without even trying

I didn't even notice that I posted an entry about how I'm allergic to eggs and then immediately following that an entry about how I love mini-eggs. HL had to point that out. What's wrong with me?

To pay tribute to MNS and beta (i.e. steal from) I was going to create one of those online quizzes but 10 questions is too many. So here are a few I've come up with so far. In an actual tribute those girls (particularly MNS) my answers are sneaky and based on what I'm feeling right this moment. Here goes:

1. I most often wish I were:
A) successful
B) a robot
C) a few inches shorter
D) more muscular
E) a slut

2. I most sincerely wish I were:
A) successful
B) a robot
C) a few inches shorter
D) more muscular
E) a Japanese woman

3. In my bag you will almost always find:
A) tweezers
B) a book (fiction)
C) my checkbook (non-fiction)
D) flushable towelettes

4. The item I value most in my bag is:
A) the tweezers
B) the book
C) the checkbook
D) the flushable towelettes

5. I spend this amount of time staring at myself in the mirror (cumulatively) each day:
A) 5 minutes (enough time to do my hair)
B) 10 minutes (hair's not quite right)
C) 15 minutes (I'm beautiful)
D) 20 minutes (how can I make my eyes more soulful?)

That's it. How well do you know me?

why oh why?

Jesus Christ. I just got an email from a dance space here about a new work coming up soon. It's by a certain choreographer whose work I can't stand. Granted I've only seen one of his pieces but I so vehemently hated it that I can't even think about seeing something of his again. I can't stress enough how unpleasant an evening that was. Here's a blurb from the email about the new piece, undoubtedly written by the choreographer himself. The piece is called Everyone.

Everyone is about the world right now and right now and right now. Nothing is interesting. Everything is interesting. This is a huge failure. Nothing works. Nothing is going anywhere. There is nowhere to go. Everything is perfect. Everything is a perfect mess. I know now. I know who this is for. This is for us. This is for me. This is for everyone.

Don't you want to go? Doesn't it sound like a lot of thought was put into this piece? Doesn't that make you think it won't be a complete waste of time?

"This is a huge failure." Thanks for the warning. How considerate.

Even if I didn't already have opinions about this choreographer I still wouldn't be interested in this show. This blurb encapsulates much that I dislike about "progressive" contemporary dance. There's this kind of blase attitude infecting the dance scene where shows no longer have to have any sort of entertainment value but can merely exist as the creators' exploration of themselves. Cohesive themes? Who needs 'em! I'm certainly not saying that all theater must only be entertainment, that usually ends up being awful. But the beauty of art is that it can be entertaining and educational, often in unexpected and unique ways.

lactoserific

I wanted bagels and cream cheese for lunch but since I also wanted a few other items I didn't go to a bakery, I went to a grocery store. When I arrived at 3:30PM the bagel selection was slim and poor, just a few flat unappetizing pieces of bread, but I had already made up my mind. To balance the fact that I was buying crappy bagels I also bought a crappy custard doughnut. Makes sense, right? On a whim I decided to treat myself and also bought some brie and wheat crackers. Now back at the office I just ate one bagel slathered with cream cheese, the doughnut and am about to dig into the brie. It's a very cheesy lunch. One that I at first thought would be healthyish but is quickly turning out to be stomach churning. I bought some V8 too, they say that counts as like, 3 servings of vegetables. Salty, salty vegetables.

I don't know why I have the tendency to avoid people, even people I like. I was walking over to the office building a few days ago and right before I got to the door I noticed a coworker about 15 feet away. I actually like this guy, he's nice and I enjoy talking to him but instead of waiting to say hello I put on a concerned face and walked into the building. We hadn't made eye contact so I wasn't being pointedly rude but as I was being stupid. I think I sometimes inadvertently revert to my junior high days where I made a point of seeming intensely occupied with my thoughts thereby discouraging any conversation. When I do that now though, I'm usually just daydreaming about winning the lottery.

my true love

Really. I love them. I would marry them if I could and then we'd have delicious chocolate babies. And I would eat them. My own children. That's how much I love these things. Even though I ate an entire pint of mint chip ice cream last night I couldn't resist buying of pack of chocolate goodness. My diet is really falling apart. I'll totally exercise tonight though.

I've discovered a problem with gay dating, one that I'm sure I've thought about before, but I have I ever blogged about it? Non-separate public restrooms. Yesterday Also-I (that's how I'm going to refer to him from now on after dropping his other, more offensive title) and I went to a movie. After it finished I needed to use the bathroom and as I walked toward it I noticed he was doing the same...and we walked in together...and stood at adjoining urinals. Normally that wouldn't bother me except for this time I really had to fart. And it's hard to release one set of muscles and constrict another. The solution may have been to go into a stall but the bathroom was quite small, one stall, two urinals and we were the only ones in it so I still would have been the obvious loud culprit. I ended up pretty much just pretending to pee then washing my hands. We soon parted ways at the subway and when I got home I ran to the bathroom.

