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Self-Righteous Arrogant Bastard  Before I start this rant, I must state for the record that I am no particular prize in the looks department. The advanced state of my sense of humor is largely a result of compensating for the fact that in my youth I resembled an evil scientist's genetic mix of Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel: I have (or, rather, did have) Paul's height and Art's hair, with the musical talent of neither. I have no severe deformities, though my toes are bizarre, and I happen to think my head is shaped kinda funny (the fact of which was merely accentuated by the cutting off of most of the Garfunkel hair). I am scrawny enough to be unmuscular yet miraculously able to retain enough fat to give me love handles and a mild tummy. In short, I am not Fabio. I am not Brad Pitt, or even Tom Green. This fact has not changed significantly since I was eighteen. Why, then, is it that now, at age thirty-one, and married, women are suddenly coming out of the woodwork and interested? When I was in college, women avoided me like the bubonic plague, and this did nothing for my self-esteem. Have you seen Swingers? That pathetic scene, almost painful to watch, where Mikey repeatedly calls the answering machine and proceeds to come across as a needy, neurotic, stalker-esque freak? I can so relate to that scene. I never did that, but the stuff I did do was entirely comparable, in my opinion. But I've embarrassed myself enough on that line of questioning; the point is, and the billion-dollar question I want to ask these generally attractive women who are expressing an interest in me at today's day and date is, "Where the fuck were you fifteen years ago?" As you can see from the latter, the word "fuck" is very important to my vocabulary in such situations, because (and I can't believe I'm saying this about hotties flirting with me) it pisses me off. My attitude, as bitter as it may sound, boils down to: "Why are you trying to tempt my tummy with the taste of nuts and honey now that it's too fucking late for breakfast?" 'Cause I don't cheat on my wife. Damn, but it would be so much easier if I could! Alas, not a big fan of either the folks who do that or of the spouses who tolerate it (if it's an open marriage or some other arrangement, I'm all for it-- more power to them!). Why do I bring this up now? I just got back from a wedding where not only the cute and single bridesmaid, but the bartendrixes and a few innocent bystanders (one of them married) were flirting with me, hard. They sighed, leaned up against me, and said stuff like, "Why do you have to be married?" A large-busted lady kept telling me about how her breasts were falling out of her dress, and when I assured her they were just fine, and casually commented in (an unrelated) conversation on how I'm a leg-man (see strip-club comments in previous entry, below), she was suddenly propping her feet up on the table and letting her floor-length skirt ride up way above the knee. One bartendress recommended a drink called a Red-Headed Slut (which was actually good, BTW: one part Jagermeister, one part Peachtree Schnapps, and one part cranberry juice). She gave me lots of eye-contact, ignored other customers, and when I expressed pleasure at the drink, she started discussing how much of a shame it is she isn't a redhead. The proceeded, unasked, to give me a triple sized Red-Headed Slut for my enjoyment. God help me if she would have offered me a single brunette-headed slut for my enjoyment! I might have yelled one of the above comments containing the word "fuck" at her. I'd think it was a fluke-- I was travelling, and "new kid in town" and all that-- but the same thing is happening to a certain extent at work as well. No details necessary, but there have been comments. Sometimes mildly embarassing ones. From cuties. It's sick and wrong and, in the words of Anakin nee Vader nee Anakin, "It is too late for me, my son." So what's up with this? Have years of computer geekitude and reading physics books in my spare time (yes, I actually do that. for fun. calculus, too) somehow released my inner studliness? I think not. It ain't me. It's got to be them. Lest you think this diatribe is entirely self-centered (which it is, of course, but lest you think that), I offer to the younger men out there that if we can solve this puzzling dilemma of the female mind, we can easily figure out an angle and, unlike myself, you could partake of countless women throwing themselves at you when you're young and single enough to actually enjoy it! See, this is entirely altruistic work for my fellow man. I want to make the world a better place. And ladies, this is for you, too! Just think-- if you can figure out what kind of guy you're going to be attracted to when you're pushing thirty, you can avoid all the messy, nowhere dates with studly used-car salesmen who wear too much Drakkar-- instead, you can snap up the nerdy gents in the early years, preying vigorously on the fact that these men will be so unused to the femninine attention you lavish them with that they will fall deeply, madly, and totally in love with you. And you won't have to turn twenty-nine-and-a-half and embarrassingly fawn on the guy playing GameBoy alone at the local Taco Bell. Again, altruism. I'm all about the ladies, here. So the question becomes: what has changed about women that they are finding a guy like attractive after all these years? It's the same women, or reasonable facsimiles thereof; it's not like I've started attending events at the Women Who Like Short Nerdy Guys club. Same chicks, same venues, mostly same me. My wife says it's probably just self-confidence born of ten years' marriage, daddyhood, and making lots of cash. Chicks dig self-confidence. I'm not ready to agree with her-- I was damned cocky as a younger guy, justifiably or not. That hasn't changed too much. A friend blames the breeding instinct, combined with cultural change. Somewhere in the 90s, the theory goes, geek became chic and, possibly more importantly, being able to manipulate technology was a surefire ticket to making lots of cash. Ask Bill Gates. So, because geekdom has become a symbol of Good Providerness, the hardwired instincts embedded in women's brains are suddenly bursting forth with: "Mmmmm... pocket protectors and Dungeons & Dragons... gotta get me some o' dat!" I know. I don't buy it, either. There is something to be said about the "you always want what you can't have" effect, and I'd be open to that interpretation. There's also some evidence linking fertility and sex drives to pheromonal triggers. For instance, studies have shown that just prior to a couple's (planned) temporary separation, the female's fertility and sex drive increases significantly (presumably so that if the male gets killed by a saber-tooth on the way back to the cave with the mammoth meat, the race may survive). But there's all kinds of more wacky stuff than that. If a male has sex with a female, and then meets another female, pheromonal cues apparently increase