Occupy This

I will be the first to shamelessly admit for the first two weeks that the Occupy movement started, that I had no idea what it was.

I saw jokes surfacing on the old Facebook and thought it must be some new hot funny thing that people who have the time for tumblrs, and feeds, and avid blog readers were privy to that I just didn't have time for.

I was too busy, you know, working, going to school, trying to dig myself out of the never ending bill hell that I have somehow managed to burrow myself into.

When I finally asked someone, they were like, "Uh, really, do you not read the news?" No. Not really, sorry. In between bouts of doing things that make me loathe my life, I like to take a load off and get drunk or watch a shitty 80s comedy so that I can unwind and not think of everything that is going to further my pissiness in this world that I feel I have no control over.

I am selfish in some aspect, but in the least selfish way possible. I have created this bubble in which I exist that extends out to those I care about most. Because I only have so much brain left and so much empathy to give, I choose who I dole all that out to.

Sure when a disaster hits, I am aware of it, and if I have the money to kick down to the cause, I will. But for the most part, if I were to have 6 different news television programs going at once that were blasting all of the injustice that is going on, I would eventually go mad with helplessness.

So, that being said, I never did come to a direct conclusion as to whether or not that I agreed with this Occupy movement. It's always good to see people standing up for what they feel has wronged them, but what exactly had we been wronged by?

I know by a series of unfortunate events that I have now given some bank exec's kid a really fucking sweet Christmas based on the amount of overdraft fees and them not being sympathetic to my plight. I hope Junior likes that deluxe whateverthefuckitis kids play with these days this year.

But standing outside of places where people who are professionals and have worked their way to the top telling them it is time to pay the poor piper did have me slightly baffled.

I am of the opinion that we need to burn down all banks or at least wrangle in and new world order their asses. They are running around like the wild west, fucking over whomever they please with no consequences. Same with insurance companies, medical and vehicle and home related. They have no restrictions on whose pockets they reach into, and it seems the less money you make, the more they want to keep taking from you.

But, I am not going to stand outside of Johnny Lawyer's house and scream at him because he went through law school, has a sweet Hugo Boss suit, and drives a BMW and goddamnit, I want a BMW too.

Anyway, that is probably all here and there, but my cousin posted a link from Adam Corolla's show that I laughed really hard at calling a lot of the Occupy people self-entitled monsters and my new favorite term, doucheasses. To a degree, he is spot on with a lot of what he says, but like I said, I am still standing in the middle of this whole mess that is going on, because we are in a generation where so many arguments can be made about this whole debacle that in the end, nobody is going to be right. There are far too many variables to nail down a who is right.

Everything has gotten so lost in translation that arguing Occupy is like arguing abortion and religion at this point. My cure for our economy right now is everyone stop paying their house payments at once and play musical houses. There is no way the banks could take all our houses away from us, and if we all played house swap, it would be a mess trying to sort out all the work. At least we would all have a comfortable place to reside in for awhile.

It is true though, the envy syndrome has kicked into high gear. And people are acting like spoiled little shits going, "Meh, I want that car why does he get it and I don't?" Well dear friends, we don't know his story and what he had to do to get that car and unfortunately this is not a fucking Communist society where we all get to share and unfortunately not everyone is going to want to share with you.

Life can be random. You can bust your ass all of it and get nothing in return. You can bust your ass and build a great empire and stare down from floor 134244 at all of your little scuffling ants that you boss around all day in pride at what you have accomplished. You can be a complete and utter bumbling idiot, yet somehow manage to make bajillions dollars. You can meet that same kind of idiot and he is just hanging around bars being that same kind of idiot.

The thing is though, is that nobody should ever expect anything to be fair or handed to them. The whole point I have learned in my vast 32 years of life is the golden do unto others rule. Except I have decided to change it up a bit due to the times a changin. Do unto others as you would like for them to do unto you. If they don't do unto you the way you would like them to back, then fuck em and move on.

Oh and by the way? I have a solution for all this Occupy business that should make everyone happy:

Let the people who worked hard and built their empires be, let them have the respect they deserve and their nice things. But, force anything that ends with a Kardashian or starts with a Snookie that have waaaay more than I do merely by televising their drunken whoriness and stupidity with pride start kicking down penances to the less fortunate as punishment for forcing us to endure their shameless idiocracy.

That, my friends, is what we call a win/win.

Anti-Travisty

I have been all of the mope lately but not really outwardly, thank all the gods, nobody wants to be around me outwardly mopey, it is just a bunch of disjointed thoughts sputtering out of my mouth that make none of the sense. But I put on some Twee Pop. What is Twee Pop? Urban Dictionary who can NEVER be disputed with describes it as:

A type of indie pop that is known for simple, sweet melodies and lyrics, often combined with jangling guitars; twee is also British slang for something almost sickenly sweet. I concur!

Which then made me decide that instead of complaining today, I am going to give praise to friendship. Because today, friendship made me feel on top of Mars. If Mars was an awesome place to be that is. Speaking of, it has been decided that everything is cooler in outerspace. Well, decided by myself. Though it did take some convincing to this friend that it was.

When I was explaining to him how someone sure looks pretty cool playing a guitar, but wouldn't they look cool doing it.....IN OUTERSPACE???? He thought it sounded like a pain in the space suited ass. Until I explained, NO, I mean you don't need a space suit!! Then he said, AHHH I get it! So I can shred guitar in my people clothes to the tune of AC/DC while flames lick up around me and everyone cheers and we don't even need the proper breathing apparatus? Everything IS cooler in SPACE!!!!!

How did I meet Travis? At a bar of course! Until recently, he was in my phone as Travis Twilight Bone. Because I was drunk when I met him and I was at the Twilight bar. I was outside being harassed by a panoply of overly annoyingly drunk patrons that were out like a gang of cockroaches that night. The first couple had to let me know I looked like Kirsten Dunst as Mary Jane Spiderman (NEVER HEARD THAT BEFORE RIGHT?) and normally I say, oh yeah I get that a lot, but this one could not let it go. She kept yelling MARY JAAAAAANE! MARY JAAAANE! Then some other dude came out and wouldn't let up with the annoying things that humans do.

Travis came out for a cigarette, I told him I was pretty sure I had met him before, and then he immediately jumped in with the let's make fun of drunk annoying strangers and see if they notice it banter. It was amazing. And enjoyable to find someone who didn't think I was an asshole for not having the patience to put up with blatantly annoying and ignorant drunks. We exchanged numbers, and then became buddies after.

He is not only a very talented poster maker, go look at his site! He makes posters for prolific artists, and some that are not so prolific but they are good men, they pay hiz billz. http://furturtle.com/

So I just got distracted there, but he is not only a very talented ARTISTE, he is one of my favorite people that I have ever met in my lifetime. He doesn't get offended by my crass humor, he actually joins in, instigates, or starts it. He may not know this, but when I was beyond sick and beyond poor (please see that I am still beyond poor) he would call me up and take me out to lunch. He literally kept me fed.

Sometimes we both get busy. Or caught up in life. But he always texts me out of the blue and says, "Let's not fight anymore. I miss you. Let's go eat." "Why are we texting right now? I want to text with mouths" Or, "We are terrible people, aren't we? Why are we not hanging out?"

When he got me to go to South By Southwest in Austin last March, it was such a fun trip that I never ever ever otherwise would have done had I not known him. I remember waking up the day before we were to go home in the throes of the WORST hangover I had ever experienced in my life, covered in bruises, full of a pounding in my head, wobbly, on two hours of sleep and still covered in makeup the night before, lying on the hotel couch trying not to throw up the nothing that was left in my stomach, and he was walking around singing Southern Man and playing guitar in an overly exaggerated Neil Youngesque voice. And I was laughing my ASS off as I drifted in and out of sleep. I haven't laughed so hard with that bad of a hangover ever.

