The Day I Almost Lay Down on Railroad Tracks - My Mother's New Computer

If you woke up this morning feeling great, poured yourself a cup of coffee, made it to work with relatively little hassle, and settled easily into your day with all the optimism and fresh-faced idealism of a bored, civic-minded rich kid, you're missing out on a mind-blowing experience that I feel compelled to share with you.

Go buy your mother her first computer.

Purchasing a computer for the otherwise technologically-illiterate is a surefire path to prescription medication, alchohol over-indulgence, and the eventual (but certain) completely new experience of the taste of gun metal in your mouth.

Back in the 80's, I should have seen this coming. I laughed out loud at the parents who made me come home whenever the electricity went out during a storm just to reset the blinking clock on the VCR. Oh, ho ho, so funny. And bite me in the ass it did.

I got tired of shopping for and booking all of my parents' flights on line, checking them in 24 hours before departure, and printing out their boarding passes and driving them over to their house. I got tired of them asking me about the mystery of "the email" and "the google". I thought that instead of my mother tirelessly bugging me for printouts of the 7,000 photos I take of my child in photographic hard copy format, I would purchase them a computer, thusly forcing their transition out of the Ottoman Empire and into the Space Age.

BOOM boom BOOM boom BOOM boom BOOM boom.... da.... da.... daaaaa..... DA DAAAA!

I tried to conduct our initial introductory classes in a helpful and pleasant manner, and thought they were successful. However, our following classes included such deflating questions from my parents such as "What's a mouse?" and "How do you turn this stupid thing on?". Now my mother just calls me in the middle of my workday, asks, "Are you busy?", gets a distracted "Yes", and then launches into a convoluted series of questions for the next fifteen minutes, the essence of which is "How do I print out page 2?".

Lucky for her, her future son-in-law has St. Teresa-like patience, and recently interrupted a dinner at a friend's house 6,000 miles away to log into a web-based program to access my mother's computer and help her to print out page two.

I was going to get her a GPS for her birthday.

She'll be getting a map and a magic marker.

The Man Bang. WHY, America???

I actually saw this haircut THIS WEEK. Man bangs, straight across the forehead. Of course, the guy also had a gigantic bluetooth headset wedged into his earwax and a pick up truck that read "AMERICA - speak to her in English" emblazoned across the back window, so he was bottom barrel scrapings, but he's still sharing my oxygen. And his hair offends me.

I thought this was some kind of farmer thing. Not that south Florida is some sort of metropolitan mecca of style, but jeez. I've caught both of my fiance's kids with straight bangs, and I'm not sure if it's the fiance, or the kids mother, but it will end. I will shave their little heads. Or just a straight line down the middle. Or a big circle, right on top.

America, you make me weep.

The Relaxation Kick in the Pants that I Desperately Needed

Hello friends. I'm your Vitameatavegamin girl. Are you tired, run-down, listless? Do you poop out at parties? Are you unpopular? The answer to all your problems is in this little bottle.

I just spent a few days in Jamaica, and I fell asleep last night dreaming about green mountains, sandy white beaches, and turquoise water. Yeah, I work in the Caribbean... but there's just something about the Jamaican people and those crazy mountain roads that makes me want to just pack up my shit and move over there. It's not just the sunshine. I have sunshine. People are just so laid back that you're forced to relax, and I got more sleep in a few days than I have in the two weeks prior to my trip.

Patois is more than a language, it's like Jamaican flavor - it's the difference between plain chicken and jerk chicken with smashed scotch bonnet peppers. There's "yes", and then there's "ya mon". "Wa g'wan" is so much easier than a stiff "hello, how are you?".

I'm shutting down, and going to go have a Red Stripe on the balcony and listen to some music. (Maybe some Natasja Saad - a Dane who spoke crazy patois like a native, and seemed to really embrace everything Jamaican.)

Jah bless. :)

Even More Reasons Why I Should Be Living Alone on a Mountaintop

Today I was getting a pedicure, and they sat me next to two blonde mid 30-somethings with gigantic purses in yoga pants who sipped their fat free lattes and contstantly said "Yah!" to each other.

I silently cursed myself for not having my iPod with me.

"So, basically, I go to meetings ALL day. I have meetings with Marketing, and... everybody else. I'm just CONSTANTLY on the computer. He says, 'Lisa, your job is to just move the dial bit by bit', you know?"

(Wide eyed "I'm listening" sip from friend): "Yah!"

Lisa, "moving the dial bit by bit" isn't putting money in anyone's pocket. He's keeping you around because your completely round, tan, symmetrical plastic tits are nice to look at, albeit a little bit too close together in the front - remember, it's called "cleavage", as in "cleaving" or "splitting"... you know what, never mind.

When Lisa's nails were done, they moved her over to the drying table, and she turned around and kept blathering on to her friend about her big jobby job. I had a feeling you could stick her head in a fish tank and she'd keep talking until she inhaled tank gravel and died.

Then I headed over to the supermarket. Picked up my coffee, heroin, and family-size box of tampons, and got on line. The woman in front of me had a cart overflowing with crap, but put it all on the register with one hand. Slowly. As she talked on her cell phone, she carefully regarded her purchases as if each can of Spaghetti-o's were a hand-stitched Italian shoe. It took her seven full minutes. I know, because I counted to 426.

There should be horns on the fronts of shopping carts. Or sharp steel spikes.

