Mindless Drivel

I've been to 5 states in less than 9 hours. What a time for the air conditioner in my car to take an unscheduled leave of absence.

Now I can post to LJ from my mobile. I don't know why this is cool. It's just like twitter, which I claim to hate. Oh well.

Testing mobile posting to LJ. Ignore me, please.

It's going to be a quiet one, but I thought I'd make a wishlist anyway.

What I want for my birthday:

1. My mom to get better.  Cancer sucks, yo.
2. My older brother to stop being a douchebag.
3. A trip to Japan.
4. Some of that perfume Gwen Stefani released; the kind that comes in those cute bottles that look like little cartoon characters.
5. Curtains for my kitchen.
6. Peace on earth... or... something.  (Kidding.  I do want peace on earth, it just seems so clichéd.)  So let's say a bunch of money for a shopping spree.  Yay, capitalism!
7. A treadmill.
8. A pay raise.
9. A new car.
10. My boyfriend to be here instead of... not here.
11. A robot army.
12. A sandwich.

OH NO! TEH GAYS ARE COMING! THEY'RE GOING TO TAKE ALL OF OUR RIIIIIGGGHHHHHTS! RUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN! RRRRRUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!

(Seriously, not funny at all.)

(But I still laughed my ass off.)

(What sad, alarmist little people.)

I have a very hard time taking these people seriously. I know I should, but it all just seems so, so ludicrous, like an SNL parody.

And now the Funny or Die response, which is so funny, I laughed until I died.

Oh, and I'm a zombie now.

A Gaythering Storm from Jane Lynch

And a more serious response:



Thanks to my Momo-chan for leading me to both of the non-retarded ones.

Now I have to go eat brains. Bye.

I was sitting at my desk having recently returned from lunch, when I realized that I’d left my bottle of water in the car. I went outside to get it, walking against the wind, leaves blowing around me. I was enjoying the fact that, four days after the Triad received five inches of snow, I was able to be outside in the wind without more than a cardigan sweater on, when a leaf was blown into my stomach with surprising force. I realized that it wasn’t a leaf and was, in fact, a HUGE FUCKING WASP. The wind was just strong enough that the wasp was having difficulty controlling its movements, and it flew into my stomach a couple more times, trying in vain to fly through me or around me.

Normally, I might have lost my proverbial shit, complete with hysterical crying and shrieking of the kind that completely betrays the common sense of my sex. I’m proud to say that I did not freak out, and instead quickly and calmly stepped down off of the sidewalk.

And in front of a moving car.

Luckily, the driver was observing common courtesy and not going fifteen or twenty miles an hour through the parking lot, for if he had been, he surely would have struck me. He slowed down and I hastened out of his way, and between the two actions, catastrophe was avoided.

Thinking about this now, having returned safely to my desk, I’m trying to decide if I would have rather been stung by the angry wasp big enough to inflict at least minor damage upon the city of Tokyo or hit by the slow-moving car. In the interest of maintaining the illusion that I am a reasonably intelligent human being, I won’t answer that question here and will instead leave that up to your imaginations.

That is all.

I realize that this entry won't appeal to everybody, since I know at least one of you has a violent hatred for the admittedly ridiculous anime series Sailor Moon. But I had to share this anyway.



I discovered a website early this morning called Sailor Moon Abridged. I features re-worked, nine-minute abridgments of all the first-season episodes, re-dubbed by a few friends with copious amounts of free time.



Y'all, I laughed so hard watching some of these I almost threw up.



They're probably best if you've actually seen some dubbed episodes of Sailor Moon, because a lot of the gags are at the expense of the horrible DiC production, but you might like it even if you're not familiar with this infamously bad dub.



Below are episodes one and two. You can click on the link provided above for more if you want them. Or, you know, you can forward it to someone who might like it. Like your little sister, Ensor. Seriously, give the link to your sister. Bastard.



Oh, and between the swearing, the gay jokes, and the references to Sailor Moon's eating disorder, these are totally NSFW.

As I was sitting here this evening watching The Princess Bride and thinking idly about putting my laundry away, my cell phone rang. I had been expecting a call, so I happily reached for the phone and flipped it open without checking the caller ID.

