Despite our best intentions... Halloween edition

I have this weird black hole in my memory from Halloween last year. I know we didn’t dress up, because I ended up returning the Nicole Miller dress I bought as part of a half-baked Mad Men costume, and I know we didn’t hand out candy, because I’m still carrying around the extra 5 10 lbs from downing all those mini crunch bars (someone had to eat them…).

I know what we didn’t do, but I don’t know what we did do. We weren’t at home, and I have no recollection of waking up soaking wet and freezing in a public fountain, so it probably didn’t involve excessive drinking. But when I try to figure out what we did do, Boyfriend and I both just come up with a big fat nothing.

Was anyone with us last year? Does anyone recall seeing us? Is this what I have to look forward to with early-onset Alzheimer’s?

So this year we started planning costumes early (seriously, I think it was still August) in an attempt to make Halloween memorable.

After months spent scouring the internet and carefully planning out relevant, funny, god-I-hope-somebody-gets-this costumes, Boyfriend and I ended up going as exactly nothing for Halloween.

It’s not that we didn’t have good intentions.

We were planning to be Christina Aguilera and CeeLo, circa The Voice.



Boyfriend would have worn some ankle-length red shorts, a red t-shirt and as many fake Rolexes as we could get our hands on. I’d have worn an oversized t-shirt, leggings, a blonde wig, a push-up bra and my best I-went-to-a-public-high-school slut makeup impression.

But fear that no one would get it (or realize that I was in costume…) kept us from pulling the trigger on ordering/purchasing the necessary pieces.

Since our very awesome costume idea fell through, we came up with a backup costume idea that could be thrown together relatively quickly with clothes we already had.

We were going to do Miami Vice costumes – Boyfriend would wear a black t-shirt, white blazer, and his hideous linen pants and white shoes that I never let him wear otherwise, and I would wear a black t-shirt, white blazer and my favorite classy-slut attire of teeny tiny (white) shorts over black tights.

But then it decided to be cold, and we ended up wearing boots and coats and gloves and hats and going to a college production of Rocky Horror as ‘those old people who probably shouldn’t be here since it’s past their bedtime.’

Tonight I’ve got class, so we’ll probably just sit at home and hope to lure children down to our basement with candy. And if no children come, I’ll just eat the two bags of candy so I can be this for Halloween next year:



Ironically, of course. Happy Halloween, y’all!

So did you guys dress up/go out? What were your costumes this year?

Fab Friday: Best photo ever

Ron Paul's eyebrow toupee. Because really, there's nothing else going on in government right now.

Snow hate and the seven dwarf (hamsters)

If there’s one thing I hate even more than everything else I hate, it’s snow. I'm fucking Snow hate and the seven dwarf (hamsters).

I still have nightmares about those giant puff snowsuits my parents made me wear as a kid to play in the snow. And by nightmares, I mean, Prada needs to make them in adult sizes so I dont have to get my pants wet.

It’s cold, it’s wet, it necessitates hair-mushing hats, which I don’t own anywhere near enough of (*ahem* Boyfriend – more shopping is needed ASAP) and it usually brings ice, which means my general clumsiness and complete inability to remain on my feet in normal situations will be amplified.

And don’t try to win me over with talks of a white Christmas. A) I’m Jewish. B) You’re racist.

So the DC weathermen, who I’m sure use the Karen Smith breast-grabbing method of weather-predicting, are calling for possible snow flurries this weekend.

Don’t lie – you got the reference, you didn’t need the picture…

Which means the season of people dashing to the food store in a mad panic and buying 20 loaves of bread and enough milk to drown a baby cow (I know they’re called calves – baby cow sounds more dramatic) has begun.

Fortunately, we’ve had a decent amount of rain this year, so DC drivers have had lots of opportunities to practice their ‘holy shit, there’s stuff falling from the sky and oh-fuck-i-cant-drive-like-this!’ defensive maneuvers. ‘Oh look its slippery and there’s low visibility! I’m going to tailgate you then slam on the brakes because wheeee that’s fun!’

The fun part about being almost-but-not-quite-but-sorta-kinda in the Northeast is that we occasionally get the shit-ton of snow, without the requisite I’m-a-badass-mountain-man persona required to handle it. Blizzards + idiots = hell, frozen over.

This year, I plan to spend lots of time shopping online for more cozy sweaters and Uggs (that will only be worn outside once, because after I realize how cold it is, I’m never going back out) and trying to come up with a logical reason for my company to transfer me to Hawaii. So who’s coming with me (and by that I mean paying for it)?

Puppy poop and naughty neighbors

This is Baxter. He is OMGsocutecanIHAVEhimPLEAAAAASE?! Boyfriend take note: I want one of these.

