It is ON, muthafuckas!!!

Last Fourth of July, Lobster and I made plans to hang out because we have no other friends.  I drove over to his house to pick him up, since he doesn’t have a car. I called him as I arrived, and he told me that we should smoke before we left.

Since I don’t smoke in my car, I got out and sat on the bench in front of his apartments.  I sat there for several minutes, baking in100 degree heat, before I started to wonder where the hell he was.

Next thing I knew, I was completely soaked with a TORRENT of ice cold water. The Lobsterling had placed his Super Soaker in the refrigerator, so Lobster took it, snuck (I say that’s a word) around the side of the complex, and ambushed me.  Fucking dick.

Artist's recreation of the events. (I don't have the anorexic body of a 13 year old girl.)

I’ve yet to definitively get him back for this.  He knows it’s coming though.  Part of the revenge though, is the waiting for the revenge.  I’m all about the psychological warfare.

On Wednesday night, I hung out at Lobster’s place with him and The Mutation.  One of our Russian friends gave Lobster his birthday present, a pint of vodka from his hometown.  Lobster and The Mutation drank the entire thing between the two of them, sipping straight out of the bottle.

At one point, they started comparing their feet.  And The Mutation put his bare-ass, skanky, stinky foot on my leg. So I smacked him.

At this point, he thought it would hilarious to put his bare foot ON MY FACE. I wasn’t going down without a fight.  It took him a good 20 minutes of wrestling me before he could get his skank-foot anywhere near my face.  I even bit his arm so hard it left a mark, which he should have a fun time explaining to his girlfriend.  I’m a rascal.

Meanwhile, Lobster was laughing in the corner, using his phone to take pictures and video of the whole thing.  HE DIDN’T HELP ME AT ALL.  Remember how I’d just made him a FUCKING PIE FOR HIS BIRTHDAY THE DAY BEFORE?!?! And remember how Lobster is 37 YEARS OLD and The Mutation and I are 28?

My friends are ungrateful, drunken children.  I am so nice to them, and they are nothing but mean to me.  I mean, I don’t even make fun of them or anything.

Anyway, once The Mutation let me up, I started acting like a weirdo, staring at him to mess with his head.  At one point, I was following him around, so he ran to the bathroom and locked himself in.  Lobster threw the breaker, plunging him into darkness, while he reminded The Mutation there are lots of spiders in the bathroom.

As I tried to unlock the door with a bobby pin, The Mutation tried to come up with ways I could get him back, just so I’d stop scaring him.  Everything that was suggested, he initially agreed to do, but then backed out of.

Including:

• letting me give him a swirly in Lobster’s toilet (which hasn’t been cleaned in approximately 2 years.)
• letting me give him a wedgie.
• letting me punch him in the balls.

Once he realized he didn’t want to do any of the things suggested, he tried to apologize.

“I”m sorry, Chamuca.  I feel really bad about putting my foot on your face.”

“I do not accept your apology.”

“I’ll be your slave for a week! I’ll come over and do chores for you!”

“No dice.”

“I’m sorry!  I take it back.  I take back the whole thing!”

“You can’t take it back.  It’s already done.”  I picked up Lobster’s huge pocketknife and opened it.

“Put the knife down.”

Lobster piped up, “You know she knows how to use that.  She was a Girl Scout, remember?”

Top left badge is for First Aid, which both these boys will need once I'm done with them.

“Oh yeah, she was a Brownie or some shit.”

“No, I was actually a real Girl Scout, too.”

“That means you know how to sew clothes and bake things, not use a knife.“

“You’re just digging yourself deeper, my friend.”  I pretended to lunge at him, so he ran into the kitchen.

Lobster yelled at him, “Dude, she’s an older sister.  She’s using psychological warfare on you.”

“Look!  Here’s a baby and a mom.  That should make you happy,” The Mutation said, trying to distract me with a package of diapers sitting on Lobster’s shelf.

“Why would that make me happy?  You like to remind me that I’m not a mother?”

