Love Rant: Steps In The Right Direction

Prop 8 got kicked in the nuts today in California.

There's a long fight to come, but a kick in the nuts is a kick in the nuts and it sure as heck hurts.

Thanks for kickin' prop 8 in the nuts Judge Walker!

Love Rant: Inheritances

So, if you know me enough to speak to me regularly, you probably know I say "what?" "huh?" "pardon?" and "one more time?" a lot and generally accompany it with a point to my ear.

It's not because I don't listen.
It's because I don't hear well.

My family has been ALL over me to go get my hearing checked. I don't think it's that bad; they do. Problem is even when I had health insurance-audiologists and hearing aides aren't covered. And hearing aides? Super expensive. $3000 dollars per ear, easy. Plus, I'm 24 damn years old. Call me stubborn and unreasonable but I don't want to wear freakin' hearing aides. So, to recap, my super valid reasons for not getting my hearing checked are: a) Expensive. That spare change in my change bucket is for a new mac, not for hearing aides. b) I don't want to wear hearing aides. So I don't really care if I need them or not anyway.

Anyway. Someone let my the fact that I have a little hearing problem slip to my grandfather. He has had hearing aides ever since I can remember. But, he's an old man. It's necessary and plus, he can do fun, endearing, old man things with his hearing aides For example, when we were little he used to make them ring whenever we would hug him. Then he would say something adorable like, "Oh that was such a nice hug you're making me ring!"
Um. If I were to do that as a 24 year old lesbian....to anybody? It would be weird and slightly creepy.
So why get them if I can't even have fun with them?
Anyway, point is...my grandpa found out about my hearing problem. And my grandpa, as many grandpas do, likes to stew and worry about things. So, my phone rings today and I had the following conversation...






















What I love about my grandpa offering me his old hearing aides:
1. That I probably got my crappy hearing from him.
2. That he is sweet enough to do so. I love that the solution to my hearing problem is so simple to him. "Well here, just use my old ones! What's that? You say you can't see well either? Well shoot, use my specs! I'm due for an upgrade anyway!"
3. Let's set aside the fact that using his old hearing aides grosses me out a little bit...how about that his hearing aides are dinosaurs and probably weigh as much as I do and would not even fit on my ear? His hearing aides on my ears would be like putting a giant expedition frame-pack backpack on a kindergartener.
4. That throughout the entire conversation, the hearing aides that he wants to give me were not working.

Awesome.

The Buzz Was Gone!

OK! FIRST OF ALL...

For those of you who've been commenting: I AM SO SORRY. I just NOW realized that I had comments on my blog. I usually get emails that tell me so, but for whatever reason have not gotten ANY emails saying that I have blog comments. This will be remedied. Thank you to those of you who've commented. I'm so sorry for not responding there. I feel like an asshole.

So you may have noticed that there hasn't been too much blog-age. I know. Horrible. It's all going to change, promise. There WILL be a love rant in the near future about how much I love Cheddar-Jack Cheezits. There WILL be so many love rants in the future about so many different, ridiculous things.

The summer has been a little nuts.
You remember that job I started a couple months ago?
The one I couldn't wear sneakers to?

...I quit.

I've never quit anything in my life, really. Well, unless you count basketball in 7th grade but that wasn't so much quitting as saying "Hey guys, instead of sitting on the bench here...I'm just gonna do it at home and watch Clarissa Explains it All. Cool?" And anyway, I ended up only bein' a quitter for like three days because then all the girls begged me to come back to the team and well, we all know I'm a sucker for girls. See? I joined back for all the right reasons: to impress girls. And man, let me tell you my track record with women started early, because I impressed them by doing things like shooting at the wrong hoop and missing simple lay-ups again and again and again and again and generally making a mess out of my two minutes of playing time.
But the point is: yup. I've never quit anything in my life. I'm not a quitter. I'm a doer. I'm stubborn, I like to prove I can do/accomplish/complete things. I hate having to call "uncle." But I did on Friday. Taken at face value (walking away from a steady, decent, paycheck complete with heath benefits and a discount at Barnes and Noble) it might qualify as the craziest thing I've ever done in my life. To other people, I might seem totally ludicrous and off my rocker. To me, it was one of the best moves I ever made in my life.

