Thanksgiving

My favorite holiday.

No religion, no gift-giving.  No overt consumerism, no 'angle'.

A time to indulge in good food and better company.  The only requisite act is a happy hug.

Let's all be grateful - for our good fortune, our completely unearned luck, for the people who love us even though they REALLY KNOW US WELL.

Cheers!

And good luck over Christmas.

My Current Exercise Regimen

I try to get to the gym about four times a week to swim.  Of course this is fraught with issues such as "Tot Time" swimming lessons; lane sharing, and not-so-subtle drowning attempts.

For one thing, WHY ARE CHILDREN CALLED "TOTS"?  They are not tiny chunks of baked potato starch. They are small people with no bladder control and they never offer to pick up the tab.  Speaking of, I don't trust those supposed "Pool Time Diapers".  I just try not to think about it.

And the whole Tot swimming lesson thing (They are TOO YOUNG to learn how to swim, People!  They exist on CHEERIOS and JUICE BOXES!) means less dedicated lap lanes.

So you have to share lanes, which I get on an intellectual level, being a socialist and all, but really you do not want to share a lane with me and this is why:

I'm a crappy swimmer.  I do the backstroke because I like facing up, I can breathe without panicking, and it is quiet, with your ears in the water.  It's an easy stroke, I concentrate on my kicking and I repeat in my head the number of the lap over and over as I take each stroke, so it is a little meditative.  However, you can't see what the hell you are doing.

So I tend to zig-zag my way down the lane, bonking into the floaty lane dividers, like some drunk rat in a maze going from left and right as I lurch from one end of the pool to another.

A friend of mine suggested I should also do some upper-body weight lifting and I suppose I should.  I used to lift a lot and I enjoy it, but I figure I'm getting an okay all-over work out since my arms are dragging my 155-pound FAT ASS back and forth across the pool.

Where was I?

Anyway, woe be onto you if you have to share a lane with me. 

So I'm on the side of the lane that has another lane next to it (so I won't be next to the TOTS) and this MASSIVE DUDE decides to share the lane next to me. 

I'm taking a breather at one end (because I'm a pussy) when this guy walks up.  As mentioned, he is HUGE.  Easily well over six foot, broad-shouldered, hair on his chest and at least 275 if he was an ounce.  He had on a speedo which conventional wisdom would suggest MISTAKE, but uh, it was okay on this guy, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN.

But then - he turned around to ease himself into the pool and I have never seen that much hair on a man in ever.  It was a veritable PELT.  I mean, I'm a red-blooded chick and I loves me the dark-eyed hairy-chested Alpha male as much as the next girl, but, Oh Dear.

And THEN - he starts pounding up and down the lane, crazy splashing as he butterflied.  When he'd get to the end of the pool he'd do that thing where you are underwater and you kick off the pool wall as you turn?  And then come out of the water like eight feet later?

But he'd surface like a fucking BREACHING WHALE and here I'm all slowly swimming along face up and he totally swamped me more than once and I thought he was gonna drown me.

In case you think I'm exaggerating, I sneaked a shot:

Manly enough to wear a pink swim cap.

Bar Results

If I did not send you an email, you might have heard on CNN that I passed the Washington State Exam.

I'm pretty stoked about it, although I am not too good on personal pride of accomplishment.

But you know what?  I had an excellent advertising career.  And then I applied, and got accepted, and finished law school.  And then I passed both the Maryland Bar and the Washington Bar.

So although my personal life is not what I'd want it to be, I can, objectively, take pride in my professional accomplishments.

I don't suck!

But the best part?

The very bestest part is, the below picture.  I asked friends to send totems and talismans and anything at all that I could tuck into a pocket during the exam.  No matter the result I decided to make a little project of all the thoughtful totems, and the final letter in the center.  Happily the letter from the WSBA is one of congratulations.  But why this is the bestest, is the love and support that all these talismans represent.  That is what I am most grateful for, most proud of.

Thanks Peeps.

Going to the Doctor

I haven't been myself lately.

Can't seem to get enough sleep.  Constantly tired, not hungry not thirsty, vaguely nauseous all the time, especially in the morning.

I can hear my friend Berens snorting from here, That's not illness, SweetCheeks, that's a HANGOVER.

As most of you know (I think there was a special about me on the O Channel) I'm menopausal.

It's been about 7 (8?) glorious years now.  I had what is called premature ovarian failure.

OVARIAN FAILURE, People.  Ever heard of testicular failure?  No?  Yeah NO OF COURSE NOT.

Some lucky ladies wake up one day in their late 50s and say, Hey, I haven't had my period in six months, what's the deal?  And they then go skipping merrily into pregnancy-free sex.  I wish all my lady friends the same.  My symptoms started at 39 and are on the other end of the spectrum - look up any effects of menopause and I've had 'em, including the cysts and permanent memory loss.

EXCEPT:  My sex drive has not diminished.  Yet I haven't had sex with another person since the Clinton Administration.  Mother Nature, you are truly a bitch.

So back to medicine.

While in law school I was totally effed up and my GP sent me to a gyno, suspecting I was menopausal.  Gyno did a hormone test and the ideal results would have been a level of 8 to 10, 12 at the most.  Mine was 42.  My ovaries had shut down years earlier, bought a condo and moved to Florida.

I was in my car, on my way from school to my job two hours away in Olympia,
and I cried as she told me.

"Are you okay?" she asked.
"I just...I can't have children.  I'll never be able to choose... I won't be able to, to have a child, a child of someone I love."

"Yes," she said, "It sucks to get old."

The Washington State Bar Exam

I had intended to write on this a few months ago but I never really rallied, but now the results come this Friday at noon.

The WA Bar is unlike the rest of the states which in general use the MultiState Bar Exam (MBE), an exam which is federal and, as one would want, objective.

This Bar covers 28 subjects but you are only potentially tested on 18; and some subjects are tested more than once so you are looking at maybe 12 subjects.  Contracts, property (including wills, estates and trusts); civil procedure, criminal law and torts are all givens.  Which makes sense because if you don't know how to draw up a contract or follow the rules of CivPro then yeah, No Bar license for you.

But you better know all of them.

The WA Bar, in my opinion, is not objective.  You write 18 essays, trying to hit every issue presented, and maybe you get a grader who thinks Yah that statement of the law is worth 1 point, but maybe you get a grader who says the same statement is worth half a point.  Six points out of ten is passing.  NO ONE makes a ten ever, on any essay ever.  Hope you nail your strong subjects (for me, Admin, Criminal, Con Law) and score a seven or even an eight to make up for the weaker five and a half you made on the Banking/Secured Transactions essay.