He is also the only friend that has laughed so hard that we were BAWLING in a hotel room bed staring at a photo of a monkey wearing people that was vomiting while a man patted it on the back and someone in the background took a picture. We laughed about it for hours and hours later. He GETS my humor. I love it.

Today we went out to lunch at the Busy Bee which is a garlic burger place/bar and had some burgers and beer. He looked at the picture of the Busy Bee on the wall and said, "I am scared of that bee. I am pretty sure it is going to rape me. Look how menacing it is with that Bud Light in its hand and its grin. I spat in laughter. We were trying to figure out if it was a pack of bees, a hive of bees, a gaggle of bees or what if they were to gang up on you and R you. We then coined the term Stangbang. We are terrible. But funny. Look at the bee though!!!



We decided that we were going to start a relationship advice column. Two of our ideas today were:

Trying to get over your ex-girlfriend? There's hope. Go out and get yourself a sweet looking little puppy to keep you company. Name it after your ex-girlfriend. Then proceed to stab it to death.

Need to feel a bit vindicated after getting your heart broken? This is a surefire trick that works every time to help you not only feel closer to her after the breakup, but also works wonders for your hurt feelings. Go to your ex-girlfriend's house, have a nice talk with her. Stab her to death, cut her face off, wear it as a mask, and then kill her whole family wearing said mask.

Then we concluded that may not be a good idea due to people maybe actually taking our advice.

After burgers we left to get some bubble tea. A guilty wonderful pleasure for both of us. As he got his and took a sip, he said, "Goddamn this is made out of the jizz of angels."

The Barista working frowned the WHOLE time while we had this conversation casually as though maybe this is really something to be considered when I said, well what kind of Angel jizz is it? Is it masturbation jizz, sex jizz, or wet dream jizz?

He retorted with, "Pssh angels don't need to have wet dreams, are you kidding me they get laid SO much up in heaven. I was like you don't choose wet dreams, they just happen, maybe they don't need to masturbate though."

As I attempted to pay for lunch earlier, he would not let me. He tried to pay for tea and threw his card down, and with all of my cat-like reflexes I do not possess, I swiped it and put it in my back pocket. He said "NO that was not fair give it back!!!!"

I said, "You can't get it back because it is in my back pocket, the Barista has my cash, and if you try to get card out of my pocket that is sexual harassment and I am suing." He sat there helpless, and the Barista continued her permanent scowl as she took my money.

I could tell more tales praising Travis, but this was literally an hour or two of our day, and I am still leaving out all of the other things we talked about, had fun about, chortled over, and it would take me a book to include the other amazing lunches we have been on, best ofs of my trip with him, and all of the porch time we have had while drinking beer.

So I am just going to include a video of Southern Man at the bottom here, and be grateful from the bottom of my mopey little heart that I have such a wonderful friend in my life that brings in some twisted sunshine into my days.

The Good the Bad & The Mildly Unnatractive

So I had that talk where I try to maintain a positive attitude. And things really did get on the up and uppish?

I applied for, and received a job in a mere 1.5 day's time. I was very excited for this.

I went out that same night with a friend that was in town visiting and we had a lot of fun.

We went to a bar that made me feel olde. See, I can go to places like da club and I can drink loads of jagerbombs and dance my unadulterated overadulterated ass off. But When I enter an overly crowded bar that is playing Katy Perry to be ironic as two pool tables stuff themselves into overly crowded said bar that is swimming with a sea of hipsters, I start to feel a little out of the loop.

Because at least at da club they aren't being pretentious. That's what you are there for. These kind of places are almost designed to make you feel uncomfortable once you set foot in there if your shade of plaid is not up to Urban Outfitters par with the rest of the population.

It was still fine, screaming over Lady Gaga. I can honestly as stated above,make the best of all situations.

We had an ending of the night drink and then I went home. And foolishly checked my email. One thing you should never do when awaiting news on something is check your email at 3:00 a.m.

Your brain is not functioning correctly, and you are at a heightened sense of odd emotion that only kicks into high gear past the hour of midnight. My unemployment had been denied, and while I had this new up and coming part-time job, I have also had creditors and a car payment due.

And might I mention AGAIN, that I got fired due to being too ill to come to work?

Well, we did what is to be expected of me and let some fat rain fall from my eyes. Wiped that rain off with toilet paper windshield wipers, and asked it to please stop.

But there had been a tsunami brewing in my brain, and the storm was angry. And my eyes kept leaking. And piece after piece of t.p. could not dam up the floodgates. And I probably repeated the phrase, "I am so fucked" at least 599787415 times.

And I felt helpless. I have felt helpless a lot lately, but this was that overwhelming sense of I have no more shit to sell, I am afraid things are going to start getting taken from me, I am so tired, but my brain is now telling my body to eat shit and figure this out fast, but my fix it instincts were scrambled since all prior options has officially been exhausted.

Before I knew it, it was 6:45 am and I had officially been weeping for over three hours. And I was beyond loopy.

And even though I am almost a grown 32 years in age, sometimes we all just need our mommy.

I texted my mommy (thanks technology for not being 1995 and making me page her with a 911 at the end of it.)

She almost immediately called me and I was a snotty hiccuping mess of nonsensical and not in the cute rhyming Dr. Seuss way.

She stopped me mid-sentence and said, "Let me get your dad on the phone."

I froze.

Sorry, but my dad is not the person I melt on. I was wondering what he could even possibly do at this point to even begin to comprehend the inane ramblings of a female on the verge of Sylvia Plathing herself.

He got on the phone and I hiccuped so many of the things I just did to my mother.

My dad is a very intense and serious sounding person. We never have had a heart to heart. As a matter of fact, we didn't speak for almost ten years.

And in the interim of us speaking over these past few years it has been light funny conversation. Or when I am being an irrational idiot, he says things that says he cares, but also tell me I am being an idiot.

I was being an idiot this time. I was feeling sorry for myself and crying why me. He stopped me in his calm voice and said:

"When we had to move you kids out here from Iowa, it is because my law partner was a drunk and a criminal. He was my best friend. He embezzled all my money. We had to file bankruptcy, and we had to siphon money from your college funds so we could even barely get standing on our feet again.

It was horrible. I had to mop floors as a janitor and your mom had to work in the Frito Lay factory, and we had you five kids to support. That was the lowest point in my life. I had this wife I was supposed to support, and here she was working in a Frito Lay factory while I mopped floors, after going to law school mind you."

I thought to myself, "Well that sucks. I hate that I was such an asshole kid during this period of time, and hearing other people's stories like this sucks too. How does this help me?" Selfish, not selfish. It just made me feel bad.

He said to me to elaborate. "You need to realize that you are going to reach the lowest of your low. You are going to be so down and you are going to be so out. And all these people that you feel are screwing you over, you can't take it personally. This is greed. These are businesses and corporations. They don't hate you persay, they are just greedy people that only care about themselves at the end of the day, and while you may feel powerless, the only way you will be powerless is if you lay down like a beaten dog and take it. You just keep standing up and you keep plowing through this.

You have opportunity. You are smart, you are going to school, you are so close to done, and you just have to get right back up again and not let people that mean as little to you as you do to them bring you down to the ground. You earn things in this world, and that makes them that much sweeter. If you actually have to work for something and not have it handed to you, you are going to appreciate it that much more. That being said, what me and your mother love most about you kids is that you have always been so independent and you guys are smart, so smart and intelligent, but at times life is going to hand you things you can't quite understand and be able to handle. I know you are self-sufficient, and I know how much you hate asking for help.