Lobster piped up again, “Yeah, that’s just gonna piss her off even more.  Her eggs are all dried up.”

“Shit.  I’m really sorry. I take back the whole night!”

“You can’t do that.  You can’t take back the memory of you putting your bare foot on my face, you dick.”

“I don’t know how to fix this!  I’m sorry your eggs are all dried up. . .well . . . you know, I could help you out in that arena.”

“My body would eat your sperm.  Chew them up and spit them out.”

“Wow . . .I don’t even have a response for that.”

So, people.  How do I get these two fuckers back?  It’s gotta be some good revenge.

Geography is SOOOO hard!!!

Since my British pen-pal Helen gave me a shout-out on her blog, I will do likewise.

When she and I first starting chatting, she was embarrassed to admit she didn’t know where Oregon was.  Totally not a problem, since she’s lived in the UK her entire life.  I gave her a brief geography lesson, and gladly explained where Oregon is, in relation to California.  Fucking California.

Helen, you really shouldn’t feel bad about it AT ALL, for reasons I will explain.

1)  While I’ve unfortunately read all of the Twilight books, I refuse to see any of the movies.  I probably should  see the first one, since it was primarily filmed within a 50 mile radius of my city.

I watched The Ellen Show today and she had Robert Pattinson as a guest.  They were talking about how the new movie was filmed in Vancouver B.C., and Ellen mentioned the first movie was filmed in Oregon.

Robert Pattinson is a tard at Geography.

Robert said, “Yeah, isn’t Oregon just south of Canada?”

“Well . . .um . . .the state of Washington is in between them,”  Ellen replied, stifling her laugh.

Seriously, Robert?  You stayed in both Oregon and British Columbia for MONTHS.  Did you not take the time to figure out where the hell you were in the world?

[Helen, by my approximate distance calculations, this would be the equivalent of an American staying in Scotland and France for months each respectively, and then claiming France is just across the English Channel from Scotland.]

However, most Americans are tards at Geography.

2)  My brother (who lives in San Diego) told me yesterday about how his girlfriend (who has lived in California for years), DID NOT KNOW WHERE OREGON WAS.

And she’s an American.  From Minnesota.  She thought it’s where Idaho or Montana is or something.

How the hell did she not know where Oregon is?  It borders a state she’s lived in for years!

[Helen, in terms of distance, this would be the equivalent of, let's say, a Romanian person living in the UK for years, and thinking that France is where Spain is.]

How the hell do most Americans not know where it is?  There’s only three states on the West Coast.  Five, if you count Hawaii and Alaska.  I can understand people not being able to place all of the East Coast states on a map, because there’s like 20 of you guys.  But 3 states?  C’mon.

I don’t know.  Maybe I’m just a geographical genius.  I did win my school’s geography bee in the 5th grade, despite being disqualified for saying that Guernsey and Jersey are part of France, when really they’re part of England.  But I argued my way back in, because I knew they are closer geographically to France.

Looking back, Guernsey and Jersey are super British names and not French sounding at all.  Oh well, I was only 10 years old.

ANYWAY.  So Helen, you shouldn’t have felt bad.  You’ve never been to Oregon, and you aren’t an American who lives in a state bordering it either.

So, that is all for today, class.  Read pages 230-249 tonight, and we’ll discuss them tomorrow.

It’s a world of laughter, a world of tears

Back in 2001, my parents took my brother and I to Kauai for Christmas/ our birthdays.  Kauai is a tiny island, mainly set up for honeymooning couples or families with young kids.  Since our family was neither of those things (I was 20, and my bro was turning 19 on the trip), it wasn’t very exciting.  But hey, I wasn’t paying for anything, so I didn’t complain.

We flew a red-eye into Hawaii on New Year’s Eve, just months after 9/11, which meant it took longer than normal to get in and out of the airports.  All four of us were jet-lagged and sleep deprived when we arrived, but we were starving.