Two days of substantive essays, three sessions each day, nine essays per day.

After the very first session, we  got a short break to re-caffeinate and I overheard a guy taking to his friends.  "Dudes, that Torts essay was a total bitch!  I couldn't find crap to talk about!"  Said friends looked at each other, then to him, and said, Erm, that wasn't a torts essay - that was criminal law.
All three looked pale and the guy who analyzed it incorrectly looked like he was going to be physically ill.  I can see why - because not only did he blow that one essay, he blew the Bar.

He failed.  Right then, on that one essay, it was over.  He might as well have gone home.

Of course, I might have done the same thing at another point in the exam, I have no way of knowing.

The third day is Professional Responsibility.

The PR rules are somewhat involved but it boils down to  - don't bang your client, don't break the law, don't lie to the court.  The shades of gray (especially when it comes to attorney/client privilege or breaking existing law) center around what you SHALL do, and what you SHOULD do.

Shall is absolute, as in, Thou shalt not kill.  Should, on the other hand, is discretionary.

The very last PR essay involved an attorney who - shocker - was banging a client, mixing law firm funds with personal funds, then took said client to a Mariners game got drunk and punched out a fan of the opposing team.

I was so tired, and so kinda didn't care at that point, I ALMOST made a joke as I wrapped up the essay - Attorneys shall not assault or batter a baseball fan, unless said fan is for the Yankees, then the attorney should not assault and batter.

But I thought the better of it.

Bar results this Friday, noon PST.

Forty-One Days of Sun

What in the Wide Wide World of Sports is a-going on here?

Hello Friends and welcome back to Disclaim and Deny where there are no rules and the points don't count.

I don't have a particular theme or subject today, but I can report I have a couple drafts in the works - the Joys of the Bar Exam, how depression works, and some new photog groups (which will probably end up on Flickr, haven't sorted that yet.)

 So just a few updates:

Parents visited.  Short of comments about my current weight and a rape joke from my Dad (and yes he knows), it went fairly well.  On the therapy session scale of one to four sessions, I give it a session and a half.

Had an unexpected visit from The Greek Boy of Falls Church and met his beautiful lady.  That was a treat.

Friend of mine reports he's lost 30 pounds.  Go You!  Your heart, and probably your liver, thank you.

Back to writing a little on the screenplay.  I started it as a creativity-as-therapy exercise, and some of the scenes were still too tender to my heart to write.  But I think I'm ready now.

Toying with taking a pottery class. I've done some slab work in the past but never worked the wheel (or 'thrown pots' or whatever it is called.)

Had the best weekend over Labor Day than I've had in a very long time.  Both stimulating and relaxing, spent with excellent friends.  Also picked up these new shoes:

wellies that look like frogs!

The Emerald City continues to be graced with nary a drop of rain in almost six weeks.

I'm also pretty darn happy these days, and I hope I take full advantage of my positive mood.  I've been eating better, drinking less.  Finally dug up my swimming gear and plan to get in some exercise.  I don't know if this happy phase is a result of my depression in retrograde and a rising manic cycle, but whatevs.  I'll take it.

Work-wise, I have a few ideas on making some things happen while continuing to troll job sites.  Passing (or not passing) the Bar will of course play a huge role in what I am capable of doing here in Washington State. 

Tune in October 12th, noon PST for those results.

Hey I can always move back to DC.  My SCB boss openly admits his Policy left hand does not know what the Lobbying right hand is doing without my assistance.

And I can move in with my friend Chippy, her fiance, and their two cats!  Three people and four cats in a two-bedroom.  I'm sure fiance will not mind in the least.

More when there is more to report.

I'm Not Old Yet

As we all know, when I don't make any effort I tend to dress like a twelve year-old boy.  And for the past two months I have made NO effort.  I've been living in draw-string pants, floppy shirts and the occasional hoodie.  When it's warm I go crazy and wear cargo shorts.

Yesterday I was in my usual Are-those-your-boyfriend's-pajamas? outfit, having a cigarette outside with one of the librarians I see around a lot.  Let's call her Bertha.

We shall call her Bertha, because now you have an idea of what she looks like.  She's in her late 60s, potato-shaped and skinny-legged.  She is a little fleshly around her unfortunate chin(s).

You know who she looks like?  She looks like a friend of your mom's.

As we were chatting we watched a very pretty girl walk by.  I say she was pretty - I didn't look at her face.  She had on a short pink sweater dress that fit her perfectly, and she had a lovely figure, nice and curvy.  Long blonde hair and longer legs.  She was very attractive.

As she passed, Bertha turned to me and said, she said to me right there in front of god and everybody,

"Must be nice to still look like that."

GAH.

I guess Bertha has never seen this shot of me.  Take that, Bert!:

 

Me and my friend 

Yvette SanRegrette, backstage

I promise to start dressing like a girl again, starting a week from tomorrow.

Eleven Days

Coming into the home stretch for the Bar.  I was initially going to rant about what a subjective and generally effed up test the Washington Bar is, but I don't have the strength for it this morning.

Getting pretty tired I guess.

Also concerned about ROWD, the old man is in Peru and apparently quite sick.  Been in the hospital for a couple of days but that's all we know.  He developed dysentery on a previous trip, but it didn't get full blown until he was back in the States.  Took him several weeks to recover that time - of course, the man is like 75 years old so I think any case of dysentery would be per se severe.

I've yet to have the pleasure of being ill in a foreign country, but I did break my ankle in Morocco and let me tell you that was no picnic.

Hopefully his illness is not as bad this time as it was last, and I suppose hospitals in Peru see more than their fair share of Americans with 'intestinal difficulties'.

Send good thoughts and I'll keep you posted.

PS  Keep the totems coming, it's been a real pleasure to hear from you guys.  It means more to me than you know!

A Coupla Pix

All this Bar business has sucked the creative right out of me - I haven't written anything interesting, I don't even have any concepts rolling in my head which is unusual.

But Hey - there'll be time for that after July 26th.

Meanwhile, have a couple of pictures:

Studying Cats Are Studying.

All the law you need to know 
to pass the Washington State Bar Exam 

in one convenient foot-tall pile of flashcards.

The best spot in the house

Also thanks for the totems!  I've received two with promises of four more.  I'll take all the good karma I can get.

I'll post something more substantive soon, probably when the O Fuck Freak Out really sets in.

Bring Me A Shrubbery!

As everyone knows, I am studying for the Washington State Bar exam.

I think it was on CNN.

Three weeks down, five to go.  Seven subjects down, 21 to go.

I know All My Good Peeps are rooting for me, and I've thought of a way you can actually help if you wanna.

Send me a talisman! 

