what doesn't kill ya

London, Munich, everybody talk about Pop Music

Last night I binged on a buffet of music downloads.  Noelle has been asking me, over and over, then again, and WAIT, ONE MORE TIME - until she asks again in five minutes - to make her a cd.  I ran out of good reasons to keep postponing it, except that I have a moral opposition to Ashlee Simpson downloads, which Noelle just doesn't understand at her tender age.

After trudging my way through the Backstreet Boys and JoJo, I was ready to burn Noelle's cd.  The playlist actually wasn't all that bad.  She has some Gwen Stefani and Black Eyed Peas in the mix.  Although, I had to say no to anything referring to "all that ass inside them jeans" or "this shit is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S."  I could get away with telling Noelle's preschool teachers that "No, really, she doesn't know what flipping the bird means!" after she's flipped off the entire pre-K class and half the staff.  (She honestly didn't know what it meant; she was copying a developmentally disabled child who was sticking her middle finger up and didn't know any better.  And Noelle, being in the midst of a "monkey see, monkey do" phase, was all too eager to take up what she thought was a new version of a thumbs up.)  I could not, however, explain to the teachers and parents that, yeah, you are TOTALLY right, these lyrics are inappropriate, and I'm sorry my daughter has been singing them to the kids all day, over and over, but hey, at least they can spell "bananas!"

After Noelle's purple cd ("Purple, mama! I want PURPLE!") was finished and handed over to her in - what else - a PURPLE jewel case, I scoped out some downloads of my own.  It was the least I could do for myself... you know, after all I'd been through.

A couple of hours later, I was reviewing my finds.  A truly wide range of musical tastes had emerged.  And I do mean WIDE.  I'm thinking I'll pass on putting Notorious B.I.G. and Patsy Cline on the same cd.  Somehow, "Big Poppa" just doesn't transition to "Blue Moon of Kentucky" all that well.

Cutting Crew

This weekend I finally got up the cajones to get my hair cut.  I managed to make my way into a salon to be shampooed, cut, and styled by a professional, one with real professional-grade scissors.  Not the kiddie Fiskars I’ve been slashing around my head haphazardly lately.  You think I’m kidding.

My stylist, (wooooooo: “stylist!”) Marissa, lopped off six inches, SIX WHOLE INCHES.  That’s twice as much as Lorena Bobbit hacked off John Wayne Bobbit. Granted, we’re not talking hair, but still.  And Marissa, the consummate artist that she is, used care and deliberation with her professional-grade scissors, employing a myriad of techniques to transform me from a ratty mop-haired mess into a neatly coiffed, more polished mess.  I don’t even think she tossed my hair remnants out her car window on her way home.  Damn, she’s good.

One of the coolest parts of my salon experience was watching everyone else in the salon, thanks to the funhouse mirrors all over the damn place.  Everyone was so HIP!  So NOW!  I was particularly impressed by a stylist named John, who was working at the station next to Marissa’s.  Complete with a white polo with the collar up, pierced cartilage, and his own hair pulled into a highlighted pom-pom ponytail, John whipped through his clients like Edward Scissorhands. The women who sat in his chair stared at him lovingly, in awe of his workmanship.  And though not of the heterosexual persuasion, John had plenty of female attention.  He’s going places, I’m telling you.  Look for him on Blow Out.

While I sat and got my hair “did,” techno music pumped through the overhead speakers.  “Pump, pump, pump, PUMP, PUMP PUMP!”   I shifted in my chair, trying to suppress the urge to bounce my head in “A Night At The Roxbury” fashion.  I was managing, and then the music started to skip.  It took a minute to realize it was actually skipping.   “Pump, pump, pump, P-P-PUMP, P-P-PUMP, P-P-PUMP.”  Yes, definite skippage. 

Not to be fooled by a techno slip-up, John paused and cocked his head to the side, scissors poised, as he froze in place to listen.  “Oh NO, that music did NOT start skipping.  I don’t THINK so!”  And with that, John swished away from his station and into the back room.  The music stopped.

Then it started again.

Only this time it was country music.  COUNTRY.  Something about a truck and a stained t-shirt.  Oh John, I expected more from you.  He sailed back to his station and announced that he was SO going to the Rascal Flatts concert.

Nobody’s perfect, eh? 

What's got the office abuzz, until someone gets canned

A few days ago someone stuck a long, thick needle through my skin.  It hurt worse than I thought it would, and I winced.  The pain made my eyes water, but I didn’t cry.  The sickest part about the whole thing is that I paid someone to do this to me.

I got my nose pierced.  Yes, me – a thirty-something thrice-married mother.  My boss asked me if I was having a mid-life crisis, which I vehemently denied.  I’m too young to be considered mid-life, I mean DUH.  The thing is, I’ve wanted to do this for a while. Husband Version 2.0 was dead set against it though, and I didn’t want to be subjected to his wise-ass comments about it, so I let it go. After my divorce I started thinking about doing it again, and decided to do it, but never got around to it.  Last week I got around to it.