The Washington Post has been covering a story about a dog walker accused of not cleaning up her charge’s poop. Mostly, I think the Post was just wanted to make jokes about ‘stepping in it’ and encourage lots of poop puns, but someone deemed this newsworthy.

The neighbors sued the dog walker, and went so far as to stalk the dog walker and photograph the dog’s poop piles for proof. Ultimately, the dog walker was exonerated, and no one had to sneak any plastic baggies full of Baxter’s alleged poo through security.

But it brings up an interesting point: Neighbors can really suck.

When we lived in Austin, I’m fairly certain our upstairs neighbors had a trampoline they would jump on from about 11pm to 4 or 5am. They would only take breaks to have loud, banging sex against our shared bedroom wall, or drop heavy objects on the floor.

Sometimes, they would crank up the quintessential I’m-an-asshole-neighbor rap music while doing Tae Bo in high heels. *smashplate, kick, stomp, dropmicrowaveonfloor, punch!*

We would complain to the apartment management about them, only to come home and find retaliatory cigarette butts all over our back patio. Those cigarettes killed all my pretty flowers – had nothing to do with lack of water/attention/care, I swear.

I once collected all the butts into a plastic cup, filled it the rest of the way with water, and left it outside their door.

They tried to claim the cigarette butts weren’t theirs. Whatever. Even if they weren’t, you still deserved the stinky cup o’ butts.

I eventually took to keeping the Swiffer in our bedroom at night. The handle had a nice rounded end that wouldn’t put a hole through our ceiling, but could still be used to bang maniacally on the ceiling until they noticed and some of the noises ceased. Then I’d crawl back in bed, finally doze off again, and wake up to repeat the process.

Sometimes I would just stand by the vent and yell at them. “Are you a bunch of fucking elephants?!” “Stop having sex, you whore!” They never answered, but I avoided eye contact with most neighbors just in case they figured out I was the one yelling those things.

I refused to renew our lease for a second year until they told us whether or not those neighbors were staying. Fortunately they left.

Our upstairs neighbor here in DC is actually a very nice lady, but she has an awful habit of rearranging furniture while wearing stilettos at 8 o’clock in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays.

Thank you for always taking the shared trashcans out for our lazy asses, but pleasefortheloveofgod, stop dragging large, heavy objects across your hardwood floors at ungodly hours of the morning.

Though I do draw the line at trying to complain about/fuck with the possible meth dealers a couple doors down. I watch Breaking Bad – I know what happens to people who snitch.

Which is all to say … there’s no way in hell I’m ever buying a condo or a townhouse. I want at least a solid 100 yards between me and any noisy fuckwits living in our general vicinity. And I want my future puppies to be able to poop in peace.

So what about you guys – any neighbor horror stories?

How to buy a car and not get stabbed in the face by your salesperson

This is still kind of a little known fact about me, but I once sold cars for about 8 months. Yeah, laugh now – I was a used car sales(wo)man, with a degree from one of the top 20 universities in the country. Try explaining that one to your parents.

Anyway, I always thought I should write a book about my experiences and/or as a guide to how to buy a vehicle (particularly for women and idiots- not that those two things are necessarily the same).

I haven’t written said book yet (otherwise I’d be blogging from the 2000 sq foot lounge at my designer horse farm), but I figured I’d offer up this quick guide for people who may be looking to replace their vehicle sometime in the near future.

1. Know your credit score – and what it means
If Blockbuster still calls you to harass you about that VHS copy of Dazed and Confused from 1998, your credit score probably sucks and no one is going to allow you to finance a newspaper, much less a $52,000 Escalade.

There are three credit bureaus – Experian, TransUnion and EquiFax – if any of them know you by name (or by multiple names – keep an eye out for identity theft), you probably have a problem.

Also, if you still haven’t made those back payments you owe to your baby mama for that little snot-devil you spawned, no bank is going to lend you money for a sweet ride. You don’t care about paying Lil Homie’s doctor’s bills? You probably aren’t going to pay for your new wheels, either.

2. Know what you can afford before you go to the dealership. If you’re budgeting for around $300/month for a car payment, don’t start off in the Corvette show room (unless you like indulging in a little S&M-style torture).

Also, nothing new or relatively-new with “ss,” “turbo,” “hybrid” or “harley davidson edition” after the name is going to finance for anywhere near $300 a month, so set realistic expectations.

And just because you think you can afford $300/mo for a car payment (you know, including the allowance money from daddy and the little bit extra on the side from the occasional pot sale) doesn’t mean the bank will agree. Generally banks will approve you for around 10-15% (depending on your credit of course) of your gross monthly income (it’s called gross, because that’s how you feel when you realize that’s how much you had before the government got their hands on it).

Bring pay stubs (and not hand-written ones signed by your John) to prove your income.

