My name is President Bush. I am a crappy speaker, I make you want to go to sleep when you hear me drone. I try my best to be as boring as possible so that when I say ignorant stuff you don't full grasp it since you are half-way dead. For example, when I tried to convince the American public that we should go to war, I said this:

"Should enemies strike our country they would be attempting to shift our attention with panic and weaken our morale with fear. In this they would fail. No act of theirs can alter the course or shake the resolve of this country. We are a peaceful people, yet we're not a fragile people, and we will not be intimidated by thugs and killers. If our enemies dare to strike us, they and all who have aided them will face fearful consequences."

Does that makes any sense? I talk about beating people up and us being "peaceful" in the same paragraph. Because, really, peace isn't not harming people. Peace is not harming people without just cause. Peace isn't related to Ghandi or Martin Luther King. That's just plain pussy shit. We only push people when we can come up with a good reason to push them. That's American peace for you.

Tuesday, March 18, 2003

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Even though I took a 3 day weekend, even though I had three long days to rest, I was completely exhaused by Monday night. Maybe I took too much advantage of the nice weather, maybe grown adults sleeping in a twin bed 4 out of the previous 5 nights isn't very restful or maybe I just needed to shut down, back up my server and sleep.

I spent my day off driving around with the windows rolled down. Saturday I replace my younger sister as the driver and did the same thing: drove around with the windows down. I got back into the city early and walked a few miles, returning to Brooklyn.

I met Bess later that evening at our "Sports Bar" which was too crowded so we roamed the city in search of another bar that took us about an hour or so to find. Maybe more. Stella on tap was quickly consumed. More wandering to find the subway occurred, with Bess finally hopping in a cab rather than wander any further. I instead, walked some more and eventually got on the subway around 2:30 am.

Sunday morning, I met Katie to buy a digital camera. It was a almost too-perfect day and we decided to walk to the ferry at the southern tip of Manhattan and take that back over to New Jersey. The sky was too clear and too blue that I tried my best to avoid the WTC pit, walking to the East River against the crowds of tourists wanting, for whatever reason, to take pictures of a hole in the ground. In the end, it would have been faster to walk near the pit as the ferry was no longer leaving from the tip of Manhattan but from it's old home near the WTC. Our feet were tired, our legs ached and the breeze off the water forced us to put our jackets back on.

Back with the boy, I convinced/ guilted/ whined / charmed him into taking me to get a new pair of shoes. I didn't like any of the shoes at the shoe warehouse we went to, using only 13.5 of the 15 minutes I was allotted. (I give the time limits, between 5 and 15 for the shoe store, between 2 and 10 for the yarn store, and so on). We sang Motown songs at the top of our lungs, each trying to sound worse than the other on our way home.

After a lazy Monday workday, I returned home to call several friends. After eating the half bag of lettuce before it browned any futher than the few pieces with rusty edges, I crawled onto my bed and resumed calling people. When I hung up at 8:30, I put a pillow over my head "just to rest." "Just to rest" until 11 pm when I shut off the lights, said good-night to the bird and went back to sleep until 7:30.

And the cute outfit today? The skirt and key-hole top? The hair just-so and make-up a tad heavier than the barely there? A bit of a function of waking at a normal hour. Mostly, though, because I'm meeting his mother tonight. I couldn't be more nervous.

Tuesday, March 18, 2003

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The gynocologist is the most degrading medical experience. But I go every year, because the degradation is worth it to hear "everything’s fine!" "you have nothing wrong!" "disease free!" "no cancer!" "you don’t have the clap, you’re just allergic to spermicide!." However, my right breast is suspiciously firm. I did not think this was a problem when the gyno said this to me. She said my breasts were firm which I just thought was completely inappropriate for a doctor to say. "It’s not uncommon for someone your age." Damn straight, I have firm perky young breasts and I’ll enjoy them this was until they become soft sagging bags, I thought. "Is there something wrong with them being this way?" was what I said instead. "Well one is more firm than the other." Damn, age is attacking my left boob, I thought. I get an ultra-sound on my "firmness" next week.

Thursday, March 13, 2003

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I am taking 5 personal days in the next 4 weeks. I am going to be "off" work 20% of the time. I am looking forward to work for the next 4 weeks because I will not be there sufficiently enough to make the times that I am there tolerable, one less evening working until 7, one less morning brushing my shiny hair and deciding whether or not I want to wear pearls that day.