But it's not your fault you got sick. You can't control your body. And your mom and I are where we are now because we worked hard for it and we fought for it. And we love you guys so much, we will do whatever it takes to see you succeed. And you need to not feel guilty for taking our help during these times. You need to stop seeing yourself as a burden when we help you and you need to take it and stop blaming yourself for all of these things happening to you. We love you, that is why we are here and we are happy to help you and make sure you are able to get out of this.

Then my father said to me words I will never, ever, ever in my lifetime forget.

And maybe this will sound like the lamest thing ever, but I don't care. The next thing he said, trumps any lyric of any song I have ever heard, it surpasses any deep and thought provoking sentence I have read in a novel. Namely because he meant it, and also because he gave me faith that the beauty of the human spirit is still alive and kicking and it made me not want to drown myself in the bathtub.

"You know. Your mother has a lot of health problems. And she is so kind. She is so sweet and selfless. She is so happy through it all. And she reminds me so much of you in that aspect. And at this stage in her life, she requires help for a lot of the problems she goes through. And she is just like you in the way that she doesn't want to burden anyone or put anyone out by having to receive help for anything. And when I help your mother with things, just as I feel about helping you out with things, I don't look at it as a burden. Because of who you both are, I look at it as a privilege."

I say this with all honesty, I think going through everything that I have, with all of the frustrations and financial difficulties and trying to get myself back on the up and up again, I would do it all again 1,000 times over just to hear someone utter that paragraph again.

Roadarrhagia

I have this condition that is actually not very abnormal if you add up all of the instances you have encountered with the majority of the driving hoi polloi.

Medically, I believe the term is called Roadarrhagia. If you look up the suffix rrhagia, it means an abnormal or excessive flow or discharge. And while I am generally a very shy and soft spoken person (sober) in public, Roadarrhagia is what happens with my mouth once I get behind the wheel of a car and am forced to endure more than five minutes of completely and utterly imbecilic drivers.

I think riding with me operating a vehicle can go either way. It may be one of the most amusing or one of the most stressful experiences for a passenger. Because once something happens that triggers the Roadarrhagia,there is not much that can stop the flow of expletives and hand gestures coming from me, the volcano has erupted and what's been done cannot be undone.

It's like the Exorcist, sans all the vomiting and green skin. Sometimes I just cease to make sense, which can make this humorous; other times I start baiting other drivers, falling into the whole trap of being almost as equally senseless due to my Hulkmones taking over.

When I say Utah drivers are the worst, some people think I may be exaggerating. Granted, I haven't driven everywhere in the Universe, but I have been in traffic jams in Los Angeles that flow more smoothly than a freeway ride on a semi-desolate Utah freeway. People know that they have to work with each other in order to keep the traffic moving in L.A. Here, everyone looks at you as though you are the enemy and if you put your blinker on to get over, that means they need to get in your blind spot and sit there until you miss your exit.

One of my hugest pet peeves is a person who cannot for the life of me stay off my ass ie the tailgater. They just love to hump my car no matter how fast I may be going, or if GOD FORBID, I am going the speed limit. I do not know how anyone can comfortably drive behind someone that way without fear that they will start braking every minute. Or their mind may break.

Which, if they don't get off my ass I do. And then I go under the speed limit. Which then results in them trying to pass me, so I speed up with my middle finger out as they look at me. All the while I am yelling "How is my ass? Does my ass look good today is that why you are riding it??? Oh going to keep doing it huh? What happens if I brake? That's right I'm braking asshole, oh wait you want to pass me now? NOT GOING TO HAPPEN because whoops my foot just found the gas again!"

Sanity has no place in my driver's seat apparently. I have once even spouted the words, "You know, this is why I don't own a gun. Because I get why people jump out of their cars and shoot people on the road." It's pretty awful that I have once empathized with the above uttered sentiment.

I have cogitated over what pisses me off so much that I want to get out of my car at the red light me and the guy behind me honking at me and tailing me for the past five miles and throw my hot overpriced Latte in his face, trust me I hate wasting good coffee, and the conclusion was actually quite simple:

There are two things that really effect me in this world, and they are two of the least regulated things that I can think of.

It goes like this; someone can tell me where I can and cannot smoke cigarettes, how old I have to be when I start drinking, and I am forced to pay taxes every year and get raped by insurance companies (auto and health alike) yet when it comes to the matters where the most obtuse and reckless people manage to excel at, it is virtually not really regulated tightly.

That would be breeding and driving. Yeah if you get caught without your license, or you can get a ticket, or you get in an accident without insurance, or child services blah blah blah, but that never stops these people from doing things.

With transportation,suddenly my life, which I surprisingly enjoy having at this point in time, is in the hands of that fucktard on his cellphone, that texting child, that 956 year old whose grandkids aren't kind enough to take him to his doctor's appointment, and that Bro whose truck is waaaaay bigger than what he is trying to compensate for. And if one of those bozos, leading their life of bozoey existence, not a care in the world for anyone else's welfare ends up mowing me down on the way to get tampons, and I die in a fiery inferno getting tampons, probably listening to crunk, I am going to be fucking pissed.

I can picture my car upside down on the freeway with women's personal care health products scattered all around me lighting themselves off of the blaze like sparklers on the Fourth of July one by one while something like a J-Lo/Pitbull collaboration blasts out of the only working part left in my car, the speakers. I probably wouldn't be wearing cute underwear that day either. Of course not, I was on my way to get tampons, so that faded pair of Hello Kittys that I got 6 years ago would be stretching out of my skinny jeans as I lay splayed across the pavement.

And I am going to haunt the living hell out of whoever did that to me.

Of course we have the dude that can't use his blinker. That's my standard: "Only in America are people's fingers too fat and lazy to turn on a blinker!"

The dude who cuts me off. The start seeing motorcycles guy in flip flops, shorts, no helmet and a tank top who just can't seem to stop cutting through lanes, the Escalade driving soccer mom who has to do her makeup while driving so the coach thinks she is hot when she gets to the game, and the texting carful of teenagers listening to.....probably what I'm listening to.

The other day I yelled, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING DICK & BALLS???" To someone who would not get out of my way. After screaming that, I said, "That's right, dick and balls you're the whole package buddy!"

The term "suck my egg sac" was invented when I realized how ludicrous I sounded yelling suck my dick since I don't have one.

Sometimes it is just a string of incoherent swear words mixed in with some made up new vocabulary. A sailor would be embarrassed to ride with me.

Not too long ago, I literally almost got into a fight coming home from the mall with another driver. Not one of my proudest moments, I will admit. But she really just managed to push all of the wrong buttons that day.

I was starving and completely hot and dehydrated when I was taking a route home from the mall. I looked in my rearview and some crazy bitch had pulled up behind me severely tailing me. She was so close I could see her screaming and shaking her fist while honking her horn.

She whipped into the hospital adjacent to me, and that is when I let go of my anger for a second. I assumed maybe it was an emergency.

Well it must have been an emergency all right. Someone must have informed her that all the McDonalds were closing down in ten minutes, because she was in a hurry to get somewhere. She had pulled into the hospital in order to cut me off.

I did not do this on purpose, but I happened to pass by right when she was trying to pull out which infuriated this woman beast even further and she started driving more erratically, and I started getting even more irritated by the moment.

We were in residential neighborhood land, and she attempted to pass me. That is when I put my middle finger up behind me, and proceeded to speed up, denying her efforts. I just held my finger there, and slowed down to a nice safe speed of 15 miles an hour.

I didn't make a new friend doing this. I went to turn right, and turns out she needed to as well, I sat there a good while, not turning even though there were plenty of gaps, and I turned around, looked her in the eyes and mouthed the word "Cunt." Then turned right.

Okay at this point I had made a murderer. She pulled up so close behind me, got up next to me honking and screaming and then cut me off, literally coming within an inch of hitting my car.

