Oh Shoot

So I have accomplished exactly zero of my three vacation goals. Goal one was to lay out the print version of The Grand Conspiracy. Meh, I never felt inspired, that felt too much like actual work-work. Goal two was to clean out the horrible (used to be) walk-in closet in my office. It’s so crammed full of random purses and shoes and craft supplies that I can’t actually walk into it any more. I really never felt inspired to do that either, because that sounds like I might get sweaty and/or dirty and/or injured. Maybe in January. Goal three was… ummm… wait. I am sure there was a goal three? OK, that’s sad. I unaccomplished it so hard that I forgot it entirely. Or wait – maybe I accomplished it and then forgot what it was because I was done? We can go with that.

So anyway, two weeks off, and no official goals accomplished, which should have me feeling aggravated with myself, but it doesn’t. I had a great vacation, lazed around, drank too much, hung out with my friends and cuddled my chihuahuas. And that’s enough for me.

The other thing I have done with my vacation is learn to shoot stuff. Which I like surprisingly much. I’ve always kind of been interested in having a gun, but didn’t have anyone to show me safety stuff, and how they work, and advise me on what might be the right type of gun for me. As such, I didn’t think it would be a good idea to just go randomly buying a gun and try to figure out on my own how to use it, nor did I have any idea how to do so even if it had been a good idea. Luckily a friend of mine’s husband is a giant gun geek, and leapt at the opportunity to  have a new victim avid trainee. He’s taken me out shooting several times, and it’s really very fun. I was intimidated at the prospect of shooting a gun, sure it would blow up in my hand or knock me down, or both. But before we ever went out shooting, Pete had me over to handle his guns (not a euphemism) so that I would be familiar with what we would be shooting. The amount of firepower he had laid out on his kitchen table made me feel vaguely as if I was attending a militia meeting, or doing something of a covert, anti-government nature. And then he showed me pictures of people with their thumbs blown off, to emphasize we’d actually be doing dangerous things, in case I had not realized. Continue reading »

The Friday Five – Bands We’d Like to See Again

So tonight is the last show ever for our friends’ band, Stella Mora. All good things come to an end—usually too soon—and we’re very sorry to see them go. But this sad state of affairs led to this listing of other bands we’d love to see once more in concert, if only they were still touring.

I would absolutely love to see Oingo Boingo one more time, that was one of the most energetic shows I’ve ever been to in my life. October Project I would love to see again, just so that I could properly appreciate what I was experiencing, they’re one of those bands I got much more into once I had seen them live, then never had the chance again. Anyway, here are the rest of the results from this week’s Friday Five, thanks for playing along! (see what I did there?):

• superbadgirl (that’s me!) Mine are Oingo Boingo, Dead Can Dance, October Project, Nirvana and Cocteau Twins. #fridayfive
• tungmobi - @superbadgirl Pale Saints, Lush, Cocteau Twins, Catherine Wheel,Genesis (with Peter Gabriel)
• gw10101 – @superbadgirl, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin, Jesus Jones, Soul Coughing, Depeche Mode (wilder years), The Cure (disintegration era)
• The_Cyr – @Superbadgirl Skynrd (original band), Led Zep, Kansas, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Guns n Roses (original band)
• narcise – led zepplin, django reinhardt, janice w/big brother & holding company, pixies (just missed reunion), jesus and mary chain #fridayfive
• H_Wallbanger – @superbadgirl The Clash, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, Thin Lizzy, Massive Attack
• stevodarkly – @superbadgirl #fridayfive The Police, the Beatles, Dead Can Dance, Led Zepplin and … I do miss local guys Todd on LSD.
• UnclePilot – @superbadgirl #fridayfive The Seatbelts, Led Zepplin, The Miles Davis Quintet, Crowded House, Soul Coughing
• El_Dickman – @superbadgirl Ummm… Queen, Led Zepplin, Collaborateur, Bel Canto, Beatles #fridayfive
• cbellers – @superbadgirl Morphine, Pale Divine, Dance Hall Crashers, Chemical Brothers, Lords of Acid
• trmink – @superbadgirl New Pornographers, The Kinks, Harvey Danger, Sleator-Kinney and a second on Thin Lizzy
• _bunny_ - @superbadgirl Gang of Four, AC/DC with Bon Scott singing, Queen, James Brown, The White Stripes #fridayfive
• sub_english – Dead Can Dance, Joy Division, The Clancy Brothers, Billie Holiday, Cocteau Twins. #fridayfive

The Grand Conspiracy

A few months ago, some of the local St. Louisans I’ve met via Twitter told me about a project of theirs, known as The Grand Conspiracy*. Since they’re almost all artists and writers—and many are both—they wanted a collective place/way to share their work.