3. I don’t care what the commercial said – you cannot trade in the 2003 Dodge Durango on which you still owe $10,000 and lower your payments in a fully loaded anything. That’s not how math works.

When car dealers say ‘We’ll pay off your trade!’ what they mean is ‘We’ll trick you into thinking we paid off your trade by rolling the balance due into the cost of your new car!’

That $10,000 doesn’t magically disappear – sometimes dealers can use a manufacturers rebate to eat some of it (if you’re buying a new car), but in actuality, you’re still paying most of that balance on top of the cost of your new car. Which means the Chevy HHR with a sticker price of $18,500? That just became almost a $30,000 vehicle. Good luck trading out of that thing any time soon.

4. Monthly payments aren’t just magical numbers that salespeople pull out of their asses. Those rates are calculated based on actual things like ‘interest’ and ‘total amount financed’ and ‘length (term) of the loan.’

So when you yell at your salesperson for refusing to give you a $500 monthly payment on a $26,500 Silverado with that 2003 Durango (valued at negative $10k) as a trade-in, keep in mind that somewhere, a logic kitten is crying.

If you take $26,500 + $10,000, and just divide that by 60 (assuming 0 percent interest – which you’re almost NEVER going to get on a 5 year term, and certainly not with less than absolutely stellar credit), you already get $608. And like I said – that’s without interest. There is no amount of magic or bribe-sex that will convince a car dealer to lower the price of a vehicle that much.

5. Finally, for godssake, plan on putting money down on the car. I don’t care how damned appealing ‘0% down!’ sounds, or how many inflatable things with wavy arms the dealership has – it’s a BAD idea.

When you buy a car, there are things associated with it, like tax, title and fees. If you put 0% down, you’re financing the cost of those extras into the cost of the car.

That means you’re already paying $2000-$3000 more for the car than it’s worth, and since the value of that car is going to drop another $5,000 - $10,000 the second you drive it off the lot, you’re really going to be upside down.

Now that Kia Soul that looked so trendy in the showroom is going to be yours for the next 7 years, unless Great Aunt Bertie dies and leaves you enough to pay it off.

So armed with these tips, you should at least make your salesperson a little less inclined to stab you next time you go to buy a car.

Anyone have any car-buying horror stories? Or any other questions about car buying that you’d like me to answer (from my obviously-overqualified-insider perspective)?

NyQuil does crazy shit to my brain

So I’m standing in line with Boyfriend, waiting to collect my raffle tickets, and I find this packet for a bunch of Disney stars.

“Ugh, they’re going to be here?”

The woman nods sympathetically, and continues to search for my packet, which is right in front of her face.

As I’m trying to convince her to pick it up, someone comes up to stand next to Boyfriend.

Out of the corner of my eye, I realize that it’s Ashley Tisdale, and that bitch is flirting with my Boyfriend.

I start yelling at her, but bitch won’t back off, so I launch myself at her and begin chopping off her hair. With a pair of child’s safety scissors.

This fucked up dream sequence brought to you courtesy of NyQuil.

Yeah, I’m sick, and my upstairs neighbor is dragging large pieces of furniture across her hardwood floors while wearing stilettos. So… lots of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition and English breakfast tea for me.

Hope y’all are having a better weekend!

Fab Friday: Samurai life skillz

File this under ‘things I do when I’m so bored I think my skull might explode into lots of gooey little pieces.’



I freakin’ love Sudokus. The harder the better (that’s what she said…).

These Samurai Sudokus (Hai yah! <- that was me karate-chopping something, if you couldn’t tell) make my brain all tingly and orgasmy. Shutup, Microsoft- orgasmy is totally a word. The four corner boxes of the inside Sudoku work in both the inside puzzle and the attached corner puzzle. The neat, overlapping-ness of it all totally soothes my inner savage OCD beast. I don’t even bother with the Monday – Wednesday free papers anymore, because they publish easy and medium sudokus in those issues. Puh-lease. Give me a challenge that’s actually a challenge.

If this were an actual life skill, I’d be fucking rich. Or at least half-Asian and good at math or something.

Then I could get on with my life plans to take over the world, fund research into calorie-burning chocolate, and have perfectly straight hair. Not necessarily in that order.

Alas, this just took up lots of brain space that probably should have been devoted to astronomy or art history in college.*

*Yeah, right, those aren’t important and/or life skills either.

So what are you guys doing with your Friday? And please don’t show this picture to my boss – he doesn’t need to know that I haven’t exactly been working on this website for the *whole* day…

Too amateurish?

My last layout felt a little too... serious, for how sarcastic/mean I've become.

But is this too childish?

What do you guys think? Don't hold back now...

UPDATE:

Oh god oh god. Panic! Now I dont know what to do with the background. Wheee bubbles. Someone help?

