8/25/07
And then Jil and I drive from Chicago, IL to Sioux Falls, SD. We dilly dally in Madison, Wisconsin, a great little college town with wonderful shops and coffee houses. It makes us nostalgic for college, as nearly everything does. F'ing Thai food and trees make me nostalgic for college, but this time the feeling is a little more reasonable. As this is just before school starts, Madison is bustling with new U of M freshmen and parents ready to dole out money as quickly as warm, longing hugs. More nostalgia. Jil buys some Wisconsin cheese, and we sit and eat it and happily observe the Wisconsin-y world around us.
Our next stop is Austin, Minnesota, where we visit the parking lot of the Spam Museum and take pictures (the museum is, alas, already closed for the night, which means we miss out on seeing the towering wall of spam and playing the interactive can-your-own-spam game). Because we are lame, we pass on the fried spam strips available at the adjacent diner and instead order a much safer mac n' cheese, veggie burger combo. Then we get back on the road. This is what we find: Minnesota is flat and rural. There are cows and corn fields. This might be your unverified preconception of Minnesota. You are right.
We get into Sioux Falls around midnight. We would have made better time, but Route 17 is undergoing construction and we have to find an alternate route to our hotel. This is complicated by the fact that when we call the hotel for assistance, the over-eager hotel clerk offers us the entire geological history of the area in lieu of actual, you know, directions. But we get there eventually.
Weighed down by bags and parcels, Jil and I awkwardly make our way to the check in desk and get our room key. We are tired and weary, disheveled, and half asleep. All we want is a bed. Maybe a shower. Perhaps we desire to put down our bags inside our hotel room. Perhaps. Instead, we encounter this same over-eager hotel clerk - a woman who is awe-inspiringly talkative, a sheer mountain of vocal strength and South Dakota knowledge. Or, at least, Sioux Falls knowledge. Or, at least, she has some ideas about how to get around town.
"Did you find it okay?" She asks us. Judy, according to her name tag.
"Yes, thanks," we say.
"Someone else wanted directions yesterday, but I wasn't here when he came in, so I don't know if I gave them correctly."
"Well, we got here fine. So... thanks. Is our room to the left or the right?"
"The truth is, you could have taken route 7 and gone around the construction the other way, you know, through the center of town, but I never know if it'll be a left or a right turn after that. Which is why I suggested taking 23. But you got here fine, so I guess it worked."
"Guess so."
"It's usually just a straight shoot off 1-90 down 17. With the construction it gets a little confusing. I got people calling for directions all the time. But I just never know, you know? Route 7 or 23. Of course there are all those back roads you could take. If you got off by Chucks Chickens and took a right heading you down to that hair place, and then see at that point I don't know if it's a left or a right again. And you know what?" she laughs, "There's that construction going on on the other side too."
We laugh too. Yes, yes. That is funny. Now let us go to bed.
"You know what I did the other day? I went on the computer and I went onto msn.com. And then I looked up all the different highways, and you could see at that point if it was supposed to be a right or a left turn coming from all those different roads. So then if someone called in, I could just ask where they were coming from. But my boss took off the internet from this computer, so now all I have is these maps. Which of course don't show the construction, so that's why I just say take 23."
We shuffle our bags around in our arms and try to inch our way closer to the hallway. "But you got here fine?" Judy asks again.
"Yep."
"Once the construction's gone, you could probably take Joseph directly through to that intersection by the grocery store. That is, if 17's backed up. Then we're just a left and a right and another mile down the road."
"Okay."
Somehow, Judy goes on for another fifteen minutes. She has broken some record somewhere; I am sure of it. Or maybe it is just South Dakota. Maybe we have reached that part of our country that is actually a foreign land.
"That was amazing," says Jil, when we finally break free from the hotel lobby. Judy may have kept us from bed for a whole half hour, but she also just made our night.
---
Last week I was playing Trivial Pursuit when, wouldn't you know it, the following question was asked: "What US city considers itself the Spam Capitol of the world?" Not only did I get it right, I whipped it's ass. Boo yah, Austin, Minnesota. Boo Yah.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Cross Country, Day 2. "Two thoughts from Chicago that have nothing to do with Chicago"
1. This Dog.
I took very few pictures in Chicago. Seventy-five percent of them were of this dog.
