Hills

5. Describe your ex boyfriend / girlfriend:

The Pretender

6. Describe current boyfriend / girlfriend:

Of Missing Persons

7. Describe where you want to be:

World in Motion

10. Describe what you want to be:

The Fuse

11. Describe how you live:

Sing My Songs to Me

12. Describe how you love:

Running on Empty

13. What would you ask for if you had just one wish:

That Girl Could Sing

14. Share a few words of wisdom:

Anything Can Happen

15. Now say goodbye:My Opening Farewell

Why my mom isn't a lesbian

2006-02-22T12:41:00.002-05:00

So last week I used whole gift for Cameron saga as a catalyst to discuss my gay status with my mother.

After the emotional event of seeing cam to give her the gift (during which I almost got hit by a car because I did the tragic movie thing and looked back to see if she was looking at me- she was- when I was almost done crossing the street). I decided to call my mother and finally say out loud to her who cam was, why she shouldn't send gifts or call cam when my cell is dead/lost (that reminds me I need to send her some friend's cell phone numbers) , and why I gave cam the gift anyway.

It was a good and productive conversation and the first time my mom and I actually talked about me and the gayness. I cried a little and she listened and added to the conversation. It was the first time she was able to hear how much my relationship with Cameron (or any woman) meant to me. I think this was a very important hurdle for us, and she even managed to be kind of supportive.

So you are probably curious about the title of this post. During our conversation my mom told me that a friend of hers said something to her about how lesbians break-up badly because both the people in the relationship are women which makes them emotional (I know I could comment about that statement but I'm not going to). I responded by saying the break-ups are also hard because you lose the person you are dating and your best friend. Now, other straight people that I have said this to have argued that their significant other became their best friend too. But not my mother, her response was, "I can't even imagine, my girl friends have always been so important to me- that would be enough to keep me from doing it (dating women)".

Sometimes my mom makes me laugh and sometimes I wonder about her. I should have responded by saying, "Well, that's because you are not gay." That probably would have been going a bit too far- not sure. When she first said it I felt defensive, like she was attacking me a bit, which is what let me to that potential response. Then I thought about it some more and I noticed that again, as in the past, she was using an argument that shows that at some point she may have had the potential to date women but went the other way. Maybe one day in the distant future I'll be able to have that conversation with my mom. Or maybe I won't and I'll be left with my ability to read "queerness" between the lines...

Some random topics

2006-02-17T14:45:00.000-05:00

I found this picture of Audrey Hepburn the other day:

Doesn't she look like a big lesbo? Like she belongs on The L Word? No offense of course, I love Audrey and fully realize that she is too good for lesbian soap opera- now Queer as Folk is a different story (yes i much prefer QAF, yes you can get into a fight with me about it). Anyway, it makes me happy to think of Audrey as a big homo :).

***

I spent 3 hours of work yesterday shoe shopping. I bought a pair of black heeled lace-up boots, a pair of nice dark brown, suede wedge work shoes, and a pair of flat extremely comfy mary-janeish work shoes...ALL for under $100. Sales make me giddy! The day before that I bought a pair of work pants and new sunglasses and last week I bought 2 hats, gloves, and a scarf. These were all bought out of necessity but I think I really need to stop or I am going to become addicted!

***

Finally, Sorry about the anger in my last post. I'm still in detox you know, and sometimes I lash out...

My own worst enemy

2006-02-15T14:44:00.001-05:00

Cameron is my ex-girlfriend. We only dated for a year, but I loved her the first moment I saw her. That year was really rough on me because she was still in love with her ex the whole time. And her ex wanted very badly to be back together with her. Sometimes things were great (usually the periods of time that her ex had gotten fed up and stopped talking with her). Sometimes she would make up excuses to sleep over at her place and act like I was being unreasonable when I was sad. I few times I caught her telling her ex that the two of us weren't "really" together- even though she was talking with me about us possibly living together.

I tried breaking up with her more than once. It just never stuck, somehow I always found a way to justify getting back together with her. In the end she broke up with me, and this is the line she used: "There is no point in us continuing our relationship until I find out if I still love Kali. I need to find out if I was just making it (the love she had for her) all up." Clearly this break-up line was meant to keep me stringing along, waiting for the day when she would realize that I was what she really wanted. And idiot that I am I continued to "accidentally" have sex with her after she was back with her ex. It would happened and then one of us would decide it was a big mistake and then we would go a while without really seeing each other and then it would happen again. This went on until the end of December.

Then on January the 1st as part of my New Year's resolution I told her we needed to stop talking and seeing each other. Despite everything this was a terribly hard decision to come to. I have had some relapses- called her or e-mailed her for dumb reasons but for the most part I have done well and I have been happier because of this.

THEN, my mother sent a very late Christmas present for Cam. I called her on Monday to let her know and to ask when I could bring it over. She called me back today during work so we could decide when would be a good time. To her credit she purposely called me on my cell (and not my work phone) with the idea that I would not answer, but I did. Somehow we got into a small argument and after calming down she was able to tell me that it was just hard on her to never be able to see me. I said I was sorry and she said she understood and we hung up and I continued softly crying (because I had already started)...

Sometimes I feel like I am doing so well, and I am so happy and comfortable with where I am. And then sometimes everything comes tumbling down on top of me. I start questioning everything. I question myself and what I am doing. I question my friends and whether or not they actually truly care about me, and if they even have an "obligation" to. And then I question how much I care about my friends and others and if I am even a good friend.

How is she still doing this to me? When will she stop making me fall apart? And when will I actually stop wanting to be with her and accept that she was not good for me, and that I am much better off without her? That there is a reason that everything was so bad and that we were not meant to be and we never will be. When will I actually believe all these things that I tell myself and actually fully move on from her? Will that ever happen? I don't want "someone else" to help me forget. I want to remember but I want to move on, on my own! UGH!!!!

Adventures in Grown-up Land

2006-02-14T12:38:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I have to be a grown-up and it is difficult.

For example, I have begun cooking for myself for the first time. This in of itself is difficult- sometimes I don't eat until 10 pm because I am cooking for hours! Anyway, I have found that there are some things about food that I was not blessed with an innate knowledge of. Earlier in the year I tried freezing my produce to ensure its long life- instead I killed it in one night. Last week a recipe I was making called for the use of a bay leaf. I thought it was odd that it just said "add one Bay Leaf" and not "crumple up the bay leaf"....so that is what I did. I took out a bay leaf and crumpled it into little pieces and put it in my pasta- I assumed it would get soft with the sauce. Fast forward 3 steps and the recipe says "remove bay leaf and serve"..."Shit!" I can't remove the Bay Leaf, it is in tiny little pieces.

So here I am, three days later, eating my pasta for lunch and chewing every bit thoroughly so I can find those nasty bay leaf bits and spit them out before they scratch my throat!

Sabbatical

2006-02-08T12:50:00.001-05:00

I know what you're thinking. "Why is this girl so irregular with her posting?" I know, I know, I'm working on it, but the last couple of weeks have been kinda crazy. I have spent a number of days out of the office doing regional work. Sounds exciting doesn't it? I have enter names and shredding files- do you know what it is like to shred for four straight hours??? And when I have been in the office I have been working on a masterpiece: "Lost Park".

A while ago my mother sent me a picture file of "Lost Park" that someone had sent to her. Lost Park is the characters from "Lost" as "South Park" characters. I was unimpressed with the job this guy had done so I found the build a South Park character website and started working on my own creation.

I was not actually planning on putting it on my Blog but I recently found out that Linds and Lei (two of my most loyal readers) are also Lost fans. So here it is for your viewing pleasure:

(It is much bigger, clearer and more detailed in reality- this is the biggest I could get it on here. If you want the full sized version let me know and I'll e-mail it to you)

Comments and suggestions are encouraged ;)

Procrastination here I come!

2006-01-27T13:56:00.002-05:00

GOLD, I've struck gold! I found a website that lets you build south park characters- eyes, body, hat, weapons, you name it.

Here is "the dirty hippy" (aka college melanie) as a south park character:

This website is my new love!

Where's my Adderal?

2006-01-26T17:12:00.001-05:00

Okay, so I actually do not support just throwing pills at problems (I even wrote a term paper on the subject once), but still, sometimes you just want some Adderal.

Yesterday my work paid me to drive 2 hours to my old college town, do 2 hours of data entry, go to lunch with friends, shop around and then drive 2 hours home. IT WAS GREAT! I got so much done, and I had fun, and I was happy. The driving was also awesome- I had to rent a car (see previous post "So Long Cindy") and it was great to drive again, plus my work is going to more than pay for the car and gas.

Unfortunately, it has made today drag by so so so slowly, I just can't concentrate on my work at all, and I have gotten so so little done all day. Oh well, it's almost quitin' time and instead of doing some last minuet work I am updating my blog...

Survey Says....

2006-01-18T12:40:00.001-05:00

My friend Claire answered a survey on her blog and then "tagged" me to answer it too. I like surveys and I like goofing off....thus, here we go.