As we drove down the main street in town looking for some grub, we saw a blond girl running on the side of the road.  She looked familiar, but we decided our minds were playing tricks on us, so we didn’t think much of it.

A day or two later, we saw her running again.  This time we actually pulled over to look at her, and realized she was one of my friends from home.  I’d known her since we were 7 years old.

Completely coincidentally and without our knowledge, she was on the island for a vacation with her family as well.  Her brother was friends with my brother, and her mom happened to be both my brother’s and my 3rd grade teacher.

Left to right: My 3rd grade teacher, her son, my brother, my friend, me (with a disgusted look and huge knockers), and my mom.  Eyes are disguised to protect the innocent.

They were staying at the hotel next to ours, so for the remainder of their trip, my brother and I would hang out with our friends, while the parents went out drinking or whatever it is they do.  Going to strip clubs or something.

Later on, when we were at the airport, we saw a ridiculous lady waiting to get on the same plane as us.  She had a HUGE bouffant hairdo that was hairsprayed into place. My mom became obsessed with this lady and purposely sat behind her on the plane, in an attempt to take her picture.

However, this didn’t work, so she and I set up a covert operation.  I stood close to the gate exit and hid my camera behind my pillow, so I could take a picture without the Big Hair Lady seeing me.  My mom took a picture of us from the other side of the gate.  My brother and dad hid their faces in shame.

Taken with a shitty disposable camera.

That's me in the background. I'd already taken the picture and hid the camera in mah boobs. Also, I'm trying not to laugh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Once I got back home, I showed my vacation pics to my friend who grew up on Kauai.  He knew “THE BIG HAIR LADY”.  Apparently, she was the mayor of Lihue’s wife and a local celebrity . . .mainly for her big hair, which is actually REAL.

Anyway, the reason why I’m taking you on a blast from the past, is happened to come across this picture today, on People of Walmart.

What are the fucking chances, people?  I’m sufficiently creeped out.

Lobster loves pie and I should have my own show on the Food Network

Today is Lobster’s birthday.  He is old.

Last year, for the two weeks prior to his birthday, he would not shut the fuck up about pie.

One night, he and Kitten were at work, and a song by the band Cake came on the radio.

Kitten said, “Ug, I fucking hate Cake.”

“So do I.  But I loooooove pie!” Lobster replied.

Later that week, he tried to get us to go out for drinks with him.

“We can’t because we have other plans,”  Kitten told him.

“Yeah, we’re having a party planning session,”  I added.

“Oh.  Ok, well I like pie made with Wilderness canned blueberries,” he told us, assuming the party was for him.

I scoffed at his presumption. “I’m not the pie-baker.  You’ll have to take that up with Kitten.”

$5 a can. And it takes 2 cans per pie.

So, Kitten ended up making him a pie from scratch using the FUCKING EXPENSIVE Wilderness canned blueberry goo.  He was so pleased, he took a picture of it with his phone.

I made some delicious cupcakes for all of us to eat, but he took that pie home and hid it in his microwave, so his son wouldn’t sneak any.  Lobster ate the whole thing himself.

This year, Kitten is being one of those girls who drops off the face of the planet as soon as she gets a boyfriend, so the making of the “gooberry” pie became my job.

I’d never made a pie before.  I spent many hours with Google, learning all kinds of tips and went to the store and bought the FUCKING EXPENSIVE gooberries.  All the other pie fillings were on sale, but not the fucking gooberries.

I also though I’d be fancy and buy the pastry flour out of the bulk bins.  Once I started making the crust, I discovered that someone had poured the wrong flour in the bin or something.  It was gritty, almost like whole wheat flour.

After I put the crust dough in the fridge to chill, I realized I don’t have a pie pan.  I decided to run up to the dollar store for disposable pans, since things seem to disappear into Lobster’s house and never return.  I think he still has Kitten’s pie pan from last year.

Then, once I made the pie, I realized that I’m too inept to make any sort of lattice on top.  Pies need some sort of venting, so I used a toothpick and spelled out “LOBSTER” in huge letters.

