Teacher's Pet

So tonight I was working on a little blurbity writing thing for my mom. She asked me to write a little farewell thing to her good friend, and my former band director. He actually taught every kid in my family. So at first, I was all “Hmm…I don’t really remember high school all that much. Wait, I WAS in band, wasn’t I?” Needless to say, it was a slow start. But then all of a sudden, I started having these memories of all the things, I guess you could call them LESSONS, I learned in school. And wouldn’t you know it? Apparently TEACHERS had something to do with it.

A few of my friends now are teachers. It. Is. Weird. First off, I always assumed all my teachers (until college) were like 100 years old and had no life outside of ruining my day with tests. I have a distinct memory of imagining my 5th grade English teacher – who was my favoritest teacher ever – grading papers all night every night and perusing the yearbooks to get to know her students in her spare time. But now, I know the truth: some of them sit down with a bottle of wine, and mindlessly assign B’s and D’s to papers while they watch American Idol. But then they also say things like “I need to think of a good way to explain fractions.” And then they brainstorm all these crazy fun things I would have LOVED to have done in my math classes as a kid. I find myself wishing my friends could have been my teachers. That would have ruled.

I had World’s Worst Teacher in first grade who smacked me on the knuckles with a ruler because I colored something wrong (my mom promptly removed me from the class), and then there was Every Single Math Teacher I Ever Had who I hated, but besides them, I’ve totally loved my teachers. Not surprisingly, the best one (mentioned above) was my first English/Writing teacher. She smelled like cigarettes all the time and had these long pointy finger nails that she’d poke into your head if you goofed off. But guess what? No one ever goofed off twice. Anyway, she taught me about prose and imagery and tone and using adjectives effectively. She picked me to read the part of Juliet when we started reading Shakespeare, and then, as if she were my own little Cupid, picked the boy I had a crush on to read Romeo. I just loved her.

In high school, there was my teacher who announced, on the very first day, “About 90% of you will fail my class. If you think you are in that 90%, please get out.” And then like 5 kids dropped the class because they believed him. But he was lying, and he was hilarious, and he was one of my greatest teachers. He taught me AP European History and I think I understood that better than regular ol’ American History.

In college, my writing classes were taught by grad students. One of them was actually a “working writer”, in that she was actually writing for publications on a regular basis. AND GOT PAID! She wrote (under a pseudonym) for various, eh hem, adult magazines. I was like star struck by her. And when she complimented me on the story I wrote about how much I loved my own butt – yup, that’s Big Ten University education right there, folks – I knew she just got me and I loved her ever since.

There's something really comforting about finally realizing that all those teachers who I loved and admired so much actually had lives outside of me. You know, they didn't just sit alone and concern themselves with what I was going to wear to school the next day like I used to assume. And then all day they'd be all inspiring (and a little scary sometimes). After I graduated and told people I got my degree in English, people always asked "So, are you going to be a teacher?" (as if that's all English majors are good for) and I'd be all disgusted and say "Ugh, no way! Work with kids all day?! PUKE." But I don't think very many people sit around and wax nostalgic about how a Sales Coordinator changed their lives as a kid. Consider this my good deed for the day, though: Thanks, teachers. I guess you're pretty okay. Now, if only you'd just shut up about getting summers off...

9021Ohhhh! I Get it Now!

Eeee! My friend Taylor is, at this very minute, having a baby. Gross! I mean, yay! I asked her how it was going, and she texted me back, "I just got an epidural. I love the epidural man." Haha. I'm so excited for her! I can't wait to see a bunch of naked baby pictures very very soon. Congrats, Taylor!

Welp, it's another night indoors, safe from the frigid biting wind that eats my face off every time I even look out a window. Sanna and I are crashed in front of the TV watching World's Girliest Shows. It's been made glaringly obvious to me lately how different TV has been since the boys moved out. With them, it was all MANswers and reality shows and Family Guy (oh my!). But now it's E! News, Teen Mom, and Lifetime movies. Tonight is the girliest night of all though. Later is Gossip Girl, but first is the train wreck that is the revamped 90210. To give you an idea of what we're dealing with here, I just heard this line from a girl who recently gave her illegitimate child up for adoption: "I am a teen former drug addict pop star on the cover of all the tabloids. I can't be a MOM, but I can be a reality star." Right.

So yeah, the new 90210, just like the old one, has the liars, the cheaters, the drug addicts, and the money. The premise is the same, too. The hilariously naive family from the Midwest moves out to West Bev, and gets a serious reality check when they see how them rich folk live. Poor, dumb Midwesterners. Then, voila! They are beautiful and end up fitting in just fine, because they are also rich. But this new 90210 has more gay people and celebrity scandals and fewer Jason Priestly's and old lady Ahhhhndreas. More trust funds, less side burns. Most importantly, though, the new one has no Ian Ziering, and I think we can all appreciate that.

Full disclosure: I lost interest in the original 90210 after probably the second season or so. Yes, I totally loved Brenda and the whole Walsh clan, because they were fresh off the Minnesota toboggan - Minnesota? They're just like me! And I thought I was destined to marry Luke Perry. But I didn't understand the entire context of the show. Like what "abortions" were, or what it meant that Dylan "cheated on" Brenda. What, like in Scrabble? That just didn't sound like such a big deal, geeeeez. So I bailed on the gang at the Peach Pit and went back to my obsession with Paula Abdul.

When I joined my sorority like 10 years later, the show was still on, but it had gone through quite the transformation and I was more disinterested than ever before. Now the whole gang was all living on their own, and wearing lots of dark eyeshadow, and just sleeping around. Plus, Kelly Kapowski had joined the cast, and it would appear that the virginal Donna Martin was no longer virginal, and we were expected to take Brian Austin Green seriously as a DJ and/or rapper. Really? Riiiiiight. But I forced myself to watch it, because all the girls in my house loved it. I had missed the last decade of the show, so I was a wee bit behind. I sat there in the informal living room at the House, surrounded by girls who were saying things like "Wait, didn't he JUST have a baby with so and so?" or "God, I can't stand the way she did that one thing to that guy and then they both got that disease!" I never spoke a word, but uttered fake gasps of disbelief as needed. I still just didn't get it.

Alas, I FINALLY got sucked in to the new 9-0. I've seen exactly 2 1/2 episodes but I'm pretty caught up, and I already know that Silver used to sleep with Teddy, who just came out and is now dating Ian, and Naomi was raped by some dude who then tried to blackmail her and attack her, but she took him down by - crazy! - spraying hair spray in his face. Girl power! And it actually makes so much sense to me this time around. And while I could appreciate the adorable floral print overalls and kicky sunflower hats of the old episodes, the fashion on the new version is far superior. Balenciaga AND Givenchy? Yes, please!

And to think, I could have missed out on yet another interpretation of life in good ol' Beverly Hills. But thanks to the overflow of estrogen seeping in to every nook and cranny of my house, I was spared the humiliation of not knowing what Lori Laughlin is up to these days.

Okay, I know that I've probably lost 90% of you by now. I know many of you are all "Uh, I could not care less about this show, and I have no idea what the Peach Pit is." And, like you, I used to think I was better than those crazy kids at West Beverly. But like the eternal love of Dylan and Kelly, once I got a fresh taste I just couldn't stay away. Stupid fake teens, with your fake problems, and fake noses...why can't I quit you?

I will say this for sure, though. The old theme song is WAY BETTER than the new, waterier version. Sometimes you just can't improve on the original.

Security System

Oh Pharon. Pharon, Pharon, Pharon. I’m quite disappointed in you tonight. In lieu of doing the responsible thing of tuning in to watch the State of the Union address, you eagerly turned on the Family Channel to watch the much-anticipated movie, Mean Girls 2. And shortly after that, I saw you drop a chunk of $9 cheese on the floor, pick off the hair, and continue eating it. For shame, young lady. For Shame.