What were you doing 10 years ago?
Hmmm... let's see. Ten years ago I was 13, it was second trimester (yup, had trimesters in Jr. high) of eighth grade. I was in the process of growing 7 inches and gaining 20 pounds (that's a little less than 3 lbs per inch...so consequently I was extremely skinny and due to my long limbs I resembled a spider). I was trying to figure out how to tell my mother that I had gotten my period a year earlier and hadn't gotten it since. I didn't tell her when I first got my period because she had told everyone about my first boyfriend and they all embarrassed me, I could only imagine what was going to happen when I told her I was menstruating. I was also growing out my hair, I had cut it into a pixie cut- ala Julia Roberts in "Hook", and it was not a pretty process. The original hair cut had prompted the nickname "Tink", which I liked, but somehow by this point it had morphed into "Captain Winkey" and some people just outright called me Richard. It was bad at the time, but super funny now... maybe I'll find a picture and scan it to put it up here.

What were you doing 1 year ago?
Living on the third floor of a charter high school in Boston, five doors down from my cheating girlfriend. Life was so hectic, I hardly slept and was constantly running around, forgetting to eat, and I cried 15-20 lbs of college and some high school weight away. When was that huge Noreaster? It was either this week or last week last year, and we had the whole week off, but somehow that still didn't help me to catch-up or stabilize. You wanna know the craziest thing of all? I miss it sooooo much!

Five snacks I enjoy:
1. Pork rinds with lime and salt (It's a Mexican thing, I don't expect you to understand)

2. Lemon-Lime Lucas- It is essentially lemon-lime flavored salt "candy". I used to get it from the ice cream man daily. My nose would sweat from all the sodium. My mom made me stop because she feared for my kidneys and would tell me horror stories about living on dialysis. I still have cravings for it. (another Mexican thing, again, don't expect you to understand).

3. "Crack". Last year a teacher at MATCH made "crack" for the tutors. It was some sort of chexmix with sugar...ugh, I can't explain it, but it was heavenly!

4. Salted Almonds- a must for any poor person- so much healthy goodness in each nut (I know the salted part is unhealthy- leave me alone mom!)

5. Anything that combines chocolate, peanut butter and salt- like peanut butter filled, chocolate covered pretzels. I don't have much of a sweet tooth, but that is my soft-spot.

Five songs to which I know all the lyrics
Back in 2001 I was thinking of transferring and my uncle was pressuring me to apply to Harvard. One day at dinner I was complaining to my friends that it would just be a waste of money because all Harvard students had at least one thing that they were exceptional at, and I was mediocre at best at everything I did. Claire responded by telling me that she had never met someone who knew soooo many song lyrics and that I should tell Harvard that.

Here are the top five:
1. Almost every Jackson Browne song. Favorites: These Days, The Pretender and For a Dancer (which will play at my mother's funeral per her request)

2. I Like Big Butts- Sir Mix A Lot. I have a great "music video" of this, if you haven't seen it, ask next time you see me ;).

3. Girls Just Wanna Have Fun- Cyndi Lauper. I went as Cyndi for Halloween last year, I will upload that pic when I get a chance.

4. Dreams- Cranberries (I know all the words to a lot of their songs- gotta love Dolores!)

5. Only the Good Die Young- Billy Joel. This is my theme song- just ask Neda, she'll tell you.

...this is ridiculous, I know all the words to at least 30 songs, probably a lot more, I like lyrics, I like to know all the lyrics to the songs I like. Other songs that came to mind during this: Since U Been Gone, Kelly Clarkson (since they always play it at the lesbo clubs); Somebody Told Me, The Killers; Humps, Black Eyed Peas; Piano Man (and many others), Billy Joel; Tiny Dancer (thank you Almost Famous), Elton John, Space Oddity, David Bowie....tons of cat Stevens, the go-gos, ugh....to many songs!

Five things I would do if I were a millionaire
1. Start a Trust Fund to be used for improving Urban education

2. Pay off my student loans so I can do the work I want without having to worry about salary!

3. Tell Shabori to work her butt off in high school and then apply to and attend any college she wants, on my bill.

4. Buy a modest but cute apartment, decorate it, paint it, and buy a puppy to live with me in it.

5. (Warning this is really crunchy) Work on buying more organic and toxin free products.

Five bad habits
1. Wasting work time on personal business

2. Falling for women who are emotionally unavailable

3. Talking too loudly (I get easily excited)

4. Forgetting to e-mail people back for extended periods of time

5. Loosing things- keys, cell phones, scarves, gloves, etc etc

Five things I like doing
1. Listening to music- my little man recently got me an ipod, thanks scott!

2. Reading, not having a book that I am really into affects my mood badly.

3. Watching movies and TV, now that I have free time and netflix this is all I ever really do

4. Playing team sports- softball, dodgeball, and football are my favorites

5. Cuddling, but the cuddler has to also be the cuddling sort or it doesn't have the same affect!

....hmmmm, that felt a little like an online dating question.

Five things I would never wear, buy or get new again
I don't like this question. Never is too strong of a word... I am a pretty random person, there's not much I can't see myself not getting- a gun? but I never bought one in the first place. A tube-top?- but I can't be sure of that. A crimper? but I like 80's nights. Therefore, I reject the question!

Five favorite toys
1. My ipod shuffle

2. My Darth Vader with Anakin inside

3. My video camera- even though its not actually mine and people get embarrassed when I use it.

4. My skis- even though I don't have enough moola to use them often.

5. I wish I had a sex toy to put on here- but alas! My box of pictures and mementos

Now I'm supposed to pass it on and tag five more people. My picks are D.B. Echo, since he has a blog, Linds, Lei, Pia, and Bekka.

2006-01-18T11:49:00.000-05:00

I have a headache...I think it may be because I am becoming dependent on caffeine- this does NOT make me happy.

I went downstairs to get a blended chai and a cute Starbucks boy was hitting on me... I got flustered and almost walked into the door. I didn't realize that men could still do that to me...

Sing HO for the life of the Gays

2006-01-17T17:07:00.002-05:00

Thankfully my mom reminded me that the Golden Globes were on last night just in time for me to see them honoring the gays.

Best Original Song in a Motion Picture: "A Love That Will Never Grow Old", Brokeback Mountain
Best Screenplay Motion Picture: Brokeback Mountain
Best Director Motion Picture: Ang Lee, Brokeback Mountain
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama: Felicity Huffman, Transamerica
Best Motion Picture- Drama: Brokeback Mountain

Oh man! Look at all the beautiful gayness (I understand that I am lumping here an oversimplifying the idea of Transexuality by including Transamerica in here, but you understand where I am coming from).

I have not seen Transamerica yet, but I am planning on going soon.

I have seen Brokeback Mountain, and let me tell you, if you have yet to see it you need to go. If you need a buddy just gimme a call because I am planning on seeing it a second time. It is such a beautiful movie and it delivers such a clear point about how our societies inability to accept homosexuality damages peoples lives and keeps them from true and simple happiness (even the lives of those who are not homosexual). I also think that the story is such that you cannot argue against this point- which is something that I have never encountered before in a movie trying to deliver this message.

Even my mommy wants to see Brokeback, and we talk about it all the time!

Other happy gay mommy things: Yesterday she was telling me she saw Ebert and Roeper doing a worst movies review and D.E.B.S was one of their "don't even see it movies". I replied by telling her that it is a "Lesbian Spy Spoof" (I don't think I ever described it to her as such before) and that you probably have to be a gay woman to really enjoy it (I have told her in the past about how much I love the movie and went as a D.E.B. for Halloween). And the awesome thing is that she seemed to have no problem with my comment and just laughed and said, "well I guess so cause they sure didn't like it".

Yay, happiness

Seriously, go see Brokeback!

2006-01-05T14:30:00.001-05:00

I just went to a meeting where we discussed one of our programs and how we need to "sell it" as cost effective in order for it not to get wiped out. I will be doing research on similar programs to find evidence on their cost effectiveness (thus proving we too are cost effective).

This all seems very adult and professional doesn't it?

I spent the entire meeting with a pair of underwear stuffed in my pants pocket...

...I am the most professional person ever!

New Years Resolutions

2006-01-05T11:13:00.001-05:00

Donate unnecessary clothing (seeing as I have four laundry bags FULL of clothes and no room in my closet or drawers...something must be done)
Correspond with 1 distant/ out of touch friend/family per week.
Get a gym membership and start working out (I am seriously lacking in the muscle department!)
Stop dating/having sex with women who are actually in love with/interested in other women (step one: take a very long and total break from Cameron and Anastasia- CHECK)

So those are pretty much my resolutions...I have some other things I am doing like- budgeting my money(start saving), trying to be more healthy, only consuming my fair share of resources (Check out "More with Less: a Mennonite Cookbook- it's great), using more products that are chemical free/ green...etc, etc.