There was enough pie crust and filling leftover to make a wee pie.  I spelled out “Lobster Jr.” on it, because I figured I could give it to the Lobsterling, and score big points.

{Sidenote:  I actually put “LOBSTER”  and “Lobster, Jr.” on the pies.  This is not one of those anonymous blog nickname switcheroos.}

Finally, when I baked the pies, I didn’t check on them, and the crusts burned a bit.  And apparently I didn’t pinch the top on the big one well enough, so it was sliding off the goo.

Fucking up this pie however, led me to create a new show for the Food Network in my head.  Specifically because I hate watching the Food Network.  It makes me feel incompetent.

It would be me, making some meal or baked good on my own, and all the shenanigans I’d get into just trying to cook/bake.  It’d make all the viewers at home not feel so bad about their kitchen skillz.

But of course, the Food Network would insist on having an actual chef/baker show up and tell me how I fucked it up, so we could all actually LEARN something.  I would demand that it be super cheesed up though, and that they play the Full House music during.

[Sidenote:  Ok, I didn't even know that was a trope. I just Googled it to see if I could find a better description.  Awesome.}

And it’d be really funny if Giada De Laurentis came on the show, since I’m told I look like her.  I’d make her do some crazy Parent Trap style shenanigans, except I’d be Hayley Mills and she’d be the unknown girl, who we only see when she has whipped cream on her face.  And no talking with your teeth, Giada.  Hell, just no talking at all.  I’M the star of THIS show, bitch.

Anyway, where was I?  Oh yeah, Lobster’s birthday.  Happy Birthday, Lobster!  Sorry your pie was shitty this year!

This was not what I signed up for

Since Sunday afternoon, I’ve been baby/house/dogsitting for my Aunt Crazy Pills and Uncle Fighting Illini. They’re my aunt and uncle who are raising their grandchild, my cousin’s son.

Welfare Slug Cousin had a baby when she was 19, whom she abandoned with my aunt and uncle when the baby was 6 months old, before she ran off with another man.  Fourteen years later, my aunt and my uncle are still raising her son.

Since I was 14 when he was born, I’ve been babysitting The Kid his entire life.  He’s the first baby I ever held, he’s the first baby whose diaper I’d ever changed.    But given his age at this point, when I “babysit” him, I just need to make sure he doesn’t burn the house down and make sure he gets to school on time.  Pretty sweet deal considering my aunt’s paying me $150 for the 2 days I’ll be here.

However. . . after what happened last night, my aunt will have to cough up a shit ton of cash for therapy.  For The Kid and for me.

Around dinnertime, The Kid said he wasn’t hungry, so I decided I’d just go to Panda Express up the road to get myself some delicious faux-Chinese food.  I told The Kid I’d be gone for 20 minutes.

When I returned, it took me longer than normal to unlock the front door, since my hands were full and the dog was trying to escape.  Just as I opened the door, I heard the sound of someone running through the kitchen in bare feet.

Once I entered the house, I noticed . . .

• The TV was turned off.
  
• My laptop sitting on the coffee table, was turned on.
  
• All of The Kid’s clothes were in a pile next to the couch.
• The Kid was no where to be seen.

After a few minutes, I discovered he was in the downstairs, barely used washroom.  A few minutes after that, he cracked the door just a bit.

“Chamuca, I was going to take a shower, but I forgot to bring a towel in here with me.”

“Do you need me to get you one?”

“Yeah.”

I helped him out with the towel situation, and then escaped upstairs with my Panda Express, my computer and a whole tub of anti-bacterial wipes.

BUT OK, SERIOUSLY?!?!?  I TOLD HIM I WAS ONLY GOING TO BE GONE FOR 20 MINUTES!!!  WHY THE FUCK WOULD HE BE DOING THAT IN THE FUCKING LIVING ROOM?!?!  AND WHY THE FUCK DID HE TAKE ALL OF HIS CLOTHES OFF?!?!?

