You’ll get a real post later, but I just wanted to share that Jillian Michaels (my new favorite love/hate relationship) will be at the iVillage offices on Monday answering questions and making everyone do push-ups. Okay, maybe she won’t make them do push-ups, but that’s what I imagine her doing. Regardless, this is awesome.

If you want to submit a question for the no-nonsense shredding trainer, go here. I’m going to have put some serious thought into mine, because I don’t suppose, “Will you come live at my house and make me freakin’ hot?” counts as a reasonable question.

If you’re lookin’ for an update, I’m on Day 8, and really digging it. I’ve dropped that extra pound, lost three more and my shoulders are starting to look like they used to before I fell in love with Lazy McTelevision. Sayonara, Lazy. I was way too good for you, anyway.

All it took was one little photo Krissa posted to her flickr with the caption that read, “Oh look, I survived again!” And a week later and I’m drinking the same Kool Aid.  The same aching shoulder, can’t walk downstairs, breathless, sweaty Kool Aid.

And I love it.

“Did I tell you I’ve been doing the Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred workout?” Jamie and I were waiting for the lights to go down at a Sunday matinee showing of The Duchess, and my thighs were still a little twitchy from my earlier 20-mintue ass-kicking.

“How funny! I just got mine today! I kept reading about it on all these Twitters…”

So. This thing. It is popular. Sort of like the snap bracelet craze that went around my junior high school. But if the soreness of my mucles is any indication, this fad will actually get me more than some useless accessories and an after school detention. What? I dare you to ignore that snappy zebra print beauty during a supremely dry lecture on the color wheel. Yeah, yeah. Red and green make brown. I GET it.

At any rate, I’m on day five, and I’m proud to report that I can make it ALL the way through the push-ups without bleeding from my eyes and ears. People, before Wednesday, I did not know I was incapable of doing push-ups. But Jillian Michaels, she made me confront that ugly truth and a few more like it. And she made me gain a pound. Which I’m hoping that’s a temporary glitch, because one does not bleed from the eyes and not expect her bathroom scale to reward her handsomely.

Are you playing along at home? If you are, I want to know what day you are on and how awesomely hot this program has made you. Because I’m staring down day six having already run four miles at the ungodly hour of 5:45, and been told in bold, black digital numbers that none of this effort is doing jack. And I want jack! Tell me I’ll get jack!

Yeah, yeah. I’m needy. I get that, too.

On Monday morning, the stress hit me like The Bus that Couldn’t Slow Down*. Money stress. A great deal of money stress. And after all my careful planning (and only buying ONE of the twenty-dollar, ridiculously cute pairs of shoes I fell hopelessly in love with at Target the day before), I felt betrayed. I wanted to stab the Universe in the eye. I made sacrifices! I turned off my AC! I’m trying here, Universe! Doesn’t that count for something?

But you know how it goes. You argue with the Universe and that spot in your shoulder starts to hurt. Then your jaw starts to ache from having it set so tight in defiance. And by the end of the day, you’re scrunched down in your office chair as close to reclined as you can get and still earn a paycheck and you haven’t cried yet but damn it, you’re close.  And by you, I mean me.

So I made an appointment for a massage. Both my mom and my best girl cleverly gifted me with hour-long massages for my birthday (me? stress out easy? pshaw) and I’d been saving them for the right time. Like, the day after the marathon relay. Or, the day when it turns out I have to empty my entire savings account and use the money that I’d been saving for a new mattress that won’t ruin my back for something far, far less gratifying. I’m getting tense again just thinking about it. Serenity now. Okay. I feel better. Let’s continue.

In the “Serenity Room” at the chain massage joint, I was finally feeling a little relaxed and, astoundingly, thinking less about money and more about… falling water. I’ve always felt those miniature waterfall machines were a little cheesy, but that baby got me to stop seeing dollar signs emblazoned in neon green on the insides of my eyelids. I considered getting one for my apartment. And hiding it when company comes.

“Miss Hunter?”

“Mmm hmm?” I answered without opening my eyes. Surely he didn’t need eye contact for whatever transaction we were about to have.

“I see you’ve marked ‘Swedish Massage’ on your form. But your appointment is with Andrew. His specialty is deep tissue.”

I considered this for a second, eyes still closed. Deep tissue would probably be good for me. Detox, and all. So I consented.

“So, full body, firm massage. Great. Andrew will be right with you.”