At got into the next lane, and what do you know? All that hurrying had put us at the same red light together. I supposed I should have just let it go at this point. I was so mad though. And shaking from hunger probably crazy from dehydration. So I unrolled my window, pointed and laughed and said, "Oh look who's at the same red light with me now????"

She drove off and pulled into a parking lot, and for a brief flash of insanity, I almost considered pulling in as well and confronting her. Somehow my need for food and beverage trumped my need to get into my first ever fight with someone who apparently had no regard whether or not she or I died that day, and I took off.

Probably lesson learned, but I doubt it.

Today driving, my iPod was kind enough to know what I wanted to hear while it shuffled, and while I had it blasting on the freeway singing out of the top of my lungs to the following:

The Beatles
Roxy Music
The Jam
The Kinks
Pete Townsend
The Pixies
Bust out your white sports jackets STEELY DAN!!!!

I actually had to stop and laugh at myself because I was singing, "Lovely Rita, meter maid, may I inquire discreetly, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING GET OFF MY ASS YOU FUCKING FUCKWAD GOD I HATE YOU GET THE FUCKING FUCK OUT OF MY WAY!!!!"

and then segue happily back into, "Rita! do do do do do do." This happened throughout all of these songs.

Sometimes I thank God for music in the car, as it is the only saving grace I have. Except for that once hiccup, albeit and enjoyable one, I know had that semi crashed into me today, it would have been during a SuperMash Brothers song.

Immunity

Note to all of your bodies: Never ever, ever, get an auto-immune thingie.

After spending all of those months ill as all of your sicknesses combined, I didn't even get a lousy t-shirt. Instead I am left with creditors calling me more than my friends, a negative bank account, and I am sitting here with mashed up lemon peels on each side of my temples in an attempt to alleviate this headache that is pounding itself into my head like a Nickeback song on repeat. I can only take Tylenol as all of the other pain guys hurt my stomach, and I hear Tylenol is bad on a sad liver, and I had some of the booze last night so since I GUESS I love my liver, I am reduced to trying natural remedies. (not working)

I went on an eBay marathon listing things like crazy last night, so I didn't crawl into slumberland til past 5:00 a.m., so while I was tired today, I was still doing pretty all right considering. I was ready to be the most productive person on the planet since Donald Trump, when out of nowhere I got a phone call from the unemployment office.

Why have I filed for unemployment? Because I was not well enough to return to work and I got canned from my fun job. Why didn't I just continue with my short-term disability? Well, because I have NO idea how lazy rednecks stay on disability forever, because it is actually harder to stay on than actually getting up and going to work. They basically bullied my Doctor into not wanting to send in any more paperwork. Thank GOD I am feeling physically on the up and up, and I will be your fat little friend again in no time, as I am stacking on a few pounds. But, since he would not send in the papers saying I was not well enough to return to work, next comes canned and then comes the unemployment filing, and then comes unemployment asking my Doctor to sign a release stating that I am well enough to work again.

Which in true Dominique's life form he did not. So now I am in Catch 22 land. Only in my world could I get fired for not having papers saying I am too sick only to not be able to file for unemployment and go through job services due to not having papers saying I am well enough to work again.

You know how angry I got right? You know how well I operate when I am angry right? I SHOWED THEM BY CRYING ON THE PHONE AND FOR THE NEXT TWO HOURS! Why do my eyes decide to rain on all the hos when I am pissed? If I can solve this mystery and make that not happen anymore, I would probably rule the universe, so there is probably a reason why this doesn't happen; the universe likes being safe and happy right now. This fault of mine has always led me to hiccup through a pile of snot and reddened eyes, "I'm not sad I'm MAD damnit!!!"

I am now left with my residual bawlbaby headache. But not all is lost. Back to the Future is on, and this movie brings back many fond memories. Namely learning all my first cuss words from it and getting my mouth washed out with soap due to said cuss words.

When I have days like this, I always say, "It's cool tomorrow will probably be totally awesome to make up for today." And then when tomorrow isn't, I just repeat that all over again pretending I didn't say it the day before. And there is always beer. And puppy cuddles. And a sweet truck I saw outside that somehow managed to trump my neighbors giant red truck that has the sticker on the back that says "Pimp Inside."

Hipster=MeAsQuare

Now that I think about my general aura that I exude to others (my dogs mainly I'm sure) I have come to the conclusion that I could have accidentally molded myself into a hipster without necessarily attempting to. I have compiled some of the evidence and will list it for you below.

1. Skinny jeans. The tighter they are, the better. I spent a good portion of whenever these things came into style making fun of them once I heard the term, "jeggings." Now if it comes with a zipper on it, I don't want it. This is due to the fact that I have a tendency *by tendency, see ALWAYS, to forget to zip my fly up. It's a good thing I don't have a dick, I would have been arrested at least 5,685 times by now for flashing people at local shopperies. In addition, all that junk I had up in my trunk, went on vacation. I don't know if it is old age, or losing all that sick weight, but I have no officially become your local plumber crack. So I had to get really tight pants that would not sag off my new lackluster of a bottom. I'm short. Not 2Short, I wish, he is awesome, but all jeans are seem to be made for this femmebot that has gotten off of planet tall, skinny, and hot, and they really don't fit this little hobbit body of mine. Jeggings tend to run short. My only beef with them is, why are they too fucking lazy to put front pockets on them??? I don't like jamming change or a lighter into my back pocket. You sit down and damn near accidentally get raped by inanimate objects.

2. PBR. Look. I don't want to pull the whole, "I WAS BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BEFORE THEY WERE" card. But I have to. I was drinking PBR BEFORE THEY WERE DAMNIT!!! I was drinking it, because i liked cheap shitty beer. Because I was poor. Because I always drank Bud Light and PBR because I wanted my beer to taste like carbonated water and my hangover to feel like a trailer park and my mouth to taste like the inside of one of Bret Michael's bandanas after a concert. After "they" started drinking it, the prices slowly crept upward, and suddenly PBR was no longer a viable drinking option for me. I have since rebelled & did a 180 and started to enjoy dark beer out of nowhere that is probably going to throw me into bankruptcy. Still, I cannot resist the sweet siren song of a PBR floating my way, and if I see one, you but I am going to lovingly cup that can and whisper, "Baby, I drink you dry because I love you."

3. Ripped clothing, stains on clothing, dirty hair, smeared makeup. Yup. My jeans get holes and stains in them. So do my shirts. And I keep wearing them after that, because it is always my favorite rock shirt or most beloved pair of jeans that gets that hole in the knee. How does this happen? you may be asking yourself. Did you take scissors and cut the whole in the knee of those jeans? Did you spill beer on that rock t-shirt at your favorite Indie rock concert? Nope. I am a klutz and a slob. I should just combine the words and we will say that I am a Klob. Jeans have been ripped by running drunkenly and getting caught on rosebushes, shirts are stained because I am a magnet for people dumping beer on me at shows, and because at some point in my life I was never taught where my mouth was when it came time to eat. Today, I found ranch underneath the armpit part of my shirt. I was eating french fries, and dipping them in ranch. I FOUND RANCH UNDERNEATH THE ARMPIT PART OF MY SHIRT. How does my food make it to these places? I have found food in my hair, down the front of my shirts, so many times on my crotch that I have started a list of "Things you shouldn't spill on your crotch lest someone mistake it for something completely and utterly different" that I am starting to wonder if I need a big and a high chair when I eat. I cannot even list the amount of times I have eagerly gone to take a nice hearty swallow of a beverage, and I somehow end up drooling it down my shirt like my mouth just had a stroke.