Instead of eating rug cheese and watching the only movie on the planet that would be better WITH Lindsay Lohan in it, I SHOULD be at Liz’s house, chatting about life and drinking wine. I made a decision though to stay in and paint my nails tonight (much to Geo’s appreciation) and try to just chillax. Do people still say “chillax“? Probs not. Oh well, I’m retro now. I’ve been all anxious for the past week. Like, not just stressed, but crazy-in-the-head anxious. I don’t know where it came from, but I just haven’t been able to shake it. Tonight, though, I’ve focused solely on myself and trying to get myself to calm down already. Hence the relationship I have forged tonight with hairy cheese and a bad movie. Not a stressor in the bunch.

You know when you’re feeling crappy, and like there’s only one thing that makes you feel better? For some it’s tea, or yoga, or a stiff cocktail. In my case, it’s my childhood blanket. It used to be vivid pinks and polka dots with Strawberry Shortcake smack dab in the middle. These days it's brownish with no discernible design of any kind, it's ripped up, torn, tied back together in some places, and could function better as a headband than an actual blanket. But it calms me down and makes me feel like I’m 5 years old again. The major problemo with that is that I actually still sleep with my blanket every night. Sexy, right? Whatevs. I scrunch it between my fingers, which lets me fidget in concentrated doses. And I also like to smell it. Not like “sniff” it, but bury my nose in it and smell it reeeeeeal good. In high school, my dad walked past my bedroom and saw me inhaling my blanket and scrunching it between my fingers, and he just like sighed and said “You look like a mental patient.”

So I tried to tone down my reliance on my blanket in college. But when I lived with Kim, she discovered my (very) dirty secret. She picked up the filthy, flimsy fabric between her thumb and pointer fingertip and sneered “What IS this?” I snatched it away from her and snarled “It’s my BLANKET. GOD!” Then I scurried off into the corner of my bed to hide away my Precious. Yes, just like that troll doll guy in Lord of the Rings. After that, Kim would laugh and laugh and laugh as I tore our apartment apart looking for my blanket that she had maliciously hidden from me. I’d find it eventually, and then take it and try and shove it in Kim’s mouth to punish her.

These days, it’s Geo I have to worry about tearing me apart from my security blanket. He’s seen it. In fact, I think KIM was the one to introduce them. He freaked out like it was a blanket made out of marriage proposals and snakes. “Oh God, that’s disgusting! You SLEEP with this?” My initial rage at his, his, nerve to insult me like that subsided quickly into shame and embarrassment. He noticed my quick descent into humiliation and said, “Well, no. I mean, like, it’s, uh, cute, um that you still sleep with your, ah, blankey”. I slowly perked up and pulled it out from the pillow I’d hidden it under. I kept pulling and pulling and pulling, and the blanket kept coming and coming and coming. I sniffled and smiled a little, and looked up at Geo and said “Heh heh…look how LONG it is!” Geo doubled over laughing and repeating like a parrot, “Look how LONG it is…look how LONG it is!” I laughed and decided not to shove the blanket into his mouth to punish HIM. Yet.

For now, my blanket is safe. Well, not “safe” in the healthy way - I can’t wash it or it will disintegrate - but “safe” in the I-Know-No-One-Will-Steal-And-Hide-It way. Although, Geo got me this super soft teddy bear, hoping it would ween me off my blanket. What he didn‘t see coming was that the blanket and bear go perfectly together. So now I’ve got a team backing me up when I feel like shizzah.

Which is definitely going to be useful tonight. I’ve already felt like a mental patient lately, so why not go all out and just compulsively sniff and fidget with my blanket while I rock back and forth relax? Oh man, I hope my dad doesn’t read that…

Oh, Brother

You guys have no idea how close I am to calling Stacy in for this one. I. Am. Pooped. For the past couple nights, I have not slept well at all, and I just polished off a big burger, fries and scoop of vanilla sundae at dinner. I'm basically comatose. But, we must press on, folks. We must.

After one of the world's longest hump days at work, I went and had some din-din with my family at Hazeltine. What's the occasion, you ask? Tonight officially kicks of the "Month of Too Many Birthdays" in my family. We've got, at my last count, 6 birthdays in a month. Tonight was Perek's birthday (HBD, Bro!) so we kicked off the Birthday Season in style.

We were all sitting there, digesting the nummy food, when Perek pointed towards the melting ice cream in front of him. "What did we used to call that?" he asked. I got this big grin on my face and said "Mmm. Snake Soup." He and I would build forts and sit in there with big bowls of ice cream, and stir it and stir it until the ice cream totally melted. We'd add "goat's eyeballs" and "tongue of newt" and then slurp it up. Gross. Plus, hello Dummies? We didn't even put SNAKE in Snake Soup. Idiots.

Anyway, that particular memory prompted me to recall many other joyous and possibly life-scarring memories about him and me growing up.

* We used to have one of those arcade basketball games in our basement - you know, the ones with two baskets, and you shoot baskets for like 45 seconds or something. Anyway, Perek was like 12, and was in the basement shootin' hoops. Alone. I crept down the stairs, snuck around the corner, jumped out behind him and screamed "BOOOOOOOO!" He screamed bloody murder, collapsed to the ground, cried, and basically hyperventilated for a minute. I haven't laughed that hard in a very long time.

* My sisters taught Perek the wrong colors growing up. We also gave him erroneous pronunciations of words like Japan.

* He used to not eat food if anyone "breathed on it". Once we discovered that, we'd blow all over his food and laugh and laugh and laugh while he'd cry and refuse to eat.

* The most well-known quote in my family was "They're just jealous." My mom would say that to Perek anytime we'd pick on him, which was daily. When we made fun of him for having a near-life-size poster of himself playing soccer in his own room, my mom hugged him to her and said "Oh Perek, they're just jealous". And that twerp would fake cry and stick his tongue out at us.

* Kids in the 80's were so much tougher than kids today. Perek and I would put on our "sleepers" - those awesomely frictiony footie pajamas - and shoot down our staircase on our butts. We'd skid down the stairs (which were only carpeted in the middle of each step) at light speed. And besides the wall, the only things keeping us "safe" were the precariously sharp wrought-iron banisters lining one side. The sliding was very fun. The smashing into the banister was NOT fun.

* Do you guys remember the music in the Sega game Sonic? AWESOME. We'd play the game and every once in awhile, something in the wordless music just made us blurt out a line and we'd write songs based on that first, impetuous line. The lines made no sense together, but somehow the words came to us like they just FIT. When we were at Geo's cabin a few months ago, Perek and flipped on Sonic to see if we could remember any words. The ones we remembered were gems such as "Must have been some magic.....must have been some magic in that old silk hat they found", "duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh, we'll take the freeway up!" and "ba ba da ba ba da ba What are we gonna dooooo?" What? Horrible lyrics. I hope I can remember them forever though.

It was never dull growing up in a house with so many kids, but Perek was the ONLY one I could, like, preside over because he is the only one younger than me. And I would like to think I took that responsibility seriously. Okay, so YES, he's younger than me and he's married and a home owner way before I am, but that doesn't matter. I will always be the one who reminds him, in public, that he didn't wear jeans until he was 15 AND I was the one who urged him to get his first "cool kid haircut". Yeah, you're welcome, bro ham. Happy Birthday, Perek!

The Red and Green Blues

Well, I hope you guys had a magical, surprising, loving, joyful Christmas like I did. But does anyone else get the post-Christmas blues? I just got home from spending like 2 1/2 days with my ginormous family, and here I’m back at my house just, like, taskless. For over a month, I spent so much time thinking of gifts (for 15 people), researching gifts, buying gifts, returning gifts, finding an outfit suitable of being both festive and elastic-y to cushion all the holiday foods, and now it’s just…over. I hauled all my gifts home tonight, and I dug through them to enjoy some of them immediately. Just trying to stretch out the feeling, I guess. I’ve got my new boots on from Geo, I’m guzzling sipping the holiday wine my brother-in-law Ben made (zummy! It’s one of my favorite wines!) from a Kate Spade mug Prinna gave me, taking random pictures of nothing with my new camera from my parents, and I just kind of keep going through everything. I just got them yesterday, and it’s like they’re already keepsakes.