I mmm hmmmed him again. Moments later, Andrew was right with me and that’s when all serenity ceased. Over the next sixty minutes, Andrew beat the ever-loving crap out of me. I won’t say I didn’t like it. Because I did. I got some perverse pleasure out of having an elbow driven into my upper back and feeling the electrical shocks down in my toes. But I don’t have to tell you that, perverse pleasure aside, the experience was not at all relaxing. The tears in my eyes were not that of sweet release, they were from pain.

The next morning, as I was fumbling my way out of running clothes to hop into the shower, I caught my reflection in the mirror and did a double take. What the hell? It looked like a dime sized mole had sprouted up on my lower back. On closer inspection, I discovered it was a bruise (one of many that would show up over the next couple days), by far darker than any I’d ever seen on my ghostly white flesh. I pressed it. It hurt. I pressed it again, just to be masochistic. And then I thought about how, when I was a kid and I complained of any kind of injury (say on my right knee) my father would offer to punch me in the left. “It’ll make you forget about the other one!”  Which is really all Andrew did. I haven’t worried about money in days because I’ve been too preoccupied counting bruises.

The one on my left thigh is particularly attractive.

* Fact: Any day I get to reference Homer Simpson is a good day.

I am a full day behind in everything. Like, today is my little sister’s birthday. I thought it was tomorrow. YESTERDAY was a freelance deadline. I thought it was today. You can see how that might make life just a little bit messy. I’m going to spend the morning playing catch up and trying very, very hard not to short out my last remaining neurons, but first! First, I am going to share with you the shortlist of Things that are Bugging Me Right Now:

In April, I filed an extension for my 2007 New York State taxes. Which makes them due in… oh, 20 days or so. Have I thought about them since April? Nooooo. I’ve been whiling away the summer like a damn grasshopper when I should have been playing the ant. Sorry, Aesop. My reading comprehension isn’t the best.

Shooties.  Really, fashion? REALLY?

Polar bears have resorted to cannibalism. I can’t even read the news story because the headline gives me a stomach ache.

People I know and love are proudly Facebooking their support to “Protect Marriage.” Protecting marriage from what, exactly? The gays? You are not protecting marriage, people. You are protecting bigotry. This upsets me. A lot.

People who cough all over their hands and then press a zillion buttons on the copy machine. Thanks, dude.

I think maybe I need a hug and some cheese and a couple hours on the couch with Season 2 of Magnum PI. And maybe two more hugs.
 

What’s your favorite word for [the male genitalia]?

Obviously he didn’t phrase it so politely. Let’s fill in the brackets, shall we? In our very first conversation, Tanner, a sports announcer and a man who by all indications had designs on dating me, asked what my favorite word for penis was. And he used the see-oh-see-kay word. On a first date. With a stranger. My response? A whole lot of blinking. I mean, you have to be famous to get Punk’d, and Totally Hidden Video was a family show (no dirty c-words there), so what the hell was going on? Rushing to his own defense, Tanner explained that the line was from a Maxim quiz, which I can only guess was created to determine my level of “coolness” and “dateability.” And all my blinking had just relegated me to the category of Undateable Prude. I wanted to roll up that magazine and give him a good hard smack in the nuts.

Who talks to girls like that? And prudish, I’m not. I can be pretty irreverent. Okay, crass. I can be really, really crass. On more than one inappropriate occasion I have used the see-oh-see-kay word without hesitation or apology. But, dammit, not with a fella I wanted to date!

At least, not until he’d bought me dinner.

Yesterday I spent my lunch break e-chatting with Glamour’s Girls in the Beauty Department blogger Beth Shapouri about my beauty routine. This makes me giggle. For one, I’m not exactly what you’d call glamorous, and my beauty routine? It’s a bit… haphazard. But, what I lack in fancy, I make up for in brand loyalty. I’m a die hard about the products I love and if a single one of these gets discontinued, there will be tears. Anyway, for a flighty trip down the beauty aisle, hop on over to the Glamour blogs to check out the interview!

Also, and I’m a bit late to the party on this one, but I’ve been simply LOVING this blog. I can’t decide if I wish we were friends or if I’m glad we were not. Such a friendship might end in a deathmatch over the love of His Crankiness, Dr. House, MD.

P.S.  While we’re on the subject, got any beauty faves you want to pass on? Like, the super ultimate red lipstick that will not make me look like a psych ward escapee? Gimme!