I've already decided to wear two necklaces (one from a former beau, one from my parents) for encouragement.  Just mail a small something to me - a beer coaster from a place we've been, a refrigerator magnet, even your business card - I just need to be able to string it around my neck or put it in a pocket.

If snail mail is too last century for you, take a picture and email it to me.  Or find one on the interwebs.  I can print it and slip it in my pocket.  Anything will do as long as it is uniquely you and will remind me of your own personal awesomeness.

Besides having little talismans from folks right there with me during the exam, it will also help alleviate the next five weeks' BOREDOM as I slog through.

So get creative - I'm curious to see what you will send that you view is quintessentially YOU.  It's all about you!  Except it's about Me.  Or me and you. 

But mainly Me.

July 24-26, here I come!

A Memory from 1975

I recently had a weird dream and among other things, I remembered a conversation I had with my dad when I was nine years old.

Which is amazing in and of itself since I can't remember what I did nine days ago.

I think the conversation was prompted by watching an episode of The Jeffersons.  The show had a pair of minor characters, an interracial couple - the wife was black and the husband white.

My father opined these characters were completely unrealistic because "No smart white man would be with a 'black'".  However, he noted, some white women would be with a black man - "Why do you think women do that?," he asked me, apparently already knowing the correct answer.

I ventured that, Maybe because women are treated differently so they know being treated differently is wrong and black people are treated different?  So they just see people more like people and not different people?

Listen - I was only nine.  Being insightful and articulate were not yet my strong suits.

He replied, "Well that's just stupid."

So which part of his opinion was the cake, and which the icing?

Wisteria

I'm quite lucky because I have a green thumb.  Don't know why, really.  A gift from from my grandma, since my mom can kill an air plant.

Put it in my hands and it will grow thick and satisfied.  Grandma used to say, "Sweet, if -you- stick a broomstick in the ground?, it'd grow.  You got the gift."  Which is saying something because she could grow anything.

 A shot of the wisteria here at Chez Lyn:

Not a very good picture, but a beautiful and happy plant.

I love wisteria because it reminds me of home.  I lived with my grandma for what I consider most of the important years of my life while my parents were elsewhere.  We'd spend time down in Anahuac, at my great-grandparent's home, during the summers.  Anahuac is only about 3 to 5 miles square and back in the day, about 500 in population.  When my grandma married my grandpa and moved to Po-Dunk (pop. 50,000) a lot of her friends snubbed her for "going all town".

Grandma grew up in my great-grandparent's two-room house with no plumbing or running water alongside her 6 brothers and sisters.                                                                                                                        
 The yard included the outhouse, the pig sty, henhouse, tool shed and the smokehouse.

After returning from WWII, my great uncles convinced Mama and Papa to let them install indoor plumbing - although Papa was offended at the idea of 'crapping in my own house.'

I never knew him, all I knew was he was in the Kaiser's Calvary, and deserted to come here with Mama.  He had few skills and worked as a carpenter.  Once for a few years many many babies died, I don't know why;  Papa made little coffins for the 'poor folk', Mama sewed a bit of lining for the coffins.

The outhouse was pulled down but the smokehouse stayed, that was Papa's. Grandma once told me that she remembered at the end of the work week Papa'd bring home his few dollars (sometimes fourteen!) to Mama, but he'd hold back some nickels to buy a couple of cans of beer, which he'd drink in the smokehouse.

By the time I started exploring it (or 'splorin' as I guess I used to say) you could hardly open the door of the smokehouse, it was so decrepit.  The butchering tools and body hooks hung quiet and rusted, glad their days were done.  There was a small window, its panes long gone but the opening thick with purple blooms and lazy gold bees, the poorest man's stained glass.

When my grandma finally decided it was time to pull it down (back in the 80s) she found dozens of decades-old beer cans hidden under the floorboards.

The smokehouse itself was so rotted there really was nothing left of it - the only thing holding it up by then were the fifty-year-old wisterias.

So that's why I like wisteria.

Found on the Interwebs, A Series of Tubes

A new offering from those Krazy Kids who brought you Yo, Is This Racist?, a new site called Yo, Should I Dump This Asshole?  There's at least one gem on each page.  Considering I have not had the sex since the Bush Administration(s), and am terminally single, it's nice to know that at least I'm not dating some asshole I need to dump.

Here's Nicholas Sparks' latest:

 What a hack.

A cool site that works a little like RueLaLa, which offers limited-time sales on designer goods, Fab.com.  An eclectic mix with an emphasis on post-modern design.  Post modern is not my aesthetic, but I appreciate it and it's a nice mental design fix to peruse this site.

Jane Lynch on Maddow's show, you've probably seen it but just in case.

Nikola Tesla, via The Oatmeal (a local Seattle dude).

I might have posted this before, and you may have already seen it, but Kristen Bell's appearance on Ellen was awesome.  For one thing, she has the same "on the verge of tears" thing I have, and, she loves sloths. I don't know Kristen Bell from any other celeb (who is she, actually?), but I like her now:




Finally, here is your Aww What a Sweet Card of The Day:

ANNND, 

Mason jars remind me of my grandma, and cooking gumbo, and sharing with friends.

So next week I'll be starting Bar review, I hope to continue regular posting but hard to say as I don't yet know how much of a pumpkin I will have to turn into for the next two months.

The Bar exam is July 24-25-26, send Good Thoughts.

Three Blind Mice

My softer title to what should be called "Three Dead Rats Under My Hottub".

This gag-inducing adventure is easily the most disgusting thing I've ever done I'm pretty sure in my entire life.

When I was young, I mucked out horse stalls in trade for jumping lessons.  "Mucking out" being the polite term for shovelling horse shit.  My shit-centric activities have also included scrubbing the bird waste in the Seattle Aquarium's shorebird exhibit area, and digging years of pigeon poop off of an old grandstand in Sydney.

I think I have a higher crap tolerance than most.  It's natural, it's just waste.  With a pair of gloves and a thorough clean up after (hands can be washed!) I can deal.

But dead critters!  Under my hottub!  Being all STINKY!

First off - the fuck are they doing in there anyway?  Clearly the idea was, it's toasty under the tub so Yay let's make a nest....but once they get in through the 2" access hole (from which the drainage hose exits) they can't get back out.

Stupid stupid rats!

Now you are all DEAD and shit.

Armed with some long sticks, gloves and a schmear of Vick's VapoRub up my nose, I commenced to remove the bodies.

They did not want leave.  It took some effort.  Effort I had to interrupt on occasion to walk away from because dead animal carcasses are extremely unpleasant.