I've also discovered that I almost always spell "separate" and "negative" wrong.

addendum: I did exercise. I did eat the entire bag.

I think I'm slightly allergic to eggs. At brunch today I decided to order an omelette even though I've always said I don't like eggs. I haven't had an omelette in a long time, years and years, so I thought that perhaps aversion to eggs might have changed. Nope. The first bite was okay, it was still edible but by the time I was half way through I was disgusted. I couldn't eat any more at all. I hated the texture and the taste. A few hours later my stomach started to hurt quite a bit. So I think I can't take large quantities of eggs. I'm probably still okay if I get them in smaller doses, like in cookies, brownies and ice cream. I'm sure that's fine.

Sometimes I feel like my emotional and psychological being is stuck at, let's say age 12. Little things can set me in a funk from which I have to fiercely fight my way out. Battles I consistently lose. Some events can be easily predicted and I do my best to stay away from those. But then I being the constant dilemma of am I reinforcing my behavior by not subjecting myself to those types of situations or is it that I really just don't like those situations? I don't know. Then there are unexpected happenings that seem to shoot straight into me, find that switch marked "depression" and flip it.

On the train today I was thinking about how I often use the words "just, like, really" and other vague modifiers. My father criticizes my speech and writing for this and tells me to be specific but the problem is that I can't. I can't be specific. I don't know what I'm trying to say and even when I do I don't know how to say it. So I need my qualifiers to leave things slightly more opened ended. I can't make a direct statement. They scare me. There's always something I don't know.

repress

I woke up this morning on my right side with my shoulders scrunched up and my head tilted way back to the right with my pillow smashed underneath. I think I have some anger issues that are manifesting themselves in my sleep. It could be that or just that my life completely lacks direction. That doesn't seem to lend itself to happy sleepy time either. My boss thinks it's because I'm too tall and don't quite fit on my bed but I think it's more complicated than that. Maybe it's time to actualize my goal of sleeping on my back. The only times I've been able to sleep on my back are when I've been extraordinarily tired and on the floor. My plan is to get really tired then lie in my bed on my back for progressively longer periods of time before I allow myself to flip to my side. I know the phrasing of that sentence is questionable but I need to go to the bathroom and can't think clearly when my bladder is full. And my teeth hurt and feel cold (when I have to go to the bathroom), which I've already mentioned though no one else appears to have this peculiar problem.

take that

A few months ago HL and I were talking and he said something slightly derogatory towards me (in a funny way, that's our relationship, that's my relationship with most people) and I almost spit my gum at him in response. I asked what he would have done if I had spit my gum on him and he said he'd have thought it was funny. What? This was a new side I had never seen. So I decided that I got one free spit out my gum to use in the future whenever I felt the occasion warranted it.

On Tuesday HL and I were waiting in the subway for the A train to take us home. He once again said something slightly insulting. I looked at him and pteuwie! Out shot my gum. The problem was that I had only just put the gum in my mouth a few seconds before so it wasn't chewed very much and the fresh piece was making my salivary glands work overtime so what ended up coming out wasn't a well aimed compact wad but a flat chunk surrounding by spit. It flung itself onto the sleeve of his coat then dropped to the ground. A woman walking by stared at us in disgust. And that was my one chance to do something funny with my gum. It worked out in a predictable ipj way, but not how I'd intended.

insensitive

During our morning meeting today I kept glancing at my boss' head. Boy, I guess she didn't really have time to wash her hair this morning, there are a few greasy strands kind of stuck to her scalp. What was she doing last night? Oh wait, no, she just has a little smudge. How strange, she's usually pretty immaculate. As I begin to open my mouth to inform her (I can't have her walking around all day not knowing she has dirt on her head, did she walk into a subway bar?) I realize that the smudge is actually closer to the center of her forehead and seems to have a particular shape. Ash Wednesday. And instead of saying anything I started laughing. Unfortunately, the whole time I was laughing I was still staring at her forehead. I hope she didn't notice, I don't think I was too overt but she is savvy.