I can't speak ill of the company or of the people who work there-they're all great. But...it just wasn't for me. I was a round peg tryin' to shove myself in the square hole of my cubicle every morning and it wasn't worth it to me. And since I'm young, and don't have a mortgage or a family to support....I cut my losses and walked away. I'm back to scraping by on part time work and do you know what?
I couldn't be more happy about it.
I taught art classes Saturday and had a conversation with a five-year-old about whether or not she believed dinosaurs could sing (she said "no" I said "yes" (duh) she finally acquiesced that if they did sing they probably did so in a dinosaur voice, I totally agreed saying that if a dino were to sing I wouldn't expect him to sound like Pavarotti). She also told me that she was named Amelia, after Amelia Earhart the famous, "airplane driver". She told me that nobody knew where Amelia was and that she believes she crash landed in a lake and died. I said I thought she was on the moon. Later, when we were talking about dinosaurs, five-year-old Amelia told me nobody knew what happened to the dinosaurs either. Five-year-old Amelia believed that the all wrestled each other too much and that's why they're not around anymore. But she is also open to other possibilities, as there would probably at least be two or three dinosaurs still around that didn't wrestle too much. I said I thought maybe the dinosaurs were with Amelia the famous airplane driver and five-year-old Amelia agreed. Then five-year-old Amelia told me that the place she wanted to go more than anywhere in the world was ancient China because that's where the first kite was invented. Awesome.
After work on Saturday I got to work at theatre and help the boys there move a giant set around and got to use a power drill and crow-bar. I got to put my flashlight and multi-tool on my belt and I got to joke with dudes who always crack me up. Disconnecting the vampire sockets on the lights led to jokes about vampires, which led to impressions of Bill Compton from True Blood. Again. Awesome.

So am I going to be able to pay off the those college loans anytime soon?
No.
Until I find another full time job that's a better fit will I be able to move out anytime in the foreseeable future?
Nope.
Will I be able to buy that new mac desktop I've had my eye on for the past year?
Eh, it'll be a while till the spare change in my change bucket equals a thousand dollars. Especially when I constantly pick out quarters to use in vending machines. Until then it's me and my four-year-old Miss. Watermelon kickin' ibook-pre-webcam style.

Despite all that I am a heck of a lot happier now than I've been for the past two months. If I've learned anything so far in life it's that I can't compromise myself or who I am. My greatest successes in life have come from being 100% true to who I am. And when I'm not in a place to be who I am, I can't be happy and I can't expect happy things to happen to me.

The best way I know how to explain why I quit is this. And this also might be the part that has me officially labeled as "crazy"...
As hard as it was to balance two part time jobs and go to school full time...
As hard as it was to then balance THREE part time jobs...
As hard as it was to work for low pay and constantly try and make things "work"...
And even though I had some really tough days, some really sad days, and some really bad days...
I always felt a little "buzz" inside me. Maybe it was all the coffee, but I think it was little hum of excitement that told me that not only would everything be ok, not only would I be ok...but that life I was working so hard for was on it's way. That I was doing things right and that eventually, I'd get to where I needed to be. And not only that, but in getting to where I needed to be, I was doing things that kept me and my brain happy in the meanwhile: teaching kids, doing backstage technical work, seeing shows, BLOGGING...
When I started working for the company a few months ago that buzz died. It just died. And I don't mean to sound so dramatic, but it did. And suddenly I wasn't me anymore. And that scared the life outta me. Because I'd always believed that with everything I can get, give, and have taken from me in this world, the one thing I could always hang on to and that would always see me through was my sense of self. And it was so scary to see that die.


And while I'm not proud of quitting because that is so not my style or how I operate, I am proud that I did what I needed to do.

Leap and the net will appear right?


Right?


Right.

Love Rant: My Veggie "Garden"

I love my veggie garden. I love my veggie garden so much. Even though my veggie "garden" is really just three plants, one in a pot, one in a hanging planter, and one...welll...one in a bucket. I love them. Want to know why I love my poor excuse for a veggie garden so much??

Because I actually think I might get veggies this year!!!! HOORAY!!