Oh, and can you guess what my fortune cookie said?  “Your sense of humor will get you through difficult times.” No shit, Panda Express.  If I didn’t have a sense of humor about this, I would have shot myself in the head 2 seconds after I realized what the fuck was going on.

The DMV is a circus and I pissed off Lobster so bad, he called me a bitch

Lobster’s  license expired last year on his birthday.  If you don’t renew it before your next birthday (next Tuesday for him), then you have to take the driving tests all over again.  Unfortunately, he decided to deny me the pleasure of watching a 37 year old man take his driving test like a 16 year old kid, and asked me if I could drive him to the DMV yesterday.

(Lobster does not own a car.  He sold it because he didn’t want to pay for gas, and he likes to walk everywhere.  Therefore, he weighs approximately 100 pounds.)

We found the location of the closest DMV online, and tried to find it ourselves.  We weaved in and out of 5 strip malls, in a futile attempt.  Luckily, I have a Garmin, so I punched in the address we found online.

However, “Garma’s” pretentious little voice did not come to my aid yesterday.  She is an unhelpful little bitch.  I might just give her a sex change operation, into the lovely dulcet tones of “British Male”.  But that means I’d have to come up with a new nickname for my GPS and I really love yelling, “Fuck you, Garma!  I can’t turn here cuz I’d be running my car into a wall, you dumb bitch,” when I’m trying to find the location of the interview-of-the-week.

After almost running out of gas, we finally found the DMV.  As soon as we entered the building, Lobster took a number (197) from the machine at the EMPTY front desk.  We looked at the little number screen on the wall, to see which one had been called last.  175.  Fuck me.

We were confused as to why, at 2pm, the front desk was unmanned.  We figured they’d have someone sitting there handing out forms, to expedite the process.  I’m not sure why we thought the DMV employees would use common sense.  It’s not in their nature.

After waiting 30 minutes, the other DMVtards FINALLY noticed no one was manning the front desk, despite the fact it was on a raised platform in the middle of the room.  The smartest of the DMVtards came out from behind the counter to deal with the huge backlog of people waiting for forms.

15 minutes after that, Lobster’s number was called.  They sent him to have his picture retaken, when another yet-unseen DMVtard (I will name him Cletus) returned from his lunch break and walked back into the employees only area.  This prompted the photo girl (Daisy May) to go on her lunchbreak in the employee area, despite the fact Lobster and another guy were waiting to have their pictures taken.  Apparently the 3 extra minutes it would have taken were unacceptable.

Eventually Cletus returned to the front, and made his way over to the information desk.  From eavesdropping on their conversation, we learned he went on his lunchbreak and didn’t notify anyone he was leaving.  The DMVtard who had to take over his position proceeded to yell at him, to which Cletus only responded with grunts.

I texted Lobster, since I didn’t want to lose my seat in the rapidly filling up waiting room.

“i think the blonde photo girl was in the back blowing the black grunting guy.”

At this point, an elderly lady with a cane was given a vision test next to the photo area.  She couldn’t see any of the flashing lights in the viewfinder thingy.  Lobster came over to talk to me.

“That old lady can’t see shit.”

“Oh, I know.  I’ve been watching the vision tester guy trying to not punch her in the head.”

“They’ll still probably let her renew her license.”

“And then she’ll back into my car in the parking lot on the way outta here.”

And yes, they let her renew her license.  Lord help us all.

Finally, the DMVtards noticed the photo girl, Daisy May, was not at her post.  They sent someone over to take the pictures of the now 15 people who were left waiting.  We were sent on our way.

Then last night, Lobster and I went to get some delicious bar food and beers at our local haunt, The Mill.  At first I thought it was “White Trash Night”, but I soon learned there was no contest going on.  People were just dressed in their regular clothes.

At one point, I witnessed a 40+ year old woman with cottage cheese thighs in a jean mini-skirt, bending over to talk to some guy.  Since her skirt was so short, and she was wearing either a thong or no underwear at all, I could see the entire bottom half of her cottage cheese ass.  It was like something you’d see on People of Walmart.

