when it's nice to be boring

i've been struggling with what to write this week...late to my own deadline.

sounds about right.

but i was struggling with what to write because there were no BIG MOMENTS. there was no massive break through, no life altering realizations, no major transformative moments.

and fuck if realizing that wasn't a relief.

whew.

it's been a FEW WEEKS for me ya'll. no child support! sliding down the kinsey scale! overcoming the massive fear of posting a video.

just...existing ya'll.

it's a weird feeling with everything going on right now.

am i inside the funnel? the cone of silence?

the world is a hot mess right now.

pandemics, politics, asteroid...

it's a lot.

but i feel like i'm just kickin back watching it all.

weird how i'll have a MASSIVE panic attack about my ability to retroactively pay daycare bills, but the pending end of the world is just like..meh.

not to be a total asshole, but things are really boring for me right now.

quarantine at home when you're not at work?

CHECK

excuse to openly wipe off your desk after gross people touch it?

CHECK.

politics?

i already voted. hit me up in november if we're all still around then. #bluenomatterwho

this week i just got to sit.

i meditated/did yoga under the full moon for about 4 hours last night BECAUSE I COULD. do you know how relaxing it is to just focus on gentle stretching and clearing your mind FOR FOUR HOURS?

do you know the last time i just took as long as i wanted to intentionally do nothing?

ok. so last weekend. shut up.

THIS WAS INTENTIONAL, NOT JUST LAZY.

self care ya'll. 

WHO CARES IF IT'S CHEESY AND CLICHE?

yeah everyone loves it, CAUSE IT'S AWESOME.

you bet your ass i have a NAMASTE pillow on my bed.

it's nice to not have anything specific to report. just kickin it. still broke as fuck. still listening to music and practicing multiple The Voice auditions FULL VOLUME. my poor neighbors.

i'm getting back into reading. i splurged last week with tax return money and bought three books:

Faking It by Lux Alptraum available: here

Never Have I Ever by Joshilyn Jackson available: here

sold on a monday by Kristina McMorris: GOODREADS

still also reading

The Italian Wife by Kate Furnival available: here

The Greatest Love Story Ever Told by Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman: GOODREADS

but yeah.

it was a boring as fuck week.

i take another, please.

keep movies out of my books

strong opinion loosely held: turning books into movies is destroying the imagination of children.

and probably adults.

but our imagination is usually already destroyed...so....mostly children.

there's many an argument about turning books into movies. people hate it because so much gets cut out. because they change some of the plot to make it read better on screen. because they change the emphasis or the lesson. because the directors interpretation isn't the same as the authors intention.

and my biggest complaint: it's never what i saw in my head.

getting kids to really engage in reading is challenging. getting them to SEE the story vs. just the words on the page is hard to do.

how many books did i read as a kid? hundreds. thousands. each one was a movie in my head. the characters built from the parts of the description that were most important to me: anne of green gables and her RED hair. polly pepper and her second hand clothes (the five little peppers and how they grew). claudia kishi and her funky artsy jewelry and decorated room (the babysitters club).

some of my favorite books eventually turned into movies and they were NOTHING like i saw in my head and it made me feel like i was imagining wrong. 

HOW CAN A CHILD IMAGINE WRONG?

how many children read the harry potter books and created this beautiful world of magic in their heads? new, made up words, new fantastical destinations, shops, creatures. then the movies came out and, while they're spectacular feats of cinematography, how many kids were like oh, that's not how i pictured it.

how many kids stopped reading and just waited for the movies? or, worse, could only see the movie setting as they read the later books published after the first movie?

how many lost their imagination? lost their creativity after that?

diving deeper, it made me think about why some books stand out for me and why i loathe others. i think, for me, the breaking point is in the author trusting the reader to extrapolate their own vision. i have a strong preference for books with intentionally ambiguous descriptions. give me enough of a jump off point and let me take it from there. if you spend 3 pages describing the exact texture and color of a leaf, i will spend exactly zero minutes reading your book.