I probably give the best advice ever

The Washington Post recently had a contest with 4 finalists, to see who could give the best work-related advice. I'm a bit pissed that I didnt know about this, because obviously I could have won the contest. To prove it, I've taken a stab at some of the questions that were posed:

Q: You've landed your dream job - you're doing the work that makes you tick, that you're passionate about. The job fulfills you and you're receiving rave reviews from your CEO and your board. The result? Emotional exhaustion. How does one manage the exhaustion that comes from working your dream job?

Who the fuck are you, Sarah Palin? #Firstworldproblems much? And next you’re going to complain to me about the mileage you get in your BMW 5 series, right?

First of all, I’m assuming this is a crank question. Really you’re the dissatisfied staffer for Madeline Bordallo, the Representative from Guam (seriously, is she allowed to vote?), and you’re just trying to convince your former high school classmates that you’ve actually done something with your life - other than drink your way through college and $150k in student loans.

Therefore, my advice to you is to quit screwing around on lolsnaps.com at work, stop posting pictures all over Facebook of you doing keg stands with that slut from John McCain’s office, and prove that you’re worthy of this position that daddy secured for you.

And if this is really actually a serious question, try some yoga and shut the fuck up, before the other 99% of us kick your ass.

Q: What's to be done about a boss who thinks it's hilarious to mark you as the odd-man-out in a company filled with other-minded voters? (Or so they imagine!) I'm pretty tired of being chuckled at as "our token lib."

Well clearly you’ve done something to earn this designation and subsequent ridicule. Think hard about what it could have been – have you recently given change to a homeless person? Shown some unwarranted respect towards a woman? Maybe you demonstrated some financial intelligence by snorting when you read Herman Cain’s 9-9-9 plan? All of these things are weaknesses that savvy Republicans will zero in on like Michael Vick checking out the competition at a dog fight football game.

I would recommend confusing the cronies by pointing out Obama’s terrible record on jobs (maybe pick up that bumper sticker that says ‘My dog has produced more shovel-ready jobs than Obama!’) or cracking dirty hippie jokes.

They won’t know which way to look, and you’ll be free to vote Libertarian, like any intelligent, educated human being. Roger Gary in 2012!

Q: Oh Wow… I just found out yesterday that there is a rumor around the office that I've been having a year-long affair with a married man at my company...Completely false! He's not my direct boss, but he is a senior member of our executive team. We've had nothing but a friendly working relationship, and the ONLY times I've seen him outside of the office is at other company events (happy hours, holiday parties, a couple of co-worker's bday parties). I have no idea how the rumor got started, but I found out through a colleague/friend of mine who overheard the rumor and figured out they were talking about me. He flat out asked the gossipers if it was me they were referring to, they admitted it, and (bless him) made it clear that he's a good friend of mine and its not true. But as you know...that will not necessarily stop the rumors. I have NO idea what to do, and I'm freaking out!! Help.

Ok first of all, you’ve already been punished for the crime, so if he’s hot, just go ahead and do it – you may as well get the perks of the rumor, if you know what I mean. Unless his wife is a scary bitch, or me, because we will cut you.

Regardless of what you decide there (I know lots of lawyers, and I can make bodies disappear…), the best way to get rid of one rumor is to replace it with a better one. Did you hear about that package of Anthrax we got in the mail this morning? I mean… I’m sure it wasn’t THAT bad, or they’d have let us go home, right…?

Nobody can ever figure out where these rumors start, so they’ll have to let you go home early just to be on the safe side. It’s a win-win for everybody.

Q: What 's a nice way of saying to your boss that you don't want your picture taken at meetings?

Why in god’s name are they taking pictures at meetings? Where do you work, the photo booth at the mall? Nevermind.

In this case, subtle hints rather than direct confrontation are probably the best. Show up in dark sunglasses, unwashed hair, a baseball cap (bonus points if it’s for your boss’ rival team) and sweatpants. They probably won’t pick you as a representative of the company’s image looking like that.

For extra effect, you can hiss like you’ve been scalded and shriek “my eyes, my EYES!” whenever someone snaps a shot.

Q: I think my supervisor may be jealous of me. Recently she has taken to calling me the "junior team member" and says, "you don't know what you are talking about" when I make a suggestion on how to improve the work environment. She has a lot of experience in one area which I would like to learn from her. My work experiences have been more diverse so I feel I bring a different perspective and can comment based on my experiences. I am younger than her. How can I deal with someone who may be trying to cut me down due to their insecurities?

There’s one thing that old people are terrible at, that people our age can use as a natural weapon: technology. Chances are, your boss is one of those people who doesn’t know how to use the “edit, undo” button in Microsoft Word, amiright?

So use this to your advantage. You need new folders set up on the shared drive? You want that document in PDF form? Not until you admit that being able to listen to Grooveshark on our computers would make the work environment 4509734x better, bitch!

