Southern Suspicions and Tennessee Truths, Part II

It is impossible to visit an area of the U.S. that once wanted to be its own country and confine all of your comments and observations to one essay. Alas, here is the continuation of my discoveries from my visit to the South.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #6: They love their Dr. Pepper. As a girl I remember the question, “Do you want to be a Pepper?” Granted, I love the sugary drink every once in a blue moon, but on my trip to Tennessee, I learned that Dr. Pepper was as important as Coke or Diet Coke. I shouldn’t have been too surprised given the fact that this area of the country developed a drink called Sweet Tea. While we were celebrating Christmas at one of my brother-in-law’s cousin’s houses one of the cousins brought in a batch of Sweet Tea that was too weak. After a serious ribbing by nearly every relative present, she finally dumped the jug of tea down the sink and exclaimed, “Y’all can bring it yourself next time!” Apparently the making of Sweet Tea is an intricate art form, which if done improperly garners serious criticism.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #7: Not every area of Tennessee offers high-speed internet. This may seem like a minor, frivolous detail, but when was the last time you had to hear the sound of dial-up? It took 10 seconds to load a basic MSN sign-in page, and at least 15 seconds to go from screen to screen. High-speed internet isn’t something you think about on a regular basis until you happen to find yourself waiting longer than two breaths for each of your emails to open. I managed to survive most of my life without the internet, but now the idea of having a slow internet is annoying and frustrating.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #8: This isn’t a place where PETA or vegetarians have too much luck. Granted, Nashville and Memphis might be more veg friendly, but in the area I was in, just asking for the bacon to be withheld from my dinner order earned me a “you have a third eye” look from the waitress. Hunting and fishing are considered normal manly things to do, and they are well boasted sports. In fact, they are so celebrated that the restaurant we ate at regularly had shotgun shell Christmas tree decorations. That’s right; they decorated one of the trees with a string of red beads and mini shotgun shells.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #9: They have this lake with trees that look like something you would see in Lord of the Rings. The trees lining the bank of the lake are average, run of the mill trees until you get closer to the roots, the bottom of the trees bubble out exposing the roots like warped, woody toes. Next to the trees are remnants of old trees that have been chipped away by the river and time and stick up like cones out of the water. It looks very cool and somewhat medieval. You could almost imagine a sweaty Viggo Mortensen wielding a sword and tromping through the cones and bubble-footed trees on the way to conquering his kingdom, if Viggo was a balding duck hunter with a beer gut dressed in camouflage, his sword was actually a shotgun, and the kingdom was the local watering hole where other hunters went to talk about the “one that got away.”

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #10: Nashville is not the easiest town to maneuver. If you are traveling to Nashville by car, make sure you follow those Mapquest directions to a tee. The moment you think, maybe this is the way to go, don’t do it, because it’s the wrong way! Perhaps this is done to detract would-be country music stars from invading the scene. Kind of like Survivor, if you can actually make it to the city of Nashville, you can have a shot at performing, but first you have to get there with all of your hair not pulled out of your head. My stepfather was driving and actually listened to me give him directions from the back seat; this is how difficult Nashville is to get around in. When a stubborn 50-something male raised in Germany will listen to a girl he once referred to as “a complete and total flake,” then you know it’s not an easy place to get to.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #11: The Dallas/Fort Worth airport sucks ass! Okay, that isn’t really applicable to Tennessee, and for some reason the verdict is still out on whether Texas is actually a Southern state (half of the Southerners I meet say it is, the other half won’t claim it), but I just had to issue a general warning. My plane from Nashville to Dallas/Ft. Worth was early on arrival, and then we sat on the tarmac for over 30 minutes. I still had 15 minutes to run a toddler in a stroller and a carry-on bag to my departing gate, but in Texas they like to make everything big. Each terminal at the airport is like its own separate island linked together by a monorail, a slow moving monorail, so we didn’t make the flight. Just a note, if you have to go through Dallas, make sure you have a decent layover, and you’re not traveling to California after a holiday weekend on American Airlines, because you’re just begging for pain.

Southern Suspicions and Tennessee Truths

I returned from Tennessee today with a litany of experiences and a huge batch of criticism from members of the Southern community. I left one week ago for the South with background knowledge that consisted of a mixture of historical facts, rumors, stories, and suspicions. However, despite having a plethora of hearsay in my head, I was determined to experience the South my own way, and in one week I managed to come up with some pretty keen observations.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #1: No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t stump me with the accent. That’s right, I understood every word they said, every colloquialism they uttered, and despite their insistence on using the word “fixin’” to refer to something other than preparing a meal, I got it. At one point, I was even speaking with my brother-in-law’s uncle who grew up “on the river” as they say, as if to warn me that those who grew up there would be harder to understand than your average Southerner, but I followed the conversation to a tee. Southerners beware! Not all Yankees are stumped by your accent.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #2: Everything they say about Southern hospitality is true. My brother-in-law’s mother and entire family took us in as if we were one of their own. Everyone was open, friendly and would start a conversation with you even if you were just standing in line. This was tremendous culture shock for me, a Pacific Northwest gal who can barely get her own friends to return her calls. The Northwest is not known for being a kind and cuddly place, and if someone doesn’t know you, they don’t talk to you. It’s just the opposite in the South, which can be refreshing once you stop wondering if someone is casing you for a mugging.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #3: In every small town there is a beauty shop just like the one in Steel Magnolias. I visited the one in my sister’s tiny town where her cousin works. There were Southern women doing hair, sitting around talking, and exchanging town gossip. During the few minutes I was there I was expecting a sickly Julia Roberts to appear from the back room, but had to settle for my brother wanting to know when we were going.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #4: Memphis is Elvis Country. The face of The King graced most of the little shops and restaurants we visited on Beale Street. Although my whiny toddler made it impossible for us to tour Graceland, I did feel like I was in the heart of Presley worship. As one of the two dead celebrities I would have sex with if they were living (the other being Jim Morrison), the idolatry of Elvis is a plus for me. I adore that sexy, smoldering face, and I enjoyed looking at it while I regretted ordering my fattening meal at the Blues City Café, which leads me to my next truth.

Southern Suspicion/Tennessee Truth #5: Southern food is really as good as they say it is. I spent the entire week sweating, not from working out, but from stressing about every meal. These folks don’t eat light, and the things they make from scratch are the stuff dreams are made of…fat, caloric, ass-widening dreams. The signature dish during the holidays is called hen and dressing, which is basically shredded chicken in a stuffing casserole. It’s yummy. Thankfully, my brother-in-law’s mother is one of the most considerate people in the world, recognized that I was watching my points, and made a couple of Weight Watchers recipes.

A few other things I learned about my journey to the South were that smoking is still legal and acceptable there. At the little, mom ‘n’ pop restaurant we ended up eating at, there was a smoking and non-smoking section, which is something I haven’t seen in the Northwest since the mid-90s. The best part about this place, where the words “egg substitute” are as foreign as speaking Chinese, is that once the waitresses finished serving you your meal, they would sit at a corner table and have a collective smoke amid the stuffed ducks that served as wall decor.

Lastly, the biggest lesson I’ve learned about the South, is they take themselves way too seriously, and have a whaling inferiority complex. Listen up America; unless you are from the South, you cannot criticize, make an observation, or comment in any way, shape or form about the South. Remember when black people made it official that they were the only ones who could use the “N word”? Well, I’m here to let you know that it is official, only Southerners can talk about the South. Very, very lame, but apparently a truth I was not aware of until my last post, which made me as hated in the South as a gay mulatto.

I Dreamed of Tennessee!?!

My sister married a Southerner nearly five years ago. He was definitely a gentleman, but I could tell that when he moved to Idaho to become her husband, his heart was still in good ol’ Rocky Top. It was only a matter of time before his discontent with life outside of the area of former succession would spill over and he would be compelled to move back to his homeland. My sister managed to move from Idaho to Tennessee, which I often wonder, was a lateral or horizontal motion. For some reason, the girl seems to be fond of areas that contain a multitude of hicks, and I’m not sure why.

In honor of the birth of her first child, my sister asked us to come visit her in the South. I’m more than happy to oblige, because there’s nothing quite like realizing that the kid you tortured in your youth is suddenly a momma, and that you must make friends for life with that new baby, because you have a desire to continue torturing your sibling well into adulthood. I can’t wait until Savanna becomes a little rebellious, and I can send her gift cards for Hot Topic and give her advice on how to properly dye her hair blue. It will be my adult way of sitting on my sister’s chest and letting that line of spit nearly drop on her face before slurping it up.

Tuesday morning, Rachael and I are off to one of the last states in America where you can legally marry your first cousin. I’ve never been to the South, except for Florida, and that was just to go to Disney World, so it doesn’t count. I can’t wait to see if all of my suspicions about this area are true. I’ve heard so many things about the racism, the resentment of those who are not from the South, the many extreme uses of pork products in the Southern diet, and of course, there’s Graceland.

Munchkin Pants and I will be flying into Nashville where we will rent a car, meet up with my stepdad and brother, and drive two and a half hours to my sister’s tiny town. She lives in a town where there are five churches, a Sonic burger joint, and not much else. She has to drive 25 minutes to shop at a grocery store, and 45 minutes to get to a clinic that will prescribe emergency contraception. Her husband has cousins upon cousins, and in this town she found out that she is related to both the town asshole who's always in jail and the upstanding sheriff who is always putting him there.