"Hello," I said.

"C is for cookie, that's good enough for me..." sang the gruff voice on the other end.

Confused as all hell, I checked the caller ID. The caller was unknown, so I hung up. A few seconds later my phone rang again, and I answered to, "C is for cookie, that's good enough for me..." yet again. Yet again, I hung up.

The phone rang a third time, unknown caller, but this time I was prepared. As the mysterious caller launched into a third, "C is for cookie, that's good enough for me..." I held the receiver less than an inch from my face and bellowed at the tippy-top of my voice, "OH, COOKIE COOKIE COOKIE STARTS WITH C!"

I heard the guy on the other end scream and drop the phone. Something tells me that's the last prank call I'll get for a while.

I discovered her videos last night. She cracks me up hardcore.

Dear Somali Pirates What Are Attempting to Wreak Havoc on the High Seas,

You've been taking ships hostage left and right for the last few months, and while some people have a problem with all the terror you're evoking in everybody from Russian sailors to American tourists, I'm pretty okay with the fact that you're acting like... well, pirates.

But here's the thing, my pirate pals: it's not enough to simply take a ship hostage. You've got a whole pirate legacy to live up to, and it’s a current that runs both shallow and deep. If you're going to be taken seriously as pirates, you're going to have to earn your Boy Scout Pirate Badges.

First thing's first: I haven't seen even one of you with a parrot or a peg leg. I understand that, in your trade, having one or the other might slow you down, but that's part of being a pirate, goddammit. Anybody can lumber menacingly on two good legs, but you just try being ominous with a peg leg and a shoulder full of parrot poop. The day you can appear before someone in full pirate regalia and they wet themselves from something other than laughter… That, my friends, is the day you can call yourself fucking pirates. I also expect to see some tri-corner hats on you before the end of the year or else I'm going to form some sort of pirate union and report you to it for being spoilsports.

Next, you really ought to think about losing the semi-automatic weapons. If a cannon was good enough for your forebears, it’s good enough for you. Aim one of those correctly and it won't even matter that a Carnival Cruise ship can sail laps around you. And for those face-to-face encounters with various helpless captives, don't you think a bright, shiny sword would do just as nicely as a prop from Scarface? I think so, and you should trust me. I've been on that Pirates of the Caribbean ride, like, ten times.

I would also incorporate some pirate lingo into your vocabularies if I were you. Not only does it inspire the right sort of mood, do you really think any serious news agency is going to quote any of you as saying, "We be takin' these land-lubbers fer all the gold ye got, yaaarr, and don't ye be considerin' sendin' out fer the Spanish armada, or these pris'ners'll spend the rest o' their mis'rable days in Davy Jones’ locker, yaaaaarrr"? You’ll be practically invincible on the grounds that no one will be able to understand what you’ve said until it’s too late.

Finally--and this is key, so I hope you pirates are paying attention--you really need to start thinking about the future of your profession and get to burying some treasure and drawing some complicated maps. What’s the good in capturing an oil tanker if you’re not going to bury it on some deserted island for future pirates to discover? And yet you seem happy to take the money and run! And you call yourselves pirates. It’s short-term thinking like that that leads to the kind of weak-kneed piracy I’m looking at now. Seriously, I'm a better pirate than you lot, and the only vessel under my command is uTorrent.

Like father, like son. Think about it, won’t you?

Sincerely,
Nuveena

I woke up and went out to the common room to find my mother yelling at my godmother about Proposition 8, which both of my ultra-converative godparents voted for. (Obviously, The Mum supports gay marriage.)

This is going to be a fantastic Thanksgiving. Maybe we'll have moved on to abortion rights by the time dinner's ready.

(Kill me.)

So I have this pressing urge, nay, need to go into a restaurant, enjoy a satisfying meal and then, when I get up to leave, autograph a paper napkin and leave it at the table.

The catch is that I don't want to autograph it with my own name. Who'd want my autograph? No, I want to give my waiter or waitress something they'd really like, something rare and special.

I'm talking about the autographs of dead celebrities.