I had a couple of small plastic bags (the black ones you get from the liquor store - thought that would be appropriate) at hand to block my view as well as hastily toss the remains to... well, anywhere really.

I got two out and had to take apart another section of the tub skirting to get to the third.  He got stuck right at the opening, his creepy rat tail STILL HANGING OUT OF THE DRAIN HOLE.

GAH.  Rats' tails are disturbing enough with that whole no-hair action.  But a DEAD hairless rat tail is truly disgusting.

Anyway.

I had one bag kind of on top of that last one, and another at the ready, in the narrow area between the tub and the fence over the drain hole.

I was trying not to look at what I was doing; trying to visualize pleasant thoughts ("um...flowers!  meadows! bunnies!  - GAH no not BUNNIES!!!")

When - something moved.  Something black and quick....

I leapt back in panic, my heart jumped out of my chest and I realized -

the rat tail had gotten stuck to the extra black bag and in my efforts I had moved the bag myself.

I totally peed my pants.


Good times.

For Your Consideration

The previous post was mainly about my father.

I attempted to talk to him about some issues that have been weighing on me, and before I could get anywhere he shut me down.  "If you tell me I hurt you, I couldn't bear it - don't tell me anything I've done.  That would hurt me too much - why would you do that to me?"

"As usual you're just too sensitive, I don't know why you don't just get over it."

....

"Your mother doesn't care, I don't know why you even ask her - I TELL her what to care about.  You should know that by now."

....

As for the observation about boyfriends:  I think it's true; it's incredibly hard to get to; Buddhism helps.  It went out to M regarding his now-ex, R, a gay couple in San Francisco I've known since my days in Manhattan.

The point of the post was, put your strength to your own rudder.

Keeping Your Hand on the Tiller

I don't know about you, but there are occasions when I could most happily kick a prick in the bits.  Oh if only that was socially acceptable.  But then if it was it probably would not be as satisfying....

I take that back.  It would be as satisfying.

I send a swift kick out to people who are devoid of empathy (not the same as sympathy, look it up).  People who dangle love and affection, but only as it suits them:  Offer limited and qualified with conditions: "Was I the cause of THAT much pain?  I hate that you told me that because THAT hurts ME.  (!!! - Ed.)  Oh, well, geez all I can truly say is - that must suck for you."

Others who are, in fact, chock full o bullshit.  Such bullshit can be:  Casual, professional, hypocritical and most importantly emotional.

God knows I have my faults and weaknesses.  But to my credit I recognize them, try to control them, speak up when they get the better of me - as in, I try not to inflict them on others.  I have scars that will always be tender; and more than my fair share of old baggage on my back.  You know that scene in Titanic when Rose is boarding with literally a truck-load of luggage (Lord that movie was an overblown waste of film)?  Okay not that much baggage.  And what with DROPPING a massive chunk o diamonds into the drink like 60 years after the fact?  Who WROTE that sappy-assed screenplay?

Meanwhile.

My point is this:  All the crappy work crap, and co-worker crappiness you are dealing with today?  That's work, don't allow it stain your life.  The old friend you thought you could always count on, but now can't?  That's just right now; sort it out and take responsibility.  And be good and generous to the new friends.  That's how old friends begin to happen.

And the worst, the lover who broke your heart?  Honey, he just....  He just did.  There are no answers and nothing to be done about it. 

It just is.  Jackass though he may be.

As difficult as it is (and it is difficult), you must MUST keep your hand firm on the tiller, as long as it takes to get you to calmer waters.  The stronger you are, as you choose to be, the more steady the sailing.

And that's hard to do when you are also trying to knee someone in the groin, so just pick the task that will serve you better.

Found on the Interwebs, A Series of Tubes

You may have seen this already, but Republicans, Get In My Vagina! is worth watching again.

Truly, my disdain for low-cut pants could not have been better described.

What really gets my back up about this, is that this is still even an effing ISSUE.  I suggest experimenting on humans.  There's too many of us anyway, and humans can say No.  Actually - primates can say No also, we just choose not to listen.

If you're not buying your kitsch from Seattle's Archie McPhee, well you're just not living.

Who is the biggest badass I'm admiring these days?  It's The Hillz, that's who.  Looking forward to 2016.

And Finally, something about this appeals to me:

Happy Birthday, Kendall

Yesterday was my friend Kendall's birthday.

I really enjoy celebrating birthdays, the day a baby was introduced into the world, screaming and sticky, who grew into a person many love and are grateful for.  My life would be so much more gray had it not been for Kendall.

We've been friends for I guess around ten years?  The best creative director I ever worked for; finds my sensitivity endearing; held my hand when I needed it through three endless years of law school.

Thank you Kendall, thanks for being in my world.

If you have a friend like Kendall, be sure to say thank you.  That person's birthday is always a good day for that.  Or today.  That works too.

Happy Friday everyone!

Happily Ever Afters

This year has brought many of my friends new dimensions to their personal lives.  Three couples have moved in together, one couple to be engaged; and of course the lovely wedding this weekend of my friends Drew and O'Kilt.

Drew was a beautiful bride, the ceremony itself simple and moving, and lots of celebrating afterward including a late night at O'Connell's pub in Alexandria, with Drew still in her wedding gown.

Although all relationships grow, flourish, and sometimes fade, and like everything in this world they have no permanence - it is a joy to see the Happy that all these relationships are giving my friends right now.

Which is not to imply I think all relationships end, or worse, 'fail'.  I remember when the Gores announced their divorce, there was a great amount of teeth-gnashing around "O if they can't make it work who can?", after twenty years of marriage.  That actually sounded pretty successful to me.

Just because something ends, does not mean it failed.  It means it ended.  And we really must be grateful for what we do have - not mourn for what we don't have, or what simply cannot be.

I have had a lot of good times and many fun adventures, but I can tell you there are only three men I so truly loved I believed I could have spent my life with them.  Adored them, admired their talent, wanted so much to be the one to make them happy.  But as anyone reading this knows, I've never been married so you can figure out how that sorted.

Again, I am thrilled for my friends, I am.  Yet it reminds me I have so much love to give, but I can't seem to find anyone who wants it.

 

I did catch the bouquet.  

Why can't the paparazzi just leave me alone?

See This Film This Weekend

Or some other weekend, but preferably this one.

The movie Chimpanzee, co-produced by the Jane Goodall Institute.  It took something like 3 to 5 years to shoot.  It centers on a baby chimp, Oscar, orphaned when his mother is killed.  Most of the time orphans are adopted by elder siblings or more rarely, other females of the tribe.  Unfortunately for Oscar these were not options so he is adopted by Freddy, the Alpha male and leader of the tribe.  This proves dangerous as Freddy neglects leading and protecting the tribe because he is caring for little Oscar.  Sensing the weakness of the group, a rival tribe attacks to take over Freddy's tribe's territory.