Even with the rattling winds and persistent rain, Saturday’s storm was much less of a to-do than the weather people had prepared us for. Still, the startling beauty of yesterday morning seemed so out of place, it was almost… garish, in contrast. Kind of like watching a luxury car drive through a bad neighborhood. Bright sun, intensely blue, cloud-streaked sky. It was stunning. Up with the sun, I went for a jog and with that sun on my shoulders and a nice breeze, it felt good. Really good. But what felt even better was going home, opening all the windows and shutting off the AC. Plunk! Plunk! I could actually hear the coins dropping into my imaginary piggy bank. I’m hardcore pining for the days when it will be in the off position on an extended basis and my electricity bill will drop by two-thirds. Baby is on a budget.

Actually, baby is in the process of preparing a new! now with 60% more realism! budget. It’s a lot less fun than it sounds. Strangely. Things were tighter than I’d thought, and for the past few months I’ve been unconsciously living a tad bit beyond my means. That’s like being a tad bit too fat for your low rise jeans. Un. Comfortable. Believe me, I know.

Good thing isn’t any room in the new budget for beer. Because there certainly isn’t any room for new jeans. 

I almost cried when my alarm went off this morning.

The bed was a nest of twisted sheets and crumpled duvet, and all but one pillow was flung to the floor – evidence not of some wild and crazy nocturnal extracurricular activities, but of a restless night. Sleep without rest is just cruel. Especially when 5:30 rolls around and you have to decide between getting up to meet your running partner or catching another hour of sleep. This morning, I chose to fight the good fight, but damn if that was not an easy decision to make. I waffled more than once. Like, when I stumbled into the bathroom and saw that my eyes were swollen and puffy like I’d actually gone ahead with the boo-hoo fest and I thought, See? I can’t POSSIBLY go running today; my eyes are puffy! What if they get even puffier and I can’t SEE and run into a tree or a BUS?

If I were ever in a pageant, my talent would be rationalization. I have a gift for it. But I also have a pretty strong desire to not suck in the Whiterock Marathon relay in December, and an even stronger desire to wear pieces from my wardrobe I don’t normally refer to as “my fat clothes,” so I splashed some cold water on my face, laced up my sneakers (while singing a refrain from Billy Madison. “…got my shoes tied tight. I hope I don’t get in a fight…”) and headed out the door.

Outside, the sky was gorgeous, clear and starry, and after a few minutes of walking and gazing, I forgot all about being tired. See, I thought. You’re not tired. You’re just lazy! Look what a beautiful morning you would have missed! Run! Run and be in love with life!  Aw, inspirational right? Well, the magic of that sweet little moment lasted only as long as the 2-mile run. Because at 7:45AM when I woke up on my couch in my running clothes, sweaty strands of hair plastered to my cheek, with no memory of having lain down in the first place, I realized I’d been had.

Effing nature. 

Sometimes, I think the Universe gets a little lackadaisical when it comes to distributing bad luck. Remember our Bible story friend Job? That guy could not catch a break. Meanwhile, there were tons of folks getting off scot-free. It’s like all that power gets overwhelming and It (the Universe) resorts to selection processes common to the playground set.

Ink-a-bink
A bottle of ink
The cork fell out
And YOU stink

I’m no Job. But people, I’ve been stinking for some time now. I’m not complaining (you do that and folks jump ALL over you about hurricanes and cancer and shit. Definitely not going there); I am pretty amused at the number of mishaps I’ve had in the last month or two. See: minor car accident leading to a very brief visit to the ER where I picked up a staff infection IN MY FACE. See also: the trip down my front steps that carved up my heel like a cheese grater. And now this. The Cosmic Playground Bully must have clued into the fact that I’ve been off antibiotics for a couple weeks and found it unacceptable.

The short of it: Monday morning, I shaved my legs. Saturday morning I was in urgent care. The two, stupidly enough, are related.

I’ll be frank: except where swimming or sex is involved, I don’t tend to bother with hair removal above the knees. It’s just a whole lot of terrain to cover and I lack the time and motivation. But on Labor Day there was a fuchsia bikini involved, so I spent some quality time with the Venus Breeze before going to sweat it out poolside.  Tuesday, I woke up with pretty fierce razor burn on my inner left thigh, but thought eh, it happens. Only, it didn’t go away. I attributed its staying power to my newly (re)found love of jogging (I signed up to run in the relay at the Whiterock Marathon. Foolish or fantastic? The jury’s still out). But I’m a dedicated fan of Neopsorin and I applied twice daily, figuring it would do what it has always done – make me better! Four days faster than a bandage alone! Oh, silly me. That only works when the Universe is playing it straight.