The New Year's Eve party I went to was pretty mellow...which is exactly what I needed. We went around and shared our resolutions at midnight...here are the others I remember:

Put money into 401K (Bekka)
Get a puppy (Suzy)
Stop smoking and start dating (Bethie)
Start working out (Belding)...okay I stole that one
Respond to e-mails within one week (Sarah Hayes)

eh...there were more but that is all I remember right now....I just appreciate that Bekka's is so grown-up and Suzy's really isn't what I typically think of when I think of resolutions....

Thank you...where ever you are

2005-12-28T17:36:00.002-05:00

I have many different things to say...especially since I spent 5 short lived days at home in sunny SoCal, but I am going to use these last few minutes of work to send a special shoutout to a kind stranger.

Yesterday I flew into Boston on a Redeye flight, not to worry, no one tried to blackmail me while I was on it- but I did get a row all to myself. Anyway, I got in at about 6 am, got my bags (one was big because I have started to really settle into Boston and I smuggled some homey goods over with me) and took public transportation all the way home.

Public Transportation from Logan to my part of The Ville: Bus to T (Subway), Blue Line to Orange Line (I sent this post to Anastasia for editing purposes and she told me I should include the part about how I broke the T, so here ya go:

Oh ya, I broke the orange line. The doors were about to close and i ran and stuck my foot between them so it would trigger the sensor and open...it did...i got in....and they stayed open......open...........open........................open.....I started to wonder if other people also thought i broke the T....but no one was looking at me.......then T guys started running back and fourth and a woman's voice kept saying "close the doors"....then nothing would happen.....then she said it again and they did close.....but then nothing happened.....then they opened them again and a few minutes later they told us to de-train because it was disabled. Then we had to wait and watch the train sit there some more and finally it left and another came...GUH....I BROKE THE T!)

, then I got off the Subway and began walking (rolling one small bag and one big one AND carrying a satchel....after years of experience I have the technique down) to look for a cab....and I walked....and I walked, and finally I got on a bus (my mother specifically gave me money for a cab because we figured the bus would be too much hassle but it was cold).

By the time I arrived home I was tired, so I left my bags downstairs and took a one hour nap before going to work. Then I got up and took the same bus back to the subway station...

Here is where my wonderful stranger comes in:

I went to swipe my "Charlie Card" to use the T and it wouldn't work, so I got in the long line to buy a token. Then people on the other side of the turnstile started to run...I knew my train was coming and being three people back in line for a token I knew I would miss it.

Then, out of nowhere, a scruffy looking middle-aged man came up to me and held a card out in his hand.
"Do you want this?Â” he asked.
"(Blank stare)", I replied, holding out my hand and taking the card.
"It is only good on the Subway," he said, turning around and walking away.
"Thank you," she mumbled, still unable to register the interaction.

I stumbled over to the turnstile and swiped the card...pushed the bar and walked through...Suddenly the reality of how nice the man had been, and how soon the train would leave hit me at once. I ran and barely made it in the doors before they closed.

Now granted this is only a December T pass and will expire on the first, but considering that the T is much more convenient than the bus and I can take it back and fourth to work- it is at least a $10 value for me...that man stood there and handed me ten bucks and I didn't even have my wits about me to thank him...

To the kind stranger who gave me an unsolicited present: Thank you very much, I promise I will find some way to pay the present forward (you know, like that movie, always thought it was a genuinely simple and profound idea...)

When Life Hands You a Lemon...

2005-12-19T16:12:00.002-05:00

At some point early last week I decided that my Karma must be fucked up...why else would so many things randomly be going wrong? I started searching my brain for what I could have done that was causing my karma to be so bad...had i casually bumped too many cars, was I too wrapped up in my own life and petty drama to notice all that needs to be done around me?

Now, a week later, I have decided that my Karma is not messed up. Instead life decided to show me just how BAD things could be.

The Wallet:
On Wednesday the 7th I lost my wallet in a bustling section of a big city....we're talking big department stores, jewelry stores and pawn shops everywhere you turn + 6pm + 2 weeks before Christmas.

On Tuesday the 12th I picked my wallet up at the Somerville Police Department. A man had found my wallet and contacted me, we decided the police department was a good place for him to leave it for me. I was sure that this man had found my wallet AFTER someone else had, since I had retraced all of my steps within minutes of loosing the wallet. Because of this I was sure that my $31 bus pass and my $10 cash money would be gone. NOPE everything was there...EVERYTHING!

This could have been a devastating experience, someone could have taken my cards and bought stuff and stolen my bus pass and cash, but instead I emerged from the experience with no harm done. That is amazing!

The Hit-and-Run:
On Sunday the 11th my car was totaled in a hit-and-run accident. I only have liability car insurance, meaning that if the culprit was not found, no one would be giving me ANYTHING for my loss! Instead of this devastating outcome, a neighbor heard the crash and wrote down the vehicle's description and license plate. But the story doesn't end there, if the responsible party is never located, I STILL will get NOTHING. On Friday the 16th sergeant Rooney called me to let me know that the driver was found, would be coming in to fill out a report and had FULL INSURANCE.

ANOTHER possibly huge loss completely avoided....

...now, if only my laptop would magically come back to life...I may just by the $100 hand crank laptop and a good green guide dell desk top once I have a little side cash....

2005-12-14T14:36:00.001-05:00

I had a few different interesting/ funny things I was thinking about posting today...BUT I just got lost, in my building on my floor (work)... it went something like this:

karin (my supervisor) sent me on an errand

"go to the third floor and deliver this to terry andersen" (I work on the fourth floor)

so i took the elevator down

as i was waiting for the elevator to go back up i felt foolish, "I'll just walk up to the 4th floor", i thought

so i followed the exit signs to the stairs

I emerged from the stairwell to an office i did not recognize...i stood there dazed...i got a little dizzy...

"what in the world....I am sure I was on the third floor and I went up one flight"

I walked in circles for a few seconds and almost ran into someone

then i started feeling dumb....I can't ask someone for directions, I am in my building, on my floor!

So i decided to just start walking like a knew where I was going....it took a while...few turns and such, before I could finally recognize my surrounds....

I had gone up the stairs on the opposite side of the building, and I had never been over there before....I've been working here for a month!

Man! and I call my mom "directionally challenged"!

Quote/s of the day: Tookie Williams

2005-12-14T13:02:00.001-05:00

"And for anyone to think that murder can be resolved by murdering, it's ridiculous. I mean, we look at all of the wars that we have throughout other countries and other nations, and all it does is – this violence, all it does is engender violence. There seems to be no end, but a continuous cycle, an incessant process of blood and gore that doesn't end. And through violence, you can't possibly obtain peace. You can, in a sense, occupy a belief of peace; in other words, through this mechanism of violence, you – it appears that because there is a standing army or standing police that is used in brutality or violence or a system that uses brutality or violence that that is going to totally eliminate or stop criminous behavior or criminous minds or killings or what have you, but it doesn't."

"I apologize to you all -- the children of America and South Africa -- who must cope every day with dangerous street gangs. I no longer participate in the so-called gangster lifestyle, and I deeply regret that I ever did.... I vow to spend the rest of my life working toward solutions."

Healthy Living Tip of the day:

2005-12-14T10:23:00.003-05:00

To reduce your chance of catching one of the many colds that fly around this time of year- add ginger, cinnamon and horseradish to your diet. These herbs have warming and antiseptic qualities that will help you fight off colds!

fresh ginger

A Happy Birthday message to Hungary

2005-12-13T15:18:00.001-05:00

Join me in wishing Maria (Master) Bates a very very happy 24th birthday. Yes, ladies and gentlemen she has hit her mid-twenties!

Bates is one of my best friends from college. Here is a list of some of the reasons I love Bates:

She is always willing to share her bed
If you need a friend, she'll be sure to be there
She is a very genuine person
She is wild and crazy and full of energy
She is in med school in Budapest (I miss her, but that is really cool!)
Her ass is as hard as a rock!
She let's me use her as a job reference (she was my safe ride boss)

Man, that list was terrible....there are so many more reasons that I love Bates, but I can't quite figure out how to put them into words. Anyway, she is wonderful and 24 years old!

So Long Cindy...

2005-12-12T14:50:00.002-05:00

I have lived in and around Boston for a year and a half now. For a little less than I year I have been parking my car on the perilous streets of the city. If you have ever owned a car while living in a city, without the convenience of a driveway or the ability to afford to garage your car, then you know what I mean. Actually, you probably know what I mean if you have ever owned a car while living in a city period.

Over the last year my car has collected an outrageous number of bumps and bruises. People just bump your car while paralleling or driving and figure, "Hey, it's a big city, they'll never find me." And we're not talking small un-noticeable things either, im talking dents as big as my head, and cracks in my bumper.

