The Snarky Writer

Illegal Abortion

2012-01-31T20:16:00.000-08:00

I get to use this image again!

For whatever reason, whether or not women should be allowed to get an abortion is a political issue, and some people believe there is absolutely no reason abortion should be legal, even in cases of rape (fortunately, even the craziest people think an abortion can sneak by when the pregnancy will kill the mother, but if not that would be condemning a woman to death).

But all this got me wondering: what would I do if I were raped tonight and forced by law to carry a resulting pregnancy to term? For the sake of depression, and because the thing that started this was a presidential hopeful suggesting women view babies conceived through a rape as a "gift from God," which you surely wouldn't return, I'll include raising a baby bestowed upon me by the gift of rape.

Emotions:

First, going through a rape (something I fortunately have never experienced and hopefully never will) is one of the most traumatizing things a person can experience. Some statistics say between 15-20% of the population have been raped, but I'd be willing to bet it's more than that because men who are raped almost never report it and women who are raped are often too afraid, too traumatized or don't believe it's rape because the criminal was someone they knew. Even still, at least 15% of the population has been traumatized by rape. First off, if this were to ever happen to me I'd be at the police station and hospital to report it and have any evidence collected to catch the son of a bitch. But I would be devastated. I would replay it in my mind again and again, trying to come up with something I did wrong, some way I could have prevented it or stopped him. It would depress me intensely, most likely affecting my sleep, my day to day activities, and most certainly my relationship. As much as I can say now I wish I were stronger than that, sex would be entirely different after a rape, and there's no way that wouldn't be an issue. And if the rape resulted in a pregnancy and I was forced to carry it?

Money:

I currently make about enough to pay rent, utilities, car payments, car insurance, cell phone, food and gas with just enough left over to put aside for taxes in April and car insurance in July. Other than what I'm currently saving, which is already ear marked, I have no savings. I would have to keep my current job, even though it does not provide any benefits whatsoever, because no company would hire a woman about to need medical leave in 9 months. This would mean that any time I needed to go to the doctor or felt too sick to work would be unpaid, and my eventual maternity leave would be 1-3 months of no income. Plus, I would likely lose my job during the leave (they would have to replace me) and finding a job that paid decently or maybe even one that provided benefits would be next to impossible as a brand new, single mother who will need flexibility to care for her baby.

In addition, I have no health insurance so all those required doctor's visits would be debt under my name. Of course, I would have to have health insurance for myself and my baby once it's born, but I couldn't exactly go get pre-natal insurance after I got pregnant, now could I? My credit limit is $5k, which isn't anywhere near enough to have a healthy baby in a hospital. Actually having the baby would cripple me, and if there were any complications whatsoever I would never recover from the debt. Diapers, a car seat, baby clothes, and whatever else you buy for a baby (even Target maternity clothes are expensive) would be beyond my current budget, which would change to zero once I became unemployed.

I could cash out my stock, but it would only be a temporary fix and only enough to cover basic doctors visits or maybe the time I would be unemployed, if I somehow found a job soon enough. Plus, cashing out would affect me at tax time, so the benefit would be further diminished.

(Should I decide to give the baby up for adoption and happen to actually find a couple willing to adopt my rape baby, they would most likely pay for my medical bills and giving birth. However, they would probably not pay for sick days when I was puking or at the doctor or for maternity clothes. And they definitely would not pay for a gym membership so I could work on getting my body back and try going back to my normal life.)

Life:

I would be forced to move out of my current apartment and find a studio or 1-bedroom apartment, which is already something I can't afford, much less after at least a month of unemployment and thousands in medical bills. I could probably move back to my hometown and rent out a room in my mom's house, but I would still need a job to pay for rent (which wouldn't be much cheaper than a place in San Diego) and baby stuff (and like I said, I have no savings). Plus, it would involve leaving my friends, my boyfriend and my life in San Diego.

Speaking of boyfriend, that would most likely end. I feel fortunate to be with someone who feels the same as I do about having kids, but unfortunately for this hypothetical situation that's that we don't want them. Even if my boyfriend wanted to be supportive and helpful, I could never ask him to stay when I have a baby that belongs to a rapist, not to him. Being pregnant is enough of a strain when the baby belongs to both people in the relationship, but a rape and a pregnancy together would be too much.

Things I Would Give Up:

All hope of getting my Master's degree (student debt on top of medical debt? Yeah right.), my dream job (taking any job without considering the flexibility, the benefits, the day care), possibly freelancing, traveling, having a horse, spending any time taking care of animals for a living, and having anything else that goes along with the somewhat exotic lifestyle I want.

My whole life would be living so that a baby I never wanted would have a chance at a decent life because, despite it just being the right thing to do if you bring a child into the world, it's against the law to neglect it. I suppose I could just go on welfare. Let all the other taxpayers pay for me and my baby, and just not work. God, this is depressing.

I might also have to let go of what I hope a marriage would be like. Dating wouldn't be for me anymore, it would be to find a husband who would be a good father for my rape baby, who would not have a father. Not to mention, between working and raising a baby I'd never have time to actually date. Meeting a man who already has a child (and probably an ex wife) would most likely be my only option, and then date nights could be movies at home with the kids. Lounging in bed for hours, making brunch and mimosas on Sunday at noon, hanging out writing this blog, spending time on Reddit, and staying out late at a bar will be things of the past. And forget reading. Well, forget reading anything at my reading level.

Additional Comments:

Should I ever be raped (which I'm just going to hope never happens... keep my wits about me, stay out of creepy dark alleys...) I really hope the criminal wears a condom. Fortunately as far as pregnancies go I'm already on birth control and have access to Plan B, so the chances of me becoming pregnant are pretty slim. But there's sexually transmitted disease and the trauma to worry about, one of which I will most assuredly have to deal with. The bottom line is rape is something so truly awful and should never happen to anyone, but that's unfortunately not the world we live in. I just hope I'm never forced to bear the consequences of someone else's criminal actions.

A Case Of The Mondays

2012-01-23T22:42:00.000-08:00

Well, the week got off to a great start.

Got my first paycheck of the year and lost almost twice what I expected to taxes. I now pay more money in taxes per month than I do for my rent, including the increase that takes place in April. Which is fucking nuts. The US tax code is wildly confusing- I've never gotten a tax return more than $400, and that was once when the $300 make work pay thing was in effect a couple of years ago, and last year I owed taxes despite working and having taxes taken out. Paying a quarter of my income in taxes seems like so much to me. I made more money than this in the past and got to see more of my paycheck then... where does it all go and how to other people get hundreds on their returns?

Add to that people were absolute bitches on the phone at work, going so far as to yell at me and hang up when I mentioned our minimum (FYI: you're going to pay good money for a remodel, you can't go calling around and say you want the cheapest thing possible and get mad when businesses tell you they like making money) and my headache from Saturday night that never truly went away, I had to remind myself a few times that I got to wake up with wonderfully warm arms around me and that my car wasn't damaged from the car fire parked right behind it (terrifying few seconds while I checked it out, though).

One thing I took away from my parents' marriage was to worry about money, even if there's no need. I've never not been worried about money. My life is in perpetual save mode: for the next 3 months I'll be saving for taxes (I'll just barely make it), and until July I'll also be saving for car insurance, which I most certainly will not make at this rate. I had planned on joining a gym this week to train for the non refundable half marathon I already signed up for but now that's an unnecessary expense I might not be able to justify, especially when I should be spending that same money on new running shoes.

Makes me wonder how a person working full time for a decent wage and relatively low rent and living expenses can feel like she's just making it. I've been just making it since... well, I've always been that way, from college to now, and my current rent is only $100 more than it was when it was its lowest. The only addition is a car payment (which is low enough to be affordable) and full coverage insurance (which is a bitch); other than that my lifestyle hasn't changed too much. I still eat rice and potatoes a lot, going out to eat means parting with $5, and my wardrobe hasn't changed since right before I got laid off 3 years ago. Granted, there's no way I would have been able to afford a new car or this level of insurance at any point in the last 3 years, but I'm working so much more now. Doesn't that make a difference?

The thing that scares me is I'll talk to a professional about my tax situation and be told that's just the way it is, whether or not I'm able to understand it. And if that's just the way it is and a quarter of my paycheck goes to taxes, I still won't get a return. And if this is all the case, why am I not doing something fun for work? Why do I sit inside and look at a computer 2 feet from my face for 8+ hours a day, 5 days a week? I was making more money per hour when I was happiest, when I had more energy, when I didn't hate Mondays. I thought I was getting ahead but now it feels like the more I try to move the more I stay exactly where I always was.

And I couldn't see the rain today. Being stuck inside in a fluorescent room with a computer sucks on beautiful days, but it also sucks on the rainy ones. I love the rain and don't get to see it enough here... I'd like to at least watch it out the window. Hope this season is another wet one so that eventually it'll rain all weekend and I'll get to see it.

One Is Not Like The Other: Part 1

2012-01-22T15:23:00.000-08:00

This is what's wrong.

Let's get this straight right at the beginning: animal activism does not equal veganism.

Surprisingly, it is actually possible to eat meat and animal products and still support animal rights and welfare. I know, right? Now, this will involve educating yourself on your meat and animal choices and reevaluating where your food comes from and exactly how far you're willing to go to meet yourself in the middle. But it's really not hard, especially if animal activism is important to you.

Up until my preteen years I was an avid meat eater. In a way I identified with predators (my cat and dog, the hawks and owls I watched around my house, even the way my rat ate bugs), and meat was tasty. Especially sausage. Mmmmm, sausage. My tastes have changed over the years and although I eat very limited amounts of meat now I don't like the notion that you have to be vegan in order to support animal welfare.

I come across websites that imply (or outright state) that the only way to be a real animal activist is to adopt a vegan lifestyle. While I fully support those who are vegan and sometimes wish I had the courage and tastebuds there's just no way I could do that. And that's because I love cheese. Cream cheese with salsa or cottage cheese and tomatoes for breakfast, potatoes with eggs and cheddar in a burrito, mozzarella with tomatoes and basil, grilled cheese sandwiches, pepper jack or gouda with crackers and apple slices, rice and beans with cheese... I love cheese. The only meatless things I can order when eating out have cheese. And I'm OK with that.

But here's the thing: I love animals. Animals will always be around, and not having a pet in 2008 was the most depressing time in my life. Seeing wildlife every day at the Wild Animal Park made my year in 2009, I vote for animal rights when they're on the ballot. I make choices based on how it will affect animals and their environments and choose the meats I do eat carefully. But I also love food. Like, really love food. Cooking, creating new dishes, sharing food with people, grocery shopping, and eating. I love eating. I will never be one of those skinny twigs because I love food.

Probably 90% of my grocery shopping is done at Trader Joe's and Sprouts, which is about as local as it can get without going to a farmer's market (which is great, just a bit out of my budget for most things). I support local hunting and fishing and don't believe that eating animals is inherently wrong. It's the way we get our meat that's wrong, but that's in another post. It's also the idea that we must be eating meat for our meal to be "real"or for us to be healthy that's wrong.

Eating meat does not make a person an opponent of animal welfare just like not eating meat does not make a person a supporter of animal welfare. There are plenty of people who eat meat and support animal rights, people who want to see the way our animals are raised change, people who acknowledge their place as an omnivore who also believe animals we eat deserve a better quality of life and death. Suggesting otherwise is a little closed minded.

Intellectual Property and SOPA/PIPA

2012-01-17T22:45:00.000-08:00

So, in a very timely surprise, I discovered a blog I write at work has been plagiarized. The blog is about garage doors and has several categories of posts, including cool and interesting garage doors, garage door repairs, garage door accidents and new products highlights. However, another garage door blog (seemingly unaffiliated with a garage door company or service, unlike mine), copied and pasted my words into their own WordPress blog. Word for word, except for a slight change to the first sentence and the omission of a phrase in parenthesis in one or two places.

I noticed last week while researching a new blog to write about and started reading this other garage door blog. The words seemed very familiar, and a few sentences in I realized I was reading what I'd already written. My writing style is very personal- it's so easy for me to recognize my work, and when I had my other blog opened in another tab and could compare the words, it was obvious I had been plagiarized. This other blog stole two of my posts, that I knew about (searching through the entire website to find more of my work is on my to-do list this week), and made no attempts to change the wording or the meaning.

So I wrote them a comment on each of the blogs. It's not necessarily bad that they're ripping me off - in part, it's a little flattering that they're reusing my words - but it is stealing when they aren't giving me credit. In the comment, I said I didn't mind them using my work as long as they included my bio and a link to my website and gave the website my contact information. That was, what, Thursday? I checked the website again on Friday and my comment hadn't been approved yet, and there was no action on their part. Monday I went in and checked the website again and still nothing had changed. Before leaving work today I checked once more: still no credit, but now there was a new blog post. And it was stolen from me.

And now it's time to fight. That website is a blatant rip off of my work and who knows how many other legitimate blogs and websites. After politely and generously permitting them to use my words, words I researched, crafted and spent my time putting together along with SEO techniques to help them show up in Google searches and appropriate and cited images where applicable, with a small and legal acknowledgement that I was in fact the person doing the writing, they completely ignored me and went on to steal again.

Fuck. You. Goddamn garage door blog. Fuck you for being so cocky that you're not approving my request for credit and still ripping me off when you know I'm watching. Fuck you for changing the first sentence in an attempt to mask what you're doing. And fuck you for not being cool about it and throwing my website a link. The whole point of my garage door blog is to bring in website views for the services we offer, the services that support our company, the services that contribute to my paycheck. And this other website is out there stealing my words and pretending I don't exist.

So I got Google involved. And WordPress. And the big dogs will, hopefully, rain swift justice on them and force them to take my stolen posts down. Maybe the website will get investigated and shut down for stealing intellectual and copyrighted data.

The fact that all of this is going on immediately before SOPA and PIPA are being voted on is just timely. As of writing, Wikipedia is blacked out in opposition to SOPA (which is currently "shelved indefinitely") and PIPA, the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act, respectively, and Reddit will follow in a couple of hours (as well as a number of other much smaller or personal websites). The supposed intent behind SOPA and PIPA is to protect artists and intellectual property holders from having their content stolen, either through illegal downloading or blatant plagiarism. Copyright protection sounds like a noble cause but the reality is it would allow big corporations to go after individuals and who's to say the profits would go to the artists in the end?

Further, now that SOPA is shelved I'm convinced SOPA was just a front for PIPA to pass quietly. Here's why: SOPA was a big deal when it was announced. Once the public (slash the internet) discovered exactly what it was and what it could mean (because it was vague in all the wrong places) it became the devil. Groups became very vocal against it, calling senators for days and requesting meetings and seemed to eventually do enough to get it shelved for the foreseeable future. But PIPA isn't much better than SOPA and that's still on the table. In fact, it's getting voted on in a few days. And because it's been much quieter it has a good chance of passing. Which leads me to believe SOPA was just bad enough to get people riled up enough to make a fuss, on purpose, so they could cancel SOPA and slip PIPA through.

Normally I'd be linking a few different things in this post to outside sources for reference and citing, but SOPA and PIPA would probably go to Wikipedia pages, and the English versions are blacked out for the next 23 hours (as of writing), so I'm just not going to link anything.

Making A Point With Money

2012-01-15T19:04:00.000-08:00

The majority of my recent post have been somewhat depressing: between palm oil, poaching, the USDA killing birds, more palm oil, and the economy, there hasn't seemed to be much good in the big wide world out there. People are greedy and willing to do whatever it takes to make a buck or get things done the easy way, the rest of the world be damned.

All of this led to me wondering about the business practices of large corporations... the latest disappointment is from a company I love and have recommended for years, yet now all I hear is Apple buying products from what are essentially slave and child labor companies in China in buildings that work people 12+ hours for pennies and have suicide nets as a standard office amenity. Apple is wildly successful and insanely popular and their young, hip and socially aware following gives Apple the ability to change world business practices, so why support unfair and cruel business practices?

I know the answer, and it's the same reason high quality food companies use palm oil when they know it's low quality and environmentally damaging, but it's depressing. Corporations can make a higher profit margine by saving money on production, and if palm oil and child labor are the means to the end then so be it. It's got me thinking twice about getting an iPhone (and a MacBook Pro) when the time comes... I don't like the other products out there, but if buying from Apple means supporting horrid labor practices I can't feel good about that, and I really, really want to be excited about those purchases. (I know that other computer and phone companies are exactly the same, and that no matter what I buy I will be supporting environmental damage or child labor or some other horrible business practices, but Apple is so popular and believes so highly of itself that it should be above that. A silver lining may be that Apple has now, finally, disclosed almost every supplier for its products, allowing third party auditors to assess the conditions of the factories and create better positions for the workers.)

Last month I bought an American Apparel hoodie because I had a Groupon for half off. I always really liked the styles of the jackets and they seem to last forever, but even still I could never justify paying $50 for a jacket. At $25 it was way more reasonable, especially since the lower quality jackets at Target were $20 this season, and I'm glad the only negative business practice that purchase supported was skanky models and a skankier CEO. But I'm not hipster enough or rich enough to shop there all the time, so Target and Ross it is for the rest of my clothes, which no doubt save money with Chinese slave and child labor (not to mention Target's financial support of anti-gay fanatics).

One of the reasons I want to be quasi-wealthy one day is so I can spend $50 on American made jackets, buy sustainable and organic food at farmer's markets every week and really make an effort to make a difference with my money. And it's sad that doing so requires a certain amount of wealth, but it does. I already spend $8 on a bottle of shampoo (and am looking for new body wash, face wash, face scrub and hand soap), buy high quality cat food, avoid palm oil, get fair trade and organic tea, and only buy sustainable fish when I eat meat, but I know all or most of my clothes were originally made in a sweat shop somewhere, the battery in my phone was mined in Africa and probably cost someone his life, and now my computer (and iPod and likely every other electronic I own or use) is manufactured by little kids or miserable adults in China.

So what am I supposed to do? Ignorance really is bliss. Not knowing, or caring, can make life so much easier. Better, maybe not, but easier.

Palm Oil: Taking Over The World

2012-01-12T21:42:00.000-08:00

Palm oil free and the best cookie dough in the world.

Since hearing about the damaging effects of palm oil production more than two years ago I've been checking labels trying to buy products without palm oil (besides, it's just used as a cheap shortening and I prefer real butter anyway). When I discovered some of the things I regularly bought had palm oil I stopped buying them and adjusted my eating or found an alternative product somewhere else. And when I found out that shampoos had palm oil? Well, we can relive my crushing sadness.