The Conspiracy was apparently originally conceived as a one-sheet of short fiction and artwork to be distributed in local bars and shops.  Since then the project has morphed into an electronic one, centered around a collectively updated blog, with a print version to eventually be taken from the best of its posts. The other Conspirators kindly invited me to play along, and I was really happy to accept. It’s much easier to write when you have an intended outlet in mind, and it’s easier to keep to a deadline if you know someone else is depending on you to do so.

Of course, people and their schedules being what they are, the blog has taken quite some time to get off the ground, but I am excited to announce that we’ve got our collective asses in gear, and will begin (hopefully daily) posting at The Grand Conspiracy today!

As luck would have it, Thursdays are my posting day, so there’s a new piece of mine “Make Your Selection” up now. I’d love for you to have a look and let me know what you think of the blog overall, and of course any critiques of my work are always welcome.

(I mean, I am not saying I won’t punch you in the face for daring to dislike my writing, but I certainly welcome the opportunity to punch you in the face.)

Anyway, have a look, add it to your feed reader, check it every day. If I know these people at all, there will be some stellar work there for your edification and delight.

*For those of you who are not St. Louis natives, this name refers to the the street, South Grand, where all our favorite bars are located. Not that this is a group which centers itself on drinking at all. *ahem*

I have extremely useful friends

My friends make me feel like a major underachiever sometimes. Collectively I don’t know that there is much they cannot accomplish. Since my main contribution to any group seems to be snark and a bad attitude, I think I would really be likely to be the first one killed off if we were in a horror movie. I am just saying.

So the lovely and talented Narcise finished my Dave McKean bracelet and pendant set last week, and they could not be more perfect! I love them beyond all reason, and most of all because I know that no one in the world has them. They are mine all mine.

The bracelet is fabulously chunky and makes really satisfying sounds when I flail my arms about. It’s also extra-strong to keep me from breaking it.

See below:

Bracelet. I scanned this, and it came out a little blurry, but I think you get the idea.

Pendant. This was the only warm-toned image of the bunch, and as such it stands alone very well as a pendant.

Bracelet on my arm, to give you an idea of the scale (they're very large stamps)

If you’re interested in your very own Narcise creation, you can get in touch with her via her Etsy shop. She makes many lovely things that you can purchase and (obviously) also does custom work. She worked with me to make sure that my pieces fit my needs exactly, and I am very pleased with them.

You can also see her September 26th and 27th at the Strange Folk festival in O’Fallon, Illinois.

In other news, another friend of mine is doing some landscaping work in the front of my house, and it looks amazing. So neat and tidy! I was totally overwhelmed by the hot mess of dirt and weeds out there, and he was able to sort it out within a matter of days. I think he will finish tomorrow, and totally change the look of the front of my house. And he even put up with a hornet attack, and the random weirdos who wander up and down these city streets pushing lawnmowers.

Still another friend of mine is going to come over and install some ceiling fans for me – another task that seems insurmountable, and yet he considers no big deal. And today MyTodd sorted out a longstanding personal problem of mine in two sentences. Just listened to the story, explained the issue, and there it was. Crystal clear. Why didn’t I think of that? It’s like free therapy, so I bought him lunch.

Honestly, there’s no end to my friends’ utility, and I don’t know what I would do without access to their skillz.

What the fuck, chick?

OK. So of course some random shit has to happen to me at the bar last night, when I was just standing there minding my bitchy, bitchy business. Why is it me who is always targeted by the crazies? We don’t know. It’s a mystery.