Given the fact Lobster decided to share the wonderful experience at the DMV with me earlier in the day, I of course decided to share with him the picturesque view before me.

“Oh my god, you gotta to see this!”

“What?  What’s going on?”

“Scoot over here!  Look!”

“Oh my god!  Why would you have me look at that!  My eyes are rotting out of my head now, you bitch!”

That my friends, is only the SECOND time he’s ever called me that word, despite the fact my other nickname for him (besides Lobster), is “Asshole”.

It brought joy to my heart that I got my revenge to the extent he resorted to calling me a bitch.  Hopefully, he’s learned to not procrastinate so much and get his license renewed in a timely manner.  Or I’ll trick him into looking at nasty asses again.  Asshole.

I need to stop watching the news

Seriously.  I just end up depressed.  And then write depressing posts.  SO DON’T READ THIS IF YOU ARE DEPRESSED.

 

In the past week, there have been THREE murder/suicides in my area.  THREE.

Last week, a man killed his ex-girlfriend and their 4-year-old son, before turning the gun on himself.

Two days ago, a man opened fire in a clinic, killing his estranged wife, injuring 2 others, before turning the gun on himself.

Yesterday, the police found a man, his wife and their 9-year-old son, dead in another murder/suicide.

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!?!  Is there something being released into the water supply?  It freaks me the fuck out, especially since the last two happened on my side of town.

A murder 3-peat happened in my area about 6 months ago too.  All within a week or two.

A woman pushed her two kids off a bridge, hoping they’d drown.  Only one survived.

Then some guy took his kids out into the woods and shot them both, before killing himself.

Then, the most disturbing. . . a young pregnant girl found an ad on Craigslist, for some woman selling some baby clothes.  She went over to the woman’s house, where she was murdered and the baby ripped from her womb.  The crazy lady hid the mother’s body in a crawlspace and called 911, claiming she’d given birth in her house and the baby wasn’t breathing.  That all happened about a mile from my place.

Do these people watch the news and see other people doing this crap and get ideas?  As I’ve already mentioned, our local newscasters have a penchant for the dramatic.  I wonder if some of these murders might have been prevented if the newscasts weren’t so all-encompassing and graphic.

I don’t know.  What good does it do to let the residents of this area know about all the murders?  I can see if there was a serial killer on the loose. Or if the murderer was still at large.  But these are open and shut cases.  Broadcasting this shit is nothing more than tabloid journalism.

 

ANYWAY, I promise to post some hilarious story tomorrow, tom ake up for the two drama posts in a row.

Americans . . .you need to honor your Veterans and your Country

When I was 11, my mom had to travel to Bethesda, Maryland, to take classes for work.  It was the summertime, so she enlisted her mother to come with her to babysit my brother and I.  We were gone for 3 weeks.

In those 3 weeks, we traveled up and down the eastern seaboard, visiting Washington, New York, Philadelphia and everything in between.  This trip was purely to educate us on our American Heritage.

My parents and grandparents have always set an example for us of self-educating themselves, in topics all over the spectrum.  Mom and Dad routinely Tivo random educational shows and anytime I’m at home, we end up watching them.  I can’t even imagine what kind of knowledge I’d have in my head if Tivo existed when I was a kid.

So either through nurture or nature, my brother and I just ate everything up on this trip to the East Coast.  We’d pore over the pamphlets and booklets at each stop and learn on our own, the history of wherever we were.  My grandmother still mentions to this day, how he and I were like sponges with the information.

At some point in the trip, we visited the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial, in Washington DC.  I remember being in awe at every one of those names carved into the black granite.  And the fact it was polished so our images were reflected on the memorial, bringing the past and present together.  I remember watching people making tracings of a name and wondering how the person was related to that dead soldier.

My brother and I were disciplined enough to know this was a solemn occasion and to have respect for the deaths of people who died in the service of our country, even at the ages of 9 and 11, respectively.