i like to fill in the details myself, make the story MINE.

think of it this way: if an author describes a farm what do you see? is it a big farm? almost a ranch? is it a small farm? is it one barn and a house? is it expansive land with crops? is it animals and gardens? is it an urban farm in someone's backyard? is it a rural farm with neighbors nearby? is it a texan farm where you can drive for hours on your own land and not see anyone? 

unless it is a crucial part of the plot, a character in itself, let me fill in the blanks.

i love descriptions that give you a soft focus: the home, a small country home looked blue at first glance but not if you looked too closely. perhaps someone ran out of blue paint covering up the last color, perhaps the blue is the last color showing through the cheap new layer. maybe it only appears blue on one side reflecting the distinct color of the garage, painted in the bold colors of [the characters] favorite sports team.

what do you see? i can promise you it's different than what i see, and to me, that's the beauty of literature.

"...he heard an animal bark in the woods. bark, is that the right word for the sound? did the neighbors dog get out again? are the coyotes scavenging nearby, encroaching into new territory and scoping out the local scene? someone told him once that foxes make a sound like barking. what would a fox be doing in this area? the bark, yelp, be it what it may, oddly complimented the melody filling the room from the vinyl playing on the modern vintage record player."

how many different pictures pop into your head from that one paragraph? are any one of them wrong?

i LOVE that each person will focus on a different part, see a different setting, different detail.

movies take that away. they lock in one persons vision; the director, the set dresser, the script writer...they take what one person deems important. it could be considered a cruel form of censorship. forcing ONE perspective, disallowing any alternative interpretation.

have you ever read the book, watched the movie and then read the book again? can you see your initial vision? or has it been replaced by the hollywood version?

as much as i love movies, and i do LOVE movies, i can't help but feel sad that even at their most creative, they're limiting creativity.

keep your movies out of my books.

i mean, keep making movies. and books do make great movies. but, you know, don't make MY books into movies. just the other ones.

no, not those ones either...


**no, YOU'RE the devil's advocate: but what about all the kids who have a hard time picturing the story and the movie finally helps it make sense to them and puts a picture to a word they couldn't figure out or puts a picture to a place they've never been and may never get the chance to see in person. what about kids reading about Christopher robin in the woods that live in the city in an apartment? they can't imagine a 100 acre wood when there's not a tree on any of the nearby city blocks? what about kids who have never been to a foreign country and can't imagine what they dress like, how different their houses may look? movies give a vision to things that may otherwise be summarily dismissed for lack of understanding or ability to put a picture to the words....**

back to basics

a few weeks ago the ladies of my book club encouraged me to sign up for a weekly writing prompt.

and so i did (i promise, i'm working on this weeks prompt).

THEN, like the true assholes they are, these amazing women bonded together and signed me up for a winter writing intensive course (be ready for a deluge of posts in december!).

jerks.

WOULD YOU JUST STOP BELIEVING IN ME AND ENCOURAGING ME ALREADY??

they presented me with THE PERFECT CARD:

it is filled with the. most. supportive and AMAZING notes that made me cry and snot all over my self, and they were of course right, it would have been better at the restaurant across the street instead of at the book fandango surrounded by strangers. BUT THERE WERE FREE BOOKS AND A HANDSOME AUTHOR SPEAKING.

SO.

to my ladies: (huh, that sounds creepier than expected)

to the ladies of "read me" (less creepy. better)

i present to you, my first short story. written, illustrated, and bound by yours truly circa 1986.

note the staple marks on the CORRECT side of the pages...well, correct when you're 6 and left handed anyway...


without further ado, The Little Bear, by Sherry Miller

i will have my actual writing assignment up later today.

thank you to all of you who read this weird little corner of the internet. thank you to those who believe in me and encourage me to write. i'm getting there.

a REAL first time story

if you haven't heard of the mommy porn phenomenon that is 50 shades, please send me the address of the rock you're hiding under, i would love to join you.