I’m sure to others, this screams: LOOK AT ME, TRYING TO BE A REBEL, WOOO HOO, LOOK AT ME, ME AND MY HIPNESS.  Actually this isn’t what I’m aiming for at all.  Part of my interest began because of a longtime friend, who is East Indian. She and her mother both have their noses pierced, and it is more of a classy, cultural thing to them.  I’ve been around them for over 20 years, so the piercings didn’t seem odd or out of place to me at all.  I’ve admired the way their piercings looked and started considering one for myself.  Thing is, I’m a white girl and people assume I don’t have a cultural reason for my piercing (they happen to be right).  What seems classy on someone else is perceived as trashy on me.

Despite all of that, I still like it, and I’m still glad I did it.  A small diamond chip in my nose doesn’t mean I’m smoking ice or wearing all black and dyeing my hair primary colors.  (Although they say purple is the new brown.)  If people don’t like it, too damn bad.  It’s not offensive, and besides – I’m classier with the stud in my nose than they are with their stanky, dumpy asses, mangy hair, frumpy clothes, and bad breath.  My daughter likes the way I look too, even though it looks like I “have a round silver booger” on my nose. 

And really, that’s all that matters.

The post in which I try to justify my lack of posts and make shameless pleas for big ticket items

Despite my best (okay, not even CLOSE to best, whatever) efforts, my slackety slackiness continues to make me post-challenged.  And this job thing?  Totally getting in the way of my dreams of prolific posting.  Oh yeah, and motherhood too.

Writing these little posts is something of a stress buster for me, and wow, people - the sheer volume of stress there is to be busted. Oh, THE STRESS.  I just don’t know what can help me… help me feel a little relief.  Well, maybe this one thing just might help… maybe this one thing will help alleviate enough of my stress that I will be able to muster the strength to go on. L-A-P-T-O-P.  My theory is, if I had a laptop, why, I DARE YE to try and stop me from posting.  The posts, they would runneth over.  Bedroom posting, kitchen posting, couch posting, vacation (if I had one) posting.  And hey, maybe even bathroom posting.  I’m going to tell John that if I can get a laptop, I will be his very bestest friend forever and ever and will sit by him at lunch every day.  And give him a cookie. 

The thing is, John will undoubtedly say, “If you want a laptop, get a laptop, honey.”  So the next obstacle is, say it with me now:  MONEY.  We just bought a new desktop last year, so I can hardly justify another computer so soon.  Plus I want a new camera even though, oh yeah, I forgot, I just got a new one of those last fall too.  Whoopsie.

 

So you see, my guilt will do me in.  Guilt and cash flow.  I guess I am doomed to post at irregular intervals, because, BOO HOO all I have is a desktop.  The thing is, though, I am grateful for that desktop.  And if I feel like writing, I should just write, damn it.  How spoiled am I, to whine about the terror, omigod, the AGONY of having to sit upright and all proper-like at a desk to write?  I tell myself:  Shut up already, Miss Whiney Pants.

Two words:  Pen & Paper.

Two more words:   

…Too

…Lazy

The future was so bright I had to wear sunglasses at night

People may judge me for saying this.  Might think I’m some kind of retro-freak.  So be it. 

I MISS THE 80’S. 

Yeah, people.  I said it.  Now, I grew up mostly in the 80’s, so this may be part of the reason why I find myself remembering the decade with such fondness.  Then again, I DON’T THINK SO.  Growing up sucked.  I hated my home life.  But THE FASHION.  THE FADS.  THE TOTAL OBLIVION.  That’s what I’m talkin’ ‘bout.  Welcome to my version of I Love The 80’s.

First, let me clear something up.  Do I wish I could wear leg warmers and acid washed jeans again?  Hardly.  But at the time, that was the shit.  I don’t want the fashion to come back.  In fact, coming to work and finding an office full of linebacker shoulder pads and Members Only jackets would surely frighten me. What I like about the fashion of the 80’s is how it felt at the time.  Hip!  Free!  Bold! Geometric! Cutting Edge! (You know you cut up a sweatshirt and a pair of jeans or two.  Don’t even front.)

Same goes with hair and make-up.  I don’t really want to revert back to electric blue Great Lash mascara or Mall Hair.  Back in The Day, though, the sun surely could not have risen without my crimping iron or my frosty rainbow eye shadow palette.

So you get my drift.  I don’t want it all back.  But I’d like to go visit now and again. 

OH 80’s, how did I love thee? Let me count the ways:

1. Video games:  Arcade style, none of this wussy, fart around on the sofa or play in your underwear crap.  Ms. Pac-Man just couldn’t be fully appreciated unless you were standing up.