From time to time we get some random tourists in the bar. By three signs do we know them:

1. They ask for Bud Light. (No AB products at all are available at the bar, and we like it that way because we’re snobs.)
2. They try to pay with a debit card, credit card, or any form of legal tender other than cash money. (That’s when Matt/Eric sends them to the skeevy gas station for cash.)
3. They ask what the drink specials are. (There are no drink specials, everything is fucking cheap, and really strong.)

So two tourist girls walk in last night and sit down next to us at the bar. They’re not wearing all black, which is a strong indicator that something hilarious is going to happen, but not a certain indicator. So we knew to watch carefully. They then asked what the drink specials were. *sigh* and then when they heard there were no drink specials, they both wanted a Bud Light. *sigh again*. Then they finally ordered some PBR or something, and sat there being trampy and talking nonsense. Other than Hotpants and I rolling our eyes a little bit, I mostly ignored them, because they were ridiculous. Hotpants was trying to convince a friend of ours to try to get both of their numbers, I think there might have been some casual betting on that likelihood. But mostly we were busy with our own business. But then after 15 or 20 minutes, brunette tourist grabs my arm. I am not a fan of being grabbed by random strange chicks, as hot as that may sound. “Hey” she slurs at me. “I really need to introduce myself to you by name.”

I think “Whaaa?” and stare at her blankly.

“What’s your name?” she asks. I tell her. “Well, I needed to introduce myself to you, because I am sitting here, and I think you hate me.”

I think “Whaaa?” and stare at her blankly.

I then assure her that I rarely hate people I don’t know and pat her on the arm, hoping she will fuck right off again to hobag land, or wherever she came from. But no such luck. After now being assured that I do not, in fact, hate her, we’re apparently besties. Now she has to explain that she thought I was looking at her funny (maybe I was, but not for long) and that I was talking about her (maybe I was, but not in a very intent way). So she thought that once I got to know her personally this would change? I don’t know. Drunk girls are weird. So she wants to go to the bathroom. I REALLY really want to her to go to the bathroom too. Firstly because she would then be gone from my immediate presence, and secondly because she needs to experience the bathroom at this bar in order to be sure she doesn’t really want to be here. But she won’t go. She just wants more reassurance that I don’t hate her. But at this point I am starting to. Then blonde tourist with the ponytail interrupts us, and urges brunette tourist to go to the bathroom already, because “Jason” is on his way, he called and he’s on his way to pick them up, and it’s rude to keep him waiting. Brunette is all Wah wah you hate me! and blondie is all wah wah, stop making Jason wait for us. Finally the girl fucks off to the bathroom, comes back, slurs at me some more, and then leaves. Well, I think she leaves. No. In 15 minutes or so she’s back. With Jason. Jason is wearing a knee-length white tshirt with, I shit you not, some kind of bedazzling all down the front. Dooooouuche! So he fucks off back outside, and then – for some reason this is the funniest part of the story to me – the brunette is standing there again, talking about how her friend told her that everyone at this bar hated her, and why would her friend do that? I replied something about meh, you know drunk girls. Then she starts lambasting our friend Jeremy for “whispering” about her. Jeremy replies firmly that he was not whispering. She tells him it’s mean to whisper about her, just because she’s not from there. Jeremy replies again, most emphatically, that he was not whispering about her. I am afraid he’s going to start talking some shit right to her face at that point. But then Eric delivers her three shots in plastic glasses, which distracts her. So then she’s standing there talking to me about how that girls is her best friend, no matter what kind of shit she talks, and she loves that girl 4-evah! then she looks down at the three shots, declares “I’m making mine bigger!” and pours some alcohol off the top of each of the other two shots into her own cup!Then she toddles off merrily on her way.

Fucking drunk girls, seriously.

Holy fuck, I hate parties.