her fertility, temporarily, while he's around. He is obviously virile enough to attract one female, so the idea goes, so he must be virile enough to breed with. Similar stuff happens on the male side: sperm generation goes up in anticipation of a long absence, and the smell of another guy on your lady (even if consciously imperceptible) causes those little wrigglers to work harder, hoping to beat that other guy's naughty little soldiers to the Promised Land. So if there are all of these physical cues, how certain are we there are no mental effects based on the same phenomenon? The brain is an impressive admixture of consciousness and creativity, but deep in its primitive recesses sits some very primal shit, and the sinister part of it is that those instinctual parts are hardwired into the rest of the whole shebang. They may not be in charge (not always, anyway), but there's no doubt they're in the mix, subtly influencing here and there. And lets not leave out the body's own over-the-counter pharmaceuticals: the hormones. They can affect the way you think in huge ways, and women are hitting their sexual peak at about thirty. There's no telling what kind of nonsense their bodies are whispering to their forebrains. Alas, folks, I don't have the answers, just a lot of questions, and this is running on a lot longer than I'd planned it to. At the risk of being repetitive, I'll just say again that while I'm flattered that I'm finally getting all the chicks I'd ever wanted, I really wish the ladies would have figured out they wanted me for breeding stock years ago when it would have done me some damned bit of good. Because now all it is is needless temptation to which I can not yield.* And how fun, exactly, is that? *My wife made me write that bit. Hi, honey! Current mood:  frustrated.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) I'm a capitalist. I don't think the market is an ideal solution to every problem, I just think it happens to be ten times better than the rest of the alternatives. So it's rare that I am in favor of legal decisions which limit business freedom. There has to be a higher principle at stake. In the case of ClearPlay and services of its ilk, that higher principle is artistic expression. Family Flix is one service which offers "cleaned-up" versions of commercial DVDs. For a small fee, they will provide you with an edited version of otherwise objectionable movies, removing naughty words, nudity, sexual content, and sometimes violence. (They claim that the Passion of the Christ will not be edited because "everyone has already seen it".) ClearPlay is slicker, not even deigning to burn a new, cleaner DVD-- they've got special players which will dial into a central server and download information about which scenes should be skipped and which seconds muted. As an admirer of technology, and of business acumen, I have to admire this stuff. However, as an ethical human being in favor of the rights of the creator (or at the very least, the copyright holder) of a work, I've got to draw a line here. These services are making a profit off re-editing other people's work-- work they had no hand in creating, and have no contractual right to do anything with other than watch. If this were a free service, you might be able to at least legally-- if not morally-- excuse the practice. After all, how different is this from someone sitting in their living room with a remote control, muting or fast-forwarding? It's not a free service. Whether you purchase the specialized DVD players from ClearPlay or the modified DVDs from the other companies, you're paying someone to touch a work they have no right to. They're making money off someone else's work by hacking it up without permission, and that's wrong. Dead wrong. Congress has already put its stamp of approval on this practice with a special law allowing such crap to continue. Special dispensation from a group of politicians who fear free expression almost as much as they fear the wrath of the "moralists" who proved they are numerically powerful at last year's polls. So it looks like, whether ethical or moral or not, this odious practice will at least soon be legal. Hooray. But beyond that... what kind of a person would use a service like this, anyway? Look, I'm a dad of two young girls. I know how hard a job it is. But finding suitable entertainment for them is the one part that's not hard. There're cheesy Disney movies galore for them. There's Nickolodeon, for god's sake, and other channels uncounted and generally even unobserved by those with higher tastes. Bottom line is: there's more video suitable for the enjoyment of young kids today than at any other time in the history of the world. If your kids have run out of stuff to watch, maybe it's time for you to realize that it's because they're watching too much TV in general. There are these things called books-- perhaps you've heard of them? (They're like TV, but with fewer pictures.) There is no need to seek out adult fare and strip out all the dirty bits so Junior isn't dismayed by the sight of Kate Winslet's bosom or hears the words which are normally bleeped out on Fear Factor or American Idol or sees that the lead character of Schindler's List had extramarital affairs. Or hears the racial epithets uttered by cops in The Hurricane-- because, you know, they couldn't possibly have been there to make a point about how racist the times were. And even if, for some reason, you decide that this is somehow necessary for your lifestyle (you want to watch a video with your kid, but can't stomach another iteration of The Lion King-- hey, I've been there!), what's wrong with prescreening the film yourself, and hitting the mute or fast-forward button? I'll tell you what's wrong with it-- it's too much work. I don't object to the parents who use these services due to their "high moral standards", or even due to their willingness to violate the work of the artists who created the content of these DVDs. I object to the parents because they are using this service out of pure fucking laziness. They have decided that it's too much work to screen the material their kids are viewing-- not just the stuff the kiddos watch when the parents aren't home or are busy, but even the stuff they watch together! These parents are not just hostile to so-called smut, they're too lazy and cowardly to sully their own hands with it in order to protect their own children. They'd rather pay someone else to do it. I'm sorry. I consider myself a lazy guy. I put off my household chores as long as I possibly can, and do the minimum possible I can get away with and still do a decent job. But I don't skimp on time spent with, or possibly more importantly, for my kids. That's a sacred responsibility that comes right after working to keep them fed and clothed and sheltered. The fact that these services allow parents to be yet more lazy is the real crime, here. The sanctity of the artist's vision, while important, in principle, is only a sideshow here. Parental responsibility, folks. And no excuses as to why you didn't take a direct hand in providing it. Current mood: annoyed.