Entries from July 2004 ↓

So, today was the last day to donate money to the Kerry campaign, and despite my being utterly poor and destitute, I considered throwing him a few bones, if only to get his average donation number down. Ultimately, I decided I’d rather pay the nice Visa people. Instead I will pay with my vote.

I got to watch coverage of the Democratic National Convention tonight, finally, after watching it on mute (with subtitles) at work. I’d just catch highlights later on the late news. And man, am I glad I didn’t give those guys my money. Did you see all that fucking confetti? Dick Fucking Cheney, that is the most confetti I have ever seen. It looked like a bazillion dumptrucks emptied a shit ton of paper, refilled and then dumped again. I imagine DNC-goers were wading out of that place with a sea of construction paper up to their shins. I certainly hope there will be MAJOR recycling going on post convention. Don’t forget Mr. Kerry, as Democrats we save the trees, not bathe in them.

If I’d ponied up $100 and saw it floating in pieces down from the sky onto the feet of Jerry Springer I’d be contacting someone right promptly about a refund.

I don’t want to bitch and moan too much, because God knows, I want these guys to win in November. So I’m just going to try to forget all about Elizabeth Edwards coming out to Shania Twain’s “She’s Not Just a Pretty Face.”

When I was a little kid I would write my sister notes in red crayon, my bubble letters oozing drops of Crayola blood, and place them on her pillow. They would say things like, “Don’t go to sleep tonight. You don’t want to know what will happen to you if you do.” Or maybe, “I’ll kill you in your sleep if you dare open your eyes.”

I had no idea how much this actually terrified my little sister. She tells me that she would stay awake as long as she could, her eyes fixed, not blinking, on the door.

Before you get all sentimental and feeling sorry for her, please know that she used to beat me up regularly and once clocked me upside the head with a rotary phone.

So, I work out now like four times a week. THAT IS SO CRAZY. I’m such a lethargic person at my basest level. I love movies and napping and reading and meditation and deep thinking and nothing at all that involves moving one’s ass. Sure, I burn calories at work, walking and heaving buckets of ice and teetering trays every day, but my body has grown accustomed to that activity. Going to work every day is not exercise, since I’ve adapted to that level of movement after eight years of it in a row.

I was thinking about this because of Ariel’s posts (1, 2) about deciding to move to a standing desk at work. While everyone in internet land knows that Ariel is way hottt, she’s been concerned about what she feels are extra pounds. Despite her stair running and hooping and wedding planning, she hasn’t seen a change in her weight.

I find it weird how quickly the human body adapts to the level of exercise it gets. Like it so desperately needs it that, like some kinda junky, its tolerance quickly rises. I go to the gym in the mornings and begin with what amounts to about 100 or so various crunches. Then I hit the elliptical trainer at level 7 for 25 minutes. I began at level 3 and have quickly jumped 4 levels higher. I have begun to use the backward motion on the elliptical trainer, though I can’t stand it for more than 5 minutes per session. That shit burns.

Then I hop off, trade out my People magazine for US and climb aboard a treadmill. I walk at a brisk 4 mph pace at varying inclines (and speeds) for 20 minutes. I try to do a full, hard run for 3-5 minutes toward the end of the session. Sometimes I’m too tired.

Then, if I have time or aren’t completely winded I jump on this stepmill thing that is just like climbing bigass stairs. I can only do this for 5-7 minutes. Ever.

Then once or twice a week I do resistance training. I haven’t been doing as much of this as I should, but it is mostly due to time contraints. After I hit the snooze button 8 times I only have time for cardio, which is probably why I haven’t seen results as quickly as I’d like.

My eating habits are a balanced 80% healthy vs. 20% not-so-much. I love cheese and indulge in it too often and I’m quick to order takeout when I should stir-fry something instead. But I can! fit into jeans I haven’t worn comfortably in over a year, so there is one tiny plus in the physical department.

What has most suprised me is the effect working out has had on my mood. On the days when I work out especially hard I see the most dramatic difference in my temperment. I am smiling, happy; not anxious or sad. Since I’ve begun going to the gym in the mornings I notice the endorphins lingering all day long. (As well as my appetite.) Sadly, on the days I skip exercising I get right back into a slump of near depression. Going without working out for 4 days in a row last week left me a crying heap. Although, of course, I was somewhat pre-menstrual, too.