Sometimes it’s hard to take it all in when it’s happening, you know? I remember hearing somewhere that if you spend too much time trying to, like, take pictures or videos of an event, you won’t remember it as well as just living it, you know? So I really tried to focus during Christmas. I wanted to make sure I saw everyone open their gifts from me, but there’s always a LOT going on. It’s like trying to watch one snowflake fall in a snow globe.

It was a stupid great Christmas this year, though. Added Bonus: I think I burned approximately 16 bazillion calories yesterday from playing Just Dance for Wii NONSTOP. I have GOT to buy that game. My parents got it for Christmas, and it is quite possibly the greatest game ever. At one point, there were 7 of us all dancing to Toxic. Seriously, it was too fun. I was actually sore today. Besides that, my parents house was just full of people, kids, noise, Christmas tree-scented candles, and wrapping paper stuck to everything. It was pure bliss.

Then today, people packed up their stuff, put it all in their cars, and drove it all away. Ever since I was little, my parents have preferred that we simply stack our stuff up and NOT put it away for a few days so they can actually SEE everything. It’s the only time they want a messy house. I now totally understand that. I was so busy opening my awesome gifts that I didn’t see Prinna’s awesome gifts. And Peter and Perek both had to swoop theirs away before I saw most of their stuff too.

But now all my gifts are set out on my dining room table. I just keep going over there and looking at different things. I’m going through holiday-cheer withdrawal. I want to just curl up under a tree skirt, pop in some Manheim Steamroller, and huff a combination of peppermint, cinnamon and egg nog. I’ve gone crazy with Christmas nostalgia. If I were the creative type, I’d make a scrapbook of my Christmas 2010 memories. I would dry my tears with candy cane wrapping paper, and compulsively fondle the glittery tree ornaments and tinsel. I’ve seriously considered replacing all the light bulbs in our house with strands of colorful Christmas lights.

Does this happen to anyone else? Do you guys get bummed after the Christmas party has come and gone? Or am I alone here? What do you guys do when a big day has…ended? You know how you plan and plan and plan and look forward to, say, a vacation, and then you get home and go back to work and life is all normal again? It sucks, yo. I’m still craving online shopping and gift wrapping. I want to wrap everything back up and make everyone do it all over again. One thing’s for sure, though. I’m going out and getting Just Dance and will try and dance away my blues.

The REAL Christmas Story

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the home
This blogger sat quietly, writing this poem.
The TV was muted, my phone was on vibrate,
The silence was wonderful, peaceful, and great.
My roommates were gone, at work or with friends,
“I live alone in this castle“, this blogger pretends;

I nibbled on grapes and sipped on some wine,
Which I generously poured into a big beer stein,
When all of a sudden, I heard a loud "S@*#"!
I ran to the window, to yell at the culprit
I tripped on a shoe, the rug, and a purse ,
I reached the window before things got any worse.

The streets below were quiet, and still, and dark
Cars badly lined up, because people can‘t parallel park,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature man, falling over and drinking a beer,
He relieved himself in the snow bank out front,
I knew in a moment he was totally drunk.

He dug out his phone and drunk dialed his friends,
And he called and he texted, clearly to no ends
"Now, Jason! now, Tony! Just answer, you jerks!
Hey, Sarah! Yo Becky! I know not one of you works!”

The man fell face first in the 3-foot snow bank,
Just by looking at him, I could tell that he stank
As the winds blew hard, he swayed as he stood,
he tried to walk straight, as best as he could,
Eventually I saw as he climbed our front steps,
He slipped and he slid, but eventually crept.

And then, in a moment, I heard on the stairs
The man coming up, and muttering swears.
Before I got to the door to lock it up tight,
The man walked in and was a horrible sight.
He was dressed all in camo, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all covered in beer that was not root;

He reached in his pocket, took a swig from his flask,
And suddenly turned into a jolly man, no longer was crass.
His eyes -- they started twinkling like glitter!
I picked up my phone and signed on to Twitter.
I wanted to tweet about what I was seeing,
He was now fully jolly, no longer publicly peeing;

He lit up a pipe and held it firm in his teeth,
A fluffy moustache, his pearly whites were beneath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
His odor was now pleasant, and not at all smelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
“Could this lush be Santa?“ I thought to myself;

With a friendly high five and a wink of his eye,
The messy drunk was now Santa, and was quite a guy;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his task,
And held out his hand, presenting the flask,
I drank and was magically filled with holiday cheer,
And giving a nod, he announced “My cab is here“;
He sprang to the car, and gave the driver directions,
And away they drove, (he put his seatbelt on for protection)

But I heard him exclaim, ere he rode to Nicollet Mall,
"Have a wonderful weekend, and Merry Christmas to all!"

Sweet Tooth

If I ever see sugar again, it will be too soon. Like, way way way too soon. I spent over 7 hours baking cookies today with Prinna and my mom. We always start all gung-ho crazy, and about halfway through, we really start hurtin'. Quality suffered. We slowed down. But eventually we finished, and we're pretty proud of the results. Without further ado, here's a photo journal of what we accomplished today.









Then I got a little crazy. I spent an obscene amount of time making "couples" with the gingerbread men. Prinna was about to toss me and my "couples" out the window, because while I dawdled away placing each little piece of sprinkle hair on one-by-one, there were literally hundreds more to decorate. But, behold! The adorable results!

Geo and Me


Prinna and Chris


My mom and dad - look! He has a little stethoscope on, and my mom has reading glasses on her head!

So, I think we did a pretty kick-butt job. We divvied out all the cookies and we each took home a thief's ransom in sugar. I almost dumped mine off our balcony though. I couldn't look at them anymore. Plus, I don't need anymore sugar - I'm sweet enough as it is. ZING! But, I kept them and I'm sure my roommates will have no trouble eating them. Meanwhile, this is the carnage that remained after all the cookies were packaged up.

Potty Humor

I spent an hour cleaning our bathroom tonight. Like CLEANING clean. Scrubbing, disinfecting, sweeping, drinking wine, wiping, vacuuming, drinking wine…but now our bathroom smells like bleach and an apple-scented candle. Kind of gross, but clean. Wonderfully clean. I talked to my mom after achieving this feat, and I told her about going through an entire roll of paper towels and not knowing how to change the vacuum bag. She said “Pharon, all I did when you guys were kids was clean. All day everyday”. Touche, Mother. I totally inherited my mom's talent in the quick pick-up, but failed to really digest the CLEANING part.

When I was young, the seven worst words a kid in my family could hear were “KIDS!! Meet me in the front hallway!” To this day it send shivers down my spine. That phrase, yelled by my mom, was the death of a good time. The killer of buzzes, the hater of fun. When my mom yelled that, the five of us kids knew: It was time to clean. Corralling the five kids in the front hallway meant a little tour of our house, cleaning room by room. We’d go from hallway, to the off-limits fancy living room where Perek spilled pen ink all over one of the couches, to the dining room, to the family room where our dog Pele had chewed through an entire chair, and ending in the horrifying nightmare that was the kitchen. If my mom was feeling particularly masochistic, we’d top off the tour with the front hall closet. That’s where we’d throw everything we had just cleaned up in the Family Room.