Chimpanzees and humans are so closely related, and this movie fully illustrates our similarities - both can be compassionate as well as cruel.

Take your kids (or someone else's kids, just borrow one) and open their eyes to how critically important it is for us to care about wildlife and our responsibility to protect their habitats.  If you see it this weekend, all proceeds will go to the Jane Goodall Institute.

This has been a public service announcement.  You may now return to surfing the web for cute pictures of cats, celebrity gossip and of course, porn.

Collective Nouns

I'm a fan.  One of the more charming aspects of the English language - a pod of whales, a pride of lions, a murder of crows.

So let's make some up.  Here's a few I'd like to see:*

A crank of retirees

A gulp of swallows

A mood of teenagers

A judgment of Republicans

A slouch of supermodels

A klieg of actors

A guilt of mothers

A 12(b)(6) of attorneys  

An angst of art directors

A whine of toddlers

A block of writers

A regret of old lovers

An indecision of designers

An ego of directors

A laissez faire of Libertarians


Add your own in the comments.



*I might have read some of these somewhere.  I'm forgetful.

A Coupla Advertising Memories*

I knew an art director in New York who worked at an agency in the Chrysler Building.  Early one morning she called in a bomb threat so she go to the Barney's Warehouse Sale.

I was working freelance for an agency that was in a new business pitch.  Most of the creative department was working fairly long hours, and one evening, maybe around 8, one of the (female) creatives came out of her office with a male coworker.  She walked across the common area and threw away their used condom.

We had a receptionist at one agency who was a bit dotty.  She was ancient, dressed inappropriately, had brittle over-bleached hair and wore a mask of makeup.  The reception area was the only place with any common seating so we'd congregate there on occasion.  One day she came out from behind her desk, hiked up her miniskirt and proceeded to adjust her stockings and garter belts.

Same area, some of us talking about local restaurants and eating out.  One of our admin chicks, a girl named Melinda walked up and interjected into the conversation: "Eat eat eat!  Doesn't anyone FUCK anymore?"

Same agency, the Creative Department hosted the Halloween party every year.  It was always a blow out and spouse/SOs were not invited.  This particular year one writer and a woman from the graphics department were having sex in his office.  As luck would have it the writer's wife showed up about the time they finished up their playdate.  Did I mention everyone is drunk at this point?  Anyway, Wife tries to open Writer's locked office door; other coworkers are trying to distract her; Writer opens the door looking as one does when one has just had sex and... Wife is outraged, goes into the office and proceeds the pull Writer's five-foot ficus plant out of its pot and starts to swing it at everything and anyone in her way.  I felt bad for the ficus.

Same party.  Two guys dressed up as the Blues Brothers, complete with little baggies of 'cocaine' (I think it was actually coffee creamer).  At the end of the night they threw the baggies away in one writer's office.  The next morning, we noticed that the cleaning crew had thoughtfully taken the baggies out of the trash and placed them on the writer's desk.

One of my first CDs was a great guy but very volatile - could get crazy angry at the drop of a hat.  One day I was sitting in my office and I saw his jambox go flying by my door.  Right behind it was CD, chasing it and beating it with a baseball bat.  He couldn't get it to work and come to find out it hadn't been fully plugged in.


*Several people have complimented me on this post (Elle, you should totally get PUBLISHED!)  But in the spirit of full disclosure, every story mentioned here is true.  The only thing I elaborated on was the jambox/baseball bat story.  It might have been a golf club.

Have a Coupla Tunes

This morning I was working on the yard and a song I had not thought about in years popped into my head.

Way back when I was just a child in my twenties, I took guitar lessons from two guys, David and Paul - each better looking than the other.  They had a bluegrass band called The Weirknot Brothers (get it?), and they could play this tune wicked.

Once I had a girl on Rocky Top
Half bear the other half cat
Wild as a mink but sweet as soda pop
I still dream about that.






And for something completely different, a gem from Chris Isaak:

Found on the Interwebs, A Series of Tubes

Am I the only chick that thinks Jeremy Sisto is the hottest thing since Hot Things?  I would totally bang him blind but he's married.  Speaking of, why do people do that in this day and age?*  What's up with that?

Texts from Hillary.  Potentially very funny site.

Yo, Is This Racist?  This site makes me laugh out loud at least once a day.   Yo - thanks.

Don't have a vagina unless you can afford it.

Conversations overheard, and hilariously illustrated, from a comic book store in Boston.

I hope everyone appreciates Bruce McGill.  Started out as "D-Day" in "Animal House", was in "Legally Blonde 2", and continues to be an excellent character actor on "Rizzoli and Isles".  He's also not hard on the eyes if you like rugged bearded men in their fifties.  Like I do.

I know the young people are into the Zach Galifianakis movies (none of which I have seen [Sorry Zach, since I'm sure you are part of the 40-ish number of people who read this site])  but he is hands-down brilliant as the host of Between Two Ferns with Zach Galifianakis, via Funny or Die.

Everyone have a great weekend - it's a sunny, brilliant spring day here in the Emerald City.  Hope it's the same where you are.



* Not that I have a problem with married people.  Some of my best friends are married.

Cake!

Last night I got a birthday cake.

But when I realized I couldn't get all the candles on it,
I just broke down.



And got another cake!

Right about now I am pretty darn content.  Personally, emotionally, if not necessarily professionally.

My heart is lighter after finally resolving a couple of personal issues, long overdue; all my peeps are doing really well; and my oldest friends are moving back to the Emerald City.

Meanwhile you couldn't pay me to be 27 again (maybe 37...) because right now, right here, I could not be happier.

A Few Peru Pix

Why is that man holding a beer AND a machete, and who's the fashion disaster in the baggy pants?  O wait that's me.

Guinea Pigs:  It's What's for Dinner.

The Cathedral of Cajamarca, Plaza de Armas.

More later.  Also - today is my birthday.  Yay me!

Some Good Thoughts

There’s only so long you can sit around in your underwear.

Make an effort for people who make an effort for you.

Accept what can be given; anything else is magical thinking.

If you think it might be racist, it is.

Lesser people than you have done harder things than this.

If you choose to love, love fully, honestly, unbegrudgingly; such love will never bring you regret.

which leads us to:

Be brave enough to break your own heart.

In the end, it will be okay.  If it's not okay, it's not the end.

Another Conversation

Over dinner.