Other AMERICAN tourists were not so respectful, playing music on their boom boxes (this WAS 1992) and eating their picnic lunches within 3 feet of the memorial, while chatting loudly about inane things.  And their images were being reflected back on the surface of the memorial, as well.  They didn’t even care about how disrespectful they were being to the visitors of the memorial, especially to the ones who actually knew someone whose name was engraved on it.  I remember the simultaneous feelings of being both proud, and ashamed, to be an American that day.

While I had many self-imposed history lessons on this trip, one of the things I will remember the most about it, was the disappointment I felt with my fellow Americans at that memorial.  On occasion, it’s something I still feel to this day.

However, I sometimes end up being pleasantly surprised with some Americans respect for their veterans.  After having worked in the food industry for several years, I have been privileged to witness the generosity and gratefulness of random civilians who take it upon themselves to honor their veterans.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve been asked by a guest, if it would be possible for them to anonymously buy a drink for or pay for the meal of a veteran or current service member, who happens to be in the restaurant.

It always varies.  Most of the time, it’s an older person who sees a young man in uniform, dining at another table.  The ones that always get to me though, are the young people, who buy a drink for the old codger who happens to be wearing a Veteran Hat.

Moments like those restore my faith in Americans and make me proud to be one again.

 

Yes, I understand the irony of me writing this post

Right after I got fired,  my unemployment claim wasn’t approved for a month afterwards.  So I went through all my possessions, looking for things I could get rid of, to make a little money.  I posted a shit ton of stuff on Amazon, and spent several weeks making daily treks to the post office, mailing off my possessions.

Most of the crap got snapped up right off the bat, but I still have a whole slew of random things posted up there.  Mainly unused skeins of yarn I bought two years ago, but never used.

Some lady emailed me yesterday because I have 3 skeins of the yarn she wanted.

{I was going to cut/paste the whole email exchange, but I figured that’d be boring.  Even more boring than this probably will be anyway.}

The exchange included:

• Me cutting her a deal, so she wouldn’t have to pay as much for shipping.
• Which meant we’d have to go off Amazon, and make the deal ourselves.
• She offered to send me a check.  (WTF!?!?)
• I talked her into using PayPal.
• She ended up paying me for the yarn only, not the shipping.
• I tried to guilt trip her by explaining I was cutting her a deal, and explaining the math of the whole situation to her.
• It went over her head, and she asked what other types of yarn I sell, like I’m a professional seller with a huge store.
• I just emailed her back and explained I’m not a professional, and was selling my possessions because I lost my job and need the money.

That guilt trip probably won’t work either.

Either she’s a total con artist, or a complete idiot. Considering she was buying yarn, I think she’s just a housewife who has no idea how things work in the real world.  She’s probably older too, based on the fact she paid with her husband’s credit card.

I don’t know though.  She IS from New Jersey.  Maybe she’s a mobster’s wife or something.

____________________________________________________________

Then today, I went to the beauty supply store, because I need to re-dye my hair badly.  I’m already salt and pepper at the age of 28.

I specifically need to dye it before Thanksgiving, because I’m meeting my little brother’s new girlfriend, who’s the same age as me.  Since she’s older than he is, I have told him she is a cougar, who is taking advantage of him.  He laughs at me, because that means I’m a cougar, but whatever.  Gotta make The Cougar remember she’s the same age as me, and that I’M ONTO HER.  Having grey hair doesn’t help with that.

While at the store, I decided to purchase some hairpin type things.  When I went to check out, the cashier asked me about the hairpins, like I’m some sort of expert on them.  Shouldn’t SHE know about the products SHE’S selling?  Then she asked me if I was going to put my LONG HAIR up with them.  I was super confused, because my hair is just past my CHIN.

Seriously, maybe she’d fried too many brain cells with all the hair dye, nail polish, etc.

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Is it hypocritical I’m criticizing housewives and hairdressers like I’m some sort of feminazi, yet I just wrote a blog all about how I have all this yarn and just bought hairpins?