It is still hard to get out of bed hours before I have to be at work to go breathe really hard and sweat really, really hard, but I remember how much of a high I get when walking back to the locker room and the joy in knowing that by 10 a.m. I have already worked out, and I need not make excuses as to why I can’t go later because I already went.

I’m proud of me. I think exercise has become just something I do, like brushing my teeth or washing the dishes. Not that much fun while it’s happening, but the results are way worth it.

Plus, I may not get heart disease and diabetes and die before the age of 65 like so many on both sides of my family.

(Thanks to Pyrimyd and Edgeling and Christopher for the work-out mixes. They were all, seriously, pretty rad. One of yours was better than the others, but I’ll never tell. Publically.)

I try to avoid The Oprah Winfrey Show whenever possible. It used to be because I had this roommate back in the day who adored Oprah. She watched her show every single day and preached the word of Oprah (reiterating whatever she’d seen on that afternoon’s episode) to anyone who would listen. She was a committed Oprah-phile, and trust me, when you live with one it gets annoying fast.

Since that time I have softened my stance on the evils of Oprah and will watch from time to time. And just about every time I do I end up crying. I don’t know about you, but I don’t need my daytime television to make me cry.

But, I have to admit to totally digging the first five minutes of Oprah’s show no matter who the guest or how much stuff she is giving away. If I am at home at around 4 I’ll try to tune in to Channel 4 for the opening segment of her show*. And I will tell you why.

Absolute. Freak show.

First, the uplifting Oprah opening them song comes on, and then 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 Oprah comes out. And after she does you can nearly hear the place implode from the mass inhalation of breath by every last woman in the room just before she opens her pink-painted maw to wail and scream like someone just stole her baby. The entire studio is filled with Oprah nuts–you know the breed I’m talking about–and they nearly lose their whole shit when they finally see her in person. Women in the front rows are seen CRYING, shaking their hands in the air and desperately trying to cling to her when she touches their hands as she passes. One woman grabbed her the other day and held and hugged her for an awkward and especially long amount of time.

And it happens every day. Count on it. When people tell you that television sucks, thell them they haven’t seen Oprah’s minions completely piss and poop themselves with wild glee when she walks out on stage for her show every afternoon.

[If I ever direct a horror film** I want to hire these Oprah fiends and have them freak all out for me on film. But then, I suppose, that means I would have to hire Oprah. Oprah is so very not in our budget.]

*Oh, who am I kidding? I watch Dr. Phil whenever I can. Her show comes on after that.
**Not bloody likely.

My digital camera is missing. There may or may not be nudie pictures on it.

!!!

UPDATE: My one and only Digital Elph is now officially lost/stolen. We’ve looked everywhere. Last time I saw it for sure I was at a party. A crappy party, at that.

This is a very sad day.

If I had all the money in the world instead of just enough, I would buy everything–EVERYTHING–at the Red Dress Shoppe.

For the bottom-heavy, like myself, a-line skirts and dresses are hard to find. Cutey, retro a-line skirts and dresses are even harder to find. Totally affordable cutey, retro a-line skirts and dresses are a gem worth sharing. Or keeping secret.

Dammit.

I’ve written Red Dress Shoppe on an envelope. One day I will start putting money in there.

Red Dress Shoppe Wishlist*
Red Flats with Keyhole and Bow - $59
Sage Floral Box Pleat Dress - $69
Pink Halter Swing w/ Black Cherries - $59
Shop Girl Dress - $85
1950’s Reproduction Polka Dot Sundress - $48
Black Cotton Eyelet Halter Swing Dress - $39
Pink w/Black Dots and Flowers Skirt - $39

*More for myself than anyone else. Although if you are feeling the urge, please feel free.

There are few things more humiliating than being decked out in all black clothing and an apron (as if you might know how to get around in a restaurant) and tripping up a stair, with drinks in hand, resulting in the most spectacular face plant maybe of all time. I promise. I lived this humiliation just today.

As I said, two beverages, one in each hand when I tripped up the final step of a two-step flight. That last step is much shorter than the first step and makes for an awkward gait if not careful. Well, I tripped. And because I had no way to brace my fall due to both hands being occupied, I hit the floor face-first with my whole body.