Jeff is using his new business as an excuse to forego a Southern adventure, which is okay with me, as long as he’s aware that I will be taking the weekend I return off to enjoy a spa somewhere. Rachael has been flying at least every couple of months since she was just 12 weeks old, so in her short life she has clocked more air miles than most adults. I don’t anticipate a negative flying experience on Tuesday, and hopefully I’m right. The long-assed drive might be a bit touchy, but at least I have a portable DVD player and a half dozen Dora the Explorer discs.

As for the upcoming Tennessee experience, I might be wrong in my presumptions that I’m going to a racist, backward area of the U.S. where inbreeding is as much of a sport as eating gargantuan amounts of pork, but we’ll see. I’ll have a chance to explore Memphis, where my sister will take me shopping, hopefully not just to Wal-Mart, and on the last day of our visit, we will all fly out of Nashville, so I’ll peruse Sun Studios (the original home of the early rockabilly movement) and Graceland. I can’t wait to see the house that Elvis built. When a hillbilly comes into money and uses it to pay for something called a “jungle room” it’s worth the charge of admission.

I have no affinity for any modern country music, but it might be neat to see the Grand Old Opry, where Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn and Hank Williams performed. They were the real soul of country unlike that Faith Hill/Shania shit that’s plopping off of Hot Country radio nowadays. We’ll probably wind up at a barbecue joint or two, which is fine by me since I won’t be able to eat most of anything they will have to offer down South. As someone who foregoes all things pig, I look forward to my weeklong Southern Diet Boot Camp.

Thankfully, my week in Tennessee will culminate with a week in Southern and Northern California where I can regain perspective. It’s kind of wild to think that in one day, I will wake up in Tennessee and go to bed that night in California, but what will be even better will be the opportunity to live in two completely different worlds all in one day. This is the type of entertainment that you can’t pay for, which is what I’m hoping from my Tennessee experience. Everything I’ve heard might be true, and if it is, I’ll be more than happy to tell you about it in graphic detail as soon as my adventure is through.

Celebrity Virginity

The topic of virginity has always been a bit fascinating to me, especially since I can barely remember having mine. It left me at 16 when I looked at my buffed high school sweetheart, and heard the voice of Tom Cruise circa Risky Business echoing, “sometimes you gotta say ‘what the fuck’” complete with the ‘80s Raybans and a big, open-mouthed smile.

Most women tend to keep their virginity stories private until many years later when they laugh about them while sitting in a circle of fellow gals sharing cheap alcohol in a college dorm room. Some ladies have the misfortune of losing theirs by force, and never talk about it, and on occasion, there are those determined gals who keep their maidenhead in tact until their wedding night.

Unless your average woman tells you how she lost her virginity, you may never know or really even care, but when that broad is a celebrity, the whole world seems to want to know how many times she’s had sex, who she’s been with, and the intimate details of how she spread for the very first time. It amazes me that a society so hell bent on constantly associating women with sex seems to place a more noble status on those virtuous girls who save themselves for marriage.

Brooke Shields was untouched when she married Andre Agassi as was Jessica Simpson when she trotted down the alter with Nick Lachey. Brittney Spears held onto the public persona of her virgin status until she figured that her fans, despite being mindless, pop culture droids, were not that stupid. Even Playboy has built its soiled reputation on the idea that the sweet virgin next door could be a wild, raging whore if she just had the proper lighting, fluffy hair, and a camera aimed at her.

The irony in all of this modern day virgin worship seems to be that the only ones buying into it are those who are attempting to promote it as virtuous. Brooke and Jessica made the decision to save themselves until marriage, which is fine, but I kind of snicker when I think that they spent all of that time foregoing temptation only to have their marriages wind up in divorce. They wasted their maidenheads on men that will forever be known as “that first husband,” and will draw a bit of a sneer every time they think about them. I’m curious to know if, when looking back, they think of all the men they could have fucked, but turned down in order to be “virtuous,” and wonder if they really regret it now.

I’m not saying that those who wait until marriage wind up with a complex, if that’s what you decide is best for your life, and you are determined, then kudos to you. I have a wonderful Christian friend who I nudged into dating a woman he knew at church, and they wound up married (score one for the Yenta punk). They were both virgins when they got married, and their wedding night, was really a wedding night. I respect their decision to stick to their guns and wait until they found each other, especially my male friend, because in today’s world a man who is sexless until marriage seems to be branded as some sort of loser or pussy.

The thing I respect most about this couple is that they made their decisions about their sex life, but were never judgmental about anyone else’s virginal status. Unfortunately, this isn’t the norm for media hounds that seem to want to promote the idea that, although Brittney is writhing on the floor in a matching, lace bra and panties at 16 years old, she is still as pure as the first snowfall in winter. It’s as if they want to imagine that all of the men reading magazines were pedophiles, and all of the women needed to be taught the proper way of mixing sexy, horny, yet pure.

I remember deciding at the age of 14 that I was going to remain a virgin until I was married. Little did I know that the little statement I made to my super secret diary (read only by my sister, brother, a few friends, and my mom – those nosy fucks), would go completely by the wayside as soon as I got that first rush of hormones.

As I sit here thinking about my first time, I’m glad it was with a good-looking boyfriend who I’ll probably never see again. If I had saved myself for marriage I would have been really disappointed, because just like Jessica and Brooke, that was my first husband, and I say those words with a very unpleasant sneer.

Feet to the Fire

One of the boldest, most incorrect statements we can ever make about another person is that we know them. If there’s one thing I have learned in my 32 years, it is that there is no way to completely know every aspect about a person. We tend to show people the side of ourselves we want them to see, and conceal the rest, until we feel comfortable enough to reveal our hidden selves. Sometimes, after a while we can do that, sometimes we never can.

Today I was at lunch with a friend who shares my same birthday, albeit different years. We get together a minimum of once a month and email each other silly spam jokes and messages quite often. She is one of the most positive people I know. We discussed the typical lunch topics: work, spouses, and the upcoming holidays. During our talk about various holiday trepidations we got on the subject of dates we don’t look forward to. I get a little weird about Thanksgiving, because my mom died two weeks before Turkey Day, and when she was alive, that was her holiday to shine. My friend has the same funny feeling on Christmas Eve, because that’s the day she lost her dad.

Just as we were winding up our last trip to the salad bar, she mentioned her apprehension about another date at the tail end of the year. Then she began to tell me about an incident that changed her life 15 years ago. One night, while she and her spouse were sleeping, two guys targeted their house for a home invasion. They robbed my friend at gunpoint, beat her and her spouse nearly to death, completely trashed their house, and because my friend is a woman, I don’t have to tell you about what they did to her. Anytime there is a crime involving a woman, it’s a given that she will be raped. When Mia Zapata was murdered on Capitol Hill, the news didn’t say she was raped in the beginning, but everyone knew she was.

I listened in disbelief as my friend recalled the details of that terrible night, and the long, recovery that followed. She told me that she overcame her fear of the world and rid herself of the nightmares by taking a self-defense course. Then she became a bit of an advocate for women learning self-defense, and spoke about her experience on local news shows.

We parted ways as we always did, but hours later, I still can’t get her story out of my head, particularly when she talked about how she survived the experience. She told me that it didn’t happen like she thought it would. When you’re a woman, you grow up keenly aware of rape. One out of every ten women in this country survives a rape, so it’s inevitable that on a dark night, after watching the news or hearing a story, you go through a mental scenario of how you would fend off a would-be rapist.

Deep down, we all want to believe that we would be Lara Croft or Aeon Flux. We would be strong, and pull out some amazing martial arts moves that would be the beginning of a serious ass-kicking for the bastard who thought of assaulting us. We would all be Wonder Woman, and in our moment of fear and panic, would instantly gain the strength of ten men leaving a bloody, broken heap of a human in our wake. This is what we all hope we can do, as did my friend.

Prior to that night, she said she used to tell everyone she would fight like hell if anyone ever tried to rape her, but that night, all she wanted to do was survive. She said she did everything they told her to do, and in the end, she was left bloody, broken, but still living. 15 years later, she talks about it freely, because she said she has nothing to be ashamed about. If she kept quiet about it, that would mean she believed that it was her fault, or she brought it on in some way, so she talks about it openly.

I thought I knew the extent of my friend’s positivity, but after this lunchtime discussion, I realized that her favorable outlook on life didn’t come from having lots of friends, or neat hobbies, or the fact that she reads at least a dozen, really funny spam jokes per day. Her happiness resonates, because on that devastating night, she could have died a horrible death, but didn’t. She overcame a brutal attack, and put herself out there as an example.

If I could say anything to my dear friend right now, I would tell her that I’m grateful that on that night, when they came in, I’m glad she wasn’t Wonder Woman or Lara Croft, because if she would have tried to be a superhero, she would be dead, and I would have never had the opportunity to know a truly amazing person. I’m better for having known you, and I look forward to next month’s lunch.