After work on Friday evening, I napped, ran some errands, and then plopped down on the couch to snuggle with the beast. Sensing an opening, Sir Hal jumped up and began kneading my lap. In a hot second, the poor, surprised cat was flung to the ottoman and I was bent over in pain. Warning: I am about to use the word groin. Don’t worry, I’m as uncomfortable about this as you will be. I pressed my hand to the glands in my… groin; it felt like I was smuggling Tootsie Roll Midgies under my skin. The hell! In the bathroom mirror I saw (to my complete mouth-sweating horror) that a red line was snaking up my thigh to my groin. I hit panic mode. Blood poisoning and death! It was certain!

No lie, I actually made a mental reference of the Little House on the Prairie episode where Ma gets an infection in her leg while Pa is away and all is almost lost, but because Caroline Ingalls is super tough pioneer stock, she saves herself with a knife and some boiling water.

I digress. I also have run long in the story of my travail, so here’s the gist of what I learned from the elderly physician who treated me the next morning. My predicament was not uncommon or surprising. Folliculitis (duh) and an infection in my lymph system. From shaving my legs. Mind you, I am a perfectly hygienic person. I shower. I even use soap!

“It happens,” he said, shrugging. “You’ve got bacteria living on your skin all the time, and it only needs an opportunity – a nick, a cut – to get in.”

“So, I shaved. I got sick.”

“Yes.”

Again, the hell! I took his antibiotic and went home, baffled. When my sister called later that morning, I told her all about my woes. She did not share the good doctor’s nonchalance.

“Heather, people shave their legs EVERY DAY and don’t have to go to the hospital.”

“I know.”

“Wow. You’re really… special.”

“I prefer chosen.”

Lately, I’ve been feeling like the human equivalent of mom jeans. The three or four people I’ve shared this with have laughed. But I am telling you right now that there is nothing (nothing!) funny about mom jeans. Awkward and frumpy, yes. Funny, no.

Things like haircuts and new shoes usually make me feel better when I get stuck in the blahs, so it was delightfully handy that Tuesday night was my 8-week hair check-up. She washed, trimmed, round-brushed, complimented me on the smooth shiny brilliance of my hair and… nothing. I still felt like mom jeans – beyond the help of a coif or even a shiny new pair of peep toes. I went home and ate a lot of cheese. Mostly smoked gouda.

Clearly, I should have stopped at the gouda, but I went for broke and turned on the new 90210. Man, and I thought I was in an awkward phase. No stranger to bad TV, I still had to turn that monstrosity off once or twice – like I do in the middle of (usually twenty-two minutes in) most I Love Lucy episodes because the characters have become such a harm to themselves it’s either intervene (not practical/possible) or cut them off. I always go back, though. I need closure.

I also need someone to explain Shannen Doherty’s teeth. That gap – is it new? Intentional? It’s certainly unsettling. I’ve never been a big believer in the racket that is adult braces, but in this case, I think I’d make an exception.

My friend Sarah Brown has a book out.

Sarah is about cake and red shoes and old movies like, Meet Me in St. Louis and A Philadelphia Story.

Her book is about teen angst.

I feel like this should be enough to convince you to mosey on down to Borders (or other fine retailers), but if you’re one of those types that needs lots of persuasion, here’s more about the Cringe phenom and the book’s amazing contributors.  Remember Reading Rainbow, where LeVar Burton would say, “But you don’t have to take my word for it…” and then cut to kids giving mini book reports? Yeah, this is just like that. Only I’m LeVar and the kids? They are The New Yorker.

Bad ass.

Last week at my yearly physical, after the doctor finished (very kindly) harassing me about my cholesterol, I attempted to explain why the end of summer is probably not the best time for us to be assessing anything about my physical well-being. It’s summer. It’s just too damn hot to be healthy.

Summer here means it’s approximately fifteen hundred degrees too hot to do anything but slink from air conditioned house to air conditioned car. So jogging is out. Just to prove that outdoor exercise in this heat is indicative of a death wish, I tried it yesterday. And while I didn’t die, necessarily, I thought about it very hard. This, I explained, is why her fancy pants doctor’s scale says I weigh twelve pounds more than my brain scale (and driver’s license) says I do. And why my jeans require several minutes of sumo squats before I can be seen in polite company.

And what with all this freakish heat, beer has become infinitely more attractive than it is during the pleasanter three seasons. Have I ever mentioned that I hate beer? I do. It’s not my thing at all. Except in the summer when I want it all the time. Blue Moon for breakfast, Miller Lite by the pool in the afternoon and goodness me, is that a Stella? Don’t mind if I do. Turns out, beer is not all that good for you. Or your relationship with denim. Even the kind with stretch.

