Hee!

Too bad the sound of balloons (or, you know, inflated condoms) rubbing against each other gives me a headache. So cute!

[YouTube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQALeeHWJyE&e]

Bitches Ain’t Shit.

Today I was at the soda shop downtown with Jack.

He likes looking at all the vintage Hollywood 8×10’s framed on the wall, pointing out John Wayne and Shirley Temple every time without fail.

A large group of junior high students came barreling into the front door, prompting me to wonder whether I was that irreverent and annoying at fourteen. I felt sorry for the girl behind the counter, who had one sandwich and seven (free) waters to serve. Ugh.

Soon after they entered, Jack and I squeezed past the group and walked outside. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a skinny kid crossing the street with a mop of bright orange hair: shaved on the sides and flopping over one eye. And seriously? This hair was the color of orange that you see in magazine features about “coral” nail polish. Really, really orange. Traffic cone orange.

Thundering steps and a flinging open of the door caused me to reflexively put my arm around Jack’s shoulders and pull him to me. It was three of the kids from inside the shop: Two girls and a guy. The guy called out to the kid crossing the street, “Jason!” The kid stopped, and flashed a peace sign. “Dude, seriously?” yelled the guy, as he turned and walked inside.

“Ugh,” one of the girls said to the other, “it’s so orange. Nice way to memorialize your dead father!”

WHAT?

I mean, SERIOUSLY? Fuck You.

I hate those girls, and I wanted to run to Jason Coral Hair and give him a hug.

Bitches.

Damn.

Ah, Helen Mirren. 63 years old and infinitely hotter than the 20-something deer-in-the-headlights model on the right.

Yay, bikinis!

(Via)

Rethinking

Man, When I get too much time on my hands (i.e.: when my children are gone) here’s what happens:

1. My laundry stays caught up. This is a good thing.

2. My house stays very neat. This is not such a good thing, because the second they come home I’m astounded at how quickly it becomes a cluttered swamp.

3. My refrigerator empties out. I don’t drink milk or juice, or use bread or butter or cheese when I cook for myself. Today’s inventory: Peaches, Pesto & Pinot Grigio. HAH! Swear to dog, I didn’t plan that.

4. I get all skinny. See #3.

5. I miss having the boys around to cuddle and hug and kiss and run my fingers through their hair.

6. It reminds me of what my uncle’s fiancée said: That being lonely when the kids are gone will make them feel guilty about leaving. She’s probably right, and I should probably start, like, dating or something.

Decorum, Please

I’m not sure why, but it really annoys the hell out of me when I get emails requesting a “link exchange.”

Take that back, I AM sure why.

It’s like that MySpace thingie, which also pisses me off that people I don’t know think it’s okay to send me a friend request without the common courtesy of a note of introduction. Like, give me something to work with, people.

Sigh. Maybe I’m just not meta enough, but when I add someone to my blogroll it’s because I like their site. And people who pay attention to their stats will see that i’ve added them and maybe they’ll add me, and maybe they won’t, but that’s oh-the-hell-kay. Whatever!

I guess I just don’t appreciate the blatant, in-my-face, oh-so-close-to-rude suggestions that a link exchange will “benefit us both.” I like my online friends, and I’ve met them all by following links, but I also think that, in this big series of tubes, things will get sorted out eventually.

I’m like a kid when it comes to this: If you tell me to do something, no way am I going to. Just to show you that you can’t boss me around. (Whoa, Mads, you’re all tough and shit. Jeeeeeze.)

And if you really really really want me to be your friend and link to your site and you can’t STAND it, a flattering email will get you far.

Who doesn’t like to get mail?

Up To

Oh.

I love my coffeemaker. I’m so glad Kelly finally got me to buy it (and it was on sale, so yay.) Also, I got a reusable filter so all you greenies can relax. Pshaw, for serious, did you think I wouldn’t? I recycle. Hell, I compost, bitches. Yay for compostable coffee grounds and yay for coffee in 30 seconds. Yay for the best of both worlds.