Five kids are messy. We’d leave our crap everywhere. You could follow the progress of someone’s day by following the trail of toys and socks all around the house. My poor mom, though. Our dining room table, with a gorgeous dark-wood dining room table, was constantly covered with stacks and stacks of kids clothes, sorted by kid. Every other day. One by one, we’d gather our stacks of clothes and go throw them on the floors of our rooms as my mom yelled “And don’t throw those clean clothes on your floor!” Miserable, rotten kids…

When we’d get to the kitchen, Perek would always get what we called “work bladder”. We’d be standing before the stacks of dishes and failed science projects, about to tackle the towers of dishes abandoned by us mid-meal, and Perek would declare, “I have to go to the bathroom”. Forty-five minutes later, as the Soft Scrub was finally being washed from the sinks, Perek would emerge from his room and say, “Oh, it’s already done?” Lazy, good-for-nothing kids…

But by FAR the worst cleaning was before a big family gathering. My mom wouldn’t stand for the hidden socks in the silverware drawer, or the tricky way we’d hide garbage under the couch cushions anymore. No. We actually had to CLEAN. I have this distinct memory of dusting the TV with a t-shirt I found under the kitchen table. That counts, right?

Which is why I found myself scrubbing the bejesus out of the bathroom tonight. It wasn’t even dirty. But that whole “Pre-Holiday” clean panic has set in. Geo’s family is coming to our house for Thanksgiving, and while I highly doubt they will be eating anywhere around my make-up case, I still find it totally necessary to wipe every bottle and organize every hair binder.

Now I’m intoxicated by the nostalgic scent of Soft Scrub, and a little buzzed from the wine I drank. And maybe it’s the combination of those two things, but I have the sudden urge to tuck some garbage under the couch cushion. Just don’t tell my mom…

Biological Snooze Button

Newsflash! Kids can be horrible! I don’t know what’s happening these days, but I’ve really gotten fed up with how rude children can be. Lately, whatever biological clock that may exist in me has had the Snooze button pressed. Seriously. Kids are brutal these days, and I can’t handle it yet.

I was at my parent’s house last night, hanging with two of my perfect nieces, Annabelle and Eve. I love them desperately and feel very protective of them. So, Annabelle is 5 and in pre-school. She is, quite possibly, the girliest girls ever to wear a tutu to the grocery store. Her favorite color may as well be Glitter. And that Girly Girlness is a great trait on her. It suits her. Anyway, she came home from school and told my mom this story. Apparently, some snot-nosed punk of a kid told Annabelle that she “was a boy, because she had a boys backpack”. Eksqueeze me? That definitely touched a nerve with me. I too was called a boy by a bunch of bullies. The kicker? I WAS a tomboy, and it SHOULDN’T have even BEEN an insult, but it was. Anyway, so this girl sneers that Annabelle is a boy. Who does this girl think she is? Annabelle knows the difference between a Kate Spade bag and “regular” bag. Suck on THAT, random-person’s-daughter-who-I-don’t-know.

So, I heard this story and was heartbroken over it. I asked Annabelle what her backpack looked like. Instead of her usual pink-and-purple-feather backpack, she had used a different backpack for a day that was “red with black writing on it”. She explained this to me while standing on a chair to be eye-to-eye with me. I told her, “Annabelle, when I was little I LOVED the colors red and black and white. I wanted to splatter-paint my room those colors. My favorite sweater was red, black, and white, and I wore it for 3 years.” Then that adorable little girl cupped my cheek and half-whispered, “Do you think that your sweater will fit me??” I have been googling “Black, red, white scottie dog sweater” all day to no avail. I would SEW that sweater for that girl if it meant that she didn’t have to take some other kid’s crap about a backpack.

I asked Annabelle what she said back to the girl, and she said, “I just tried to tell her it WAS NOT a boy backpack!” I couldn’t believe how furious I was about that girl. It also doesn’t help that I live down the block from an elementary school where kids frequently scream at each other “SHUT UP! YOH A BASTUUHD!” They can’t even say their “R”s but they can call each other bastards? Where are they LEARNING this?! Are kids not disciplined anymore? If I had EVER said something like that when I was young, you can bet I’d be holed up in the bathroom digging Dial Soap out of my teeth. That’s how it should work, people.

Okay, back to my point. Annabelle seems, as of now, pretty unfazed by this after hearing about my awesome sweater. But geez, it’s not long until she’ll be in middle or high school and dealing with those kinds of bullies that constantly harass and terrorize other kids. Is this bratty little pre-schooler, like, Bully Zero? Is that where it starts?

See? That’s my point. I’m waaaaay too, um, volatile to raise another human being right now. I’d freak out and be like “Oh yeah? She doesn’t like your backpack? Tell her that her disgusting split ends are giving you a headache and then smack her.” Yeah. I just don’t understand how to correctly deal with child politics. I don’t get how one human can totally insult another to her face and not have to deal with any consequences. I don’t walk up to a stranger and tell them they need a nose job or something and then bounce on out to recess worry-free. If I did say something like that, I’d run away screaming, afraid she’d come after me with a rusty knife or something.

Well, call me crazy, but I think kids should be nice to each other. I think they should be kind and lovely and innocent. And if they are rude and condescending to each other? Bar of soap. In the mouth. Case closed.

An Immaculate Concept

I did it, you guys. I finally did it. People doubted me. They thought, “Pharon never follows through on her dreams and goals.” And I know, I know. I’ve done this kind of thing before. You know, promise myself and my friends and family that I will ACHIEVE something! And then sit down with a glass of wine and debate whether or not to paint my nails instead of getting off my tuckus and taking a step towards success and maturation. But not today, people. NOT TODAY! I have tiptoed into the unknown, and beat the crap out of adversity. Today, I am a winner. Today, I am an adult.

Today I cleaned my room.

It was ugly, friends. It was scary and I didn’t know what I’d find under Shoe Mountain, or behind Old Magazine Canyon. But I did it. I put all my clothes back into the closets that threw them up in the first place. I dug through old clothes and old makeup and amassed a giant bag of “easier to throw away than clean up”. I found the gross little fake scars I wore to the Zombie Pub Crawl inside my running shoe (maybe I should start actually USING those shoes). I matched up shoes that were under the desk, on the desk, under the bed, and in my t-shirt drawer. Finally, I looked around at my room. I put my hands on my hips, and took in the splendor that was a spotless room. The bed was made. The dirty laundry was sorted out from the clean laundry - and then WASHED! I couldn’t believe what I had accomplished. I can’t wait to mess it up again…just to relive this cleansing high.

The truth is this. I hate cleaning my room, and there is no way that I am capable of KEEPING a room clean. I have too many clothes that I throw around like confetti, and end up in a tornado of Banana Republic and The Gap. I’m like the people on Hoarders. I can tiptoe through the piles of clothes, shoes, and empty boxes and then pluck a white tank top from the depths of a pile of crumpled up clothes I washed 2 weeks ago. It’s like a gift to find that needle in the haystack. I’m proud of it, sometimes.

I’ve been like this for my entire life. So, it’s not like I’m going to change any time soon. I just can’t keep my bedroom under control. When I was really young, and playing outside with my neighbor Claire, my mom would be all “Pharon! Stop eating those ants and come in and clean your room!” Lucky for me, I was a very manipulative little brat, and Claire had that lovely, easily-manipulated mind that so many kids have. Five minutes later, I’d be laying on my bed and directing Claire where to hang my Scotty dog sweater and denim overalls. I’d be like “Claire, the faster my room gets clean, the faster I can come over and play fashion show.” Unlike me, Claire was a phenomenal cleaner. She was efficient, and organized. She’s exactly that way today. In between commercials on a TV show, she’ll mop her kitchen floors. So, we all have our strengths. And cleaning? ‘Tis not my forte.

So tonight, I can bask in the cleany goodness that is my bedroom. I won’t trip on empty gift bags or twist my ankle on a round brush hiding under sweatpants. It’ll be nice, I guess. But how will I know what clothes I have to choose from unless they are all carefully thrown onto the floor?