This dog is the ultimate people-watcher, but he has the best cover ever because he is a dog.
2. My Thesis.
Jil and I were at this wannabe German pub slash sports bar in downtown Chicago, and I was talking to some random friend of a friend’s friend, and the kid actually asked me about my thesis. How we got into a thesis discussion in the middle of a somewhat terrible, fratty bar, I have no idea, except to say that I swear I didn’t start it. In fact, I hesitated to impart the title of my thesis because, frankly, the title alone tells you a great deal more about me than I sometimes care to share within the first five minutes of meeting someone. It’s kind of like saying, “Hey, my name’s Lijah. I’m going to insult your taste in movies and PC your ass all over the pavement.” It’s not my intention, but I guess it’s the effect.
I told him anyway. “Interesting,” he responded. “So, could you unpackage that a little?”
If you’ve ever completed a thesis you know that, like me, your heart’s greatest desire is that someone will actually read the damn thing, besides your advisors, readers, and the department head, who are all mandated to do so. But since it’s not socially “acceptable” or “cool” to carry around your 115 page manifesto and then make people read it, the next best thing is that someone will voluntarily bring it up, and then ask you all sorts of questions about it, and then reinforce your mother’s proclamations that you are an extraordinary genius and generally speaking a gift from God. Your thesis is, after all, the pinnacle of your academic existence, a paper that took not just one whole year, but a lifetime’s worth of maturity, preparation, sweat, blood, and caffeine to complete.
The cool thing about my thesis (that’s right, I said “cool” and “thesis” in the same sentence) is that it’s completely accessible. If you’ve ever seen Wedding Crashers or heard of Will Ferrell, you can pretty much get it. I remember attending my brother’s thesis presentation, which was entitled “New Photochemical Source of Dichlorocarben,” and latching onto the occasional conjunctions and articles – and, but, or, the – as if my life depended on it. These were truly the only words I understood for about fifty inferiority-complex-creating minutes. My thesis (here comes the cool part) isn't like that. Nevertheless, I do accept the 99% full-proof Unwritten Law of the Thesis, which states: Everyone thinks his/her own thesis is brilliant and dynamic and absolutely intriguing, but to everybody else on the planet, it’s… not. (Half because everybody else doesn't get it, and half because it's... not.)
Anyway, this kid asked me lots of wonderful questions, and I reveled in the thrill of it all, until the time came to return the favor. You see, Unwritten Law #2 of the Thesis states: If someone asks you about your thesis, you must act in kind and ask him/her about his/her thesis. While I like to believe my topic's accessibility makes it a fairly decent discussion piece, Random Kid’s English major thesis might as well have been called “New Photochemical Source of Dichlorocarben.” At least then I would have felt better about not understanding anything but the definite articles.
As it was, Random Kid's paper dealt with a certain archaic novel by a certain incomprehensible author. I’m sure that had I known the work/author/context, it would have been quite interesting or at least not completely off-putting when he ultimately concluded, "You see, everything is really death!!!"
Of course, not everyone should write about something everyone else can get. In truth, I applaud his thesis, it's just not something I'd like to TALK about. I mean, if I ever become an author with, like, a book, instead of a silly blog, I think the highest honor would be to discover that some college kid has wasted away his entire senior year trying to figure out why I'd named Jenny Crossfire "Jenny Crossfire," and why I put three doves in the fifth chapter instead of six, and how it all symbolizes the re-emergence of life and the disenchantment of the East with the West, when in reality I'd forgotten there were any doves in chapter five at all.
And that's Chicago.
To be continued....
I took very few pictures in Chicago. Seventy-five percent of them were of this dog.
This dog is the ultimate people-watcher, but he has the best cover ever because he is a dog.
2. My Thesis.
Jil and I were at this wannabe German pub slash sports bar in downtown Chicago, and I was talking to some random friend of a friend’s friend, and the kid actually asked me about my thesis. How we got into a thesis discussion in the middle of a somewhat terrible, fratty bar, I have no idea, except to say that I swear I didn’t start it. In fact, I hesitated to impart the title of my thesis because, frankly, the title alone tells you a great deal more about me than I sometimes care to share within the first five minutes of meeting someone. It’s kind of like saying, “Hey, my name’s Lijah. I’m going to insult your taste in movies and PC your ass all over the pavement.” It’s not my intention, but I guess it’s the effect.