I shop mostly at Trader Joe's and Sprouts and most of the prepared products I buy are made directly by the companies, so I know which products are palm oil free. Fortunately, Trader Joes is pretty good about having nothing but real, genuine ingredients in their food, which makes it all the more disappointing when their freezer lunches occasionally have palm oil (I wrote them a letter). I love, love, love that Trader Joe's packaged cookie dough doesn't use palm oil because they have the best cookies and I would be devastated if I couldn't buy from there anymore. But because you never know where palm oil and its league of awful sidekicks are going to show up next, I still always check the ingredient list when buying just to be safe.

Which brings me to the point... It's become a compulsive habit to check food labels, so when I picked up a dark chocolate and unearthly delicious caramel Ghirardelli square I browsed the label. Palm oil was right there, like the fifth ingredient.

*Sigh*

It's almost not even sad anymore. It's just literally in everything. Palm oil isn't even a quality ingredient: it's used as a cheap and lower-fat butter, so why would a high quality company like Ghirardelli use it? And now that I think back on my visits to Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco, their famous ice cream sundaes use Dreyers ice cream, which I learned a couple months ago has palm kernel oil.

Oh well... Ghirardelli Square is out of the way unless I'm already in Fisherman's Wharf, so it looks like I won't be making a trip there next time. Disappointments all over. At least their brownie mix doesn't have palm oil, and the directions call for vegetable oil, so I'm still buying that. And thank goodness, because Ghirardelli brownies are hands down the best you can buy in a box.

Not So Mysterious Anymore

2012-01-11T17:56:00.000-08:00

Remember several months ago there were whole flocks of birds literally falling dead from the sky? It was happening all over the United States though it concentrated in the South and East. Birds fell from the sky for several months last year and experts blamed a wide range of causes, from extreme weather to unusually loud noises to disturbances like fireworks. But the results of necropsies were inconclusive and at the time of publication for some of the articles chemical testing hadn't come back yet.

Now the answer may be a little more dark than a few flukes... it turns out a project called Bye Bye Blackbird is responsible for the deaths of many of these birds. The project is headed by the USDA and they are poisoning millions of black birds and other bird species across our country's agricultural center, from South Dakota to Arkansas to Maryland. Birds are being killed because they're eating grain and other crops from farmers. The birds then fly to other cities where they die by the hundreds and thousands, and take down birds of prey and other predatory animals who happen to eat these poisoned birds. The USDA disrupts the whole food chain and kills many, many more animals than it intends with these bird massacres. Unless the USDA is incredibly crafty and completely evil and purposely poisons black birds, knowing they'll be eaten by many other animals we call pests...

The coolest part? All these animals are being killed with our taxes.

The weird thing is there are also unexplained bird and fish deaths in Europe. Can the USDA have a hold on those animals, too? Are officials in Europe doing something similar? Are the people in this world really resorting to this blatant massacre of animals without even trying less lethal methods? Will we always be at war with the animals who were here before us, who are doing what they've always done, just because we're here now? Will we never think to use methods that allow us to coexist?

Why I Love Chipotle

2012-01-10T16:04:00.000-08:00

Living in San Diego, with the abundance of real, delicious and amazing Mexican food, it feels a little wrong to love Chipotle so much. It's not real Mexican food, and it really is like the Subway of Mexican cuisine, but my goodness it hits the spot. For around $6 you get a burrito that easily weighs two pounds, stuffed with fresh ingredients that you pick and choose and can see them prepare. For a little more than a dollar extra they'll give you a bag of some very yummy tortilla chips (seasoned with big bits of salt and lime!). I judge a Mexican place by its chips and Chipotle has them down.

I've loved Chipotle ever since I found out about their food purchasing habits: a significant percentage of their vegetables are purchased from local farms (about 20-30%) and so much of their meat is from naturally raised sources that when their suppliers can't meet their demands they post signs saying so. Chipotle supports the food documentary Food Inc, which is still on my Netflix queue, which leads me to believe they must not have much to hide. Ten years ago there wasn't much of a demand for sustainably raised meats, for animals to be treated humanely or for local shopping options, and now there are farmer's markets all over my city, Whole Foods is a sustainable Mecca and Chipotle and their "food with integrity" program is the leader in buying animals from real ranchers who don't use antibiotics (cue heavenly music). All, as in 100%, of Chipotle's pork is from natural ranchers (pastures, vegetarian food, letting pigs be pigs), and they're working on getting 100% of their chicken, beef and dairy from the same sources.

Chipotle also re-evaluated their menu a little while ago, now providing calorie counts next to their menu items, brown rice in addition to white and kids options. They also made the price of their salad the same as everything else to encourage salad eating.

Plus, their literature is snarky, and how can I not get behind that?

But the reason for this post? Every time I go in there when I'm feeling un-awesome they seem to pick up on it and make my day. Once I went in amazingly hung over after my worst night of drinking and a full shift the next day and got the most massive burrito and a sympathetic look from the workers who knew exactly what was up. Recently I went in on a frustrating lunch break and the cashier slipped me a mini bag of chips and a soda. It's not much, at all, but man does it make me happy. A little kindness goes a long way, and Chipotle is certainly doing it right.

Driving Stick

2012-01-07T17:03:00.000-08:00

Stick!

It's been about a month since I bought my car and I think I've really gotten the hang of the whole driving stick thing. At first it was a little frustrating because I kept stalling and was nervous about pissing people off and being too slow, but some encouragement from a friend and the stick-driving Reddit community made me less worried. I still have to concentrate on listening to the engine when I'm driving around town but the sweet spot is showing itself must faster now.

Parallel parking is coming easier, making me more confident that I can squeeze into those tiny spaces, and I've tackled the big scary hill by my apartment a couple of times. I still get excited when I shift smoothly and angry with myself when I make a mistake. But the mistakes happen a lot less often now.

There are still a couple situations that I don't have a handle on: letting the engine slow the car down in a low gear (the engine sounds like it's freaking out) and inching forward in traffic (it's probably best to just not do that). But learning all these things, and the intricacies of driving a manual transmission, is a lot of fun and it's really exciting. I can't wait until I'm good enough to teach my friends.

If there's any one part of manual driving that makes me think I have a handle on it, it's driving in heels and flip flops. In the last month, I've driven in my normal shoes, a couple different pairs of flip flops and heels at New Years and the only time I had a difficult time driving was when I drove barefoot after getting a pedicure. Driving in flip flops and heels was a slight concern when I started because The Ex would never drive in flip flops, saying it was too hard. Though he wouldn't walk in flip flops without intense prodding on my part either, so now I'm thinking it was more of an insecurity than a hardship... there's no way I could be a San Diego girl and not know how to do anything and everything in flip flops, and I can't very well always bring an extra pair of shoes when I need to wear heels, now could I?

Two Thousand Eleven

2011-12-31T18:36:00.000-08:00

After the disappointment that was 2010 I decided 2011 was going to be better. It so fucking was.

First, it was a year overwhelmingly full of love. I fell in love with San Diego all over again, discovered a love for running (which I'm working on rekindling as the year closes), and fell ridiculously crazy in love with a wonderful friend who I absolutely cannot wait to spend the next year with. I love my neighborhood, my brat of a cat, my apartment with the bars on the windows, and my new car. I loved seeing my friends move on in adulthood and succeed, paying off the debt I'd carried around since graduation (one of my favorite accomplishments), and seeing my sister get serious with someone who's great for her.

I started off the year by participating in a flash mob. I enjoyed it a ton, even though my roommate got really sick the days leading up to it and wasn't able to do it with me and now that flash mobs are so last year, I can at least say I participated in one. For silliness.

Easily my biggest accomplishment for 2011 was finishing 3 half marathons, 2 5Ks and a 4 mile race for a total of 49.3 racing miles and who knows how many training miles. I bought two new pairs of running shoes, several pairs of dry wicking socks, a running jacket, shorts and an iPod and send a few hundred dollars on entry fees and transportation. I have a small stack of bibs, 3 finisher medals (one of which glows in the dark!), a bunch of safety pins and more technical t-shirts than I know what to do with. It's a good feeling, and when I continue in 2012 I'm gonna try to beat that 2 hour mark.

Probably my second biggest accomplishment for 2011 was not moving. That's right, I had the same address for a full year, something which seriously doesn't happen very often for me. One of my goals for 2012 (a ridiculously easy goal, at that) is to make this address the one I live in the longest in San Diego. I have absolutely no intentions of moving, and unless my roommate decides to buy a place she doesn't either. North Park certainly feels a lot more like home now, and I've learned to appreciate what it offers.

I also was able to find a job in my area, one in which I'm using my degree (and, for the most part, need it) and making a higher rate than I ever have, which, now that there's a car payment, still seems like I'm just getting by. My commute is short, my hours are good, my coworkers are a lot of fun to be around and my boss can be pretty generous when he wants to be. It may not be my dream job, and one goal for 2012 will be to find my dream job, but it's good for right now, and it's helping me learn a lot that's going to help me in the future.

This year was not without it's down moments, however. In a coincidental yet poetic turn of events, the day before my birthday, which just so happened to be a day before the 1 year anniversary of my dad officially cutting me out of his life, I went to his house and gathered the last of my belongings there. It was civil and very quick and I'm glad to have gotten it over with, but it has made the last few months extra full of anger and resentment. Every time I see an older woman with red hair I feel incredible hatred towards these perfect strangers. It's becoming difficult to understand how such hatred can exist in the same place as such incredible love.

It was also not a good year for electronics. My camera battery is 99% dead, and the minute or so that it holds a charge really isn't long enough to take and download even one picture. Also unfortunately, I don't think they make those camera batteries anymore (at 4 years old it might as well be ancient) so it looks like I might have to buy a new one. Lucky for me, however, I have my own personal photographer (ok, he's not my own personal photographer) who is usually willing to take my pictures for me, so buying a camera isn't an immediate need. My computer also took a turn for the worse- a laptop without a working screen isn't good for much. The weird thing is after all the shit I put that machine through it still works perfectly and is way faster than the one I've been borrowing for the last few months, except for the screen. A new MacBook Pro is very, very high on my list of things to buy once I pay taxes. Finally, though this isn't really an electronic, my trusty Hyundai Accent died, forcing me to buy a new car.

Other events this year included two cousin's weddings, a trip to Disneyland, discovering goodies at my farmer's market, the rapture, the return of 90s TV shows, learning to drive stick shift, paragliding, getting my 6th piercing, not cutting my hair (it's super long!), a power outage, and getting more fish. It's been a very full year, and I'm proud to say I achieved the goals I set for myself at the beginning. I'm also happy to be looking forward to 2012, taking steps to accomplish my new goals, and sitting with my boyfriend and a bucket of popcorn as we watch people flip out over the Mayan calendar prediction.

Conservation Lows

2011-12-29T17:19:00.000-08:00

More than a dozen dead elephants in one box.

This year wasn't a particularly good one for a lot of people, mostly due to the world economy, but it was a particularly bad one for endangered animals. In addition to smuggling, a man releasing his private zoo before offing himself and the essential acceptance of global climate change as legitimate fact, poaching was steeply on the rise in 2011. More than 400 rhinos were poached this year (compared to less than 15 just 4 years ago) and thousands of elephants were killed for their tusks. Millions of dollars worth of illegal ivory was confiscated and showed that poachers are getting smart in the ways they kill elephants and transport ivory to Asia.

Which really pisses me off. As awful as rhino poaching is and as useless as it is (really, Asia? Powdered rhino horn is going to cure your cancer?) at least they believe it has medicinal properties so valuable that they'll pay it's weight in gold for even a few ounces. Elephant tusks, on the other hand, are used purely for decoration. Ivory is carved into shapes (sometimes, for irony, in elephant shapes), used to adorn silverware and handles and added around the house to show off wealth. How fucking vain. Oh, and sometimes elephant feet are also chopped off to be used as a side table to display more wealthy shit. Even ivory. Cause, you know, that's high fashion. And totally worth causing an entire species to decline and untold amounts of pain and suffering.

Again, I'm left to wonder what will happen when these animals do disappear from the planet because, let's be real, it's only a matter of time for most of them. There's only one species of rhino that is doing alright and that's only because of extreme protection, and even they had record deaths this year, and the rest are on the fast track to extinction. I'm still not sure what people will do when there's no more supply of rhino horn... will the existing horns skyrocket in price? Will Asian medicines be altered to include parts from other animals? Will the other animals used in Asian medicine be poached even more (bye bye tigers)? Will people realize they were silly to think that rhino horn or tiger penis had any benefits whatsoever and shrug that they're gone now? Will ivory become even more prized and will people begin hurting each other for a piece?

And what about the rest of us? I'm always one to revel in "I told you so," but (to quote my favorite movie butler/caretaker), "on that day... even I won't want to."

Goodbye, Accent

2011-12-21T21:04:00.000-08:00

My first car.

Much like when I was 15 and thought my cat would be with me forever, I really didn't think the day would come when I would say goodbye to my car, that I'd be 35 and still driving the car I got when I was 16. That car and I have been through quite a bit in the nearly 10 years I had it: my first job, a tire blowout, moving to San Diego, a near death experience with a dead battery, half a dozen trips to San Francisco, a weekend drive to Humboldt, 15 months of a 90 minute daily commute to Africa and countless (OK, 11) addresses.

My Hyundai Accent was $10,000 new in 2002 and I unwrapped it on the lot. It had .2 miles on the odometer and over the next nine and a half years I put 141,000 more on it. My intention was to run it into the ground and only upgrade when I had no choice. Fortunately, that happened at a time when I was in a position to upgrade. I was able to make the decision to buy a new car rather than be forced to pay for the necessary repairs and go days or even weeks without my car. It's a huge relief to know I won't have to worry about problems or repairs for a good long while, but handing over the keys was a little heartbreaking.

Although, the whole car selling experience fascinated me. For the last month I was under the impression that selling a car was a much bigger deal than selling any other used item, but it really wasn't (for the most part, the same went for buying a car). I posted my car on Craigslist at 6:30pm and it was gone within 3 hours. My phone was ringing off the hook and the first guy to look at it wanted it. My car was barely even working and people were calling and emailing offering cash without even seeing it, which makes me wonder if I priced it a little low (honestly I didn't... the car needs work). I made the buyer sign a form I created myself stating the car was sold "as is" and without a smog check (required by law, but obviously I would have been unable to fulfill that requirement) and signed my title away.

I'm going to miss that car. For what it was, it required very little maintenance and effort on my part, got great gas mileage and despite the noises and quirks I knew it'd get me where I needed to. It was time to say goodbye though, and I hope it'll have a few more years once it gets a new transmission.

Bye, Accent. You were a great first car.

Living Alone

2011-12-19T22:28:00.000-08:00

Making it.

Exactly one year ago today I started this blog post after reading a hard-hitting New York Times article about the trials and challenges of being young and living in New York City and trying hard to make it. (The only reason I didn't publish was because I didn't save the link to the article and then couldn't find it again.) The point was supposed to be college graduates will do what it takes to live in the city because doing what they're passionate about matters to them, which is not something our parents and grandparents did. I expected to read stories of aspiring actors and artists working multiple serving jobs, taking any role or gig just because it would get their names out there and that's where you start. What I read was entirely different.

The article opened up with an inside look into some kid living in the center of the city, in a tiny apartment, trying to make it, and was quoted talking about sacrifices he makes in order to live where he does (unsafe neighborhood, run down building, no space to turn around). The kicker? His mom pays his rent.

What. The. Fuck. I'm making it on my own as a college graduate in a shitty economy and my mommy isn't paying my rent. I'm working because I have no choice but to live on my own (when I started this post a year ago I had written "I'm working in a crap job because I have no choice"), but I wouldn't want it any other way anyway. My job choice is important to me, like this kid, and I've left jobs before because I was unhappy, but I have yet to let someone pay for my rent or bills because I just didn't like my job or it wasn't what I went to college for. Clearly: I spent over a year of my college educated life driving a broken van part time for just above minimum wage because it was paying the bills at the time. But you know what? My princess cat wouldn't do so well homeless.

The rest of the people they interviewed were at least paying their rents, but 2 of them had professional jobs and just chose to spend their entire paychecks living in a 8X5 room in a posh neighborhood. That's not "oh it's sooo hard to make it in this economy!" That's making a choice and living with the consequences. Hey, I'd have tons of credit card debt too if I ate at restaurants and went to clubs every night, but I don't. I make choices, and I live with the consequences. Not going out means I don't get into debt. Seems worth it to me.

I'm also reminded that the time is just around the corner for those wonderful Christmas letters we get from people we apparently don't speak with anymore because they think we care about the very mundane aspects of their lives. A couple of years ago (or was it last year? I'm getting old...) one relative sent out her family letter and ended it saying how, like everyone, they're getting by and waiting for the economy to turn around, because life got so much harder with the increased taxes on the wealthy and now they have to pick and choose which charities they donate to.

Such crap.

Religious Questioning

2011-12-18T22:18:00.000-08:00

First thing that came to mind when I did a Google image search...

Not long ago I had a random question about God being omnicient: if God is all knowing and knows what a person will do, what a person will be like and what will happen to a person before that person is even conceived, if God creates a person knowing full well that this person will be bad and will not repent or change his ways at any point during the person's life, why wold God make such a person?

As a Catholic I was raised to believe that all people have free will, and that's why bad things happen to good people, but that even the worst sinners can repent at any time, call Jesus into their hearts, and be saved and welcomed into Heaven with open arms as long as the repentance was genuine- even if it's on a death bed and likely fueled by fear of Hell (which, to hear many Catholics and Christians tell it, is a perfectly acceptable reason to believe in God). So Hitler, who lived with such hatred for a very large number of people, could have called out to God, sorry for the way he lived his life and sorry for the atrocities he caused, and God would have happily called his soul to heaven (I'm going to leave out the fact that most sects of Christians, including Catholics, are supposed to believe all other faiths are damned to Hell, so in that sense Heaven would actually be the perfect place for Hitler).

But there's a huge problem with that logic, if God knows what's going to happen to every person then He should know whether or not a horrible person would eventually repent, and if He knows if a person wouldn't repent why should that person be created in the first place?

Additionally, and this is my mere human logic, why not just not make a bad person, repentance or not? What if Hitler had a moment of clarity before his death and repented to God for his actions? What if Hitler is in Heaven? Leads me to believe, if repentance and turning to God at the last moment no matter what the sins is so important, that God is pretty selfish. Seems pretty human.