And if all else fails, unplug her computer and watch her scramble for hours before calling IT to come “fix” it- it won’t solve the situation, but damn, it’ll be funny.

So what do you guys think? How did I do? Did I miss any key pieces of advice?

Zombies vs. Bears vs. Grammar Demons

Ok, I’m a grammar nerd. I spot typos everywhere, and I get worked up into a frothy rage whenever I see “thru” on a street sign.

But one of my biggest pet peeves (ok, aside from you’re/your – read.it.out.loud. if it can be read as ‘you are,’ use the apostrophe version, if not don’t. Or you’re an idiot. End PSA.) is then/than.

‘Then’ connotes time, ‘than’ indicates a comparison.

It’s that simple.

When you use them wrong (and then encourage people to post your improper usage all over facebook) I get all Christina-Aguilera-eyed and twitchy, and start hallucinating crazy scenarios.

How come Britney got to go all crazy and shave her head, and all I got was The Voice and fat?

So for example. Say you write something like: “Zombies are cooler then a bear.” Obviously you mean that on a coolness scale, bears are way below flesh-eating zombies, because everyone knows that’s true.

But I’m going to read it as “Zombies are cooler, then a bear…



And everyone knows that’s not true, because zombies are way scarier than (<- there, see? Properly used) a bear, and you’re (<- you.are. Also properly used) just trying to mess with my mind. So for the sake of my sanity, and so I can convince Boyfriend that I need to shop more so I have enough cute clothes for the coming zombie apocalypse (isn’t it amazing how everything always comes back to clothes?), please use your ‘thens’ and ‘thans’ properly. What grammar things piss you off? Other than nothing – don’t make me feel like a bitchy loser, thanks.

Pumpkins and pee jokes

Boyfriend and I went on our first LivingSocial “adventure” this past weekend. I’m such a dweeb for pumpkins and hayrides and [spiked] hot apple cider, so the pumpkin patch/hayride/haunted house adventure was sure to whip me up into a Courtney-Stodden-twitter-frenzy.

If it weren’t for the colder temperatures and the promise of ass-bruise-inducing ice to come, I’d probably go so far as to say I love fall. Unfortunately, winter is as bitchy as Hermain Cain being asked to actually explain his godforsaken 9-9-9 plan, and makes about as much sense.

So our adventure starts at the Rosslyn metro stop, where we had to buy wine (yes, it’s a requirement for me in uncomfortable social situations) at the little deli there, sbecause no one told us in advance that we could bring our own adult beverages. I would have totally liquored Boyfriend up before the trip so he’d be more excited about it.

Boyfriend attempts to demonstrate an excited face. He may also be scared. Or constipated.

We boarded the bus with the dancing adventure guide, which was obviously our first mistake. Never trust someone who dances non-stop. I hope she wasn’t actually having seizures the whole time – I’d feel really bad about not getting her some medical treatment.

So we get to the farm, and our bus heads for the pumpkin patch to “pick” our pumpkins. Or at least pick them up off the ground, where someone had strategically spread them about. The mystery of the pumpkin patch was ruined when we went around back to the haunted house and found the giant boxes of pumpkins they shipped in.

Then they fed us, and the corn stew was actually decent, so that was cool. Yay, food. Then s’mores , or rather marshmallows between chocolate pieces for me – graham crackers are overrated anyway – and more dancing from the tour guide. Dance dance dance.

I much prefer my marshmallows to be a perfect, lightly-toasted golden brown color, with a warm, gooey center, but I have the attention span of a 5 year old, so I invariably end up just catching the thing on fire so it’ll cook fas—oooh look, pretty flames!

Then it was on to the “house of panic.” Show of hands how many people think this was probably a bit of a disappointment? You guys are so smart!

It was just … dark (we cheated and used a flashlight – fuck that darkness/authentic experience shit) and involved a lot of crouching, which I can’t really do, because when I’m not a 5 year old, I’m a cranky geriatric with bad knees. Oy, someone get me a walker and a nice cup of [spiked] tea.

Then on to the haunted hayride, which was decent, although after the first guy in a mask runs up screaming, it kind of loses its novelty.

But the corn maze… now that’s where it was at. We started off with a group of people, but when they all turned left, we kept going straight. Possibly because my balance was a wee bit missing thanks to half a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.

As we were walking, I kept squinting ahead of us, because I could kind of make out a shape or something in the dark. I made boyfriend pull out the flashlight, and found this weird creepy doll-like thing kneeling in the middle of the path.

“Umm… let’s turn left now!”

But then the creepy thing turned out to be a person and tried to scare us. Normally I scare pretty easily (I once notoriously jumped 3 ft out of my seat during The Sixth Sense when they switched scenes and a flare lit up on the screen. Not the creepy ghost children … just a loud-ish noise and a bright light – that guy never asked me out again.) But wine makes me a giggler.