I told him anyway. “Interesting,” he responded. “So, could you unpackage that a little?”
If you’ve ever completed a thesis you know that, like me, your heart’s greatest desire is that someone will actually read the damn thing, besides your advisors, readers, and the department head, who are all mandated to do so. But since it’s not socially “acceptable” or “cool” to carry around your 115 page manifesto and then make people read it, the next best thing is that someone will voluntarily bring it up, and then ask you all sorts of questions about it, and then reinforce your mother’s proclamations that you are an extraordinary genius and generally speaking a gift from God. Your thesis is, after all, the pinnacle of your academic existence, a paper that took not just one whole year, but a lifetime’s worth of maturity, preparation, sweat, blood, and caffeine to complete.
The cool thing about my thesis (that’s right, I said “cool” and “thesis” in the same sentence) is that it’s completely accessible. If you’ve ever seen Wedding Crashers or heard of Will Ferrell, you can pretty much get it. I remember attending my brother’s thesis presentation, which was entitled “New Photochemical Source of Dichlorocarben,” and latching onto the occasional conjunctions and articles – and, but, or, the – as if my life depended on it. These were truly the only words I understood for about fifty inferiority-complex-creating minutes. My thesis (here comes the cool part) isn't like that. Nevertheless, I do accept the 99% full-proof Unwritten Law of the Thesis, which states: Everyone thinks his/her own thesis is brilliant and dynamic and absolutely intriguing, but to everybody else on the planet, it’s… not. (Half because everybody else doesn't get it, and half because it's... not.)
Anyway, this kid asked me lots of wonderful questions, and I reveled in the thrill of it all, until the time came to return the favor. You see, Unwritten Law #2 of the Thesis states: If someone asks you about your thesis, you must act in kind and ask him/her about his/her thesis. While I like to believe my topic's accessibility makes it a fairly decent discussion piece, Random Kid’s English major thesis might as well have been called “New Photochemical Source of Dichlorocarben.” At least then I would have felt better about not understanding anything but the definite articles.
As it was, Random Kid's paper dealt with a certain archaic novel by a certain incomprehensible author. I’m sure that had I known the work/author/context, it would have been quite interesting or at least not completely off-putting when he ultimately concluded, "You see, everything is really death!!!"
Of course, not everyone should write about something everyone else can get. In truth, I applaud his thesis, it's just not something I'd like to TALK about. I mean, if I ever become an author with, like, a book, instead of a silly blog, I think the highest honor would be to discover that some college kid has wasted away his entire senior year trying to figure out why I'd named Jenny Crossfire "Jenny Crossfire," and why I put three doves in the fifth chapter instead of six, and how it all symbolizes the re-emergence of life and the disenchantment of the East with the West, when in reality I'd forgotten there were any doves in chapter five at all.
And that's Chicago.
To be continued....
Monday, September 3, 2007
Cross Country, Day 1. "Traffic"
8/23/07. Today's goal: Connecticut to New York to Cleveland, OH. Before leaving, I must check the air in my tires, buy a pressure gauge, check my email fourteen times, and buy a cooler.
I have some trouble checking the air pressure. We won't discuss the details, but to summarize, it was embarrassing. My father may have been called in a state of panic and quite possibly I accused my mother's pen-shaped pressure gauge of insolence instead of admitting my own incompetency. It was, what one might call, an "episode."
By 12:00 pm I am technically ready to depart. I procrastinate by taking pictures of things like our garden in the backyard and my mother standing on the porch. I don't want to forget that the backyard can look so resplendent or that my mother sometimes stands on the porch. There are only so many things to photograph, however, so eventually, I get into Eloise.