Went to a party last night, which reminded me most painfully how I hate fucking parties. A bunch of uncontrolled drunken shirtless strangers, shooting fireworks out of their mouths and cavorting homo-erotically around a stripper pole… excuse me for not seeing the fun there. It probably didn’t help that I only knew about 10% of the people there, less and less as the night went on. And then I am in the corner having a political discussion with a stranger at 4 a.m. and thinking it’s the first interesting conversation I’ve had in the last hour. Everyone else is just rubbing up against each other sweatily and talking about how drunk they are and what a great party it is, and I do not get it at all. I suppose I should have just gone home – but since I have such an strange way of perceiving social events I am never sure if I should force myself to do these horrible-seeming things or not. Most things seem horrible and strange and upsetting to me at first, and then sometimes they get better. In retrospect, this particular thing was never going to become superbadgirl-friendly, and I should have cut my losses and run at 1:30 or 2:00 when most of the people I knew left. But I stuck it out, and learned a lesson.

In other news, I think I am going to have a party for my birthday. Surely I can’t hate a party at my own house, where I control the guest list, like I hate other parties – can I? Stay tuned.

Things About Which I Am Excited

So a few months ago Neil Gaiman twittered something about Dave McKean designing some stamps. Not just any old stamps, Mythical Creatures stamps. Naturally I knew that I needed to own any such a thing, but somehow just owning them didn’t seem to be enough. What fun is it to have some beautiful miniature artworks created by my favorite artist, and then just stick them on a shelf somewhere? It’s not like I would pull them out periodically for reverential gazing. I thought about ordering two sets and framing one, or displaying them in some other way in my house.

Coincidentally, my friend Jenny twittered something around the same time about a new jewelry technique she was trying out, and like your chocolate getting in my peanut butter, and your peanut butter getting on my chocolate, a great idea was born in my noggin.

See Jenny does these lovely custom jewelry pieces, and has the technology to make me better, faster stronger… wait no, that’s the Bionic Woman. What Jenny has is the talent and know-how to take my lovely, lovely stamps and create a beautiful one-of-a-kind bracelet for me! I talked to her about it, and she knew just where to order the settings she would need for the project. (And she also knew to make the links extra strong since I have a tendency to be tough on my jewelry in general, and bracelets in particular.)

The stamps arrived in early June, and earlier this week I dropped them off with her – and I got to see the setting they will be in! She ended up deciding to make a bracelet and a pendant from the stamps, since there are 6 and the bracelet was the perfect size using only 5.

Here are the stamps, the dragon is the one she’s using for the pendant, the rest will be used on the bracelet.

In case you can't see, it's a unicorn, a dragon, a giant, a mermaid, a fairy queen and a pixie.

She’s working on it now, and I can’t wait to see it finished! Stay tuned and I will post pictures when the pieces are done.

Vacation all I ever wanted

…so where did I leave off? Oh yes, that tree coming out from behind a bush and attacking my Mom’s bumper. Tiresome.

After that the day got better. We chilled on the beach, and Dave discovered that the cast cover is suitable for swimming in the ocean, as advertised. We all got a little pink in the sun, then had a pretty bad lunch at The Crab Shack. (Stale kaiser roll with some prefab shrimp salad, microwaved hot pecan pie from a plastic wrapper – bleh.) Also the lackadaisically indifferent waitress seated us as far back as possible, despite Dave’s gimpitude. Rude. Oh and the bathroom was really dark, dirty and spider-y. We all thought we’d like it better if it were cooler outside, and we were drunk.

Dinner wasn’t much of an improvement, we ventured down to the main strip here and tried one restaurant – but no one ever came out to take our order at all, and they kept misting us down with water of questionable origin. We moved on to some Applebee’s wannabe type of place, and the food was OK, but the wait to get in there was quite ridiculous. We left the house at 7pm and we didn’t get food until 9. And the place was about four blocks from here. I guess they don’t have to have good service if they deal with primarily a touristy crowd. Anyway, we did have plenty of time to people- watch while we waited for a table, and that’s where I saw a girl who was maaaaybe 13 years old wearing incredibly short shorts and a very tight black t-shirt that said “I’m Fun Sized.” Good going parents, way to pay attention. She was with a whole cadre of other pre-teen/teen girls, all of whom looked ripe for sexual abuse and drug problems in later life. Once their adult minders showed up, it all made sense though. Todd spotted a super-geeky 14 or so year old boy wearing a “Tell Your Girlfriend I Said ‘Thanks’” tshirt, which made Todd want to give him a smack.

Todd and Dave looking a little pink around the edges at Wannabee's.