I've also been going through some Jehovah's Witness literature (not because I sought it out, because it's been sitting on my boyfriend's table after they talked to him, and he asked so many questions they ended up leaving). The material is supposed to explain why you should want to be a Witness, why it's best to devote your life to God/Jehovah, and what it is the Witnesses actually believe. Sex before marriage is a big no-no (it will undoubtedly lead to disease and an empty, vapid life), everyone should definitely get married, and all married couples should have daily prayer time. The booklet I read had a true life account from someone who grew up in a bad neighborhood (in an impoverished country), got caught up in gambling (he was "passionate about horses") and led a life filled with alcohol, women and bad decisions. He turned to Jehovah's Witnesses and is now married with a daughter. Ta dah! What a great life. Except in the story he says he doesn't hide anything from his daughter and tells her about his past in order to show her what a life outside the Jehovah's can be like. I'm not a parent, but I'm not so sure that's a great idea- all those "I used to be on drugs and was in jail but then I got clean and now my life is fantastic" presentations throughout school only shed light on the possibility that you can do whatever the fuck you want until you decide to adult-up and then everything will be ok.

These things just shed more doubt and uncertainty on the whole religious idea. I know it's the whole point of faith, but having blind faith without real or solid answers is a little difficult. Even when I was a kid I asked "why?" and "because I said so" never cut it. Why would I be different now?

A Cynic Falls In Love

2011-12-07T22:54:00.000-08:00

This one has a pretty big say in my romantic life.

I feel like I've reached the age where I've seen enough real life relationships succeed and fail to know what makes one work. A few years ago, during one of the times I was contemplating ending things with The Ex, someone told me that if we did break up it would be a successful relationship, that just because the relationship ends doesn't mean it's a failure. A failure, similarly, doesn't just mean the couple split; it could mean they've stopped being in a relationship but haven't split up because they don't have the guts.

Most of the last four months I've been head over heels crazy for one of my closest friends, and although I'd missed being in love and wanted to be with someone I could feel strongly for, the speed and intensity with which it all happened is very unlike me. I'm a cynic. I don't believe in love at first sight, soul mates or destiny. And yet there hasn't been a day since August that I haven't felt powerful. I have that I'm-in-love feeling every single day. No one's made me feel this way about myself before. It's pretty incredible. One of the biggest differences between this relationship and every other person I've been involved with (or know) is that we want the same things. Or values line up, which means there's no automatic end to the relationship. It's not like he's allergic to cats. Or wants kids. Or likes pulp. We have the chance to give it a shot and not assume we have an expiration date or that there would be some huge hurdle to work around. That makes me really relaxed and unconcerned about where it's going or what it means or what we're doing. The big stuff isn't a problem and it makes the little stuff seem... little.

There are things you can't force or fake in a relationship: a genuine interest in what the other person does, a genuine desire to be near him, attraction (and chemistry), a genuine desire to facilitate his life and an appreciation for him as a person. And then there are things you can force, or at least remind yourself to do every now and then: take on an extra chore, let him pick how you spend your Sunday together, use your manners and let the little things go. I'm a volatile person sometimes. I pick fights, I'll argue any point just because I can and I'm proud. I learned a long time ago that I need to put most of that on the back burner if I want to have a meaningful relationship. But it really helps when you genuinely want to make someone as happy as he makes you. And that my cat is just as smitten as I am.

Zoom Zoom

2011-12-05T19:27:00.000-08:00

So I bought a car.

Yay!

This was not something I was expecting to do for a while, and not something I was prepared for, but I'm pretty excited about and happy with what I got. It's a Mazda 2, something that's only been around in the states for about a year, the manual sport model (which sounds fancy, but it's the base model because that's what I can afford), and I'm still figuring out how to drive it. My friend helped me get it home the first night and gave me a much, much needed refresher course on how to drive stick (I stalled a good half dozen times before having a successful start) and I've been trying to get the hang of it ever since.

I broke it in this weekend with a trip to Las Vegas. (Hey, I spend ~$15 thousand on a new car I'm not going to spend another $200 on a plane ticket, OK?) There are some questions I have about driving stick, and about driving this particular car, but I think I'll get there quickly.

I'm pretty proud that I was able to do this, and do it 100% on my own. I got a loan from my credit union (which was a BITCH because of my employment status- never doing 1099 again), had a decent down payment saved up, great credit and did all my research in about 2 weeks. On the one hand, it really sucked that as soon as I'm in a position to buy things I want and save up some money my car breaks and I have to get myself into a load of debt, but I'm fortunate that I don't also still have my credit card debt, bad credit, or less than what my current work situation is. It's nice knowing I can do this.

Saying goodbye to my Hyundai Accent isn't going to be easy. I might have given that car a lot of shit in the past but for 140+ thousand miles in 9 years and very little maintenance requirements, even after what would be considered an accident, is pretty great. I did love my little car, but there was no way I was going to rebuilt the transmission. I'm sad it didn't make it to 10 years though, and I'll miss that car. But it's going to be very great to not have to worry about car repairs or whether or not my car will make it on a trip for a good long time.

So if you're looking for a fixer-upper car I've got an automatic 2002 Hyundai Accent that needs a new transmission, battery, tires, brakes and shocks with your name on it.

Slugging

2011-11-15T22:11:00.000-08:00

And then society does something awesome: carpooling with strangers.

Slugging, as it's called, is when a car pulls up to a line of waiting people, calls out a destination, picks up 2 random strangers, and hops in the carpool lane. Yes, trusting complete and total strangers with your commute, your car, and your life.

Why oh why would people do this, and in DC to boot? Hint: not because carpooling is environmentally friendly. Slugging has a number of benefits for both driver and passenger, which is what's making it so popular. The driver gets a quicker commute by skipping congested highways in the much emptier carpool lanes (and in some places escapes a toll, saving actual dollars) and the passengers get a free ride that's much faster and cheaper than public transportation. Win win!

The thing that makes slugging great (or rather, the thing that made news organizations take notice) is not necessarily that it's environmentally friendly or a nice time saver for everyone, it's that it came about organically and without government assistance or encouragement. People wait in line at the big employment centers in the city and sooner or later someone going their way will come along and offer up a ride. Completely for free.

I actually found out about this months ago (like, 8 months ago), but I was reminded of it this week because I've become carless.

That's right... my trusty little Hyundai which wasn't actually so trusty has finally gone kaput. It was a slow end and I kept telling it to just do this one thing (make another drive up to my hometown, jump my roommate's car, drive a little faster because I was running late) and I'd get it fixed. I also promised it new tires and shocks. But when Kelly Bluebook said my car wasn't worth even giving me an estimate (they can do that???) I decided it was time.

And now I really wish we had slugging in San Diego. Or some form of reliable public transportation. However, I'm incredibly fortunate to have people I can depend on. My roommate just so happens to work right down the street from me and usually starts and ends around the same time I do, and she's been awesomely driving me to and from work most days. I'm also fortunate to have a self-employed boyfriend who will let me use his car on days he doesn't need it and offers to drive me on days he does need it. And, by a stroke of good luck, my boss happens to have a spare truck he isn't using (due to some bad business luck on his end) and has generously offered to let me borrow it.

I wish I lived close enough to work to ride a bike, or that my city had public transportation (there isn't even a bus route near my work). But because most of my whole country is a must-have-car place I'll be buying myself a new car pretty soon here. Which makes me a little sad. I thought my car would make it to our 10 year anniversary, and I thought (and feared) I'd have it forever.

Barbaric

2011-11-14T23:11:00.000-08:00

It's not surprising to hear stories like Ethiopian tribes killing their infants and children for what seem like ridiculous and insignificant reasons.

Like when a baby is born to a woman who hasn't gone through the marriage ceremony rites, or when a baby's top teeth come in before his bottom teeth, or when a child is injured in certain ways. These babies, called mingi, are cursed, and must be killed in order to protect the rest of the tribal members from drought, famine and death. The tribes don't see it as murder, they see it as protecting the rest of their members. By sacrificing one infant they see it as a sort of insurance policy that must not be allowed to expire.

Naturally, the mothers of these mingi children are sad at the loss of their babies. The connection they have with their babies while they're still developing is understated, and even when the women know they must give up their babies (often without even being able to look at them before they're killed) they still want to keep them. But they don't because they don't have a choice.

What you don't expect to hear is stories of forced sterilization of children, teens and women in the United States.

North Carolina used to (as recently as 2003) legally allow the forced sterilization of people deemed to have undesirable genetic traits, which included poverty, alcoholism and promiscuity, in order to improve the genetics of the area. The state eugenics board (aimed at "improving the genetic composition of a population") was formed in the 1920s and tens of thousands of women and men were sterilized until the 1970s. Many of the victims had no idea what was happening to them. One woman was sterilized at 13, immediately after giving birth to the child she had after her rape, and didn't find out about it until she was married 6 years later and trying to have more children.

This is America. Things like that should never happen here. It should never happen anywhere, but we're supposed to be a country of educated, free people. These victims, the ones who are still alive, might not even be compensated. The state issued an apology a few years ago, which was seen as too little too late. Sad.

No Excuse for Abortion

2011-11-05T12:52:00.001-07:00

A person.

A proposed law in Mississippi will make it illegal to have an abortion except to save the mother's life. The new law will define "personhood" as a fertilized egg. Not even a growing fetus- a fertilized egg, two cells that haven't even implanted yet, which haven't even grown and don't have any nourishment in order to have a life. A fertilized egg will have full legal protection according to the law, which means it has the same rights as you and I and a person can be prosecuted for harming a fertilized egg. Including the mother carrying the fertilized egg.

So what if she has a natural miscarriage? Will it seem suspicious if she's unmarried? Or what if she does harmful things (drinking, eating mercury-laden fish) because she doesn't realize an egg has been fertilized? Sometimes women go weeks or even months before realizing they're pregnant, and if a fertilized egg is a person then a woman could be jailed for unknowingly harming or killing a "person."

What about birth control methods that prevent a fertilized egg from implanting? Or medical treatments that are lifesaving for a person but damaging to a fertilized egg? Even IVF is going to be sketchy under this law (and IVF is for people who want to have babies): an egg is fertilized outside of the uterus and then inserted in the hopes of implantation. Several eggs are used at once to increase the odds that one will implant and turn into a fetus and then into a baby. But what happens to those extra eggs? This new law will make it illegal for them to be discarded, which could mean parents who really want one baby might be forced to have several at once.

What about rape or incest? This new law insists that a resulting pregnancy will be more blessing than reminder of the rape, that women who go through with the pregnancy are happy they did, women who choose abortion regret it, and hey, there's always adoption (because there are so many families just waiting for an unwanted rape baby). One woman is standing up in favor is this proposed law, saying she is a rape survivor and regrets the abortion she had 13 years ago. Her words? "Rape is no excuse for abortion." She believes that what she did to her baby (the two cells that found each other in her uterus much like a tumor) was far worse than what her rapist did to her. And maybe it was. Maybe her 31 year old self is now regretting the baby she could have had at 18. But at 18 years old could she really have been in a good position to raise a baby she was forced to have? Does he really believe forcing other 18 year old women to have their rapists babies is for the best?

My biggest gripe with people who are so anti-abortion/pro-life as to want to legislate it and make it a crime for others to choose a different outcome is that adoption is always used as a fall back. Just have the rape baby and give it up for adoption, as if a life in foster care is good enough.

Maybe I'm just biased because I grew up knowing I was planned for, wanted (at least by one parent), provided for and taken care of, but I think all children deserve the same chance I got. Growing up in foster care, or in poverty because the mother had no choice but to give birth at a time she wasn't ready, or knowing you're unwanted and a burden, doesn't make for healthy productive adults. Sure there are those success stories of people who started out in shitty childhoods and became something great but they're not the majority. Shouldn't all kids be wanted? How would it feel to grow up in foster care because your mother couldn't bear looking at you because half your DNA and physical features belong to her rapist? How would you feel knowing our father was a rapist and probably has no idea you even exist? It doesn't seem reasonable to me. And that's why I believe the option to abort a fertilized egg or fetus should remain legal. It just means there's a choice, it doesn't mean that legal abortion becomes mandatory. If you want to have the baby you conceived after being raped you can, but if you decide that's an undue punishment you don't have to, and if you don't want an abortion but don't want a baby you can give it up for adoption. Three options to choose from, since no one chooses to be raped.

But that's just me. And if this thing passes Mississippi will be even more missable.

Louder Than Words

2011-10-29T08:52:00.000-07:00

People are really good at telling others how they are. I've been hearing a lot of it lately, and the more I hear it the more I believe it's not true. When I was in high school and all the girls were wearing shirts that said ridiculous things like "Mrs. Timberlake," or "Caliente" it was blindingly obvious that the people buying and wearing them were anything but. I'm well into my 20s now and not only am I hearing it more, but I'm hearing it from people who are older than me and should know better. But they're still wrong.

When I started at my current job the office manager would talk about how her husband makes 6 figures and only works because she gets fulfillment out of making a company grow, something she's done in the past. But certain things make me think maybe she really does need the work: working 10+ hours a day in a highly stressful environment for little money, wearing clothes with holes in them or clothes that don't quite fit, bad spending habits in the past, and her mother-in-law lives with them in their apartment in a shady neighborhood. Granted, some of these things I do too (hell, my apartment has bars on the windows), but I'm not claiming that I don't absolutely need to work, and all of these things make me question whether that's really true for her.

I've also heard "friends" go on about how important friendship is, how much they value others, how they want others to value their friendship, too. Proclamations like these aren't true but I get the feeling that the people saying them likely want them to be true, at least for the time being. A couple years back I was friends with a coworker who said these things all the time and I fully believed it. Then I left that job and realized he was using me for a ride to work and a couch to sleep on. When I started hearing those same proclamations some months back from a different friend I was skeptical. Turns out I had a right to be. Certain people have different ideas of what friendship is, and when your ideas on your respective roles in that friendship differ it's hard to maintain a relationship. Fortunately for me it was good to get out of that first friendship and not too hard to let the second one slip by.

We judge others all the time, but I think our worst and least accurate judges are ourselves. We're so quick to tell others what we're like instead of letting others find out for themselves. And why don't we actually live up to what we say we are? Show your friends, coworkers and acquaintances what you're really like with actions, not with empty words.

Palm Oil Invasion

2011-10-26T21:45:00.001-07:00

Wish I had my photos... I could show you a lady I know.

Right before bed last night I read an article about palm oil. In addition to the damaging effects I knew about (deforestation, rampant species extinction, encouraging poverty), the article describes how is encourages child labor and slavery. For many months I've been reading the ingredient list on all of the packaged or processed foods I buy (which actually isn't very much) looking for palm oil and palm kernel oil. Turns out I should be looking at the products in my shower, too.

Sodium laureth sulfate is an ingredient in many shampoos and body washes. I recognize this ingredient because for the last two years I've wondered if it's a contributing factor to having irritated skin in certain areas and have been trying to find shampoos that are both cruelty-free and sodium lareth sulfate free. Know how hard that is? I checked the bottles in my shower this morning, including my beloved St. Ives Oatmeal and Shea body wash and Apricot face scrub, and lo and behold SLS. I honestly woke up saddened at the realization that SLS is in fucking everything and then got even more sad as I discovered the ingredient in products I've loved for years. For most of the day I felt a sort of helpless. I really try to make environmentally conscious decisions every day: how many paper towels I use when I dry my hands at work, running errands close to work or home so I'm not driving out of my way and wasting gas, making sure the lights are turned off, turning off my fan every morning... yet by buying products I thought were good for me and good for the Earth I'm actually contributing to loss of forests and the extinction of species.

But this story isn't all bad. On my way home from work I stopped at Sprouts to pick up some groceries and my face lotion. While I was there I figured I was in a good place to check out body products that meet my standards. Turns out Sprouts is a very good place for that! There's a great variety of brands that are within my price range, have the leaping bunny logo, and even many that are sodium laureth sulfate free. I understand my price range for these products is significantly higher than most people's but for what I'm getting I think it's worth it. Knowing the things I use on my body aren't tested on animals, that the money I spend isn't contributing to species loss and also not irritating my skin is well worth the nine bucks.

But it looks like I'm now in the market for a new body wash that meets those specifications and also moisturizes super well, so, you know, if you've got one I'm interested. Otherwise I'll be spending the next several months testing out various brands until I find one I like enough to stick to, which was a rather expensive and disappointing 2 year process with shampoos.

Apple

2011-10-06T20:44:00.000-07:00

Anyone who knows me knows I'm a big fan of Macs and Apple products. I never really had a preference when I was starting out with computers; all I really knew was that Macs were twice as expensive as other computers, so why spend the money?

Looking back, I remembered the first computer I was exposed to was a Mac in 4th grade. But it wasn't until I was in 7th grade that my family got our first computer. I have no idea what it was but it didn't last very long. That was the age of AOL and dial-up and me getting yelled at for taking up the only phone line for chatting online with my high school boyfriend. After that computer we got an e-machine, which was assembled by a family friend who was our go-to computer guy. This family friend later told us the computer had problems because we rearranged the shortcut icons on the desktop. I didn't know much about computers, but I knew that couldn't be true.

When I was 18 The Ex introduced me to Macs. He was frustrated with my limited access to the family e-machine so he lent me his old, black, plastic Mac. Six months later I bought my first PowerBook (ironically, I'm using a PowerBook to write this...) and I never looked back. I used that computer for 5 years, all through college and beyond. I loved it because it was mine: I bought it, I used it. But it was amazingly easy to use and didn't have the same problems the family computers had.

Since then I've used a Mac at home and a PC at work, and I just get frustrated at work. Also since then, the company that created that PowerBook has changed the way the entire world communicates. Even if you're a PC person you have an iPod, you use iTunes, you want an iPad and you use or are super familiar with the iPhone. All of these inventions? Steve Jobs.

Also, Pixar. Some of the best Disney movies were great because of the animation Pixar did, which was headed by none other than Steve Jobs. He changed movies, computers, cell phones, music and the way people communicate with each other. He talked about passion, determination and making a difference. It wasn't just a fad or just a popular thing to like Apple products: they were easy to use, intuitive, and endlessly stylish.

The world lost a great person yesterday when he died, but he's one of the lucky ones who was able to live to see his ideas change the world for the better. When I buy my MacBook Pro in a month or so, and when I likely eventually get the iPhone, I'll be remembering the genius behind the person who put all these ideas together.

364 Days

2011-10-03T21:20:00.000-07:00

On October 3, 2010 I woke up on a couch after a night of partying in San Francisco with my best friends. I remembered having one of the best nights of my life and certainly the best night of that year, but in the next second I realized my dad never even sent a text saying happy birthday.

On October 1, 2011 I went over to my dad's house to gather the few boxes of old books, photo albums and knicknacks from my childhood because the previous three hundred and sixty four days had made it abundantly clear that he wanted to forget he had any ties to me.

I felt the strong urge to tell my dad what I'd been thinking for the last 364 days. I knew it wouldn't help anything but getting it off my chest to the person who's caused me more grief than anyone else would have made me feel better. Instead I said 4 words:

Me: *knock knock*

Him: Come in.