My eyes popped open this morning at 4AM and I immediately knew that I was sick. I often wake up in the middle of the night, usually several times but normally it's a sort of groggy, moaning waking up, not an eyes wide open kind. Also, I had kicked off all my blankets and still felt a little warm. Now I know New York weather has improved since a few days ago but it's still cold and it certainly wasn't warm enough in my room to warrant no covers at all. So I pulled my blankets back on, huddled into a ball and smushed my head farther (further?) into my pillow. And now I'm sick at work though not feeling near as awful as many people I know. I'm grateful for that. There is one part I like about being sick though. It's never felt so good to close my eyes.

pants o' the mornin'

I had a good test for my new jeans this morning: I was bloated. Like crazy, y'all. I had a smoothie for breakfast with soy milk, bananas, blueberries and peanut butter but I've had that before and nothing's happened so I don't know what set it off today. Maybe I just had too much. It was out of control though. My jeans held up well, they still felt comfortable. Of course, I'm wearing the pair I bought specifically because they were more comfortable and less snazzy. The other pairs I bought are tighter and might not have fared as well. This was definitely a concern of mine when I bought them. I pretty much can't gain any weight in the stomach area, or in my legs, or my butt. And yet if my butt ever gets so hard and perky to actually do any damage to my jeans my happiness over my new perfect ass will totally overshadow any anger I might feel. If it just gets fat that's another story.

Last night it took me until 11:00PM to convince myself to go buy some dinner. If I had just gone around 9 when I first thought of it I would have been fine but I didn't really want to get dressed to go outside again and would much rather have just continued playing video games. But I finally did and it was a bad idea. I may have also smoked a little, which was also a bad idea as I had already been coughing up phlegm for most of the day. And I returned to an old friend, brownie mix. Some of the mix had gotten hard and stuck together into little hard pebblies. What a disappointing experience.

I need to remember to look for books on trauma at the library today. MNS suggested I get a degree in performance art with an emphasis in trauma studies and while I think that's an awesome idea I'm not quite ready to commit to a degree. So instead I'll do my own research and see where that takes me. The thought of it has already given me some images to work with. Like a woman in a big comfy chair wearing a muumuu talking about her past and present. Don't traumatic events make you want to wear a muumuu?

Here's what one patron wrote on her order form she faxed in to the theater the other day:

Question: What years were the kids with whom you will be attending born?
Answer: None yet!

I thought that was pretty funny.

Damn it. I just noticed that I've already spilled soup on my new pants. I'm certainly not surprised, just very very annoyed.

It just stays the same. My priorities are skewed and I have no direction. I keep using the word "just." I have nothing to report. Last night went better than I thought it would. I actually had a good time mostly. I need to go get some food. It may or may not happen.

Okay, granted I did first see this around midnight so I might have been a little tired but I still think it's pretty hi-larious.


I may or may not be going on a date tonight. I mean, I will mostly likely probably be going, I'm just not sure if it's a date or not. I haven't been on a date since I moved to New York. I was going to say it's not from a lack of trying but really, that's exactly the reason. This did give me a reason to pluck my eyebrows; I've been lax in their upkeep lately. I'd rather have had them threaded but that would have cost money and I don't know this person well enough for that. Also, I'm lazy.

thank god

I bought some pants! YorN graciously went clothes shopping with me today, a task that we both abhor so I'm very appreciative that she kept me company. She was really helpful too, going to search for different sizes and colors. And kept telling me my butt looked hott. Whether it actually did or not is irrelevant. What a good friend. I ended up spending too much money on three pairs that are basically the same jeans, with slight variances between them. We then trodded over to Urb*n Outf*tters, a store I dislike on principle, which we almost didn't go to but then I caved. It was incredibly crowded, no surprise. I picked up a few more pants to try on and, on a whim, a jacket that mildly reminded me of one my father used to wear to church. I didn't think it would fit at all but I'm trying to broaden my shopping to include trying on items I have no intention of purchasing. None of the pants fit, they were all to small and too short, the very things that have made me hate shopping over the years, but then I tried on the jacket. It wasn't quite as slim in the waist as I would have liked but otherwise I thought it looked good, really good. Uh oh. I bought it. Why not spend more money that I don't have?

YorN and I had a quick lunch before the shopping spree in which we had an interesting discussion on the meaning of being masculine, feminine, transgendered, transexual, queer and a whole slew of other related terms. We found that we had a hard time discussing any of those terms without making sweeping generalizations and relying on stereotypes.

oh my god

It's finally happened. I knew it would, I just kept hoping that it wouldn't. I was sitting at work and felt, well, for some reason I suddenly needed to feel my butt and there it was: a hole. And since I wore a thong today I brushed my finger right against my ass. I knew the ass of my jeans would give out sometime, all I do is sit around. I ran to the bathroom to look in the mirror and it's definitely noticeable. Luckily my sweatshirt is long enough to cover my ass, literally and figuratively. There was a question in my mind whether or not I'd be going out tonight but now I think it's been answered.

I may not have love

Happy Discount Valentine's Day Candy Day! HL and I went to Duane Reade during our lunch break and it took all my willpower not to fill my arms with 50% off boxes of chocolate. I only bought one small one for my office and only ate slightly over 1/3 of it. Good thing I didn't buy any ice cream last night.