Then there’s the grilled hot dogs and the bratwurst. Don’t judge, but I’m pretty much powerless to the charms of some flame-kissed meat byproduct. At yesterday’s cook out, a fellow hot dog enthusiast theorized that our fascination probably has something to do with the fact that when summer comes around, you have to eat your fill because once grilling season is over, you’re out of luck. You can’t just saunter into a Burger King and order a flame broiled beef frank. So you’ve got to get while the gettin’ is good. And I do. And then I have to go home and lay on the floor and do Lamaze breathing until the hurting stops.

My doctor is the sweet, patient kind.  And after I got done with my defense high triglycerides, she just smiled.

“Oh, I’m sure that’s mostly in your genes.”

The obvious yet hilarious genes/jeans joke was so tempting (“You’re not kidding lady!”), but I figured she’d had enough for one morning. There’s only so much a person should have to put up with for a twenty dollar co-pay.

Overheard:

“My boss is seven months pregnant. A new guy just asked if she might be pregnant.”

“Might be?”

“Yeah, dude, the alternative is she swallowed a globe. My god, is there nothing too obvious for a man?”

“It’s why their genitals are on the outside… so they don’t miss them completely.”

“Damn fine call.”

P.S. It’s high time I updated my “Favorite Links” section. Because, as much as I love my friends, some of them don’t exactly write anything on their blogs anymore. Thing is, I haven’t really explored the blog world in a while. Got any recommendations?

It’s raining in my bathroom.

The man on the other end of the line chuckled. “That’s not good, is it? Let me send someone over to take care of that.”

I put down the phone and picked up a mop. It was 9:35. I’d been zonked out on the living room sofa for a good hour when the sound of water smacking linoleum roused me from my delicious Tuesday evening coma. Plop! Plop! In my sleepy haze, I misinterpreted it for the sounds of cat mischief.

“Knock it off, Hal!”

Grumbling, I yanked the thread worn chenille blanket up to my chin and prepared for coma re-entry. Five, four, three. In whoosh and the crisp snap of claws on couch, Hal’s round black face appeared over the arm of the sofa, looking foolish and eager. You rang?  I freed an arm from my blanketed cocoon to give him a lazy, grateful scratch on the chin.

Plop! Plop!

Cripes. The ruckus was decidedly not cat mischief. By the time I found the source of the plop!, there was a tire-sized puddle on the bathroom floor. I swore (the f dash-dash-dash word). At the edge of the puddle, a brand spanking new giant roll of Charmin Ultra Soft lay, displaced from the roller, disintegrated in a soggy gray heap. I swore again. Then I called maintenance, cleaned up the mess and waited.

And waited. When I got tired of wringing out the mop, I installed garbage cans to catch the water. Then I waited some more, horizontally.  Sometime after 12:30, I gave in to sleep and dreamed that my coworker had turned into a zombie and was trying to eat my work friends. Our panicked fleeing made a steady rhythm – slap! slap! slap! – mimicking the bathroom weather system. When I woke up, it was dawn. No one had come to fix the problem, which was now a lake, shored up by the soggy hallway carpet. I took in the sodden shower curtain and the trickle that had wriggled down the bathroom mirror into the cabinet, destroying the remaining five rolls of Charmin. More f dash-dash-dashes followed. Exhausted from a night of escaping the living dead, I abandoned my long-held rule about not taking out my frustrations of people in the service industry. I redialed maintenance and swore into the answering machine.

“You owe me some f-dashing toilet paper!”

Like the technologically savvy communicator that I am, I use my Facebook status updates to announce very important details about my personal life. Behold, updates from the last week:

Heather is… celebrating her nuptials to a pulled pork sammich.

Heather…just gold medaled in napping.

Heather is… unreasonably happy that the Notebook kids are back together.

Well, fine, maybe they’re not important… but what my status updates lack in meaning, they make up for in sincerity. Once, I suggested I might initiate a cage match with my officemate. I meant that every bit as much as I did the degree to which I admired my new Hannah Montana lip gloss ring (Oh yes, they do exist. Four for a dollar at Target).  I do love tater tots more than I do most people I meet. And as far as the Notebook kids go, this may be the most sincere statement I have ever made publicly. I am unreasonably happy. I will never understand why Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams pretended to break up for the last year or so in the first place because it’s obvious they are meant. to. be. and should not eff with fate like that, and seeing pictures of them reunited and snuggly made my heart swell with the kind of love that only a strange fascination with the romantic lives of complete strangers can achieve. Wuv, twu wuv.

(I told my sister it gave me elephantitis of the heart, but after a quick wikipedia lesson, I realized how truly horrifying that was and decided to go with a less graphic description. You’re welcome.)

