the slant

i am a little disturbed. i decided to check out lisa's link that she left in her comment to not a colada.

(now don't immediately scramble to find the link, hear what i have to say first.)

first, the verbs
banging. hammering. attacking. punching. knocking out. ramming. ramming head against the wall. shooting. riding a bronco. spewing. beat the piss out of. push into a wall or table. sweep legs so as to incur falling. punch in the head.

now, the nouns
tramp. nasty wombat. big fat no-good worthless slob. whale. trollop. chick. girl.

every sex act involves a term referring violence. of one person dominating another. if you had seen the list of words without knowing their context, you could have easily thought i was referring to a fight or battle.

the nouns clearly depicted who its intended recipient was and exactly how it was meant to make her feel. to maintain control, to exert force or to manipulate. to demean her and make her feel used and worthless. dirty for a being a witness to his guilt and shame.

and the only thing i can think of is the slant by ani difranco:

... the sound of them strong
stalking talking about their prey
like the way hammer meets nail
pounding, they say
pounding out the rhythms of attraction
like a woman was a drum like a body was a weapon
like there was something more they wanted
than the journey
like it was owed to them
steel toed they walk
and i'm wondering why this fear of men?

all dogs go to heaven

and if they don't, i wanna go wherever they go.

it is never easy saying good-bye to a close friend or relative. if the family is lucky, they get their chance to say their good-byes in person to have the other person at least hear how he or she impacted your life in some way.

if the person is lucky, he or she would die knowing this already and pass quickly without pain and suffering.

perhaps the unluckiest person dies alone, unloved and without ever knowing how he or she mattered to someone. anyone. at all. to know you have not lived an empty existence.

+ + + + +

someone i met through majesty rottweiler rescue has had her heart broken today. brenda lee, one of her furkids, lost her battle with lymphoma. thanks to krissie, at the end, brenda lee knew how much she was loved.

brenda lee came from a shelter in nyc, a well-placed call from one of the shelter workers there alerted krissie to this wonderful girl, abandoned there a few days before. imagine taking your small child to the mall, and leaving him or her there with a stranger, knowing you were never coming back for him or her. imagine how frightened and alone your child would be in that situation. the unfamiliar sights and sounds, strangers poring over the anxious child - alone and afraid. it was no different for brenda lee.

like the child left behind, brenda lee couldn't tell us what happened or why she was there. she couldn't speak of missed meals or family members. of snuggling with her favorite person or walks in the park. of missing her favorite squeaky toy that both calms and entertains her. unfortunately, it is old scars and wounds healed over which often speak the loudest.

without saying a word.

at first krissie planned to foster her and until a family could be found for brenda lee. it was soon apparent that brenda lee had instead adopted krissie and her family. and so 6 months after bringing brenda lee home from the shelter, krissie "formally" adopted brenda lee.

a few weeks later, a small lump in brenda lee's mouth was diagnosed as cancerous, a tumor growing for some time and that now was making swallowing difficult. the vet's prognosis was bleak.

krissie was heartbroken but knew it was for the best. although still painful to krissie, no adopter wants to bond with a dog and lose him or her so quickly. it happens to be why it is so difficult to place older dogs into permanent homes -- everyone is looking for the "cute" puppy and no one wants to go through losing an older dog to illness and death.

for brenda lee, it was kismet. in the short 6 months, she knew love and tenderness, and for once, knew that she would be cared for and comforted. she impacted krissie's life as much as krissie impacted hers.

so with her passing, she has gone to the rainbow bridge where they say dogs wait for their families join them. if that's not heaven, then i'd much rather go to the rainbow bridge.

not a colada

for once, i wasn't involved in making this cooking mess. and we've discovered liz is never allowed to cook with milk again. first curdled custard and now curdled colada.

note to liz: what the hell was all the white powdery stuff you used to make the not-a-coladas? it looked like we were doing lines of coke on the bar when we were cleaning up the mess. mike had less flour in the kitchen and he was doing his dance of the pizza-making fairies again.

in trying to analyze the frothy, foaming not-a-colada left to separate into two distinct layers, we set off a round of dirty word associations as we tried to describe the contents of the blender.