After dinner we headed over to Tybee Time for some very strong frozen drinks and more people watching. We discovered that, among gentlemen, the “Captain Ron” look is very big here. Well, if Captain Ron had been played by Richard Dreyfuss, anyway. We saw all kinds of other interesting people, like Little Smokey, a wee man with a cigarette behind his ear, who was vying for the attention/affection of Eve, the lady in the dirty stripey dress. The main problem with this is that Eve was more interested in Captain Ron. Little Smokey got louder and louder in his quest for Eve’s notice, but to no avail. Frustrated, he ended up giving Captain Ron a smack in the mouth as Captain Ron was trying to do a shot. I think there was some blood. Captain Ron had to go to the bathroom to clean up, and Little Smokey took the opportunity to usurp  his seat. Eve was having none of it, however, and moved away to shake her braless tits at other bar patrons until CRs return. After that Little Smokey took his cigarette from behind his grimy ear, smoked it quite forlornly, and then left.

We were pretty worn out after that, and had to retire to our condo for reflection and meditation. Also bed.

Is my arm supposed to be purple?

I am sure there are some noteworthy things happening on this vacation, but I *yawn* can’t really find the *stretch* will or energy to write about them. (is it naptime yet?)

Drive down was uneventful, in a good way. DaveWWT forgot both his sunglasses and his phone charger, and had to cash in 27 gimp credits not to be scorned for his forgetfulness. We stopped somewhere in Kentucky for him to replace both, and this is where we got the first awesome quote of the trip, from the gas station attendant who couldn’t price Dave’s charger and had to hunt all through the racks for one that was “sim-yoo-ler” to that one. Dear South: I had forgotten how dumb your inhabitants sound.

Made really good time getting here, and we were ready to cross over onto Tybee at about 10:30 local time. We were ready for Tybee, but Tybee was not ready for us – the only road to get here was flooded due to high tide. We were told to park it and wait an hour. That would have been annoying on a regular day, but coming off a 13 hour road trip it sucked some serious hairy balls. We pulled into a BP parking lot and prepared to hang out. That’s where we met the charming fellow we’re just going to refer to as “The Racist.”

The Racist was from Hannibal, Missouri, and he struck up a conversation with me based on my having Missouri license plates. It was hot and humid and I was tired and really just wanted a shower, so I gaped dumbly at The Racist while he told me about his grandpa (dying of cancer) his job (pipefitter, local something-or-other) the cops on Tybee Island (assholes) and his plans for the evening (taking his wife and baby daughter over to Tybee Island in order to catch a glimpse of Miley Cyrus filming a movie.) I was barely paying attention to him when the second memorable quote of the trip happened. Looking over at the line of cars waiting to cross over to this island, he saw someone moving their truck out of line. “Whoa, Mexican! Whoa!” he shouted at the dark-skinned man in the truck. I gawped at him wordlessly. As the man pulled out of traffic and proceeded quite innocently with his business, The Racist muttered after him “Awww, go back to Mexico.” His wife shushed him, but I was so flabbergasted I couldn’t really say anything. Again, South, your people do not sound so smart, nor so tolerant. Since then we have been “Whoa! <insert descriptor>, whoa!” at pretty much everthing we see.

We finally made it over to Tybee and into our place at around 12:30 or so. Not too bad, and nothing we could really do about it anyway. Place was even nicer than I expected, so that’s a plus.

Just as nice as they advertised, a pleasant surprise.

We can see the beach from our balcony :-)

The next morning I went to the rental office to pay our balance, and get some info about our wifi (not working.) As I left the office there was a man painting on a big billboard or something. He started humming at me, and then said something about could I hear the steel drums. Since there were none, I could not hear them. I said that maybe he should have a radio on or something. But then he started explaining to me how the steel drums were the manifestation of god’s voice on earth. I said “oh sure” and got in the car to leave. Just then, a large tree jumped out of nowhere, and ran behind my car, causing me to back into it. The trees around here seem to be tricky like that. Since I borrowed my Mom’s SUV for this trip, it wasn’t as small of a deal as it could have been. I can get it fixed, looks like a panel that can be replaced in the back, but still a shitty way to start the day. Fucking shady-ass trees.