It is so expensive to keep a car in the city! Because not only does the value of your car drop monthly as new dents and scratches are added, but there are also numerous simple ways to rack up tickets. There's street cleaning (can't park during), meters (malfunctions & forgetting to pay), driveways (can't block um), intersections (can't park too close), two hour visitor parking (can't stay too long), resident permits only, overnight restrictions (stupid Brookline) (I have gotten tickets/ towed for each of these), fire hydrants, snow emergencies, and the list of ways to get a ticket goes on and on and on....Not to mention that gas costs soooo much!

For a while I have been contemplating selling my car and investing in zip car and buying a bicycle/ scooter instead. This would be both more economical and more convenient (albeit more dangerous as my mother heatedly pointed out). Well, on Saturday night/ Sunday morning as I lie in bed dreaming of sexy ladies, someone decided to give me a very very forceful push forward in my planning....

Sunday morning, around 9 am, I woke to the doorbell ringing. Despite the fact that I have three roommates I knew I was the only one who would both answering, so I got up and headed downstairs. As I was walking I suddenly thought, "This has something to do with my car" (the section of street right in front of my house is permit parking only M-Sat, so when ever I go out late on a Saturday night I gleefully park right in front of my house and relish in my 24 hours of freedom). Sure enough I spied through our small stained glass window that something did appear to be wrong with my car. I opened the door and a police office was there to greet me.

Here is what I saw next:

I think the pictures speak for themselves, but I do want to point out that the sticker on the right (mangled) side of the bumper reads "Be the change you wish to see in the world". Yes, someone smashed into my car, effectively destroying the bumper sticker and then took off...oh, you read correctly, I was hit and run.

At first I stood there in shock, then I thought, "Hm, there is a good chance my 'liability only' car insurance is not going to cover this", so I called my mom to confirm. My mom's response, "You may just have to be without a car for a while...that is when I started crying. But amidst my tears I noticed a note, neatly preserved in a ziplock bag, sitting on my windshield. I grabbed it and lo-and behold it was the description and license plate of the vehicle. A neighbor had woken up at 4:30 am to the sound of the crash, they wrote down the drivers info. and left it on my car for me. This just occurred to me: my karma may be messed up in some ways, but really these bad experiences have just been forums for others to emerge and come through for me in huge ways.

So now all I can do is wait. Wait to hear back from the police (please please tell me you found the person and they have insurance). Wait to hear back from my insurance company (please tell me you will be there for me if this person's insurance is not. Wait to figure out what the best course of action will be. Scooter here I come?

Speaking of scooters, my scooter loving friend Anastasia made me this to commemorate the occasion (note the bumper sticker changes...AMAZING):

There is always a bright side to look at:

I wasn't in the car
The neighbor took their info
My car was dirty anyway
I've been dying to drive stick again
I can seriously consider the zip car & scooter/ bicycle idea
I got some cool artwork

....end thoughts: That is a lot of pictures for one post....This post may not flow very well because I kept having to leave it and come back, and I don't feel like fixing it.

I get by with A LOT of help from my friends...

2005-12-09T13:33:00.002-05:00

Now you may think that this is the beginning of a John Lennon memorial post, since yesterday was the 25th anniversary of his death, but it is not. Rather, it is a post about me and my amazing friends, who are always willing to come to my rescue.

On Wednesday I left the office and went to CVS to buy some hairspray. The bus I take home is right in fornt of cvs, so I left my wallet (with my new bus pass) in my coat pocket. I soon (like 1 minute) realized that the bus would probably not be coming because the street was all blocked off with emergency vehicles. So I walk toward the T station (subway), and on the way a woman asked me for money. I looked at her and thought, "it is winter, she says she has kids, I have two five dollar bills in my wallet, I should give her one", but I just walked by. As I walked down the stairs to the T station I reached into my pocket to get out my wallet, and to my horror I did not feel it. So I retraced my steps looking very carefully (it was a 1 minute walk). I went back to CVS and asked if I left it there...nope. I checked my purse....nothing.

Enter angel #1:

Bekka
I went back to my office and immediately called Bekka (she was on her way from work to my house to watch America's Next Top Model with me). I told her the situation and we decided to meet at a T station. After much deliberation we decided to get some food to make and head to her house (she lives close to the station). After providing me with warmth, food, entertainment, and warm socks, Bekka gave me money for the T and Bus so I could get home.

I got to Sullivan Station (where I normally catch the bus home) close to 11 pm. I was waiting and waiting and waiting for the bus, freezing my butt off and wondering what time my bus stopped running (I had never attempted to catch it this late and there were no schedules available). There was another bus at the station that had been there when I arrived (this was the second time it had showed up), it said (town) via Broadway. I live off of Broadway, and somehow I decided this bus would take me near home, and I was so confident that I didn't even check with the driver.

And of course, it went the opposite direction (didn't think of THAT possibility, did you Melanie?). I walked up to the driver and asked him for a transfer and to let me off at the next stop. So I got off the bus in the freezing cold and walked to the bus stop on the other side of the street. It wasn't long before I decided that since it was 11:20 pm I had very little chance of catching a bus back to Sullivan and then another bus to my house.

Enter angel #2:
Molly
I decided since I had no money, my only option was to call a friend with a car, but who to call? I tried my roommate first, but she did not answer. I thought about calling my ex, Cameron, but I didn't think she would answer either. So I called Molly, and sure enough she answered. She told me that she had been drinking, and then I panicked, but she came up with the perfect plan. I flagged down a cab, took it to her apartment, she came out and gave the cabbie $20 and I took the cab home- the whole trip including tip was exactly $20.

I do not know WHAT I would have done without my two angels. Both times I was stranded, with no money, no way to get money, insufficient clothes for the cold weather, and too long of a walk in heels for walking to be an option. I honestly do not know what I could have possibly done with out the help of my friends. It is a scary feeling to be so incapable of helping yourself, but it is so comforting to know that when I am defenseless my friends will always be there to help me.

Morals of the story:

Always be there for your friends
Leave an emergency cash stash in your office
Leave an emergency cash stash at your house
Follow your strong instincts (if I had tried to give money to that woman I would have notice my wallet was missing sooner). Unless your instincts have to do with buses, because as my friend Anastasia once said, and in the words of my crazy friend Corrie: "Buses, they do what they WANT".
The winter is cold and lonely, do something to help those in need

WELCOME, now let's get to work....

2005-12-07T17:22:00.001-05:00

So you may have noticed that I have been MIA for the last couple of weeks. That is because two days into my new job at the Department of Public Health, Division of Perinatal, Early Childhood and Special Needs Health, as a Program Coordinator (try saying that 10 times fast), I was told that we had a grant application due the following Friday.

I was one of three people who were wholly consumed by the "Healthy Weight in Perinatal Women Project" grant application. Everyday my supervisor would come to me to add 5 more things to the list of things I still hadn't accomplished to ensure that the grant got out the door safe and sound. I went from grading sophomore history papers to "editing" a narrative written by an adult woman. It was wonderful!

I think I may be a workaholic of sorts because now that the application is out (we mailed it off 2 minutes before the deadline) there is a lot less for me to do and I am less excited to go to work everyday. But, it means I have time to update my blog (if anyone still bothers stopping by to see if I've actually written). Oh man, I have some good things stored up in my noggin!

Addendums

2005-11-21T16:35:00.000-05:00

On my Harriet Miers Post I meant to add that to find the picture of Bush I used for my pin I googled "Bush + Monkey".

Anastasia feels that by calling her a "cute visitor" I made her sound like an elf. Since she is not an elf I have decided that "sexy visitor" is more appropriate.

The Stephanie Miller Show

2005-11-18T12:40:00.002-05:00

Sometimes I am lucky enough to have a very cute visitor for a sleep over. This visitor works very close to my house and doesn't have to be in to work until 9 am, so consequently I end up leaving for work MUCH later than usual (I usually leave at 7:20 to arrive by 8 am).

These are always good mornings for me, for two reasons: 1) I get a kiss goodbye. 2) I get to listen to The Stephanie Miller Show. I have been listening to the Stephanie Miller Show for a few months, since I started listening to Air America Radio. She is on, at least in the Boston area, starting at 9 am, if you get a chance you should listen in- it's really funny.

Anyway, I was listening on Monday and she played an "American Idiot Montage" including sound clips of Bill O'Reilly and Pat Robertson making frightening comments last week, and for added flair she included the terrible comment Bill Bennett made a while ago. She announced that the clip would be available on her website. You must must must click on the link and listen, it is sooooo good and scary!

As an added bonus, while on her website, I discovered that Stephanie Miller is hot! So now when I am driving I get to imagine her speaking, and the experience is just that much better.

Politics and Anarchists

2005-11-17T17:33:00.002-05:00

That title makes this post look more interesting than it is.

This was my costume this Halloween (I know Halloween was weeks ago, I kept forgetting to bring my cord into work to transfer the pictures).

I went to two Halloween parties, one was at a gay club, the other was at a friend's house. I purposely did not wear this costume to the club because I thought it would not go well (I was the faux French D.E.B instead....if you have not seen D.E.B.S go see it right now! More on that later).