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) Once upon a time, when you donated money to charity, you were giving. Lately, I don't hear about "giving" anymore. Everyone who's anyone is "giving back to the community". And I refuse to jump on that bandwagon. The cynic in me says that someone in the big charity business is behind this. Psychologically, if you couch charity in terms of "giving back", you've shifted the game from asking politely to demanding your due. After all, we can't give something "back" unless someone gave it to us, first. So there's an obligation in there, somewhere, apparently, though it never gets spelled out. Wouldn't that be a clever way of increasing donations? I'm a realist, though, and while it's an amusing theory, I tend to blame stupidity rather than conspiracy, if at all possible. I think people are just being clumsy in their wording. Someone saw a celebrity giving to some organization which had helped them in the past, heard him or her say "giving back to the community" and thought it sounded charming. And it just avalanched from there. Let's examine this, shall we? When someone accosts me and asks if I'd like to "give something back" to the community, what exactly am I repaying? 'Cause I'll be honest, here: the "community" has been nothing but a weight around my neck since a very young age. I can't name one damn thing "the community" has ever done for me that I could conceivably owe for. Even the things I arguably did get as freebies that helped me along in life were paid for thoroughly by my parents' tax dollars, and later by my own. The community is and has been a pain in my ass, as they snag my cash and use it to pay for stuff I think is of questionable worth, at best, and am morally opposed to, at worst. But we won't go into my politics, here. I object to this in principle, anyway. In this new semantic regime, I don't get to wallow in my good feelings for giving of myself to a worthy cause. No, why should I? I'm "giving it back", which means technically I owed it, and though repaying a debt is certainly honorable, it's just what's expected. It's hardly above and beyond the call of duty, it's something you're supposed to be doing anyway. I'm sorry... If you would have ended up on the street but turned out okay because of Big Brothers / Big Sisters, and you later offer a sizable chunk of cash for their new building... If you got a scholarship from the city's merit scholar program and later donate $25 or $25,000 to the city's education budget... If you are a big Hollywood star and owe your fame to a group of fans, and spend some time with them at a convention or otherwise make them feel happy... you are conceivably "giving back to the community". But I don't owe too many "communities" anything. My "giving back" is probably going to be restricted to taking care of my parents and wife if and when they are unable to properly care for themselves. That's "giving back", folks. In the most direct and possibly most unpleasant way. That's something I believe I do owe, and unless by some bizarre chance your parents neglected your ass or tormented you in the days of your youth, you probably owe them the same sort of thing. I have no objections to giving charitable donations, by the way, and have, and will in the future without complaint or restriction. I hand cash to homeless guys, too (possibly subsidizing their liquor habits). But I do it because I want to do it. Because I'd like to make the world a better place. Not because it's my duty. It's not, and I resent the implication that it is which is inherent to the phrase "giving back". Screw "giving back". I'm just giving. Current mood: bitchy.
(1 comment | Comment on my insane rantings!) Will I say the wrong thing? What if I look shady, or suspicious? Should I shave the beard? I'm feeling fidgety, and probably should have blown my nose. Why the hell am I here? I don't have what it takes. But if I'm just clever enough, just impressive enough, and just self-deprecating enough, I might, might get my daughter into this elementary school. Arizona is not known for its public education system. It ranks somewhere in the lowest 25%, last I checked. Probably the lowest 15 or 20%. It ain't pretty, and it ain't why we moved here. What Arizona does have is School Choice, coupled with a Charter School system that rocks. What are these? School Choice essentially says, "You can go to any public school in the state, but we'll only bus your kid to the one nearest your home." My daughters can attend elementary school in Flagstaff, if I'm up for the commute. Which means that I can get the pick of the crop when it comes to schools. And while the state has a dismal public school system, that's on the average. There are some damned good public schools a half-hour's drive away, if I value my kid's education more than an extra thirty minutes worth of sleep in the morning. So there are options. Next-- Charter Schools. Look, I'm not gonna discuss my feelings about public education in general; there's no time, and it's just flamewar fodder. Suffice it to say that I think, at the very least, that the massive "one-size-fits-all" way of doing things is grossly unfair to both the parents and the students it is ostensibly designed to serve. All kids learn differently, and sitting them in neat little rows to stare at chalk-scrawled walls and the authority figure du jour is not going to change that. So you have charter schools: they have all the characteristics of a private school, with all the things (good and bad) that come with it, except that the tuition dollars get paid by the state-- the same amount that is ordinarily paid to a public school if your child were to attend there. They have to accept all students on a first-come, first-served basis, and they don't get all the facilities and maintenance and construction cash the state provides to other public schools (that has to be by private donation). What they do get is the ability to compete against the public schools for the tuition money of the students on a reasonably fair playing field. And I couldn't be happier. Don't get me wrong; studies have shown that charter schools are no better and no worse, on the average, than public schools. There's that word again, though: average. There are some lousy schools out there, ones whose experimental teaching methods completely miss the boat. And I've heard some doozies-- there's one that's like a happy-happy feelgood commune, and there are some that concentrate on agricultural education. Small wonder that neither is burning up the standard achievement test score recordbooks. Too, there are specialized schools for the arts, for sports, for vocational education (I always picture an entire classroom full of welders), and for students with Problems (criminal or otherwise). In each case, the curricula are tailored toward the goals of the students (or the goals of their parents, anyway), and that's a refreshing option. It allows teachers to concentrate on the types of students they handle best, and it also allows