"know thy enemy" and so i read the books. all three of them. and i almost vomited.

where do you start? the fact that they FUCKED UP every single part of a healthy sex life? sure, let's start there. how about labeling spanking as abuse and giving it a bad name for people that have never even thought about trying it. or the fact that every. single. adult store in town has posters up everywhere about 50 shades and the toys there in? yes, i know this for a fact. yes, it pisses me off. soccer moms without a clue venturing into a world that takes research, thought and communication to be done in a healthy way. fuck. talking to the guy at castle i found out they've had to TRIPLE their order on all the stuff mentioned in the books. and it's still selling out.

"isn't this a good thing? getting people to open up sexually?"

NO. because they're going off something they read in a book. A FICTION BOOK. any spanking, toys, anything in that realm requires communication and trust. they are NOT marriage savers. they are not something that should just be picked up. it could lead to a LOT of problems, pain, mistrust, abuse if not handled properly.

let's not even start about how from the very first sexual experience (a virgin to boot) EVERY. SINGLE. ORGASM. was perfectly synchronized and magical rainbows and sunshine. FUCK YOU FIFTY SHADES. synchronized orgasms are the exception, not the rule. perfect sex every time takes TIME and getting to know your partner. thank you for setting unrealistic expectations. fucking bitch. RAWR.

ok. end rant. kind of. all that fucking BULLSHIT aside, here is my answer to 50 shades: (this may end up being multiple posts to cover all the misconstrued sexual experiences).

FIRST TIME (virgin) SEX:

She had been crushing on him for most of the year but he still hardly noticed her existence. They had talked a few times, he had snuck into her room late one night and done something strange to her. Many years later she learned that strange thing was oral sex and when done right can be amazing. MANY. YEARS. LATER. (and a few more for the amazing part).

He was perfect in her eyes- muscular, tanned, athletic. She was non-existent to him- a virgin, a church girl, a nerd. Their world had no intersection, no reason to be around each other, no matter how hard she tried to make it so.

One day she heard that he would be moving to a different state and knew it was her last chance to get his attention. There was only one thing she knew that would get him to notice her, only one thing that would make him want to spend time with her.

One fall night at a High School Wrestling match, she timidly approached him.

"I heard you were moving."

"Yup."

"Well, if you want to have sex before you leave, I'm ready."

"Ok. Lay down."

She looked around the dirty, empty high school class room. Here? But he was willing, he was paying attention to her, that was all that mattered.

She lay down on the floor of the room and wiggled her wrangler jeans down as far as they would go while he unzipped his jeans and knelt over her.

In the quiet of the empty room he pushed into her, hard and painful. She tried to relax but the pain was just too intense.

"Ow. That kinda hurts." She whispered.

"Ok." he said standing up, zipping his jeans.

Without another word he walked out of the room and she never saw him again. She quietly pulled her jeans back on and stared in horror at the large stain all over the classroom carpet having no idea what to do or how to cover it up or make it go away. Ashamed, she left the room and never went back. Thankfully, it was never one of her assigned classes the rest of the three years in high school.

The next day at school everyone knew about what had happened. It was her first lesson about how boys talk. An embarrassing, long lasting lesson. It would be two years before she let another boy anywhere near her again, and then only to quell the pressure of peers.

THAT. see that? THAT is a mother fucking first experience. not some perfectly orchestrated multi-orgasmic love fest with a perfectly sculpted multimillionaire god in a gigantic bed with a maid to wash the sheets after. FUCK YOU FIFTY SHADES. fuck you for making every woman feel inadequate. fuck you and your horribly written fanfic gone overboard. fuck you and your "escape from reality" bullshit.

oh, and if you haven't noticed, I FUCKING HATE THOSE BOOKS.

one month slackiversary

ok kids. here it is. MY ONE MONTH SLACKIVERSARY!

yes. it’s true. i have officially been sitting on my ass for a full month. and my couch has the dent to prove it.