"Finally!  Barney Franks - the queer - is leaving Congress."
"'The queer'?  THE queer?  That's a lot of pressure."
"Since the day he got to Congress he's been trying to destroy everything."
....
"Everything?  Hasn't he been in office like twenty years?  You'd think someone would have caught on earlier."
"First his committee tells banks to make bad loans, NOW he wants people to able to get OUT of bad loans - without any penalty!"
"Wait so...you don't want banks regulated, and you don't want consumers protected?"
"I don't want any of it!  Let the market figure it out and people pay the price."
"So free market, limited government, personal liberty?"
"Of COURSE."
"I think that sounds a little like Libertarianism."
"Those Crazies?  You don't know what you're talking about."

If anyone knows The Crazy, it's me and I have two decades of psychologic med scrips to prove it.

"You're probably right."
"Of course I am."

To Come

Pictures to go up on Flickr today or tomorrow latest, assuming I stay awake long enough.

Not my usual shots as I like to shoot landscapes, animals and birds. Little opportunity for that.  Maybe next time.

Although one thing was interesting - I went to a neighborhood party where the tradition is to cut down a tree festooned with household items topped with a Peruvian flag.  It was fun and everyone was really nice - and by really nice I mean Latin men intrigued by my blonde hair and lack of bilingualism.

Lord have MERCY, Latin American men.

Although I will say my personal rule regarding Latin American men - especially while IN Latin America - look but don't touch.

Where was I.

The interesting bit was at the end of the night my new acquaintance, a young woman named Netchie, asked, "Elle-a, you body muy atractivo, why you wear the clothes no see?"

So now it has been established in two hemispheres - I dress like a 12-year-old boy.

Berens 1, Elle 0.

A Coupla Conversations

So I sez to da wife, I sez....

There is a homeless woman who begs outside the hotel where we stayed.  According to ROWD she's been there for at least the past three years (since he's been going to Cajamarca).

She is very old, filthy, with few teeth and shoeless.  One morning she approached me and I had to say I had no money (which was true - all I had was a cigarette and a lighter on me).

Rather - I tried to say in Spanish, "I'm sorry but I have no money."

But what I think I said was, "I'm sorry but I don't like money."

She laughed and walked away.

At breakfast I told this to ROWD.  He said, "I gave her 50 soles once (about 35 cents) and now she won't leave me alone." 
"ROWD, she's homeless.  This morning around six I was leaning out my window and I saw her peeing in the gutter."
"You know why she doesn't wear shoes?  Makes her look more pitiful.  She can afford shoes!  I could GIVE her shoes and she wouldn't wear them."

 ..............


During another breakfast:
ROWD:  "I'm glad you're here, it's nice to have company and you get to see the company and the mine."
"I've enjoyed it."
"Makes me think about when you were little.  When I would yell at you or punish you, you'd just cry cry cry."
"I guess I didn't want to disappoint my father."
"You were so SENSITIVE.  It was just AWFUL."
"I'm still sensitive, I know that.  I try to be aware of it and not take things too personally - but my friends don't mind and I think it makes me more empathetic than most.  Folks that have a problem with it, I try to avoid."
"But now you're grown up and I never expected you to turn out to be the woman you are now.  You are strong and confident and you've travelled the world."
"What do you mean?  How did you expect me to 'turn out'?"
"Just a housewife like your mom."

Total Travel Time: 20 hrs 52 min

One way.

Much to write about, to come later when I'm sufficiently recovered.

Beautiful little town, friendly folks; the people threatening kidnapping in the clink as of a few months ago so completely safe.

Shots to go up on Flickr in a few days.  If you do not have my Flickr site address let me know.

Glad to be home.

What Never to Say to a Woman.

I'm in DC right now visiting friends.  It's been a good trip.

Sunday I went shopping with my friend Drew and her two bridesmaids.  Lovely women both, I was particularly taken with her friend Meredith who reminds me of my friend Heather back home.

I like shopping as much as the next girl but lately it's been a solitary activity because all my girlfriends work and so I just end up going for whatever I need and then I'm done.

But Sunday was particularly fun.  We were looking for bridesmaids dresses so the four of us are in the dressing room, saying, Yes, No, Maybe, the length is wrong, that one smushes your breasts, etc.  When we were done all four of us spilled out of the dressing room like it was some kind of girl-shopping clown car.

Next up was shopping for Drew's trousseau, first stop was Victoria's Secret (or "Vickie's", as Meredith called it).

We were obviously all together and Drew had picked out several things to try on.

I saw a fantastic black and white bra - white with black lace - which would go perfectly with a black and white dress I have.  I don't what it is about that dress but I am always complimented on it and it's one of my favorites.

I'm thinking how fab that bra will look, and how sexy it would be to pull that dress off to reveal that bra to all the men that get to see me undress.  And when I say "all the men" I mean none, but anyway.

I go up to the chick who has been helping us and I ask for the bra in my size.

She says to me....She says, in front of God and everybody:

"So are you the mother of the bride?"

OH. MY. GOD.

I closed my eyes because the room started to spin.

When I opened them, I was immediately 10 years older and 20 pounds heavier.

I was no longer the curvy sexy tart I've always considered myself to be, but a frumpy 40-something with saggy tits and my grandmother's flat butt.

Afterwards I told the story and Meredith gave me the biggest hug and an, "OH MY GOD I AM SO. SO. SORRY!"

Drew piped up with, "Hey you know, my face is breaking out and I look really young for my age...."

I appreciated their words, but the damage was done.  DONE I SAY.

"So are you the mother of the bride?"

Never, EVER, say that to a woman.

A Few Things I Disapprove Of

1.  Spiders.  Within their ecosystem, spiders play a vital role which blah blah blah.  Whatever.  They're creepy.  I don't dislike spiders per se, I dislike how their legs move independently from each other.  At least centipede legs move in sync.  It is well-established that humans are wary of creatures that do not resemble them.  The less the resemblance, the more suspicion.  Insects have too many legs, snakes none.  Crabs are up to something, echidnas are not to be trusted.  And let's not forget, in a league of its own, the curious beast that is the geoduck:

That's his foot.  If his feet are that big, I shudder to think....

2.  Cruise ships.  They're floating, overblown resorts of sickening outrageous indulgence.  I'd think the idea of an ocean liner would be about, oh I don't know, enjoying the sea.  So why do they have bowling alleys, rock climbing walls and cabaret singers?  Also they are out in THE MIDDLE OF THE OCEAN.  No land in sight.  Water as far as the eye can see (and that's just the TOP of the water).  What if it falls over?  And the FOOD!  Large fat white people binging on huge spreads of the finest money can buy.  Cruise ships are everything that is wrong with America.  Which leads me to....