parents who aren't that concerned to fall back to the generic public schools if they are so inclined. All of this is background for my problem: we've found the perfect school for our daughter, and I'm chewing on my cuticles in anticipation of her getting in. My wife and I are big fans of the Montessori educational method (which I shan't detail here), and lo and behold! a Montessori charter school exists within a reasonable proximity to our home and work. I can't detail everything that makes it wonderful, but today we looked in on the kids in both the primary (age 3-6) classroom and the early elementary (age 6-9) classroom, and it was a beautiful sight. The kids were in a state of barely-controlled chaos, sprawled across the floors and even in lofts, individually and in groups, working on everything from grammatical analysis of sentences to entomology to geometry. The kids were typical kids, punctuating their work with talk about SpongeBob, but there was no whining or aggressive behavior, and and and... Never mind. Words cannot convey. You have to see a Montessori class to believe it-- and I'm sure it's not for everyone. The point is, in two days' time, I get to be interviewed. My eldest daughter is X on the entrance list, and X is a very low number, and they will not offer her a spot in the class until my wife and I have attended an "enrollment meeting". Which is to say (without explicitly saying), an interview. Of us. I'm terrfied. What if I say the wrong thing, and my daughter misses out on the opportunity to kick academic ass at this school? What if I come across as self-righteous, or arrogant, or a downright bastard (gee, what are the odds)? My daughter will have to attend a lesser school and it will be All My Fault. Her entire life could take a tremendous downturn, and when she's thirteen and selling crack to seven year-olds in order to pay back her loan sharks, she will look back on it all and blame me. How can I live with that? The pressure is on. I know this entry seems silly, and, in a way, it is. My experience has been that the biggest indicator of kids' overall chances of success in life is how much attention their parents paid them, and to a lesser extent to how much attention their parents paid to their education. If I spend my time letting my kids know how important they are, and spend even more time making sure that I fill in any gaps the school has neglected, then both girls will be fine. It's me that matters, not the school, or what she watches on TV, or even the neighborhood we live in. And somehow, that's even more terrifying. Huh. Bring on the interview. Current mood:  scared.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) It's almost a year, now, and I still haven't updated this thing. I knew this was going to happen. What's happened since the last update? Let's see... I, indeed, did not make Grandma's funeral, and Mom, indeed, was very upset about it. She offered to pay for a full-fare ticket to get me there anyway, but she can afford the $800 even less than I can. Perhaps that was a mistake, because you can't put a price on pallbearerhood in Italian families, but I don't regret it at this point. Of course, now I've had the other Grandma (Therese) die, in the recent past (January of this year, in particular). My dad sprang loose some frequent flier miles and my sister provided a bed, and I was, therefore, able to attend the funeral. There was some weird Catholic ritual about the "giving of the gifts" I muddled through (and probably screwed up), and I was of course a pallbearer. She had been institionalized for four years due to her Alzheimer's and had been pretty far gone before that, so I had an odd sort of detachment from the whole thing; I'd said "goodbye" to her in my heart when she became incapable of understanding the word. Aside from a somewhat bizarre (and only-kidding, mostly) discussion my cousins had about stealing the funereal pall (which Grandma had actually sewn), it was pretty uneventful. I feel almost derelict in not giving her the same long discussion I gave Vee last year, but I'm finding it hard to get into the same mood. Sorry. If there's a heaven, surely she'll be wagging her finger at me, but ultimately forgive. Let's see what else... wow, a lot, yet not much. I went on sabbatical in the summer last year, spending two weeks in Michigan (some in Detroit and some in Traverse City-- which was beautiful, by the way. No, not Detroit, you fool!) and another two weeks in Chicago. It was largely relaxing, especially the three days The Wife and I spent in a Bed & Breakfast in Chicago-- I highly recommend the China Doll, if you're planning on hanging in the Windy City and need a cool place to stay. The remaining month of sabbatical was spent in Arizona doing chorey things like painting the girls' rooms and prettifying the backyard. And swimming in the new pool. Did I mention the new pool? And then... whoa! New job! Can you believe it? I know last time I wrote I was on the fence, and lo! and behold! I took the plunge. I'm in a completely different organization, doing a completely different job... and it's entirely possible that I may be in over my head. Hell, for that matter, it's entirely possible the entire organization is in over our heads. We shall see, when silicon doth arrive later this year (ask me about silicon sometime. it's not just an element on the Periodic Table, folks!). Um... the girls are both in school now; Eldest is in kindergarten, and just recently started going full day when her school came through with a scholarship for afternoons (we were gonna just bite down and pay for it, because we felt she wanted/needed it, but if someone's gonna throw money at me, I'm not turning it down!). Youngest is in three-day-per week preschool, and would go every day, if she could. She just loves it. Both girls are potty trained-- even at night, in bed, which was kind of a shocker. We expected it of Eldest, but when Youngest jumped on the bandwagon and even more insanely *succeeded* (sometimes better than Eldest-- shhhh! don't tell her!), we were very pleasantly surprised. So the diapers and pull-ups are all gone in our residence, which means we can afford more DVDs per month!!!!! (or Wifey will buy the kids more clothes... which do you find more likely?) The kitchen is now a lovely shade of green, and there is rock in our backyard (for those of you in less deserty climes, this is equivalent to what you unlucky people would call "a lawn"). The pool, despite a stubborn greenish tinge it recently possessed, is scrubbed squeaky clean and ready for the insane nerve-endingless children to jump into it as soon as we will let them. Wifey has allergies. Eldest has allergies. More on that topic on another day (might be a year from now; you've seen my record). I'm writing. Finally! I've found new ways of motivating myself which I shall not share with you until I am successful. It involves knowing my own weaknesses and fooling myself into exploiting them-- and if anyone can do that, I can. It's a children's science fiction novel, and I hope to have it done in the next several months. Or never. I'm alternately positive I will finish it and be published, and certain that I will never see it on my screen, let alone in paperback. I suck. That's it for an update. I need time to cover allergies and other topics (my sister and best friends and their weddings), but that will be some other time. Hopefully not next year. Hopefully. Current mood:  weird.