And it happened in a fraction of a second. You know how sometimes you fall, but before you hit the ground you know you are falling and you are all, “Oh God, I’m not vertical, OH SHIT!”? Well, there was no time for that. I was standing erect, and the next thing I know I’m lying on the floor in the middle of the dining room covered in diet Coke, surrounded by ice, my arms and legs totally splayed wondering how I got there. I looked up to see every single person in the place staring at me, mouth agape, waiting for me to move or do something. One guy put his forehead in his hand and began to wag his head.

I had to think fast. I don’t know about you, but sometimes after I fall I don’t mind lying there for a second to access the damage and regain my wits. But I knew I couldn’t just lie there, face in carpet, so as fast as I could I jumped up like I’d stolen a base, threw my hands in the air and yelled, “I’m OK!”

Completely red-faced, I picked up the large pieces of broken glass and took them with me toward the kitchen when I run into my manager and the chef laughing. “That was awesome!,” one of them said. I finally started to laugh. I went into the kitchen to find everyone else laughing their asses off. Just about everyone saw my spill, and they were all amused by my post-plunge curtsy. But it wasn’t a curtsy. It was a “TA-DA” with my body. I wish instead of the very stupid, “I’m okay!” I’d have thought to say “Magic!”

My tables were all very concerned about my well-being. I just wanted them to stop talking about it. I felt fine physically, just THOROUGHLY embarrassed. Honestly, I wish I had a videotape. That fall was no doubt one of the most elaborate around. This is verified by a comment made by my favorite co-worker M: “I have been a waitress for nearly 9 years and I have never seen anybody eat it like you just did.”

Thank God, though, that no one clapped.

In fifth grade I was woefully shy, with a slapdash haircut and a crush on Robert from the class next door. I was going through some traumatic shit at home and was struggling to make even average grades. I can’t remember whole, long stretches of that time in my life, but there are certain days, certain instances that blaze in my head.

Thanks to a totally insane, 100% certifiably abusive and psycho stepfather, I spent a lot of my youth sheltered. I wasn’t allowed to say “gosh” in case it sounded sorta like taking the Lord’s name in vein. I was forbidden from drinking Cheerwine, no matter how hard I begged, because–you guessed it–it had the word wine in it. Well, my stepfather didn’t count on Marty Gross.

I sat next to Marty Gross all year long. Assigned seats. Marty was short and impish with big, round freckles all over the tops of his cheeks. He was a Very Bad Kid. Marty rode the bus with me, and he got off at the shabbiest, rundown shack in all of Ashland City. And that is saying something. There were always way too skinny dogs in his yard, along with an old couch and shoes and trash and cigarette butts. So, Marty had it pretty bad at home, we can all agree.

To say that Marty acted out due to his desperate situation would be a preposterous understatement. That kid was always getting paddled or sent to in school suspension. He would curse as much as he said any other words, and he was always hitting kids who’d never tell on him.

One day Marty was passing a folder around class that was causing quite a stir in the cramped aisleways of the classroom. Our teacher was frequently gone for just a minute, probably taking smoke breaks or something; it was then the folder would begin to float in and out of the hands in the room. I was the resident Ass Licker Kid, who was an obnoxious goody two-shoes, always willing to rat out my dearest classmate for my teacher’s affection or approval. Telling on Marty was something I knew I had to do, I just had to figure out what was in that folder. I managed to sneak a look at what was inside to discover, utterly horrified, that it was a Playboy magazine. A naked, squatting woman with red painted lips and slick breasts leering into the camera.

I was frozen with terror. This was my first ever experience with pornography and I was wholely unprepared for what I saw. I didn’t tell on Marty that day–and he never got caught–because I couldn’t find it in me to speak of what my scarred eyes had witnessed.

I didn’t have to tell on Marty the last day I ever saw him.
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“S” stands for soup. “W” stands for Angel Wing (small, filled flour tortilla). “F” stands for fish. I have since learned how to spell “cassoulet” and “pomegranate” correctly. To my credit I have to write this lightning fast.

two egg whites and one whole omega-enriched egg
spinach (in the eggs)
one flax waffle with raspberries and walnuts
soy sausage
low-sodium V-8
water
+
45 minutes on treadmill
30 minutes of restistance training
——————————————————————–
healthy, happy me

What did you have for breakfast today?