I got all dressed up on Saturday night, excited about my totally fun costume. I entered the party and within minutes realized my folly. Most of the attendees were Angela's (party thrower) boyfriend's, Anarchist co-op mates (did you follow that?). Basically most of the people there were Anarchists, and Anarchists don't pay particular attention to politics because they see it as obsolete (or something). Because of this only one person in the whole party recognized who I was. He came up to me and told me he liked my costume, "Very topical". It made me happy, but I wish more people had known.

Another strange thing about the reaction to my costume is that I kept getting hit on. I was supposed to be Harriet Miers (there yah go) for christ's sake! I was trying to look frumpy!

Anyway, this post was just an excuse to put my Halloween costume on my blog since most people didn't see it and I was very proud of it.

Comments

2005-11-14T18:16:00.000-05:00

So I don't know how many regular readers I have. I am guessing that the number is somewhere around 6 or 7. And of that handful of readers I think only one actually has a blog (and a great one to boot), so I thought I would inform you all of a blog writing fact. Comments are very very important to blog writers. It is cool to see the numbers your stat counter gives you and know that people are reading your blog, but it is really important to know what they are thinking.

When no one comments on your blog you begin to question how good/ interesting/ worth while it is. My friend claire's blog gets tons of comments (click link above to read), because it is genuinely good. My blog on the other hand only has one comment on the whole page, and it is my cute friend Leilani just saying hi.

A few weeks ago my blog was getting pretty regular comments and I was feeling fairly good about it, but now I hear crickets every time I look at my page. Is anyone out there? If you are, please consider posting a comment....you can post a comment anytime one of my posts means anything to you or makes you think of anything. Claire has readers that post very regularly and it is always interesting to read what they have to say.

So be kind, post a comment next time you think of one...

Sorry about the shameless plug!

Field trip

2005-11-14T12:42:00.002-05:00

If you live in the Boston area you should make your way to the DeCordova sculpture park and museum.

My sexy artist friend Anastasia took me on a feild trip there on Saturday. The park is tucked away in the hills of Lincoln Mass, and the beautiful winding drive through quaint wooded countryside (reminiscent of the drive from MHC to Smith) is just long enough to get you mentally and phsycially out of the city and ready to relax and take in the art.

The park itself was magnificent, and being led by an actual sculptor made it even better. The park had everything from a tree with eyeballs, to a Trojan Pig (which prompted some fun Monty Python quoting) to an archway made of tires. And almost as exciting as the art were them children everywhere, running around giddy and genuinely excited about the experience.

After it got dark we went in the cute gift store and talked dreamily about the day when we could afford to buy lots of cool stuff to decorate our house with (that last statement made it sound like we are talking about moving in....we're not, we may be lesbians but there are no Uhauls in site!).
All in all it was a great trip, and we didn't even get a chance to check out the indoor photography exhibits, so we are definitely going back.

Below are some of my favorite sculptures:

Spiral in Flux, 1999, Caroline Blessing Bowne Court

Pine Sharks, 1997, Kitty Wales

Two Big Black Hearts, 1985, Jim Dine.

I am tempted to take these pictures off because none of them even comes close to experiencing these sculptures in person. So it's decided, you have to go!

It's time to play "Find the Lesbian"

2005-11-10T13:04:00.001-05:00

Contestant #1 Contestant #2

Information about Contestant #1: On any given Friday night you can find her wearing cargo pants and a flannel shirt.

Information about Contestant #2: On any given Friday night you can find her wearing a tight shirt and tight jeans.

Which one is a homo?....cast your votes!

Revealing factor about Contestant #1: She can be found cuddling and kissing her bearded boyfriend whilst wearing said outfit.

Revealing factor about Contestant #2: She can be found at a gay club, dancing and making out with women whilst wearing said outfit.

************************************************************************************

On Sunday night my roommate had a boy over, she had informed him that one of her roommates was gay.

On Sunday night I (contestant #2) had a girl over (a very cute one).

We (and contestant #1...the other roommate) all sat together watching football. Anastasia (the girl) and I sat on a single seating recliner, together. We were cuddly and holding hands and such. Anastasia has a faux hawk (a haircut recognized by many as decidedly gay). Anastasia made a comment about picking up chicks on her scooter (thus confirming her gay status). We both left and headed up stairs to go to bed...

The next morning my roommate informed me that her boy (Rex) said, "So, Emily (Contestant #1) is the gay one, right?" When she informed him that in fact, it was the roommate who was cuddling with a lesbian that was gay, he was taken aback and made a comment about how pretty I am.

So, apparently lesbians are not pretty...for one thing, AND I am so decidedly straight looking that even sitting in the lap of and cuddling with a girl who has been established as a lesbian is STILL not enough to make me appear to be gay...

Sometimes stereotypes fail people... They are built on something, but they certainly do NOT hold up for everyone. How much proof do you need before you can let go of your preconceived notions and open up your mind to the fact that everything you have ever been told (by other people that do not know) could possibly not be true all of the time for every person.

....AND, I am stepping down from my soap box....

The Lesbian Drama Scene

2005-11-08T13:06:00.002-05:00

You might have noticed that I have been M.I.A for a while, or if I did update it was very boring. That is because I have been fully sucked into the lesbian drama scene in Boston, and trust me, there is SO much drama.

Last week I made a chart for my girlfriends from high school to help keep them abreast of my life (just the previous two weeks) it is so complicated that I felt they needed an actual map to help them keep up. If you would like to see said map, shoot me an e-mail at hyperextendedjoints@yahoo.com (side note: I just made that account and somehow I accidentally set the language as Spanish- I am definitely leaving it)...

Drama: I have come to learn that a circle of lesbian friends is a breeding ground for drama, the reason for this is obvious to me, but maybe it is not for you. When you're a lesbian (I use that word more and more lately, even though I usually refer to myself as gay) there is a great chance that your group of buddies includes people that you are interested in dating or are possibly interested in dating you. Because of this, tons of drama ensues. In lesbian relationships there are no boundaries like there are in straight relationships. Generally if a man and woman are friends people always assume there might be something there:

"Harry Burns: no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive. He always wants to have sex with her.
Sally Albright: So, you're saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive?
Harry Burns: No. You pretty much want to nail 'em too.
Sally Albright: What if THEY don't want to have sex with YOU?
Harry Burns: Doesn't matter because the sex thing is already out there so the friendship is ultimately doomed and that is the end of the story." (When Harry Met Sally, Act I, scene 5)

(I just treated that like a supporting quote in a research paper...sometimes I think im witty...but not really) So, I don't know about the whole unable to be friends thing, but, there is certainly always that sexual element there. With lesbians that is the case with all their relationships, and by that line of reasoning lesbians can only really be friends with gay men. Now with my friends from college there are pretty set boundaries that everyone pretty much understands. But on my football team, we're all just getting to know each other, so it is basically a free for all and drama abounds.

The whole friends and lovers are one and the same thing also complicates the lesbian break-up a lot. When lesbians break up they loose so much, because it is inevitable that your partner has become your best friend. I know this happens with men and women too and I try not to speculate about things I do not have experience with, but I generally think it is more severe in the lesbian relationship.

This is another hurdle I am in the process of dealing with, how to become just friends with my ex... (Because she became my bestfriend and when we broke up I didn't really know what to do with myself for a while.) We talk a lot, she calls me every morning, but have we become friends? Not sure. Will I always hurt a little when I think of us and what happened during our year together? Will her current (who she cheated on with me) ever be able to accept our friendship? If I can ever spend time with the two of them, will it hurt me? I am hopeful that things will work out in the end...I'll keep you posted.

(I am not sure how good this post was...might have been hard to follow...I think my head has just been so full of all this drama that I have a hard time focusing on anything else)

The Lesbian Drama Crew

Which Rovey?

2005-10-28T16:12:00.002-04:00

The other day I was thinking to myself: "Rovey's going down" and just as I thought it I realized that it represented to real possibilities, one great and one frightening:

1) Karl Rove, turd blossom, gets indicted
2) Roe v. (Wade) is overturned

...man, I am so excited about number one...and so frightened about #2...Harriet, I don't know how you would have voted, but I am afraid of who they will dig up in your place.....

Commercial Break

2005-10-27T09:58:00.000-04:00

This is a raised sugar donut. It is not a powdered sugar donut...raised sugar, granules. It is my
favorite type of donut, so when I ask you to grab one for me, don't look at my weird. There was a box of Krispy Creams in the kitchen and I got the only sugar donut because I was there when the box arrived. WOO!

Next time you get a chance try one...they are good.

Internet Radio

2005-10-26T15:02:00.001-04:00

I found an AMAZING internet radio station!

Accuradio

They have categories you can choose from including:

Classic Rocktober
A Flock of Eighties
Listening Post (discover new rock)
Celtic
Brit Rock
Twang
Broadway
Piano Jazz
High Fidelity (Indie Rock)

And on top of having such awesome options, they also give you info about the song that is playing: Song name, band name, album title, year, and a picture of the cover. AND you can skip songs, and you can click off on artists you DON'T want to hear songs from. AWESOME.