Me: We're good.

Him: *comes to the door and indicates the garage* Your things are in there.

Me: Thank you.

And in about 6 minutes we packed our things and ourselves into my little car and left. He didn't overtly watch us pack up and go, but I hadn't even started my car before he'd closed the garage door. No goodbye.

On the upside, I remembered just how much elephant things I've accumulated since childhood. My sister tore into a garbage bag with all of my old stuffed animals and tossed them to me: "Elephant, elephant, elephant, bear in an elephant costume, Raggedy Ann..." Some things just never change.

I now have some amazingly embarrassing pictures, some treasured pictures of Milo, my high school cap and diploma, and cards and keepsakes from friends. I'd completely forgotten the vast majority of the things I had there, but we had a great time going through them and laughing and remembering being kids. But some things I just don't have room for, and can't justify keeping in an apartment especially with as often as I move, so I'll be keeping only the things I absolutely can't part with.

In the end, I'm very glad to be done with my dad. It's hurt me more than I cared to admit the last 364 days (well, more than that, but at least before then I thought there was a chance), and I'm ready to not be angry anymore. If he wants to believe we have a relationship, that he's doing everything he can to be a dad, there's nothing I can do. If this were anyone other than my dad people would be telling me to stop trying. It's only because he's my dad that it's acceptable to keep beating a dead horse. But I have too much self respect to allow it beyond the 364 days I've already allowed it, and a father shouldn't ever treat his daughter this way. This isn't me taking a stand so much as giving in to the stand he took October 3, 2010. I have to accept the things I cannot change.

And hey, I'm 26 now and I've got a pretty good life going on. And I'll always have elephants.

In Which I Am 4

2011-09-29T22:37:00.000-07:00

How I feel most of the time.

When I get discouraged about the world, especially if I don't have a job, the first thing I do is stop listening to or reading the news (and why I turn to Fark and Reddit for my news more than ever). The news can be really depressing, and if you're spending weeks and months looking for a job or stability hearing how the economy might be double dipping isn't very encouraging.

Even though I have a job the news is still discouraging. The somewhat recent Rupert Murdoch scandals and the political turmoil over the United States debt makes me feel like people in high places are just as out to get us as anyone else. And now there's even more games in our government with the upcoming debates and elections, now the only word on our minds is "jobs" and we're throwing away our environment because the jobs are worth it right now. Which makes me wonder, like a child, why do people do bad things to other people? Am I just naive to think that people, especially those in higher positions, should be good and decent? Is it really silly to think that the people we hire and elect to protect us and our interests should actually protect us and our interests?

I haven't decided if I'm an idealist or just naive, but I don't think it's very hard for the world to be a better place. Children should all be wanted and have good lives, leaders should protect their people and not starve or kill them, and people everywhere should act like people, not wild animals. But we have greed and corruption all over the world that make it near impossible for the honest people to get a leg up, or even keep going. Sometimes it feels like the bad people overwhelm the good ones. It'd be nice if everyone could be good and we could all get along.

Maybe I am 4 again.

Happy 18th Birthday, Milo

2011-09-25T14:39:00.000-07:00

It's definitely getting harder and harder to still say he'd be however old if he were still alive; cats can live to be 18 but not very often, and especially not if they go outside. But I can still pretend.

Usually twice a year I write about how that cat was more than a cat: the day he was born and the day he died. Milo was the best Christmas present I could have ever imagined and there's nothing I could think that could be better. I might've only gotten 8 years with him, which was entirely too few, but in those 8 years he affected a lot of people.

Milo was the love of my life. But he was a lot of things to a lot of other people, too. Milo was the big strong brother of Peanut, my sister's cat. He defended her against the other cats in the neighborhood, taking them on in the middle of the night, even losing part of his fang. Milo and Peanut would tear though our house like horses, chasing each other in their games. They would both taunt the neighbor dog, a giant German shepherd, who got loose twice to nearly kill each of them.

When we got bunk beds, Milo spent more nights in my sister's bed than mine because cats like to be up high. One morning she woke up covered in feathers and had a small panic attack. Milo was a very successful hunter and she tore through her bed looking for the body of the poor bird he had undoubtedly dragged to her bed. It turned out that he only killed her dream catcher, not a live bird.

Milo didn't get along with the other animals in our house, though. He'd watch the birds with interest, probably wondering why we'd keep them in the house in a cage, he ran from the dog, and he mostly hated my sister's cat, Scar. Scar was BFF with the neighbor cat and they played all the time (Milo was way too good to join in). But when their games led to Scar's death, Milo started to tolerate (even befriend) the neighbor cat. I found them laying on the sunny grass right next to each other, as if having some sort of cat conversation.

Soon after that, Milo started to go over to the neighbor's house in the mornings. He'd help himself to the other cat's food (it was more expensive than what I fed him), get into bed with the neighbor girl and wake her up, and spend a few minutes with the family. The mom was the first one to find him after he'd been hit by a car, and she was as distraught as my own mom.

I'd always thought I'd take Milo to college with me, and it wasn't until I got there that I realized he would have hated it. I suppose it was for the best that I didn't have to make that decision; in our home he could roam where he wanted, he knew enough to avoid predators and cars (making his death highly suspicious), and was king of his land. He might not have done so well in San Diego, but leaving him would have killed me.

As always, I'll end this by saying I know no cat will ever be like Milo was, even though that will never stop me from keeping and loving Chloe and any future cats. But maybe tonight Chloe will get some extra love, a can of wet food and maybe a little catnip, just because.

If We Don't Finish What We Started, The Terrorists Win

2011-09-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

The morning of September 11, 2001

Ten years ago I was a new junior in high school. It was homework period in colorguard so I wore something a little cuter than normal because I didn't have to worry about getting them dirty spinning in mud. But when the carpool arrived, the mom shouted across the driveway to our mom that the World Trade Center went down. None of us knew what the World Trade Center was, but we could tell this was something big. At school, first period was homework and listening to the radio. I still didn't understand what was going on, only that terrorists from the Middle East somewhere flew our planes into two buildings in New York and a lot of people died.

I could grasp the seriousness of the situation but understanding it would take much of the next decade. Class that day consisted almost exclusively of teachers trying to answer questions and letting us mostly listen to the radio or do work silently. When I got home the news was on (it would stay on for a whole week) and both my parents were home. Over and over we watched as one plane after the other came out of absolutely nowhere to crash with incredible accuracy into the side of one of the tallest buildings in the world and stay there, burning a giant hole. Then we watched as smoke, ash, papers and debris flew over the streets of New York City covering citizens and firefighters from head to toe, people lying injured and bleeding, people running literally for their lives as cameras bravely rolled on. Then, we saw footage of people in the towers jumping from windows far, far too high. Many people jumped, which is something I still don't quite understand. That was perhaps the hardest thing to witness.

As a nation we were first shocked and scared, but we quickly turned to unity with one another and became angry, fully backing the war we'd just been brought into. Whatever it took to make the perps pay for the thousands of lives they cost (and the hundreds of thousands of lives that would eventually be lost) was justifiable.

Over the years America became overtly racist towards Muslims and anyone looking even remotely Middle Eastern. Then we started losing our own rights, one by one, in the name of protecting us from terrorists. First the Patriot Act, then losing virtually every freedom we had in airports, then allowing our phones and conversations and sometimes even our properties to be monitored by the government, all of which is justified by saying you have nothing to worry about if you have nothing to hide. What ever happened to "give me liberty of give me death?"

We've become so paranoid about another attack that we're willing to live in the shadow of fear for the rest of our lives or give up what were once basic rights. Because of one attempt we now have to take our shoes off at airports, plus all metal, plus go through a metal detector, and now (in addition to everything) body scanners that show our naked bodies and be pat down by a disgruntled and underpaid TSA employees. For what? Are we safer? Does turning over our nail clippers make us less likely to encounter another terrorist? I don't feel like it does.

However, I'd rather live with that risk and have an enjoyable life. I'd rather not be looking at every person with dark skin and a beard or a hijab and wonder if they're plotting against me. I'd rather take my chances when I fly than be forced to undress for a stranger. I'd rather live freely in the Land of the Free than be afraid of the police who are supposed to protect me, wondering if some innocent thing I do will be considered suspicious. But I feel alone in these preferences. So many of those I know would rather spend an hour in airport security half naked because it makes them feel safer in the air, or allowing phone tapping because, as true patriots, they have nothing to hide. If there's even a chance that these measures will prevent another terrorist attack they'll allow them, even if it impacts our way of life.

This is not what it means to be an American. If we were attacked for our way of life we should be living that way of life louder and prouder than ever. We should taunt those who hate us, beg them to try again. But we aren't. For the last ten years we've been afraid, deeply divided, and hateful of anyone that isn't us. We've given up on our schools, our economy, and fortifying the strength of our country on our soil in favor of "helping" other countries form democracies and ensuring our safety overseas.

What if we just said fuck it, we're done, we tried and we're calling quits. What if we stopped spending the billions on Iraq and Afghanistan and started spending that money on educating our kids so we can be even stronger in 40 years, or providing jobs to those who have been out of work for 6 months or more so we can have a strong and vibrant economy again? What if we cared about our people and our country half as much as we cared about other countries, and what if we spent our defense money on protecting our borders? I'd be very interested to see.

There are hundreds who died ten years ago saving, or trying to save, the lives of others, and hundreds of thousands of others deeply affected by September 11, 2001. I'm grateful I didn't lose anyone in those attacks, grateful those I know in our armed forces returned to their families, grateful I was as old as I was when the attacks happened. I'm sad to see the direction my country went after that day and I hope one day we turn around and can become the hopeful, strong, leading country we used to be again. I also hope those who lost someone due to the attacks and the wars that followed will heal and were OK today. Finally, I hope those lives weren't lost in vain and that something good will again come from all of this.

Power Outage 2011

2011-09-08T23:05:00.000-07:00

This thought did cross my mind.

I remember where I was September 8, 2011, the day of the Power Outage 2011. It was about 3:40 in the afternoon and I was sitting at my desk at work, taking a mental break from writing about garage doors and reading about the toll September 11, 2001 had on the children of those who died. This is something I found funny… reading about destruction and despair as the whole city (and soon other states and part of another country) loses power. We’ll lose power for a few minutes because of bad weather or some car accident, but it’s usually localized and back on in a matter of minutes. I immediately posted my enthusiasm for the break in routine to Facebook and then texted my boyfriend. It was when he responded with “here, too,” that I knew the power outage wasn’t localized and wasn’t likely to be back on. He was on the other side of town, so far away that there was no way some accident or overuse of power or other normal cause of an outage was the culprit. This was citywide.

Soon I got text messages from other friends, and started sending them to people in San Diego’s extremities. Downtown? Out. Escondido? Out. Coronado? Out. The power outage had reached from Carlsbad to downtown/Coronado, and from the oceans to La Mesa. This was going to be big.

Within the first half hour reports came in that the outage extended as far north as San Clemente (Orange County) to as far south as parts of Mexico (a whole other country), and as far east as Arizona and New Mexico (other states). I was constantly texting my friends and refreshing Facebook for updates; I knew that Los Angeles was safe from the lack of updates from Facebook and because my family members hadn’t texted, but the rest of us were in for an interesting night.

That was when the excitement really hit. At first the power outage was an interesting distraction from the monotony of work. But after the first 30 minutes it became clear this wasn’t going away soon, and because by then it was already after 4pm there wasn’t much reason to remain at work. I did, though, because no one else was leaving and because I’d heard that the freeways were more like parking lots, but when 5pm rolled around and the power still wasn’t back on I peaced out.

I headed to South Park with a friend in search of fun. We found free gelato and $1.50 beers in a candlelit bar. After that I met up with my boyfriend at his friend’s house in my neighborhood for more candlelit atmosphere (and more beer), and after that I headed home, because my day tomorrow is scheduled as normal.

And as I write this (on Word, using the battery on my borrowed laptop), I’m alone in my candle-lit apartment, snacking on my dinner of cold jalapeno artichoke dip and chips, and feeling like my boyfriend should be here to appreciate the ambiance. Candles might be girly but they’re also ridiculously sexy. Candlelight makes anyone look hot and sets the perfect mood… as much as I wanted to be alone tonight, now I wish I wasn’t.

Although I do need the money, I hope the power outage lasts long enough to let me leave work tomorrow. If that happens I’ll bring the fish that’s sitting in my fridge (that I *just* bought) to my friend’s house and with her gas stove and/or barbecue we’ll make a feast. It’ll be a day I’m not at work, which will make it automatically good, and it’ll be a day I’m with my lady, which will make it automatically great, and eventually the power will come back on and everything will return to normal and, hopefully, I won’t have lost much food. Because honestly that’s the worst that can happen.

Oh hey, it's 11pm and the power came back on. Well what do you know.

Do Not Want

2011-09-02T00:06:00.000-07:00

Alright, guys... here's your fair warning to turn away now. This is another post about my bodily functions.

I'm pretty sure I'm just looking for an excuse to use this.

I got my period. Again. (You were warned.)

Normally this is not ever an event worth talking about (much, much less one worth committing to the Internet), but due to recent events I'm back on birth control, after a glorious whole 5 week break, and once this period is over it means I'm safe.

Hale-frickin-luja.

The other day I went to the San Diego Museum of Man and one of their exhibits is about reproduction and birth. The most disturbing thing in the whole museum is a 3D display of how a woman's pelvic bone expands to allow a baby's head to fit through it. Bone fucking moves. First off, it's incredibly amazing that a woman's body can do that (and also, babies skulls are soft and they sort of squish to pass through the bone... incredible). It should not be possible, but it is. Second, holy FUCK no. I'm absolutely convinced that I would die if I had to go through childbirth. Even though I know women much smaller than me have been successfully giving birth to much larger babies than I was, it still seems far too impossible to be real. It didn't help much to view that exhibit the day I should have gotten my period; when my period is even a few hours late I go into a mini freak-out mode because I'm paranoid, but because I've messed with it a bit the last couple months (and my body and I are pretty tight... I knew what was up) I kept mostly calm. But looking at how a bone goddamn moves to allow a giant baby skull to pass through it when your period should have already come is enough to drive a sane person mad.

Hence the post about me getting my period.

Also, as much as I love writing about condoms, and using the image of the pope when talking about sex, I really hate using them. I'm not entirely sure what it is about them; I thought it was a latex sensitivity but the latex-free ones aren't any better. Regardless, a little discomfort during sex is ten bazillion times better than passing an 8 pound baby (aka the only STD that can outlast you), so latex sensitivity or not, I'm gonna have to suck it up. Because...

This made me lol.

Elephants in Raincoats

2011-09-01T22:04:00.000-07:00

Go ahead. Just try to find a cuter picture.

I've recently been introduced to my calling.

Over two years ago I realized I'll probably never be happy unless animals are a very large part of my life, which means they'll need to be part of my work life. Whether that's working with them directly, writing about them, or working with people for their benefit, having animals only in my personal life just ain't going to cut it.

Then I saw this article. Because of human actions these baby elephants are orphans. However, because of human actions these orphan elephants are loved and cared for. They even get raincoats! That's what I want to do. I want to give orphan elephants their raincoats.

Elephants are like people, perhaps more than any other animal. We might be almost genetically identical to bonobos but when it comes to animal emotion I'm convinced elephants share a more similar mind. This means elephants, especially baby elephants, experience something very similar to PTSD. Just like a human child would be scarred for life after experiencing the death of a parent, a baby elephant would be traumatized.

If I had a lot of money I would buy a lot of land (like, tons) and use the space as a sanctuary for elephants here that are neglected, abused, unwanted or unable to be cared for. They would be able to live out the rest of their lives on that land, be fed, be able to interact with other elephants, be cared for when they needed it, and not be made to work or perform. It would be like the Black Beauty Ranch, except just for elephants (and hey, maybe Babe would want to come to have some company).

And then there's this picture:

How fucking amazing is this?!?

Clearly I am not in the right place in the world. Screw my fear of chemistry and being halfway decent at math... I could be in veterinary school right now.

When I become a world famous author and have the money or enough pull to get the fundraising necessary to pull off my dream, that's exactly what I'm going to do. In the meantime, I'll find a way to meet myself halfway.

Why I Love The Oatmeal

2011-08-29T12:57:00.000-07:00

As far as internet comedians go, The Oatmeal is easily one of my favorites. I started going to the website for the grammar and stayed for the ridiculousness.

The Oatmeal combines silly cartoons of dinosaurs (and other, non-extinct, animals) with intelligent observations on life. I mean, the guy made a guide on how to pet a kitty. And it's completely accurate. And hilarious! Outside of grammar my favorite comics are called Minor Differences. I look at them at work sometimes and have to try very hard to not literally lol (Part 4 is my favorite).

Also, I found out The Oatmeal is a runner. And not just the I'm-gonna-take-a-quick-jog type of runner. He ran a 50 mile ultra marathon. Through mountains. That's hardcore running.

So not only is The Oatmeal a funny and insightful comic, but he brings awareness of our wonderful language to the masses (if you use the wrong you're/your on Facebook you better believe I'm judging you) and he's apparently a very active person. Props to you, Mr. Oatmeal. And please post things more often.

Eating Dogs

2011-08-20T19:55:00.000-07:00

Don't do a Google image search for "dog meat."

Depending on where you live, the concept of eating dogs really doesn't give people the reaction that it probably (hopefully) gives you.

However, this is not going to be a debate about eating dogs.

I came across this article on CNN a while back that was provocatively titled "What's wrong with eating dog meat?" So of course I clicked on it, because... well, that's what it was there for (so I'm a sucker). The article was written in a slightly negative tone about how animal activists complained enough to make the Korea Dog Farmers' Association cancel their dog meat festival, which was designed to showcase the upside of eating dog.

Dog meat isn't actually consumed very often in Korea, so that's not the point (China is a little bit of a different story). The point is going to be a less animal activist and a lot more English major.

First, the writer calls it ironic that animal activists claim we shouldn't eat dogs because they're companion animals even though Korea didn't have many companion dogs until very recently. That's not ironic.

Second, the writer pulls quotes from other authorities to describe the difference between Korea's pet dog population (in the city) and meat dog population (on shit farms in the country), and how the only difference between these two types of dogs is that one was born in one place and one was born in another. As soon as this quote is finished, the writer launches into a just-because-we-don't-do-it-here-doesn't-mean-it's-bad closing argument. WTF? Where did that come from?

Her last words, calling a practice bad just because it's not a worldwide practice doesn't make a very good argument, follow several (very short) paragraphs about how dog meat isn't even a popular food, how more and more Koreans are taking on pet dogs and how animal activists in Korea have effectively shut down pro-dog meat festival. Ms Emily Lodish, you do not know how to construct an argument either for or against something.