And Then Some Asshole from Ohio Comes Along

On a regular basis, I don’t go out looking for things to get completely pissed off about. I’m normally a very happy and content cynic, but lately ridiculous situations seem to keep popping up that warrant some outcry on my part. I was half-asleep with CNN droning on in the background, when just as I was about to enter that wonderful state of REM, I was jolted awake by the story of an asshole in Ohio.

Apparently this asshole works for Walgreens filling pills in the pharmacy. He was hired to read prescriptions and fill pills. He takes home a paycheck from Walgreens for reading prescriptions and filling pills, and his job duties are clearly to read prescriptions and fill pills. However, on one particular day, he read a prescription and refused to fill pills. Walgreens told him that since it was his job, he was going to have to do it or think about pursuing a career outside of the Walgreens family. He is now suing them, because he refused to do his job.

If this situation isn’t enough to make you bang your head against the wall, let me take this opportunity to really make your blood boil. The prescription he refused to fill was for emergency contraception that a young woman brought into a corporate pharmacy to avoid the bullshit. He believes it is against his religion to fill her prescription, because her taking a pill is tantamount to abortion, and by giving her the pills, he is essentially participating in killing her unborn child. I used to laugh when the college dropouts at my shitty, high school, burger job used to take their positions too seriously, and now their equivalent at the pharmacy is actually suing his employer.

Walgreens offered the asshole a job in neighboring Michigan, but he refused to take it. Pat Robertson is now involved, and helping the man with legal expenses and council, and filed a complaint with the EEOC on behalf of this asshole. I guess it’s fitting that one fundamentalist asshole help a fellow fundamentalist asshole, but this story is one of a rash that I’ve been hearing about lately.

When did pharmacy assistants become moral activists? They do some 18 month course at a trade school, and all of the sudden they are in a position to tell grown, educated women how to run their lives? I don’t fucking think so. This asshole in Ohio’s job is to read prescriptions and fill pills, if he can’t do that then he needs to quit, end of story. Let’s apply the same situation in a different sort of way. I’m a waitress at a steakhouse and I see some 400 lb. guy squeeze his enormous ass into a booth and order the 20 oz. prime rib, loaded baked potato, and a Diet Coke, because they always order the Diet Coke. I go to my manager and tell him that I refuse to give the portly patron his red meat order, because it is against my religion to aid someone in committing a slow, cholesterol-driven suicide.

Do you think Pat Robertson and his band of brothers at the 700 Club would be hiring lawyers for me? I think the crazy, old goat would probably tell me that I was out of line, and that when a man tells me to put a meal in front of him, I should move my girly tushy quickly and get him his chow.

I’m getting really, very sick of those who feel they are more moral then me trying to make my life difficult in order to make themselves feel like they are doing the work of Jesus. I can’t take the pill, because the hormones fuck me up. Jeff and I don’t want anymore children in the near future, because I’m happy working, he just started a business, and one toddler is already a handful. In the event that we have an oops, as two educated, responsible people who have made calculated decisions about their lives, we don’t want to have to drive to a dozen pharmacies trying to get a prescription filled, because someone who didn’t even go to college feels like they might sin by doing what they were hired and paid to do.

I’m waiting enthusiastically to see all the ways the Walgreens corporate lawyers can tear this guy and his 700 Club attorneys new assholes. It seems kind of funny to me that the right-wingers are always talking about how terrible frivolous lawsuits are and how we need tort reform, then they bring this kind of shit into the picture. It must be different when it’s your senseless bullshit you are trying to force down the throats of others.

The most valuable thing I’ve learned from this is to always patronize the pharmacies up on Capitol Hill and the U-District, because they will fill anything, avoid giving money to Christian charities of any kind, because they are using it for evil not good, and stop trying to fall asleep to CNN, because you’ll just end up wide awake and extremely pissed off.

Following the Popular Girl

My first lesson about popularity was a cruel one. I was in the fifth grade, and everyone in the class had to draw a poster publicizing the school’s fundraising cake walk. I did a bang up job etching two Care Bears walking hand-in-hand amongst cupcakes, and to top it off, I used the word “awesome” in the promotional language. All was perfect until it came time to vote on the best poster. Bernie, short for Bernadette, wore her hair feathered back, her collar up, and presented her poster first. It was a large, grinning muffin with a lame promotional tagline written in poor cursive, but it won. I sat back in complete awe and disgust, my championship work of art defeated by a fucking, blue muffin. Why?

As the years went on I was picked last for sports teams, failed at bids for class elections, and never managed to be “employee of the month” at my shitty, high school burger job. By age 16, I came to the realization that I was not popular, nor did I give a fuck. There was great value to floating under the radar, and as a grown up, currently working in the field of event production I revel in doing my magic behind the scenes.

Popularity hasn’t crossed my mind in years, until tonight. We attended the annual neighborhood holiday dinner. It was our effort to meet a few new people, and find out if this neighborhood was as vanilla as I had predicted. Thankfully, we knew the first couple who hosted the beginning portion of the neighborhood party. We felt comfortable in their home, poured ourselves some wine, and tried to mingle. We thought people in the neighborhood would be happy to meet us given the previous owners of our house.

We are the third owner of a house built in 1997. The first owner was bad news: lots of fighting, a messy divorce, and the neighborhood association had to file a lien against the property for uncollected homeowner’s dues. We put an offer on the house when the first owner was still living here, but we hadn’t sold our old place, and he didn’t want to wait for the money, so he ended up selling to a nice couple with two kids. The second owners lived in the house for exactly four and a half months, then moved because the husband was from the East Coast and couldn’t deal with the Northwest. We purchased the house from the family’s relocation company, and only met them once.

Unfortunately, for me, in that short four and a half months, the wife managed to meet and make BFF with half the broads in this neighborhood. She gathered with them for mommy groups, hosted the regular Bunko game, and had the same Jenna Elfman haircut as the rest of them. She was most likely a member of the Neighborhood Exercise Squad, but that might be purely speculation on my part.

When we introduced ourselves and divulged our address, we were met with a hint of disappointment. “Ooohhh, that was so and so’s house. We really loved her.” I guess it was a bummer to learn that their bestest buddy’s replacement was a cynical, punk rock Jew who *gasp* works instead of staying home with her child. How could I possibly take the place of the Katie Couric wannabe that used to occupy this dwelling?

I didn’t mind the subtle lamenting at the fact that I lived where their friend used to, it was the outright and blatant disappointment that left me with the same feeling that I remembered from the 5th grade drawing contest. How fucking rude can you be! One can reasonably expect children to have little regard for the feelings of others, since they are indeed still in the process of emotional development, but women in their late 30s/early 40s should know better.

One of the bitchier chicks seemed to have an extremely hard time letting go of it, and went into detail about how close she and the previous owner were. I smiled while thinking she should seriously get over it. Apparently, to make matters more difficult on my part, the former owner still emails her friends here in the neighborhood on a regular basis from her new home on the East Coast. Thankfully, I’m able to approach this situation with a lifetime of experience dealing with the bitter end of popularity.

At the end of the night, when the bitchy one went on and on about her long, lost friend, I listened with half-assed attention all the while thinking, I know you went walking with her everyday, and I know your daughters played together, I guess it’s too bad that I own her fucking house, and she’s never coming back. Then I left the party the same way I did after all of these years, under the radar and not giving a fuck.

Pinatas, Kosher Cake, and the Dirtiest Dozen

As the day of Rachael’s second birthday rounded the corner, Jeff and I began to get excited about the prospects of giving our girl a party. Last year, despite my objections, Jeff insisted on throwing a bash to celebrate the anniversary of her first day of life. This year, I knew the party would be far better, because she actually might remember it.

I began inviting friends with kids and before I knew it, the list of possible children attending was over 30. What can I say, a good percentage of my friends with kids are Orthodox, and they like big families. Thankfully, as the day approached, the number of children in attendance had whittled its way down to the late teens.

I set the birthday bash for 2:00 PM, and by 2:30 PM only two of my friends had shown up. I was beginning to think that my daughter’s birthday was going to wind up like that scene from Bette Middler’s movie, Stella, where no one comes to Jenny’s party, because her mom is weird and kind of slutty and they are poor. Fortunately, it was just a case of living on JST (Jewish Standard Time). Jews, for some unknown reason, are habitually late. They always do great and diligent work and are the life of the party once they arrive, but making it to something on time is one battle that will never be won.

The children arrived with their parents in herds and instantly took to the inflatable jump house. Earlier this year, we realized that a formal living room was an enormous waste of space, and sold all of the furniture to make way for a new office. Unfortunately, we still haven’t found office furniture we like, so the room remains bare leaving us fodder for neighborhood rumors that a divorce may be pending. Today the empty room came in handy as kids jumped, yelled, threw colored balls at each other, and ran around like a pack of wild monkeys on speed.

The chaos progressed from the inflatable jump house to Rachael’s playroom and spilled over to the family room where we parents were attempting to be inconspicuous and have a conversation that didn’t contain the words, “put that down”, “don’t touch” and “because I said so.”

Since I’ve planned every kind of get together imaginable, including and not limited to, bachelor parties, frat gatherings, backstage meet ‘n’ greets, and the “night off” party for the Up In Smoke Tour back in 2000, I decided to do the simplest itinerary: letting the kids run the party. The two oldest girls who were all of seven-years-old took charge. They provided valuable leadership telling the adults when it was appropriate to open presents, cut the cake, and break the piñata. They were both bossy, determined, and in their position of power showed more hunger than George W. staring at an oil well in Iraq. Normally, I’d worry about such behavior in girls, so young, but in their coup over the adults, they were also taking care of the little kids. Yes, we were dealing with pint-sized tyrants, but we were getting a much needed break from our kids, so ‘viva la Ninas!’