i haven’t done much. obviously i haven’t been writing. at all. i spent a good portion of time watching ugly betty from the beginning. all four seasons. i am now approximately half the intelligence i was a month ago. seriously! that show was a train wreck. i had to keep watching even though i loathed myself for doing so. more than once the following thought passed through my mind: WANT. TO. PUNCH. TV. it’s a good thing i was lazy enough to never actually move from my couch to do said punching. i like my tv. the horrible show wasn’t it’s fault!

so. besides getting caught up on terrible tv on netflix, what else have i done?

have i started working out like i vowed? not so much. have i started writing the books i want to get out of my head? not even a word. have i been in the classrooms at school? well, actually, YES. a bit. teaching an “exploratory” on fridays at the oldest sons school for an hour each friday. teaching a class full of 9-12 year olds crochet. yes, i am that stupid. dear god i hate other people’s children. now wait, that’s not fair. MOST of the class is ok/tolerable. it’s those other few though- oh those other few. and i feel bad because i recognize them- the socially awkward girl stuck in braces/glasses that thinks the stranger she acts the more people will pay attention to her and therefore like her...NOT SO MUCH HONEY. the boy who likes the girl but thinks being mean to her is a better idea. the “i’m too smart even for the smart school” girl that i want to punch in the face. BUT, i tell myself it’s only a few weeks, they’re learning something new, i’m in his school even if he’s not in my class, AND HE LIKES that i’m teaching a class. so. as long as he likes having me on the school grounds i guess it’s all ok.

i HAVE been reading. not quite the full month of it like i planned (stupid ugly betty!), but i have been reading. if you haven’t heard of kate furnival, go look her up and read her books NOW. historicalish novels based in russia at the fall of the romanov era- REALLY well written. the books of the bizzare (there’s two of them now) are fun and interesting to read through quickly. all sorts of facts you never knew you needed to know. LOVE them. did you know when an octopus gets stressed they will eat their own tentacles? see? things you need to know! nikki sixx biography: AMAZING. slash’s biography? OBNOXIOUS. made me want to punch him in his stupid top hat. shit my dad says? hilarious and well written. i hope they serve beer in hell? PEE YOUR PANTS funny. and obnoxious. makes you want to junk punch and jump tucker max’s bones all at the same time. full of the stupidest things any boy could ever think to do, the worst ways to EVER treat women, the most offensive references to women, having sex with them, ways to describe them, and i’m peeing my pants through all of it. now i HAVE to watch the movie. i have a stack of 14 more books to read and more being delivered by barnes and noble any day now. basically: don’t expect me to do anything real any time soon.

oh. and there’s boys. of course there’s boys. you didn’t think i would completely let you down did you?

where to start? biggest train wreck first? or the creepiest? then there’s the two that i promised i would never speak of. so. this is me not speaking of them. now you’re curious...right? too bad. i keep my promises. oh. and then there’s the worst of all: a good one. *sigh*

ok. creepiest first: guy popped up on plenty of fish via email. seemed mostly normal. emailed back and forth a few times, then he popped up on instant messenger (the site has it’s own messenger). this is all in the time span of about 20 minutes. so we’re instant messaging, he’s kinda getting my jokes, isn’t at all what i would seriously consider, but at the same time isn’t completely obnoxious. yet. out of the blue he’s all: I’M COMING TO SEE YOU. started asking which bar i wanted to meet at for a drink. umm...wow. run away freight train anyone? even better? HE LIVES IN TRICITIES. it’s 9 at night, i’ve been talking to him for about 30 minutes, the weather is SHIT, and he decided he wants to drive up to spokane to have a drink. we went from zero to FREAK ALERT in about 30 seconds. no, it wasn’t flattering, it was creepy. i kept trying to think of way to put him off, the roads are bad, i have to get up early for car pool, no, i really didn’t want to go out for a drink. or food. OR ANYTHING. but this guy just wasn’t getting it. allegedly (my crystal ball is on the fritz, so i didn’t actually SEE anything to prove it was true) he got into his rig and started heading this way. then he realized (allegedly) how bad the roads actually were, turned around, and emailed that he wasn’t coming but wanted to meet on the weekend at a bar in davenport that his friend owns. now. do i know if he actually got in his truck and started driving? no. could have been a big show to try to impress me (ummm...FAIL). could have been a bathroom break. no idea. but suffice to say, i was RELIEVED. would i have actually met up with him if he had come to town? scary to say, but yes. i have this odd guilt thing about shit like that. if he had spent 2.5 hours driving here in shit weather, i would have at least met him for a drink. in a VERY public place. with several friends (and the police) on standby. luckily that was the last i heard of him save a few follow up emails that weren’t returned. oh, and there was this whole bit about how he expected me to dress up for him (still not sure what he meant by that), the whole racist/homophobe comments he kept dropping, and the creepy way he kept saying he couldn’t wait to get me in his hot tub. ew.