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) This journal contains "bastard" in the title for a reason. I'm not much for partaking in the grieving process. I meet tragic events with a few moments of sadness, perhaps even brief tears, but I got most of my crying out in my youth. and since I was a pretty whiny kid, there isn't much salt-water left in the ol' ducts. Then I go back to being as irreverent and rude as before. Anyway, the quote I've headlined this entry with keeps returning to me every couple hours or so. For those who spent their teenhood doing stuff besides watching movies over and over again on cable or the VCR, it's from Edward Rooney: Dean of Students and antagonist of the great Ferris Bueller. The words in question were spoken as he looked in disbelief at his secretary while she informed him of Ferris's latest excuse for skipping class. Unfortunately, the words are not an excuse of any sort for me, unless possibly an excuse for writing a journal article when I've neglected this page for a week (In Accordance With The Prophecies! scroll on back to the first entry if you don't believe me!). Nope. Unlike Ferris, I don't have a class I'm trying to avoid, although I am missing one. And also unlike Ferris, my words are not just a farce. See, on April 13, 2004, Vincentia Finazzo died. She was my grandmother. It was pretty quick, as far as it goes; she'd been on weekly dialysis for years, and been holding up very well, for the most part. She had a heart attack last week, was taken to the hospital, and stayed on morphine until the doctors discovered fluid in her lungs which they had no luck in removing. The options were a tracheotomy and the remainder of her life hooked up to machines, or removing her from the machines and hoping she would miraculously recover on her own. My relatives chose the correct one, and she died in her sleep, peacefully, on Tuesday morning. Vee was a kind-hearted lady who never lost faith in her God or in the goodness of her fellow man. I don't agree with either assessment, but I can respect her and others who do. When my grandpa died in 1986, she could have become an embittered old woman; he worked for years as a janitor before being let go just short of retirement, and there wasn't much left in terms of money after his extensive battle with cancer. But that didn't happen; she had her relatives, and the love she'd always shared with them came back to her in the form of companionship and support. Grandma was 90 years old when she died; she was around for the Roaring Twenties, the Great Depression, and lived through wars hot and cold-- wars sometimes more meaningful, and sometimes less, than the ones we wage today. She saw the first televisions, the first men in space, and the first electronic computers. She had some outmoded views, but proved astoundingly able to adapt her outlook as society changed around her-- unlike my paternal grandfather, who would complain until the day he died that there were too many "coloreds" in the broadcast basketball games, and from whom I heard for the first time most of the racial epithets my parents had kept from me. Grandma despaired as my unmarried teenage cousin got pregnant, but she didn't withhold her love for either my cousin or her child. Vee was no saint, thank god. Saints are snooty and not very much fun to have around. Grandma was earthy, and mischievous. When my mother expressed offense at the words "piece of ass"-- who knows why that phrase pissed her off: she says "fuck" more often than I do-- my grandmother went out of her way to use that particular terminology whenever the conversation would permit it. And smiled when she did it. She told dirty jokes, although she would often laugh uncontrollably before delivering the punchline-- whether because the joke was so funny, or because she was immensely amused at herself for actually saying such naughty things. She'd try to convince the most gullible kid in the room that a piece of chopped garlic was "candy", and keep at it until he or she actually took a bite in order to check. (I know, for I was that kid). She was sometimes rude, often crude, but never mean. I caused her no end of displeasure, for as a child I didn't like pasta-- a cardinal sin for someone with Sicilian ancestry. (I've since reformed.) And, though she often insisted I knew Italian when I was young, I stubbornly refused to spend time learning it as an adult: Spanish is much more practical. It didn't stop her from spewing Italian at me from time to time, and cocking an eyebrow at me as if to inquire, "Did you understand that, this time?" The most important thing I can think of about Grandma, before she died, is that she never, ever, lost the hold on her mind. Oh, she was wrong about a lot of things (and I can say that, because I'm always right), but she had a damn sharp mind, capable of critical and analytical thinking. I am glad she was able to retain that until her last days; my paternal grandmother has been institutionalized for years with Alzheimers, and is completely incoherent. That terrifies me, and I hope medical science has cured that particular malady by the time I'm hauling around an AARP card-- I think I'd rather die than have my mind slowly waste away until I'm something that doesn't even recognize my own spouse or children. And I'm the kind of guy that doesn't plan on dying, ever. (So get to work, doctors! Shoo! You've got lots to do!) My plan was to visit Grandma this summer, with my wife and kids, as I made the journey to Detroit for vacation (don't get me started on how contradictory that sounds). She'd never met my youngest daughter, since we've just not had her back in Michigan in the year-and-a-half since she was born. And that's probably my biggest regret-- that I didn't get to show her the newest member of my family-- and of her family-- before she died. I contemplated going to see her before she died, and would have done so as late as last weekend, but my mother informed me that she was unconscious 100% of the time, and frankly, that isn't a trip I needed to take. If I'm going to visit someone on their deathbed, I'd prefer they are able to be aware of it; I'm certainly not doing it for me, for god's sake. So no real regrets there; I don't have to remember Grandma as the one hooked into tubes and barely alive; I can instead remember her shining eyes as she brought a plate of tomato-sauce-doused meatballs to the table, on my last visit there, when she met my eldest daughter. As it is, I'm typing this right now in the airport, in a somewhat vain attempt to fly back for her funeral. I feel no real need to be there for myself, but my mother would like to have me there, as a pallbearer and a speaker at the ceremony. It's pretty much unlikely to work out, as I'm flying standby and they just cancelled the entire flight prior to mine. I think I'm screwed. But I had to try. Mom will be disappointed, and my absence will no doubt reinforce her oft-expressed beliefs that I don't like her and don't ever like to visit her, but she'll get over it. I'd like to see the rest of the family, too, but I suppose it will wait until summertime. I loved Grandma, and I'll miss her. That's all. Current mood:  sad.