<---(Eloise)
I stock Eloise's side pockets with packets of gum, my cell phone, and anti-bacterial goo. I reset my odometer to zero. Considering I am saying goodbye to everyone and everything I have ever known for some indefinite, but assuredly long, period of time, I am in relatively high spirits; after all, there are snacks, my new cooler is blue and has one sleek silver stripe, and my ipod has been outfitted with a new playlist (that morning, I'd hastilly downloaded a bunch of songs with "California" and "Los Angeles" in the title, including Bob Marley's cover of "Hotel California," Arlo Guthrie at Woodstock, and the theme from The O.C. It is an odd mix.) All in all, life is good. Stereo off, I sing my way to New York City to pick up Jil, my travel companion, because once she is in tow, singing really loudly a cappella will no longer be allowed - unless I wish to be both mortified and cruel. (I don't.)
Someone in a red Subaru cuts me off, then decides to drive window to window watching me rock out to my own original off-key tunes. He is a douche. He points me out to the passengers in his back seat. Awesome.
After successfully crossing the NY-CT border, I confuse I-278 with I-287. New York highways are not kind to dyslexic folks, nor those who have dyslexic moments, nor those who can't read. It's no biggie, however; I still manage to get to East Harlem at the appointed time of 2:30 pm. Jil and I are in the car and officially off an hour later. One hour after that, we have officially moved two miles. I consider this practice for LA. I also consider it a huge pain in the ass. Finally, we are in the clear and driving at a comfortably illegal pace. Then we stop to pee.
Around 2 am, after 5 or 6 pee stops and 2 tanks of gas, we arrive in Cleveland, OH. We are tired. Cleveland has beds, and a nice girl named Tessa who takes us in and feeds us muffins in the morning. We like Cleveland.
To be continued...
I have some trouble checking the air pressure. We won't discuss the details, but to summarize, it was embarrassing. My father may have been called in a state of panic and quite possibly I accused my mother's pen-shaped pressure gauge of insolence instead of admitting my own incompetency. It was, what one might call, an "episode."
By 12:00 pm I am technically ready to depart. I procrastinate by taking pictures of things like our garden in the backyard and my mother standing on the porch. I don't want to forget that the backyard can look so resplendent or that my mother sometimes stands on the porch. There are only so many things to photograph, however, so eventually, I get into Eloise.
<---(Eloise)
I stock Eloise's side pockets with packets of gum, my cell phone, and anti-bacterial goo. I reset my odometer to zero. Considering I am saying goodbye to everyone and everything I have ever known for some indefinite, but assuredly long, period of time, I am in relatively high spirits; after all, there are snacks, my new cooler is blue and has one sleek silver stripe, and my ipod has been outfitted with a new playlist (that morning, I'd hastilly downloaded a bunch of songs with "California" and "Los Angeles" in the title, including Bob Marley's cover of "Hotel California," Arlo Guthrie at Woodstock, and the theme from The O.C. It is an odd mix.) All in all, life is good. Stereo off, I sing my way to New York City to pick up Jil, my travel companion, because once she is in tow, singing really loudly a cappella will no longer be allowed - unless I wish to be both mortified and cruel. (I don't.)
Someone in a red Subaru cuts me off, then decides to drive window to window watching me rock out to my own original off-key tunes. He is a douche. He points me out to the passengers in his back seat. Awesome.
After successfully crossing the NY-CT border, I confuse I-278 with I-287. New York highways are not kind to dyslexic folks, nor those who have dyslexic moments, nor those who can't read. It's no biggie, however; I still manage to get to East Harlem at the appointed time of 2:30 pm. Jil and I are in the car and officially off an hour later. One hour after that, we have officially moved two miles. I consider this practice for LA. I also consider it a huge pain in the ass. Finally, we are in the clear and driving at a comfortably illegal pace. Then we stop to pee.
Around 2 am, after 5 or 6 pee stops and 2 tanks of gas, we arrive in Cleveland, OH. We are tired. Cleveland has beds, and a nice girl named Tessa who takes us in and feeds us muffins in the morning. We like Cleveland.
To be continued...
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
I should be packing RIGHT now.
I leave for Los Angeles in 48ish hours. I am not packed. Here is a list of things I've been doing instead of packing:
1. Got my guitar restrung. Been meaning to do this for 6 years. Now seemed like a good time.
2. Ate.
3. Thought of a number 3 for this list. Zoned out. Watched an episode of Scrubs.
4. Edited my brother's wedding video, which again, been meaning to do for about 2 years (this, by the way, took 5 hours).