Think about it. Wouldn't it make your day if you were on the receiving end of a paper napkin signed, "The soup was wonderful, and the salad divine. Hugs and Kisses, John Wayne"? I know it'd make mine.

Or how about, "Bitchin' fries! Love, Audrey Hepburn"?

Think of the possibilities! I could relay joyful messages from Fatty Arbuckle, Adolf Hitler and everyone in between!

I might eventually branch out to insignificant D-listers. Imagine how tickled you'd be to find, "I will take news of your ice cream sundaes to my dark lord and master, who might enjoy one after a night at the bacchanalia sodomizing kittens. Smooches! -Kirk Cameron," on your table. I believe you'd be so tickled you'd consider suing me for sexual harassment.

I'm off to stock up on Sharpies. Peace out, bitches.

Ignore my title. I'm sleep-deprived.

Obama supporters are catching a lot of grief from people who didn't vote for him for treating him like the second coming of Christ. So I'd like to go on record as saying that I think Barack Obama is nothing like Jesus, mostly because Obama is real, and he doesn't have a criminal record.

I'm glad I got that off my chest. I hope we can share more moments like that in the future.

In other Only-Actually-News-If-You're-Batshit-Insane news
Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France, is the anti-christ. Well, he is if you believe Jack Van Impe, anyway.

I mean, I knew he didn't support the military occupation of Iraq, but I had no idea he was the anti-christ. Somebody should do something about this.

Van Impe also suggested that Gordon Brown might be the anti-christ, but I think he personally favors Sarkozy, probably because it's hard for anybody to imagine that the anti-christ would be named "Gordon Brown." "Nicolas" is at least kind of close to what the anti-christ was called in those Left Behind books.

I guess I wonder what would be the repercussions of having a French anti-christ? I imagine "freedom fries" just wouldn't cut it anymore; restaurants would probably have to start boiling their potatoes in holy water.

I bought a winter coat last night. This is it:



As everyone--with the possible exception of our government--is aware, we're in a recession. This means people are not buying as much as they used to, and this means that stores are doing what they can to entice people to spend their money.

Enter me, my need for a new coat, and my desire to take full advantage of my local mall's financial misfortune.

The Mum and I made a night of it. We went out to dinner and then hit the mall, where I found the above coat. It was marked down $30.00. Add to that the coupon the store had mailed to entice me to buy from them, and it was actually marked down $90.00.

You read the correctly: $90.00. I saved $90.00 buying a winter coat in the middle of November. I couldn't even save $50.00 buying a winter coat in April a few years ago at an end-of-season sale.

If you still have a job and are putting off making a similar purchase, you might want to take advantage of this situation before all of these stores go out of business.

I'll stop being obnoxious now and go back to thinking that it'd be worth it to pay full price for a coat if it meant the economy was healthy.

Okay, so I'll go back to thinking that tomorrow. I'm going to bask in this for at least one more night.

So I was listening to that song, "You're Beautiful" the other day, and it suddenly occurred to me that you suck.

Don't take that the wrong way, James Blunt. I mean, you're cute in a floppy, unwashed English way, and you obviously know how to write quasi-sensitive shit that HAS to get you laid, but here's the thing: when you get right down to it, "You're Beautiful" is one of the weirdest, creepiest songs in existence, and it makes you look like a douchebag.

Take the verses, for example:

My life is brilliant
My love is pure
I saw an angel
of that I'm sure
She smiled at me on the subway
She was with another man
But I won't lose no sleep on that
'cause I've got a plan

[ . . . ]

Yes, she caught my eye
as we walked on by
She could see from my face that
I was fucking¹ high
And I don't think that I'll see her again
but we shared a moment that will last 'til the end

Excuse me, James Blunt, but that's very, very weird, lame, and restraining order-creepy. And even if it wasn't, I've known guys like you, and I've talked to guys like you, and here's what I think of when I hear that lyric.