(2 comments | Comment on my insane rantings!) So there we were. 'course, I don't know where there is, except vaguely. Scottsdale, AZ, somewhere near Babe's Cabaret, in a largish bar with a live band but little in the way of atmosphere. The cab containing Best Man Gone Awry had just arrived, and the menfolk were starting to get antsy again. The Mission To Acquire Attractive Young Ladies at The Library had failed, so the next step was obviously to move on to a Real Live Strip Club, one of which "Babe's Cabaret" certainly seemed to be. (I am on record as having wanted to try out "Skin Cabaret" that night, as it is owned by pr0n star Jenna Jameson, and I figure if you're going to indulge in the sin of almost naked girls rubbing themselves [and sometimes you], you might as well go with a club which is managed by a notable Expert In The Field) Anyway, at some point, most of us headed over there (I never found out what the others were doing-- talking to the limo driver? drinking more beer?-- but they showed up eventually) and wandered in the door. It was at this point that I started to sober up, which is probably a pity as being hammered may have made the next several hours more interesting. I bought a couple of dances for the Groom, and watched as he was dragged onstage and molested by five ladies at once (though how they could move, let alone molest anyone, with those eight-inch high platform shoes on is a mystery to me). Best Man evaporated midway thtough the night, and there were some other mild adventures regarding two unattractive (in my opinion) girls we met there who turned out to be Escorts and who blew our crew off after the bar closed down for the night (oh, darn-- put it this way: when one of my comrades paid for a stripper to dance with one of the Escorts, I didn't even *watch*. Even the promise of Hot Girl-Girl Action was not impressive enough to make these chicks interesting. Damn, but my friends were drunk...). But for the most part, it was more amusing to watch my compatriots' antics than it was to check out the dancers. So here's where my previous discussion of breasts comes into play (see Part One). To reiterate: they're not that big a deal to me, but they seem to be the primary focal point at strip joints. Which I suppose I can understand: it's illegal in most places to show more Downstairs, and if you're a leg-man like me you can get much the same form of thrill from hitting a beach in midsummer. (depends on the night, apparently; while in the rest room, I noticed a poster which indicated that Tuesday night was entitled "Garters and Girls". Rrrowr! See, I could go for that...) Plus, as I get older, I'm learning a lot about myself, and about what I find sexy. See, nakedness is nifty, very nifty, but we're in modern America, and let's face it: skin is near commonplace (despite what numerous prudes would like to imagine). Even Bible Thumpers wear miniskirts (praise the Lord!). I'm sure in downtown Tehran, or anywhere else in that ass-backwards, sad little part of the world, the guys would lose their frickin' minds if they saw a lady in a bikini, but here in America, large expanses of flesh are just not that big a mystery, even if you've somehow avoided late-night TV or pop-up windows on the Web. So anyway, I've discovered through the years that, dammit, I like a little mystery to the game. A good-looking girl wearing something transparent (or even just translucent) is going to rivet my attention much more so than one who is baring it all. It seems ridiculous on the face of it, but less is more, in my opinion. Something in the depraved part of my brain chartered with the task of actually deciding this kind of crap has determined that sexy, to *me*, includes some sort of evidence that the female in question has actually put some *thought* into being sexy. And after all, what kind of preparation does it take to be naked? (an aside: yep, I'm aware of all the body makeup the strippers are wearing, and how long it doubtless takes to apply. my libido is not impressed with such things, and it doesn't seem worthwhile arguing with it) So I'd rather see a girl in lingerie than in the buff, all other things being equal, and strip clubs are notoriously interested in removing all but the most legally necessary-- and the great bosomic quantities they reveal were never all that interesting to me in the first place. Fine, fine, you say, but what about table dances? Surely no man can assert that a beautiful woman, no matter her state of undress, rubbing up against you in a very personal way, is without its seductive qualities? To which my reply is, "Hell, yeah!" But I have to caveat that: I've had numerous table dances purchased for me by buddies in Oregon and Arizona (never purchased one for myself, though I'm not fundamentally opposed to it), and while they were marginally enjoyable in their own right, never did I go, "This is totally worth the twenty bucks! More please!" At first, as the lady in question is whispering in your ear that she wants you to have a good time, it is marginally plausible to imagine that she's really enjoying this-- that, even if she's not exactly attracted to you personally, the money waved beneath her nose has somehow impressed something primal inside her and her hormones have flared due to your Good Providerness if not your Scrawny Chest. But only if you like to wallow in self-deception. It doesn't take long to get to the point in the dance, however, where her movements become mechanical in nature-- where you start recognizing specific pelvic thrusts and self-ass-smackings as the stripper equivalent of third and fourth positions in ballet. And aside from people whose fetish is robots, exactly how sexy is "mechanical"? That's okay; men are stubborn creatures, and somewhere within us lies the capacity to ignore even this, if we try hard enough. After all, this is a near naked woman, and regardless of the reason, she *is* dancing for me. The cold bucket of water which hits me in the crotch is due to the fact that the poor girl won't look me in the eye. And that's it, really. The huge popularity of strip clubs indicates that I'm way out in the third standard deviation on this, but without that contact, some kind of acknowledgment that I'm there, that I'm a human being and not just a mannequin in a chair-- that *she's* there, and not just a frickin' bot-- I can't be all that excited about the situation for very long. I spend my expensive five minutes analyzing what the heck she is thinking, or how she may have come to be in this profession, or whether her claim that she is a