The piñata, shaped like a kneeling Dora, was fun. You never know how much aggression a three-year-old has until you hand him a broom handle and put him in front of a paper Mache figurine filled with candy. These kids were fierce! The little ones didn’t want to quit hitting Dora and the older ones were going for broke with their three turns. In the end, the little Explorer held her own, and we had to pull the weenie string on the bottom to get the candy to release. Jeff spent the next few minutes wondering how hard it would be to bang the dent out of Dora’s head, so we could use the piñata for next year’s party.

Rachael opened her presents, with help from several of her friends, and then we were ordered to do the cake. In order to accommodate our kosher friends, we got a kosher cake. It looks just like a regular one, but it doesn’t contain any dairy products. It also costs twice as much, as Jeff reminded me when he brought it home.

The nice thing about having kosher friends is that everything has to be disposable, which is a great benefit at the end of the night when paper plates full of half-eaten pieces of cake and pools of melted ice cream are everywhere. I folded the paper table covering over all of it and tossed it in the trash, along with random pieces of half-eaten piñata candy I found around the house.It was over, the house was clean, and Rachael’s second birthday was successfully caught on DVD by the amateur Copolla working on the video editing software upstairs. I kicked back with a shot of rum, and the joy of knowing that I wouldn’t have to do this again for at least another 365 days.

Spoiled Bitch Society

I caught the news tonight and there was a story about the high price of teenage birthday parties. Very wealthy parents are going far out of their way to give their darling little girls celebrations that cost more than your average American makes in a three-year time span. The news, of course, perpetuates the situation by trying to show these parties in some sort of positive light, despite the 10 second rebuttal from a child psychologist who desperately tries to explain the devastating effects this amount of opulence could have on a lass of 13.

This news story seemed to touch on a trend I’ve been noticing for the past few years. With the popularity of vacuous, do-nothings like Paris Hilton and Ashley Simpson is it any wonder that we’ve come into the era of the Spoiled Bitch Society. Young girls are spoon-fed the belief that you don’t have to be talented, smart, responsible, or contribute anything to society at large, yet you can still be famous and sport high-priced, designer goods. I see more girls under 15 walking around with Coach handbags than I do grown women who actually make enough money to afford them.

I’m not some out-of-touch fogy, and I know styles and priorities change, especially in teenage culture where the average kid has the attention span of a gerbil on speedballs. However, I’m a little floored at the notion that we are currently raising a society of young women who believe that everything should be handed to them, and that working to earn anything is something that is beneath them. What’s going to happen when these young women get out into the real world, have to deal with grumpy and demanding bosses, while trying to figure out how to make the mandatory contributions to a 401K account, while still making rent each month.

I’m a parent myself, so I don’t feel particularly hypocritical about putting the blame on those who are siring the Spoiled Bitch Society, after all, the money for the Prada has to come from somewhere. In this news story, a young JAP (Jewish American Princess) was getting a $200,000 coming of age party thrown by her mother, a professional party planner. Jeff was on the couch stewing in disgust, while remarking that the party was less for little Amber and more for her mama to show off. I couldn’t agree more.

I began to think back to my fondest teenage party memories, and figured out that the most expensive thing ever purchased for any of the parties was the cheap-ass beer. Sure a case of Bud was about $12 back in the day, but you had to slip your friend’s slimy, older brother a $20, so he would buy it for you. Most of the parties I attended were at friends’ houses. We would gather, play Guns ‘N’ Roses tapes, smoke cigarettes outside, a few lucky and horny kids would hook up, and on occasion the neighbor down the street would get his mailbox blown to pieces with MD-80s. It was cheap, ridiculous, teenage fun; the type of obnoxious shit that those John Hughes and Amy Heckerling movies were based on.

I don’t get how in such a short span of time it could have gone from a $50 Saturday night (i.e. beer, the bribe, some chips, and a trusty pack of Trojans) to $200,000 for a bunch of 13 year olds. When did the strong sense of entitlement come in? As a working mom, I know how easy it is to give into temptation and let your whining little girl have whatever she wants, especially at the end of the day when you’re tired and all you want is peace. I’ve been there, and it’s a lot harder to say “no” and weather the temper tantrums, then it is to give in. However, by giving in, I would be letting my girl know that if she pushes enough, she too, can be a member of the Spoiled Bitch Society, and I’m just not willing to do that.

My daughter will always have what she needs, and maybe a few extras here and there, but she will know what the words “chores,” “allowance,” and “earning it yourself” mean. I always thought it was ironic that Madame Hilton’s show was called “The Simple Life,” because what could be simpler than not going to college, spending all day shopping on your daddy’s dime, hanging out with sleazy, rich guys at New York City clubs, and buying your dog diamond earrings. The best reality show would be one where Miss Paris gets disinherited and actually has to work for a living.

Only time will tell how hard the Spoiled Bitch Society will fall once their parent’s money well runs dry. Fortunately, lower level admin jobs are plentiful as are old geezers who want to marry hot, younger women, so these broads might have a future. I just hope they keep those Coach bags in their dust covers at night, because they’ll need something to carry their Kelly Services timecard in.

Show Us Your Lits

The males of Suburbia perform a strange ritual that coincides with the winter setting in. On the day after Thanksgiving, they, and the child they’ve been able to recruit, usually the oldest of their male children, descend to their garages to gather strands of outdoor lighting, staple guns and ladders, then for the next several hours begin a dance of shouting, pointing and wildly stapling. The end result is the pissing contest to end all pissing contests: the Christmas light yard display.

I’ve made it no secret that Christmas is the least favorite time of the year for me. I don’t like snow, I don’t like the theme music, and the whole commercialization of what is supposed to be a sacred occasion, just seems to hit me wrong. In our old neighborhood, a few people would string some lights here and there making for a tastefully, reserved display of holiday cheer. I had no problem with that, but in our new neighborhood, they go completely ape shit.

I don’t know if it was the eight foot, blow up snowman that caught me off guard or the enormous, illuminated Santa flanked by reindeer, but whatever blinded me as I turned the corner attempting to reach my darkened home with my retinas in tact did not prepare me for the light brigade that followed.

It spread quicker than a venereal disease at a drunken high school prom party. Once a couple of houses decorated, then a few more followed, until which point we recognized that we were the only house on the block that remained dark. Except for the home at the end of the block, where there was a husband/wife domestic dispute that resulted in a bunch of cop cars racing through the neighborhood during the annual potluck picnic, it’s now up for sale, so there are no lights in that yard. Normally, I’m not one to get involved with any sort of status quo bullshit, especially when it comes to something Christmas-like in nature, but after a car ride through the neighborhood where my little girl pointed at every house enthusiastically screaming, “Lights, Mommy, More Lights!” Then upon arriving at her own abode asked, “Where lights go, Mommy?” I knew I had to reluctantly take part in this energy-gouging tradition.

I unpacked all of our Hanukkah shit and found our two items of exterior décor: a 14x14” fabric sign that says “Happy Hanukkah” that hangs on the front door, and the electric menorah that now flanks our window. When I told Jeff’s uncle about our decorations, he replied simply that at least now “they’ll know where to throw the rocks.”

It seems strange to me that Hanukkah is the “Festival of Lights”, but Jews don’t go with it more. How come there are no eight foot inflatable dreidels? Why aren’t there long strands of icicle lights in soft blue? Why do Christians get big, gaudy stars to top their front yard foliage when all I have is a lousy plastic, light up menorah? Lastly, why do I really even care?

I didn’t realize it as I was checking the bulbs and testing the light socket, but I was attempting to respond to an issue that I know I’m going to have to deal with sooner than later: being a Jew during Christmas. The guys who do South Park did an amazing job hitting the nail on the head with the funny song, but it’s really a conundrum, especially when you have a child, and are the only Jews in the neighborhood.

It’s only a matter of time before Rachael wonders why Daddy isn’t out there the day after Thanksgiving pillaging the garage for a tangled mass of wire and bulbs, while trying to funnel all forms of self expression down to making sure people can see Santa’s elf from the street. She will be bummed that we don’t have a tree despite the fact that we have a dozen menorahs that when fully lit make our family room look like the Phantom of the Opera’s lovemaking boudoir. Thankfully, my mother-in-law goes way overboard with the gifts, so my munchkin won’t feel cheated in that respect.

Hopefully, she will just accept the fact that we are different, and different doesn’t mean that we are better or worse than anyone else in the neighborhood. It just means that Daddy isn’t willing to risk a broken leg for the rest of the winter, because Rudolph’s nose needs to line up with the chimney at a perfect 90 degree angle. I also will revel in the day when she recognizes the fact that being recruited as your dad’s lighting assistant just means that you will spend the entire day freezing your ass off, while your crazy old man attempts to outdo the neighbor down the street who went to the rival college just to boast at the neighborhood holiday party. And maybe, just maybe, she will realize that no matter how much justification goes into it, having a big sign in your yard that reads “HO HO HO” is just wrong.