JAMES BLUNT: (one year after seeing girl on subway) "Man, I just KNOW we were meant to be together."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: (toke) "What?"
JAMES BLUNT: "We just... We shared something. It was so intense."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "Dude, what are you talking ab-- Oh, CHRIST man, not her again."
JAMES BLUNT: "I really missed my chance with her."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "You saw her once like a year ago. You didn't even talk to her."
JAMES BLUNT: "I just know."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "Seriously, Jim. Therapy. Seriously."
JAMES BLUNT: (toke) "I'm going to go write a song about it."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "Yeah. Sure. You just grabbed a bottle of vodka and forgot a pen."
JAMES BLUNT: "I'm writing it in my head."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "Yeah, 'cause your head's obviously a safe place to keep things."
JAMES BLUNT: "Man, I can't believe I missed my chance with her."
JAMES BLUNT'S FRIEND: "I can't believe I don't have any other friends who sell pot."

So, anyway, James Blunt, your song is weird (and your video is, like, socks-eating crazy), and it makes you sound like an obsessed douchebag loser. I don't think I can listen to it any more. I just thought you'd want to know that.

Sincerely,
Nuveena

So there's this little town in Fukui, Japan called Obama, which means "little beach." As one would expect, the residents of Obama, Japan were particularly excited last Tuesday.

From Tokyo Mango:
Their "Obama for Obama" support group are ingenious in a typical Japanese fashion; creating Obama manju, Obama chopsticks, Obama kimonos [sic], and even Obama fish burgers. Some of their committee members are hoping to fly to Washington to attend his inauguration. They're hoping that the Obama hula girls will be asked on stage to perform—unlikely, but hey, anything can happen.

Nuveena to Japan: I ♥ you more than ever.

There are many, many things I like about living in the Triad. For one thing, the overabundance of art, music, theater, restaurants, parks, etc. Southern people really are as friendly as you've heard they are (though I fully admit that my good friend [someone] might have a different take on this, as she's Arabic and I'm not). There are also some pretty cool bits of history wedged into all the time-awful. Did you know that Winston-Salem State University was founded by a former slave? Did you know that the famous Woolworth's lunch counter strike happened in Greensboro? In fact, there's really only one thing I dislike about living here: people are hella Religious. I don't mean they go to church on Easter and Christmas and pray before they eat. That's religious. These people are Religious. Capital "R." It's all they talk about. It's all they think about. And because it's all they talk about and think about, I constantly have to react to assumptions about my own religious beliefs, which are roughly that there is no god. (Which isn't all that rough, I suppose.) I have lots and lots of other interests--art, writing, reading, Japan, my cell phone, history, the Chicago Cubs (*melodramatic sniffle*), my cat Trebley, politics, music, bad movies, good movies, bento, Shakespeare, stationery, herbal tea, science, lip gloss, and how to steam a perfect bowl of rice--but you'd hardly know that if you spent a typical workday inside my head. I've said it before and it still rings true: living here makes me feel like little more than Nuveena the Atheist. Though I rarely say anything (I'll get to that later), my thoughts offer a constant commentary on all of the very religious talk I hear around me. I work for an insurance company, not a church or a Christian charity. Ideally (even legally), I shouldn't be listening to anything like this as often as I do. I'm not a complete hard-ass; I don't really care if two people who go to church together spend some time on Monday morning talking about the sermon before they get down to business. I figure it's the same thing as me talking about Heroes on Tuesday morning. The problem that has arisen in my office is that, up to this point, it seems everybody who works in my department is of a like mind when it comes to religion, and they've all figured this out. So, while I don't believe they seek to be intrusive, they take it for granted that no one who works with them will be offended if they badmouth Barack Obama for being an "atheist Muslim terrorist" (how he has the time or ambition to be all three, I'm not sure, but I certainly want someone who can multitask so well to be my President. How 'bout you?) They don't think there's any reason not to pass on email forwards full of Bible verses and pictures of some guy's reproduction of Noah's Ark (which actually was impressive from an engineering standpoint, but I could have done without the Bible jargon at the bottom). Which brings me to an email forward I this morning received from a really sweet woman I’ll simply call “Coworker”:

Subject: FW: SCARY - I'VE THOUGHT SO ALL ALONG To: Date: Monday, October 6, 2008, 9:17 AM This will make you re-think: A Trivia question in Sunday school: How long is the beast allowed to have authority in Revelations? Revelations Chapter 13 tells us it is 42 months and you know what that is, almost a four-year term of a Presidency. All I can say is "Lord, Have mercy on us!" According to The Book of Revelations the anti-Christ is: The anti-Christ will be a man, in his 40's, of MUSLIM descent, who will deceive the nations with persuasive language, and have a MASSIVE Christ-like appeal....the Prophecy says that people will flock to him and he will promise false hope and world peace and when he is in power, will destroy everything…Do we recognize this description?? I STRONGLY URGE each one of you to post this as many times as you can! Each opportunity that you have to send it to a friend or media outlet..do it! I refuse to take a chance on this unknown candidate who came out of nowhere. From: Dr. John Tisdale Dear Friends, As I was listening to a news program last night, I watched in horror as Barack Obama made the statement with pride…we are no longer a Christian nation; we are now a nation of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, . . ." As with so many other statements I've heard him (and his wife) make, I never thought I'd see the day that I'd hear something like that from a presidential candidate in this nation. To think our forefathers fought and died for the right for our nation to be a Christian nation--and to have this man say with pride that we are no longer that. How far this nation has come from what our founding fathers intended it to be. I hope that each of you will do what I'm doing now--send your concerns, written simply and sincerely, to the Christians on your email list. With God's help and He is still in control of this nation and all else, we can show this man and the world in November that we are, indeed, still a Christian nation! 0A Please pray for our nation! Please pass it on to anyone that would find this of interest!

And here is the reply I will never send to her:

Coworker, Thank you for taking the time to send this email to me. It obviously resonated with you, and I want you to know that it resonated with me, too, but probably not the way you wanted it to. Mostly, I'm struck by the pervasiveness of astonishingly bad ideas. Though much of what the forward relays is twisted, dangerous, dishonest, and just plain wrong, it seems that no one has been able to successfully squash this information like the disease-ridden insect it is. And so, though I imagine I am talking to a brick wall here, I cannot help it; I have to at least attempt to set a few things straight. 1. It's the book of "Revelation," not "Revelations." You're the one who worships the Bible, not me, and so you, the people who passed this email on, and the person who wrote it have no excuse for not knowing that. I can only think that perhaps none of you have actually read the Bible beyond what your pastor dictates to you on Sundays. This would not surprise me, but I do find it alarming that no one seems to have taken the initiative to investigate the entire book for themselves. It's pretty dense reading, I'll give you that, but if I've read it cover to cover three times even though I don't buy a word of it, surely you could have slogged through it at least once. 2. Revelation doesn't offer a laundry list of characteristics of the anti-christ. It doesn't even use the term "anti-christ," and it definitely doesn't say that "the beast" will be of Muslim descent. It couldn't. Revelation was written between 60 and 100 AD. Islam was introduced in 610 A.D. Don't take my word for it; you're a Google search away from that information. Also Barack Obama isn't a Muslim. 3.To claim that this is a Christian nation shows a vast ignorance of the history of this country. Yes, many of our Founders were what you'd call Christians, but few of them belonged to congregations. They were skeptical of the fundamentalism that characterizes many of the people (including you) who propagate this Christian Nation myth. What's more, several of our Founders--including President Thomas Jefferson--were deists. This is why the only reference to any god in the Declaration of Independence is to "Nature's God." Some people call this "Spinoza's God," and it's fair to assume that the debate in the 1700s was not between atheists and theists, but deists and theists. When it comes to the Declaration, the deists--not the hardcore, congregational Christians like you and the other people in our office--won. They went a step further in the Constitution, which was the first constitution in history not to include any god or single out any one religion. It was both praised and lambasted as "The Godless Constitution." Jefferson and James Madison drafted the Bill for Religious Freedom in 1777, which was the first law to give rights to atheists and other non-religious people. Later on, the Treaty of Tripoli stated: ". . . the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion . . . " This statement, written by Joel Barlow, was backed by Secretary of State Timothy Pickering and President John Adams. The Senate then unanimously approved it in 1797. I bring this up not because that treaty is still legally binding, but because the email you sent me attempted to cite the wishes of our Founders to uphold this country's Christian values. I have given you evidence (and if you want even more, I can provide it) that what you believe our Founders wanted for this country is wrong. Not mistaken or misinterpreted, just plain wrong. Of course, you will never see this email. I am writing it merely to kill some time, I suppose, but there is part of me that hopes that, when I post it online somewhere, someone else who has received the above forward will be able to send my reply (or a reply of their own with the information I've provided and any other information they care to add) to the person who sent it to them. I hope that enough people send it on that it eventually makes its way back to you and you read it and learn from it without having to know that it was me who wrote it. Others who read this might wonder why I won't send this to you. They might think I'm a coward, and, in some ways, they're right. But I am willing to defend the truth when I feel it's necessary, and so this unwillingness to do so at this crucial time just before our Presidential election seems odd and contradictory. There is, however, the matter of my ability to perform my duties at work with your full cooperation, and I fear--if I do not know--that some of what I'm about to say would make our working together in the future if not impossible, then wholly uncomfortable. I'm an atheist, Coworker. I've heard the way you talk about them, and I've heard the way you talk about me, and I'm not willing to take the chance that, if you knew I was an atheist, your opinion of atheists would change. It is far more likely that your opinion of me would change. You think I'm a good, noble person for moving 1200 miles to help my mother, stricken with cancer. You and several of our coworkers even called me an "angel." How would you reconcile that statement if you knew that I don't believe in angels? I've seen far too many statistics which consistently show that atheists are the single most reviled group of people in the United States to stick my neck out. Our boss replied to the forward you sent, too. (Though she actually mailed her reply back to you and every other recipient.) She said it was "a wonderful wake-up call to any Obama supporters out there. We can not [sic] have an atheist sleeper cell in our White House." The woman who sits next to you replied to that with, "how people can support this man is beyond me. He does not believe in our God. If he wins, there will be a slaughter of Christians by the atheists and moslims [sic]." You replied to both of them with, "I watched the debate last night waiting for him to blaspheme the name of our Lord. How dare he call on us to pray for the troops when he doesn't even believe in our Savior." So, you have to admit, Coworker, that if you were me, you probably wouldn't want to out yourself, either. I don't want much out of this job. I just want to come in, perform my assigned tasks, collect my paycheck, and leave. In a perfect world, I could do this without the anxiety that comes with knowing that I would be considered an unwelcome intruder were any of you to learn what I believe (and, more important, don't believe). In addition to my usual tasks, I now have to bypass questions about church and prayer meetings. I now have to sit awkwardly and department luncheons while you all bow your heads in group prayer before you eat, not sure if I want someone to look up and see that I haven't joined in or not. I've had to figure out a game plan for several different scenarios which will invariably present themselves around Christmastime. None of these things are easy because I have to keep in mind that lying about who I am is not an option, but then neither is admitting the truth. There is a part of me that wants to believe you would feel bad if you knew that you are unknowingly causing me so much anxiety. There's a part of me that believes I could simply excuse myself with a "my beliefs are private," and never hear a word about any of this again. But I know better. Why would I refrain from contributing to the conversation if I agreed with everyone around me? If I bow out, I cause suspicion, and if you suspect that I might not believe as you do, you will look for evidence that supports this. And you will find it in spades. And then what? I can't be fired for not believing in God, but I can be kept from doing my job, which requires the cooperation--and often the kindness--of all of you. If that kindness was to disappear and I was unable to perform my duties in perfect sync with yours, I could be fired for "not working out." I can’t afford to lose my job for any reason, and I surely don’t want this job to become more hassle than it’s worth. I don’t want to be preached to, I don’t need to be converted, and I definitely don’t want to be reviled as some godless heathen. I do like you, Coworker, even if we don’t agree on many things. I know that you believe Barack Obama is a Muslim, I know that you believe the Armageddon is near, I know that you believe that this country is, was, and always will be Christian. You’re wrong on all counts, but I still like you. I just wish I could believe that you could know nearly as much about what I believe and still like me. Sincerely, Nuveena

I am the kind of person who's absolutely useless without at least ten To-Do lists going. Sometimes I'm even the kind of person who's absolutely useless with ten To-Do lists going, but there's less of a chance of uselessness if I've got Post-Its stuck to every flat surface in my cubicle.