…to be continued when I have more energy. *yawn*

Gentlemen

OK listen up. It’s come to my attention that some of you single gentlemen feel as if you’re having issues hooking up with the ladies, and/or getting laid.

This is your own fault.

Never in my life have I witnessed such a concentration of guys with no game as those I saw last night. Honest to fucking god. There was some epic fuckwittery happening all around me, and it was a bit baffling to observe.

So here are a few hints, guys, and they may help you out!

Hint: If you’re trying to sex up a lady, do not tell that lady that there are a lot of other women trying to fuck you, and you’re considering fucking one of them. You might assume that this will put the lady in the mindset of “Oh my, I had better jump on this premium opportunity before he is snatched up by some other avaricious female-type person!” In actuality, this will put the lady in the mindset of “So why don’t you go fuck that chick up in the Niagara Falls area, then, and also remove your hand from my ass?” Women with any sense of self-worth do not respond well to your trying to play them off against each other.

Hint: Any interaction you’re going to have with a lady is pretty much going to involve talking. If you’re unable and/or unwilling to talk, you could try flash cards – but this is not likely to have a high success rate. If you walk away whenever your target lady is in the vicinity, you’re probably not going to be able to progress the relationship much.

Hint: Getting drunk and asking women to feel you up is not a path to blow jobs. It’s a path to creating a throng of skeeved-out women promptly turning their backs whenever you walk into the area. Plaintively asking “What’d I do? Why’s everyone avoiding me?” will not help your cause.

Hint: Being overly cruel and assholish in response to playful banter is not necessary. We’re not in a war, we’re in a conversation. Check your level of snap-back, and moderate it.

Hint: Giving women lectures about their behavior and/or actions is not necessary, nor is it likely to be well-received. We’re not looking for life coaches. Most of my lady-friends are competent adults, and none of them got to be the age they are without knowing how to take care of their own shit.

In general there is a progression to sexual/romantic interactions and it goes something like this:

1. Meet coincidentally (“Hey, good to meet you, what’s going on in your world?”)
2. Converse to your mutual pleasure and satisfaction (“So tell me what you do. Here’s what I do. Cool.”)
3. Do that another time or two (“Hey, so cool to see you again, how’s that one thing going?’)
4. Make plans to interact outside the original meeting place (“Hey, want to hang out at such-and-such thing that seems interesting to us both?”)
5. Exchange methods of contact (“Here’s my phone number, text me and we can arrange to meet at that very interesting place.”)
6. Interact outside the original meeting place (“I am so glad you were able to come out! Isn’t this fun?” Alternatively: “Holy shit this is a bad time! Glad I can share it with someone with your sense of humor!”)
7. Do that another time or two (“That was so cool/bad that we should do it again/do something entirely different next time.”)
8. Get sexed up (“I’ve got a great bottle of tequila/adorable puppy/comfortable bed at my house. We we should go check that out.”)
9. Keep doing that some more, or decide you’re not doing that any more and call it off. (“Hey we should totally do that again sometime.” or “That was awkward! I will see you around and we can mutually pretend it didn’t happen!”)

It’s honestly not that complicated, guys. Really. We women are familiar with this pattern, and are generally very, very gentle about interrupting the flow if we don’t want it to progress.

Additionally:

• Women who don’t seem to want to converse with you or constantly excuse themselves to use the bathroom do not want to go to step 4.
• Women who can’t seem to remember their own phone numbers or email addresses for some reason don’t want to progress to step 5.
• Women who invite you over to “watch a movie” want to skip to step 8.
• If you’re having a nice conversation with a woman and she suddenly walks away angrily and won’t speak to you any more, you did/said something wrong. Review your conversation and see what it was. Don’t do it again. Perhaps apologize or clarify. Don’t follow her around for the rest of the night trying to play it off, or seemingly not realizing that she’s dodging you.

FSM bless everyone, that was some sick shit to observe last night.

Addendum: Spilling multiple drinks on a girl, and then offering to lick the last one off? Also not ok.

Feel Bad, Inc.