But your editor can write a damn controversial title.

Boyfriend

2011-08-16T08:32:00.000-07:00

Might've taken a few "o hai"'s...

That's a word I haven't said in a long time.

It's a word I've certainly wanted to say, especially in the last year, but no one really seemed to fit the bill. Turns out there was in fact one person I met in the last year who would fit the bill, who I was constantly texting, who was always down to hang out, and who shares my passion for animals and good food. Who knew, right?

My boyfriend (still getting used to saying that) and I started out as friends. Kind of... we started off on pseudo-dates, which progressed to friendship, which progressed to very good friendship, which has now turned into a full-fledged (and incredibly intense) romance. My pattern certainly seems to be dating acquaintances, but this is the first time I've gone after someone who has such an involvement in my life. I'm definitely digging it.

Although this whole thing is still incredibly new there's already a lot to be excited about. I can honestly say there hasn't been a person I've been this crazy for. Ever. Not that I've dated a lot, but still, for two weeks I've been constantly excited. Again, I know it's still brand new, and I know exactly how silly I sound, but I can't help that past boyfriends (and almost-boyfriends) have started out more meh than anything. Finally, a man who is actively exciting me from the get-go and who certainly seems to be just as excited about me. I could get used to this.

For more than a year if I couldn't have a boyfriend I at least wanted to be excited about someone, to have a crush on someone, or just even to be thinking about someone; when I started thinking about this guy I never expected to not only get those feelings and then some, but to have those feelings returned so absolutely. And the best part is because of our pre-existing friendship I already know what kind of person he is, he already knows what kind of person I am and (get this) we like each other anyway. There's no worrying about exposing our dorky sides and no need to hide behind whatever facade people hide behind when beginning a relationship. There's a high level of honesty and comfort built in.

I promise this blog won't be turned into a sappy lovey thing (I'll prove it with my next post), but it's just been a while since I've felt this way about someone, and there's never been a person to make me feel this instantly connected to him. I'm looking forward to the road ahead and the fun times it's sure to bring.

EDIT: Also, the universe works in a kind of funny way. A month after I decide to take a break from birth control for an unspecified amount of time I find someone I want to be with long term, someone I can't wait to undress and someone who wants babies even less than I do. . I feel like Robin when she meets Don because everyone told her as soon as she said she wanted to focus on her career she'd meet someone, except that for me it was birth control and I already knew the person I'd meet. And I'm very, very OK with that.

A Boy And His Dog

2011-08-03T20:28:00.000-07:00

This came up in a Google image search for "ridiculously happy." Seemed appropriate.

In any normal situation I would never dream of coming between a boy and his dog. Last night, however, was not any normal situation...

When we're wooing a guy, women will go to all sorts of lengths to look impressive. We have make-up and tons of clothes and accessories available to make us feel sexy; I've definitely dressed the part and gotten all dolled up, but oh my god I don't think I've ever felt sexier in my whole life than when I was wearing just a t-shirt and a boy's favorite pajama pants. Nothing could have been more comfortable or felt better than that pair of well-loved burgundy pajamas while we made dinner. I'm not sure whether it was that I was offered pajama pants, that my boy offered them to me because he wanted to wear pajama pants himself, or that I was offered his favorite pair, but wearing them made me feel like a million bucks.

Back to this not being a normal situation: I'm not even really sure what a normal situation is, but I've been thinking and I can't remember a time I smiled this much or for this long without stopping. It's been 6 days and it feels like... I can't even say. I typed out a few similes but nothing sounded right. It feels amazing to be grinning this much, though.

Last night I fell asleep with a boy pressed up against me on one side and his dog cuddled against me on the other side, and there was nowhere in the world I'd have rather spent the night. I would have been happy to have spent the night with either of the two (though I'm quite a bit more partial to the boy) but sleeping in between both was like the best security blanket I could have imagined. I felt so welcome, so wanted, and leaving that comfortable place was the last thing I wanted to do this morning.

In any normal situation I'd never come between a boy and his dog, but if that boy and his dog welcome me between them I'll be the happiest person to stay.

Yes On 8

2011-08-01T22:07:00.000-07:00

One of the worst stereotyping I do is towards someone driving a car with a Yes on 8 bumper sticker. But the other day I saw the worst yet: an innocent-looking bumper sticker with two very wholesome child faces and the words "I want a mommy and a daddy please!" This particular sticker shared a bumper with a regular Yes on 8 sticker, which just infuriated me (you're so against gays marrying that you're declaring it with two bumper stickers?!), and the woman driving looked like a choir singer. There are several reasons the bumper sticker I saw is one of the dumbest things around, and I'll illustrate these reasons:

First, the bumper sticker implied Prop 8 was about gays having children. Getting married, believe it or not, is not the same as having children. Just because gay citizens want the same rights as all other citizens to marry the person they love does not have anything to do with anybody being a parent. Prop 8 was about whether we should allow same sex couples to marry one another and get the benefits of being married, like financial benefits and beneficiary benefits.

Second, the sticker implies a gay couple must be married in order to adopt children, which is untrue: a gay couple is allowed to adopt children (or at the least a gay couple is not expressly prohibited from adopting children) in the majority of our states. For that matter, adopting children together is not contingent upon marriage regardless of your sexual orientation.

Third, the sticker implied all children have both a mother and a father, that both the mother and the father want the kids, and that both the mother and the father will be present for the child's life, which is COMPLETELY UNTRUE. Parents leave their kids all the time! Parents get divorced and move far away, parents die, and parents are just fucking absent. Children do not always have a mother and a father when the parents are straight, and probably not even the majority of the time (am I being too cynical?).

Fourth, the sticker implies that if a kid has a straight mother and a straight father (regardless of if they're married), both parents will actively take on the role of parents, which means caring for and acting in the best interest of the kid(s). This implication is that all children are wanted and all straight parents do a good job (which is why we don't have a foster system in the first place! Oh wait...).

Fifth, and this is something the makers and displayers of this bumper sticker may intend, the sticker implies divorce should be against the law. If marriage is what we do when we want kids, then divorce really has no place in our society. So if gays can't marry because they shouldn't have kids, then straight married couples should not be allowed to divorce.

There are probably a host of other reasons why that particular Yes on 8 bumper sticker is dumb as shit, but these are the most glaringly obvious. It pains me to see, in this day and age and especially in this state, people so opposed to other people's existence or ways of life that they have to proclaim it in loud yellow in their cars. One day, hopefully in my lifetime, we'll look back on this time of gay oppression and think how dumb we were...

The Link

2011-07-30T13:43:00.000-07:00

I went into the wrong field...

I'm beginning to think there's a link between birth control and eczema...

Since early 2005 (so, for the last 6 years) there has been fewer than 6 months when I was not on some sort of hormonal birth control. The last time I went off the pill was in early 2009 when I ran out, didn't have insurance and Planned Parenthood decided I made too much money to get them for free, meaning I'd have to pay $20 a pack, so I went off it to figure out what to do (can't remember why The Ex wouldn't split it with me...). About a month after I stopped taking them was when I developed eczema and began my avocado and latex intolerance, which I only realized because I had to actually use condoms again. That same week I was laid off, which meant suddenly I was poor enough to get free pills again, so I went right back to Planned Parenthood. The eczema cleared up with some heavy duty steroids and has been dormant for the majority of the last two years.

Fast forward to a little more than a month ago when I decided to take some time off the pills again. And guess what? Starting to see signs of the eczema returning. Which is no fucking fun.

Coincidence? Nothing else has changed recently, and nothing else is the same as it was in February of 2009. I'm living in a different place (and have been for a while), it's not the same time of year, so far I can still eat avocado and Planned Parenthood gave me a stash of latex-free condoms (I've said this before and I'll say it again and again, Planned Parenthood is the absolute best) so I don't have to further aggravate my skin. The only other thing that might be the same is my stress level: I knew I was going to be laid off back then and wondering how I'd pay rent on the studio I just moved into was weighing rather heavily on me, and now I'm working in a stressful environment, have still a good ways to go to be caught up with things that cost a lot of money, and am still on the hunt for a job I like. So possibly stress is causing me to be rashy... However, one very compelling reason I believe the hormonal birth control might be a factor is because I experience rashes in hormonal areas, like armpits (where there are glands) and... other hormonal areas.

For the time being I'll use my body as a mini experiment. I haven't decided how long I'm going to stay off the pills, but I loosely figured I'd go back on if I started a relationship, or like 6 months, or until I am annoyed enough with not knowing when I'll get my period or whatever other thing might annoy me. I've been on birth control for so long it's strange being off it, and if it turns out eczema is one reason to stay on it I'll happily do so till menopause.

Because I Slept With You

2011-07-23T01:51:00.000-07:00

"I'm an excellent judge of character."

It feels like there are some universal truths as far as mankind goes: we're all good drivers, we would all make great parents and we're all good judges of character. Never mind that these things are nearly impossible to be objective about, these are things most people truly believe, yours truly included. But let's focus on that last one: good judge of character. The people we date are good people, hands down. It's only after we break up that we see the other side of them, see what there isn't to like, and why it's better that we're not dating anymore.

As far as this post is concerned, being a good judge of character means someone is a good person, or at least the person you believed them to be, simply because you were fucking them. If a person was deserving enough of your private parts they have to be good all around, right? They have to be the person they led you to believe they are, or at least the person you you led yourself to believe them to be. Maybe it's giving others the benefit of the doubt, maybe it's thinking we're so good at getting to know people, maybe it's just me. But I think if we were more objective about our ability to judge character, more honest about the hottie we're boning and less likely to make excuses for them we wouldn't end up disappointed. Just because a person has access to our genitals does not make them deserving or good.

That's not to say believing this about the people we're having sex with is entirely a bad thing. It's unfortunate when people don't live up to the expectations you set for them, but it's also most likely not the person's fault (and if you're like one of Barney's girls... well, it's hard to know where to put the blame). If we were completely objective about the person we're fucking we might not have relationships that last more than a night, or relationships at all. We have to compromise sometimes and on some things because expecting perfection is probably a huge reason people get divorced. We should be thinking the person we're sleeping with is amazing... but take each person with a grain of salt and an honest mind.

In Which I Am 13

2011-07-23T00:02:00.000-07:00

Check the name tag.

I got my period. (Yep, that's what this post is about. Keep reading, boys!)

For the first time in more than 3 years I stopped taking birth control pills and decided to go au natural for a little bit, and it feels like I'm 13 again and learning everything for the first time. All of a sudden I'm dealing with pimples, which hasn't been an issue for years. (Also, I'm TWENTY FIVE and shouldn't have pimples in the first place.) Cramps have all but disappeared, which is bittersweet because duh, no more cramps, but they're also a great way to know when I'm getting my period, which is super helpful when I'm not taking pills.

I decided to take some time off the pills partly because it's been a while since I've taken a break, partly because I'm not getting laid for the immediate future, and partly because I've forgotten how my body would react off the hormones. My theory is if birth control pills make your body believe its pregnant constantly (hence the whole bigger boobs thing), then wouldn't you be storing belly fat? And if you stop taking the pills, wouldn't you be more likely to lose some of that belly fat? The same could be said about the boobs but I'm not too concerned about that: taking hormones for the last 6 years gave me a nice stock pile. And so far I'm feeling much lighter in all the right places, even this week.

After a month, the consensus is there are reasons to be on the pills and reasons to be off. Obviously the next time I'm having sex on a regular basis I'll be back on them, but for the time being I think I'll be happy taking a few months off. I may have to deal with acne and not knowing when I'll get my period, but feeling a little lighter and saving those pills for when I'll need them is worth it.

Stay tuned for the next time I feel like blogging about my bodily functions.

Drugs Or Me

2011-06-27T23:21:00.001-07:00

First of all I'd just like to say I never in a million years thought I'd have to ask someone to choose between doing drugs or being with me. Second, I certainly never thought someone would actually pick the drugs. Holy fuck.

There are so many questions I have because this seems so irrational to me. Of all the things you could leave someone for, of all the things better than having a girlfriend, or even all the things you could get in a fight over, a drug just sounds silly. I don't date people who do drugs. I don't get involved in drugs. I don't even want to know about it. I'm still shocked this happened.

This weekend made me wonder about the last few months. I'd spent a good part of this year working towards a relationship with this guy, and the last few weeks when it became pretty obvious we were essentially boyfriend and girlfriend I was excited. I liked him and I knew he liked me, and last weekend I wanted to make our relationship official. Only he dropped this bomb on me and then watched me leave. He asked me if I was sure this was a big enough deal that I was going to end the relationship over it, but I should have asked him the same thing. Obviously, though, we both knew it was. If I'd been thinking clearly I would have asked him if he was really willing to let me leave, if this one night was worth losing me. So what was I these last few months? What were we if it was that easy for him to let me go?

It's so hard to see someone you really like make a decision like that. There's no way I can look at him the same way after he tells me he'd rather have a night of drugs than a relationship with me; it's made me physically sick to my stomach to think about it and I don't think I've ever been more disappointed in someone I liked. I want to yell at him, make him feel like shit for making me feel like shit, to hear him say it wasn't worth it and he regrets it and wishes he didn't do it, but even if I do yell he won't say those things. I don't know if he realizes how bad that hurt me; he's apologized a bunch of times, but I still want to say everything I've been thinking to him to make myself feel better. "I'm sorry" isn't enough to make my complete embarrassment over wanting a relationship with someone who'd rather do drugs go away.

I do have to wonder, though, what he'll tell those who ask why we broke up. Anything he says will make him look like a dick (except to those who were doing it with him). Two of his friends watched me leave. I was holding all of my stuff in my overnight bag, visibly crying and giving him a hug goodbye when they came in, instantly saw what was going on and froze, just watching. I turned and left, trying my hardest to not start sobbing, and the three of them watched me go. When I made it to my car I couldn't hold back anymore and cried until I saw their taxi pull up, then I moved my car and cried some more. Never in a million years did I think that's why I would break up with someone, and never did I think it would hurt this much.

I'm a good girlfriend. I cook and bake, I bring you shit when you're sick, I don't make you watch chick flicks, I split the bill, I give massages and I'm willing to go do things. It doesn't seem fair that I was picked second to a drug.

You Think You Know

2011-06-25T00:33:00.000-07:00

Being disappointed in people is starting to get a little old. Scratch that– being disappointed in guys is getting really old. Discovering major flaws in people just when you're ready to take a decent sized step with them really sucks. Hard. It makes it especially hard to have to make these discoveries twice in 6 months.

I'll admit I'm tired of being single. I miss being in a relationship, miss being in love, miss that certainty and comfortability that comes with a certain level of commitment. I get hit on all the goddamn time, in places I'm really uncomfortable getting attention (for future reference, all guys reading this, making noises at a girl while she's working out isn't going to make her want you) and... I don't know, I just don't like it anymore.

It's not that I thought this relationship was going to go very far, but finding out things you really don't like about people you really do like hurts, regardless of the relationship. And feeling like you came in second on top of everything is just depressing. So, here it goes again, back to looking for someone to spend my time with. Let the fun and games begin.

Dumb Animals

2011-06-10T19:00:00.000-07:00

I'm not the only one disgusted.

Spoiler alert: the dumb animals are us.

Thanks to poaching for a completely made up reason, there are now 7 Northern white rhinos left in the world. One captive Northern white rhino died recently in a zoo in the Czech Republic, leaving the captive count to 3. And two of them are what some call reproductively challenged. Also, old. So there's no captive breeding, period. Those 4 that were shipped of to Africa a 18 months ago better be making babies STAT.

Angalifu likely represents exactly 1/3 of his species.

It's long been known that rhino horn is used as a traditional Chinese medicine, supposedly curing everything from fevers to AIDS. First, we can ignore the obvious logic that if rhino horn did cure anything, we'd be raising rhinos for the exact purpose of harvesting their horns. Now that all reason is removed, let's look at China, one of the biggest players in the rhino horn black market. One man, the retired head of the National Traditional Chinese Medicine Strategy Research Project, believes it's only a matter of time until rhinos are bred for their horn, and is actively trying to re-legalize the use of rhino horn in traditional Chinese medicine. At least this guy (Jia Qian) is 70 and doesn't have his whole life left to see his goal realized, and if he does rely on rhino horn for his medicine he should be dead pretty darn soon. So that's good.

But in the meantime, Jia believes

"the reason the Chinese government hasn't used rhino horn for these diseases is because some people were Western trained and tainted by Western thought. Other people were weak and gave in to foreign pressure."

Fuck you, Jia. Western scientists have intensely scrutinized rhino horn to see if there is anything even remotely worth using for the benefit of our own species and there's absolutely nothing. It's just hair. Simple hair formed in an unusual way (no other animal has a horn made entirely of hair), but not miraculous and certainly not medicinal. But he, and others, believe strongly in its use and advocate breeding "endangered medicinal-use animals" to deal with the increase in demand.

However, and this is a big point, the only reason there's an increase in demand is because Jia and the Chinese government are encouraging its citizens to use rhino horn. There's already a rhino farm where 60 or so white rhinos are kept in concrete pens (under the guise of creating an African safari-type park for tourism, despite the fact that plans for this park halted over two years ago) and are used in horn harvesting experiments (under another guise of reintroducing the animals into the wild through breeding centers) which is 100% against CITES and definitely not why South Africa gave them to China. What does China gain by doing something the vast majority of the world disagrees with? Why does China eat dogs?

Nola, the sweetest girl to live out most of her species. She's 1/7 her population.

But here's some good news: South Africa just sentenced 2 poachers to 16 years in prison after catching them red handed - literally - with a freshly cut rhino horn that they later matched with DNA analysis to a dead rhino. And then in Kenya some poachers shot an elephant with poison arrows, killed it, roasted its meat, and then died from eating poisoned elephant. Serves you all right, you fucking assholes.

But You Could Be Anything

2011-06-01T19:59:00.000-07:00

One of the things that makes humans different from all other animals is our ability to recognize decision making, especially bad decision making, in our peers. It's so obvious when our friends go for a relationship that's completely wrong, stay in a job that does nothing for them, or start or continue down whatever destructive path they're choosing. But it's fucking impossible to see these same things in ourselves.

One other thing that makes us humans different is that even if we do know we can do better in whatever aspect of our lives, it's an entirely different thing to know those close to you can do better but don't take the effort. It's so obvious to you, but they can't see it, or won't see it, or see it but refuse to do anything about it. There is someone who is (or was) in my life who refuses to earn his full potential, someone who was with the exactly wrong kind of guy, someone who pines for the exact wrong kind of guy, someone who has made every wrong decision ever presented to him, someone who makes poor financial decisions, someone who could be a great boyfriend but finds excuses, someone who lets one decision run her life, someone who hides behind the decisions of others and someone who makes decisions I'll never understand. And then there's me, who sees these people blindly making certain decisions, and recognizing how I make those same decisions every day.