I am listening to Classic Rocktober, and learning more about bands that I have been trying to familiarize myself with for a while. Seriously, if you enjoy the luxury of listening to web radio then you should click on the link (I have already added it to my favorites!)

Friends with benefits?

2005-10-26T10:36:00.001-04:00

Are friends with benefits ever really friends? Can you really go back to seeing someone as a friend after you have had sex with them, after you have become privy to information that only a select group of people know.

How can you look at them without thinking about what they look or feel like naked? Or talk with them without thinking about the noises they made?

What do you think? Can you go back to being friends after having sex?

(yes I do realize that last sentence sounded like a poor excuse for the end of a "sex and the city" column)

Whatcha gonna do wit all that breast...

2005-10-21T12:17:00.001-04:00

...all that breast inside that shirt? I'm gonna make make make you work. Make you work work, make you work.

If you have seen me since yesterday you know that I was watching the My Humps video non-stop yesterday at work. Every time I finish I project I watch it as a treat.

You have to click on the link and watch the video and you HAVE to pay attention to what Fergie does during the red "works" in the lyrics above. And then look at Fergie's and will.i.am's facial expressions.

other great moments to watch for:

1. Every time will.i.am goes "Ohhh" after they say "she's got me spendin'"
2. The dance move the girls do when they say "Make you scream, make you scream."
3. The dance moves during the "Imma start some drama, you don't want no drama." part...Fergie looks really silly.
4. The way Fergie sticks out her butt when she says, "And move my hump."
5. The way Fergie sticks her chest out when she says, "In the front" and the facial expression she makes.
6. After #5, the dance move will.i.am does during his "Ohhh"
7. All the random and amazing stuff that goes on during the breathing part
8. Finally, the little chuckle Fergie gives at the end.

what's that you say? I am spending too much time watching this video...yes, that's true, but it's not gonna stop me from watching it at least 5 more times, and wishing that Toast wasn't retro so they would play the song and I could bust out my moves tonight!

Fighting Irish

2005-10-20T12:34:00.001-04:00

This is my flag football team, The Fighting Irish. We won our first game this past weekend! WOOHOO!

I lost my position as running back and am now officially an outside linebacker. (Yes, that is a big kid position, and yes, as Cam pointed out, I am the smallest person on the team). The top picture is of the Defense...my new team. See the woman in the white in the back center? She is who I was up against most of the time (thats my head poking out in the back). That woman is twice my size and I did such a good job shutting her out on one play that she gave me a disgruntled shove after the play was over. GRRR...I am tough!

I love my team, we all hug every time we leave each other. Lesbians playing football and hugging, so cute!

It's just head...

2005-10-20T10:30:00.001-04:00

So Jerry just cited a study done by the CDC surveying 13,000 teenagers across the US, and they reported that 50% of teenagers have had oral sex by age 17.

He pointed out what my generation grew up believing: "that oral sex isn't a big deal, it's not like it's sex... you don't even need to be in a relationship...no body's going to get pregnant."

He then went on to say that when he was young oral sex was considered a bigger deal than sex..."You could have sex, but if you got to oral sex, then you were really intimate, then you were really serious."

I agree with that, there is a really intimacy with oral sex that doesn't have to be present during non-oral sex (I may be gay but I have had sex with a man)...you can detach from sex much easier (that's why I was able to do it). But I have to admit, when thinking about other people, say my high school students, I wouldn't be as worried to hear they were having oral sex, because "it's not as big of a deal"...that is just the idea that has been socialized into me, and it is hard to overcome that.

(...this post got too personal...but I'm going to leave it...)

What needs to be done to reinstate this idea of oral sex actually being a big deal?

Our intelligent president

2005-10-20T09:22:00.002-04:00

I just heard this clip on Springer on the radio (yes im listening to Air America while I work):

"We have a saying in Texas, they may have it other places...It goes: 'Fool me once, shame on...on you. Fool me twice...uh...you can't fool me again." ~George W.

...WOW!...I agree with Harriet Miers, "The president is the smartest man I've ever met!"

....um....if I were her ex husband, or a man who had ever met her, I would be really insulted!

Some good quotes

2005-10-19T13:20:00.001-04:00

Here are some good quotes that I have heard in the last week:

"Democrats need to quit complaining that Hillary Clinton can't win the presidency and just get behind her! I am tired of it! If the democrats would just get behind her she could win, of course she could!" (paraphrased) Ed Schultz

"When we make mistakes we say, 'How fascinating. How fascinating'." Benjamin Zander (founder and conductor- Boston Philharmonic) after realizing the mic he was speaking into was turned off.

"I am a non-practicing, non-believing Catholic" Peter Mansaeu, author of "Vows : The Story of a Priest, a Nun, and Their Son"

"Looks like Miers is gonna get the boot...I am just scared to see who they're gonna dig up in her place!"(paraphrased) Mark Reily of Morning Sedition (which is the best name ever for a progressive radio show!)... finally someone else is voicing my big fear! I mean, it is the conservatives that are raising the biggest stink about Miers because they don't think she is conservative enough! So you know they are going to dig up a very obviously conservative slanted judge in her place!

2005-10-14T14:26:00.000-04:00

That last post was like a spelling bee, because I began it and ended it with the same word.

Antsy

2005-10-14T14:20:00.000-04:00

Something is making me very antsy. Here are the possible causes of my antsyness:

1. It is Friday.
2. I have really fun and exciting plans for tonight
3. I have already had two cups of coffee today (I rarely drink coffee).
e. All of the Above

...I do realize that I switched from numbers to letters, it just felt like a multiple choice scantron test, didn't you hate it when "all of the above" or "none of the above" were ALWAYS an option?

another tangent: I had an assistant coach my senior year in college, Roni (everyone thought she was soo hot), and she used to always say, "1st of all....b of all....c of all"...it always made me chuckle.

go clock go... go go go....GOOOOOOOOOOO!

antsy

Idle no more...

2005-10-14T09:04:00.001-04:00

I think someone at the office must have found my blog. Ever since I posted that I had time to update in the office they have been giving me non-stop projects. But it is good, I am a true American- I live to work. Even though the tasks are mundane, having a reason to get up in the morning and a way to be productive is really good for my mental health. I actually enjoy coming here everyday.

Last night at India Quality my friend Bekka said that people really just need structure to their day, and I totally agree. It made me think about unemployment, I guess I have always focused on the psychological stress of not having money, not being able to provide for yourself and/or your family. But there is also the psychological pain of not having structure to your day, not having some place you are expected to be, some way that you are expected to be productive. It makes you think with the unusually high unemployment rates in our country, how come more psychologically tormented people aren't using their pain as a catalyst to rise up against our incompetent leader who not only hasn't been helping find solutions to the problem but is clearly a huge part of the problem! (wow that sentence was a terrible run-on wasn't it?)

I should stop now...

I need my moment of Zen

2005-10-13T20:28:00.001-04:00

The daily show has been showing reruns all week, and it is making me really sad. I do get my news in other ways- the paper, democracy now, wonkette (thanks claire), other peoples blogs, but I must say Jon Stewart is my favorite place to get the news. Although I could watch Jon's impersonation of George W everyday, it is sooo awesome! "eh heh heh heh...."

Ha..ha..ha..ha..HAPPY BIRTHDAY

2005-10-13T12:31:00.001-04:00

This is Priscilla. She is amazing, and adventurous, and crazy, and UBER stylish (clearly), and
today is her 23rd birthday. She has joined the rest of us in our last year before we hit MID twenties! Priscilla posted a comment on my Chaz Tenenbaum...post, so check it out to get a first hand insight as to what she is like.

Here is some information for you:

When we got our star tattoos Priscilla got one that could fit inside of the rest of ours because her father threatened that he would stop paying her tuition if she ever got a tat.
Her voice message on her cell is sexy and sultry and she never says her name.
We have dubbed her the "Samantha" of our group of four. (I know what you're thinking and that's not why, but it would be fine if it was ;))
She is Romanian
She lived in Spain during the summer and is going back soon.
The night after she wore this outfit she wore a shirt that scooped down to her naval and she had to tape it to herself, but not before Adrian, Lindsay's boyfriend, saw her tit!
She has a thing for barrel chested men.
She is completely WILD and random, and amazing and I am proud that I can call her my friend!

I Love You P! Hope your birthday is amazing!

Alia my fashion consultant

2005-10-12T22:15:00.001-04:00

As promised, this is Alia (the one on the left, the one on the right is Suad). I don't have a picture of Lori which is sad because she has really awsome style.

Chaz Tenenbaum took his lunch at his desk...

2005-10-12T12:08:00.001-04:00

Is it weird to sit in your sparsely decorated gray cubicle eating lunch and updating your blog?

It is only my second day here at Insulet and I don't really have any friends or anything- not that it's a big deal since I will only be here 3 or 4 weeks. I think most of the people working here are considerably older than me, the receptionist is around my age and very nice, but I don't want to go up to her desk and ask what she is doing for lunch.

