My childhood was a marketing ploy

The other night, Josh, his brothers and I were driving to Castle Rock and the song "Heard it through the Grapevine" came on the radio. And I said hey I know this song, it's by the California Raisins! Josh's brother starts snickering and I go, "What," and then they inform me that it's COVERED by the California Raisins. It's not by them, it's by another band. And I was like, what? Why would the California Raisins cover this song? It was in their video, they were claymation and they sang it.

Josh says "The Raisins were a marketing ploy" and I said for WHAT? And he said "California..... Raisins. They covered a bunch of songs to sell raisins."

So I go, wait a freaking minute. I have the California Raisins claymation Christmas special, and it has the Raisins and a bunch of other claymations and they sing carols and it's like my most favorite Christmas memory, and you're telling me it was to sell raisins? And he goes "Yeah, pretty much."

And I was so horrified like, what are you talking about!? I watched that show every year, and the VHS is getting all loopy and the sound all warbly but the We 3 Kings is still my favorite because the camels get all funky and... it's to sell FOOD? "Next thing I know you'll be telling me my favorite cartoons were to sell things too," I said as I was washing my face the next morning.

"Well, the Transformers were made to sell cars" said Josh. "I know, NOW they are.. the movies are all product placement," I said. And Josh goes "Nooo.. back in the 80s they were designed to..." and I hissed "Shut your lying mouth!!!" And Josh smiled and started to say something else and I yelled "GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!!!"

And he did leave, but he was laughing, because my childhood favorite shows were designed to sell me raisins, and cars.

Music

My husband is obsessed with music. And I'm not talking about the sort of obsession where you can go up and tell him "Hey I like MGMT and I really like jazz flute, can you recommend a new band? I mean, maybe he could do that but anyway. He's obsessed in the sense that he's always updating and tweaking his itunes library. First he went through this massive overhaul and added in all the album art *which was hard, because should he include this art from the Caddyshack compliation album, or the original artist album?" Once that was done, he added in album names, years made, etc. He could probably sort his playlists by year and get an exact chronological order of all of his music.

But the funniest part of all this is the fact that he updates mine too. I was downstairs playing an RPG for 2 hours, and I came upstairs and he said "Oh I started cleaning your library but the computer battery started beeping at me, so I plugged it in." I started going uh, what? And he said he was removing duplicates and getting rid of all the jazz, which he knows I hate. And I was like, why did you do that? (sort of laughing) and he said it's because I was harassing him and telling him he never shares music with me. He does, I tell him what I want and he gets it for me, but... I don't harass him for it. I merely claimed that I was going to hire him as my music manager, to constantly update my ipod with music that I would find to my interest and liking, and he goes off and begins cleaning my library like some cleaner fish on a sun fish in the ocean. I love it. I love him, and his musical ways. :)

Aerial Fabric, Take 2

I just got back from my second aerial fabric class. Because I can't just join a gym, I literally need to suspend myself from the ceiling with a kung fu death grip, and sheer willpower. My hands hurt much less this time, but I still found new and surprising ways to hurt myself. Well, not bad, but I am definitely discovering that hoisting my own body weight around while dangling from a ceiling is not easy.

Last week, I was just in for a ton of surprises. I got lost on the way there, drove around a lot, and when I finally found it I was like "oh that looks like a circus school, in the middle of a pitch black dirt road." I went inside, and there was literally caliope music playing while people did some insane fabric routine. A girl even dropped from the ceiling and caught herself, circus style. I just sort of stood there looking like the new girl when someone helped me out and showed me where I needed to be. This week, I still stood around awkwardly, but I at least had a general idea of what I needed to do, and I still almost died during the "warm up."

So, at the beginning of the class, the teacher has me climb up and down a few times. I can't even climb as well as I could in junior high. I mean, I'm climbing the EASY way, where I'm not hoisting with my arms, but reaching high on the fabric, scrunching my feet to my ass, and standing up on it. Anyway.

After that, she has me down on the ground and is demonstrating how to do a foot lock. It's really simple, conceptually. So she's standing on the ground, and kicks one leg up to it's perpendicular to the floor, and her toe is all pointed, and I thought "easy easy. I can do that. I bet my leg will look straight like that and my toe will be all pointed too."

No.

I kicked my leg up, and my leg was not beautiful and pointed, but bent - like a broken weathervane. Plus, my leg ass muscle cramped painfully, and as I was screaming inside I was smiling and saying yeah I'll give it a try! So I climbed up a bit, and tried to tie my leg, and I did it! But then I realized I'd need to hoist myself up, so I could hold my ass cramp leg out, to get the foot lock off..... I just stood there for a second and pretended to be mesmerized by the other class attendees, when really I was trying really hard to not just fall and let myself crumple on the ground.

Anyway class is over, I came home and went to take a shower, and noticed these red marks all down my torso. Basically it looks like I'm wearing a giant red thong that's pulled up to above my belly button - marks from hanging upside down in the fabric in a V, then hooking my leg back and circling it to my head. FLEXIBLE! At least I still bend that way.

Anyway it hurts but it makes me smile. I know I'll be sore again tomorrow (and most likely for the next 4 days) but it feels good to be doing something. And I like throwing it into casual conversation. "Oh me? I can't go tonight, I have circus school."