In truth, I never realized the impact that these silly status updates could have on the internet world at large. I certainly never guessed that they would become a reason for an… intervention. But today when I logged on – initially to make a statement about the life changing experience of eating Reese’s Pieces for breakfast – I found I had a new message.

“what makes u so unhappy? I never see u say anything positive. Makes me sad for u.”

Unhappy? UNHAPPY?! I appreciate the pity and all, but come on. The Notebook kids are back together, I ate an infant’s weight delicious saucy pork, and I napped the shit out of my Saturday afternoon. I cannot imagine someone being in a state of better emotional health!

Clearly, I’m going to have to start embracing emoticons and multiple exclamation points before someone locks me in a room with hideous yellow wallpaper.

Confession: I’m reading the skankiest book right now, and I LOVE it.

Actually, I have three books in rotation right now, but the other two have been pushed aside because it turned out that their incest/murder quotient was simply not high enough to keep my interest. Before last summer’s adventure with the Outlander series, I had never read anything that could be classified as a romance novel. Forgive me, historical romance. Not that I wasn’t getting my daily recommended allowance of smut. It was just well disguised. You know, in novels by folks like Marquez or Kundera – some seriously dirty bird writers, who by virtue of maleness, managed to escape having their perversions labeled as romantic.

At book club the other night, we did a swap. My contribution was a book of short stories by Ursula Le Guin; my take home was Wideacre, by Philippa Gregory. Boy is that lady a degenerate of the most awesome kind! Her heroine (who I find myself pulling for despite her proclivity for evil) is a seductress, a murderess, a dominatrix and a super eager/willing participant in a steam incestuous relationship all while still in her teens. Does it get any better than this? Probably not, which is why when I finally pluck Three Junes off the nightstand to finish it, it’s going to seem a little bit like homework. Not in the way Tolstoy does, mind you, but the lack of riding crops and patricide? It will be keenly felt.

I don’t know how we got on the subject. Actually, I’m not sure how we get on most topics that we do, but Friday afternoon in the office, when the work is slow and we’re itching for freedom, my coworkers and I decided it was critical that we knew the origin of the word, “shorty.”

“Shorty?” John turned around in his ergonomic chair.

“Yeah,” I said,”it’s kinda like boo. As in, Michael Phelps is my boo.”

“Michael Phelps is MY boo!”

Before Laura and I could attack each other with letter openers and sharpies over the love of our aquatic god, Shawn had Urban Dictionary up on the screen.

“Wow,” he said, hovering his mouse over definition number 2. “Apparently, it originally meant someone new to the game – either rapping or… selling crack.”

“So, in essence, our interns are shorties,” I said. “But that doesn’t really explain how it applies to women now…”

Turns out, Urban Dictionary couldn’t be counted on to really clear that up. But the first definition of the word did provide some amusement, if not enlightenment.

1. Shorty: affectionate term for a girlfriend, attractive female or concubine.

Okay, hold on. CONCUBINE? Like, King David concubines, or is this some new-fangled hip hop concubine? The more I learn, the more it seems as though I have a lot of investigating to do if I’m ever going to truly understand the complexity of being a shorty. One thing’s for certain, though. The interchangeability of shorty and concubine has made my world a richer place.

Yo concubine, it’s your birthday! Drink Barcardi like it’s your birthday!

“Have I ever told you my son is an absolute angel?”

“Are you just saying that because you’re his mother?”

“He’s my reason for living.”

“Mine’s melted cheese.”

“What?”

“My reason for living – it’s melted cheese.”

“Like, fake cheese on nachos? Yeah, that’s a pretty good one.”

Today is my knocked up sister’s birthday.

I wonder if it says something not good about my personality that I vastly prefer calling her knocked up (or up the stick, or with fetus) to pregnant. Pregnant is boring and mature sounding. My sister is neither of those things. And me, well, I figure if I start saying that, I might as well incorporate “touch base” and “out of pocket” into my standard verbiage and pleated khakis into my wardrobe. Eeeech.

Likewise, it probably says something  that I kind of dig how uncomfortable the phrase “knocked up” seems to make other people. It makes me feel delightfully ornery. Kind of like the time John said, “It’s not a baby bump. It’s a people sack,” and then grinned in a way that suggested he got to put a gold star on the refrigerator chore chart every time he was responsible for setting people’s teeth on edge. Two more and he gets a new Nintendo game!