I brought a bag of lunch supplies with me because I didn't have time to make my lunch this morning. Is it weird that I have a shopping bag with a loaf of bread, a safflower mayonnaise jar, mustard jar, package of turkey slices and a package of provolone slices in the office fridge? I have never worked in an office before so I don't know, do people do that? It makes sense to me, but so did putting my produce in the freezer in order to preserve it (just in case you are dense like me, here is a warning: NEVER PUT YOUR FRESH PRODUCE IN THE FREEZER, it doesn't preserve it, it kills it!). Maybe I should change the name of this blog to: "The True Adventures of a SoCalGal Living on Her Own for the First Time". What do you think? Too long? Trying to be funny but not succeeding? Anyway, I digress, what do you think about my office lunch supply? Is it weird? I need help with these things. Either way I am leaving my stash here for the week.

Speaking of things I need to know: I am not blessed with the ability to color coordinate. Is this yet another deficiency that I can blame on my mother, or was I born lacking this ability? Right now I am wearing a light tan/khaki colored shirt, forest green cords, and talc blue shoes with tan/khaki colored stripes. What do you think? Do I match? Maybe I will start planning my outfits the night before, then if color coordination is in question I will snap a digital pic, upload it onto my blog, and ask you, my readers, to tell me if it works.

Last year I lived with the people I worked with (very long story, maybe I will share it here some day). Anyway, whenever I had a color coordination issue I would step outside my room and find one of my fashion consultants: Alia and Lori (I will try to find a picture of them to upload after work- such stylish ladies!). I would ask them if I matched or I would run through my shoe options and ask what would work best. The shoes are usually where things go south for me, I can figure out how to match the top and the bottom, but the shoes, ugh! In the past my solution was to have such a plethora ("would you say I have a plethora of pinatas"...there's a prize for the first person who can name that quote!) of shoes to choose from that it was not a problem, but unfortunately during my move from MHC I lost a box with all of my favorite shoes! Thinking about it still makes me cry at night.

Anyway, it seems I have updated my half hour lunch away. More updates later when the inevitable happens and they run out of things for me to do.

Check out my new counter at the bottom...it gives me all sorts of nifty stats- more on that later!

Girls

2005-10-11T23:07:00.001-04:00

I need to relax...if you see me tell me to get a grip!

Headlines

2005-10-11T15:24:00.001-04:00

These are the top three headlines from Democracy Now:

- Pakistan Death Toll Tops 42,000
- Over 2,000 Feared Dead In Guatemala from Mudslides
- Car Bombings Kill Dozens in Iraq

...so much death and distruction. I am having a hard time processing all of this...

Live From the Cubicle

2005-10-11T14:25:00.001-04:00

First of all, I have decided that my previous print size was too small. My blog is boring enough as it is, I don't need to make it difficult to read to discourage people from reading it.

I am now getting the first taste of what my good buddy Claire does all the time. I am updating my blog during work. As I type I am sitting in my own little gray cubicle in the Insulet building in the middle of suburban Massachusetts. My job so far is to enter data, scan sheets and upload, name and save said sheets. Images of Dilbert comics keep running through my mind...

Things I have decided/ observed:

1. I need to decorate my cubicle (I will be here 3-4 weeks...that's long enough right?)
2. 7 or 8 men in the office have a "weight loss pool" going on (I will describe this more below)
3. While in the bathroom the idea of doing coke while in the office flashed through my mind.
a. no, I have never snorted coke (long story), but I could understand how someone
doing a mundane data entry job like mine would want to.
4. I like the power that my access card (which is clipped to me and has a zippy string) gives me.
5. Fall in New England is cold but gorgeous
a. since this is my 6th year out here I already new that, but I was just reminded
6. I have noticed some people wearing jeans...nice jeans + nice shirt= dressy cas.?

The weight loss pool

Dear readers, it has happened again, I have written a detailed account of something, and then pressed spell check only to have my changes disappear due to a pop-up blocker. This is at least the third time this has happened to me, you'd think I'd have learned by now! Anyway here is the gist:

men, no women, just men in a weight loss pool
participants are weighed weekly
for each pound lost you are paid one dollar by each of the other participants
if you gain weight you pay each participant $2
you must pay $50 for early evacuation from the pool
there is no consideration for percentage of body weight lost (big guys and small guys get paid the same for each pound lost)
some guy was upset and having a fit about his less than pound weight loss not counting since he was small to begin with....if he was small to begin with why did he enter the pool? (my guess is it was peer pressure, like when the "cool kids" tried to get you to smoke cigarettes in Jr. High!)
I appreciate men complaining to each other about their weight loss problems
of course men found a way to make weight loss a competitive sport!

In Celebration of Mass Genocide?

2005-10-10T08:32:00.001-04:00

I know that this is no longer a radical or unusual thing to say but: Why do I not have work today? Why does my daily organizer say Columbus Day? Why are we still celebrating today as a holiday?

I suppose an argument could be made as to why today can be celebrated, we are here and Columbus is the person who sparked European interest to go West. Regardless of whether it should be celebrated or not, the devastating affect that Columbus, the conquistadors, and the multitude of early settlers had on the natives and the land should not go unmentioned and should receive at least equal reflection.

A few things: It is queer to name Columbus the discoverer of the New World when he himself died thinking he had reached Asia, and had no idea that he in fact had reached a land mass relatively unknown in Europe. Columbus has even less to do with the discovery of what today is the USA, since he only ever set foot on the islands of the Caribbean. I believe Ponce de Leon was the first of the conquistadors to "discoverer" North America- he landed on Florida in 1513.

The following are excerpts from the first chapter of Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States", it's a great book and it reads like a novel. Columbus' contribution to the world:

"...They found no gold fields, but had to fill up the ships returning to Spain with some kind of dividend. In the year 1495 (this was during Columbus' second voyage), they went on a great slave raid, rounded up fifteen hundred Arawak men, women, and children, put them in pens guarded by Spaniards and dogs, then picked the five hundred best specimens to load onto ships. Of those five hundred, two hundred died en route..."

"But too many of the slaves died in captivity. And so Columbus, desperate to pay back dividends to those who had invested, had to make good his promise to fill the ships with gold. In the province of Cicao on Haiti, where he and his men imagined huge gold fields to exist, they ordered all persons fourteen years or older to collect a certain quantity of gold every three months. When they brought it, they were given copper tokens to hang around their necks. Indians without a copper token had their hands cut off and bled to death.

The Indians had been given an impossible task. The only gold around was bits of dust garnered from the streams. So they fled, were hunted down with dogs, and were killed."

"...Among the Arawaks, mass suicides began, with cassava poison. Infants were killed to save them from the Spaniards. In two years, through murder, mutilation, or suicide, half of the 250,000 Indians on Haiti were dead."

And that was just the beginning...in total Columbus and his men are believed to have been responsible for the death of up to 3 million (some say 8) Natives and the complete genocide of the Arawaks. The Arawaks were a people who swam out to meet the Santa Maria, showering its captain and crew with gifts, but to their great demise one of those gifts was made of gold.

Howard Zinn concludes his chapter:

"Was all this bloodshed and deceit...a necessity for the human race to progress from savagery to civilization?...Perhaps an argument can be made- as it was made by Stalin when he killed peasants for industrial progress in the Soviet Union, as it was made by Churchill explaining the bombings of Dresden and Hamburg, and Truman explaining Hiroshima. But how can the judgment be made if the benefits and losses cannot be balanced because the losses are either unmentioned or mention quickly?

That quick disposal might be acceptable ("Unfortunate, yes, but it had to be done") to the middle and upper classes of the conquering and "advanced" countries. But is it acceptable to the poor of Asia, Africa, Latin America, or to the prisoners in Soviet labor camps, or the blacks in urban ghettos, or the Indians on reservations- to the victims of that progress which benefits a privileged minority in the world?...And even the privileged minority- must it not reconsider, with that practicality which even privilege cannot abolish, the value of its privileges, when they become threatened by the anger of the sacrificed, whether in organized rebellion, unorganized riot, or simply those brutal individual acts of desperation labeled crimes by law and the state?

If there are necessary sacrifices to be made for human progress, is it not essential to hold to the principle that those to be sacrificed must make the decision themselves?..."

"Beyond all that, how certain are we that what was destroyed was inferior? Who were these people who came out on the beach and swam to bring presents to Columbus and his crew..."

"...Before the arrival of the European explorers, they were using irrigation canals, dams, were doing ceramics, weaving baskets, making cloth out of cotton."

"...The concept of private ownership of land and homes was foreign to the Iroquois (a nation of five separate tribes who lived in present day New York)...'No poorhouses are needed among them, because they are neither mendicants nor paupers....Their kindness, humanity and courtesy not only makes them liberal with what they have, but causes them to posses hardly anything except in common.

Women were important and respected in Iroquois society. Families were matrilinear...When a woman wanted a divorce, she set her husband's things outside the door."