guy #2: oh my. T.R.A.I.N. W.R.E.C.K. younger kid: mistake #1. he’s a 25ish punk kid that is every kind of messed up you can imagine. first, let’s start with his profile: two of his pictures are of him smoking, neither shows him in a particularly good mood. or even a recent lingering good mood. then there’s his catchy “about me”: Well i like all kinds of things. videogames, camping, traveling anything really. I am going to SCC to get my AA and then after that im going to move on to Eastern to do something with history.

wow. all those details. so much information. “all kinds of things.” what more does a girl need to know? oh just wait...HE HAS A SON. normally not a big deal until you hear the story: he knocked up his parents cleaning gal: “...she said she couldn’t get pregnant. or at least she hadn’t since her last kid who is 9.”

ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? a girl with multiple kids, the youngest is 9 and she hasn’t gotten knocked up again, so suddenly she “can’t” get prego and you fall for it? and you reproduced from that shockingly shallow gene pool? thank you for lowering the future iq of america even further.

now. here’s the rest of the gory details: he’s 26, lives at home with his parents because he DOESN’T WANT TO WORK (i mean, he’s in college. work AND college are just too hard you know). not only does his live at home with his parents, he happened to mention that he sleeps on a mattress on the floor because it’s just not worth paying money for a bed. ooo...think of all the lucky girls that get dragged back to that patch of floor. he’s thought it would be cool to tell me that he’s been on plenty of fish for a while now and has contacted EVERY. SINGLE. GIRL. on the site. he goes for the shotgun effect: if he emails ALL of them, then at least SOME of them are bound to respond. seriously? that’s your dating philosophy? aim for them all and go for the ones that actually respond? oh.my.god.

just when you think it can’t get any better: he tells me about growing up. he was out on his own at 14 renting an apartment with his manager from wendy’s. ok- that kinda sucks. kinda start to feel bad for him. don’t worry, didn’t last long. right after that he launches into how that started him moving around to all different cities all the time. pattern went like this: abandon current apartment, move to a new city, live in a homeless shelter for a few weeks, hit up all the local charities for help, get a job, get an apartment (furnished by said charities), get tired of said city, abandon apartment, repeat.

some would find this resourceful and creative and hippie erotic. i find it a pathetic way to live, sucking resources from people who will actually use them to set up a REAL life, and a creepy way of probably hiding from more things than i want to know about. like this little jewel: he’s an excellent store robber. never been caught. he has a great gut instinct that lets him know when shits going to hit the fan so he can get out early. excellent. he’s the best convenience store robber in all the land. how could a girl possibly feel any more lucky? oh, but she can.

as if the illegitimate merry maid in training wasn’t enough, or the bouncing from homeless shelter to homeless shelter, OR the prolific robbery career, there’s also his magical way with words. “hey punk, send me some shower pictures.” how can a girl possibly resist that? “you need to bring me a sandwich and a blow job.” what the fucking fuck makes you think i would even piss on you if you were on fire, let alone get you a sandwich and a blow job? “what are you up to? i should slap you.” umm...how is this even remotely a conversation starter? do girls find the offer of getting slapped attractive?