childhood speech pathologist is bullshit or not. (I've met three strippers who've made that claim. Either the field of childhood speech pathology is swarming with underpaid yet highly attractive women with few inhibitions, or strippers are trying to play on whetever deep vestigal pieces of men's brains still look for a mating partner who will be nurturing to their children. Though I can't do the required research myself, I'd advise any strapping young lads who are headed off to college to hit an introductory speech pathology course. At least show up for the first day and report back what you find to the rest of Us. It's possible you will become a national hero.) Which is actually pretty interesting in its own right, and which is why I do continue to attend strip clubs, though I don't derive all that much sexual enjoyment out of them: I am interested in these women, and what their stories are, and how they think. I'm sure most of them don't appreciate this, and would rather I just drooled lasciviously like the rest of the guys, and just ponied up the cash-- it's highly likely that most of these ladies are doing this because they need the cash, and not because they have some kind of exhibitionist streak, and they'd just as soon not have me think of them as people at all. Then we'd be even. But I can't do that. If any strippers are somehow reading this, I apologize in advance. Seeing you as an object just doesn't work for me. Doesn't mean I won't pay you for your time with my friends-- they actually seem to enjoy this stuff-- or partake when my buds feel I've been generous and they need to "repay" me. I can't possibly be alone among guys on this, can I?!? Something tells me that a stripper who was a good enough actress to be able to look directly into her clients' eyes with something like interest-- let alone devotion-- would make bucketfulls of cash even if she had an unimpressive figure. I've got to believe that there are other guys who would find that much more arousing than the run-of-the-mill Fake Tits In My Face, Grabs Her Own Ass And Jiggles It chick. Of course it's just possible there are other guys like that, and they just aren't demented enough (like me) to go to strip clubs. All in all, the bachelor party was not the best night of strip clubbing I've been to. Even when you discount the fighting bridal party and the Escorts Of Skankitude, I've had *much* more fun trips to clubs in Phoenix and Portland. (but not in the Philippines. ew. don't do it. just trust me on this one. ew.) Current mood:  lethargic.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) Recently I attended my first bachelor party. Now how did I get to be thirty-odd years old and have this be my first foray into this male phenomenon? Well, let's just say I don't make close guy friends easily-- aside from thinking women are incredibly desirable, I don't have much in common with most guys. I don't like to watch sports, I don't particularly enjoy beer, and I'm not all that into tits. Yeah, you heard me right. Breasts are fine, happy things, and I have no objection to women who have them and even like to display them: they are pleasant curvy things which imply that their wearer has reached the age at which she can breed. But they don't really turn me on in the way that, say, a glimpse of thigh or a slinky-yet-elegant gown or even a "come hither" glance will. I'm a leg-man, as you'll agree if you read my stuff for long enough, or spend time in a room with me and a crowd of nubile females. There was a girl I dated in high school named Tonya Loveless (more about her some other time) who apparently had a huge bra size. I say "apparently" becuase I literally *hadn't noticed* until one of her acquaintances rather sleazily intoned, "I know why you're dating *her*," and I looked blank until she mimed excessive decolletage. After which I thought about it, and guessed that, yeah, maybe she did in fact have a rather huge rack. And to think, I had thought she just looked cute in a miniskirt. Anyway, so: not a breast guy, not a sports-guy, not a beer guy, ergo like three close male friends in the whole world. (Two now, since Jeff has completely blown me off, but that's yet another story I don't feel like getting into now.) Anyway, with minimal male friends, the opportunities for bachelor partyage have been minimal. Hell, the night before my wedding my friends didn't even show up in town until midnight-- the "bachelor party" consisted of us going into downtown Chicago and watching "Co-Ed Prison Sluts" at the Annoyance (note: not a strip club, but a comedy theatre, now sadly defunct) with both male and female friends. On the two occasions when I was best man, experiences were similar: I flew into town on the night before the wedding and left soon thereafter. So I round the thirty marker, and lo and behold! An acquaintance is getting married, and the crew we hang out with from time to time is throwing him a bachelor party-- the invitations make it clear that the agenda is unclear, but that Booze and Boobs will feature prominently in the festivities. Fine by me; though I vote "no" on the limosine option, and offer to be the designated driver instead, but everyone else seems to be all for it. So we head over to John's on the Night In Question, and begin our drinking in earnest. I said before I'm not a fan of beer, and it's true. Heck, it's been less than ten years I've been a fan of any alcohol whatsoever; Dad's an alcoholic, and I didn't trust myself near the stuff until I was most of the way through college. Eventually I realized that I'm not my Dad, genetic predisposition or not, and that I therefore don't have urges to drink which I cannot control. But when I do drink, it's certainly with every intent of warming the brain. I don't get any real pleasure out of the act of drinking: I hear people commenting on the flavor of their favorite microbrew, or tasting fine wines, and it all blows right past me. Friends generally know better than to present me with a flagon of 1996 Silver Lake or whatever is popular this year, because they know I'll just shoot it back same as if they'd just drizzled it out of a Franzia box. Folks, however you want to flavor the yeast poo-poo, be my guest. But I'm in it for the kick. I don't have any illusions about the palate. So I tend to go for the hard stuff: straight vodka is preferred, as when chilled it is next-to-flavorless, but I'll pinch my nose and knock back whiskey or rum. If the social situation demands slow drinking instead of daring each other to take "just one more shot", I'll content myself with something fruity-- I am the king of Chick Drinks. Screwdrivers, Appletinis, and my favorite, the Kamikaze-- if I have to drink this stuff to get a buzz on, then I may as well drink something I would drink if it had no liquor in it-- fruit juices. So here we are, all getting our buzz on. The Best Man shows up, lately flown in from Seattle. He is regaling us all with tales of the Groom-To-Be's exploits and embarrassments. He is discussing his drunken antics in a country club that afternoon. He is hammered