I came home last night in a fairly good mood for someone that had been at work for the previous 8 hours. I walked through the city before getting on the subway, something that I haven't done in months and weeks and so far back that it seems like an ice age has passed rather than winter. The Second Avenue stop had a fire the day before enad the familiar charred smell pinched my nose but I would not let it make my eyes water.

At home, I cleaned. I scrubbed and cleaned and managed not to clean to perfection but to the state normal people consider clean. In a way, it felt better not to be a cleaning freak. In a way, it was wholly unsatisfying to not get bleach-burns on my hands. I made dinner. Rice, chicken with orange and fennel, green beans. I did this while cleaning. I also rearranged the furniture in the livingroom a little. A baked a loaf of bread.

None of the above things are lies.
They are all in preparation of the great spring cleaning of 2003. I may need to take more days off.
Something above is a lie.

Wednesday, March 12, 2003

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I keep asking, who are these people? Where do these people live? How many are there? Are they real? People who are actually in support of this supposed war that our President wants to start, lining up his green plastic army men in the sand box, bossing all the other kids around to play his way or else daddy's gonna fire their daddy's from the factory.

55 percent of respondents in the latest poll would support an American invasion of Iraq, even if it was in defiance of a vote of the Security Council.

I want to know where this 55 percent lives, what they do with their lives and precisely how much crystal meth their mothers did while they were in the womb. (continued. . .)

Tuesday, March 11, 2003

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Things that go bump in the night scare me. Things that go bump in the night in a home that isn't my own, that makes sounds I am unfamiliar with scare me more. Thing that go crash!, Bang! and SLAM particularly freak me out and cause me to become excessively startled and scared. They cause me to scream. This causes me to force Jersey boy to wake up and come with me to show me that there are no axe-murderers in the living room, no evil villians lurking behind doors and I can go back to sleep, trying to hide foolish tears from being that scared. I doubt I'll ever be able to escape that fear I get, that need to lock everything up, the intense, but false, certainty that there is something out there trying to harm me.

Last night's sleep sucked. Even if the noise way only the stick-on shaving ledge with mirror and ravor-holder slots that startled me so. It's hard to be so obviously weak, to have no control over that fear. When I get scared like that, once or twice a year, you can't really fix it until morning.

Monday, March 10, 2003

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Two Barnard girls drinking beer on 3rd Avenue and 23rd Street. One with long blond wavy princess hair, dimples and a scarf tied about her neck. The other with her reddish hair thrown into a ponytail, plastic framed glasses and a yellow cashmere sweater. A guy name Tad, a Quaker and has lived in places like Detriot and Chicago with a salt and pepper beard, strikes up a conversation since they have technically stolen his seat in attempt to move further away from the door where the gusts of winter wind are chilling their delicate female constitutions.

"You two are obviously sweet." "You two smoke, how unlady-like, but I guess it's very classic in a Hepburn way." "So what are you guys, cultural anthropologists?" "What jet-setters you are. She to Haiti, you to India. And not France or whatever, but these exotic places."

He was so wrong, but so right and bought us a round to thank us for talking to him as he waited for take-out to take to his wife and sweet daughters.

Friday, March 7, 2003

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The small one-way, low-traffic streets that comprise the majority of my walk from subway to house were not salted, plowed or otherwise considered by the city yesterday resulting in about 3 inches of solid ice covering the blacktop while the kind home-owners of the area had carefully removed all sorts of slick and sticky things that had fallen from the sky so that their concrete sidewalks stood parched with a salty dust. A pair of ice skates probably would have been the best way to get from the subway home, but I had on boots with flat soles and had to gingerly step across the streets.

Two girls were walking behind me discussing the horrible winter and how slick and dangerous it had been. One mentioned slippings and fallings. I knew I wouldn't slip or fall, I've skidded forward a few steps now and again. I've thanked Jersey boy for making me walk holding his arm as I've used it to re-establish balance a few times. "But fall!?" I thought as I crossed towards my small street.

WOOPHF

Right on my ass I did. In a slip second I was down. I groaned out of frustration. The two girls were shocked as I had essentially disappeared below the car-line in a second. I got up, rubbing my ass and walking towards home. My ass is a bit sore. Winter finally kicked me in the butt.