Whatevs. I’m glad it’s over with. I don’t have to worry about cleaning it for another month week or so, and I finally have matching socks again. Everybody wins. For today, at least. Next time? Next time, maybe I’ll see if Claire is bored…

Kids Say the Darndest Things…While Holding a Knife

Don’t you guys miss the good ol’ days, when we were kids? Things were so much simpler then. “Problem solving” consisted of using your words, taking a time out, or wielding a butcher knife and chasing your brother around the house. Yeah. Good times, people. Wait, what’s that? You DIDN’T chase family members around the house with a knife? Huh. I can’t believe I’m the only one…in that case, I should probably elaborate.

I’ve been seeing a lot of my siblings lately (all four of them). And last night, I got into a disagreement with my brother. There was some name-calling via text messages, and just some general animosity that yanked me back to my bowl-cut-having, windsuit-wearing days when I was a witness to, and cause of, many many fights that left bruises on your arm, not ego. I’m going to say this, by the way: If you have siblings and NEVER fought with them, I don’t know how to talk to you. Or believe that you’re even a real person. And before I go dredging up old, YET HILARIOUS, childhood memories, I’d like it on record that I actually love my brothers and sisters. And not even because I have to. I genuinely love them. They are all bright, productive members of society now.

Okay, so I chased my brother Peter with a knife when I was like 9 years old. He was getting in my face while I was, I don’t know, cooking? Butchering some meat? Whatever. I was 9 and using a knife. He did something to set me off, I got enraged and chased him, holding the knife like I would hold my Barbie’s hair brush on a very bad hair day. He escaped. My mom found out what I’d done and, well, I did NOT escape. Whatever the problem was with Peter and me at the time, my mom solved it immediately.

Then there was the incident with the aluminum bat. I don’t remember this accurately, so I’ll just say: Someone hit someone else with a bat for some reason.

Remember when I told you how hot our house used to get? Well, needless to say, fans were a hot commodity (no pun intended). We each had one, but some of us (read: ME) wanted a lion’s share of wind blowing on our face. So, I stole Perek’s fan one day when I was about 15. He came in my room, unplugged it while I was laying on my bed basking in the windy goodness, and brought it back to his room. He jerry rigged a system of locking the fan to itself in his room, but I was determined to crack the code. I shoved Perek around, ransacked his room, hungry for high-speed air circulation. During that rampage, Peter came to Perek’s rescue. He stood across the room as I was JUST about to free the fan, and threw a combination lock at me. It hurt. Perhaps he had a few years of pent up anger regarding that whole knife-chase thingy. Whatever. Perek kept his fan.

There was also some psychological warfare going on. Because I was young, I don’t remember Padrin and Prinna fighting a lot. Sure they argued, but I don’t remember Padrin chasing Prinna around with any sort of weapon ever. I do remember, because the evidence existed for a long time after it happened, one day when Padrin put on her thinking cap. In their shared closet, Padrin had written, in permanent marker, “I HATE PADRIN” and then blamed it on Prinna. I wonder if it’s still written in that closet…

See? The commonality between all these situations is none of us like sat down and chatted about our feelings and had a great big family hug over a bowl of marshmallows or whatever, while a soft tune played in the background, teaching us all an important lesson. We were kids. Real, live kids. In the 80’s. That’s just how problems were solved. I’d never condone physical fighting these days. I just wouldn’t. But there’s something so wonderfully innocent about it when it comes to me and my own brothers and sisters. And I’m pretty nostalgic about it now, as it relates to the current situation in which I find myself and my brother. I’m sure he’d like to pin me to the ground and dangle spit in my face while doing a typewriter on my collar bone (for old time’s sake), but that just doesn’t work as adults. Or does it??

Have a great weekend everyone!!

What, Me Worry?

Full disclosure, y’all. I’m not the happiest camper right now. In fact, I’m a whole messy bundle of emotions that I don’t know what to do with. Primarily, I’m a little worried. I don’t really want to go into all the details just now, but do me a solid, and send out your positive thoughts in this general direction. Thanks, yo.

When I was little, my mom used to call me a Worrywart all the time. I remember worrying that lightning would strike the tree in our back yard, which would then crash into my house and right on to my bed. While I was sleeping in it. I worried, after watching the critically ignored Made for TV Movie “I Know My First Name is Steven” that I would get kidnapped. I worried that Kevin, the boy in my swim class, wouldn’t like me because I didn’t know how to do the Butterfly stroke (BTW, the worrying made me QUIT SWIM TEAM). I worried about soccer games and piano recitals, and I worried that I’d run out of underwear before school (AGAIN! It happened once when I was like 10 years old, and my mom made me wear a pair of Prinna‘s). There were no limits to my worrying.

Somewhere along the way, I ended up not worrying ENOUGH anymore. I’d waltz into dangerous situations in downtown Minneapolis, I’d show up unprepared for tests just basically hoping to pass, I ended up just kind of pawning it all off on “Fate”. I’d be all, “Meh, if I’m supposed to pass this test, I will.” or “If Kevin doesn’t like me, he’s not worth my time anyway.” I got lazy. I got complacent. I got too Sure of everything. But after getting my first “F”, I discovered Fate had a cruel sense of justice anyway.

Then I started the Selective Worrying. There were things I couldn’t do anything about, so I’d obsess over something like sleeping through my alarm clock. I’d spend night after night, waking up every couple of hours to check the clock. Instead of worrying that I wouldn’t get a job I was interviewing for, I’d worry about just getting lost on my way to the interview, and arrive 2 hours early because I don‘t know how to manage driving time. I’ve spent literally hundreds of hours worrying about what to wear, instead of what I was really scared of. Typically it was things like getting in a car accident, spending my life alone, or seeing my house catch on fire and losing everything I’ve ever had. Those aren’t things I can worry about. They’re too big, too impossible to prevent. So, I cop out and worry instead about getting poisoned by the moldy food in our fridge. That’s the kind of thing I can worry about and then fix.

When I was little, and worrying about something like whether or not I’d grow a watermelon in my stomach from swallowing a watermelon seed, I remember taking refuge under my bed. I’d drag my Barbies and My Little Ponies under there with me, and make THEM act out the situations. “Oh no, Sparkle Pony! You have a watermelon in your tummy! Dr. Barbie, you have to fix it!” And with a couple quick pats on the pony’s tummy, the watermelon would be gone and Dr. Barbie would hop in her Ferrari and speed away to Ken’s house. The only thing left to worry about then was finding Barbie some matching shoes for her hot date. Though, if you’ve ever played with Barbies, you'd know that this was impossible.

I wish I still had that kind of coping skill: the imagination to both create and solve a problem all on my own. My imagination these days is limited only to whether or not Nelly Furtado will be able to sing at my non-existent wedding. I wish I worried more, though, because then it would just be something I do and would be used to it. I would learn to embrace that trait, as I have my incessant need to eat carbohydrates, instead of shoving the worry onto something less-deserving. I’d be able to bite my nails and just deal with it. But as it stands, I’ll just continue to worry about not worrying about the right things in the right way.

Child "Care"

I babysat my nieces Annabelle and Eve tonight. They rule, and I love them insanely. Plus I totally love babysitting. When I was young, there was never anything more exciting than going over to someone else’s house to watch their kids. All the exotic foods you had access to (Pizza in a ROLL? Whaaa?), the shows on – gasp – CABLE that I couldn’t see at home, and the responsibility. Ooooh, that sweet, sweet responsibility! I am the 4th out of 5 kids so I NEVER had to take care of anyone at home. So babysitting ruled. I’d be all “Now, no TV allowed. You have to go ride your bikes. And you can only ride in the street if you don’t see any cars. And those crayons aren’t toys. Organize them by color! Them’s the rules, minions.” Sheesh, fun-hater. It was totally arbitrary what kind of rules I’d enforce because I was only about 14 at the time. But that sense of power and control was awesome. Babysitting now is, like, so much better though.