Anyway, I was glad someone asked to hear more about my… fine, I’ll say it… pregnant sister. Even though I only get to experience the process through phone calls and text message photos, I’ve been absolutely fascinated with the whole thing. That my beanpole baby sis has been gaining double-digit pounds weekly. That Nephetus kicks a lot now. That my other siblings get to put their greedy hands all over the tight skin of her belly and play with those tiny, mysterious feet. My brother actually pushed his recently knee-surgeried wife out of the way to get in on that action (now forever part of the family lore). And I’m jealous. Really jealous. Because I’m far away and missing everything.

I even miss it when my sister pulls her stomach taut to make her bellybutton pop out for everyone at family dinner. What passes for entertainment in Utah is deplorable, but still, I want to be there to get grossed out with everyone else.

Last night, with Laura’s Tivo acting as a safety net, I took a break from my Olympic binge and actually spent an evening outside of my apartment. When I say I took a break, I mean, when we arrived at the restaurant for dinner, I asked to be seated at a table near the bar, so I could keep an eye on the synchronized platform finals. Because I am weak. And I am addicted. Fortunately, my dinner partner is either just as gravely in need of an intervention or a truly gifted enabler, because not only put up with my constant TV glancing, he had a hefty supply of Michael Phelps trivia.  Oh, the depth of emotion I have experienced over swim cap layering!

When this is all over, I suspect that I’m going to feel very empty and sad. Maybe I will start caring about Heroes. Or Mad Men. Or, you know, humanity. But more than likely I will simply start watching my Little House on the Prairie DVDs all over again.

In a feat of remarkable self control, I did manage to separate myself from Olympic coverage completely last night for the couple hours it took to see Pineapple Express. Hysterical, I tell you. Worth missing the women’s gymnastics final? Well, like I said, I had Laura’s Tivo. Otherwise, crazy talk.

So, I know things have been slow around here, and so I’m going to open it up to requests. Wanna hear about something particular? Leave a comment! I warn you now that requests involving the words “intern” or “musician”  will be blatantly ignored.  Proceed!

The last ten days or so have been…trying. It’s been a blur of doctor’s visits and trips to the pharmacy, and I’m going to spare you all of the boring details except to say, the highlight was scratching/tearing my cornea. Whee! The experience itself was painful and horrible, but a gallant eye doctor, who’d never met me, agreed to see me on a Saturday (because, after all, he was having his hair cut across the street,and it would really be no bother) and then gave me his home phone number, just in case. That was such a warm, fuzzy, small-town feeling, people, I half expected to see Atticus Finch ambling down the street. You know, out of my good eye.

Thankfully, epithelial eye tissue heals pretty rapidly and I didn’t have to miss the Unofficial Company Outing Sunday afternoon on the Redneck Riviera (that’s what Mike J so sensitively called our party boat excursion, and I suppose if you take into account the keg and number of white bread products on board our vessel, it’s a pretty fair description). I did have to wear a ridiculously big floppy hat and stay out of the sun for the most part, but damn if I didn’t eat grilled hot dogs and barbecue potato chips like a rock star. A Redneck Riviera rockstar.

One hundred and eleven. That’s what the thermometer on my dashboard read when I pulled out of the parking garage yesterday afternoon. And then my face melted off.

When we were kids, summer time was magical. I mean, except for the part where we had to get up at 7:30 to pull rocks and weeds out of the family garden. But mostly it was bare feet, running through the sprinklers and laying on the concrete driveway until you were warm and dry. Jelly shoes and bike rides. People, I don’t know much about the melting point of jelly shoes, but I’m pretty sure that if I’d been wearing a pair yesterday, they’d be a gooey mess on the sidewalk outside my apartment. And if my tastes in rubbery footwear is anything like it was back then, they’d be a sparkly turquoise gooey mess. Man, I loved those shoes.

(This is where one of those transitions I’m not bothering with would come in handy…)

You know what else I love? The Olympics. I mention this for my friend Margaret who is as obsessed with certain events as I am (gymnastics! diving!), and I’m afraid our friendship will suffer if I don’t publicly acknowledge it. So, let me say this loud and proud:  When Mary Lou Retton graced the front of the Wheaties box in 1984, I lamented that we were a Cheerios family. At some point, I even had the Mary Lou Retton haircut. There’s a whole lot of lamenting that goes with that, too… but it was the 80′s. Mistakes were made. I have seen Stick It no less than three times. The quality of that film alone makes this shameful. Shamefully awesome!

I’m getting a little bit giddy just thinking about this weekend’s upcoming Olympic offerings. You know, maybe it’s  because I lack the grace necessary to manage something as simple as a handspring on a trampoline, but nothing fascinates me quite like a kick-ass floor exercise. Well, not nothing, but this is summer, not winter, and we’re not talking about figure skating. Because if we were, I’d have to admit to having seen Ice Princess and both sequels to The Cutting Edge.