People of the world, there are people around you. And behind you. And in listening range.

Shut up and get moving.

That is all.

Weird Things My Kid Said Today

"Tell me what crucifixion means RIGHT NOW!"

"What's a comedian?" It's someone who's job it is to tell jokes. "Knock knock." Who's there? "Comedian."

"You're the best mom in the whole world. You know how I know?" No, how? "Because I just said so. You wanna try again?"

Working from home used to seem like it would be so much fun.

My Wish for the Children of the Economic Downturn? Less Shitty Music.

Woo fuckin' hoo, the economy's in the crapper! You know what that means, don'tcha, kids?

BETTER MUSIC. And I for one, am thrilled to bits.

The blues, ska, early rap (back when it meant more than gold teef and a spot on MTV Cribs), Vietnam-era rock, punk... hard times makes for great creativity. I, for one, have had enough of Miley Cyrus and her foot-stankin' Uggs, and am ready to revel in the sounds of being stuck between a rock and a hard place.

PAIN! GIMME PAIN AND SUFFERING!!!

I have no idea who the Jonas Brothers are, and I intend to keep it that way. Until, of course, the Hollywood capitalist regime is overthrown by the masses and their severed heads wind up on sharpened sticks as a warning to other talentless pretty boys with expensive haircuts and a blinding lack of life experience.

I can hear the battle drums thundering dimly in the distance, and I giggle to myself in anticipation of the bloodshed.

I can't even keep track of subversive music anymore. Hard rock is way too stylized for me these days. No one's saying that James Hetfield couldn't have used a haircut, but ever since Metallica got extreme makeovers in 1996, I've had a bad taste in my mouth. Everyone's overly marketed, instantly accessible via Twitter, and churning out mp3's based on graph trends. At least Amy Winehouse is still drunk and disorderly. She's like the mujahid of the entertainment industry, dynamite strapped to her chest and willing to fatally OD, because THAT'S A CREATIVE AND SUFFERING ARTIST, MAN.

Do teenagers with razor blades to their wrists listening to some kind of music that matters even exist anymore? I don't just mean Gothopotamus. Purple ponytails in Dayton, Ohio and a strong love of Cheetos doesn't translate into anything meaningful for me. OK, so you like eyeliner, safety pins, and the color black - you've taken something truly beautiful and turned it into the tasteless flavor now known as "Goth", displayed by cutesy Japanese teenagers who also have pink Swarovski-encrusted cell phones and throw up chirpy peace signs like Paris Hilton's still looking for a new BFF.

You should all die.

Wake me up when the revolution comes.

Old Lady has spoken.


Over and out.

We Hate it When Our Friends Become Successful. Only Because We Slept Late and Are Only Just Now Unloading the Dishwasher.

It's a normal Sunday morning - I'm vacuuming, putting the laundry away, and watching some ducks float across the lake.

My friend Robert, on the other hand, is getting ready for this evening's opening of Alice Tully Hall, a 4-year architectural project that he just completed, hailed by the New York Times as "a revelation". My childhood friend Gary (who I've decided is the nicest person on earth), is up for an Academy Award tonight.

I am wiping scuff marks off the moulding in the living room and mentally tracing back the steps of my life to see where I veered away from fame and fortune, desperately trying to discover if any of my dwindling existence is salvageble. And these scuff marks won't just get cleaned on their own, I'll tell you that much.

If it weren't for the boring Facebook statuses of other people, I might actually feel sorry for myself. Alisa's trying to get organized. Allison's making something in the crock pot. Noel is hung over. (That's my girl.) David is getting a massage from his cat. (Been there). Lauri is watching her turtles while they sleep... (wow, folks, I think we've found a winner).

It's amazing how Facebook can cast such a harsh and judgemental light on my own failure, and yet, simultaneously comfort me with the sad lives of others. Point a screeching finger, give a hug. Scream, "WHY AREN'T YOU MORE LIKE YOUR SISTER?!", and then bring me a hot cup of tea and a cookie. It so parallels the relationship I have with my mother. No wonder I respond to social networking so well.

Thank you, Facebook. Thank you for breaking me so I could learn to love myself.

I just went into my downstairs bathroom with some Windex and a paper towel, and said to myself in the mirror, "Wow. I really thought you'd be taller."

@TwirpingTweetyTwodTwootie: Paper Dress, Stirrups. Yowzah.

I just signed up for Twitter. I'm not sure why - I think it was mostly because I was aware of the fact that I was avoiding it.

Twitter's pitch is "Real life happens between blog posts and emails."

Thank you for reminding me. I wasn't sure what all that superfluous stuff was, without anyone there to instantly validate me. Real life. Gotcha.

Little does Twitter know that between blog posts and emails, I pretty much just drink myself into a stupor. Not a lot of Twitter fodder there. Or "Twodder", if you will. My alcohol-induced comas are not Twittertastic.

I was able to check my Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo accounts and see which of my friends were already Twittering. Out of my hundreds of contacts, six of them twittered. Or send "tweets", as the kids are saying. My peeps and their tweets. This is sounding a little too Easter eggy for me. And the fact that I'll be 40 in a few short years, and am blogging about my tweeting peeps, is unnerving. At least I'm not still saying "posse".

Fo' shizzle.

So next week, when I have an appointment with the gynie, if I tweet about it via a text message, does that become "twattering"?

I'm just sayin'.

TGIT.

Sir, I asked you not to play the song again, didn't I.