I used to “nanny” for my niece Annabelle when my sister Prinna was pregnant with my niece Eve. Prinna was the Murphy’s Law of pregnant women. She contracted cryptosporidium at Waterpark of America, she was severely dehydrated all the time, and also suffered with intense nausea that could only be suppressed with drugs and an occasional dose of acupuncture. I was unemployed at the time, so I just basically spent my days hanging out with Annabelle while Prinna lay debilitated in her bed. I. Loved. That. Job. I showed Annabelle how to eat snow and make a snowman. I’d sneak her candy under the table when she finished her broccoli (or “trees” as she called them). I would yell “Dance Break!” while I was cleaning up the kitchen, and Annabelle would run into the kitchen, I’d swoop her up in my arms and we’d dance around for like 20 minutes to a song on the radio. It was incredibly joyful. I didn’t have to do any of the Hard Stuff though. I had no part in potty training her, teaching her the alphabet, or disciplining her when she was naughty. Babysitting was straight up fun.

All this was pretty different from when I was young. At 14, I thought “Hey, if I have to follow rules, you do too.” And I’d set unnecessary boundaries and time limits on everything. I didn’t understand yet why rules were rules. I just thought to myself “Everything I want to do is against some rule, so the idea of babysitting was if it’s too fun, it’s probably against the rules.” Now that I’m older, though, I get it. My college writing professor used to say “You must learn the rules before you can know how to break them with purpose.” So now, sure I set boundaries. And I enforce the rules if necessary. But I’m flexible. Probably more so than my sister would like. I know kids shouldn't watch too much TV, but what ELSE are they supposed to do while I’m playing Angry Birds?

I also used to religiously read The Babysitters Club books. The girls in the books treated babysitting like a business, so I did too. I took it way too seriously. It felt so grown up sitting at a dining room table with a tall glass of chocolate milk, doing my homework, listening to a sleeping baby on the monitor. Then when the baby would wake up, I’d sigh, chug my milk down, close my books, and head into the baby’s room. God, I was so annoyingly grown-up about it. That is – luckily – no longer the case. I pack my nieces so full of candy that they can’t see straight. And instead of making them go to bed on time, I’ll set up sleeping bags in the living room and watch a movie with them until they crash right there. Then my sister comes home, silently curses my name upon seeing the havoc we've wreaked, and I hop out the door leaving the destruction in my dust. Prinna – remind me again why you ask me to babysit?!

But all in all it was a successful night full of discipline-free fun and plenty of sugar. Gotta love irresponsible child care! Have a great weekend, everyone! And don't forget to stop and dance around a room for a bit, or prepare a dinner consisting solely of candy bracelets. Kids seem to like it!

AARGH! Kelly Clarkson!

Loooove me some Happy Hour. Valerie, Lana and I met up at Cause in Uptown tonight (I highly recommend this place if you love good deals and excellent service, without having to fight for your server) and had some good ol’ fashioned girl time. Out of the hundreds of topics that were brought up, the one that really got my attention was Eyebrow Waxing. We talked about the intricacies of waxing vs. no waxing vs. do-it-yourself vs. professional service. We came to the conclusion that humans have entirely too much hair on our bodies.

My first experience with shaving was when I was 12. I went away to soccer camp, where I was on a team with older girls. One in particular took one look at my pre-pubescent legs and said “EW! Why don’t you shave?!“ Then she went back to organizing her Multiples and snap bracelets. I got home from soccer camp and asked my sister Prinna “How do you shave your legs?“ She wasn’t all that interested in, like, teaching me a vital life lesson so she mumbled “You just take a razor and go zhoop zhoop zhoop up your legs.“ She made quick, upward motions with her hands. So, I went in the bathroom, found a Bic and went zhoop zhoop zhoop. I was not planning on the 4 inch long piece of skin that came off due to too much pressure and dry legs. My mom made me use an electric razor after that. Then, when I was in high school, I used to shave my arms. Like, the whole arm. I thought it made me look skinnier. At the time, I was all of 80 pounds soaking wet, so I don’t know what my problem was.

The point is, I’ve never really “gotten” shaving. I’m lazy, clumsy, busy, tired and a bunch of other things that makes it exhausting to care about it. The only times I really focus on tweezing my eyebrows is when I have insomnia and can’t sleep. Then it becomes an obsession. And the morning after, it becomes a Mistake. I look like I’m always questioning what you’re saying.

However, I LOVE beards and moustaches (on men, duh). If I had one, I’d groom it constantly. I’d make funny shapes and styles. Facial hair is like an accessory! I’m always fascinated by it. I would have a little comb, and twirl my moustache between my fingers, or tug my beard when I’m confused…stuff like that.

Now, I’m not necessarily saying guys have it easy (Okay, I KIND of am saying that) but they have a much smaller surface area to attend to. I will say this, though. Two gentleman, who shall remain nameless to preserve their dignity, decided that they wanted to wax their backs. They didn’t want to go in someplace to have it done, so they gave me money to go buy them some wax. Next thing I know, one is laying on a dining room table while the other rips off the strips with the brute force of a dinosaur. The next day, one of them had a ginormous bruise on their back from the unfortunate technique of the velociraptor he had hired for the job.

Turns out, being a human is a hairy situation. The one thing that separates us from, say, lizards, is the fine hair that covers our bodies. Also, we are warm-blooded. And we don’t eat bugs. And other stuff that makes us different. But really the relevant thing here is the hair. And yet we spend zillions of dollars and like a quadrillion hours of time removing it. Why?

Well, I don’t know what to do about it. I guess people are just fine with their razors and laser hair removers and bleach and whatever else people use. Me? I have found that if I just systematically shave off layers of skin, like when I was younger, the hair will stop growing eventually.

On that note, you hairy freaks, have a great weekend!

Mama I'm Comin' Home

This weekend shall be bittersweet. The sweet? I’m going to Iowa City again for Homecoming. The bitter? I have a huge blister on my chin that is, well, unsightly. So all the pictures, if I allow any, will consist of me doing some random hand gestures that will strategically, yet not subtly, cover up said face-eating virus. So, yeah. I’m excited to go and see my friends again and hang out with a bunch of other aging college grads. I just hope they don’t cower in fear upon seeing my mangled face.

I haven’t been back for a Homecoming game since I graduated. There’s the whole parade thing and all kinds of events that college students participate in. Or so I’m told. After my freshman year, I literally did nothing special on Homecoming. But my freshman year, when I was in my sorority, we built a float for the parade, went to the pep fests, won a spirit award, and all kinds of stuff, so I know these things exist. I remember wondering if and when there would be the Homecoming Dance. We had them in high school, and I loved those. But, alas, there would be no dance. There would be awkward conversations and getting beer spilled all over me in the huge crowds at the bar, just waiting for someone to come talk to me.

I love the idea of Homecoming. They should have these in real life, like outside of schools. Imagine it: Homecoming for your favorite shoe store. For one weekend, you go in, hang out with other regulars, reminisce in the boot section about the days you came in for Birkenstocks and espadrilles. Oh, the memories! Or Homecoming at work. All the people who quit or were fired would come back, have a glass of wine, and after the awkwardness dissipated in a haze of alcohol, people would stand, arm in arm, and sing Piano Man together. Aww…everyone loves Homecoming.

Also, why aren’t I involved in more parades? I love parades. If it were at all possible, I’d put streamers, balloons, and a novelty horn in my car and drive real slowly around the city. Throwing candy out of the window. Fabulous!