Straight to DVD, it happens for a reason.

For you, I am lifting a nearly ten-year God embargo, I wrote. And then I prayed.

I prayed for my sweet friends, their babies and the long, long life they deserve to have together. I prayed even though I’m notsure mine actually count anymore. Not being surewho’s on the receiving end, or how much of a difference I believe mymutterings will even make, I feel like a phony. A fair weather friend.

When Phil called me on Tuesday, he did not tell me he was having heart surgery on Thursday. Why? Because Phil is not like me. He doesn’t think about himself on a continual and relentless basis. In fact, he was calling me to help his better half with some sort of publicity piece, to check on my dating life, and to bug me about writing a book – conversation that did not hint at the complications ahead of him.

Last night, after Stephanie and I talked worst case scenarios, I packed an overnight bag and made arrangements to leave work early the next day. Just in case. I cracked jokes with Phil about vibrating hospital beds and fervently hoped that the prayers of an non-believer would count for a little something. Or, at the very least, not come with attached penalties.

Update: I will leave the lengthier explanations to Stephanie, but Phil is home and recovering. Thank you for your kindness, Internet Strangers. 

Girl One:  Let’s talk about something fun and potentially scandalous. You’ll have to start, cause I got nothin’.

Girl Two:  Oooh – that’s a tough one.  My personal excitement device is insanely loud and I wish I lived alone.

Girl One:  Ha! My “personal excitement device” fell out of the pillow it was casedin, when I had male company. He picked it up, said, “Whaaa?” and putit right back down.

Girl Two: Oh my god that’s way better!  Mine live in a makeup bag on my nighttable that I have instructed the roommate to never open or suffer theconsequences.  The silent one just isn’t as effective as the hammer.

Girl One:  It wasn’t in a perfect state of cleanliness, either. I mean, it was gross, but it wasn’t like, all pristine and sparkly.

Girl Two:  We are such liberated little scuzzmonsters. 

Girl One:  I mean, think of how the male company must have felt. That would be like finding… a crusty tube sock.

Girl Two:  Eh. Their entire bed is a scuzzy little gym sock, don’t ya think?

Girl One:  Point, set and match.

I had gone to bed for the night, with every intention of staying there. But the second I laid back against the pillows I realized it was not to be.

“Holy sh!t!,” I typed into my phone. “There’s a gecko in my bedroom!”

There was, in fact, a small, pinkish colored gecko hiding out in the joint between the wall and ceiling of my bedroom, where no respectable gecko ought to be.

Assessing the situation, I decided I had to act fast. The resident feline was asleep on the back of the living room sofa, but like that would last long. The second his mischief radar picked up a small, edible creature in a state of panic, chaos would surely ensue. I guessed that was the gecko’s reason for being inside in the first place. Feline persuasion. I snatched a shoe box from the closet and then walked calmly into the dining room to retrieve a chair, all the while sending out extra boring mental vibes. Don’t get up. Just um, dusting the ceiling fan. And then maybe reading the Financial Times. Nothing nearly so exciting as catching a lizard. Shhh. Go back to sleep.

Can I just say, before we go any further, that I did not realize geckos can shed their tails when the situation calls for it? Apparently, being tailless helps them to run faster and also, the detached tail then acts as a diversion… because it MOVES ON ITS OWN. Which is, to say the least, disconcerting. And even after you have rescued and secured the poor frightened fellow in order to transport him outside, the detached tail will continue whipping about wildly in an attempt to distract you from the real deal, moving rather frantically himself, inside your cupped hands.

People, it kind of freaked me out.

I wish I could say that things calmed down after I’d delivered the poor lizard (along with his still twitching tail) to his natural habitat (i.e. the patio). But they did not. Back inside, I realized that there was blood – gecko blood! – on my hands. I’d been awfully gentle with the little guy, so I went back outside to investigate the source. On close inspection (now in shock, he was no longer trying to make an escape), I saw that the reason Sir Hal wasn’t interested in my lizard dealings was that he’d already had his way with him. A little piece of my heart broke.

Because it’s just not something I’m capable of, I couldn’t put him out of his misery. So I went back inside, threw some evil glances in the direction my sleeping cat, and prepared myself for nightmares about tailless, suffering lizards.

I’d like to think that the reason he wasn’t still in the same spot when I went to check on him the next morning had something to do with magical gecko healing powers… and not the tree full of birds across the way.

I know, I know. What a downer.  This is why I don’t watch nature shows.