WWJ(M)D?

Every Tuesday night, well except for last week, I venture into the old Jewish area of Seattle known as Seward Park to take classes. These are real Jewish classes, not the pop culture, phony-assed Madonna Kabbalah bullshit. Tonight we discussed Jewish history, and with the Hanukkah holiday upon us, the topic inevitably turned to the Maccabees.

Here is a quick and simple lesson about Hanukkah for those whose knowledge of the Jewish holiday doesn’t go past that weird little spinney, top thing, and that way cool candle holder. The holiday of Hanukkah started when the Greco-Syrians conquered the land of Judea, many, many moons ago. The Maccabees, led by Judah Maccabee, decided not to deal with the Syrians and their shit, so they fought a big, victorious battle and reclaimed Judea. In the time that the Syrians had Judea, they totally trashed the sacred temple, so when the Maccabees took over, they had to clean and rededicate the temple. The candle holder is significant, because there was this special blessed oil that they used to dedicate the temple, but there was only enough to burn for one day, and since Wicks ‘n’ Sticks wasn’t around back then, they didn’t have the means of obtaining more oil. In the end, they said “fuck it” and decided that one day’s worth of oil was better than a temple filled with Syrian stank, so they did their deed and one day’s oil burned for eight crazy nights (hence the miracle).

Fast forward a few thousand years to now where Hanukkah has become the Jewish Christmas. My non-Jewish friends are often surprised when I tell them that this little candle lighting festival is actually a minor holiday. We don’t stop working or eating, and we do a prayer, but it’s a little one. In Israel and other non-U.S. countries, Hanukkah is just all about lighting some skinny candles, and maybe getting a new pair of socks.

I sat back thinking about the current status of Hanukkah as a godless orgy of consumption, where the real story, much like Christmas, gets told, but the words seem to lack any real meaning. I began to ask myself: What Would Judah (Maccabee) Do?

First of all, Judah and his Maccabee sons were hardcore, right wing Jews. They make the Israeli Chassidics (you know the guys with the long, curly sideburns and beards from hell) look like drunken fraternity brothers in a Saturday night game of naked, Crisco Twister. If Judah saw the way modern Jews were celebrating the occasion where he and his kids fought with all of their blood and soul so that a temple could be preserved, yet most of the people lighting candles don’t even go to the modern day temples, he would get pissed. I’m not talking mildly pissed, like when the annoying family member makes off-color remarks at dinner and laughs at their own jokes, I’m talking ‘cut off your head, spit down your neck pissed.’

I continue to ask, “what would Judah (Maccabee) do” about the raging consumerism. Again, he would get pissed, because after fighting a battle, he and his children had to reclaim a land that had been officially pillaged. We don’t see much pillaging nowadays, but almost everyone has had something they loved stolen from them, and we know how angry it makes us. Imagine having a whole country’s worth of valuables stolen, and you want a new Xbox 360! ‘Better you should give that money to people who really need it.’ Judah would say. Given the fact that most American Jewish kids aren’t exactly hard up for anything, I would have to agree with the warrior patriarch.

In my final examination of the holiday that Hanukkah has morphed into, I asked “what would Judah (Maccabee) do” about some other Hanukkah details such as the annoying as hell “Dreidel Song,” the fact that Hanukkah has at least 500 different spellings, and my fruitless search for a low-fat, low-calorie latke (potato pancake) recipe. At this point, I think he would look at me, shake his head, and wonder why modern day Jews are such idiots. Then he might spend the rest of the night yelling at G-d, much like Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof, asking him why he drug his children into such battle when all future Jews would be obsessed with was spinning tops, eating foods that didn’t exist during his time, and buying gifts for each other.

I can empathize with Judah Maccabee, and I have decided to spend this year’s Hanukkah exhibiting the same kind of pride in my people as the patriarch did when he waged the uphill battle against the Syrians, and to prove it, I’m definitely going to fashion those blinking blue and white lights into a Star of David on my front lawn.

Thanksgiving: The Gluttonous Food Orgy

Of all of the holidays I dread the most, Thanksgiving is at the top of my list. There are many reasons that I don’t particularly care for the November holiday: my mom died two weeks before Thanksgiving last year, all of the stores skip the horn of plenty décor and go straight for Christmas crap, and no matter how diet conscious you attempt to be, there is no escaping the food.

We were down in Southern California this year for Thanksgiving, which was great from a weather point of view. I’ve found that the warmer you are, the less you eat, which is why people in the mid-West tend to be on the hefty side, while those on the warm, West Coast are a little svelter. It could also be that the West Coasters are vacuous and care more about their looks than their health, but that’s another story. My in-laws claimed the weather was chilly, but they shiver when it dips below 70 degrees. I was just fine, and spent nearly the entire turkey holiday without a jacket.

I still am not sure why any activity remotely related to family seems to center around food, but I’m thinking that if I had been orphaned at a young age I could have spent my teenage years doing something productive like writing poetry or publishing my own magazine instead of trying to use the pliers to zip up my jeans, while one of the Christinas measured my hips. I know most people out there can empathize, after all, is there another house you ever go into, besides your own, where the first thing you do is look in the fridge or cabinets for something to eat?

On turkey day, I began by drinking at least two cups of really strong coffee, while my husband, up at least two hours before me, was studying the ads like they were the Torah. Coffee usually takes my appetite away, and I wanted to save all of my points for the actual meal. I spent most of the day dancing the fine line between trying to help my mother-in-law prepare dinner and staying out of the kitchen to avoid diving into the cheese and crackers. I did pretty well most of the day, until as usual; my brother-in-law and his wife were their mandatory 30 minutes late holding everyone in the family room salivating while the buffet in the kitchen teased us with its fantastic scent.

While we all waited, a great crowd of family and friends was on hand to talk with. I had spent the day before coaching myself to lay off anything alcoholic, but as I said before, it was a crowd of family and friends, so wine helped me enjoy the scenario without going out of my mind. How many times can you really talk about various family members’ illnesses before you want to kill yourself?

When the actual meal did finally take place, I spied the selections carefully avoiding anything with more than two cups of sugar or fat in the recipe. Thank goodness white meat turkey is one of the best meats you could eat. I loaded up on that stuff, despite knowing that I would be in that weird Thanksgiving turkey coma a mere 55 minutes later. I skipped the stuffing and the Jell-O mold; the stuffing to avoid the fat, the Jell-O mold, because they always freaked me out just a bit, and don’t ask me why. My meal basically consisted of veggies and meat, but it was great and I didn’t feel so guilty about it.

It’s kind of strange to think about what this particular holiday evolved from. In school we learned that it was a fun feast between the Pilgrims and the Native Americans, which when I went to elementary school were still referred to as Indians. In college, the real story came out that the meal was really a ploy to give the Native Americans (which is what they were referred to by the time I went to college) diseased blankets, so they would get sick and die, and the uber-religious, hypocrite Pilgrims could take their land. It must seem so justifying now to the Native Americans that the decedents of those same swarthy, lying bastards are now in their tribal casinos every weekend losing an assload of money. What can you say, payback is truly a bitch!

After two days of turkey leftovers and dining out, I hit the food wall on Saturday night, so hard; I didn’t even eat the cookie the nice flight attendant offered me on the plane ride home. Gluttony may be a fun thing to do in one short, yearly spurt, but if you carry it on for any length of time, you begin to feel like that poor, severely obese guy on tv who had to be carried to the hospital on a horse gurney.

I’m glad Thanksgiving is over, and I can once again return to my normal eating and workout schedules. I’m also glad that I’m only a third generation American, so none of my relatives had anything to do with the raw deal those pious, English schmucks gave the Native Americans. However, I’ll still gladly support their casinos.

Greener on the Other Side?

My husband’s favorite expression, mostly when I’m bitching about him and the kid, is “the grass is always greener on the other side.” He says this snidely, like I’m going to stop mid-bitch and realize that despite the fact that he is on the computer looking up shit for his business while Rachael’s wet diaper is sagging on the floor leaving puddles on the carpet, I have it good and should appreciate his inaction. Of course this never works, and I complete the bitching flawlessly.

Today, his “greener on the other side” theory got put to the test. I sent him and the girl to the airport this afternoon to fly a day ahead of me to California for the big family Thanksgiving. I felt a surge of elation as I dropped them off realizing that, for the first time since Rachael’s birth, I was on my own for 24 hours. It felt like I was single again, except when I went to the can and ended up staring at the faded, tiny stretch marks on my belly. I was on my own for an entire day to do as I pleased.

I contemplated all of the ways I could spend the next 24 hours. First off, I would have to finish my workday at The Facility. Thankfully, my supervisor and boss took off early, so I did too. Then I was off to fulfill an important task: getting my nails done. I ended up in downtown Renton early, so I popped over to get gas and a slice of goopy, cheese pizza. This is my guilty pleasure when I have enough points available to indulge.

I spent a quick hour in the nail salon amid the flurry of Vietnamese-speaking nail techs and children running excitedly through the tiny shop. For a moment I sat in my car thinking I should call and check in, but then I remembered that I was free for the night, and accountable to no one.