Vix and I have decided that, from time to time, repeating something that someone’s just said, but repeating it ghetto is very funny. Like, if I go to Target and my total is 87.13, and the cashier says “your total is 87.13,” I then say, “Aw, yeah, Ehteh-sevuhn-thuh-TAYN! Mmm-hmm…” It’s sort of ridiculous, but it makes laugh and think of ANTM when the models get all up in each other’s faces and heads start to tilt and fingers wag. Because, you know, they’re from the streets and they don’t take disrespect from nobody. Oh, models, you make me smile.

My house is clean and staying that way. I like it. Then I feel guilty because the reason it’s clean is that I’m here without kids. Yesterday I turned on Ben 10-Alien Force just to hear the theme song.

Spanked is out and I received my author’s copies in the mail this week. It is pretty and there’s gonna be a virtual book tour and author interviews, so add it to your feeds.

Kelly comes back from Europe this weekend and will spend many uninterrupted hours here. I am excited about this, and even though I accidentally outed myself (and the blogging thing) to him, he’s sweet and cool and sort of titillated by the whole thing. I sort of can’t wait to get my hands on him. 

So, that’s mostly it. I’m being tres productive and doing some cool stuff. I think I’ll have some more coffee.

One

It’s twelve hours since I got the phone call from my mom. 

At first I let it go to voicemail, because I was in a noisy restaurant bar with Reece, but she called right back. And told me that my children were still waiting for their father to collect them from the airport. An hour after they’d landed and Miles called me like I’d asked.

Right, so, of course I freaked out, called my ex (no answer, no surprise), called his wife (also no answer), and phoned Miles’ cell (yes, he’s nearly eight and I got him a cell phone… thank goodness.) Reece gave me her phone since my battery was dying and I still hadn’t heard anything except that Daniel’s car broke down on the drive to the airport. Ugh.

I spoke with the airline rep waiting with them, apologized, and asked her to find them something to eat, since it was seven o’clock and they’d eaten lunch at one. 

I called later, after a few vodka crans and Miles said they were at Daniel’s house. Good. But I didn’t speak to Daniel, because nails don’t spit well over the phone. 

On the up, I stopped at a Linens-N-Things on the way home from the airport. It’s one of the ones that’s closing, and I wondered if I could be so lucky as to find the coffeemaker I want on sale. And I did, so now I have a brand-new Keurig in my kitchen, replacing the ancient Krups that always spattered and scalded me and took ten minutes to brew a cup of organic.

Try 30 seconds, motherfuckers.

And I shall be productive today, and I shall not lose my temper with my ex. And I shall clean the shit out of my house, and it shall stay like that because there is no one here to mess it up. Sad face.

Hi and Sorry for all the Links.

So, I’ve been busy. There’s the Naked Bits gig, which I’m totally loving, and I hope you are, too, so while you’re sitting at your computer anyway, send off a little note to the Village Voice telling them how hard Audacia Ray’s Naked City rocks. Michael Musto shouldn’t get all the glory. Loveyoumichaelloveyourhairmwah!

Turns out that regular writing for the above has given me back the “huh, I should maybe blog about something” bug again, which is good, because blogging or rambling or digital diarrhea or whatever you’d like to call it, serves as a kind of warm up for better stuff. And I’ve been doing better stuff.

Like, hey, I wrote a book! Okay, not my own concept, and not Pulitzer stuff, but writing for hire is writing for hire, and I got paid to write a funny, silly, sexy little book. Often I found it more funny than sexy, but that’s partly because I laugh a lot while fucking. Actually, probably because the process of the book was pretty hilarious. I don’t know what it’s called yet, and the last I heard it’ll be published, like, Spring of 2009. That seems forever from now, but then I’m still unpacking from my summer vacation last year, so I think we can all guess how the time will go from here. I will, of course, post more when I know more, but hey, I thought that was kind of fun. Also, there are lots of hilarious naked photographs on my computer now that I desperately need to drag over to the external HD. No, I’m not getting rid of them, they turn me on and make me laugh simultaneously. That’s good stuff, folks.