5. Made copies of the wedding video for everyone I could think of (still in process).
6. Ate.
7. Bought some clothes. (I don't even like shopping.)
8. Bought more clothes.
9. Contemplated the fact that all these new clothes won't fit next month when I'm down to a size 2.
10. Pooped.
11. Dusted.
12. Bought shoes.
13. Ate.
13. Did the dishes.
14. Practiced the guitar. (I'm still really bad.)
15. Called some people. Might put together a bbq.
16. Wrote this blog.
17. Proofread this blog.
18. Determined MUST pack. Seriously. MUST DO IT.
19. Ate some more stuff while wearing new clothes. Spilled on new clothes. Had to go nuts with the zout and the clorox and the washing of the new clothes.
20. Got a Pap smear.
___
Am leaving for Los Angeles in less than 47ish hours. Here is a list of things I DO have packed:
1. Blow up mattress.
2. Tennis racket (I don't play tennis).
3. Newly strung guitar (I don't play guitar).
4. Umbrella.
1. Got my guitar restrung. Been meaning to do this for 6 years. Now seemed like a good time.
2. Ate.
3. Thought of a number 3 for this list. Zoned out. Watched an episode of Scrubs.
4. Edited my brother's wedding video, which again, been meaning to do for about 2 years (this, by the way, took 5 hours).
5. Made copies of the wedding video for everyone I could think of (still in process).
6. Ate.
7. Bought some clothes. (I don't even like shopping.)
8. Bought more clothes.
9. Contemplated the fact that all these new clothes won't fit next month when I'm down to a size 2.
10. Pooped.
11. Dusted.
12. Bought shoes.
13. Ate.
13. Did the dishes.
14. Practiced the guitar. (I'm still really bad.)
15. Called some people. Might put together a bbq.
16. Wrote this blog.
17. Proofread this blog.
18. Determined MUST pack. Seriously. MUST DO IT.
19. Ate some more stuff while wearing new clothes. Spilled on new clothes. Had to go nuts with the zout and the clorox and the washing of the new clothes.
20. Got a Pap smear.
___
Am leaving for Los Angeles in less than 47ish hours. Here is a list of things I DO have packed:
1. Blow up mattress.
2. Tennis racket (I don't play tennis).
3. Newly strung guitar (I don't play guitar).
4. Umbrella.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
humble apologies
Dear Loyal Readers,
Thank you for your continued readershipness. Please accept my apologies for the month-long lack of blogging, which can only be explained by a song performed in the key of Fb major. If you find one and listen to it repeatedly, you will understand. Anyway, I do solemnly swear to blog more soon, barring Nuclear Holocaust.
With Warmest Regards,
moi.
Thank you for your continued readershipness. Please accept my apologies for the month-long lack of blogging, which can only be explained by a song performed in the key of Fb major. If you find one and listen to it repeatedly, you will understand. Anyway, I do solemnly swear to blog more soon, barring Nuclear Holocaust.
With Warmest Regards,
moi.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Mmmmmm, body hair.
I've never gone gaga over a guy simply because of his perfect tresses, like I might over a perfectly sculpted abdomen or a sinfully sumptuous intellect. I've certainly never said, "Damn, the way his chest hair curls just so. Could anything be more divine?" But I have done the contrary: I've been physically turned off by receding hairlines and men whose neck hair crawls over the back of their shirt collars. Might these men be otherwise dashing? Perhaps. Might their over-zealous shoulder fur be covering up a warm heart and million-dollar personality? It’s possible. I'm not proud of it, but still the reality exists: body hair can't make you, but it certainly can break you.
While I sympathize with the argument that Nair commercials and Austin Powers have made us believe body hair is far more disgusting than it actually is, I contend some of the repulsion is instinctual: back in the day, cavewomen who looked like men and cavemen who looked like apes got a lot less ass, and this continued until all the super hairy homo erectus were Darwined right into extinction, leaving behind the far less but still too hairy h. sapien.