"it's the cum used in a japanese porno." "the foamy beach jizz that's left behind after the waves crash on it".

all of which just titillated us even more. so a bunch of thirty-year-olds are trying to out-gross each other with sex terminology.

the shocker - two in the pink, one in the stink.

double pump jump - man's sorry excuse for an attempt at anal sex. as in sorry, i slipped. yup. sure ya did.

jelly donut - tasty treat for the guy not icked out by his girlfriend being on the rag.

cleveland steamer - my dogs leave steaming piles of this in the yard. why anyone would want to do this to another person, i just don't know. but if they ever need a fix, they can bring a bag or two and scoop some from my yard. no questions asked.

santorum - yum, the frothy mess of fecal matter, cum and lube left behind (no pun intended) after anal sex. term can also be used to refer to the republican, ass-sucking politician.

dirty sanchez - for my bridal shower, flug bought me a sombrero so i can have a proper dirty sanchez. try explaining to my grandmother and other older female relatives what a dirty sanchez is. i just kept saying he bought it for me because i like margaritas.

queen of fellatio - my nickname given to me by flug. for a gay man, flug is often involved with aspects of my sex-life.

of course, there's tons more we have yet to hear or know about. pretty soon, we'll all be dirty ol' folks, sitting around the old folks home discussing felching.

you be me for a while

"ouch! you're touching me. why are you touching me?"

"christina, i like you. i really do. but i grew up in a trailer park and i know how to kick your ass. and christina, i will kick your ass if you don't give dr. burke back his surgical cap."

+ + + + +

oh izzie! when my trailer-trash tv alter-ego said those words last night on grey's anatomy, my heart leapt. see, i grew up in the ghetto -- the urban equivalent to a trailer park -- and like dr. stevens, i grew up knowing how to fight.

no matter how hard i try to stuff the olney bitch posse (OBP) into my mental skeleton closet, it manages to pop out like the button on a pair of pants you desperately wish would still fit.

my personality fits the OBP well. at times, when i'm jazzed over an idea, or a project, i feel like i steamroll over people ("roll on" in OBP speak) not in a malacious way, but sort of like a beast who isn't aware of her size. or her intensity.

and awkward. like the big, orange hairy thing from a bugs bunny cartoon.

i feel like i need to slowdown because others around me aren't moving at the same speed. then i question what i am doing. are people staring at me like that because i am moving or talking too fast, because there's a booger hanging off of my face or are they scared i might eat them?

my worklife's mission so far has been to walk into a messy situation, observe the insanity, pull on my shit-waders and dive in to begin cleaning house. i organize, i create, i provide new methods and new thinking for old jobs. my resume should say simply say iSimplify to offer the newest product and creative services from me.

but trust me, i think i am learning to relish my "wonderwoman" role. look out, i have the lasso and i'm going use it. no excuses or lies when you get caught in it. my goldcuff bracelets riccochet the bitchy barbs of coworkers. "who the fuck does she think she is?"

then, after solving another problem and putting my clothes back on, people who see me walk down the street say, "oh my, she's such a lady, isn't she?"

if only i could find my wonderwoman underoos -- now, that would kick ass!

finally! porn for real women

wow! and just when we thought sunday nights with mcdreamy were really nice along comes this tasty morsel...

my bestest boyfriend flug sent me this link, i am in love. finally, a little something to make a real woman sweat. sorry, fellas, but this is what women really want. a guy built like matt damon on steriods and who cleans. purrrr, baby.

the cleaning hunk.

classic!

new form of procrastination

this may be a first. i am doing homework now to avoid doing "work" work.

yes, this seems like an alternate universe. this is what drives home the name multiplicity for my blog is this need to exist in two worlds. i have not 1, but 2 board memos to write by tomorrow. don't ask my about my progress on either. at least, on the more pressing of the two, i have written about 2 paragraphs. of a 13-page document.

tomorrow's gonna suck big, fat, donkey balls. where's martha's assistants to help me pull this souffle out of my ass? or in this case, where's martha's lawyers?

so how am i spending my time? i am working on my non-fiction book proposal for school. although it needs to be completed, my time would probably we better served working on that because a 7-hour day half-filled (or is it half-empty?) with meetings, doesn't allow for the concentration to pull this thing together.

but still, my inner calvin calls . . .

impulsive and imaginative

my buddy flug always includes these funny personality tests in his blog. his way of showing the world his true colors. today i decided to take his latest quiz the calvin or hobbes test to see whether i'm more mischievous or just a stuffed shirt.