as he walks in the door, and pouring himself another as he sits down at the table. As one of the other guests put it, "We are *so* going to jail tonight." I have to agree: the Best Man is going to be Trouble. None of us, of course, objects to this, in principle-- men are like that. It gives us funny stories to tell around the campfire in between bites of wooly-mammoth meat and complaints that the women always bother us about cleaning the cave when we just want to relax after a long day of stone-axe-head-grinding. You don't want to be the one arrested, of course, but you weigh your probabilities against the more inebriated members of the crew and decide that, all told, your expected return on the game is a net positive. So as we're deciding all this, the limo driver rolls up. We grab all the booze we can carry and stuff it into the back of the limo, for recharge purposes, since no one knows how long this will all take, and it would be nigh-sinful to remain in a semi-sober state for any amount of time when this evening's theme is Booze and Boobs. Now, I've not done this before, but it's quickly becoming evident that several members of the party have. They turn on the local Hip-Hop station, pull out pimp-tacular rolls of twenty-dollar bills, and start talking in urban accents white boys like us wouldn't even *dream* of attempting cold sober. (Heyll yih!) Anyway, apparently, it is imperative to go to a regular club before hitting the strip clubs; I'm still unclear why, but in between jargon I didn't understand from some of the other guys, I gathered that the goal of this was to pick up a couple of "regular girls" and take them in the limosine to the strip joints with you. Which part I *can* understand immediately: women Doing Things with other women is Frickin' Hot. (and though I plan to cover this extensively in another journal entry, *no*, it's not because we fantasize about being in between them) Anyway, we get to a nifty club in downtown Tempe known as The Library. The theme is appropriate enough, the part which is not dance floor and bar and sports-TVs is surrounded by bookshelves and education-esque tables & chairs. The barmaids are uniformed in pigtails and little plaid skirts-- the Schoolgirl Gone Bad look, which is always oh-so-popular, and which I can't complain about, due to the long legs displayed, and the fun hosiery. But I digress... Even women like The Library-- or at least my wife does-- enough that they do not object when from time to time the barmaids get up on the counters and do an impromptu (yeah, right) dance to their favorite tunes. So there we are, standing in line to get in, when the doorman turns away the Best Man, who is considered Too Drunk To Come In. Now, it's hard to argue with the doorman on this one; only someone similarly intoxicated would think that Best Man was a safe bet to be gentlemanly-- did I mention that he's built like a linebacker? Regardless, argument with the doorman ensues. When it looks like it may get violent, we forcibly (and yet carefully) spend seven grown men's effort pushing Best Man back into the limosine. There are Ugly Words decried, and then Groom-to-Be asks the wrong question and suddenly six grown men are *not so carefully* forcibly restraining Best Man from killing or seriously injuring Groom-to-Be, while the limo driver is yelling that we'd better not ruin his vehicle. Eventually, the six grown men are successful in separating the two dear close friends who want to beat each other senseless, and Best Man is put in a cab with one of the other guys, while Groom-to-Be stays in the limo, and we all head north to an ordinary nightclub which I don't recall the name of. It was unclever and even stupid and the club was less interesting than the name. Good god, we haven't even gotten to the Strip Club yet! I'd better append a "Part One" to the header. More later. Current mood: bored.
(Comment on my insane rantings!) Just an update, for anyone insane enough to be reading this: I've changed the format to something less boring. It's probably still annoying, but you shall survive. Anyway, instead of giving you the option of "Post a Comment", this particular scheme advertises your ability to "Make Notes". Do not be fooled. It is the same thing. Feel free to do either. Or both. Current mood: apathetic.
(4 comments | Comment on my insane rantings!) My friend Laura has an Evil Ex-Husband. While I'll not detail the unpleasantries he put her through before and after the demise of their marriage, I will state for the record that he is a Philistine of Great Annoyanceness. Anyway, about once or twice per year he peers out from whatever rock he is hiding under this month and emails her at work. You know, to see how she's doing, to brag about the drugs he's on, to tell her how much of a bitch she is. That sort of thing. This time around, he sent the following pleasant missive: What on earth make you think I would have or know where your mothers journal is. We have finally transported all the shit left in Maine to Phx and haven't run across anything of the kind. I find it very hard to believe that you would have left anything that important to you. I doubt very seriously that I will find it but someday in the future when I have the time or inclination I will be sorting through all that crap. Though you better hope that I don't find it cuz IF I decide to not burn it and I give it back at all it will cost you big time. There is a ton of your shit here, old notebooks, nick-nacks, books, horse shit ect.. Any of which you have any interest in will cost you. I guess the biggest one is your tack box. I am thinking it might make good kindling wood, so if you have interest in it better let me know. I suspect, though I cannot prove, that he is still a little bitter about the marriage's dissolution, though it has been more than five years. Laura is really a decent soul, and I'm sure her response to him will be polite and factual. She did, however, request a suggestion for what she should write back. I supplied the following: Dear [deleted], I seem to recall you from my past, but I'm having a difficult time placing the name with a face. Did we perhaps meet in a bar in an unpleasant part of town, or share a disgusting story in a laundromat? Because while I can't remember you very well, the feeling I get when I contemplate your name is one of vague nausea and discomfort. Anyway, I'll not be supporting your vagrant ass with anything resembling money. Though I am saddened you would attempt to try to get me to ransom my former possessions, I have a strict policy of not bargaining with the insane, so I guess they'll go up in flames. It's really too bad, but I shall get over it if you promise to throw yourself upon the pyre as well. Toodles! Hope the psychiatrists are having luck with that thing, Laura Not my best work, by any means. My breakup letter to my college girlfriend (now my wife-- LLLLLLLLONGGG story) was much meaner both in spirit and in tone. Current mood:  chipper.
(2 comments | Comment on my insane rantings!) |
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