Indecision

I've posted on the same blog since 2001, and then I was enticed to THIS blog company by the ability to post pictures, and all that neat stuff.  Then I assumed no one would see this, so I switched back to the old one, to realize that the only two people who read it never commented or anything.  For some reason, I stopped letting people know when I updated my blog, probably when I switched from MySpace to Facebook.  Maybe I only want a few people to know about my blog.  Maybe I'm paranoid that I'm so fantastic that these posts might make the internet explode, I don't know.

I know this is totally random but, it sort of pains me to have two blogs.  Like, I need to choose one and have that be that.   But I don't make simple decisions like this easily.  Take, for example, the other day when I realized that since I quit using a certain daytime infomercial acne empire face wash, my skin has gotten a bit worse than normal.  And a bit worse means "a few marks here and there" and I absolutely cannot handle this because all through high school, I had probably the worst skin on the planet.  Like, guys told me they liked me and my first thought was "why."  Anyway, I immediately went online and bought said skin empire product, and posted a Craigslist ad to sell my Clarisonic, which I sent nuts for and bought in April.  

But, I'm not ready to give up the Clarisonic, and I was turned off by the pushy people who were demanding to know how much the replacement brush heads were.  So, I deleted my Criaglist ad, bought the skin empire, and will figure out how to use both, because I love them both.  I can split my skin care system, but I definitely can't split my blog life, so which do I choose?

Jealousy

The other day at lunch, I said that I didn't really know the meaning of irony. I don't throw the word around a lot, because I don't know what it means. I don't go "oh my god that's SO ironic" at all. It makes me think of Alanis, and then I heard that her song gives the word the completely wrong meaning. "Her song is more like a series of unfortunate events that have nothing to do with irony," someone said. "Irony would be like this band playing a really loud punk song." I asked why. "Because it's like, so peaceful". So, does irony mean the opposite? I'm still sort of lost.

But... it's sort of similar with jealousy. I think we get jealous because someone has something that we want. But I never really subscribed to the "green with envy" theory because in my life, jealousy has usually spurred me to action, whereas green with envy seems to imply some sort of vegetative state of being, almost like a stasis. And if an emotion spurs me to action, it can't be that bad right?

Lately my jealousy has been regarding other peoples' good news. And it's not so much like, oh I'm angry I'm so jealous - it's been much more pathetic, like a 3 year old bouncing up and down saying "me too me too me too". I just want some good news too - really anything. This has been one of the least enjoyable years of my life, ranging from knowing for a YEAR that I'm going to lose my job, to slowly caring less, to totaling my car, etc. I just want some good news. Like, a giant heaping dose of it.

Me too, me too..... me too.

Thoughts on Car Accidents

To date, I've been in two car accidents. One that wasn't my fault:

And one that was:

You would think that they're really similar, but they're definitely not. Being in a car that's tipping over is like a weird carnival ride that lasts forever, but you have no idea what's going on and "come to" on the roof of a car wailing about your bleeding head. Rear ending the one person in Colorado who stops at a yellow light, though, freaks me out more.

Ever since then, I've had a few really weird side effects.

1. I always cringe when I see brake lights and I'm not driving.

2. There's one spot, when I leave work, where I look to the left and don't see any cars coming. However, I make that left turn and I still brace for impact, sure that one day someone will blindside me.

3. I throw my accident into casual conversation. "Oh yeah I was worried about Audi maintenance too. That's why I totaled mine before I got any repair bills."

4. I balk when Josh wants to drive, because I'm worried he'll drive wrong, when I'm the one who's totaled a car! (Note - I have no idea what "driving wrong" even is).

Anyway these were just some things I was thinking about. Car accidents in general I really don't recommend, so definitely avoid them at all costs, because they change the way you think. Makes for interesting conversation, though.

Hello Blogger!

I guess the world of blogging isn't really new to me, as I've had a blog since 2001 but... it was time for a change. If you're at all interested in the last 8 years of my blogging history, ask me for the link and I'll gladly provide it.

I was just taking a shower and thinking about why it is that I like to blog - and part of me thought that it's because I can come on here and talk about my day, and express my point of view and have this escapist fantasy. But in reality I think I come on here to connect, because I don't necessarily re-read what I write, but I like seeing if people comment on what I write, and I think that's the best part. Maybe it's a bit narcissistic to come on here and think people are so excited to comment, but I guess there are worse things that I could be doing, like smoking crack.

As many of you probably know, I'm looking for a new job / career path, but I haven't figured out how to start yet because it's the one thing I don't know about. Someone told me once that I have insanely strong opinions on things that don't matter in the slightest, like ice cream flavors with random chunks, of film majors - but I don't have opinions on the things that matter, like oh I don't know, knowing what I want to do with my life. I didn't know in college and I guess I thought I could skate on through but... not this time. So here I am not knowing what I want to do, and the last interview I had scheduled was cancelled on the day I totaled my car. But that's another story.

Anyway the other day I decided to get in my closet and take a look at my interview suit, only I couldn't find the pants. Then I remembered the black pants I was looking for in December. I was raiding my closet looking for black party pants - very different than interview pants. And I found my interview pants and decided to donate them to charity because they didn't have the ass-defining qualities I was looking for at the time. So, here I am with half an interview suit, and I feel like a fool because it's like my ultimate lack of career direction decided to physically manifest itself into half a suit. Things could be worse, I know, but... I can't go to an interview with no pants on. And if I can, it's definitely not the type of job I want.