Now, if any of you followed my blog last year you may recall the vegetable garden I tried to grow and its miserable failure. "Miserable failure" doesn't even cut it really. It was more like an epic miserable failure.
Last year, I only ended up with a little bit of cilantro and a couple jalapenos out of the six different types of veggies I planted. Yeah. Pretty epically miserable.
I was ashamed.
I was disheartened.
I cursed my garden.
And for a brief moment I thought I'd never make it as an eco-conscious, forward-thinking, grow-you-own-grub type of 21st century human being taking steps to be more responsible about food intake. I'll be honest, before I planted my plants last summer? I had visions of a full out, rowed garden in my backyard. I had visions planting plants in "found" materials like old tires and clementine boxes and milk crates. I had visions of making delicious dinners solely out of what I could pull from the ground in my back yard...
BUT seeing as how I a) live with my dad and he probably wouldn't appreciate me digging up a good portion of his yard and dragging those "found" (read: trash) planters like tires and boxes INTO the yard and b) Every book I read about gardening told me to start small, I decided to start small last year.

...or so I thought.

Turns out, planting six different types of plants in containers along the wall of your garage when you're a busy girl running between three jobs doesn't qualify as "starting small". Two tomato plants. A cuke plant. A jalapeno plant. A pepper plant. And a pot of herbs. 8 weeks into the summer last year it became painfully clear that my initial foray into home-grown sustenance was going nowhere fast.
And in planting those plants in planters along the wall of my garage I realized I had made another critical error...
I planted the plants out of reach of the hose.
Yup.
Super dumb.
Basically, this meant I had the schlep a watering can back and forth from the hose to the garage 6 different times every time I watered.
Basically, this meant that my plants were probably WAY under-watered.
Lessons learned.

Like I said, I was ashamed and disheartened that my first garden was a wreck.
BUT I am also incredibly stubborn. I mean...incredibly perseverant.

But being stubborn doesn't make me a total twit, so THIS year I cut my plant-age in HALF. Three plants to deal with is a whole lot easier than six. You can pay attention to each one, encourage it to grow, and go over to it each day and whisper things like, "I can't wait to eat your ovaries." (No, I don't actually do that because it would be super creepy).

I planted three veggie/fruit plants this year: a tomato plant, a strawberry plant, and a jalapeno plant. I planted them in pots and NEAR the hose. And they're doing pretty well! Nothing has gotten big or developed enough to actually eat yet, but...it's getting there! (I think)

I also made sure not to make the mistake this year of naming my plants. I named my plants last year and that made their failure all the more depressing. Now, my plants are simply known as what they are: Upside-down-tomato-dude, Strawberry-dude, and Jalapenos-in-a-bucket-dude. You might think it cold-hearted, but this way if they fail I won't be depressed.

Check them out....

Strawberry-dude. Oh man. So excited for this dude to start producin' ripe stuff:


I think this little guy will be the first one I can eat. I say this only because, so far, he is the biggest. I am tracking his delicious process daily:

One day, when I'm all grown up and have a home, I picture myself in a cute little cottage-y type place with tons of overgrown berry bushes in the backyard. And all I'll have to do to get breakfast in the morning is walk in the backyard and fill up a dish with good stuff, grab a cup of joe and be made in the shade.


Upside-down-Tomato-dude:

(I didn't want to actually spend money on a planter made for planting tomatoes upside down, so I just bought a regular planter with a coir lining and cut a hole in the bottom. Plus, I'm pretty sure my Dad would have evicted me if I tried to hang up the Topsey-Turvey in his yard.)


Grow little tomatoes GROW! I want to eat you on some bread with some goat cheese.

Jalapenos-in-a-bucket-dude:

This is the one I didn't expect to do all that well because a) I planted him in a bucket and b) I ran out of soil by the time I got to him so he only got like 1/4 of a bucket of soil (I know I KNOW I'm like the worst gardener EVER) but look at those little dudes go! Pretty soon I'm going to have more jalapenos than I can handle.

My New Job: A Story In Comics

So I started a brand new job recently. This new job is not like anything I've ever done before. It's a great place to work, with very nice people. But I feel a little out of my element so far. Mainly, because I'm way way waaaaay out of the "art" sector. None-the-less, I'm lucky to have found a job and to get to work for such a great place.

Aside from the nice people, having a paycheck, benefits (now I can get hit by a bus and not get sent to debtors prison), and weekends off here are a few pretty awesome things about my new job:

1. I get a super official badge that grants me access to the building.

It makes me feel a little bit like I work for the CIA or FBI 'cause I can say things like, "Yeah, I've got the security clearance to be in this cubicle sector".
Mostly, I like it because I wear it around my neck and in doing so I let everyone I meet/come across/smile at in the hallway made of cubicle walls know: Hey. I work here. So don't even think about asking if I'm here for take-your-son-to-work-day.