Thing is, I know there are good things out there for me, and I know there are better things out there for those I care about. I know we have to want them bad enough to change aspects of our lives and go after the better things. That knowledge makes us different from other animals. Whether or not we use that knowledge, however, is a completely different story.

Old Friendships

2011-05-31T21:53:00.000-07:00

So here I am, above palm trees, so straight and tall. You are smaller getting smaller but I still see you.

One of the most hurtful feelings a person can go through is realizing you're just not as close friends with someone as you thought. Last night I was discussing this with someone I consider my best and closest friend and how we've both found ourselves in situations like that. Then today on Reddit someone posts an open question to AskReddit asking what the most dickish way in which a friend showed you're not as close as you thought. If you're feeling sad about having lost friends this will break your heart.

Naturally I started thinking about the friends I left behind and the friends who left me behind. Just as naturally, the one I'm mourning now was much, much more than a friend. When I decided to cross the line from friend to more I knew I could potentially lose him, or at least the relationship we used to have. We swore and promised and proclaimed no matter what we'd always be friends, and through our many disappointments we would express hurt but always end with more declarations of friendship. Except that now it's becoming clear that we're not, in fact, friends anymore.

On the one hand, this realization has been helping me finally begin, for real, the forgetting. I think in the last 6 months I got everything out of my system, including telling him I do, actually, want him to move here. I didn't lay everything on the line, but I got close enough, and... nothing. My mourning now is centered around the realization that not only won't he move, but he's completely content. Strangely, this I'm OK with. This means I can stop hoping or wondering or thinking what if and open my eyes to the rest of the world. Knowing things won't change, while a little heartbreaking, is at least somewhat of an answer to my always questioning mind. It's something concrete to mourn.

But on the other hand, I recognize that I don't want to forget. If I've lost the friendship entirely it's OK.The time we spent together as much more than friends was worth losing the friendship, as fucked up as that might sound. That time meant a lot to me, and it isn't something I want to forget.

Of course I hope the time will come back someday when we can be friends again. I hope by then I'll have gotten over my hopes and imagined jealousies and will be able to accept him as a friend, and I hope he'll do the same for me. I hope that the closeness we once had won't be forgotten forever, and I hope he doesn't become one of those friends that vanishes forever.

Unlike the thread on Reddit, neither of us did anything hurtful enough to cause a lost friendship, so maybe our story won't end up like the stories I read. I guess at this point only time will tell.

Vacation

2011-05-30T20:48:00.000-07:00

Just an infinity edge pool in a mansion. No big deal.

Some years ago I was friends with a Canadian-American who was dating a German girl. Much of their relationship was long distance (San Diego to Munich long distance, not one Southern Californian county to another bullshit long distance), but it was ridiculously obvious how much they cared for one another and she ended up moving back here and they got married and are presumably still ridiculously happy in love. However, while they were long distance they still were able to meet about once a month. For like a year. To put this in perspective, when The Ex and I were doing our shitty version of "long distance," which seems really dumb when you compare it to what our friends had, we didn't even see each other that often; we had the ability to talk on the phone whenever we wanted and could have spent every weekend together had we really wanted to. Obviously we didn't really want to, or we would have made it happen.

Even still, I found myself wondering how this German girl was able to visit the States about once a month. The Canadian-American took advantage of the multiple conferences held around the country (which were available to him as a grad student) and his German doctor girlfriend got permission to go to these same conferences. They were both paid to spend a night or two together in various cities. God damn was I jealous.

But one thing that really helped to make it that easy to spend so much time together is the way Germany views vacation time. How she explained it, something like every hour of OT she worked, which happened nearly every day, she accrued vacation time in lieu of extra pay. So a 10-hour day got her half a day of vacation time. And that's on top of the regular 4-6 weeks of mandatory vacation Germans just get, which is on top of national holidays. Fuck, America sucks sometimes.

So my Canadian-American friend and his German girlfriend got through their year or so of long distance dating with the help of Skype, international conferences and her nation's incredible vacation system. And The Ex and I didn't even talk on the phone every day.

America has always been stingy with vacation time. Work seems to be valued above everything else, and time spent away is almost grudgingly, like "oh, if I have to take this 3-day weekend I will, but I'm not happy about it". How did we get this way? Why is it so bad to be excited for the weekend, for a 3-day weekend, for a week off or for regularly scheduled days off? Why is it so looked down on us expressing our happiness at being away from work? This boggles my mind especially after realizing how few Americans actually love their work. We end up doing jobs that we're good at or jobs that happen to make us a lot of money, not necessarily jobs that make us happy or fulfill a part of our soul. But even if we all did love our jobs, enjoy waking up every morning to go to work, and truly enjoy our time spent at work, we still need time away. No matter how much those lucky few truly love their jobs (and even if we all truly loved our jobs), we need time to focus on ourselves, our families, our lives and interests outside of work. And it feels like we should all be pretending that our jobs are the only thing we need.

The upside is America is slowly realizing the need for a work-life balance. Some companies even use their flexible understanding as a way to grab valuable employees. Though this is great, and it may lead up to us actually playing on the same level as other countries, it feels really weird that some companies get to brag about offering vacation time, health benefits, and other outside-life-related perks. It feels especially weird to think that other countries seem to get so much more for their time and money: Americans say that other countries have higher taxes, but those same countries have free universal health care and some have free universities. Overtime worked translates into more time off, which makes more sense than extra money. Other countries seem to recognize the link between healthy lives and productive employees. When is it our turn?

Still Here...

2011-05-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

That was awkward. "No one knows the day or the hour..." Mathew 24:36

Well guys, it's the evening of May 22, 2011, more than 24 hours after the Rapture was supposed to have occurred. I saw no one raptured into Heaven, there was no discernible earthquake in my area, and nothing out of the ordinary whatsoever happened on May 21, 2011 (except for an insane amount of REM quotes on Facebook). At 6pm I was getting back to the hotel room in Pam Desert after an afternoon reading by the pool. No end of the world travesty. In fact, it felt a little like paradise.

Little surprise there. If I actually did feel an earthquake and people were suddenly recalled to Heaven I probably would have had a stroke. But what about all those "true believers" who were fully expecting to experience the second coming of Christ last night?

This is both depressing and hilarious.

Some felt confusion, some felt bewilderment, and all felt disappointed. I'm sure some also felt embarrassment for having believed some crazy whacko as strongly as they did, some even going so far as to give up homes, jobs and family to travel the country and spread the "awesome news" that the world would end May 21, 2011.

So, what happened to these people once they woke up on May 22, 2011 and realized they were wrong? Since there was supposedly "no Plan B," not even an obscure chance that May 22 would come for the saved, there's no turning back. Some will be destitute, some might go crawling back to the families they left behind. But there's a concern that these uber devout might turn to suicide as a means of coping with this severe loss and disappointment.

But there's a problem with this (and I realize it's a logical issue being applied to illogical people, but bear with me): Christians are forbidden from committing suicide. So no matter how bad their sorrow is at being wrong/left behind/whatever, they have to bear it until their natural or otherwise-not-self-inflicted deaths. This brings me to another logical problem I have with this whole rapture ordeal: some people truly believed this was God's telling them May 21, 2011 would be the date of the rapture, not a crazy old man who's been wrong before. And while I'm on my rant, the crazy old man who came up with this whole thing HAS BEEN WRONG BEFORE!

Harold Camping, however, isn't admitting lunacy. He says May 21 was an "invisible judgement day" and that the world will still come to an end October 21, 2011. And, of course, he's keeping donated money because he's not wrong.

Doomsday

2011-05-19T22:57:00.000-07:00

Bugs Bunny: Eh, what's up doc? Hey, I gotta get back to Earth. Can you help me?

Marvin the Martian: *Busy putting his space modulator in a doomsday device* Oh, the Earth won't be there in a few moments. I'm going to blow it up.

Bugs Bunny: Oh, never mind then. *Stiffens cartoonishly in surprise*

Marvin the Martian: *Closes eyes and covers ears* 5...4...3...2...1

Bugs Bunny: *grabs space modulator and runs*

Marvin the Martian: Where was the kaboom? There was supposed to be a great big kaboom. *Notices the space modulator is missing* Hey! Come back with my space modulatooooor!

Seems like everyone thinks the world is going to end these days. Thursday April 21, 2011 was the day Skynet, the super-computer from Terminator, was supposed to become self aware and decide to destroy humankind. May 21, 2011 is Judgement Day, according to some guy (who was wrong once before). June 1, 2011 is the date determined by alien crop circles two years ago to signify Earth's demise. December 21, 2012 is the date the Mayan calendar predicts the end of the world. And each theory has its proof in order to suck in the unsuspecting.

Skynet: OK, so this one was totally fiction, but in the Terminator trilogy the super computer system realizes its own identity in the future (2011) and decides humans are bad and must be destroyed and go about killing a ton of people until Sarah Connor and her son strike back and save the human race. Ta dah!

Judgement Day: Harold Camping is the genius behind this theory. Back in 1994 he said the same thing and the world kept on turning. But this time he's right, or so say his devout followers. He's worked out this whole mathematical system that proves he's right and then went around and put up billboards all over the country saying the Bible guarantees this date. I've read the Bible (twice) and it says repeatedly in the second testament that no one is able to know the day or time of the coming of the Lord. But if this guy says the Bible guarantees it maybe there was something I missed. Twice.

Crop Circles: This one's a little more complicated. The website goes into detail on how it's so impossible that these crop circles, which appeared in June 2009, could have been created by people. And the symbols depict a time in June 2011 when the planets and some random foreign object are all in line. This could actually have some effect on our planet, if it's true that the line up occurs, but I seriously doubt our planet will be torn to shreds.

Mayan Calendar: This has been talked about for years now. People even made a (terrible, awful) movie about the world ending in 2012. Now, every earthquake, tsunami, hurricane, volcano eruption or oil spill is all part of some great plan signaling the end of the world. The supposed official date for the end of life as we know it is December 21, 2012, but there's no consensus on how, exactly, it's going to end. We do know that planets and the Milky Way will align on that date (at 11:11pm, how freaky is that?), so, as with the crop circles, whatever cosmic stuff happens will happen, but it's probably not going to be the end of the world.

If you believe in any of these apocalypse theories (ok, so Skynet never happened) it's time to do some praying, buy some supplies and otherwise prepare yourself for the end.

But what does this mean for the rest of us? The greatest excuse to party! Some atheists are having a shin dig on May 22, 2011 to celebrate Harold Camping being wrong (hell, even some Christian groups are purposefully organizing large events immediately after May 21). I might join them to celebrate their ignorance: I remember specifically reading in the Bible that no one is to know the time or day of the rapture, not even Jesus himself. So what makes this schmuck think the Bible hints at it, much less "guarantees it?" There will also surely be huge celebrations right before Christmas next year, which will likely last for ten days, until January 1, 2013.

These are interesting times we live in, and I look forward to each end of the world.

I Was In Love With The Place

2011-05-16T12:14:00.000-07:00

I don't hate the number 4 so much now.

Before I lived in my studio in Banker's Hill, San Diego didn't feel much like my city. I moved all the time, changing zip codes as if it was nothing. I never felt at home. Community, and living alone for the first time in my life, changed that. In that quirky, old and crooked apartment I fell in love with San Diego.

Living two blocks from Balboa Park, an easy stroll from Hillcrest and an $8 cab ride from downtown connected me to the city. There was so much to do and experience, always people around, always someone doing what you're doing which makes a person living alone feel not so alone. For once, since moving out of our home the summer before my senior year of high school after my parent's divorce, I felt like I belonged. That space was mine to do with as I pleased, to cook what and when I wanted, to have whoever I desired over, to clean as often and as obsessively as I needed. My cat was no longer harassed, I no longer worried about who would be up when I came home, and sharing evenings with my neighbors made me happy to be social again.

But I also fell out of love in that apartment. With this newfound love for my city, and especially for my neighborhood and my job, my heart started leaking the love I had for my relationship. That love was suddenly no longer as important. My cat, my life, my city and my passion were all so much more deserving of love so I let the other one go. Looking back I mourn the temporary nature of my job and that I had to leave that apartment and that neighborhood, but I don't mourn the loss of my relationship.

Finally, that apartment was where the seeds of a future love were laid. Weeks, possibly days, before I packed up and left I was falling asleep when the person whose arms were comfortably wrapped around me whispered "I love you." I wasn't meant to hear those words so I pretended to be asleep. Those words weren't exactly real at the time, but they did mean there was more than just companionship. I wasn't ready to be in love with another person then, and because of that the following months were a roller coaster of disappointments. Now those seeds that were planted just before I left that place have sprouted and they feel like they're in full bloom.

Maybe it's all in my mind, just like the song:

I was in love with the place in my mind, in my mind
I made a lot of mistakes in my mind, in my mind

It's hard to think of certain things as mistakes though. I don't like that I don't live in Banker's Hill, but I can't afford it; I don't like that I'm not in love, but I wasn't ready when it was offered. In a perfect world I'll live in my old neighborhood again and the one I want will be nearby, and I'll just be the happiest girl in San Diego. Maybe it's time for me to make more of an effort at getting what I want.

When I Grow Up

2011-05-15T14:00:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it would be nice for life to be this easy.

When I was little I was going to work with animals and I was going to be a mommy. In high school I was going to be an animal trainer. In college I was going to be a journalist. Post college I was going to be a writer (whatever that meant). When the economy tanked and the opportunity to go to grad school presented itself I desperately wanted to hop on that boat, but I didn't know what to study. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life: biology sounded great but I'd need to completely start over and I still had no idea what I wanted to do specifically. Journalism still sounded fun to study, but the idea of being a reporter was totally unappealing.

This went on until last December. I was at my mom's for Christmas and it was just us two, talking and drinking wine. I was complaining about the sucky job market and how I wanted to get my master's but couldn't decide in what when she asked what seemed like a really obvious question: "Do you know what you want to do?" I started laughing (kind of hysterically) and practically shouted at her. If I knew what I wanted to do I'd be doing it, or at least taking the steps to do it.

The following months somehow sparked a change. I remembered the deadline to apply for schools was early February and if I didn't do it now I wouldn't start my master's until late 2012. Towards the end of my undergrad I took a few sociology courses because I'd always been interested in women's issues, but after two classes in which I learned women are valued less than men, no matter where you are in time or space, I got bored. In the years since sociology has stayed in the back of my mind; until a few months ago when I saw the deadline to apply was days away.

After years of not knowing what I wanted to do with my life, being confused about my hopes for love and wishing to return to the time and place I was happiest, I know exactly what I want. And knowing is weird. It's weird to have answers to big questions like life and love. My dream life, which I'm working towards, is to get my master's, work in a field I'm passionate about and fall in love with a certain someone.

The sucky thing about knowing what I want is recognizing that there are certain things I just don't have control over. I know what I want to study but certain admissions departments don't think I'm deserving of the opportunity, I know what I want to do but it depends on available jobs, and I know who I want to be with but a certain person still lives too far away. Finally knowing what I want is freeing, but it can also be debilitating when it's something I can't have.

At least a girl can dream, right?

A Decade

2011-05-12T22:43:00.000-07:00

Sweet girl.

I've written before, many times, about my cat Milo. Today was the tenth anniversary if his death. It may seem silly or crazy (let's not forget I'm both silly and crazy) but that was the first thing I loved and he's still the love of my life. Had he still been alive he would turn 18 this year, which is a pretty unlikely age for a cat, especially one that goes outside. But that doesn't matter.

It's so weird to think of someone being dead longer than they've been alive. Milo died ten years ago, a few months before he would have turned 8 years old. Two nights ago I dreamed our dog, Tipper, was with me on an intense hike with a group of strangers. She was the only dog and she was a real trooper, even though she was older. Everyone loved her, she hopped up onto the rocks like a pup, and swam in the water with me, even though in real life she was a little afraid of water. I gave her a big hug, like I was just realizing how great she was, and it felt so real in the dream. I woke up pretty happy that I had that experience with her, even though it wasn't real. I miss her a lot; she was a great dog.

The behbeh.

Part of the problem with loving animals is they don't live very long. That means I'll love, and lose, a great number of animals in my life. On the other hand, I've been lucky enough to not have had to experience the loss of people in my life yet. But I feel like I can have a stronger connection with animals than I can with most people, so maybe their losses have more of an effect. But that doesn't matter either, because that's something I never want to change.

So Much More Than This

2011-05-09T01:09:00.000-07:00

"I'm famished!"

Ah, the job search. That never-ending search for a job that sucks your soul least. As I start my 4th week at my new job I hit the depressing realization that I do not give a shit. And it's not even like the money is good, either. It would be somewhat decent if it was for something I cared about, but using all of my creative juices to convince people to call us for their garage door repairs isn't what I saw myself doing.

On the upside, I am learning a lot about SEO, which is all the rave with my field. But on the downside I'm being asked to put a lot of effort (skipping lunch, staying late and working in a stressed environment) for not a lot in return and for something that doesn't really matter.

This is where it sucks being an idealist. I'm not about doing what it takes to make the big money, or working a shit job so I can afford nice things or doing something I don't like or don't care about only because it pays well. It's more important to me to love my work, like my coworkers and look forward to Monday, rather than just the paycheck. As long as my needs are met and I can support my lifestyle (which is far from that of the rich and famous) without worrying about every dollar I spend, I would much rather do something I love and always be a little poorer than be miserable and rich.

Will I find my happy middle ground or, if I'm lucky, that perfect job? Is there a position out there that will allow me to help others, improve the world and feel good while also letting me live comfortably? No one helps me financially; my parents don't pay my rent, I don't have a boyfriend or husband or sugar daddy to pay my bills or buy me nice presents, I do everything for myself. I need to work to support myself because I have absolutely no choice. Unfortunately, I'm afraid, the jobs where you can genuinely help others and make the world a better place are pretty low-paying jobs. I might be able to make a paycheck doing something I'm passionate about but if I ever want to have a savings or retirement plan I better marry rich. And while it would be nice to work for fun and not because I need the money, I kind of doubt that'll happen. I made my peace a long time ago with being at least a little poor, but I would like to live in a place that doesn't need bars on the windows.

Too much to ask?

Subtle Differences

2011-05-08T10:45:00.000-07:00

When I first told people I preferred Hillcrest to North Park I got a lot of surprised reactions. But in the last 7 months (apparently it's been that long already) I've got some subtle yet concrete reasons for my preference.

First, the not so subtle (the blindingly obvious?):

There are cops everywhere. Like, everywhere. It doesn't make me feel any safer, it makes me feel like they're either out to get me for whatever I could possibly do wrong or that there's enough crime to necessitate that many cops.