My people are crazy. I know this, and in many ways I actually prefer it. The problem is that when you live full-time in crazytown, it’s way too easy to forget that’s where you stay. Your world gets all inverted, and crazy seems normal, and super-crazy only seems mildly odd. You start to question your own way of being, in relation to the madness, and then you feel badly about yourself because all of your sense-making and logic gleans no positive response in crazytown.

A friend of mine mentioned that she was frustrated this weekend, because no one she was talking to seemed to be making any sense. And I reminded her that our friends are usually pretty drunk and half of them are also high whenever we speak to them. And we’re usually drinking too. It’s not like we’re at a meeting of the rational-thought society, exactly. And that’s without even taking the crazy into account. And the crazy is in full fucking effect. We’ve got your anti-social, your socially awkward, your bi-polar, your raging alcoholics, your compulsive liars, your irritating braggarts, your garden-variety misfit/loners, your megalomaniacs, your mixed-message giving fuckwits, and a whole other assortment of emotionally stunted nutbags.

And I am not complaining about this shit, because it usually doesn’t get boring. We’ve got the artists, the muscians, the people who throw the good parties, the people who act out in ways that boggle the imagination. We’ve got the storytellers, the attention-seekers, the sexually promiscuous adventurers. We’ve got the people who do the things I want to talk about the next day.

We don’t  have the stay-at-home moms who sit on facebook at 10 p.m. talking about how they’re going to bed after they’re done baking tomorrow’s casserole and wiping their drippy progeny’s noses. We don’t have guys who spend all weekend rearranging their toolsheds and rating their top five breakfast cereals. And honestly, that is usually the way I prefer it.

But then again, there’s a point where I am standing in the street at 2 a.m. next to a trash can, and the very last of my friends has abandoned me to the clutches of a fucking weird-ass known psycho stalker who is trying to chat me up while wearing a helmet for no reason I can ascertain, and I realize that I may need to orient my life somewhat differently. That, you know, perhaps this isn’t exactly the result that I was looking for from my evening. That my people are crazy and entertaining, but they can also be unreliable. That there’s got to be some balance between keeping ourselves entertained, and this helmet-wearing freak-a-tron who is now somehow purring, right out loud. That a life with some reliability and some constancy might not be all bad.

And there’s also the realization that throwing your own small supply of sanity into the crazytown well, and wrangling with the same issues and nonsense for months on end without getting anywhere, that’s a recipe for feeling bad. I do love an unwinnable war, and to tackle some giant projects, but I tend to lose sight of the basic underpinnings of our social circle. We’re all fucking nuts. We’re in our late 30s and early 40s and we’re all apparently totally incapable of maintaining successful adult relationships. We don’t know how to act with ourselves and with each other. Somehow 2+2=magenta cornflakes in our world.  And it’s addictive, and it’s exciting, and it’s something to play with and look at and talk about and it exhilarates me, but it exhausts me even more. It leaves me feeling empty and broken and disoriented. It makes me question myself, when I am not quite sure that’s whose way of being I should be questioning. It is not making me happy.

I just need a break. I need a time-out. I need to not be in this same place. I think that the all-access pass into my world is about to expire for some motherfuckers, and I think that’s a good thing. I am just too tired.

Life. It’s such a fucking bunch of histrionic bullshit and seems to require way more navigational skills than I have acquired in my journey thus far.

Now, where’s my helmet?

Greek-o-rama Extravaganza

Cooked Greek for this week’s supper club. I swear, next time it’s my turn I am making a meatloaf and some frozen peas. This dinner was expensive and fucking time consuming, though it was apparently also delicious. For a few of you who were there and wanted the recipes (all ganked from epicurious.com) here they are:

Grilled Haloumi Cheese and Lemon

Turned on to this grill-able Haloumi cheese by a few of my Twitter friends, this appetizer was a huge hit. Had to search a bit, but finally found the cheese at Jay’s on Grand. Was supposed to grill it outside, but it seemed to work well on a ridged pan over my gas stove.

Orzo, Feta, and Tomato Salad with Marjoram Vinaigrette

It’s two days later and I am still trying to finish off this orzo dish. It makes a ton, is all I am saying. It’s quite delicious cold, and seems like it would be a great summertime or picnic lunch. The Dijon mustard and marjoram really added to the vinagrette, and it was super, super tasty.