Mostly Calvin

You are 70% Calvin and 30% Hobbes
Your inner Calvin often prevails, but, as in the image below, you have a significant Hobbesian component. I'm going to try to stretch the visual metaphor here: you have a good head on your shoulders, but when you don't use it, your crazy body gets you in trouble? Does that work? Odds are you're impulsive and imaginative, but it's possible you've collected just enough wisdom to hold your most anti-social urges in check. Most of the time. It's a precarious balance, like a boy on one foot with a tiger head.

the right attitude is everything

with less than 2 hours of being a twentysomething, i feel strangely wistful about the number of candles on my cake. on one hand i am thankful the decade is behind me. yet, being the goal-oriented person that i am, i feel i need to start back a level 0, evaluate where i've been and see what roads i need to travel this decade.

something that i wish i had done on my 20th birthday is write a list of what's floating around in my head at the time -- school, work, love, likes, dislikes, a mental "state of my union" address. so my friends, let's start with the 30-year plan:

things to do
visit italy
go to every art museum in europe
live in new england
live in north carolina
volunteer for an animal shelter
take part in a pro-choice rally
create one great masterpiece
go to grad school
have sex on a beach
sleep under the stars and not get eaten alive
inspire one woman to dream she can be more than a baby machine
smackdown a religious fanatic with a good ol'can of whoop ass
own a vacation home
destroy all credit cards!

things to learn
learn to be more tolerant of others (i know. it doesn't quite make sense seeing how i want to whoop up on a nun, but really, it's all about finding balance.)
learn to kiss these last fucking 20 lbs of fat cells goodbye
learn to love myself even if the fat cells stay (i am beginning to think my thighs are rent-controlled)
learn to be patient
learn to be a nicer goat
learn to save more, spend less
learn to find more joy and less complaints in the mundane
learn to become a better writer

things i value most
friends
family
creativity
fairness
pushing the envelope
personal growth/openness
animals as teachers

things i believe we would all be better off without
gw
dead-eye dick
religion
stupid people
south dakota's abortion laws

greatest loves in my life
my hubby
my sadie and chloe
my family
my friends
strong coffee
fiona apple
ani difranco
reading laurie notaro and laughing so hard i can't catch my breath
making something out of nothing
organizing
strengthening my writing voice

who knows what the next 10 years will bring but my very first goal is to love every moment of it.

the devil dog is in the details

if only they would use their powers for good, i would get to sleep later most mornings.

this morning, after our doggie breakfast, a trip to water and fertilize the lawn and bark to let the other dogs know, "hey, yo. where are you? sadie and chloe are in the yard", we continued with our routine. i went upstairs to shower. except the girls stayed behind to play downstairs. with sheldon.

sheldon is my mother's horny, old golden retriever. like the lecherous old men found in singles bars, he tries to hump anything with a pulse. considering i have two fine female doggies myself, sheldon always enjoys visiting our house.

really i'm not kidding with the analogy. sheldon at 10 years old is going on 70 in people years, while my girls each at 2 1/2 years old are barely legal beagles. pops is robbing the cradle.

but although much attempted sex was had . . . it wasn't the sexcapades this morning that caught my attention. the old coot really doesn't know what he's doing. (like some men out there. note to lisa: touch here. oops, now here. oops, no. now over there. here. there. strike up a bad grover imitation -- neeeaaarrr? farrr? ha ha ha ha ha!)

no, this morning, the three devil dogs somehow managed to work together to liberate one of the rawhide bones that was placed *supposedly* out of their reach so they would eat breakfast this morning. for people, this is like bringing out dessert and then asking you to eat brussel sprouts. dogs feel the same disappointment.

when i went upstairs to shower and feel/search for my pelvic bones, i could hear them yapping downstairs. yapping is good. it means sheldon is trying to hump chloe (sadie will kick his ass if he tries to hump her) and sadie is telling him to back off, she's my sister.

as i came back down the stairs, it was quiet. uh-oh. this was a bad sign. it could only mean 2 things -- they killed each other, or, they were getting into something they shouldn't be. either way, not something i wanted to deal with when i am literally running for the train.

sadie and sheldon casually sauntered into the kitchen, with their little, "hi ya, how ya doing?" type smile most commonly found on the face of used car salesmen and pickpockets right before they make off with your wallet. disarming. or at least an attempt to be.

now i was really worried. two dogs? what did they do with the third? are they covering for her like silly teenagers: "no mom. michael got in okay. he's been home sleeping for hours" when a pile of pillows under the comforter is meant to be the cover for your football-playing-sized brother sleeping soundly in his room.

i entered the family room the devils left seconds before and called the little shit-starter's name.