Well my hair, say whatever the hell you want. I can't afford a haircut, it gets thick, and I hate washing it all of the time. Besides, it's not healthy to wash your hurrr every day so technically mine probably stays healthier than yours. It may not look better, but underneath all this dirt and grime and grease is shining Sleeping Beauty hair, there has to be! I grew it out long again too so what does that mean? Oh ponytail, thank you for taking over my life.

4. Giant sunglasses: I wear giant sunglasses at night or during the day, due to the fact that I feel as though I have a very giantly disproportionate head. I can't look all cool in tiny RayBans like the rest of you populated awesome people out there, and well, I just don't look good in sunglasses generally unless they are filling out the rest if this jack o lantern that we call a face.

5. Tattoos: Fuck you, I got tattoos. And got most of them when I was a youngster. And really wasn't thinking about all of you douchebags when I got that free you can practice on me konji on my neck.

6. Greasy as all get out food. It's really all I can afford.

7. I cut myself: It's true. I do. I cut myself with knives. I cut myself with razors. I even cut myself with bottle openers. Not even those surface wussy I am just going to do it to see what happens cut. But deep within the realm I am going to leave unattractive scars all over your body kind of cuts. But this is not to see if I can still Trent Reznor feel pain. This was more along the lines of I cannot cut fruit, open a beer, or even shave my legs correctly. Proof in picture earlier tonight as I bathed and sliced a fresh new chunk off my leg and yelled OH FUCK OUCH WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK??? And then had to place 4 Toy Story Bandaids atop it. As I am fully aware than I can still feel pain, yet apparently I am not old enough to operate a razor.

So basically what it boils down to, is that I have all of the amazing attributes to be a full-blooded hipster, but I am far to spazzy to fit into this population that would most definitely not accept me if I explained all of the above to them.

Insane in the Mundane

I am trying to think of which day it was when I hit it. Normally when you "hit" something you have done three of the following:

1. Finally gotten laid by that person you've been making out with and then whoops! Home base was scored for both parties.
2. You physically assaulted that one human being that has been annoying you for an eternity and a day after having 500 fantasies of doing so. And though you may be sitting in jail, calling anyone but your mother to bail you out, you have a complete sense of smug satisfaction.
3. You have had a long time coming goal. You have been struggling to reach it as far back as you can remember, when all of the sudden out of nowhere it is accomplished and you feel like He-man.

Well. None of those apply to me at this point. Boo.

I suppose i would say boo if that is technically what I was feeling at this point. And by the way I have hit something completely and utterly different. It's the one where you were losing mad weight and you are on the cusp of looking hot but that extra 1.5 lbs just won't shake itself from your everloving gut no matter how hard you try. It's called.....a....PLATEAU.

Yes. Stagnant. Not fresh. Not rotting. Simply just existing waiting for one or the other to happen yet neither does. For some reason there is no expiry date on the container so you are left with a mystery that you cannot afford Sherlock Holmes to solve.

I don't know if I made mention of this specifically I tend to blather on a lot, but someone recently asked me the question: What is making your life so mundane?

I guess if we want to get into the shallow specifics of it all is that trying to break down what is making it so mundane has become mundane in and of itself.

I think the older I get in age years the less I understand that the human psyche is so seamlessly able to be able to accept the mundane as a perfectly rational way to exist.

But then again, I think about that fact that that makes me sound like some sort of cocky asshole and have to start rationalizing that I may have the problem of not being able to accept that updating a Facebook status with, "Just wakin' up!" may be a great method of being able to let others into your life.

What may be considered my hell could be another's heaven. Maybe the devioust in me and the atheist in me refuses to take this life lying down. With that white picket fence smothered in 39494 shitty diapers while working eight jobs and posting infant vomit updates. But then again, there are obviously enough people out there that love Creed's music enough to make them wealthy, so perhaps my taste in life is a little like someone's taste in music. We are bound to enjoy and be fulfilled by completely and utterly different things.

Aside from that fact, just waking up person with said bajillion children does appear to be happy. Whereas, I sit here floundering trying to figure out what really is going to make my bubble swell.

So this post ends with....no resolution. Do not consider myself a resolutionary. Yet.

Counterpartductive

Wow.

I have not been on here in a bit. I almost forgot how to log in. Let's just say I have been thoroughly distracted. But something (gin) whispered into my ear that it was time to make a new post. (boredom and gin)

So my 30 Songs in 30 Days is most definitely going to be 30 Songs in 30 Years.

My health has improved significantly. My ability to pay bills with no paychecks....not so much. It's a long story that has a lot of me saying blah blah blah in it, but we will just say that as of Friday I was officially Fed Ex Overnight terminated from my less than understanding place of employment that I had worked at for 6 arduous years.

Said place in which I sell many an item to supplement my income has started holding funds on every item I sell "just because" is the most coherent answer I can get after many a phone conversation. But honestly, I am not bitter. This. Is all TBE. (to be expected)

If at least 34839743 stupid things don't happen to me a month, then I am am not meeting my metric of retardicity. I did get a diagnosis which was awesome after 12 years of not knowing, but also saddening, as I do not know what to do with this broken little body now.

I suppose that doesn't matter because everyone else seems to know what would be the best method for me so maybe I should just continue drinking those brain cells into the black abyss from whence they came!

But that is neither here nor there. Part-time work, which was once so easy to find, has not become an impossible feat to overcome. I am still pushing for it though, as I feel like I have been a drain on all of those nearest and the very most dearest to me. For the love of God, I was telling my mother of the tale about my dog that enjoyed hunting down and eating all of my underwear and how I planned on being commando until I could go buy more today. I intended this to be a humorous tale, as my sweatpants with commando action fell down in my backyard, and I was praying that none of my neighbor friends had witnessed this horrifying event. But instead, she got very sadfaced and tried to shove $20 bill in my hand to go purchase new unmentionables.

When your mother is trying to hand you money for underwear, that means it is time to find work.

All of that said, I love, love, love the people that invented me.

All of that being said, let's get to our song. This is dedicated to my male counterpart that lives across the many seas out with the hobbits, and stuff and things. We phone speak on occasion via Skype and our timezones never mesh, so it has made for some fun times. Probably one of the more funnier people I have encountered in my life, and when it is time for me to leave for homework, this song gets sung in my ears.

I then proceed to laugh my everloving brains out as it is great, and as I wake up with it in my head for the next week and a half or so, and as I love this song's face off.

There is more dreamy hair in this video than you can shake a brush at.

Nuances Can be Nuisances

I am going through a very strange period in my life indeed. I'm not sure if it is the insomnia, the sickness, or self-reflection catching up with me.

I could quite possibly have short-circuited finally, and maybe I have become one with the 40 oz. of crazy that I should have dealt with a long time ago.

But I don't really deal with things. Not in the manner that I guess they should technically be dealt with. I like laughing and having fun and being witty and making sardonic comments so that I don't have to feel that sense of doom that is always hanging over my head like a big fat gray raincloud.

My actions have always been impetuous, ever since I was a child. Yet I have always been prideful of the fact that I don't over-analyze things and I am quick to let any feelings of panic by way of my actions go with but a brush of the hand.

I cleaned out my garage on Sunday. It was a hellhole. It was also fucking unreasonably cold out for May weather. With my iPod hooked to me on full blast and a hoodie on, I got my hands dirty as I pored through the past that I have been dragging around with me since the age of 15. Soon the hoodie came off, as I was sweating, and soon I was drowning in a sea of memories.

I used to have quite a prowess for documenting every last second of my life. I have over 10 journals as proof. I found them. I started on the ones where I was 14 and falling in love, but got bored of what an idiot I was and moved over to the later years.

As I started reading, I realized there were far to many nuances from my past of over 10 years ago that were mirroring my current state. It's slightly disturbing. How can one person continue to bitch about something yet think they are making changes only to look back and realize that they are still standing in that same pile of quicksand that they had been previously stuck in? How did I manage to trick myself into thinking that I had gotten out? I don't know.