Lamb Souvlaki with Yogurt-Garlic Sauce

I had never cooked lamb before, and don’t know if I will again. I thought this recipe was tasty, but with the amount of lamb they call for, the souvlaki seemed very light on meat, to me. At $13/lb I understand why they don’t call for more, but I wonder if some beef might not have been just as tasty. The yogurt garlic sauce, on the other hand, was ten kinds of the bomb. I really don’t like yogurt, but the combo of the Greek-style yogurt, pureed cucumber and the lemon juice made for a really tasty, tart  dressing. Loved it.

Baklava

And last but certainly not to be overlooked was the baklava. I see why I only make this every few years, because holy shit, that’s a lot of work. Boiling the syrup myself really let me taste the individual flavors though, and the taste of the orange seemed to come through much more strongly than it would have with a pre-made baklava. But seriously, unless you have a few hours to devote (and a pretty large party, this makes a shitton of baklava) I would almost recommend buying it instead. I would also recommend asking your friends if any of them are allergic to almonds, prior to serving this dish. (Not saying anything occurred, just… sorry about your tongue.) Also, I totally chopped the nuts in the food processor. Totally.

Anyway, I would recommend all of these dishes, they were super tasty, if time consuming. I am still the laziest cook in the universe though. Next time = meatloaf.

This is Not a Guest

I know that some of you will think I have a guest blogger posting here, but despite that risk I must inform you that I have been having a really great weekend. Friday was fun, and then I had an epic WIN day yesterday, with chilled-out napping, casual lunching, productive shopping and orgasmic driving-around weather. Top the whole thing off with a super-fun night out of shows and drinking, and a few hours of laughing as hard as I’ve laughed in a long time. I even spent about an hour in the middle of the night trying to explain to someone else why their negative worldview and scorn for humanity was so harmful to them —- and I wasn’t even struck dead by an irony-bolt or anything.

It was just all happy fun times, and I feel all relaxed and contentified now. I don’t know if it’s the good weather, or some kind of serotonin storm, but I am luxuriating in it while it lasts.*

Yay for the fleeting happy moments, from which we string together a life of fond reminiscences.

*It probably won’t withstand a trip to NoCo and my hateful, hateful family, so don’t worry, by this evening I am sure I will be back to myself again.

Need your voting powers, people!

My friends Dave and Amy are finalists in Apartment Therapy’s “Small Cool Contest 2009″.

They could win $10,000 just for having a really cool house! Please go vote for them – there’s a simple registration in order to be able to vote, but it’s painless, I swear! And check out the pictures of their house, which incorporates a giant log. Log = automatic WIN.

Weekend Wrapup – Gastronomical Delights Edition

You know, my weekend did actually improve after my whole misery-guts Friday experience. It was a struggle, and took some epic willpower on my part (plus a lot of patience on the part of my friends who are really sick of hearing my stories) but I managed to hoist my broken carcass out of the depths of resentful misery and into a better, more productive place. Yay me.

Friday was errand-running during the day, with a surprise appearance by MyTodd™. I bought a new jacket, which cheered me. Then Friday evening was drinking and being irritated. Saturday morning was getting over myself and then some errand-running. I had to run to the grocery store and pick up about 62lbs of meat and seafood for Sunday dinner. Later, Todd and I ended up going out to dinner at Franco in Soulard, which was delicious. I had the mixed greens to start, Todd had the onion soup. We both had the wood grilled bistro steak for our entree, with raito, green beans and pomme frites. I had peanut butter ice cream for dessert, he had an apple tart/vanilla ice cream combo. We loved everything. I especially enjoyed the green beans, since I spent most of my life hating them until once I had them prepared correctly, so now every time I can find good green beans I get all excited. The interior of the restaurant was very nice, low-key, calm and modern. The staff were extremely friendly, to the point of an almost obscenely cheerful obsequiousness. When Todd got up to use the restroom, our server rushed over and refolded his napkin into a fancy shape. That’s a little OTT for me, but it never crossed the line to truly disturbing/offensive. Continue reading »