But this Homecoming weekend, I’ll miss out on all that because it’s happening as we speak. By the time I get there, the streets will be littered with wet streamers and popped balloons. It’ll be like the city already has the hangover I’ll have on Sunday morning. However, the Homecoming football game (that I’m not GOING to, but simply tailgating for) is a night game. Since it doesn’t start until 7:05 p.m. I will actually have a chance to go in to downtown and shop on Saturday morning. It’s the little things, I guess…

So okay, maybe I won’t be wearing a sick body-hugging black velvet dress with a fur trim at the bust (yup, that’s the bombest dress ever that I wore to my high school senior year Homecoming dance), and I’ll miss all the crazy floats and old men playing bagpipes at the parade, but I’ll be with some of my dearest friends visiting my old stomping grounds again. If that’s not a great Homecoming, I don’t know what is. Plus, I can just buy my own 2 year-old stale butterscotch candies and I’ll just throw them around to my friends all day. I’m guessing they’ll love it. And it’ll take the attention away from my gnarly face.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Boresville (Population: 1)

So bored. So, so, so very bored. I don’t know how long I’ve been sitting here, doing nothing, but it’s been awhile. I don’t have the TV on (nothing’s on), I think I’ve reached the end of the Internet and therefore have nothing else to look at, and I just don’t have anything I have to do tonight. So I’m just, like, sitting here. For 5 minutes straight, I thought about Smurfs and how awesome they are. I smurfin’ love the Smurfs. Then I just sat here. Not doing ANYthing. Not thinking about ANYthing.

I can’t remember the last time I actually felt truly BORED. When I was a kid, my friend (and next door neighbor) Claire and I were ALWAYS “bored”. We’d walk into the kitchen and ask my mom “What can we doooooo? We are so booooored!” She’d shoot off a half dozen ideas, none of which were quite right for us, and Claire and I would go back to moping until we’d eventually decide on a half-hearted fashion show. It was always either a fashion show or Restaurant. Both games enabled us to dress up and speak with a French accent. We’d go over and over and over the set-up before we even got to the actual game. Come to think of it, most of “playing” was just “planning on playing”. We’d work on our costumes, and then discuss our personas for hours. Who do we think should come in to eat? (New Kids on the Block.) What are we serving? (Chocolate cake and Goldfish.) Who gets to have the boyfriend? (I do.) By the time we set up all the rules, I had to go back home and clean my room.

Perek and I used to play Bank when we were bored. We’d get the thermoses from our lunch boxes, put Monopoly money in them and roll them back-and-forth across the floor while we laid underneath the twin beds in my room. That, or we’d play Sonic the Hedgehog on Sega and make up words to the instrumental songs on each level. We still remember some of the words. We were that cool. And if there was no one else to play with, I’d spend my days spying on my sisters or thinking of new ways to style my bowl cut.

The point is, I was always bored as kid, but had like a zillion things I could pretend to do. Now that I can actually do all the things in real life that I used to pretend I was doing, I don’t do it. Turns out? Going to the bank is not as much fun as it was with the thermoses. Then, at a certain point, boredom turns into “relaxation”. Sitting around with no plans, no chores, no place I have to rush off to is a luxury. I don't call my mom up and ask what I should do. I sit quietly and pray my phone doesn't ring. With that logic, I didn’t have a boring weekend, I had a relaxing weekend.

But right now? Right now, I’m definitely bored. And like the suggestions my mom would give us in the kitchen, nothing that I can do seems like any fun at all. Although, I kind of want to call someone and see if they want to play Fashion Show with me. Come on over, and we’ll dress up in all my ugly clothes and take Polaroids with our Barbies. I think THAT sounds fun.

Mall of America('s Next Sweetheart)

Ahhhh…the Mall of America. Where people shop, get married, and go to college. Then ride the rollercoasters. Typically, I don’t go to the Mall all that much. It’s giant. Too many options. Too many pre-teens, and not nearly enough aisle-side beer vendors (Currently: Zero). But I put on my walkin’ boots and headed out in search of a birthday present or two for Geo. It’s his birthday tomorrow and I have left the shopping until the last minute, which is actually very unlike me. So, I had to go to the place with the most to offer.

It was a pretty typical trip at first. Then, much to my surprise, I discovered that Tim Gunn (from Project Runway and my dreams at night) was making an appearance there to sign some books and no doubt, be very concerned with the current state of Midwest “fashion”. A very familiar feeling rushed through me as I slithered my way through the tangled crowds of people. “If Tim Gunn sees me, I’ll be famous.”

Wait. Huh? Yeah. See, I’ve always had this notion that if a famous and/or powerful person saw me at the mall (this scenario always happens at a mall for unknown reasons), they’d want to meet me and then fly me to Hollywood to be a famous something-or-other. Like, they’d see me from across the masses of dull, boring, average people and say “Now THAT girl is what I’ve been looking for!” and then they’d have their bodyguard or agent or handler come and escort me to a limo waiting outside. Then it’d be off to Hollywood to become a rich, powerful [insert current career-obsession here].

I’ve had this feeling ever since I was little. My sister Padrin thinks it’s hysterical. When I was much younger, Padrin would take me to the mall to watch her shop (apparently, I loooooved it). Padrin tells me that I used to always put on a skirt before going to the mall. I had like mousey brown hair, in a bowl cut, I was scrawny, dirty, and usually scraped up from head to toe from playing outside in the trees with my friend Claire. But, I’d put on a skirt every single time, in the hopes that someone would see me and want me to be a model. Something about putting on a skirt made me feel like less of the tomboy I was, and more like a girl in the Gap Kids ads. I was the undiscovered talent.

At any rate, all those skirt-wearing days must have really seeped into my self-conscious. To this day, I’m sure that some TV star or reality show crew will stop me in the mall. These days, though, it’s not to approach me with a modeling contract. It’s way more vague now, and depends on what I’m feeling/wearing/carrying/doing at that moment. Tonight, for instance, I had on a coat, jeans and boots. So, nothing room-crossing there. But my hair is like incredibly shiny, and I actually dried and straightened it this morning. In my totally messed up 9-year-old subconscious, I thought, “Tim Gunn will see me, and then compliment me on my hair. And then ask me to be in a Garnier Fructis commercial.”

You guys, I KNOW this is weird. I KNOW that none of it really makes sense. But somehow, in my puny little pre-adolescent brain, it’s the life I concocted. And now it simply won’t go away. Sometimes it feels really weird that it hasn’t happened. I’ve seen plenty of famous people (local weatherman/overly-tanned “celebrity” Sven Sundgaard was just outside my house TONIGHT on a run around the lake), and nothing has ever come of it. I’m quite the opposite of famous, actually. Still, though, at least it encourages me to not go to the mall looking like a homeless person. Nothing wrong with that, I guess.

Do You Remember?

Finally! The Labor Day weekend can begin! I’ve treated myself to taking Friday off, and look forward to filling my long weekend with hours upon hours of not Laboring. I did some research (a.k.a. briefly breezed through the Wikipedia entry) on Labor Day. Much as the name suggests, Labor Day is a day to celebrate the “working man”. To give rest to those who build the foundation on which this country stands. Also, it’s the official start to the NFL season. w00t.

When I was little I thought Labor Day had something to do with babies. You know, the whole “she’s going into labor!” thing? Yeah, I thought that’s what this weekend was all about. I don’t remember what I must have thought happened to spark the annual federal holiday in terms of a pregnant woman about to give birth, but I imagine it had something to do with the stork. Maybe it was his only day off. Or, his busiest day of the year. Who can say? The fact of the matter is, all things about that thought process were wrong. Such is life…

So Labor Day. The finest holiday I do not understand. According to sources (Wikipedia), there is a declaration that there are supposed to be parades and speeches by prominent leaders. Sounds, uh, fun? I’ll pass on those things. Instead, I will celebrate my love and appreciation for fellow workers by sleeping late, drinking beer, painting my nails, and decorating for my niece’s 5th birthday party. I can’t believe they didn’t include ANY of those national pastimes in the original declaration. Fools.