I will clarify.  I don’t hate housewives or hairdressers.  These two women were just stereotypes of those two archetypes.  And I hate stereotypes.

I hate Goatees

(I’m about 75% of the way through my self-imposed quest to watch the entire Star Trek franchise in chronological order.)

In the Star Trek universe, Starfleet’s fancy technology tends to screw things up a lot.  At least once a season, for the 17 seasons I’ve watched so far, there is either a transporter malfunction, or some unintended time travel/traveling to parallel universes, due to the fact their ships are capable of going faster than the speed of light.

(In effort to not be completely esoteric . . .parallel universes is a legitimate quantum mechanical theory, which states that in every situation, every possible outcome  that can possibly occur, creates a parallel universe in that same 3-dimensional space.  If you ever watched the show Sliders in the 90’s, you should know exactly what I’m talking about.)

In the “Mirror, Mirror” episode of Star Trek (‘The Original Series’), a transporter accident occurs which causes a run-in with a parallel universe.

This particular parallel universe is essentially our universe’s evil twin.  There’s no peaceful, scientific, exploring Federation.  It’s a war-mongering, murdering “Empire”.

So obviously, all of the characters have “evil twins” in the mirror universe.  Spock’s evil twin has a goatee, which created an ongoing in-joke later on in the other Star Trek series.

On occasion, the Star Trek writers would intentionally have a character’s doppelganger wear a goatee, as a shout out to ‘The Original Series’.  So far in my Star Trek trek, I’ve come across several other incidents of goatee-wearing doppelgangers.

In ‘The Next Generation’, a transporter accident creates 2 Will Rikers.  The evil doppelganger shows up on Deep Space Nine several years later, when Evil Riker assumes the identity of Real Riker, to steal a ship for terrorists.  Since Real Riker has a beard, and Evil Riker has a goatee, Evil Riker has to glue fake beard pieces to his face to fill in his beard.

(I just watched this episode last night, which led me to writing this blog today.)

In the prequel series ‘Enterprise’, two episodes took place in the same Mirror universe as ‘The Original Series’.  In the Mirror universe, the character Soval has a goatee, which is a direct reference to Spock in the Mirror universe.

Many other works of fiction have adopted “The Beard of Evil”.  It all goes back to Spock’s goatee though, baby.

That being said, I fucking hate goatees.

I grew up going to church and all that jazz.  Then I had a major falling out with organized religion, which began with my youth pastor being a douchebag.  And that youth pastor happened to have a goatee.

Youth pastors having a goatee is like a right of passage.  Most youth pastors have goatees all of the time.  However, my youth pastor would only grow a goatee when we were away from home.

In Junior High, he would take us all up to a State Park which used to be a military fort, and run some sort of Jesus Boot Camp.  Since we were camping, he wouldn’t shave the entire time we were gone.

In High School, I went on mission trips to Mexico, a Navajo reservation, and inner city LA.  We would be gone for 2 weeks each time, and our youth pastor wouldn’t shave the entire time either.

Now clean-shaven, this youth pastor was a complete jerk.  He really didn’t do any “pastoring”.  It was more of a “call-out-kids-in-front-of-their-friends-for-their-personal-failings” thing.  And that can have serious repercussions on the developing psyches of the kids you’re supposed to be helping, asshole.

A couple years ago, the church ended up firing him.  I still have no idea what for, since my mom refuses to tell me.  I’d like to think he was sleeping with a high school girl, despite being married with 3 kids.

[Sidenote:  I think that's my goal for Thanksgiving: to get my mom to tell me why he was fired.  I need the vindication.]

Anyway, so my youth pastor was a bastard when he was clean-shaven.  But when he had his goatee, he was actually pretty cool.  And that fucked with my head because I would actually start to warm to him when we were on trips.  But as soon as we got home, he would start being a jerk again.

So people, I’m here to tell you that men with goatees aren’t to be trusted!  Listen to me!

Just look at Satan. That should be all the proof you need.