My cubicle, like most cubicles, has one of those huge, flat desk calendars in it, and so, to save Post-Its, I tend to use that as my Everything agenda calendar. One of its many jobs is keeping track of when money is withdrawn from my bank account to pay various bills. I've got "$45.00/Storage" written on the last day of the month, "$40.00/Alltel" written on the 15th and so on.

This morning I added a new payment to the calendar. I wrote "$100.00/" in the appropriate square and then paused. The company's full name would have taken up too much space. Plus, it's a debt collection agency, and I hesitated sharing that much not only with the calendar, but also with anybody who might walk into my cube and see the calendar. So I abbreviated the name and used the company's initials instead: A.A.

Just before lunch, my boss came into my cube to go over some paperwork with me, which she plopped down on top of the giant calendar. She was staring down at the desk dictating some information to me as I typed it into the computer when she paused briefly. When she started speaking again, her voice sounded slightly different for a few seconds before she swallowed the frog in her throat and resumed her dictation.

A few minutes after leaving me be, my boss returned to my cubicle to ask what I was doing for lunch. When I told her I had plans, she said, "OK, well let's make plans for next week. I like to take my new employees out to lunch to get to know them, and you've had such a hard time lately that I really want to treat you to something." I smiled, thanked her, and told her I appreciated it. But the whole time, I noticed that her eyes kept darting toward the calendar.

My boss is a very direct woman. She could start down a rhino with an attitude problem, so it seemed odd to me that she seemed to be having trouble maintaining eye contact with little ol' me. I thought about it for a few minutes after she left, and then, as I glanced at the calendar myself, it hit me: "$100.00/A.A."

Oh my gawd, my boss thinks I'm a recovering alcoholic.

On one hand, this could work in my favor. As long as she thinks I'm recovering, she'll probably be supportive.

On the other hand, I've probably just blown my chances at getting invited out for after-work drinks and dinner with The Girls.

On the other hand, I don't really like hanging out with my co-workers.

On the other hand, the employee handbook states that any employee can be tested for prohibited substances at any time for any reason, so I should probably drink a lot of water because I have a feeling my pee might be in high demand, seeing as I'm a klutz who walks into walls even when completely sober.

On the other hand, I must be some kind of mutant freak, because I have way too many hands.

If I hear one more person tout Sarah Palin's nomination as McCain's running mate as a huge boost for feminism, I'm going to stick my finger down my throat and puke until I'm a size 2. Because that's about as pro-feminism as Sarah Palin's nomination is.

First of all, when have you heard this woman refer to herself as anything but a "hockey mom" who was pulled into the big, scary political machine practically against her will? Say what you will about Hillary Clinton, but being a mom was only part of her identity, it certainly wasn't the catalyst of her entire political career. Palin has routinely buried her very serious political decisions behind words like "PTA" and "hockey mom," and there was never a point where it wasn't old. I think the PTA is pretty great, too, but I don't think it qualifies anybody to be the Vice-President. What, is she going to oragnize bake sales to raise money for a war in Iran? Is she going to get Senators to sell candy bars door to door to fix the economy? No? Then she needs to shut the fuck up about the hockey mom bullshit, because it's neither here nor there.

Second, she's a dude in a dress and a wig. That's not a slight against her looks (heaven forbid anyone suggest she might be a pig in lipstick! Or was it a pitbull? Hell, I don't remember anymore.), it's a comment on the language she uses to describe "real" men. They're fighters. They're warriors. She mocked Barack Obama's ambitions to "heal the planet" the way Eric Cartman rants against hippies. One could accuse Hillary Clinton of the same thing, but Sarah Palin is practically cartoonish. She sneers at anything too namby-pamby or sensitive the way high school football players sneer at the "art fags" in the drama club.

Third, I've said it before, but how is it a giant leap forward for women to have a candidate who opposes a woman's right to choose what she does with her own body? Whether you choose to abort a pregnancy or see it to term, you make a choice. They both involve choice. Sarah Palin's applauded the choice her own daughter made in the same breath that she discussed her own reasons for not allowing anyone else to make that choice. So she's a fucking hypocrite, too.

Something tells me I'll be in skinny jeans by the time the election rolls around.