Now the subtle:

Interactions: People in North Park aren't as likely to smile. Running through Balboa Park I probably get smiles or at least nods from 3/4 of my fellow runners/dog walkers/outdoor yoga enthusiasts. Running around North Park gets me smiles/nods/eye contact from maybe 1/3 of the people who are out and about. Not quite as friendly.

Maybe you just have to be more friendly on a bridge?

Environment: Hillcrest has a lot more trees than North Park. Lawns are more maintained, buildings more recently painted, and sidewalks a little cleaner. North Park has less green, more concrete, and more litter (which could be one reason why there's bi-weekly street cleaning in North Park and none in either of the two places I live in Hillcrest.

All the pretty palm trees.

Sounds: There are constant sirens. In Hillcrest there are ambulance sirens because there's a major hospital nearby, plus quite a few retirement homes. In North Park there are cop sirens and fire truck sirens (though there's a fire station down the street from my apartment), which are a bit more unsettling.

Smells: North Park smells like fried food. Between the fast food restaurants and the smells wafting from various apartments, it's no wonder we're an obese country. On pretty much all of my running paths in North Park I pass by at least 1 fast food place, plus there's fried smells coming from apartments all around. There are also loads of bars which almost exclusively sell fried foods, making the smell nearly impossible to avoid. Breathing in fried foods kind of sucks when you're huffing and puffing.

There are a few other things that make me feel less at ease about being in North Park (the bars on my windows, the amount of bums, the way the streets smell, the lack of parking) that I never thought of in Hillcrest. One day I'll return to Banker's Hill, that perfect distance away from Balboa Park, University Avenue, Downtown and the airport and flight path. In Banker's Hill I felt both safe and in the middle of the city. I almost never had to drive around looking for parking, I could walk to Hillcrest or Downtown, and nights were quiet as businesses and families turned off the lights. I might be romanticizing that area a bit, but I did love it, and did hate to leave it.

Two Years Ago

2011-05-07T10:55:00.001-07:00

Two years ago I made out with a giraffe. Kind of.

Two years ago yesterday was the first day of the rest of my life. On May 6, 2009 I signed employment papers to be a photo caravan driver at the Wild Animal Park. I met people who changed my outlook on life so much that I'll never be happy if I'm not doing something I'm passionate about.

Two years ago I had been unemployed for 3 months after being laid off from my writing job. I wasn't happy there and had been looking for a new job, but never would have looked at the zoo job board had I not gotten laid off. And because I was desperate for a job I knew I'd take anything. Luckily, being a photo caravan driver was the best thing to happen and I rocked my interview, getting the job the next day. I went into the interview thinking it was for the Journey Into Africa tram and was beyond excited to hear otherwise. I spent the next 4 months getting up close and personal with dozens of wild animals, listening to my coworkers talk about their behaviors and how they've adapted to their environments, and watching species I don't know if I'll ever see in the wild act completely natural. It was a dream come true for me, a dream I never really knew I had.

Two years ago I didn't know this animal existed.

Two years ago I was in love with someone I knew wasn't right for me, but too afraid to let go. I had been going back and forth between wanting to break up and wanting to stay for almost 5 months. I didn't have the courage to leave a 5+ year relationship and I knew it. Meeting the photo caravan people, seeing their immense passion for these animals, getting glimpses of their lives and the animals in them, made me realize how unhappy I would be if I didn't leave my relationship. I always knew I wanted horses, a cow, dogs, cats, rats, whatever came my way, but the person I was with not only didn't share that dream, he was allergic to animal hair. The only reason we lasted as long as we did was because he put up with it to be with me, and he adored my cat, but it was always a sore issue. I knew being with him would eventually mean giving up many of the animals I wanted in my life. It took me two more months to fully realize this, to fully realize how badly I would hurt in the future if I had to give up (or be restricted in) having animals in my life, but I finally did and I left. In the two years since it's been absolutely crucial to be with someone who loves animals. I may not have found the perfect man yet, but knowing that this is something I can't compromise on really narrows it down.

Two years ago I learned this face will likely determine who I love.

Two years ago I was lazy, tired and bored (and boring). Working in an office all day, staring at a computer screen, sitting on my ass drained all of my energy. I would go home, put on my pajamas and watch TV until I fell asleep. I didn't go out and do things at night and barely did anything on the weekends. I hated who I was. Working in the intense heat of the San Pasqual Valley, moving around and lifting buckets of water when I wasn't driving, and being mentally stimulated while I was driving gave me ten times the energy I had from my previous job. I left work sweaty and gross but rejuvenated, went home to shower and went out with friends and coworkers. I had energy to sit up late with my neighbors drinking wine and talking in the courtyard, energy to go to Taco Tuesday pretty much every week, energy for Stone movie nights, energy for bar hopping on nights off and running on mornings off. I loved who I was that summer. When the summer, and my job, ended I knew I would have to find a new job I could be passionate about, that I wouldn't be happy ever again doing something I didn't care for.

Two years ago I never imagined this photo would exist.

Two years ago I had no direction in my life. I gave up on being a journalist and had no where else to turn. If I wasn't going to continue making writing my career, what was left for me? Biology would be too impractical because of the debt I would have and because I still didn't know what I wanted to do. Writing didn't make sense if I wasn't going to be a teacher or a journalist, and nothing else interested me. Despite knowing I definitely wanted to continue with higher education I couldn't just do something for the sake of getting a master's. I needed to love it, needed to want it, needed to imagine myself in a specific position afterwards. And I'm excited to admit now, finally, I know what I want, know what I want to be, and know how I want to help change the world.

Two years ago I had an idea but I was on the verge of giving it up. Two years ago I found out I don't have to hide my passion and excitement for animals and conservation. Two years ago I learned what it meant to be a Cape buffalo. Two years ago I knew it couldn't be any other way.

A Deserved Death

2011-05-02T21:37:00.000-07:00

This is my favorite!

Within minutes of the Obama press conference announcing the death of the current world's most hated terrorist, the Internet had a field day making snarky images. Facebook has also been blowing up with people arguing over whether we should celebrate his death or...well, mourn would be the wrong word, but not celebrate it. While I agree that no death should be outright celebrated (come on, we are better than that), some deaths are very, very deserved.

I'm a supporter of the death penalty. I think that some people do such atrocious things to others for no reason that they give up their right to humanity, and with that goes compassion and life. Osama bin Laden was responsible for hundreds of thousands of innocent deaths, and his own death could not have come too soon. But on the other hand, maybe chanting and singing and celebrating isn't the right approach. Maybe we should have a respectful moment of silence for those we've lost in the last ten years (still wrapping my mind around the fact that it's been ten years), and reassess our efforts in our war triangle.

Perhaps it's finally time to withdraw from the Middle East and focus our resources on strengthening out country from within. Let's spend that war money on defense (not offense), educating the poor kids who keep getting school days taken from them, putting people to work, and celebrating our own very unique culture. Maybe, if this was our goal, now we can stop "helping" others for long enough to help ourselves. Maybe.

After watching the press conference I wanted two things: to see a picture of the body and to learn about the SEAL who fired the bullet (and his brothers). I don't know if either will ever happen, but I'm glad for this milestone. I'm sorry it had to take so long, and I hope this means the end is coming soon.

Struggles

2011-04-25T21:58:00.000-07:00

A bridge. Literal image, metaphorical idea. Also one of the coolest bridges.

An interesting part of humanity is that we have the ability to hide our feelings. When an animal is scared he either cowers or fights back, when an animal is pleased or content he is relaxed. A person can appear one thing on the outside and feel the opposite on the inside. The struggles people carry with them on a daily basis can very often be completely hidden from all but those who know them best.

This makes me happy. <3

I started my new job carrying a good amount of anger (completely unrelated to work), and that anger combined with a few very unexpected obstacles caused me to break down on my second day. No one in my office knows of the anger I carried (carry?), but it doesn't matter. I know they carry their struggles, and sometimes those struggles are hidden just beneath the surface. I found out about this when one person's struggles came out; I have no idea what each of them carry within their heads or hearts, just like none of them know what I carry. We, all people, are just trying to get through the day and get to whatever it is that makes us happy. The good thing is I know what makes me happy, I know what I want now and in the future, and I know that I value those things so much I can't be apart from them.

This makes everything seem better.

There's a dream I have of my hopefully not too distant future: to live alone in a beautiful, spunky apartment by Balboa Park, with my kitty, to run in the park every day, to have my debts paid off and to not worry about how I'm going to pay for the things I need, and to do work I can feel good about. This dream hinges on one or two decisions, so my life should have the direction I want in a couple of months. If everything goes according to plan I may have to put off that small dream for a few years, but I know it'll be way worth it, because the big plan will be in the works.

Paranoia

2011-04-22T00:28:00.000-07:00

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean the world isn't out to get you.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm just paranoid or if I'm being smart...

There are things I want to write but because I don't know exactly who has access to this site (which is to say I do know who has access to it I just don't know who they share it with...), but that whole thought makes me angry because that's NOT THE POINT OF THIS BLOG! I decided when I began two years ago that I would write what I wanted no matter who was reading, no matter who was going to be upset by what I wrote.

The problem with that is when I started I never in a million years thought I would be in the position I'm currently in with members of my family. There's a level of fear I live with now which is beyond constricting and I don't know what to do with it... If I say things here that get distorted and spread around it could cause serious problems for others. I'm not concerned about myself because I stand behind every word I write and will defend it to anyones face. But others can't do that.

What it all seems to come down to is whether or not I think certain people are intentionally malicious. I always give people the benefit of the doubt, from intimate connections to total strangers. There is always a more innocent explanation for why someone would do or say something harmful than because he or she meant to cause harm. But what if I'm wrong? What if that is the explanation?

I can't believe people are like that, though, so I'll just go on assuming the best until I have irrefutable proof otherwise. I've been let down before, but I'm already cynical, and I don't need to believe the worst. That will destroy me.

An Open Letter To Men

2011-04-21T00:40:00.000-07:00

Dear Men,

Please shave your goddamn faces. This is an issue that seems to present itself way more often than the cursory I-woke-up-in-a-rush-this-morning-and-didn't-have-time should allow. Why does this happen? Is it the rugged manly-man commercials that make stubble look sexy? Are you lazy? Are you trying to hide some pimple or something? Are you all failing miserably at growing beards? Why do you want to grow a beard anyway? They're not sexy. (You can have Movember; anything for charity.)

Here's the reason a clean shaven face is sexy: our cheeks, our lips, our necks, our shoulder blades, our collar bones, pretty much anything you might want to kiss is naturally hairless. I mean, there are the little tiny fuzzies that create that baby soft smoothness that you'll never have on your cheeks (sorry, but that's the way life is), but otherwise hairless. This means there's no protective barrier against those painfully sharp little spikes you've got growing out of your chin. Try rubbing that on the inside of your arm or something. Doesn't feel good, does it? Imagine a half hour of that. When you're making out with a guy with a 3-day beard your chin gets all raw and red. Which not only isn't attractive, it fucking hurts.

And there's one more, somewhat more subtle reason a clean shaven face is sexy: our other lips appreciate a fresh shave. A lot of guys now like a woman with little to no hair-down-there, and more and more women are going Brazilian (or are at least trimming). We do NOT like those painfully sharp little spikes you've got growing out of your chin on those VERY SENSITIVE AREAS. Talk about killing the mood: I like you, you like me, I'm putting up with your spiky chin because you're funny and you smell nice, until you try to step things up a notch by heading down south and I have to try my damnedest to enjoy it. It might have actually been good, but I'll never know if your face is covered in sandpaper.

Which brings me to another point. Guys, I realize shaving is probably not your favorite part of waking up, and it must suck to have to do it every other day. But when you consider that the only thing you're shaving is your face, while your women are shaving their armpits, arms, legs and vaginas, it's really not so bad. We do it because you don't want to look at hairy armpits, because running your hand up a hairy leg is not a turn on, and because eating out a ball of hair has its downsides.

So, boys of shaving age, if you think there's a chance you'll be making out with a woman later you should shave. If you don't think there's a chance you'll be making out with a woman but you're hoping it'll happen anyway you should shave. If you're not even going on a date or seeing anyone but you've always entertained the idea of making out with someone you just met spontaneously you should shave. If there's absolutely no chance you'll get anywhere near a woman, if you have absolutely no interest in making out, and you have absolutely no desire in creating an opportunity to make out you can skip the shave.

It seems that facial hair should be a clear indicator of interest. A clean shaven face would mean the man thought ahead, decided there was at least a 0.001% chance he'd get to make out (or more), and figured you'd appreciate a fresh shave, making him considerate, or at least into you. A day old shave would mean the guy's a little more comfortable with you, or at least not trying super hard to impress you. A 2-3 day old shave would mean he's either not that into you or doesn't give a fuck how making out with sandpaper feels. Or that he's trying to grow a beard. And a full on bearded man should be saying, "Hey, I know I've got a small mammal on my chin, but I sure as fuck know what I'm doing."

So, guys, shave your faces. Every single body part on us thanks you.

Sincerely,

Women.

Writing, Writing

2011-04-20T20:39:00.000-07:00

Eh.

My hours are filled with writing words. My thoughts are all about writing. When I'm struggling to find a new, interesting way to tell prospective clients about garage door springs (they make a cool "sproing!" sound when they break?) I'm thinking about what I'll write at night. I don't necessarily want to spend all of my waking hours in front of a screen thinking about the right words and the perfect order they go in, but when I leave my job in the evening I'm already planning out my own words. Which could mean one of two things: I'm really a writer and can't get sick of it, or I'm doing a lot of self psychology.

I worry that the situation with my dad is doing the damage it usually does to people. Because I feel so rejected by him I feel other rejections so much more. That's so unfair not only to me but to the people in my life. When I first realized what my dad was doing I remember thinking of how it would affect my sisters and I in 6 months, a year, 5 years, 10 years. I wondered what our relationships with men would be like, if we'd be screaming for attention or looking for the wrong kinds. If I were in a committed relationship I'd be happier with it, glad there was a man I could look up to, someone I loved who wasn't a complete jackass. It kind of sucks not being in a relationship and wanting one, and having slight abandonment issues doesn't really help. You would think that being 25, a complete adult by anyone's measures, would make me exempt from those feelings, but apparently not. Hopefully, if I go down the sociology path, this will give me good thesis ideas. If nothing else, maybe I can at least use my experiences for good.

It makes sense for me to be drawn to sociology. Researching, case studies, writing, and probably endless reading seem to be involved. I already have those skills. It would be so exciting to use them for something I'm so interested in.

Sabotage

2011-04-17T00:06:00.000-07:00

Blogger, why do you sabotage the posts I want most? I spent 45 minutes writing a detailed story and it should have autosaved several times while I was writing, and especially should have saved when I clicked "save now." It's true I wasn't planning on publishing my story now (possibly ever), but I wanted it anyway. I wanted it for personal reasons, in case someday I felt it was time to publish. It was mostly for my own records, for whatever impulse in me decided I needed to write, and I'm deeply hurt that you took matters into your own hands, so far that you not only failed to do a basic function I regularly count on, but you blatantly ignored a very, very basic instruction. Both of those disappointments combined caused me to lose a long piece, one which I poured much emotion into and one which I'm sad and angry to have lost.

I've tried recovering it through my history, but my history is incomplete. I also closed my browser window after incorrectly assuming my story had successfully saved, so anything I could have saved is gone. Blogger, you've left me adless, and now for the second time you've left me without a personal story that I really wanted despite my efforts to keep it. If you're not going to keep the things I save why would I write drafts?

And now I'm just angry. I write things I want and you delete them. But I've been using your service for 2 years and it's free and my readers know this site. I like the layout, it's easy to use and I'm comfortable here. But why that post? Why that article, which I wanted for myself so much?

I'll rewrite it, but not here. Since it's really going to be mine I'll keep it offline, to myself. Blogger, you disappoint me.

My Love, My Life

2011-04-14T23:43:00.000-07:00

A girl basking in the sunlight: a self portrait.

Last week I had a brief moment of clarity: I'm happy and, besides every day frustrations (and in spite of or perhaps because of the super shitty things that seem to occur more frequently these days), always am. The happiness that enveloped me had little to do with it being my last day at a job I was sick of, little to do with the job I was about to start, and little to do with my general position in time. However, it has everything to do with my position in space. I'm so lucky to live in America's Finest City; I love my city so much, and just knowing that it's so important for me to live here, that I will do whatever it takes to keep a roof over my head on my own, means so much. It means that my heart belongs here. I have a feeling that this is the city I'll always return to, that no matter where life takes me 619 will be my area code, that home will always be SD. San Diego both satisfies me and makes me want more. Like, a lot more. And after I've experienced the best the world has to offer maybe I'll come back, and breathe a sigh of contentment.

That's not to say I don't do that now. Driving around, seeing skies that were filled with both the fluffy white clouds that look almost tangible and make everything seem better and the dark, ominous clouds whose threat of rain excites me like a little girl, running in my beautiful Balboa Park early in the morning with the last few raindrops illuminated by the rising sun, how could I want anything more?

Which brings me to wondering about love. Much to my regret, my mind keeps wandering back to one certain boy. Time has somehow caused me to view him in this glorified way, which makes the ongoing task of stopping those romantic feelings slow going. But I do have one large flaw to hold on to: if he's so content with living so close to where we both grew up, content with never having lived more than an hour away from his parents, and (most importantly) content with remaining that way, then I have to accept that that's just not good enough for me. Which is starting to be OK. I know there will one day be some all-consuming great love like all the songs say... I guess I just miss being in love.

Sometimes I'm Right

2011-03-31T11:31:00.000-07:00

Every now and then I go to my guilty-pleasure website, The Frisky. I do so mostly for the Dear Wendy, but I also read the articles. One writer, Jessica, really bugs me. She's highly dramatic and she has a "no apologies" kind of attitude. About 2 years ago she wrote she found the man she would marry, after a month of dating the guy, and moved in with him and his best friend within 3 months. They told the world. Literally. For 2 years she blogged about how happy she was that she found the love of her life, the man she would marry, how sure they both were that they'd spend the rest of their lives together, how every mistake in her life was now OK because it led her to this guy.

See where this is going?

Yep, he dumped her. According to her blog post, it was sudden and unexpected. She decided not to post the dirty details out of respect for his privacy (oh yeah, and she also still hopes they'll get back together and doesn't want the dirty laundry to make her look bad later) but did in another post describe how it took him a week to kick her out and less than 2 weeks to go on a date with a girl he apparently had been e-mailing and flirting with. I'm gonna draw my own conclusions.