"chloe?"

up pops a head, laying alongside the sofa. standing there, head cocked to the side, quizzically looking back at me, rawhide bone dangling from her lips like a cigarette.

"what did i do?" she says. (and yes, dogs *talk* more than some people i know.) now the other two collaboraters come circling and panting at my knees, "he he he. we can explain," they say. guilty, guilty, guilty.

somehow, between the three of them, one of them managed to climb up to the top of the bar, put their snout over the edge of the bar, and grab one of the rawhides placed on top.

now if they could figure out how to unlock the backdoor and let themselves out to pee, we'd be all set. i would just need to get a combination lock on the cabinet where their food is kept.

the new taint collection

okay, i obviously need to do something tonight other than vent my frustration by boring all of you.

so i clicked off to smoke a little crack and barrel. it's almost springtime, you know. and that's when i knew i am a geek.

the splash page heralds the "new tate modern" collection across from a yummy, cream- and blue-colored bed quilt, tucked precisely into a low platform bed. except, i didn't read tate.

i read "taint" and scratched my head while i attempted to figure out exactly how crack and barrel has begun selling the small patch of skin behind a man's testicles and his asshole.

now for men everywhere, you too can own a new taint. hurry, offer valid only for a limited time.

drunk logic

i love the way a drunk person thinks and the stupid theories they come up with.

my husband, for example, came home pissed drunk tonight after heading out after work with coworkers. but mind you, he was not drunk.

nope. he was not drunk after having 3 margaritas from a joint that has a "3 margarita limit" sign on the wall.

nope. it was the house. our house that made him sick.

he was fine until he walked in the door, as if passing through our threshold increased the toxicity of the alcohol flowing through his veins and ran roughshod over his stomach.

silly drunk. i'm not sure which i am more amazed about -- him driving home "while he was fine" or the fact that my house has special powers to make alcohol more potent.

we definitely need to use that as a talking point if we ever decide to sell the house. now uses 40% less alcohol. parties are cheaper. drinks more potent.

what's not to love?

fat cells 5, diet 0

my fat cells are giggling right now. they have succeeded in another victory over my diet.

oh, it was a tough match today. my diet was fired up having done 60 minutes of cardio last night and ate well enough on the 1200-calorie plan to make a dent in the previous night's dinner of 2 stale pieces of pizza and bag of doritos from the hospital cafeteria. i even drank two bottles of water.

my diet feels motivated when i wake up with a slight hunger in my belly, and when in the shower, i can feel my pelvic bones. i imagine that one day -- there will be no soft rounded bulge in between them. but my diet has been on a mission. 5 straight week of loses (gains in poundage) has stressed both me and my diet out. we tell ourselves we're doing everything right while blindly omitting the sins of asiago cheese bagels, breadsticks and pizza we've fornicated with those weeks. (see a pattern -- cheese, bread, cheesy bread. ah, if only life were so simple!)

but the fact of the matter is, unless i shake that ass at the gym, the needle on the scale isn't moving. i could starve myself; but even if i had the willpower (1 hour past missing lunch and the tapeworm in my belly starts acting like the alien in "alien" -- lemme the fuck out of here now so i can go to quiznos!) nothing would really happen to my fine, pear-shaped, bootylicious bod.

no, i need to torture myself, kicking and lunging at imaginary people, tirelessly bike to nowhere for an hour and end up just where i began . . . with a bubble butt and marshmallow thighs*

my diet's strategy for a win (lose) this week, was simple -- get the ass moving at the gym. i was on spring break this week, the one night i am i class that i blame for my failure on the scale was cancelled. i had no excuses this time. i could be a winner (loser).

once again, the cards were stacked against me like the flapjacks that i haven't eaten in god knows how long!

monday night -- sadie had a vet appt to get stitches removed. scratch.

tuesday night -- no school, but had to work late. scratch. (don't worry still have a solid 3 nights in a row.)

wednesday -- get a phone call for a family emergency (hence the hospital). scratch and point for the other fat cells for the pizza & doritos.

thursday night -- i got you sucker. boo-yah!

friday night -- tonight. a night that could tip the scales in a positive way . . .

brick. as in "she's a brick h-o-o-o-u-u-se. she's the one. the only one. built like an amazon."