So he runs up behind us and then starts following us, and I’m just giggling like Anderson Cooper at a pee joke. Then I announce that he’s really spoiled our plans to make out like teenagers, and it’s creepy guy’s turn to try to hide the giggles.

Finally he gives up and we continue on. A bit farther down the path, we spot a shadow in the corn, and decide to preempt the scare-attack. So I, in my I’m-drunk-and-thus-obviously-more-funny-state, shout something to the effect of ‘Boo! We see you! Sorry to spoil the surprise!’

Turns out it was actually a couple making out. Whoops – sorry about that, guys.

Eventually we find our way out, and I’m able to take my 4th (5th?) port-a-pottie break of the night.

Turns out I’m a cranky geriatric with bad knees and a bladder control problem. God I’m aging gracefully.

Overall – a fun night, with a minimal amount of socially inept encounters, and enough hay and marshmallows to satisfy even the most rabid hypoglycemic wannabe-cowgirl.

So what’s your favorite thing about fall?

Urine trouble now!

Ok, about 95% of the reason why I wanted to write about this topic was so I could use that post title. The other 5% has to do with people being mother-effing ridiculous. Which is right up my alley.

So it turns out some of those chain emails the old people have been forwarding have an element of truth to them: Arizona, Indiana and Missouri now require drug tests for people receiving government benefits such as welfare, food stamps and public housing.

Look, I know I’m a crazy Libertarian, and I believe in funny things like “common sense” and “hard work,” but I really honestly can’t see how anyone could possibly have a problem with this.

And then I remember that the ACLU exists for the sole purpose of well … being ridiculous about 75% of the time. That’s not to say that they don’t/haven’t done some great things, but really? Calling drug tests an “unreasonable search and seizure”?

Hide yo’ kids, hide yo’ wife! They’re snatchin’ up yo’ piss out here!



Why isn’t it an unreasonable search and seizure for drug addicts to seek out and take my hard-earned tax dollars?

And it’s not a “stereotype” if it’s “true.” Kind of like how 55% of a population is no longer a “minority.” But I digress.

See … if people can just pass the drug test, then … no big deal! Yay, you don’t fit the stereotype of being a drug addict on welfare! But if they can’t, then they’re drug addicts on welfare… which, you know, is not just a stereotype because, oh right, it’s true.

Sometimes I think I should just give up and have someone lock me in a padded room so I can spend my time banging my head against a more comfy wall. Plaster kinda hurts.

Guard your pee wisely, folks, because you never know when someone's going to order you to 'cease and de-piss!'

Have I gone Wiccan?

So y’all remember the drama last week when I tried to get my hair done, right?

Well, I finally had that appointment with the new salon on Saturday, and I’ve been crying hysterically practically non-stop since.

Not even kidding – I’m a drama queen, I admit that – but this is by far the worst color job I’ve ever had.

I booked the appointment for color and highlights, and told the guy (who happened to be the owner, because I’m special) I wanted something bright and dynamic – brown, but vibrant.

I showed him this picture:

Excuse the fact that it’s Hilary Duff – I embrace my inner squealing teenage girl.

I ended up with this:

Excuse the poor quality - it's an iphone pic.

Seriously? The ends are like… purple-black. I look like an angry emo 13 year old who had an accident with a box of Jet Black Henna.

As soon as it started drying at the salon, I knew it was wrong, but I froze. All of that “I’m going to be more badass and stand up for myself” shit went straight out the window. I finally worked up the nerve to be like “this is too dark, I don’t like it.”

And you know what? He blamed it on me. And told me that the matte black helmet on my head looked exactly like that picture of Hilary. I do NOT look like Hilary, that’s for sure (although I could probably pass for a few months’ pregnant … really gotta get on that diet thing).

So I called the salon back yesterday, choking back tears, and asked for it to be fixed. I have another appointment to have my hair further tortured tomorrow, so hopefully this will end better. Otherwise, they are getting one nasty Yelp review from me.

Either that, or I need to learn to cast some Wiccan spells.

Fab Friday: Snuggle bunny stinky pants: an ode to Boyfriend

So I’ve probably mentioned Boyfriend here a time or two (or in almost every post). But just who is Boyfriend, other than a twinkie-eating, tequila-shot-blocking baby daddy to one delightful fluffball hamster?

Well, to start with, he’s my super sleepy snuggle bunny (guess who’s not gettin’ any tonight, y’all… this gal!), and the love of my life (at least until Ryan Reynolds gets his act together and comes to sweep me off my feet). Just kidding, Boyfriend, I wouldn’t go. Probably.