The reason I thought this deserved writing about is because I want some record somewhere to state that I CALLED IT FIRST! Two years ago, when she was ecstatically writing about moving in with Mr. Wonderful, I knew this day could not be too far away. I don't know what it is, but when you start blabbering on about how wonderful this love is, how no one else could possibly know what it's like to be this much in love, how you're both sure you'll get married and have babies and live happily ever after, how you're "practically engaged anyway," how you can't imagine living with any other person in any other way, how happy you are to be in love and how much you now pity your single friends and "just hope you find the same happiness I did (even though no one can possibly know what this feeling is like because you're not with this man)," I know it's not going to last.

And you know what? My whole life I've been right. So, Jessica, I don't even feel bad for you. It sucks that this boy broke your heart and went after another girl not even two seconds after kicking you out of the house you rented with him, but maybe next time you'll keep your lovey-dovey to yourself and not go proclaiming what your relationship is before you've even reached that step. Painful lesson to learn for sure, but it's high time you learned it.

Love=Anxiety

2011-03-27T20:33:00.000-07:00

No anxiety here!

Every so often I'll get this knotted feeling in the pit of my stomach. Sometimes it's because I'm super anxious about something, but sometimes it's because I'm in love with life. When I recognized that it's the same exact feeling, just with very different associations attached to it, I started wondering what makes it one and not the other. I'll get that feeling and attribute it to being in love with my city after a few days of being annoyed with my position in life; these times it's an unexpected but very welcome respite in what can be a dreary week.

Spurring this lovely respite was running my first 5K with my favorite lady in the Race for Autism. We were in Balboa Park, my favorite part of San Diego, in the foggy early morning with thousands of other supporters and fellow runners. Despite starting things off seeing a nasty fender bender over a not-so-desirable parking space, and then having to run my bag back to the car (we didn't realize how far away we'd parked until then) 10 minutes before it started because there was no bag check (which, honestly, how do you not have a bag check?), we were really happy to be part of everything. Because of the whole bag thing we started the run 5 minutes late and had to make our way through hordes of walkers with dogs and strollers, but it made us feel like champs to pass that many people throughout the course. When we finished we were given water and fruit and walked around the rows of booths providing a wide variety of professional resources for parents of those with autism, ranging from medical research to after-school enrichment. Then we trekked through lovely Banker's Hill back to the car and made a delicious breakfast before heading off for shopping. Rounding out the day with sushi with friends and going home still drunk made me a happy camper.

That happiness rubbed off on today and, though all I did was work, I felt in love with life. It was overcast and sprinkling raindrops, good songs were on the radio and I got excited for my plans next week. Again, I was asked why I don't move back to my hometown. These last couple of weeks have made it even more impossible for me to imagine leaving my wonderful city in order to move back there. I may not always live in San Diego, but if I leave it'll be for another amazing city I haven't lived in yet (Seattle's been sounding awesome lately). There's so much to love here: the vastly different neighborhoods, the food, the beautiful weather, Balboa Park, the nightlife, the people watching, the beaches, the friendliness of others and the abundance of running trails and dog parks.

But I still wonder... what makes that knotted feeling in the pit of my stomach feel like love? Or anxiety? Just like there's plenty to love, there's plenty to be anxious about, namely that I've now been job searching, heavily, for three months with no relief, that the job I do have is getting ridiculously out of control in the mismanagement, and that my poor computer– despite constantly outperforming no matter how much I abuse it– is definitely on the fritz.

Still, today that feeling was unmistakably one of love.

Grammar And The Internet

2011-03-24T00:09:00.000-07:00

If this guy ever comes into your lunch place, run.

I recently (and by recently I mean several weeks ago, I just forgot to publish this post) finished reading a grammar book called Eats, Shoots & Leaves, by Lynne Truss. Though it may sound nerdy, it was actually very funny. Even the title is a joke:

A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air. "Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder. "Well, I'm a panda," he says, at the door. "Look it up." The waiter turns to the relevant entry in the manual and, sure enough, finds an explanation. "Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."

Get it??? Pandas eat shoots and leaves (you know... bamboo) but the manual incorrectly used a comma in between eats and shoots so the panda ate, shot and left! Ha ha!

Anyway, the rest of the book was fun to read. But towards the end I did find a funny problem, and it had nothing to do with the fact that this book is about English English and I'm an American (though I could adapt to English English very quickly as I already use some of the un-American grammar described in the book). The book was first published in 2003 when personal computers and access to high speed Internet was first fully mainstream. So when I was starting college, buying my first laptop and becoming fluent in what Truss (and others) have dubbed "Netspeak" she (and others) were trying to make sense of this chatting and texting business that seems to have forgotten all about grammar. Which is perfectly understandable. When something comes along that changes life as we know it so dramatically (do you remember the time before the Internet?) those who were not only used to the previous way of life but who made a living in that previous way of life must be a little reluctant to adapt to these new ways. Especially if that previous way of life was proper English grammar and those who made a living in that previous way of life were grammar sticklers (we call them Nazis). Texting and chatting shorthand must drive them up the wall. However, this paragraph made me lol:

I've just spotted a third reason to loathe emoticons, which is that when they pass from fashion (and I do hope they already have), future generations will associate punctuation marks with an outmoded and rather primitive graphic pastime and despise them all the more. "Why do they still have all these keys with things like dots and spots and eyes and mouths and things?" they will grumble. "Nobody does smileys any more."

HAHAHA, Ms. Truss, how little you knew. Welcome to 2011, where the emoticon is not only still just as popular but often absolutely necessary. No matter how effective of a writer you are, it's still nearly impossible to get the proper tone across when dealing with a sensitive issue (or just teasing, as I've come to learn) in a short text message. Plus, it facilitates flirting a whole hell of a lot.

Though I have to agree with Truss on other annoying means of emphasis. Exclamation points are not to be used in every sentence and certainly should not be over-used (which I find is a symptom of the older generations!!!), all caps means YOU ARE YELLING AT ME (which just makes me ANGRY), and italics and dashes (oh god, and ellipses, please please please do not use ellipses after every half thought) need to be pulled out only when necessary. But then again, I'm the kind of person who writes full and completely punctuated text messages, judges those who don't, and has a hard time deciphering poorly written and badly punctuated corporate emails.

But an interesting thing has occurred in recent months; a new form of emphasis has been adopted by the younger generation (younger being those still in high school, a whole ten years younger than me) which involves retyping the last letter of a word to emphasize that word. "I love you" is now "I loveeeeeee you" and it means "I love you very much." This would make sense with a word like "so": "I love you sooooooo much" is something people actually say IRL. People don't actually say "loveeeeeee." You can't even pronounce that because the "e" is silent. But, and here's the logical kicker, you could say "loooooove." Quite often now I see on Facebook, "I'm veryyy exciteddd!" I can only assume that some kid somewhere knew enough to figure out that some words can be emphasized by retyping the last letter in that word (like "so"), but didn't know enough to know that it doesn't work with every word (like "very"). But it caught on anyway. During a chat once I actually mentioned to a friend my appreciation for his knowledge of the difference between words that can be emphasized that way and words that can't. He wrote, "I'm reeeeeally looking forward to..." when he could have written "I'm reallyyyy looking forward to..." So I thanked him. And to my surprise he knew exactly what I meant and said it annoys him too. Halleluja!

I doubt the new emphasis of retyping the last word will stick on, and if it does I hope it will stay among the younger generations (I hope people grow out of that and we're not reading corporate emails with "very importantttttt" in the subject line), but I like that the Internet is causing trends to be born at this quicker rate. Truss mentions that in the time before the Internet it was near impossible to add a new punctuation mark, and even if one got approval from the grammar gods it was hardly used and would likely not become mainstream. I think if an idea is good enough it will stick around long enough and with access to all the ideas out there at our fingertips we have an opportunity for communication that would never have been possible otherwise.

2011-03-23T22:32:00.001-07:00

There are 2 methods of asking others, in real life, if they're Redditors:

1: Act completely serious and somewhat inquisitive, as if you're about to impart basic yet valuable information. "Do you go on Reddit?"

2: Weigh weather or not asking will make you seem like a complete nerd, decide it's worth it, and ask, "Do you go on Reddit?"

There are 3 responses, and 3 reactions.

Response 1: "Yes! I love Reddit! OMG today did you see the picture of the parrotlet hiding in the hoodie? So funny!"

Reaction 1: You both now share something special that you didn't know you shared.

Response 2: "Um, well, I know what it is but I don't go there."

Reaction 2: They think you're kind of weird (if they didn't already) and you now have to either explain why Reddit is awesome (which never really works) or drop the subject entirely.

Response 3: "What's that?"

Reaction 3: You now have to either explain what Reddit is (which isn't easy) and why it is awesome (which, again, never really works) and then explain why it ties into what you were talking about, or drop the subject entirely.

You always hope for Response/Reaction 1.

Not long ago I was hanging out with my lady and our friend used Method 1 to broach the Reddit subject. I gave Response/Reaction 1 and my lady was somewhere between Response/Reaction 1 and 2. She wasn't a Redditor but knew lots about it since I talked about it all the time. Now she's a Redditor too! (To be fair, all three of us are more lurkers.)

Tonight I broached the Reddit subject using Method 2. I was slightly nervous I would get Response/Reaction 3, and then be a total nerd (and not the cool kind) as I tried miserably to explain the very weird amalgamation of news and cartoons and science and pictures and inside jokes that is Reddit. Luckily, I got somewhere between 1 and 2: he is a Redditor but seemed thrown off by my asking.

When I learn someone is a Redditor I like them that much more. When my friend asked if we were Redditors I nearly jumped in the air with excitement. Someone automatically gets approval points for mentioning Reddit, and someone I don't know well I'll want to know better. I feel like there are others out there, everywhere, who do what I do, like the world is much smaller than it seems.

Thanks, Redditors.

13.1

2011-03-14T15:53:00.000-07:00

I'm in orange.

Yesterday I ran 13.1 miles– more than I've ever run– in 2 hours and 5 minutes (and 38 seconds, but who's counting?). Today I can barely move.

The event was the San Diego Zoo's Safari Park Inaugural Half Marathon. I raced in a group of 3,500 in order to raise funds to build a new tiger habitat. Though, I wonder how much of our fees actually go to tigers: we got a technical t-shirt (which is the coolest thing ever!), a finisher's medal, fruit, and as much Powerade as we wanted, not to mention paying employees to be there early, equipment to set up water stations, mile markers, a permit to shut down a busy road, winner medals (and the awesome stuffed-animal cheetahs they won), and extra employees to attend to the crowd. We probably raised well over $200k, but I still wonder. Regardless, it was an amazing experience and one I definitely want to do next year.

The biggest pitfall with this run was that it was the same day as daylight saving time. So not only did I have to be up super early, I had to do so on a day I lost an hour of sleep. And, since I'm just this lucky, I woke up in the middle of the night (I'd had a LOT of water right before bed) just in time to see the clock change from 1:59am to 3am. Less than 2 hours later we (my mom came for moral support) were up.

There's only one road leading into the Park and it's only one lane. But there's 2 ways to get to that road, and I knew the one no one else would be taking, which got us into the parking lot in record time (I don't know how 3k+ cars made it on those roads and into the limited parking lot space...). Gear check, potty break, bib on and I was good to go. There was a morning DJ kind of guy with a mic doing his best to get people pumped. There were girls in sequined skirts, groups wearing animal-themed outfits, a guy in a condor costume, and two men in matching zebra and tiger striped leggings, as well as many wearing the orange shirts. The sun started to break, 7am came and we were off.

Somehow the weather was perfect for the run. The sun was out for a while, letting my hands thaw, but after a while the sun retreated behind cloud cover and mist. While the sun was still rising we ran down a road lined with orchards, horse corrals and cow pastures. One house had a large field behind it and a white horse, backlit by the rising sun, ran alongside the fence as cows mooed beyond. It was a beautiful sight and a few people near me took pictures with their phones. The course was a lot hillier than I expected but I told myself to not stop on hills, no matter what. I broke that resolve for a few seconds on the last hill– it looked longer than it was, and because it was steep I gave in halfway up. A man on the sidelines shouted encouragement: "This is the top, you're there." A girl next to me told him he'd better be right and we both picked up running again. He was, we were over the last hill. The medic was stationed at the peak of that hill (which was a point we passed twice), and at the bottom were residents of a neighborhood we invaded cheering us on. One man turned to wave, tripped and fell. He rolled like a hero in a video game, popped right back up, and waved again to the small crowd saying he was alright. His buddies, running alongside him, joked that he'd have to go back up the hill if he needed the medic, and that he should tell others he was saving someone from a lion.

Around mile 10-11 I had to stop for a few more seconds to give some relief to my hip and to adjust my shoe. All together, including walking through the water stations, I stopped running for less than 2 minutes. The last mile seemed much longer than a mile, but when I saw that 13 mile marker I started running fast. I powered through and the last .1 miles was almost sprinting. I saw my time on a giant clock and had a huge grin as I passed the finish line. I knew I'd finish before 2:30, and I secretly wanted to finish before 2:15, but I never guessed I'd finish at 2:05. I accepted my finisher's medal, a bottle of water and Powerade, found my mom (who promptly took my very sweaty picture) and just tried to keep from collapsing. My legs were shaking and there were so many people (over a thousand finished before me) crowding the area that there was no room to walk it off.

Once I regained my composure (and took my zebra stampede photo) I started to feel good. I headed over to see if I could find my former co-workers/fellow runners, and hopped on the one morning caravan that hadn't sold out yet. I finally introduced my mom to the best job ever (she was excited to meet my giraffe and rhino friends) and once the sun came out we started to forget our cold and enjoy the day.

When we were home I took the world's greatest shower, ate a plate-full of pasta and vegetables, and we lay down for a nap. More than 4 hours later we woke up, still exhausted, and I devoured a giant plate of nachos. A day later and I'm still exhausted, and now with very sore legs. But I feel accomplished that I ran a half marathon. This is a race I want to make a tradition, and next time I run I want to beat 2 hours.

Kissing A Stranger

2011-03-08T22:39:00.000-08:00

I was on a date, of sorts, with this guy. It was maybe the third or fourth date and we were just hanging out at his place, some of his friends were over, and it was a pizza-beer-movie kind of evening. He had his arm around me on the couch, in a kind of compulsory way. But suddenly he turns, looks at me with confident eyes, and kisses me. He kisses me deliberately, securely. It lasts a few seconds, then he pulls away leaving me speechless, almost even breathless. We stare at each other for a second, then he turns back to the movie, grinning, and I look around the room, seemingly for the first time. The friends are laying sprawled out on their stomaches on the floor, chatting about what's going on on the TV, this guy's arm is now comfortably around me, holding me close, and I'm just accepted into this group of people without question, all because I'm with their good friend. We're all lounging in sweatshirts on a weeknight, entirely unconcerned with dress code. I relax into my date's arm, at once contented and excited at my new place in this group. That kiss, the deliberate way in which it was delivered, the confident no-questions-asked attitude, roped me in.

And then I woke up.

On the up side, I woke up in a really good mood. If reading into dreams means anything (which, after the earthquake dream the other night, I hope not), maybe it means I'm going to meet a handsome stranger in grad school. When I looked at this guy after the kiss I felt amazed– not that we kissed like that but that I knew this was something. Not it, but something meaningful. And that was exciting. Waking up with that feeling still fluttering around inside me reminded me that that exists– I may not have been waiting around hoping my boyfriends would ask me out, and definitely never thought my relationships would last more than a couple of months or be even remotely serious (boy was I wrong), so I never got that really excited "I hope this works out" feeling. I'd certainly like to think that I'll have that feeling, or something similar, if I ever get married. I'd also like to think that if there ever is anyone I want to marry that I'll know, even if it doesn't work out or he doesn't want to marry me; the thought of being in a ('nother) serious relationship for years but still having that "how do you know it's right?" feeling lurking around seems depressing.

Though I have to say I did know, in my two relationships. I knew they weren't right, I just may not have been quick to admit it (ok, ok, it took me years to admit it, and then 6 months after admitting it to ending it... so I take my time, alright?). Half the battle is working up the courage to get along on your own, but the other half of the battle is working up the courage to break some poor guy's heart. Nobody really looks forward to either of those battles.

I like that my dreams take on hopeful themes as well as terrifying ones (simultaneous earthquakes are scary as shit, apparently, but in my dream everyone was physically and mentally OK). My dreams, combined with some real life positivity, make me think things are gonna get good quick. I'm ready for change.

For now, it's off to Nyquil land for some more drug-induced adventures.

More TSA Goodness

2011-03-03T10:52:00.000-08:00

This is genius. I should have been a boy, just so I could try this.

The Viagra TSA Experiment. Please click that link and watch the video (or read the transcript); it will be worth 5 minutes of your time. Just like it sounds, a man, named John, takes a hefty dose of Viagra (and I mean hefty...) an hour before arriving at the airport. Naturally, he refuses the body scanner, whips out his camera and records the ensuing and highly awkward male-on-male pat down.

If you've never had one of their pat downs this may not seem all that funny. But I've had a pat down*, and those guys have to be eye-level with your junk, so I imagine having a raging erection (while being fondled by a government agent in a room with hundreds of other people) being an interesting part of the day, to say the least.

What's better, the TSA agent was made aware that he was going to be touching a man who'd taken Viagra, and you know that was the only thing on his mind, probably especially as he was eye-level with it. John tried to joke around while being man-handled, and the agent went along with it for a while. Though you can't see in the video what the agent was doing when he decided to stop playing along, my guess is it was right at the point he had to actually look the erection in the eye. The procedure begins with arms and shoulders, moves to the chest and legs, and the end is the genital region. Maybe it's just hard (haha!) to find the humor in that situation when your job requires you to be on your knees in front of another man, touching parts you'd never otherwise touch, while the man has a raging boner. TSA agents are not paid nearly enough.

The last paragraph (for those of you not clicking on the link... shame) I'm going to share here because it's word for word exactly how I feel:

Our freedoms are being stripped from us (literally) with every body scan we submit to, but it's not the TSA agent's fault, of course. It's our fault. It's our fault for being so scared that we allow the government to take away our privacy, in order to gain the illusion of greater security. My stance is simple: I would rather have less security, and more freedom.

Thanks, John. I wish I had a penis so I could do this the next time I fly.

Also, looks like I'm not even safe in Canada. The US government is making Canada go through the same bullshit body scanners for all flights into the US. I remember reading that one of the TSA board members is the one behind all the scanners– he's making a shit load of money off our stupid fears.

*I opted out of the body scanner last October and had to submit to a pat down. Though the woman who inspected me was professional, at least to the point of not actually touching my sexy bits and using the back of her hand when she was near my boobs and butt, she was in a foul mood. I found that funny.