I do know one thing for sure. Labor Day is the day I start listening to Earth, Wind and Fire’s September on repeat. It’s pretty much the world’s greatest song of all time. I dare you to listen to it and not feel warm inside your bones. There was a perfect Labor Day a couple years ago when my friend Ally, Geo, Perek, and I hung out and played games all day and listened to the song on repeat. For like 3 hours. The best song for the best time of year. Now, I’m going back to watching the final pre-season Vikings game and gearing up for a delicious weekend of relaxing, enjoying the weather, and a whole lotta this:

(Happy Labor Day, kids. Be smart. Be safe. Be Youtiful.)

COLLEGE

Another week, another trip to Target. Seriously, I have a problem. But I noticed a whole lot of college freshman doing some school/dorm shopping with their parents. It was quite cute, actually. A lot of exhausted parents were strolling through the aisles with single-cup coffee makers, new bedding, and plastic little bookshelves. I heard one girl tell her defeated dad, “But dad, I NEED a blender! I can make my own smoothies in the morning!” Okay, honey. Judging by the space-saving materials your poor dad has bought for your inevitably lofted bed, there’s not going to be room for a blender. Priorities, Honey. Priorities.

I remember getting all the fun new stuff for college. I loved shopping at the Union Bookstore in Iowa City for my giant textbooks, my color-coordinated folders, and several thousand highlighters. I had a whole new basket of toiletries for my shower caboodle thing, new shower shoes, towels, everything. I brought all my new stuff to my new school and set up shop.

Cue: worst experience ever. I applied late to U of Iowa (people will tell you that I thought I was applying to Iowa STATE, not University of Iowa, but those people are jerks. Maybe they were right, but they’re jerks) and therefore was assigned to Temporary Housing. Temp Housing is just a room that is technically a shared lounge for the whole floor. They cram some people in it, and as other unfortunate freshman drop out, or don’t show up, members of Temp Housing are reassigned to the abandoned rooms. I walked into the 4th Floor Lounge in Burge Hall. It looked like an insane asylum. There were 6 bunk beds with plastic mattresses on them, 6 dressers, and mini-kitchenette off to the side. There were 4 desks lined up against a wall with dividers in between them. It was…sterile. It was small. And it was empty otherwise. Because I was rushing sororities, I was a week earlier than the rest of the students.

My parents set up my cot, we chose my dresser, taped up some pictures of friends from home, and then it was time for them to take off in the empty conversion van. I realize this sounds pathetic, but I cried like a giant baby. I begged my parents not to leave me alone there. I said I would clean my room every day if they took me home. I wasn’t ready for college. I would return all my new stuff if they would let me get back in the van. “Don’t leave me here alone!” I sobbed.

During this infantile breakdown, the first roommate, Kristen, showed up with her mom. She was going through Rush as well. After they set up her stuff, they hugged and off her mother went. Then Kristen bounced off to go shopping downtown. I was like “UM! YOUR MOTHER JUST ABANDONED YOU!”

It was bad. Then, Rush started. I stopped calling home and crying every night because I was too busy hanging out with my Rush group, and staying up late eating Mac and Cheese out of a hot pot debating which house had better GPAs and parties. I would guess it took about 2 weeks for me to forget my family altogether. Pictures of home were replaced by pictures of my new “sisters”, all my books and folders were tossed onto the floor as we converted the desks into make-up stations, and the only crying I did was when a roommate would be reassigned to another dorm. I discovered Hawkeye football. And tailgating. Oh yeah, there were some classes in there too…

I only lived in the dorms for a year (most people at Iowa only live in for a year, two tops). It was a great year. Hallways full of open doors, people walking in and out of everyone‘s room, guys and girls chatting outside the showers (co-ed floors=very Ally McBeal-ish bathroom situation). I loved it. Moving into my first apartment after that was never quite as much fun. Bills? What?

So anyway, back in Target, this girl and her poor dad were debating the blender for a good 5 minutes before compromising on a Magic Bullet. The dad tossed it in the cart, and she was going on and on about what kind of contact paper to get for her drawers. I wondered if she’d be like me or Kristen when she was left alone at college. Judging by her obvious “first time away from home” priorities, I’m guessing she’ll be a wreck like I was. Lucky girl…

Somebody Should Consider Putting Baby in A Corner

Hmph. I still haven’t made a decision on the grand, fabulous shoes I drooled over yesterday. The shopping high has waned a bit since my leisurely shopping trip yesterday turned me into a maniacal sociopath hell-bent on feeling incomplete without a pair of gray shoes. (This is not to say I won’t still buy them.)

Anyhoozle, I was thinking about World’s Best Game Ever that I made up on Friday night. Kim, Madeline, and I were hanging out at my house. The yawns were approaching quickly, we were slumped into the couches, and overall we were pretty pathetic. In order to get the blood pumping, I decided to invent said best game ever. Here’s the gist. Each person rolls a dice. The person who rolls the lowest number has to stand up in front of the other two and just dance to a randomly selected song for 30 seconds. And if the others didn’t think you danced long or hard enough, Mr. Jagermeister was waiting to punish you accordingly. Um, yeah. It’s pretty much the most hysterical thing ever. I mean, how often do you dance BY YOURSELF in front of other people!? But we did it. And it was oddly liberating. Sure, the others would laugh hysterically, but it was thrilling being forced to just let loose.

I don’t know exactly when or if it happened, but I’m concerned that I’ve turned into a bad dancer. I remember in high school cheerleading I was put at the very front for dance routines because I was actually pretty good. Also? I won a Running Man contest in 6th grade. I mean, that SAYS something, you know? I could do any dance, I could release and restrict my body parts appropriately, and I had range. Now, I just hop up and down on a beer-soaked dance floor at the bars. I do the totally skill-less “punching my arms repeatedly up and down in the air to the beat of the song”. Sometimes I’ll do two arms, other times just one. If I’m really feelin’ it, I’ll alternate. There was also a time when I thought I could pop-and-lock. No. Just, No. People probably considered bringing over a wooden spoon for me to bite on.

I don’t get it. I’ve got rhythm, I’m entirely mobile, I’m pretty good at following directions in a song (“Two hops this time, criss cross! Now, Charlie Brown. Everybody clap your hands!” - Yup, real song. Real AWESOME song!) I feel like I’ve got what it takes, Coach. Yet, when the music comes on, up go my arms and down goes any chance of being cast in Step Up: 3D.

I will offer this one explanation. A few years back, I lived by myself. I loved the freedom. I was watching So You Think You Can Dance, and I, inspired by the music, decided that Yes. I think I can dance. So I flung myself around my apartment, spinning and jumping, shaking my, well, everything. I was sweaty and laughing at myself. It was great. And then. Behind the cords of the TV were two beady eyes staring at me. Mocking me. It wasn’t until after I had silently shamed myself that I realized it was a mouse. I screamed. Whether it was the fact that it was the first mouse I had ever seen, or the humiliating feeling that the mouse was laughing at me and judging my dancing, who’s to say? But I screamed, and hopped up on my bed, and never danced like that again.

Maybe it’s like what happens in the movies. Julia Stiles gives up dancing because her mother was in a car accident in “Save the Last Dance“. Channing Tatem gives up dancing (for a second) in “Step Up” because his rep as a tough guy was seriously in jeopardy. And hello? Maureen gives up dance for L.O.V.E. love in “Center Stage” (and because the poor girl just wanted to eat a piece of pizza without the constant fear of having to wear Spanx under her tights and tutu). Perhaps I too have had to make the selfless sacrifice. I shall dance alone no more, lest I risk infesting my home with snarky, judgmental mice. The only thing my milk shake brings…is mice.

However, I’ll make an exception in the case of World’s Best Game. Yeah, I’m dancing by myself, but I’m not alone. My only regret is that I didn't perform my award-winning Running Man that night. Oh well, there's always next time. And there WILL be a next time.