Nevertheless, somewhere along the line, let’s say during the Reagan years, the cosmetics industry took our dislike of body hair and drove it right into the Land of the Absurd. If you live in a world where it seems perfectly rational to attack your own body with razor blades, hot wax, dyes, poisons, and laser beams – and to pay good money to do so – it’s perhaps time to sit back and recognize just how truly insane we all are. Which is why, although I totally buy into the “Back hair –yech!” movement, I also find my own superficiality as appalling as chest hair that literally pokes through T-shirt fabric like little, black, rabid tentacles (how does it DO that?!?).
And so the hypocrisy remains that while body hair turns me off like a downed power line, I'm rather anti doing anything about it. In fact, guys who wax give me the heebies even more than guys who should and don't. (As a general rule, I prefer men who primp less than I do, which pretty much means they’re allowed to roll out of bed and shower - but no more than five times a week.) A likeminded soul recently described a guy she was desperately attracted to as "so hot: he was in need of a shave, and you could tell he wore that same shirt yesterday." And since this makes perfect sense to me, I realize that what I'm looking for (aesthetically speaking) is some guy who's good looking, but doesn't try, and is also completely unaware of his hotness. Such accidental dreamboats are both extremely rare and extremely difficult to nab; for the most part, they seem to find each other among the wreckage (the rest of us) and settle down, thus leading gorgeous and ignorantly blissful lives, running ten miles a day for fun and never getting cancer.
But besides the primp factor, I'm simply against spending oodles of money on unnecessary cosmetic procedures and products. In fact, three years ago I vowed to henceforth never get a manicure/salon treatment without simultaneously donating an equal sum of money to charity. The vow was prompted by the fact that I only ever got manicures when I visited New York City, which was also the only time I encountered and refused to give money to masses of homeless people, and the whole "No I will not give you fifty cents so you can eat and one day maybe rejoin society as a functioning individual"/"Oh, yes, here's my twenty-five dollars for 0.3 ounces of paint spread upon 1 square inch of surface that will last 1.2 weeks before it will grow out, chip, and look crappy" didn't sit well with me. Of course, since that vow, every hypothetical manicure has cost me upwards of $40, which has reduced my manicure per year rate from 0.75 to 0.0. But even putting my own financial woes aside, as well as all well-thought, tempered, and reasoned argument, the cosmetics industry is an evil, evil empire that fuels and is fueled by eating disorders and teenage insecurity and is also the sole entity responsible for nightmares and Tyra Banks. So I try to stay away.
Also, waxing scares the bajesus out of me.
Despite the yuck-factor, it's true that many of the men I've loved in my life have been hairy, hairy beasts. My step dad was one of those unfortunate creatures who could weave a toupee out of his ear and nose hair, but was elsewise completely bald. When it came to body hair, life dealt him a harsh hand of ironic. It's different of course when you're talking about a person you'd potentially like to see naked, but yes, I have sweat a hairy boy or two, and yes I did want to see him naked.
There's a finely tuned thought-process hierarchy at work that, at least for women, goes heart, libido, head. (As for men, your brain functions allude me completely.) When a woman first meets someone who’s really awesome, but has gorilla arms, her head says, “Oh, he’s really awesome,” but her libido says, “He’s got gorilla arms.” And since she's yet to create any real emotional connection, her heart’s got nothing – at which point, libido wins all. But, if she gets to know someone, say, at work, and suddenly she realizes she's in love with him, her head could say, “Bad idea; we work together,” and her libido might be whining about his trucker stache or man boobs, but both are quickly ruled out by her heart gushing something about loving him more than [insert favorite dessert]. This is how women work. In any event, the head gets the short end of the stick every time.
So yes, we are all (men and women alike) superficial, brainwashed idiots who likely don't measure up to our own impossible standards, but there's hope. I imagine that when I’m truly in love, my man could have two noses (that's right, two noses!), and I wouldn’t care. Or, maybe he'll turn out to be a habitual waxer. Or maybe he'll shower eight times a week, and change his clothes every day, and I'll just have to deal, dammit. See, we all have to make compromises. Nasty ass body hair is reason enough not to be into someone, sure; but it’s never reason enough not to love someone.
While I sympathize with the argument that Nair commercials and Austin Powers have made us believe body hair is far more disgusting than it actually is, I contend some of the repulsion is instinctual: back in the day, cavewomen who looked like men and cavemen who looked like apes got a lot less ass, and this continued until all the super hairy homo erectus were Darwined right into extinction, leaving behind the far less but still too hairy h. sapien.