2. Keds: Nice and pristine white ones.  Oh – and black worked too, for the right outfit.

3. Sony Walkman:  Discman is so 90’s.

4. Gum: Bubbalicious, Hubba Bubba, Tidal Wave, Tubble Bubble, Big League Chew.  Not that I chewed gum a lot or anything.

5. Banana clips: They made my hair look like a horse’s ass in no time flat.

6. John Hughes movies:  The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, Pretty In Pink… if you scoffed at these back in the 80’s you were a dweeb, and, like, you would totally gag me with a pitchfork.

7. Anything neon:  Yeah, my nails were painted day-glo pink.  And???

8. Tom Cruise:  Is it just me, or wasn’t he way hotter before we knew he was gay, before he started lecturing us on vitamins and psychiatry, before he started doing acrobatics on talk show sofas?  PRESENT-DAY TOM CRUISE IS A FUCKING IDIOT.

9. MTV:  You know, back when they actually played videos.  Good stuff, like Duran Duran and Van Halen and…. um, Michael Jackson. 

10. Michael Jackson:  I don’t think I need to go into detail here, but we all know that the Michael of the 80’s (um hello, THRILLER!) blows the bleached, face-falling-off, young boy-fancying Michael of today out of the friggin’ water.  Did I say “blows?”  Sorry… allegedly blows.

11. Rubik’s Cube:  The love-hate relationship I had with this contraption contributed to the downfall of my mental health, I’m sure of it. Those dudes that could whip it back in to shape in like, 3.8 seconds?  I spit on them!  Get a life, neo-maxi-zoom-dweebie!

12. Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific:  Okay, this is more 70's, but I like things that smell good.  This smelled TERRIFIC.

13. Clairol Herbal Essence Shampoo:  The original, people.  Not this remake they have out now.  Clairol should have realized their mistake, just like Coca Cola did when they replaced the classic with New Coke.  That fell flatter than my chest before puberty.  Clairol should have gone straight back to the original: the thick green goo.  Also, the bottle.  The one that had the lady with flowers and birds nesting in her long blonde mane.  Mmm.  Herbal.  Good. 

14. Perms:  Okay, let me reiterate that I don’t want them back.  But I haven’t had as much fun with my hair since those days.  The days I spent scrunching Dep gel into it to achieve the maximum springy permy curl effect.  And I admit it: I had HOME perms (not Ogilvie, bitch). But I worked that home perm. Oh yeah, I worked it. 

15. Guess? Jeans:  Jean snobs could totally tell if you were wearing a knock off.  “I see that exclamation point on your ass!  Authentic Guess has a question mark, poser.”

16. The 80’s Dance:  You know, a la Molly Ringwald in The Breakfast Club.  Too funny.  Especially funny when the preppy dudes in their tight-fit polos, straight-leg Levi’s and white Reeboks busted it out.  GUFFAW!

17. The Ford Escort:  Just kidding.

18. Computers:  Ahhh, the Apple IIe.  That little rainbow-colored apple made me hot.  Or was it hungry?  Anyways.

19. The Olympics:  Now, I know the Olympics have been around forever, way before the 80’s were a glimmer in the 70’s little eye.  But the 80’s were the last decade when they still rocked.  Everyone sat around the TV for hours, and would plan their days around watching their favorite events. Talked about it at work or school the next day.  Nowadays?  “Olympics… wah?  Is that this year?”

20. Ronald Reagan:  The puppet version in Genesis’ “Land of Confusion” video.

21. Trans Ams & Camaros: ‘Nuff said.

22. Rollerskating:  Nothing better then busting your ass during a heated round of “Red Light, Green Light.”  The snack bar was the place to hook up, hopefully with some kid without sweaty palms to be your partner during Doubles Skate.  Favorite skate song:  “Another One Bites The Dust.”  Or  “Xanadu,” depending on my mood.

23. “Solid Gold”:  I can imitate a Solid Gold dancer like nobody’s business.  The only downfall of the show was having Marilyn McCoo as a host.  Boooorrrrring.

24. The Geometric Mod Haircut:  Okay, there’s a lot about hair in this list – but one must admit that hair was a big part of the 80’s.  Hair could have run for president and probably won.  Anyway, the Geometric Mod Haircut… the one with one short side and one long side?  Absolutely HATED it.  Why is it on this list then?  Because I loved making fun of the people who had it.  Hardy-har-har!  As if.

25. Breakdancing: And his close cousin, Popping.  I couldn’t make a top spin, let alone MY WHOLE BODY WHILE BALANCING ON TOP OF MY HEAD.  Nothing rocked like lunchtime at school, when these dudes would bust out the boom box and blast Herbie Hancock.  Breakin’ 2 Electric Boogaloo!!

Okay, so I’ve counted the ways and there were 25.  But there’s so much more.  I mean, I can’t possibly list everything I love about my Decade Crush – but it will hold a special place in my heart forever, in the Totally Rad and Gnarly section. 

Love is a battlefield, y’all.