+ + + + + + +

nope, not getting to the gym when hubby is striken with a bout of tequila flu and reenacting the exorcist in my bedroom. after sucking all the cold out of our downstairs bathroom's slate floor, his attempt to make it to the upstairs bathroom to suck the cold from there was unsuccessful.

really, i'm not sure why he thought this in the first place since the upstairs bathroom is carpeted and the thought of laying on that nasty carpet makes ME nauseous. and i haven't thrown back a few toxic margaritas from tex-mex this evening.

in between his drunken mumbled apologies and promises to clean the carpet (damn right!) i think i hear the giggling and hi-fives from my fat cells on another victory.

*marshmallow thighs? oh yeah, that is one of my mother's famous back-handed compliments given to me a few years ago. as in, "your thighs are so soft... like soft, marshmallow pillows." unfortunately, she said this in front of my younger brother, who has vowed to never let me live it down.

blue without "grey"

freakin' oscars. they preempted the all that is good in the world when they replaced "grey's anatomy" with tinseltown's version of the anorexic olympics. here we have adult women who haven't eaten in days, all decked out in couture with arms as thin as michael jackson's alibis lugging around an 8-lb gold statute. someone's gonna get hurt.

i tried to stay away from the massacre. i watched enough "pre-game" action to know that reese witherspoon is my new hero -- starred in 'sweet home alabama' with both mcdreamy and yummy josh lucas! beyond that, i got a little bitter. it's the last sunday before the "sopranos" make their triumphant return to hbo and i need to change my viewing habits. no longer can the 9 pm hour be used to pack my lunch, do dishes, iron my clothes.

okay, strike that last one. my husband irons all my clothes. let's switch it to "get my clothes ready." ahhh, much better.

but back to the stinky oscars. my nephew oscar's diaper stinks less than these award shows. when i am queen, i am going to change how these shows flow.

no longer will people have 5 minutes to thank everyone from their elementary school librarian to jesus in casting. uh-uh, the announcer will announce the category, introduce the nominees and a brief clip of their performance, then the envelope please..... at which point the winner will dart on stage, pump their reedy little arms in the air, accept their gold-plated paperweight and move offstage. brownie points are awarded if anyone trips across the stage doing their one-arm pump.

no "thank yous", no "i'd like to thank the academy" bullshit. we know you're excited. we know you're happy. and we sooo know you're thankful that not eating for 6 months paid off. so please save us the bland speech that everyone gives. like the freakin' energizer bunny, the same song just keeps going and going.

instead -- if you must give a speech -- tell us how you really feel: "see, jane in costume, i told you if i wore the pink bonnet, my character would suffer. and look, i've won an award. bite me, jane."

that's what dr. yang would say. bite me, academy.

my life as a goat

the other day a well-meaning friend sent along a link to reincarnation station. a good old-fashioned time suck.

i opened the link and answered the questions, pretty light and airy stuff. what do you value most? (my accomplishments.) if you had only $2 and a friend asked to borrow $2 would you give it to him or her? (yes.) if you see a retarded person, what is the first thought that comes to mind? (my answer "ding! fries are done" is not getting me brownie points.)

so when it tallied my answers to let me know whether i'm coming back in my next life as a slug or puppy brought to live with one of my descendants (the highest level that could be achieved), i was mildy perplexed when it said i was to become... a goat.

but then i kept reading (and probably where i should've stopped) it told me 61% of people are coming back higher than me (re: are nicer) and i better change my life or my future self is destined to become a goat.

what? lemme see goats are herbivores, live on the side of mountains in picturesque settings, get fat and make awesome cheese from their milk (so i'd need to learn to cook). what is so wrong with being a goat?