Also, hey, I’ve got a story in the Rachel Kramer Bussel’s forthcoming anthology Spanked: Red Cheeked Erotica, available for preorder here. Check out the blog here. My story is called Laser Tag. I think it’s funny. Rachel apparently thinks it’s hot, and it’s based loosely on events from a Flaming Lips show last summer. So there’s that. Order the book! Get it in July! Imagine the poolside/seaside conversations you could be having once you’ve been spotted reading it. (Uh, seriously? I’d buy it for the cover alone. Yow.)

I’m working on another nameless writing project which I hope will garner more coinage, contacts and constructive criticism (unless said criticism finds fault with my rampant and mostly unintentional use of alliteration), because I’m really kind of digging this.

Um, what else?

My ex still thinks it’s okay to be superbly behind on his support for our children, so that’s a nice constant, but I believe I am steadily making strides toward not totally relying on him. Like, omg, what if he made a ton of money and decided to all of a sudden write a check for everything he owes? Dudes, I would skip my happy ass to the bank, wait cynically for five business days to make sure it cleared, and fucking go to Disneyland. Or Canada, because I think that overall, Canada’s a pretty happy place and giant mice pretty much eliminate the fun factor for me.

Okay, so let’s recap: I’m doing well, not flush enough to attend Pilcrow and support my ladies Amy Guth and Leah Jones (Wah!), but things are moving and I’m doing pretty okay. I could stand to exercise more, to look awesome for my future book signings, so I’ve set myself up an online running log. If you’re on Active.com come over and say hi. Apparently I can’t get enough of the social networking doohickie. Though I’ve heretofore resisted Facebook, my sense is that eventually I will crumble to its will.

Along the same lines, Twitter seems to have taken over as my preferred method of disseminating awesomeness across the interwebs. So easy to just pick up my Blackberry and go “woah, check this out!<< Link>>” (Seriously, check it out.) You can follow my Twitter updates if you want. Probably I won’t insult you or anyone you know and if I do, probably you/they are mean and deserved it, and/or it’s funny.

Let’s go have some fun.

Ire Land

So, while people seem bent on concerning themselves with everything I do and my mother’s reverted to High Martyrdom, Kelly’s in Dublin on business. We met at a hotel near the airport to have sex before he left. Well, also to kiss and take a shower together and stuuuuuff. Cos it’s fun to have sex in hotels.

Anyway, I gave him a flash drive with music. Cos that’s what he does. He makes me playlists and this was the first time I’d made one for him, and I sort of worried about whether he’d think I was sappy or in luuuv or whatever (WHATEVER), and I thought that maybe I shouldn’t give it to him because now that I listened to it on the drive over, I think maybe it’s cheesy and awful and weird.

It is cheesy, but I give it anyway. It’s a sweet thing to do. As many sweet and goofy gestures as Kelly has done, I am put to shame, and nothing I do with a stupid iTunes mix is going to trump his collection of stunts.

I have never seen High Fidelity (and no, Kelly’s never stood outside my house with a portable stereo), but I think that mix tapes (cds, thumb drives, whatEVER) should tell a story, or at least make sense to somebody, and not just be some random collection of songs that somebody happens to like. So here’s our story, I guess.

I give you a selection from this music I gave this person who has had five sexual relationships in his life and who calls me from his seat while they’re telling people to turn off their portable electronics just to say thanks for the music, SugarPop, I had no idea you liked the Ramones.

First up: Fluorescent Adolescent by The Arctic Monkeys

You used to get it in your fishnets
Now you only get it in your night dress
Discarded all the naughty nights for niceness
Landed in a very common crisis
Everything’s in order in a black hole
Nothing seems as pretty as the past though
That Bloody Mary’s lacking in Tabasco
Remember when he used to be a rascal?