Nevertheless, somewhere along the line, let’s say during the Reagan years, the cosmetics industry took our dislike of body hair and drove it right into the Land of the Absurd. If you live in a world where it seems perfectly rational to attack your own body with razor blades, hot wax, dyes, poisons, and laser beams – and to pay good money to do so – it’s perhaps time to sit back and recognize just how truly insane we all are. Which is why, although I totally buy into the “Back hair –yech!” movement, I also find my own superficiality as appalling as chest hair that literally pokes through T-shirt fabric like little, black, rabid tentacles (how does it DO that?!?).
And so the hypocrisy remains that while body hair turns me off like a downed power line, I'm rather anti doing anything about it. In fact, guys who wax give me the heebies even more than guys who should and don't. (As a general rule, I prefer men who primp less than I do, which pretty much means they’re allowed to roll out of bed and shower - but no more than five times a week.) A likeminded soul recently described a guy she was desperately attracted to as "so hot: he was in need of a shave, and you could tell he wore that same shirt yesterday." And since this makes perfect sense to me, I realize that what I'm looking for (aesthetically speaking) is some guy who's good looking, but doesn't try, and is also completely unaware of his hotness. Such accidental dreamboats are both extremely rare and extremely difficult to nab; for the most part, they seem to find each other among the wreckage (the rest of us) and settle down, thus leading gorgeous and ignorantly blissful lives, running ten miles a day for fun and never getting cancer.
But besides the primp factor, I'm simply against spending oodles of money on unnecessary cosmetic procedures and products. In fact, three years ago I vowed to henceforth never get a manicure/salon treatment without simultaneously donating an equal sum of money to charity. The vow was prompted by the fact that I only ever got manicures when I visited New York City, which was also the only time I encountered and refused to give money to masses of homeless people, and the whole "No I will not give you fifty cents so you can eat and one day maybe rejoin society as a functioning individual"/"Oh, yes, here's my twenty-five dollars for 0.3 ounces of paint spread upon 1 square inch of surface that will last 1.2 weeks before it will grow out, chip, and look crappy" didn't sit well with me. Of course, since that vow, every hypothetical manicure has cost me upwards of $40, which has reduced my manicure per year rate from 0.75 to 0.0. But even putting my own financial woes aside, as well as all well-thought, tempered, and reasoned argument, the cosmetics industry is an evil, evil empire that fuels and is fueled by eating disorders and teenage insecurity and is also the sole entity responsible for nightmares and Tyra Banks. So I try to stay away.
Also, waxing scares the bajesus out of me.
Despite the yuck-factor, it's true that many of the men I've loved in my life have been hairy, hairy beasts. My step dad was one of those unfortunate creatures who could weave a toupee out of his ear and nose hair, but was elsewise completely bald. When it came to body hair, life dealt him a harsh hand of ironic. It's different of course when you're talking about a person you'd potentially like to see naked, but yes, I have sweat a hairy boy or two, and yes I did want to see him naked.
There's a finely tuned thought-process hierarchy at work that, at least for women, goes heart, libido, head. (As for men, your brain functions allude me completely.) When a woman first meets someone who’s really awesome, but has gorilla arms, her head says, “Oh, he’s really awesome,” but her libido says, “He’s got gorilla arms.” And since she's yet to create any real emotional connection, her heart’s got nothing – at which point, libido wins all. But, if she gets to know someone, say, at work, and suddenly she realizes she's in love with him, her head could say, “Bad idea; we work together,” and her libido might be whining about his trucker stache or man boobs, but both are quickly ruled out by her heart gushing something about loving him more than [insert favorite dessert]. This is how women work. In any event, the head gets the short end of the stick every time.
So yes, we are all (men and women alike) superficial, brainwashed idiots who likely don't measure up to our own impossible standards, but there's hope. I imagine that when I’m truly in love, my man could have two noses (that's right, two noses!), and I wouldn’t care. Or, maybe he'll turn out to be a habitual waxer. Or maybe he'll shower eight times a week, and change his clothes every day, and I'll just have to deal, dammit. See, we all have to make compromises. Nasty ass body hair is reason enough not to be into someone, sure; but it’s never reason enough not to love someone.