3.  The Cheesecake Factory.  What ocean liners are to sailing, The Cheesecake Factory chain is to the local diner.  Have you seen the menu?  A novella of mashed-up caloric craziness.  They offer a Pad Thai pizza.  WHAT?  NO.  Pizza OR Pad Thai, for godssakes.   Also - the servings can feed a small village in Guatamala for a week.  It's disgusting.  And the DESIGN of the restaurants themselves - the last one I was in had an Eygptian theme.  Why?  If they all burned down tomorrow, the world would be a better place.

4.  The Kardashians.

5.  When people buy purebred dogs.  Besides the wrongness that is puppy mills, there are so many deserving pups at animal shelters that need a home, I think it is ridiculous and somehow self-indulgent for folks to spend scads of dosh on a dog because it has 'papers'.  Seriously?

6.  When people write lists that no one but the author's mother cares about - "The 2011 Top Ten Alternative Band Venues in Seattle"   WHO CARES?

Oh wait.

Peru, in limine

The upcoming trip to Peru comes with strings.

While there, I've been told I'm not allowed to leave the hotel without a bodyguard.

A BODYGUARD?  What the FUCK?

Now, I have to say.

I've been all over the world, on my own.  Lived in four countries, visited over 20 on seven continents and can roughly (very roughly) speak three languages (five if I'm bragging).

I don't mean to boast, my point is  - I kinda know what I'm doing when I travel.

If I can make it through Tangiers I think I'm good.

However, apparently ROWD has been threatened with kidnapping - he and anyone he travels with.

The white-haired, blue-eyed Texan who owns the local mine and probably makes no effort with the locals.

I'm shocked, shocked to hear this.

Should be interesting - behaving myself is not my strong suit.

Food Shoots

I worked on a lot of food accounts over my time in advertising - picante sauce, breads, burger chains, soups, chips, fried chicken chains, ready-made meals - and I found food shooting to be the most difficult.  People and animals take direction; cars just sit there, and exterior location shoots are a matter of waiting for the light.

But food is a bitch.  It is very difficult to control; there's a window of time when it can be shot then it "dies" under the heat of the lighting.  You also can't (or shouldn't) manipulate it to such an extent that you misrepresent the product.  And the waste!  Just as with models, you go through hundreds of bags of bread looking for the the perfect slices - the properly shaped crown, no big holes, the even distribution of the grains.

Pounds and pounds of chicken are prepared for shooting, not eating.  Cooked for the perfect color of crust; raw chicken inside. 

Countless cans of soup opened, the food stylist picking through with tweezers looking for the perfect mushroom slice, the prettiest piece of carrot.

Then everything is tossed in the dumpster.*

A few quotes from food shoots:

"The broccoli needs encouragement."

Regarding a close up of a spoonful of chicken noodle soup, to the stylist:  "Can you PLEASE make that noodle look LESS like a WORM?  AND WHY DO I HAVE TO EVEN ASK THIS?"

Shooting raw strawberries and bananas for a retail juice label:
Client, regarding the hundredth banana we tried:  "That one won't work either.  It looks like a penis."
Photographer, frustrated (to me):  "It's a BANANA.  It's longer than it is wide!  If she wants a banana that doesn't look like a dick maybe we should just use an apple and CALL it a fucking banana."

Client:  "I was really expecting better than this."
Photographer:  "Well it IS a meatloaf we're shooting here."

"Listen, this is not just a cup of nuts.  These are American Airlines First Class warmed nuts.  WARMED nuts.  I need to feel WARM nuts otherwise what's the point?"  

Nationally Know Corn Chip client:  "Obviously shape, form and pointy-ness is critical - I just don't want the cheese dust to be secondary."

Pizza shoot, to the talent: "It's called a bite-and-smile shoot FOR A REASON.  You bite, you SMILE.  I give a shit what it tastes like.  And don't fucking SWALLOW, you're going to be doing this for eight more hours."

Shooting deep-fried fish, deep-fried hush puppies, and french fries on a plate for National Fast Food Fish Chain.  From the client:  "But everything is the same color!"

Explaining to a client why we use a portable fabric steamer to mimic steam off a dinner plate.  Client wanted the food itself to be steaming:
"To get the amount of steam we need to read [on film], this is better because heating the food can't really be controlled steam-wise, and it would probably burn the hand model's hands."
"Aren't we paying her?  Isn't that what she does?"

 "Think it's easy?  You try putting a perfectly fried egg on a piece of Saran Wrap."

"Tell the hand model to spoon the sauce like she MEANS it."

"This isn't working - the beans are taking over.  We need to dial back the beans."


I got paid for this.



*Some clients and photographers do go to great lengths to see that edible product left over from shoots goes to local Food Banks.

The Secret to Happiness

As I type this, sitting at my dining room table looking West, the clouds are rushing north over the Olympic Peninsula.  Grey trotting dogs, dark leaping cats, pink and blue glowing behind them.  The Brothers and Hurricane Ridge shown when dark horse head clouds choose to reveal them.

My wide front windows change at each moment, the two-hundred-year-old Hemlocks and Douglas' across the street indifferent; my little eighty-year-old house unnoticed, unimportant.

My fat tabby, pawing at the keyboard.  Twelve years old.  Happy for now but if I don't wait on him soon he'll bite my hair.

The clouds are thickening and now there's little to be seen - at least, what you may expect to see.

I hate to reveal the secret to happiness, because really - if you don't learn it yourself it has little worth.

But here is a hint:  It is not having what you want.

A Chosen Family

I had a very nice dinner last night, the host a friend I have not seen in several years.  One house, four jobs and two kids ago to be exact.  He and his lovely wife are building their chosen family.

We know each other from my last ad job before law school.  Our creative director was easily the worst CD I have ever worked for.  And as I roughly count now, that's a grand total of about 20 CDs.

Although I should be, I am not ashamed to say I hated that man with the heat of a thousand suns.

He took all credit and no blame.  Only worked on the choice assignments, all the dreck to the rest of the team.  Micro-managed.  Did not understand the difference between art direction and design.  Every piece of golden creative he touched turned to lead.  His monumental lack of talent, arrogance, and appalling treatment of others drained any final love I had for my chosen profession.

We discussed him briefly last night at dinner, mainly to reaffirm that Yes, he was indeed a toad.

A poisonous, poisonous toad.

However.  Had it not been for that soul-sucking job, I would not have many of the wonderful friends I have today - namely Burns, Autumn, Jeannine (Everyone's Favorite Lesbian), Tim, Mister Rick... and in turn the friends I have made through those good folks, like Heather.

So I am grateful for that job, because it helped me build my chosen family too.