Boyfriend and I first met at college when I was a sophomore and he was a freshman (I still maintain that younger men are more trainable, even if many of my attempts have failed…).

A big group of us from the humor newspaper went out for sushi for a friend’s going away party. One of the guys on the staff happened to bring along his roommate, who just happened to be Boyfriend (in his pre-Boyfriend days).

There is still some debate as to which hat he was wearing when we met. He maintains it was some grey hat or something, but obviously it was the Dolphins hat, because otherwise, how would I have known that he wasn’t a Steelers fan, and was therefore safe to date?

That hat. Minus the crown. I probably wouldn’t have dated him if he’d been wearing the crown.

I knew from that first moment that this was the boy I would someday blackmail into being my boyfriend. It was magical.

We kind of *ahem* saw each other for several months before jerkface over there got cold feet and decided that things were moving too fast and we should see other people.

So we split for a while, but ultimately he couldn’t resist the pull of my feminine charms and prowess. That, and I knew things he didn’t, like how to fix a toilet, and girl on top. I’m the total package.

So we started seeing *wink, wink, nudge, nudge* each other again, and generally not fooling his roommates with the ‘he’s just going for a walk’ story every time he came to my dorm.

Then one day, probably after he called me his ‘friend’ in front of some stupid chick or something, despite all the winking/nudging going on, I decided it was Girlfriend time or bust. So I laid down the law: ‘call me your girlfriend, or no more sex!’

Uggghh… do I gotta??

For the record: blackmail using sex is 100% effective.

So now it’s been nearly 7 years (our dating anniversary is sometime in January – I think I arbitrarily picked January 28 because we couldn’t remember the exact date of the ‘no Girlfriend title, no rockin’ your world in the bedroom’ talk), and he still does super sweet things occasionally, like taking me to romantic B&Bs, endlessly rubbing my back and buying me all the whiskey sours I can drink (which is none, for the record, I drink amaretto sours).

You don't like this drink? *sad face* Now I will have to drink it all myself...

He’s my own personal space-heater at night, a farting champion, and the guy who once thought it was a really good idea to grow a goatee.

Really? Really? At least it matched my hair.

He’s incredibly smart (even if he did once support Hilary Clinton), and he knows how to make me laugh (ok, so does the dog wearing shoes and walking funny, but that’s beside the point).

But most of all, he’s the guy who puts up with my crazy gun-toting Republican father, my nudist mother, my angry-at-all-Mexicans grandmother, and my frequent forays into spastic craziness and excessive online shopping.

So Boyfriend, even when I’m flipping out at you for leaving empty coffee mugs scattered around the apartment like you expect me to go on some sort of treasure hunt to find them all, I really do love you, and please ignore those two packages that came for me today.



Love you!

Westboro redefines irony, and I'm still making fun of Courtney Stodden

When I saw the headline “Westboro Baptist Church uses iPhone to announce protest at Steve Jobs’ funeral,” I honestly thought it was a fake Onion article. Yes, and the Congressmen are holding America’s youth hostage, we GET it, The Onion. Oh wait, you’re the Washington Post? Well, fuck.

A quote in the Post reads: “‘Westboro will picket his funeral. He had a huge platform; gave God no glory & taught sin,’ Margie [Phelps – daughter of Fred Phelps] tweeted Wednesday night on her iPhone.”

It’s too much irony. My brain is melting … meeelllltttinnnggg….

God I hope there’s a special place in hell for hypocritical assholes. If you just keep stacking irony on top of irony on top of irony, will it eventually collapse Jenga-style in a flaming pile of not-so-ironically-dead Westboro freaks? One can only hope, right?

Most. Amazing. Picture. Ever. This was taken at Vandy my freshmen year. The guy on the left is Russ, but I don’t remember the other guy’s name.

I hate giving these people any more attention than a creepy-crawly I would squish with the toe of my fancy new boots, but seriously? You’re a legitimate church, and Courtney Stodden is a fucking Harvard-bound role model for America’s youth.

Fred Phelps is not sexy because he doesn’t use alliteration and backwards-ass sentence structure! *DroolPoutEyeFuckCameraDrool*

Anyway. Can’t someone just permanently Blue Screen of Death these jackwipes? Oh wait, probably not, because their Steve Jobs-created technology is too secure.

And that’s all of the time/energy/thought they get from me. Go roll around in rancid pig shit and die, Westboro “Church” members.

Channeling MJ

For some reason, people seem to think that since my voice has all the volume and projection of Michael Jackson’s speaking voice, I’m a pushover.

Just because I beg allow waiters/waitresses to tell me what to eat most of the time doesn’t mean inner Tiger Heather can’t rear her Flava-Flav-contestant head sometimes.