Miss M had asked me to be her valentine, which I felt was quite the honor. That's her name for this blog from now on. We had planned on dinner and a movie but the selection of films was disappointing. Between the two of us we had either already seen most of them or were not at all interested in ever seeing them (Factory Girl). We casually agreed on a 9:30 show and went to find a restaurant. We walked for a while and finally entered an Indian place. The owner (I think he was the owner anyway) approached us and asked to wait a moment. He never said why exactly. We watched as he and his staff prepared a table (we assumed for us) and in the meantime we were approached 2 or 3 more times by staff members asking if we had been helped. When the table was ready we were given a choice to sit at it or at some other tables in the back. We thought it slightly odd that we weren't just immediately seated at the other already prepared tables but then maybe they were also fixing those tables at the same time, I don't know. I'm usually not a fan of Valentine's Day and can get pretty downcast but the couples around us helped to lift my mood. They perfectly demonstrated that just being in a relationship certainly doesn't guarantee happiness. To one side was the bitchy demanding couple and to the other was the bland "do they even like each other?" couple. All Miss M and I wanted to do was talk about them but of course, they were less than a foot away. I said we should try to disguise our conversation in metaphor.

My head is spinning. I've eaten way too much sugar. Is this what love feels like?

Ah crap. He ended up emailing me back this morning. And he was once again funny. And furthered the inane Netflix babble that I started. Now I have to be "on." But I have to wait to write him back. He waited 4 days; I don't want to seem desperate; he doesn't need to see that side of me.

repeatedly

I've done it again. I've been emailing, pretty frequently, with a guy on friend*ster, also with the name i. Things seemed to be going well, he was funny, I was funny (I think). Then he suggested a meeting. Apparently that's where I screwed up because his emails have stopped. It could be because I let my true feelings about his suggestion be known and I didn't offer an alternate suggestion or it could be that, as MNS pointed out, "you're making yourself sound crazier than you really are." That's what happened last time I spoke with someone online. It's kind of a relief. I know I bemoan the fact that I'm alone but I also don't want to do any of the work required in a beginning relationship. I basically want to date someone I can assimilate into my already set life. Of course, what's the fun in that? None, and that's the point. I'm not looking for fun.

This morning when I got up there was a note left for me on the kitchen counter. It was written by my roommate Horsey and let me know that the pipes in our kitchen sink are leaking (again) and could I knock on the super's door and take care of it because she's going to be gone all day every day. Apparently our sink has been leaking for about 3-4 days. I looked under the sink and sure enough, there was a bucket with water in it. Did either of my roommates tell me this? Nope. My other roommate left this morning to go to Florida for about 3 days. I really kind of feel that since he takes up the most space (in the fridge, freezer, cupboards, bathroom or any other room he's in), has lived there for 10 years and I'm really just renting a room, it should be his responsibility to take care of things like this. Plus, last time when our kitchen sink pipe actually broke I was the one the super yelled at for filling it with food. So I turned the note over and wrote that I had woken up late and just saw the note as I was heading out the door, Horsey will have to talk to the super when she gets home. At least I'm consistently passive-aggressive but not enough to push me into that crazy roommate category (I hope). Although I am prepared to go to a movie tonight specifically to get home after Horsey.

realizations

2 crumpets
1 glass half orange juice, half vanilla soy milk
1 cup hot chocolate
1 beer

When I was in high school, maybe junior high, I read a short story (you probably did too) about a totalitarian society where the government forced everyone to be equal. This entailed giving everyone a handicap particular to their strengths. The two characters I most remember were the father and son. The father was considered too smart and thus regularly had electrical shocks administered to his brain, to lessen his awareness. The son was too athletic and strong and had sandbags attached to his body. I was thinking about this story yesterday. I was thinking about how maybe we create our own hinderances. More accurately, about how I create my own hinderances so that I don't reach my full potential. And how amazing I could really be if I did utulize that potential. But then I understood that part of the reason I create these problems is so that I don't have to ever discover that that potential doesn't exist in the first place. It's much easier to believe that you could be great rather than truly discover that you actually don't have the talent for it.

lil' whiny

My nose won't stop running but I'm not sick. I don't have any tissues, just rough toilet paper. My room is a mess. I don't want to go outside. I have a two hour break today in which to do nothing because I don't want to do anything and I still don't know what I'm going to eat.

cleanliness is next to

HL and ipj are watching Grey's Anatomy. One character, overcome with happiness, leans down and kisses a patient who has just successfully come from a long and intense surgery session.

ipj: Ew. I bet his breath is terrible. He's been unconscious in surgery for hours.
HL stares at ipj incredulously.
HL: Sometimes people's emotions transcend personal hygiene! You probably would've made him brush his teeth before you kissed.
beat
ipj (thoughtfully): Yeah.