Friday, March 7, 2003

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At the end of this month, smoking in bars is offically over with in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and every where except for Jersey where smoking is actually the state sport. In 3 and a half weeks, finito on the lighting up and puffing away until 4 am. The non-smokers in their smug lives will be so happy. Until one of them gets really drunk and wants that odd cigarette they used to smoke. I hate people who take too much pleasure in this, I hate how proud they are as if they themselves are responsible for the ban. Part of me feels like I should make the best of it while I can. Part of me doesn't have the energy or cash to make the best of it while I can.

I did not want to go to work today. I did not want to get out of bed. I was fully awake and having an exceptionally not cranky morning conversation with the boy where mokeys with mullets was briefly discussed. We slept with the window open and the heat fairly high, making for a lovely arrangement of cool and warmth. There was something particularly warm and cuddly and a promise of infinite restful sleep in that bed. It took me until noon to feel fully awake.

Pop Quiz - There is only one right answer.
Chicken : Egg
a) Cigarette : Beer
b) George W. Bush : stupidity
c) Tara talking about her boyfriend : Throwing up in your mouth
d) Coffee : Insomnia
A home-made item will be the reward for the correct answer. Ranking of possible answers is welcomed.

"I saw one of those ads for 'Drop 40 pounds in 2 months' in a exceptionally bad section of Newark and immediately thought: crack. And then I continued to read and it said 'Free samples given' and thought: yep, crack."

Thursday, March 6, 2003

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"How long before sour cream turns bad?"
"It's good forever. It's already sour, isn't it?"
"So you can have for years?"
"If it's already soured, I don't see why not."
"Why is it refrigerated then?"
"It probably doesn't taste as good warm."
"Fine, the expiration date was 3 days ago and if I puke later I'll know who to blame."

Wednesday, March 5, 2003

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Last night was one of mine "City girl working late into the night, followed by phone calls to friends while some vague meal is cooking and will eventually be eaten mostly cold" nights. These are the nights I have when I am not having a "suburban wife takes train to get picked up, gets kiss, complains about day, picks up 6-pack . . ." night. Those are the two nights I generally have these days. I can't wait until the warmth comes so I have have a "walk 3 hours home, inhale enough city scum that smoking feels cleansing, fall in love with something new about city" nights.

I was tired, cranky and desparately wanted to be home immediately, not sitting listening to music, nothing to read so my eyes wandering the car and trying not to stare at anyone. The default to the eye wander is the intensely study the subway ads look. Luckily, it was a new ad campaign for some hair gels or mousses or sprays. It was easily the most obnoxious ad camaign for gel or mousses or sprays.

4 HR TH@ H8S 2 HLD STLL

That was the tag line to the ad. That tag line haunted me for the entire rid. TH@ H8S 2. How obnoxious. I could see old ladies going cross-eyed trying to decipher the message, 12 year olds writing in down to add to their book of messages to share over IM while doing "homework" in their bedrooms with cable modems, mini-fridges, dvds, X-boxes and everything else I will never own. It made my eyes weary. I couldn't stop looking at it but hated looking at it. I thought about getting off a few train stops early and getting dumplings for dinner over cold ravioli. I was too tired to move, I was too tired to play the "I'm not staring at you" game. Instead, over and over I looked at "4 HR TH@ H8S 2 HLD STLL" I desparately hope I never encounter these ads ever again for fear of losing my sanity.

Tuesday, March 4, 2003

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I haven't talked to my older sister since last week when I told her that her fiance could be an ass, followed by her going into extreme hysterics, slamming car doors and telling me I am a) jealous that she's getting married b) petty for the one thing I told her bothers me about her fiance and c) a bitch for refusing to indluge any more things that bother me about him (after my first being called petty.)

I love Dave Barry. He understands what I particularly can't fully articulate.

Monday, March 3, 2003

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Last night I dreamed it was no longer winter. I dreamed of people in tee shirts and the warmth of sun on your skin, but not the temporary fleeting warmth of winter followed shortly by a bone chilling gust of wind. I dreamed of the psychedelic yellow-green of the first buds on trees and shrubs. I dreamed of something outside of all this glaring white, washed out blue and stark contrasts. I am sick of ice, mud, salt and the crunch of ground beneath your feet.