Opposing Counsel

Some of you who follow my Twitter updates may have noticed a short tweet last night that went something like this: “Omg, rudest date ever.” Here’s the (longer than 140 characters) story:

Joe called last Saturday, after basically three months of silence. It’s cool, we didn’t have an exclusive relationship, goodness knows, but I tend to gravitate toward the “Hey, let’s take a break for a while, no hard feelings” line of breaking things off, rather than screen and ignore calls or emails which he seems to favor.

I like Joe. He’s fun to hang out with and go to football games and watch basketball games and Mike & Mike in the Morning. You know, buddy-style. And while I am, in his words, “damn sexy,” we have never had penetrative vaginal intercourse (Ew, sex ed.) I look good on his arm at parties and restaurants and I’m smarter than most women he knows, which is a big turn-on.

So, last Saturday I picked up the phone and he asked me to dinner on Monday, after he finished his hearing at the courthouse.

(Did I mention that I referred my sweet little brother to Joe, who is a hell of a divorce attorney?)

I met him at a bar downtown, we had a glass of wine and I admired his suit. I’ve never seen him in pants other than jeans, and never in dress shoes. Like, ever. He started telling me about the hearing, and how clueless my sister-in-law’s attorney was. I could tell he was in lawyer mode, and silently thanked the universe that I didn’t have to face him in court. Since this was a dinner date and I was starving, I suggested we finish our wine and go down the street for sushi. And that’s when the real trouble started.

Instead of sitting at the table to which we were shown, Joe scooped up the menus and moved over to a different table. I have no idea why; they were right next to each other. Then, when our server came to take our order, he wanted her to have the chef make half an order of the sashimi assortment because, as he said, “20 pieces of sashimi is too much food.”

For two people? Seriously? That’s 10 bites of food each.

I ordered a spicy tuna roll and he rolled his eyes.

“What’s wrong with that?”

“You’re just going to fill up on rice. It’s a waste.”

“Even so, I would like the spicy tuna roll, please,” I said to the server.

Joe threw up his hands. Poor server walked away with our order and my apologetic look.

Soon the server was back. “Excuse me, I’m very sorry, but the chef cannot halve the sashimi plate.”

“Why not?”

“It’s restaurant policy.”

Joe laughed menacingly, as if this server and the sushi chef had conspired against him and he was now prepared to make their lives a living hell, “Bring the menu back.” Then, “Give us the seven-piece tuna sashimi. And some more sake. Hot.”

No “please.” No nod of acknowledgment when things were presented, much less a “thank you,” which I attempted to deliver, embarrassed by his lack of etiquette. I fucking hate that.

So, dinner for two consisted of one seaweed salad, one spicy tuna roll and seven pieces of sashimi. What?

Midway through the salad, he mentioned something which gave me a chance to tell one of my famously funny sushi stories. Two sentences in, he corrected a detail about a James Bond movie, “It’s blahblahblah,” he shot. I replied, “Huh, really? I thought it was blahblahblah.”

“Listen, I’m the 007 expert here. It most certainly is blahblahblah; I’ll bet you a hundred dollars. Two hundred dollars.”

I sat there, stunned.

What?

“Um, okay.”

“Finish the story.”

“No.”

“Just finish the damn story, Linnie.”

“I will not tell the story simply to finish the story. It’s not funny anymore.”

I took a bite of seaweed. The couple at a nearby table were looking over nervously. We sat in silence.

“Listen, you could have at least waited until I’d finished before you–”

“Shot you down?”

“–interrupted me and shot me down. I’m not opposing counsel.”

He apologized to me, but maintained his rudeness to our server for the remainder of dinner. I didn’t see the check, but I’m sure he didn’t tip her nearly enough for having to put up with him and his pompous, condescending attitude.

We walked out, and said goodbye on the corner. His car was at one end of the street, and mine was at the other, “I’ve missed you, baby, we should see each other again soon.”

I smiled wanly, “Thanks for dinner, Joe.”

I waited for the light while he walked to his car. I turned on my heel and walked back into the restaurant. The hostess held up my umbrella, “Back for this?”

“Oh, I forgot about that! Thanks, but I actually wondered if you could please give this to our server with my apologies.”

I handed her a ten dollar bill and went home hungry.