Land-Raping the Peruvian Andes for Fun and Profit

I know this Rich Old White Dude (ROWD) who owns controlling interest in a lime mine in Peru.

Lime is an essential mineral needed to efficiently mine gold.

As you learned in 7th grade World Geography, Peru has a lot of gold.  A lot.  So a lime mine is, as the saying goes, a gold mine.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I am in fact related to ROWD, but his wealth is not mine (he enjoys reminding me of this).  I struggle to make my mortgage and heating oil is so expensive these days I spend most of my time at home in four layers of clothing.

I had a conversation with him recently about the mine.

It is difficult to do business in Peru.  Corruption, for one thing.  Also these PEOPLE have all kinds of HOLIDAYS when they just don't WORK.  And efficiency is just unheard of - like, how hard is it to get back hoes and generators the size of a small house to a village in the Andes?  Apparently quite hard.  Assuming they do not then get stolen.  Not that all these people are poor or anything.

And of course there are the constant strikes and actions against the companies doing the mining.  These companies pay the locals pennies for the little land they have, land they use to scrape out existence through farming.  Then the companies literally scrape the land for lime and gold, using precious water for the sluices, water that becomes so adulterated it cannot be used for farming let alone drinking.

And the SOCIALIST GOVERNMENT, which lately has been insisting these companies more fairly compensate the locals.  Hey, the locals signed CONTRACTS!  They got paid, what's their PROBLEM?

Yes, ROWD, the central issue is basic contract law.

In ROWD's defense, he was already cranky during this conversation.  The discussion took place over his car phone in his 2012 Camaro convertible as he drove home from his vacation property.  He was peeved because he was driving home.  Why would this annoy him?

Because the weather was too poor for him to fly home in his private plane.

Listen, it's hard to be a rich white man in America.

I'm going to Peru in March.  I hope I can keep my mouth shut.

But I will tell you all about it when I get back.

Viva la revolucion.*




*Yeah okay that's a Mexican expression but whatever.

Match.com, part 2

At first I was like, Meh.

But then I was like, WTF/this is getting funny.

Total profile views:  211
Emails:  0

Why You Should Never Tell Me You Really Have To Go To The Bathroom

I don't know about you, but I've never "worked a booth" at a conference before, but I did about this time last year.  My employer, a biological organization, was hosting an international scientific conference, so I worked our booth.  We got a lot of folks coming by for information about the Society and the usual swag (T shirts, buttons, books, "Ed Monton" the souvenir plush caribou). Of course it was wax and wane - 45 minutes of nuttiness and two hours looking at each other, waiting for the next break after presentations.

And two hours is a long time, which is filled with inane yak.  After one busy stint Drew, our Membership Coordinator, said, "I MUST go to the Ladies!"   I freaked out and said GO RIGHT NOW.  She looked a little startled, but then went. She came back and said, Um?  So I said:

DUDE.  I cannot deal when someone has to go to the bathroom.  It is impossible to tell you how panicked I get.  It’s like I have to go FOR them.  This person HAS TO PEE.  I'm like, "People, out of the way!  My friend needs the bathroom!  MAKE A HOLE!"

And maybe this comes from when I wet myself in my favorite dress in first grade because my teacher wouldn't let me go?... Or when I was on a Brownie trip (precursor to Girl Scouts) to Boston and I had to go in a Tupperware cup on a public bus...?

Probably not.

I even have dreams about it.  Not like I have to go and I just can't find a bathroom.  Oh no.  I can find the bathroom, but I can't get in because there's some code or something to open it.  Or I find the bathroom, but the toilets themselves are such alien contraptions - the stirrups from the gyno table, you have to hang from a monkey bar, it looks like a weight machine from the gym - I can't figure out how to use it.  Or it is a roomful of people (male, female) watching me and the only place to go is right in the middle in front of everyone....

Meanwhile.

Where was I?

So about then Kaitlyn our intern spun in, bouncing in a chair and rattling on about her PhD presentation being late; a meeting in twenty minutes; and a two-hour focus group ahead of her - and then she announced:

DID I SAY - I HAVE TO PEE SO BAD I CANNOT EVEN BEGIN TELL YOU!

Drew hit the floor laughing and THAT'S WHEN MY HEAD EXPLODED.

I'm also afraid of heights and ocean liners.  Yeah, I'm not well.

Joys of a Creative

Back in my advertising life, I'd go back and forth between:

1.  You produce a string of good work - not brilliant, but presentable - then maybe you actually get something strong and conceptual produced.

Right about then - The Hack Police come.

They bust into your office and announce, "Elle, we are sorry to inform you, you're a Hack.  Come with us please."

"But - wait!  That last spot for Mazda wasn't that bad!"

"Ma'am, we've been watching your work for some time.  We're sorry for your loss."

And your career is over.



2.  You're on a roll.  You're winning every creative shoot out you're assigned to, you are flying to cool places to work with awesome directors.

You go to the award show in New York to pick up the statue, people slip you their cards.  Maybe you'll get to go to Cannes.

You are heady with success, you drink too much champagne and then - you wake up around 4am, and your mind says, "Hope you enjoyed that awesome night - because you are NEVER HAVING ANOTHER DECENT IDEA EVER AGAIN, EVER."

And your career is over.

Online Dating

All of my lady friends* have encouraged me to try the online dating.  They all either have met, or know someone who has met, a fine specimen of a man through Match.com, and I should too.  It's brilliant!  You meet so many people you would have never met otherwise!  There are tons of men out there, Elle, who would be thrilled to go out with you!

You do have to be in the proper mindset, though, to fill out the never-ending questionnaire.  SO MANY QUESTIONS.  And most of my answers would be, It depends.  (The lawyer in me).

And obviously - to make a good impression,  you really shouldn't be depressed when you fill out these things (Me?  Depressed?)

Q:  What is your current state of mind?
A:  South Dakota.

Q:  What mood are you in usually?  Hopeful?  Content?
A:  Bitter.

Q:  When were you happiest?
A:  Right before I started filling out this idiotic questionnaire.

And so on.

I dutifully filled out the questionnaire in a happy positive way; posted a couple pictures, and promptly forgot about it.

Now it's about two months later and I realize I have to actually check the site for emails and such.  I go to my page and it tells me 87 people have looked at my profile - and as a result, I have three emails!

THREE?

Seriously?  Only three.  Three out of 87.  I would have had a better return if I had launched a direct mail campaign.

So now in addition to the five-ish guys I've asked out and been rejected by in person, I'm about to hit triple digits in guys rejecting me online.

Thanks Internets!


*Oddly enough, none of my guy friends think its a good idea.  What's up with that dudes?