2. We got a free travel mug.

The coffee to go in the travel mugs was not included. But at least now my coffee can travel with me and stay reasonably hot. AND I can score points for the environment by taking my travel mug into coffee shops and filling it up instead of using one of their paper cups. You're welcome environment!


As awesome as badges and free travel mugs are, there are some things about my new job that are hard for me...

1. You are not allowed to wear sneakers.

Not even on casual friday.

2. You have to talk about polite things. Like the weather and The Hawks and laundry.


You are NOT supposed to run your mouth off.


If you run your mouth off you might insult people...


3. You cannot run in the office. I mean, no one has officially told me that I can't run, but I assume it's one of those rules you should assume to be true.
You cannot run.
You have to walk.
Professionally.
With your badge on.
Why is it such a big deal that you can't run?? Because the area where I work is pretty much made of cubicles, and hence there are perfectly crafted "lanes" for racing. I mean...DUH. And it could only be all the more interesting to race in cubicle lanes and have to dodge printers, recycling bins, and fax machines. ALSO, I think it would be way fun to put a prize in a random person's cubicle and have a race to find it. Kinda like rats in a maze, except less Kafka-esque.


Here are some things I wish about my job:

1. That I could have a drum set in my cubicle.

I don't know how to play the drums, but the office is so quiet that sometimes I just want to make some noise. Hence my desire to have drum set in my cubicle to bang on.

2. That the cafeteria had an ice cream machine.
The cafeteria at the place I work is run by the same company that ran the cafeteria at the university I went to. One thing my school cafeteria had that this cafeteria does not have was a soft serve ice cream dispenser. There were days where I would eat three ice cream cones in one day. And I certainly would not mind if those days happened again...


Really, if I could have a drum set and an ice cream machine I would be pretty made in the shade. I could get over not wearing sneakers. And if I had a drum set that would distract me from wanting to run around. And if I had ice cream to shove in my face that would prevent me from saying something stupid!! Everyone WINS!

Love Rant: This Sketch From SNL

Ok. Obviously this is brilliant for so many, many reasons. Not the least of which is Betty White, who was beyond hilarious all night long (I nearly fell off the couch when she came out on the Latin talk-show and couldn't keep up with the head-snap dance in that long-haired wig). I could go into great detail about Betty White's genius comic timing, the awesomeness of Betty White, Tina Fey, Rachel Dratch, Amy Poehler and Ana Gasteyer all on one stage-but really...it speaks for itself.

Here are the reasons beyond the obvious, that I love it:

1. "Lez" as a verb. If I had a nickel for everytime I had to do something girly when I would have rather stayed home and lezzed? Well...let's just say I'd have my own lesbian fashion line for girls who can't fill out the boob-sacs in shirts made for women.

2. Betty White saying she wishes she could go back and lez it up 24 hours.

3. "You can put that lesbian in any kind of a dress you want and you know what you're going to end up with?? A lesbian." This sketch made me realize that, growing up, I never needed a pony or a hamster or a pair of red converse high-tops...what I REALLY needed was Betty White sitting in the corner of my house, doing needlepoint-stating the obvious....

Like...when I sobbed over having curlers put in my hair...
MOM: I don't understand why you don't like having your hair curled! Don't you think you like so pretty??
BETTY WHITE: She's a lesbian!

MOM: Now why did you take your communion dress off ALREADY?! Our family hasn't even gotten here from the church yet for your party!
BETTY WHITE: That girl is a lesbian!

MOM: Why don't you want to go to social dance class?? Everyone else in the seventh grade is going!
BETTY WHITE: Awww! Just let her stay home and LEZ!

...and...when I brought home a boyfriend who was clearly gay himself, though nothing was ever said to me, I'm sure at one point this conversation happened...
DAD: Should we be concerned that she's dating a gay man?
MOM: Oh I don't think he's gay! Why would he be dating our beautiful, lovely, daughter if he was gay??
BETTY WHITE: BECAUSE THEY'RE BOTH HOMOSEXUALS. NOW TELL THEM TO COME OUT OF THE CLOSET BEFORE THEY END UP MARRIED WITH FOUR KIDS.


Oh Betty White. What good work you could do for gays across the world if you could sit in a corner and state the obvious.


....also...I have new cursewords. They are "Crabapples!!" and "Awww Crackers!"