It's odd. I don't like when people throw quotes in my face. Because they are taking advantage of a profound thing that another person said and trying to switch it up so that the quote applies to the situation at hand. I think that's cocky. That's reading something into words that a person said and then assuming that they meant something by it according to the current state of affairs that you are trying to apply them to. Feels dirty.

But what if you quote yourself?

I found this entry tonight dated 03/27/01: GOD I AM OLD. No that was not the entry.

It was:

It's moments like these that make me step back and look at my life as a whole and appreciate it through and through. I wish I could remember those moments with a distinct sense of clarity while taking into account that I just need to appreciate them for what they are. They are just moments. I don't need to cling to them. I don't need to crave them and lust for them. I need to remember to enjoy the ride and stop flashing back on them wishing that I were there right now rather than at work, sitting in front of the t.v., napping on the couch.

Yup. I officially realized tonight that I am an over-analyzer. More so in the sense of nostalgia though.

And to top it off. I haven't changed. I suppose that should be slightly depressing, but in all honesty, it's more embarrassing than anything.

Anyway, 30 Songs in 30 Days.


* Day 07 – A song that reminds you of a certain event----Huey Lewis

My friend summed it up best when she said that when she was little she had herself convinced that Huey Lewis was her cool uncle. It's true. He's been there for me through the bad haircuts, the happy moments, the breakups, hanging out at breakfast, making up dance moves to his album Sports, reappearing for American Psycho, and not too long ago on a warm spring day, I didn't even care if this was the dorkiest thing ever, I BLASTED Sports while I drove around with my windows down. I will always have a special place in my heart for Uncle Huey.

He reminds me of damn near every event in my life. He's my little musical family member. My cool uncle who gave me noogies and a hug.

Mope Than This

Oh Hay. I. Had. Whiskey. I haven't been drinking much since I have been down with the sickness. But I am a miserable fuck to begin with, so every once in awhile, you have to have your medicine to be able to tolerate the abundance of suck that this world is in.

Yes.

I am in a positive mood tonight.

No.

Really I am. It started out with my BFF (we should just get BFF necklaces already, oh wait we already did) coming to visit me. And that was awesome. We had amazing conversation.

I swear to God. Sometimes I wish I could be more attracted to the female persuasion. Because her and I would totally be dating right now. She gets me in every way. She doesn't judge me. I share errything with her. Everyone needs at least one person in their life at one point that is like this.


She needed to go home. Which is fine. I GET IT. Hahaha, kidding, but she left. And I was left to my own devices. Beer, whiskey, and my songs. Generally I have a hot playlist going on in the background when I drink of pure unadulterated stupidity.

But I let it roll on random tonight.

Tonights 30 Songs in 30 Days consists of:



* Day 06 – A song that reminds you of somewhere

I already gave my warning of how subjective this is.

But tonight I picked a song that was...well...ubiquitous. Meaning, it am thinking of a song that reminds me of somewhere, but it is everywhere in my life.

The first time that I heard this song as an adult...my heart hurt and thudded. I can't really explain it. It was as though I had heard it 5,000 times before and it invoked 5,000 of the first feelings that I had ever experienced all at the same time. Again, there was no explanation for it. It's like when you have relived a beautiful moment over and over again, but there is no way to be able to put it into words.

Which of course is a feeling that you can't explain to anyone unless you were Foreigner singing "Feels Like the First Time" or Madonna (that scary spidery looking bitch) singing "Like a Virgin"

This song is all of the best things happening to me in a lifetime comprised with every single horrible and hurtful thing that has happened to me. I feel torn when I hear it. I want to get laid when it comes on or I want to ball up into a corner and cry when I hear it. How do you explain that to any
one? I was just trying to, but again, it's inexplicable.

It's inexplicably nostaligic.

The reason I say that is because, I never made out with anyone to it. I have, and never will, give birth to it, I wasn't in a breakup when I hear this song, it wasn't the first time that I fell in love with a person that I heard this particular song, I wasn't down and out, I wasn't up and high, I just.....was.

So it covers every aspect of my life. Happy, sad, lonely, covered in an orgy of too many people, it's a mixed bag of emotions.

Now.

Gaze into the hypnotic eyes of Mr. Ferry.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOnde5c7OG8

Cool Dude. Dude Cool.

I have an admission. A confession. A cadmission? When I was little and living in the flat grassy country lands of BF Tinytown Iowa, my four brothers and I had nothing but time on our hands and not enough bills to pay yet. We would play all day, creating forts out of the farmer's haystack next door, and ride the horses that belonged to someone else to the field adjacent to us. When it got hot out, my brothers would tear off their shirts and run around. I followed suit.

One day, my mom told me I couldn't do that any longer. I was so confused. Why not? My brothers got to. And so born was my longing to be dude cool. Luckily I got this sweet John Cougar shirt in the mail today to keep me clothed and off of any Girls Gone Wild videos.

I was always a tomboy. I can't tell you why. It may have been all the brothers being my main source of company for the first vital parts of my years. Maybe it was because when I was playing with my friend and tromping through mud puddles and when I eagerly asked her to join in, she looked disgusted and shook her head no, saying she would get in trouble by her mom if she came home dirty. I never got in trouble for being dirty. My parents encouraged me to play sports. (I suck at all sports but track for the record.)

I remember coming home complaining to my dad about a boy that used to pick on me all the time, and he said "Well punch him!" That's because if you were a girl, you could get away with punching a boy. If they punched you back, then they punched a girl. If you punched them, then they were a sissy for getting beat up by a girl.

I matured really slowly when it came to liking boys. I wanted to play GI Joe with them. I wanted to pinch them, and punch them and call them the names they called each other. I was never on level with the girls who couldn't write all over themselves with pen and who wanted to quietly play Barbie whips up Ken a sweet meal. (Ken's gay, Barbie.)

So many times in childhood and in adult life even, the way I act has gotten all misconstrued too. When buddying up with a buddy, buddies or buddy's friends assume that I have a crush on him. Sometimes it's met with a friend saying, "Not true, she's just nice like that, or whatever. Or when I was in the 4th grade and someone asked me if I had a crush on the boy that sat in front of me because I was always poking him and giggling about things, I got overly defensive on stating my wish to just go catch frogs with him.

The first time I even kissed a boy, it was because I was surrounded by people egging it on. Wow, that was romantic.

When I really learned to kiss though, I definitely couldn't stop. But that's where things even got more turned around and my Dude Cool longing kicked into high gear. I learned the hard way that you couldn't just make out with a guy and then turn around the next week and make out with another person. Okay, I never officially learned my lesson on that one, I just had more questions.

Why could guys do that but if girls did, suddenly they were called all these names and labeled as something terrible? Why couldn't I kiss someone and then contact them the next day just to hang out with no expectations?

Trust me, I have had plenty of cad guy friends, and to be honest with you, I don't care. It's endearing.

Yes, I was one of those idiots who always tried to stay friends with my ex, or a hookup because come on I still want your high-fives and stories about the time you shit your pants!

And I know chicks can be crazy when it comes to situations with guys. Trust me. But it's still not fair, and it still gets blown out of proportion. I swear 99.9% of the time that I have done something so-called "crazy" it has to be the male's fault because their perception on my actions is completely skewed. That's the thing, I am fine with just the old hangout afterward. I hate awkwardness and butthurtedness. So if I come off as overbearing, it's because damnit let's be friends!

As I got into the pubescent years, it became even more apparent that the female persuasion was just not for me. Women elevator eye you. If you are a girl, you know what I am talking about. The ol' sizing you up from feet to head. They think you don't notice it, but you do. Plus I have had girlfriends freak out on me for the STUPIDEST things. Guys never had periods or jealousy to blame anything on. If you got in a fight, it was about food or because I pinched you too hard, and then all was forgiven without even having to say a word.