"...The senior women in the village named the men who represented the clans at village and tribal councils. They also named the forty-nine chiefs who were the ruling council for the Five Nation confederacy of the Iroquois. The women attended the clan meetings, stood behind the circle of men who spoke and voted, and removed the men from office if they strayed too far from the wishes of the women."

"Children in Iroquois society, while taught the cultural heritage of their people and solidarity with the tribe, were also taught to be independent, not to submit to overbearing authority. They were taught equality in status and the sharing of possessions. "

"So Columbus and his successors were not coming into an empty wilderness, but into a world which in some places was as densely populated as Europe itself, where the culture was complex, where human relations were more egalitarian than in Europe, and where the relations among men, women, children and nature were more beautifully worked out than perhaps any place in the world."

"...They paid careful attention to the development of personality, intensity of will, independence and flexibility, passion and potency, to their partnership with one another and with nature. "

*****************************************************************************

That was a little longer than I intended, but I really love this book, and it sums up a lot of the most interesting works I read in college. I really believe in everything that I copied down here and the telling of these stories is why I think I want to teach history.

So, as you "celebrate" (read: sit on your couch watching TV instead of at your desk in front of a computer screen) today keep in mind what the real celebration is about. Never forget to question all that you have been taught. Just because this type of history isn't as buried as it used to be, doesn't mean that we should stop talking about it. I know it sounds risky or corney, but try mentioning the truth about today to someone else...word of mouth can be very powerful.

WE REJECT SIN

2005-10-09T20:40:00.002-04:00

Since my mother is working on accepting me and understanding my lifestyle, I figure I should work on accepting and understanding her lifestyle: I went to mass today.

Today at 5:40 I left my apartment to attend Catholic mass at the Paulist Center. Since I decided to actively reject my Catholic up brining three years ago I have attended mass a handful of times. This was the first time in three years that I actually participated in the mass, I spoke the parts, took the host and wine, used the holy water...everything.

It felt good to be there, to be doing something for my mother and for myself. It is a pretty liberal church, it has a Lesbian, Gay, and Friends group that meets after mass, they never refer to God as "He", there were songs in Spanish, a song that referred to hearing a God rather than our God or the God. The priest took time to mention that 10% of the collection was going to a house for women and children who were victims of domestic violence.

There were some parts I had trouble swallowing. A child was baptized during the mass and the congregation sang things about rejecting sin and believing in God and Jesus...I didn't sing these parts and felt a little like I was being yelled at. I suppose if it was entirely easy it wouldn't be making a sacrifice for my mother, which was my main point in being there.

At the end of the mass the priest asked all new people to stand, and since the congregation seemed small and tight knit (thus I was probably already recognized as an outsider) I stood. There was a number of "new people" and the congregation clapped to welcome us. So I have decided that as a sign of respect and gratitude for my mother's willingness to work on accepting who I am I will continue to go to the Paulist Center whenever I can for mass. That is until I find a good Unitarian church to be involved in- even though the service was welcoming and the church is very liberal I still have problems with all the dogma and the long and sordid history that comes with Catholicism.

Solidarity Sunday

2005-10-09T10:53:00.001-04:00

This is my beautiful, youthful, strong, loving mother.
The other day she wrote me an e-mail to let me know that today is called Solidarity Sunday.
Solidarity Sunday is a faith-based anti- gay violence initiative. She told me she is going to wear a rainbow ribbon to church today in support of me and my friends. She is not really ready to talk to me about my sexuality or my relationships, but she is trying, and praying about it. It is unfortunate that something that is so wonderful for me has to be so hard for her, but I am really proud of how well she has responded. I am ashamed and proud to have found out that my mother is a stronger and more accepting person than I ever gave her credit for.

It's unfortunate that we still live in an unaccepting society and that we still have so far to go, but we have come far and hopefully one day things will be much better. Maybe there will never be full acceptance but I do believe that things will get much better!

That's not my bag baby!

2005-10-08T18:04:00.001-04:00

This is an awsome saying and more people need to use it.

Today at Costco one of the old women, we're talking like 70s, said, "Oh nah, I don't want the chili dogs, that's not my bag."

...let's all make a concerted effort to use this phrase more!

Spring Bloom

2005-10-08T17:49:00.002-04:00

I know this isn't the right season, but this is how I've been feeling all day:

These are the days that you'll remember
Never before and never since, I promise, will the whole world be warm as this.
And as you feel it, you’ll know it’s true that you are blessed and lucky.
It’s true that you are touched by something that will grow and bloom in you.

These are days you’ll remember.
When may is rushing over you with desire to be part of the miracles you see in every hour.
You’ll know it’s true that you are blessed and lucky.
It’s true that you are touched by something that will grow and bloom in you.

These are days.
These are the days you might fill with laughter until you break.
These days you might feel a shaft of light make it’s way across your face.
And when you do you’ll know how it was meant to be.
See the signs and know their meaning.
It’s true, you’ll know how it was meant to be.
Hear the signs and know they’re speaking to you, to you.
************************************************************************************
Things are all coming together for me, and the world feels so full of possibility!

Sit Down Captain Crunch!

2005-10-08T00:37:00.001-04:00

WOOT WOOT Way to be Angels!!! I stayed up way past my bed time to watch this game, and I'll pay for it tomorrow.

I'll be wearing my 2002 Championship shirt out to the clubs tomorrow.

Pictured above is the man of the game: Chone Figgins. Did everyone see his diving catch in the 4th (?). Now that's what I call not having a defeatist attitude. Oh man oh man, a center fielder after my own heart!

Queereoke

2005-10-07T06:38:00.001-04:00

Last night after football practice I went out with my team to a bar where "Queereoke" was being held. Yes, it was as much fun as it sounds! We all decided (it wasn't the whole team- I think there were like 6 of us) to sing a song together, and I foolishly mentioned that I thought "Sweet Caroline" would make a good kareoke song. Just in case you were wondering- "Sweet Caroline" is NOT a good kareoke song, the chorus is too high and the song is too slow. But we had fun and that's what counts.

A little later when the bar had gotten more full, the "DJ" decided to sing "Piano Man" by Billy Joel. He was massacring the words and I was singing along and complaining. Linda told me that I should go up and join in, but I just shook off her suggestion. Then he said it, "Anyone who wants to come up and take over for me is welcome." So, with a couple beers in me, I shakily got up and took the stage. The song was only a fourth of the way through so I had a ways to go. Then something amazing happened, people stopped what they were doing and paid attention, and cheered me on, and sang with me- I am not ashamed to admit that I did a good job, and it was really fun. Afterward my teammates all congratulated me and told me I had a good voice and such. Then something weird happened.

Random girls started coming up to me to tell me I had a good voice. Keep in mind that I had come from football practice- I looked grubby, bag shirt and sweat pants with hair pulled back in a frizzy half pony. But somehow, despite my appearance i was being hit on more than I am accustomed to, and one of these girls was relentlessly throwing looks my way.

So if you ever find yourself at a kareoke bar trying to impress the ladies- Billy Joel is where it's at.

And if you find yourself in JP (Jamaica Plaine Massachusetts) on a Thursday night go over to the Midway....it's a wicked good time!

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday....FOOTBALL!

2005-10-06T14:31:00.001-04:00

The Fighting Irish (us) vs. Jeanie Johnston, part of the Boston Women's Flag Football Leauge. That's me in the bright blue shorts with the 9 on my shirt. If you have never played on a team sport you should try it. It keeps me sane to know that I have practice coming up and a reason to exercise and get in good shape. Plus I have met a group of amazing women that I love to hang out and talk with. No wonder all those studies show that being involved in sports keeps kids away from drugs and such. Team sports have always been a part of my life and I guess now I realize that they always will.

Three posts in one day! Can you tell how much I missed my blog?

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim

2005-10-06T13:52:00.001-04:00

If, like me, you are from a baseball loving Orange County family you are excited about the Angeles being in the American League playoffs. What I am not excited about is the perpetuation of the myth that Orange County is in fact just an extension of Los Angeles. Three years ago the Angeles won the world series as the Anaheim Angeles- ANAHEIM, it's in Orange County, it's where Disneyland is, it is NOT a part of Los Angeles County. Now, due to the marketability of "Los Angeles" their name has been changed to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Every time I see the score of and Angeles game go by under the title LAA I wonder, "What baseball team is in Louisiana?" Now if I saw LAD I would know it was referring to the LA Dodgers. To tell the truth I am more of a Dodgers fan than an Angeles fan, but it is not because they are from exotic LA, it's because I grew up in an Los Angeles County family with a grandmother who loved Tommy Lasorda- I too love Tommy and miss him.

Point being: LA is a city in Los Angeles County which is the county directly North of Orange County where Anaheim is. They are in fact two separate counties. I am tired of saying I am from Orange County and having people respond, "Oh, so LA"...I would rather they say, "Like the O.C.", because that (albeit sad) is a lot more accurate!