just for shits and giggles (and because i knew it would be good writing material), we went out for a drink (i told you i had to see it in person). the bar closed early but he didn’t want to go home (oh yeah, did i mention? he doesn’t have a car, you have to drive to his parents house and pick him up for such a blessed event). i’m not quite through being entertained by this train wreck, so we try to figure out something to do. he wants to go to the strip club because he TOTALLY knows how to play all the strippers- i mean they’re just dumb bitches and he’s totally figured out their game. *PAUSE* strike 902 asshole. you’re not fooling anyone. i know several of those girls and i would NEVER, EVER, EVER expose them intentionally to an ass wipe like you. you are fucked in the head if you think you know how to “trick” them into anything. on behalf of all the darling girls that i know that are 900 times more brave than i am for working at the clubs and putting up with the assholes like you, GO TO FUCKING HELL for even thinking that way about them. *UNPAUSE* nope, wait, *PAUSE AGAIN* i want to junk punch your defective baby maker so hard that your tonsils are replaced with your balls and then run you over with my car 47 and half times for the way you talk about them. assholes like you should be branded on the forehead so the bouncers will recognize you on site and never let you near my girls. EVER. *UNPAUSE*

i politely decline the strip club suggestion and decide instead to take him to the castle. now. if you don’t know, the castle is an “adult mega store.” read: costco of sex toys. i have this theory that you’ll learn all you need to know about a guy by the way he acts in an adult store. you’ll find out what he makes fun of, how comfortable he is with himself, and possibly get a preview of the inner freak. THIS GUY: classic. awkwardly making fun of the different games. showing disgust at several of the toys (most of which i already have at home in my toybox), trying to impress me with all his high school sexual antics (so, i was at this party and was really smashed and all the bedrooms were filled, so i fucked a girl on the couch in front of everyone. umm...EW). like there weren’t already enough strikes against him from the whole night, and all the things he was making fun of, he had the gall, the fucked up audacity, to make fun of pin up girls. there were several books sitting out- vintage bettie page, suicide girls, other pin up models and pictures and he was talking about how stupid they were and how they’re not sexy at all. they’re boring to look at. i’m sorry, WHAT? might not seem like a big thing in the overall count of him splendidly striking out, but you’re talking to a girl that’s about to get a pin up girl tattooed on her body. i think they are GORGEOUS. the vintage girls are the most beautiful example of the way women SHOULD be- curvy, confident, and damn sexy- they made those old neck to knee swim suits look hotter than any micro bikini i’ve ever seen. *le sigh* so. we have: making fun of sex toys that i own, making fun of one of the things i find stunningly sexy, AND bragging about possibly the most degrading sexcapade i’ve ever heard of. yup. i think i learned PLENTY from this trip. THAT will never get near me. EVER.

from the atomic cheesecake studios

all for you kids. well, partly because there’s nothing like seeing a good train wreck in person, but more because there’s nothing like being able to share that train wreck later with other people.

now. the other boy. um. well. let’s put it this way, my darling friend across the mountains has yet to miss a prediction about the men i meet. he NAILS IT every single time. knows exactly how the train wreck is going to happen, when, and where. he has yet to make i mistake or incorrectly predict the male flight patterns in and out of my life. his prediction on this one? i believe it went something like this: “he’s in it for the long haul.”

even typing that made me take an hour long break. not even kidding. wow. “long haul” what the eff is that?

i don’t even know what to make of that. i mean. long haul? strange thing is, i can kinda see it. and i think i’m kinda ready for it. especially after the last year- it would be nice to have some semblance of belonging again. and yes, i realize that’s not a reason to...whatever...long haul it with someone, but it’s something. it’s a start.

wow. mood swing much? i blame netflix. went from a comedy to a dramedy. totally changed the blog. sorry kids. shouldn’t write and watch at the same time. anytwaddle. it’s time to get back to my busy schedule of nothing. SOMEONE has to be a professional slacker and today that someone is ME. so. happy one month slackiversary!