I like to belch really loud, because if I have to, I have to. I like talking about poop, because I poop. I love a good dirty joke, and I have the mouth of a sailor. My dad said I am a version of him out to sea. It's so true. I kind of think like a man. Every single time I have written anything fiction, the main character is a man. I can't get into the brain of a female to write a full story or book about her. I mean look at all the shit Hunter S. Thompson did. Could a female have done that without being labeled just some crazy bitch? Odds are probably not.

When I look at the dynamic of men with each other, it's like the world is their locker room and I wanted to badly to be in that locker room with them. If I talked to a girl the way men talk to each other, it was met with horror. I have been hated by oh so many girlfriends of guy friends because they assumed we were flirting, when in all actuality, no, him telling me he was going to shove that ketchup bottle up my ass if I didn't knock it off was not a form of foreplay, that was me having a taste of being dude cool.

So I thought I found my niche. But you never really do in these kinds of situations. It seemed like whenever I was with the guys it's like my vagina was hanging out or something. I couldn't just start mooning everyone without being treated differently.

Plus, I reached a point of where I had to admit that I am still female. I wanted someone to talk about my makeup and clothes with. Someone to let me be just a little but of a crazy bitch when I needed to be, and someone who could empathize with fluctuating hormones. Someone to explain to me why a male was making me crazy because they were thinking it was crazy that I just honestly like making and keeping my guy friends and that I must have some crazy ulterior motive up my sleeve.

So in my older years, I have been very picky about the females I surround myself with, and the ones I do surround myself with are the ones that are just like me. We are the little female outcasts that have the luxury of peeing outside when we get drunk, burping in each others faces, and calling each other names and LAUGHING about it. We compliment each other and don't act like a bunch of jealous whores around each other.

Even as an adult, I GUESS I can get it at times, when I meet an awesome person and I want their number, or if I get drunk and start chest bumping them or leg humping them or hugging them, I can see where the confusion may set in.

And I don't want that confusion, but part of me still wants to pretend there is a banana in my pants. (Just kidding I don't want a penis)

I would like to hang out with guys that are legitimately my friends and if they happen to be in a band not to be ribbed by strangers about being a groupie, I want to wear tight as hell black pants with shiny shoes and not be given shit if I didn't shower that day, I want to shove someone with my elbow playfully without them thinking I am flirting. I want to be in a room full of guys and have one of them not pause and look at me suspiciously when they start to tell a tale of hooking up with a girl like I am going to go all Sex in the City on them and divulge all about their secret life of debauchery. I don't want to take my shirt off and run around in the backyard anymore though.

It's all ebb and flow though. I will get those few precious moments when it happens, and when it does it feels wonderful. And when I am with my other dude cool female friends, it's even that much better.

Oh yeah. This is also 30 Songs in 30 Days:


* Day 06 – A song that reminds you of somewhere

Strange Currencies by REM. What a gorgeous song. Lyrically and musically. It's so wistful when I hear it now. It reminds me of somewhere in my mind. And that's youth, longing, loving, wanting to be loved back and just wanting someone to just fucking open up and say it already to you rather than be so ambivalent about it all. Before Katy Perry and her stupid Hot and Cold song, this my friends, is the OG Hot and Cold.

http://listen.grooveshark.com/s/Strange+Currencies/xjPeZ?src=5

Who's the Boss?

This rock t-shirt summer is going to be pregnant with epicness. I got a trigger finger that cannot be stopped. When that car payment can't be made, or the house gets repossessed, I will just make me a giant quilted tent out of all the Rock Ts I have purchased and I shall live in that.

I have officially cut myself off until I am actually bringing in decent income (until I pretend that I am and start mindlessly bidding on shit at 2 a.m. is what that that means) but it did end on a high note.

Everyone needs something Bruce Springsteen in their lives. Whether it be a pin, or shirt, or some albums with pins and shirts attached to them, he is pretty much a rock-n-roll icon. He's rugged and dreamy. He had Courtney Cox in one of his videos! Ben Stiller did many parodies on him when he had The Ben Stiller show in the 90s!!! Remember the 90s?!?!

The guy wrote Born in the USA, and the best part is all these dipshit people in political office want to use it as an anthem of sorts, when the song isn't about that. It's about the effects of the Vietnam war on Vets.

Reminds me of the time that Palin/McCain wanted to use Pink Houses for their campaign my Mellencamp. Yeah, Cougar contacted them and was like, "Uh what?" Rawr.

But that's my rock-n-roll T of the day, and my song of the day for 30 Songs in 30 Days is:

* Day 05 – A song that reminds you of someone


It's so hard to pick one song for these things. So I just kind of go with the first thing that pops in my head.

Kings of Leon have been kind of a long running joke when I find someone that likes them. It goes like this: "Oh sweet, they have two fans now.

Because even though they seem to be able to successfully sell concert tickets for 40+dollars and we've seen their Sex on Fire plastered all over MTV more times than we actually would want to count, (that one kind of does sound like a VD commercial jingle) I consistently run into others that, not dislike, but LOATHE them. They basically Creed hate them. You know what I mean by that.

I had a really talented friend that opened for them one time when they played here, and though I thought the show was pretty awesome aside from all the popped collars there (OH MY GOD JOCKS LOVE THEM THAT'S WHY I KNOW NOBODY THAT LOVES THEM) and maybe it was the half bottle of rum I had ingested, but when I met up with friend at the end of the show, he told me that they were a bunch of pompous assholes who used like 500 cans of hairspray in the dressing room and then got far too drunk to even play a proper show.

I really try to separate myself from bands when I hear stories like that. I tell myself it's all right, because I'm not really there to befriend them, I just want to enjoy my music and go home. I don't condone other bands being assholes to friends opening for them of course, I just again, try to separate myself from the assholery that musicians are so prone to possessing.

Now that we've established it's Kings of Leon.


I lost my Grandma, this is terrible I don't know the exact amount of years ago, but it was September 15th, I believe five years ago. She played a really important albeit strange role in my life.

Growing up in Iowa, a lot of our summers were spent coming out to Utah to visit Grandma and cousins. Grandma came out to visit us once or twice on our little farm/notfarm. She was VERY and I mean VERY proper. I was helping her do dishes one time and I remember I put the dishtowel between my legs to grab something really quick and she told me that ladies don't do that. That paired with having 4 brothers growing up, no wonder I turned out to be such a filthy little girl who thinks she's a boy.

One of my most shocking memories of Grandma was while she was visiting in Iowa was her getting really angry about something and I heard her curse. "WHAT IN SAM HELL!!!??" She said. Amazing how we can never quite remember why someone got mad, but we can remember their reaction when angry. (Dad, I was listening to Back in Black by AC/DC when you threw my door open and kicked my CD player across the room what were you mad about again?)

Anyway, I was beyond shocked. MY GRANDMA SWORE? Never! She was still living in the 1800s, did people even swear in the 1800s unless they lived in the land of Deadwood? I finally gutted up and told (tattled) to my mom about it, and my mom informed me that she was using and old expression "What in Sam Hill"

I also found out that my shopping problem and love of all things clothing is not my fault. Turns out I am genetically predisposed to want all these sweet unique and beautiful pieces of clothing in which I want to adorn myself with out there. My grandma was a snazzy dresser.She was classy about it and had great taste in the items she picked out.

When I got uprooted from Iowa and moved out here to Utah, and my parents were super pissed at me because I was 15 and all I wanted to do was drink, smoke, and swear, my grandma still took me school shopping. I even have a sweet photo of the shirt I picked out for my first day of school in Utah. I was in complete and utter 1995 with it.