My hips vaguely ache from too many nights sharing a twin bed. I looked at them in the mirror this morning, the way they curve against my pants and saw his fingertips in the mirror as his hand rested briefly on my hip on his way to the bathroom.

Monday, March 3, 2003

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Taken off of Dave Barry's blog:

"The vast majority of people say they have been mentally tortured at one point in their lives by a song that keeps repeating itself over and over in their heads. And new research shows that people most frequently plagued by this phenomenon are those with slightly neurotic tendencies. . ."

A few years ago, I had a song stuck in my head for months and months on end. Not just a day or a week, but maybe up to 18 months. It would viciously attack me at times, relentlessly filling my head until I thought I could burst. I could listen to other songs on repeat for hours to try to get rid of it, but deep inside I heard its hum.

This old heart of mine been broke a thousand times
Each time you break away I feel you're gone to stay

I would forget about it, and then suddently realize it was gone, unable to recall the song that had been plaguing me, unable to even imagine what it would have been that bothered me so. Sometimes, I was stupid enough to ask a friend "what is that song I am always complaining about being stuck in my head" and they would tell me. Replanted, sprouted and growing again like ivy on Northeastern collegiate buildings, I was be stuck with it. Thankfully, most of the time it was the Isley Brothers version, not the dreaded Rod Stewart. The weeks that Rod Stewart's version was stuck in my head were pure agony.

And one day, it was gone. I could recall the name of the song that used to be stuck in my head without re-infectation. I couldn't recall the feeling of the first few lines looping over and over any more. I was suddently free. Sometimes, like writing about this now, I may get a little flare-up, but in an hour or so it'll be gone. Hopefully. If you see me humming it, lipping it or anyway re-infected by this song, please slap me. Hard.

Ever get a song stuck inside your head that won't come out?

Friday, February 28, 2003

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An account of my literal run-in with the police this morning.
I was very lazy this morning. I was lazy and slow and did not get in the shower until 8:15. I was lazy and slow and tried on 3 different outfits even though I knew what I wanted to wear last night and went with that in the end. I was lazy and slow and looked for a cd, talked to Conrad and took more time "doing my hair" than my hair actually necessitates. I did not leave the house until 9 am and then strolled instead of hustled my way to the subway station.

As I approached the stairwell, in the near-distance I heard the rush of wind, the grind of wheels on rails and all other indicators that a subway was approaching. And I ran. Down the stairs, doing that side-stepped jog of thump-thump-thump-thump to get down as fast as possible. I ran towards the turnstiles as I heard the train grind to a halt. I ran around the attendants booth.

And into a police officer.

Well, not quite into him but directly in front of him, my feet about to land where his feet, walking perpendicular to me, were going to land. I halted, but did not stop. Moving that fast, that rushed, means you cannot come to a stop. It's more like a suspended pause, a freeze frame where I murmured sorry and let him pass.

He did not move fast enough for me, I was on the go again, my feet only temporarily planted to let him pass as I heard the subway doors below open. I stepped forward, onto the heel of his shoe. I clutched my metro-card, prayed to the Metro-card reader gods that it would say "go" and not "please swipe again at this turnstile" and turned to see the shock in his face. I stepped on his shoe. I interferred with the serious duties of a police officer walking mindlessly around the F-train station.

"Go" the turnstile said and I rushed through, running towards the Manhattan bound tracks. But as my foot hit the metal strip of the top step, the dreaded dinging tone of the closing doors echoed through out the station, the neighborhood, all of Brooklyn. Before I even had a chance to get near the platform, to stick a hand into the door, to watch the doors close on my nose, the train was leaving. At 9:05 am, without me on it.

I sighed heavily and hung my head, defeated. My stairwell-police dodging-metro card swipping dash was of no use. I would have to wait 8 minutes for the next train. I looked up, the police officer was there, on the other side of the metal bars, he free to roam, me stuck waiting for the next train. "Was it worth it? To nearly run me over? And step on my shoe? No, you still late for work any how."

I got my income tax refund today and paid my credit cards, made a deposit to my savings account and have the exact same amount of money as I generally have for each month now. I looked today's pay-stub and noticed that my income tax refund was less than I have already paid back in federal taxes in the past 2 months.

Friday, February 28, 2003

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