I blew off my Jewish studies class, which means I’m on lox and bagel restriction for at least a month, and headed to the mall. Although I knew there would be Christmas music blaring as far as the ear could hear, and that I was never that fond of shopping, I loved the idea of going somewhere and not having a time restriction.

I spent two hours perusing the shops, and getting pissed that I’m down 30 pounds and the new fashion seeping into all the stores like toxic mold is Boho. I don’t want to dress like a hippie. I don’t want to dress like an earthy hippie, a rich hippie, or a stylish hippie, therefore I can only hope the style changes within the next ten pound loss, because I’m not dressing like a fucking hippie. The sad thing is that the Boho look has creeped into everything: jewelry, purses, and shoes. It really sucks!

The positive thing that came out of my mall experience was that I learned I’m down another size, which is good especially since I’ve hit a weight loss plateau for the last two weeks, and Thanksgiving is the day after tomorrow.

Jeff finally called to check in with me while his mother gave Rachael a bath. He was probably going to get together with one of his more interesting friends tonight, and I was off to pick up some sushi. The rest of my evening will be spent folding laundry, lounging while I watch bad tv, working out during Law & Order: SVU, and staying up until the wee hours of the night playing a mindless, computer game. Best of all, I won’t have anyone asking me when I’m coming to bed, or why I’m playing ridiculous computer games instead of finishing my book.

I do miss my little munchkin. She was in a happy mood today, and her smile is a bit addictive, but I can forego a sloppy, toddler kiss until tomorrow afternoon. Although I have to work tomorrow, I get to leave early, and enjoy a solo flight for the first time in three years. I get to sit down in an aisle seat and read a magazine. Oh, the small things in life we find ourselves grateful for.

The next few days will be spent in sunny California, which will be a nice break from the freezing cold fog that has consumed Seattle. The only downside will be the natural drama that seems to happen every time anyone group of loosely related people come together, do some drinking, and attempt to do something stupid like enjoy a holiday. Nobody can ever seem to do the Cleaver Family thing properly, but at least I’ll be in the right mindset. The grass may not be greener on the other side in the long run, but I’m happy to spend a day or two on the lawn.

The Music of the Christmas Season

I can’t tell you how many years I’ve hated Christmas music. It’s one of those annoying things that you don’t think about until one day, usually as early as October, you are in a store, and there it is: “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas…” All that runs through my head at that point is; oh fuck, it’s that time of year again!

I know most will think my loathing of the Christmas season is because I’m Jewish, but hopefully you are more original, and hate idiots who go for the obvious. I’ve never liked Christmas. As a kid, when the big reward in our house was putting the star on the top of the Christmas tree, I would retire to my room and let my sister or brother have the honor. Putting up the tree was always a big pain in the ass. I grew up in a completely non-religious household, because my stepdad didn’t want to play “G-d’s ballgame,” and my mom was one of those freaky, hippie types that were way more “spiritual” than religious. We did the Christmas morning with all the presents thing, and the tree, but I was never into it.

As I got older, I kind of grew to resent Christmas, because as with anything in this country, the soul behind the true meaning gets thrown away in favor of blatant, rampant commercialism. My mother’s birthday was on October 26th, and one year I went out in the middle of the Halloween month only to be confronted by tons of faux pine trees and big, red, velvet bows. I complained to the store manager, but he said he got the orders to display the Christmas shit the first week of October.

Thank goodness for the internet! With the invention of this little shopping paradise, I’m able to avoid the “holiday shopping rush” completely. It’s not that I don’t love sales or buying for others, in fact I would rather buy a complete stranger a gift than have to shop for jeans for my fat ass; I just hate the Christmas music. Is it a requirement that those songs be annoying? Has anyone written a cool Christmas song only to be told by the powers that be that they can’t release it, because the chorus just doesn’t grate on someone’s nerves quite the same way as “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree”? I love Bing Crosby’s voice, but if I have to hear him sing “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” for the 500th time, I’m going to go completely ape shit.

Hands down, the only Christmas song I don’t feel down right wretched about hearing is Elvis’ “Blue Christmas”. That man can sing anything, and thankfully, his Christmas song is starting to become popular, so if I have to brave a store, I can count on hearing it at least once.

I don’t mind classical or musak, give me all of the Christmas elevator you’ve got, but please keep Christina, Brittney, and Mariah’s versions of “our holiday favorites” out of my aural range. They don’t add anything to these tunes, except more annoyance, and since most stores probably have a loop of Christmas songs that get updated about every ten years, there’s no point in adding any of these pop divas, because these broads don’t have a combined ten years left in their careers.

Unfortunately, I don’t have a good alternative to Christmas music to offer the general public. Adam Sandler did a bang-up job on putting out the “Hanukkah Song,” and I appreciate his ambition in releasing a new and updated version of it each year, but one can only listen to it twice a day without going insane. Our other Jewish holiday song is the “Dreidel Song,” which is about as bad as an Ashley and Jessica Simpson duet of “Here Comes Santa Claus.” As for Kwanza or Diwali (the Hindu, end of the year holiday), I’ve never heard any of those holidays’ theme music, so if they have something catchy and nice, they should step forward and offer it up. Our society is so freaky about being P.C. that I’m sure the more “cultural” holiday music would manage to make its way into a few of the average malls’ holiday music lexicon before some conservative, white guy pitched a fit.

In a few weeks, I’ll host the hors d’oeuvres part of the Neighborhood Progressive Dinner, and everyone will just have to be satisfied with some good ol’ classical. Maybe, if I’m in a good mood, I’ll whip out the London Royal Symphony’s version of The Nutcracker. Otherwise, I’ll take it upon myself to enlighten our multicultural, non-Jewish neighborhood dwellers with an hour of Israeli music, while running 8 Crazy Nights on a constant loop on the tv up in the family room. Either way, you can be damn sure “Let It Snow” and “O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree” will be no where in sight.

Bigger, Faster, Better, More

I’m continually fascinated by our somewhat fucked up society. Like a demanding spouse or a nagging parent, nothing is ever good enough for us. In the ‘70s, the single family home was too small, and the sprawling rambler came along. In the ‘80s, regular models were no longer good enough, you had to have supermodels. In the ‘90s, you couldn’t just be pissed off; your life had to be completely angst-ridden, and now in the new millennium, although we bitch a lot, bigger is definitely better.

We all know that guy who will kvetch to no end about paying $120 every time he has to fill up his Suburban, and to be politically correct, he gives a great cock ‘n’ bull story about getting rid of it as soon as he can pull together enough scratch for a hybrid, but he’s full of shit and we all know it. The fact is, he loves the feeling of towering over the other cars in his way, and having two tons of steel at his control. Sure, he gets that horrible sense of foreboding as the gas gauge nears the “E”, but he will never give up his manly ride for something more efficient.

Less obvious to the naked eye is the fact that the “bigger, faster, better, more” philosophy has spilled over into the idea of family. A couple of years ago, the family movie of the season was Cheaper by the Dozen. The story of a nice, mid-Western couple who longs for the pitter-patter of a whole herd of feet, and wind up with a dozen adorable kids. He’s a football coach, she’s a successful author, and chaos does ensue, but when it’s caused by someone as cute as Hillary Duff, it makes for a great movie.

This year, a dozen wasn’t enough. I have been inundated with previews and movie posters about a man with eight kids who gets into a relationship with a woman with ten kids, it’s called Yours, Mine, and Ours, and it seems ridiculous. First off, after carrying and giving birth to ten kids, no woman is going to be that thin, unless she’s married to a plastic surgeon and has a surrogate on call. Secondly, I’m wondering when the movie about the people with 30 kids is going to be out. Perhaps it will be 2008, and will star Julia Roberts as a woman who just haphazardly gives birth to sets of triplets, and Jude Law could play a very fertile man whose seed seems to only harvest twins.

Despite the concept of the Brady Bunch on crack, its fiction, and even more, it’s Hollywood where reality doesn’t exist, and all reason is thrown out the window if there’s a chance to make a buck and sell merchandising rights for Happy Meal toys. Nothing like this multiple kid conundrum could ever really happen in our bigger, faster, better, more society, right? Think again; an Arkansas family who just had #16 and isn’t opposed to adding a few more new faces to their enormous brood. They have been featured on CNN, Primetime Live, and are the subject of a Discovery Health Channel special.

Apparently, the mother (a uterus with a bad ‘80s haircut) home schools all of the children, and laughs about spending $2,000 a month on groceries. They proudly bear bumper stickers on their minivan praising George W. Bush, and to make everything a little more confusing have made all their kids’ names start with the letter “J”. I, personally, don’t want to be there when the kids are behaving like perfect publicity robots, I want to be there when the mommy is sick of never having sleep or a moment to herself, and loses it locking all of the kids in the shed. I want to see the look on the dad’s face when he has to fain happiness as his wife tells him for the 17th time that she’s pregnant, which means they will be great grandparents before they ever have the opportunity to just be a couple again.

The most disturbing part of this “bigger family is a better family” is the fact that it only applies to certain families. If the family is a bit chaotic, cute, and Caucasian, everything is okay and it makes for a great, Hollywood movie. However, if you were to put Ice Cube and Jada Pinkett Smith in the lead roles, then I think your average American moviegoer’s comments would change rapidly. I know several wonderful Mexican families from my childhood in Idaho that were all about double digit kids, and they were called a “menace” and “irresponsible.”