Love Rant: My New Pair Of Sneakers That I Convinced Myself I Needed/Deserved While Shopping For "Work" Shoes

These are my new sneakers.
I LOVE sneakers.
I LOVE these sneakers.

Personally, I believe that there are a pair of sneakers for any occasion in life.
Sneakers make me feel good.
Sneakers always feel like "me".
And if I have to wear an outfit that's not wholly comfortable, or if I'm in a new situation or doing something I don't necessarily like doing-I feel so much better about life if I'm wearing my sneaks. Some people have pendants or jewelry that they always wear. Some people can't function without their special watch on their wrist. Some people have lucky hats...
I have sneakers.

So yesterday I got a new pair of sneakers (see above picture (aren't they totally awesome?!)). There's just something about sweet new shoes that make me feel good! Maybe it's my inner girl coming through. But instead of drooling over a new pair of pumps or some sexy, strappy sandals...I swoon over sneakers.
Is that weird?
I can't help it.
So I bought a new pair yesterday afternoon. And I'll admit I was especially vulnerable yesterday because...

I was out clothes shopping.

*Cue the foreboding, dramatic music*

There are few activities I loathe more than clothes shopping. But this is not a blog that talks about things that I loathe, it's a blog that talks about things that I love. So I will not go into much more detail than to say: when you're small it's impossible to find things that fit. And it gets to be a miserable day when you're shopping for regular old button-downs and try on a petite 0/XXS and it STILL looks stupid on you because you don't have the boob-age to fill out the built in boob-sacs that they build into ladies' shirts. So. Frustrating. It's not my lack of boob-age that I care about, it's the fact that ladies shirts look stupid on my because of it and kids' shirts don't fit because the sleeves are too short and mens' shirts are just too damn big and I just want a shirt that fits I don't care WHERE it comes from! Is that too much to ask?
Anyway.
Back to sneakers.
I had no luck in the clothes shopping department yesterday. None. I got belts. That was about it.
...Good thing I had to buy shoes too.
I am starting a job where sneakers are not allowed (I know, it's heart-wrenching), and hence, needed to find appropriate footwear.
Now, one totally awesome thing about having the build of a hobbit is that you can fit into kid size shoes. And so my body-type (read: hobbit) redeemed itself and I was able to buy a plain old pair of brown "work" shoes and a plain old pair of black "work" shoes in the kids section and hence...on the cheap! So what if the brand of my shoe is "Buster Brown" and the "o" in "Brown" is a little paw print?? No one has to know but me!...and all of you.

So since I was able to find the shoes I needed for so cheap, when I saw the converse rack, I thought: "Why the hell not?! I deserve a new pair of shoes that make me feel good! Who cares if I can't fill out the boob-sacs on a petite 0/XXS ladies shirt? You know what I CAN fill out?! THESE TOTALLY AWESOME HIGH-TOP NAVY BLUE SNEAKERS!!!!!!"
And I bought them, and wore them out and felt much MUCH better.
That is the power of sneakers, y'all.
Call it crazy.
But that is the power of a pair of sneakers.
And that is why I love them.
'Cause even though shirts don't fit me properly....SNEAKERS ALWAYS FIT ME PROPERLY.
And even though the day might have been a lose on the "agenda-I-need-to-buy-new-button-downs" front, it was an absolute victory on the sneaker front. And a victory in sneakers most certainly pawns any lose on the clothes front.

When I was a kid I used to think new sneakers could make me run faster.
Like new sneakers gave me some sort of extra power that I didn't have before.
And like nobody else had to know. It was enough that I knew I had something special on my feet, like a secret weapon.
When I was a kid, new sneakers made me walk a little taller.
I felt like nothing in the world could be all THAT bad, 'cause I had a new pair of sneaks on my feet.
And I could say the exact same thing about a loyal tried and true pair of sneakers too.
Loyal tried and true sneakers pretty may as well be super hero capes.

I guess the reason I love sneakers so much is that I still sort of believe all that. To me there's something just a little magical about them.



...And it's not like I'm a crazy collector. I'm by no stretch of the imagination obsessed with sneakers. I don't have 100s of pairs. And it's been about a year since I bought my last pair. I usually kick them off at the back door without untying them. They also tend to pool around the door to my bedroom, in the threshold, and halfway to the closet. I get frustrated when I can't close the door to my room because they're in the way...and then I kick them across my room. I most definitely use and abuse 'em. But I certainly love 'em.