Sunday, July 1, 2007
Another reason to love wikipedia
The following article is a great read for aliens plotting to conquer earth who may need to brush up on their Human 101. If you're not an alien, it's more like reading about your astrological sign for the very first time, when all the pieces fit together and you realize just how much you really are a Pisces(!!).
Humans, or human beings, are bipedal primates belonging to the mammalian species Homo sapiens (Latin: "wise man" or "knowing man") in the family Hominidae (the great apes). Humans have a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, language, and introspection. This mental capability, combined with an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, has allowed humans to make far greater use of tools than any other species. Humans originated in Africa about 200,000 years ago, but they now inhabit every continent, with a total population of over 6.6 billion as of 2007.
Like most primates, humans are social by nature; however, humans are particularly adept at utilizing systems of communication for self-expression, the exchange of ideas, and organization. Humans create complex social structures composed of cooperating and competing groups, ranging in scale from small families and partnerships to species-wide political, scientific and economic unions. Social interactions between humans have also established an extremely wide variety of traditions, rituals, ethics, values, social norms, and laws which form the basis of human society. Humans also have a marked appreciation for beauty and aesthetics which, combined with the human desire for self-expression, has led to cultural innovations such as art, literature and music.
Humans are also noted for their desire to understand and influence the world around them, seeking to explain and manipulate natural phenomena through science, philosophy, mythology and religion. This natural curiosity has led to the development of advanced tools and skills; humans are the only known species to build fires, cook their food, clothe themselves, and use numerous other technologies....
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If you still need a reason to love wikipedia, there's also the fact that it contains some rather indispensible information like the following photo and caption...
Squilliam Fancyson – fictional character from SpongeBob SquarePants is endowed with a unibrow.
... as well as a list entitled Famous People with Unibrows, which includes: Jim Adkins, Adam Carolla, Jennifer Connelly, Colin Farrell, Oasis band members and brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher, Josh Hartnett, Salma Hayek, Matisyahu, Matthew McConaughey [really?], Jack Osbourne, Frank Zappa, Rudolf Hess (Deputy-Führer of Nazi Germany), John Kerry, Pete Sampras, Frida Kahlo, and Oscar the Grouch...
Fabulous.
Humans, or human beings, are bipedal primates belonging to the mammalian species Homo sapiens (Latin: "wise man" or "knowing man") in the family Hominidae (the great apes). Humans have a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, language, and introspection. This mental capability, combined with an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, has allowed humans to make far greater use of tools than any other species. Humans originated in Africa about 200,000 years ago, but they now inhabit every continent, with a total population of over 6.6 billion as of 2007.
Like most primates, humans are social by nature; however, humans are particularly adept at utilizing systems of communication for self-expression, the exchange of ideas, and organization. Humans create complex social structures composed of cooperating and competing groups, ranging in scale from small families and partnerships to species-wide political, scientific and economic unions. Social interactions between humans have also established an extremely wide variety of traditions, rituals, ethics, values, social norms, and laws which form the basis of human society. Humans also have a marked appreciation for beauty and aesthetics which, combined with the human desire for self-expression, has led to cultural innovations such as art, literature and music.
Humans are also noted for their desire to understand and influence the world around them, seeking to explain and manipulate natural phenomena through science, philosophy, mythology and religion. This natural curiosity has led to the development of advanced tools and skills; humans are the only known species to build fires, cook their food, clothe themselves, and use numerous other technologies....
---
If you still need a reason to love wikipedia, there's also the fact that it contains some rather indispensible information like the following photo and caption...
Squilliam Fancyson – fictional character from SpongeBob SquarePants is endowed with a unibrow.
... as well as a list entitled Famous People with Unibrows, which includes: Jim Adkins, Adam Carolla, Jennifer Connelly, Colin Farrell, Oasis band members and brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher, Josh Hartnett, Salma Hayek, Matisyahu, Matthew McConaughey [really?], Jack Osbourne, Frank Zappa, Rudolf Hess (Deputy-Führer of Nazi Germany), John Kerry, Pete Sampras, Frida Kahlo, and Oscar the Grouch...
Fabulous.
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