Bigger, faster, better, more may work when it comes to cars, video games, and devices to store illegally downloaded music on, but when it comes to the good ol’ American family, you’d better leave it at two and a half kids and a dog. After all, in this society, the family becomes less appealing when the father looks more like George Lopez than Dennis Quaid and the mother is Rosario Dawson, not Rene Russo.

Whores Deserve Cancer

Did you ever hear something on television that was so outrageous it rendered you mute? This happened to me the other day, and I can tell you that it isn’t often that I’m stricken speechless. I was flipping through the channels, innocently enough, when I came across the wonderful news that there had been a bonafide cure developed for cervical cancer. Each year over 10,000 women in the U.S. and hundreds of thousands of women worldwide are stricken with this painful form of cancer. Now that there’s a vaccine, all is well…now for the dumbfounding part.

Apparently a conservative Christian group is fighting the release of the vaccine in the U.S., because they believe it will encourage women to be more sexually active. I guess they figure that the women who contract cervical cancer are slutting around, and end up with a more than normal amount of nastiness in the ‘gina region. Therefore, cervical cancer is just G-d’s way of punishing them for being women of lowly virtue, and if given the vaccine, they would be cured and would continue their loose lifestyle.

Two and a half minutes into this report, the speechlessness had left me, and I was spinning around the family room like the Tasmanian Devil stuck in Seattle rush hour traffic. Beyond pissed doesn’t even begin to describe my mood. Of all of the ridiculous fucking things that I’ve heard in my life, the idea that women should be allowed to painfully suffer and die of cancer, because they weren’t virgins when they got married made me really pro-nuclear at that point.

What continues to piss me off, days after watching this jaw-dropping news report, is the plain ignorance of the Christian extremist right. I realize that the women inflicted with the cancer will certainly be curtailing their sexual practices, but I doubt the women who receive the life-saving vaccine will change the course they are currently on. Also, what about the woman who was a virgin when she got married, and spent her life being faithful to her husband, yet contracted the disease, because he didn’t return the monogamy? Maybe these particular Christians, instead of banning the vaccine, should ask the government to approve a Whore Review Board.

Women afflicted with cervical cancer could go before all of the white, male, Christian ministers, and if she was found to have a chaste life, would be able to receive the vaccine as long as she signed a special contract agreeing to continue her virtuous lifestyle. If she violated the contract, she would immediately be injected with a quicker, more deadlier form of cancer as her atonement.

I may not be a Christian, but I have Christians in my family, and growing up in this American society has naturally given me some exposure to the teachings of Jesus. With the limited amount of information I know regarding the J man, I can safely say that I don’t think he would have approved of letting women suffer from cancer. I also think that other, more reasonable Christians should have these idiots who claim to represent them censored or excommunicated.

When I look at these bloated, Caucasian, baby boomer males talking about letting women suffer from cancer, images of darker skinned, Afghani males come to mind. Yes, that’s right, I am comparing the leaders of the Christian right who want to ban a cancer cure with the Taliban, because the only difference between the two is the Christians let their wives shop at JC Penney while the Taliban wives are cruising the sales racks at Abdullah’s Burqa Hut.

Anytime you have an unreasonable group of zealots who are willing to let innocent people suffer in order to advance their religious agenda, it’s just wrong, oppressive, and theocratic. I just thank my lucky stars that Bush is finally falling flat on his ass in the polls, and given the most recent elections, people in this country are beginning to come to their senses and realize that just because you don’t like an aggressive amount of sex on t.v. doesn’t mean that you believe women shouldn’t be given a lifesaving vaccine.

I’m not all that worried that the drug won’t be approved by the FDA, because if there’s one thing our government loves more than moral values, it’s money, and Merck is championing this vaccine, and they have a lot of money. Thankfully, by this time next year all of us whores will be eligible to receive the vaccine for cervical cancer, and maybe we won’t have to go before the review board.

Airborne Cocktails and TB

I grew up in a household that was quite hypocritical when it came to health issues. My stepfather was inflicted with a genetic lung disorder that made him terminally ill at a young age, until he was able to have a double lung transplant ten years ago. Some of the rules in our house barred the use of Aquanet indoors, and given the hairstyle I achieved through enormous amounts of the toxic spray, should have extended the ban to include the town I lived in. We adopted disposable paper cups as our vessel of rinse when we brushed our teeth, and were asked to apply perfume at school. We were very careful and health conscious when it came to all issues of the lungs.

For everything else, we were miserable failures. Eating disorders, depression, low blood pressure, and a serious lack of exercise riddled the house of my youth, so when I went to college, I had a lot of catching up to do. I took nutrition and health classes, and adopted a rigorous exercise regimen that led me into the arena of bodybuilding for awhile.

I have always been a relatively healthy person, but since my daughter has come into the picture, I have experienced an irrational number of colds, flu bugs, and other weird bouts of ickiness. This shouldn’t be a shock since kids are basically walking disease boxes in Children’s Place clothing, especially those who attend daycare. They have no concept of cleanliness and think nothing of putting some other kid’s possessions in their mouth.

My husband is one of those paranoid hand washing people, and thankfully, he has passed this obsession on to my daughter, which does help the illness situation, but we still get the sick bugs running through the house.

Lately, I’ve been experiencing feelings of yuckiness, and no, I’m not pregnant. Since I’m not one who runs to the doctor at the drop of a hat, I have instead chose to dose myself with a nearly nightly cocktail of two Airborne tablets with a side of 1,000 mg of vitamin C and a multi. It has helped my yucky feeling, but it still makes me wonder if I’m one step away from starting the pandemic flu.

Since achieving Mommy status, I have been far more paranoid regarding health issues, which is normal for a woman, particularly a Jewish woman. I’ve done all the reading up on the Avian flu, and I am prepared to wall myself and my family up in my house until it passes. Rachael is current on all of her vaccinations, and whether my husband fears needles or not, we are all getting flu shots this year!

Lately serious health issues, aside from the pandemic flu, haven’t crossed my mind, until yesterday. As an employee of The Facility, I was required to get a skin test for tuberculosis. Okay, if you have half a brain, you’ve figured out that I work for some sort of health provider, but legally I can’t say which one, so don’t ask. Anyways, I went in faithfully and had a pea sized amount of TB injected into my arm on Monday. Tuesday, I had a red mark the size of a dime. Wednesday, it was the size of a nickel and slightly itchy. Thursday, when the nurse looked at it, she was sure I had a positive skin test. That’s right, all of my Airborne and vitamin cocktails, a regular workout schedule, and the absence of red meat from my diet and I’m taken out by something as relevant to our time as polio or shingles.

Thankfully, my bump didn’t measure up. In the world of the TB skin test a ten millimeter bump is a positive measure, I had a seven. I have to go back in for a follow up skin test next week. If it turns out positive, then comes the chest x-ray along with blood and urine tests. I went to the internet right away, and discovered that TB is completely curable. If any further tests prove that I have TB bacteria present in my body, I can begin a three month run of antibiotics that will wipe it away.

It just seems kind of strange that something like this could appear at this point in my life. I haven’t been around any coughers lately, traveled to Asia, Eastern Europe or South America for at least four years, and aside from a potentially positive skin test, I’m extremely healthy. It’s perplexing, and has now made me a bit of a nervous wreck.

I guess all I can do now is wait for the follow up test, which won’t give results until next Thursday; what a wonderful way to begin a Thanksgiving vacation! At least I’m not contagious. You have to be coughing in order to be contagious, so for now, I’m just walking around as a potential TB carrier. Perhaps I’ll try three Airborne tablets tonight; after all, it couldn’t hurt.

People Who Need to Be Slapped

There are a whole lot of people out there who need a good bitch slapping. Corrupt politicians, bigots, blonde heiresses, and a president or two could all use a hard one upside the head. These are the obvious recipients. When we see them our hand kind of tingles, but there is limited access to these folks, so instead we just cringe when we see them and rely on Jon Stewart and Bill Mahr to bash them regularly on cable tv.

Most people in my day-to-day life are lovely. I am pleased to be surrounded by a good group of friends, co-workers, and acquaintances. Sure, every now and again I have to run like hell to the bookstore to avoid wanting to physically injure the man and child I live with, but that’s what happens when three individuals with unique and strong personalities decide to reside in the same house.

There are a select few people in my life right now that I don’t see all that often, but when I do see them, piss me off to no end. These are the people who I’m forced to deal with from time to time, and have to be polite to for the sake of making the occasional time I spend with them less of a hell, and no, they aren’t all relatives or in-laws.

One of the people whose head I’d like to go upside is a woman who attends the same class I do on Tuesday night. For the past few months I’ve been taking a Jewish studies course. Most of the people in the class are great. They are wonderful, thinking people with easy-going personalities who are always willing to make small talk and greet you with a smile, then there’s this bitch. Orthodox Jews who observe the Sabbath, and adhere to the laws of Jewish living are called frum. Sometimes, the women, who often dress modestly covering their hair, are crudely referred to, by less observant Jews, as frummies. I don’t know if the chick that annoys the hell out of me in my haven of Jewish study and thinking is going for the award of “Frummy of the Year,” but she’s pissing me off in the process.