So when I biked my fat ass up the small mountain that is Massachusetts Ave yesterday as fast as possible to make it to my 5:30 hair appointment (which was scheduled a week in advance, because they needed more time to do color and highlights) on time, and was then told ‘oh no, we don’t have time for both, you’ll have to pick one or the other,’ I was a wee bit put out.

Ok, more like a Jersey Shore chick after a bad tanning experience put out.

I actually sat for about 30 seconds and pondered what solid, boring hair color he could dye it, so I could give him $150 and leaving feeling disappointed as always.

Then I grew some lady parts and told him that I wasn’t interested in spending a fortune to compromise on what I wanted, and he needed to reschedule me.

And then I realized that I didn’t want to reschedule a time to come back and be treated like crap again, so I left, to the sweet sounds of my stylist yelling “We’re sorry, Heather! We’re sorry about this!”

I can rock a bitchface like nobody’s business – I think it’s something about all the wild hair and magic color-changing eyes (from blue to dark grey – I used to tell the other kids I was a witch in elementary school) that really gives me that maniacal ‘you just don’t know if I’m going to pull out a sharpened file and carefully saw off your testicles’ look.

Bitchface has kept many a drunken bar patron from getting too saucy with me.

So my hair will continue to look like a brassy, mangled mess until Saturday, when I have an appointment with the Aveda salon across the street.

And they better give me what I want, because this PYT Pretty Young Thing is feeling kinda Dangerous… Oh yeah, I went there.

Boot love.

“Psshh… Marshalls has these SAME Coach boots for $40 less!”

I turned to stare at the woman next to me, still clutching the last pair of Vera Wang over-the-knee boots as if someone might try to wrestle them from my grasp at any moment.

“The Marshalls across the hall?” I ask stupidly, because sometimes, you’re so flabbergasted that you just have to restate the obvious.

She gives me the crazy eyes and walks away, which I take to mean ‘yes, that Marshalls.’

With one last, loving stroke, I put the Vera Wangs back on the shelf and [after a quick detour to finally put back the gorgeous Kate Spade dress I can’t afford to splurge on right now], I leave the Nordstrom Rack and head over to Marshalls.

My quest for the perfect fall boots starts every year around late August, and generally results in me finding the perfect pair of boots, not buying them because I convince myself that they’re too expensive/tall/short/unique/plain/zipperless/whatever, regretting the decision not to buy them, and spending the rest of the season looking for those same boots, which are never to be found again.

I was determined that this year would be different.

I started off coveting the Charles David Regiment boot, but at $179 for a used pair on ebay, I couldn’t quite justify the price.

Then I found a pair of Diane Von Furstenberg’s at Neiman Marcus Last Call. With the additional 30% off sale, they were about $165- still a tiny bit more than I wanted to spend. In true Heather fashion, I convinced myself that because they didn’t have a full inside zip, I would come to resent them.

I spent the next week seriously regretting the decision to walk away from those boots.

So last weekend, I decided to give the Nordstrom Rack in Pentagon City a shot. And I was buying a damned pair of boots no matter what, because hello, October 1, and I still don’t have THE pair of fall boots (ok, fine, I have about 5 pairs of fall boots, but not THE boots, you know?).

I found a pair of Cole Haan boots for $180 at the Rack very similar to the DVFs. Then I found the Vera Wangs.

The VW’s had the full inside zip that I desperately wanted, and they were over the knee, with soft enough leather to fold down on those rare occasions when I don’t want to look like a dominatrix.

They were perfect. They were also $250.

So back to the story.

I carefully backed away from the Vera Wangs and headed across the hall to Marshalls.

There, about 3 rows back into the boots section, were those very same Vera Wang boots. A little more scratched up from careless handling, but practically glowing beneath their $149.99 price tag.

I snatched them up like a kidnapper with an unattended 3 year old and was heading for the register when another pair of boots caught my eye.

Knee height Charles David riding boots. Not the lace-up Regiment boot, but sleek, with a small stacked heel, and best of all, a $70 price tag.

I just spent 15 minutes trying to get a picture of me in the boots that didnt make me look like some sort of weird, distorted hipster skank. It didn't work, and my co-worker thinks I'm trolling internet dating sites. You're welcome.

I set the Vera Wang’s down carefully at my feet, half straddling them in case anyone might try to snatch them literally out from under me, my Gucci bag dropped carelessly on the dusty floor to make room for the coveted boots.

But the second I slipped that first Charles David boot onto my foot, I knew. It was that feeling of sliding into the perfect pair of designer jeans. Like not having a muffin top in those perfect designer jeans. It was magic.

These were my boots.

And so the Vera Wangs were cast aside, and today I’m sporting the Charles Davids with a flowy dress and a J. Crew sweater, and the only thing I have left to regret from this fall boots season is not buying that stunning Kate Spade dress. Damn you and your regret-causing dresses, Kate Spade, damn you.