Usually, I approach people who try way too hard to fit in with pity. I mean, how pathetic is your life when you have to go out of your way to be something in order to get acceptance. If you were meant to fit in with a group or be a certain way, it would just come organically and with little effort. This woman has crossed over from pity case to annoying, and the very tone of her voice makes me want to slap her a good one.

She was semi-polite to me until the night I walked into class wearing slacks. She kind of gave me a pissy look and went out of her way, in a very clownish and animated gesture, to hug another (more observant) Jewish woman who walked in the room behind me. I realize I may not be the fabulous fashionista I would like to be, and I don’t dislike this woman, because she doesn’t like my pants, I could give a shit less about her critique of my personal style. What chews my cheese is that she was judging me, and who the fuck is she to judge me!

It’s bad enough that I have to watch her kiss ass to every rabbi who comes in to teach, or that I have to stand in line to ask a relevant question about the lesson, because she wants the rabbi to know that she is inviting his wife over for coffee, to be judged by a woman who pairs Nikes with a long jean skirt, frumpy sweater, and a poly-cotton blended beret is just too much.

All of my experiences with members of the Orthodox Jewish community have been wonderful, so I can’t hold one bad seed against them, and I wouldn’t encourage anyone else to either. Unfortunately, assholes reside in every group and every circumstance.

There are those waitresses with chips on their shoulders who believe that what they do isn’t merely food service, but a personal favor to you - the lazy woman who didn’t want to cook for her family. There are the people in the accounting and IT departments who assume you are stupid and have to explain some lame ass process to you, even though you don’t care, because in the end, it’s their job, not yours. And, we must not forget those friends you don’t see very often who send you the conservative spam email completely forgetting that you are against George Bush’s war for oil and worked on the Kerry campaign.

Yes, for every ten people you meet in life on a day-to-day basis at least one needs a good, hard bitch slap. The kind of slap that’s done with feeling like every fiber of your being draws your hand to their face with one smooth gliding motion, and releases a tension the size of a good Mt. Saint Helen’s blast. Unfortunately, what you see as a favor to society, most local authorities see as assault and battery, so you just have to look at those sorry bastards and daydream about slapping them. After all, dreaming is free.

Just Finish the Damn Book!

I normally pride myself on not caring what people think; especially when it comes to something I do creatively. I’ve weathered criticism before, the worst being when I published a small indie zine in Idaho. The entertainment editor for Boise’s largest daily newspaper went on and on about what a sellout, shitty rag the zine was. Did I mention that other than being a complete dick he was also egotistical, and basically stuck in Boise, because he couldn’t get a job writing for a bigger publication anywhere else. Anyways, like I said, I take criticism like a lady.

My worst critic is (be prepared for a shock) myself. I’ve been writing this damn book for nearly six months, yet lately when I want to do just a few more pages, a little voice in the back of my head begins telling me that instead of writing a compelling story, I’m penning mindless, romance novel drivel that will contribute nothing to society and make me a complete laughing stock. I wonder if George Orwell had this same problem.

I went to visit some of my former co-workers, all of which know about the book, and they greeted me with enthusiasm asking me when the book would be finished. Even my dad, who admits he is not exactly the most astute person, has asked me when I’m going to be finished with my book. Jeff regularly inquires about my progress, and sometimes I take it as general concern as opposed to more nagging, but again, I’m overcome with this sense of insecurity.

Worst case scenario: I could finish writing the book, and the only publisher interested would be Harlequin and my book would come out as a romance novel and be read by only a thousand people. Harlequin would pass on the option for a second book, and I would be relegated to dropping the other three books in the series or self-publishing.

Even worse case scenario: I could also end up getting turned down by Harlequin and have to completely self-publish which would be like taking a second job given the daunting task of marketing. After self-publishing and working myself ragged marking the hell out of my self-published work, I would only end up selling a small number of books to my friends and family, and figure out that it wasn’t worth self-publishing the rest of the series. I guess, in the end, it’s all a big gamble.

The best case scenario would be that I would get a nice publishing deal with a small, but influential publishing house that would call my book “cutting edge” and “emotionally real”. They would begin a successful grassroots marketing campaign that would lead to an assload of press and national recognition. My book would work to a best seller and I would end up on Oprah giving her little nibbles of information about the “much anticipated” second book in the series.

For years I worked in the music industry, and always admired the musicians I met, because even though some were famous enough to fill arenas while others drew a modest club audience, they got out there every night and played like they were on fire. If they had any self-doubt or moments of fighting off that voice in the back of their head, I never saw it on stage. I should take a queue from them, just finish the damn book, and put it out there.

It is an interesting story, after all. I mean, what woman in her lifetime hasn’t wanted a passionate romance with a rock star, or been in a situation where the relationship feels so good, but it’s bad for your life. I’ve re-worked the character slightly, because after reading through the first 100 pages, I thought she was beginning to come off like a bit of a whiny bitch. I want her to be struggling with choices, but I don’t want each decision to be a Vagisil moment.

In the end, I worry less about whether I’m good or if I suck, and more about just being mediocre. I don’t want to be one of the writers that are easy to pass by on the bookshelf. I want what I do to grab people and make them read the inner flap. I want people to read my work, and be honest about what they think. When I say I want to sell a million books, I’m less concerned about making money and more interested in having a million pairs of eyes examining my words with interest.

I guess the voice in my head comes from trying to compare myself with the writers I love, and constantly asking the question of whether my work is comparable to theirs. This I will never know, until some asshole who writes for a literary review tells me that my work is absolute drivel. For now, I should buck it up and finish the damn book. Who knows, I could be the next Margaret Atwood, Pearl S. Buck, or at least a less pathetic version of Janet Evanovich.

A Re-Discovered Appreciation for Friday

I’m finding myself in a weird place these days with working the new job, and all. Some of the things I’ve discovered such as traffic, my daughter’s clinginess when I drop her off at daycare, and trying to look busy during those last 45 minutes of the workday, when there’s nothing to do are big downers. Lately though, I’m beginning to remember a childhood pleasure that has re-emerged in my day-to-day life: the joy of Friday.

I don’t think there is a kid in America, barring the juvenile delinquent and the sorry, uber religious, home schooled bastard, who doesn’t associate Friday with fun and excitement. It’s the end of the week, the beginning of 48 hours of extremely limited structure where you can stay up watching cheesy, B-rated cable movies, and IM your friends until 2:00 AM. Then following fun Friday comes glorious Saturday with its “breaking all the rules” mayhem. On Saturday, we used to go to the dinky, little mall and buy cigarettes out of the vending machine until some Mormon legislator outlawed those sweet dispensers of addiction. I would spend Saturday night at Christina or Christina’s house, the only difference between the two being one Christina’s family would drag me to church on Sunday, while the other Christina’s mother made us waffles.

Sunday was always kind of a sad day, because it signaled the end of the fun. On Sunday you had to do your homework and fold laundry. You had to get to bed early on Sunday night and tiptoe around the house during the day, because Dad was sitting in his chair watching sports and he didn’t want to be bothered. There was nothing fun, exciting or mayhemish about Sunday, it was just a drag.

In college there was less appreciation for Friday, simply because I would usually skip class, or if I did go, the professor was so antsy to get his weekend started that he let us go early. Friday did usually include a game and a drunken party at Kappa Sigma, but that happened on Saturday, too, and on occasion the Kappa Sigs would throw down and party during the weekdays.

I entered the professional world and went into the music industry, where Friday was always a concert night. We would do shows on Fridays and Saturdays, so in a way, the regular week was a break for us, and because of the circumstance, ended up losing even more appreciation for the Friday.

After Rachael was born, I retired from the working world, and one day looked like any other. I would often figure out which day of the week it was by the amount of time Jeff would hang out around the house. He was in graduate school for most of Rachael’s first year of life, so even on the weekends he was gone. I would end up figuring out that it wasn’t a weekday by looking for Oprah around 4:00 PM, and getting football, which is somewhat sad and pathetic.

Now that I’m back at work, and on a regular schedule, the fun and excitement of Friday has returned. I look forward to the end of my productive work week, because I know that in between arranging the big event and trying to make the best of the six evening hours before bed, I get a 54 hour stretch of time that I can do whatever I want. Even when I had all the time in the world to waste, for some reason, it was too much of a good thing, and I didn’t recognize it as fun. However, much like the mainstream news and The Daily Show; you need to have a balance. You can’t appreciate the humor, fun and insightful, liberal perspective of The Daily Show without the boring, regimented, and right-wing slanted mainstream news.

On either Friday or Saturday, much like the days of old, you know, when MTV actually played videos, I stay up until 2:00 AM. The strange thing is, again much like the days of old, I’m alone watching television in my pajamas, but now it’s a bit different. Instead of wishing there was something better to do, like I did when I was a teenager, I revel in my late night, alone time. It’s just me and Comedy Central’s Secret Stash, where I can hear comics in all of their filth-ridden glory. Sometimes I write, sometimes I play computer games, and sometimes I just surf the web for whatever topic I feel like exploring. The next day, I get up lazily and we have breakfast as a family, and get out of the house for awhile. It’s a happy time, until Sunday evening rolls around, then just like the days of old, I’m neck deep in laundry, weekday planning, and mild housecleaning, all the while, looking forward to another glorious Friday.