There are pages and pages and stories stacked on top of stories that I could fill you with about my grandma, her house, her weeping willow tree, summers in Utah, Cottonwood Mall, the clothes she made me,the cookies she baked, the smell of Tide wafting from the laundry room, but I am sure you don't have all night, and well, I do probably because I feel like shit and will be awake for another 3-4 hours.

Toward mid-adulthood, my grandma didn't care for me that much. I was shacking up with dudes while not being married, dying my hair pink and purple, working in bars where they served ALCOHOL, and sin of all sins, I worked at eBay. I remember now with so much fondness her telling me how stupid that company was, and who would want to sit around all day buying a bunch of other people's junk?

I said "Grandma, when I was unemployed, I made a ton of money selling on eBay, it got me through my unemployment."

She yelled, "A TON of money? You made a TON of money? I highly doubt that!!!"

She really thought the Internet was the devil, and for that, I love love her.

Toward the end there, she just got old. It was hard for my parents. They spent a lot of time taking care of her. She got a little bit nutty. She got a lot of panic attacks. She couldn't do stuff on her own, and for a very independent woman, that was difficult for her to come to terms with. At times, she was difficult to deal with. She would, out of frustration, confusion, and getting to the end of her life, be pretty cranky. She would yell at my parents and they would get sad because they were spending so much of their time with her and doing everything they could.

Eventually she did need to get placed in a home when it was getting pretty apparent that people couldn't be there for her 24/7. She was livid. I took it upon myself to start paying her frequent visits. She took it upon herself to start only liking me. What a strange ironic gift. She was never fond of my hair or my lifestyle.

One day while visiting her, some people from her church came over, and she kind of brushed aside some gifts they brought for her, and complained of everyone around her, and then said, "This is my granddaughter. Isn't she just the most beautiful thing you have ever seen? Don't you just love her hair?" as she ran her hands through my hair. I was glad that crazy Grandma decided she loved me, even if sane one wasn't too fond of me at times.

I was out of town when she passed away. I took it hard. I got back and got ready for the funeral, and I HATE funerals. I hate them so much. I mean I don't know anyone that loves them, but I am ultra-sensitive when it comes to death.

I still try to trot around in this fantasy world that we don't die.

But we do. And it happened. And I was driving down the road to go to her funeral when King of the Rodeo by Kings of Leon came on. And Kings of Leon reminds me of my best friend Victoria too. We both listened to this album so much, and she is that 2nd fan of theirs. It makes me think of all the fun but crazy weirdness that we were experiencing at the time as single people.

So that song was such an upbeat number for me. And I started to giggle at the irony while in my car, and then I burst into a blubbering pile of I wonder if I am going to crash my car from crying so hard. I was singing to it while bawling and simultaneously laughing at the situation.

Because this was the only thing that made me not completely lose it; thinking about all the good times with my best friend while listening to this song. I can't even tell you to this day what that song is about. As a matter of fact, I can't understand what the hell he's saying half the time.

But now when I hear it, I think about both life and death.

Believe it or not, this is my first time seeing the video!

Feelin' Fine...Be That Way

Today's 30 Songs in 30 Days is brought to you by sheer exhaustion. I have been up until about 3:00 a.m. or later for about the past month, and I think it finally hit me like a ton of bricks. Good news is, I will probably be in bed by midnight tonight, but the bad news is, my body is going to flip me off about an hour into that, and I will be wandering the house like a peevish ghost in no time. You will hear my haunted swears in your dreams.

Day 04 – A song that makes you sad

I talked about sad songs that make me happy in a way. If I am depressed, I might throw on some John Cale and hear his deep melodic voice sing songs of woe, but it doesn't make me cry. It comforts me.It validates my feelings. It tells me that I'm going to be in a great mood tomorrow, and if not tomorrow, maybe the day after.

It's like getting one of those hugs from a person that doesn't quite know how to hug you which makes it all the more endearing, as opposed to the person who will hug you if they see you scowling. That just means I wasn't wearing my glasses and was trying to read something of a wall, hands off Handsy McHandserson!

But there are songs out there that reach into your heart and start poking at it with a needle. You may have been hanging outside on a sunny day just moments before, soaking in how wonderful life is, only to go inside and put your music on shuffle when out of the depths of your playlist comes out a song that sags your shoulders and makes a few small fat tears start to drip from your face. After the song ends, you throw on a little Huey Lewis for a pickmeup, because what the hell? Where the hell did this come from? There are a few songs that do that to me. Some because they are just damn sad, and because there was a difficult period on my life when I heard them and they remind me of being down with the sadness.

This one is a culmination of the above. I was going through a breakup, (Okay who hasn't) when I started listening to Beck's Sea Change. Holy depressing. This album is about his own going through a breakup, and he spared all of us the grueling duty of writing a bunch of shitty poetry about ours by writing a naked and heartfelt album chock full of gorgeously articulated grief.

Whether you are a Beck fan or not, or whether you memorized all the words to Loser like my friend and I did in Junior High, this album is worth giving a good hard listen to. It's so raw, his voice is so full of broken beat down emotion. It cracks with pain that is so authentic, that there is no way he could have been feigning it when he recorded these songs.

So when I hear Guess I'm Doing Fine a number of factors come into play. It's like having a friend show up on your doorstep sobbing and you just happen to be able to feel every single thing that they are feeling at that time without going through it yourself at that exact moment. Or being at a funeral of someone you don't really know, but seeing all of the people around you, the look of loss on their face and despair, and suddenly you are right there with them. Or, if you were going through that breakup yourself and this little ditty popped on, it feels like he wrote the song JUST for you at that moment.

The lyrics aren't as such that come off as whiny woe is me. They are a genuine feeling of loss and pain when everything is fresh off the suck press. You wake up one day and everything looks and feels so gray. Songs don't sound the same to your ears, it's just a record that the needle is scratching in an ugly manner over and over and over again. You are so exhausted from the blue snuggie of depression that has enveloped you that you can barely bring yourself to get out of bed to get a glass of water.

When Beck gets to the chorus, that's the real kicker for me:

It's only lies that I'm living
It's only tears that I'm crying
It's only you that I'm losing
Guess I'm doing fine

Right there where he says "Guess I'm doing fine" that's it. I mean it's such a sarcastic bald-faced and obvious lie. But what else can you tell yourself when you have hit this point? It's that or yes, drown yourself in the toilet. He gets to the end of the song and sings the chorus one last time, and his voice gets so overwhelmingly emotional, he is wailing so hard that it really does bring on a wave of boo-hoo.

I have to commend you Beck, for successfully being able to bum me out every single time that this song comes on.

Full lyrics are:

There's a blue bird at my window
I can't hear the songs he sings
All the jewels in heaven
They don't look the same to me

I just wade the tides that turned
Till I learn to leave the past behind

It's only lies that I'm living
It's only tears that I'm crying
It's only you that I'm losing
Guess I'm doing fine

All the battlements are empty
And the moon is laying low
Yellow roses in the graveyard
Have no time to watch them grow

Now I bade a friend farewell
I can do whatever pleases me

It's only lies that I'm living
It's only tears that I'm crying
It's only you that I'm losing
Guess I'm doing fine

Press my face up to the window
To see how warm it is inside
See the things that I've been missing
Missing all this time

It's only lies that I'm living
It's only tears that I'm crying
It's only you that I'm losing
Guess I'm doing fine (x2)



And here, go cry yourself to sleep on your huge pillow!

Concentrated Happiness

Who's your little slacker? I am, I am! 30 songs in 30 days will probably end up being more like 30 songs in 3659678674 days for me, but I am not good at keeping up on everything like I should be. It's called Attention Deficit Disorder for a reason.

Plus I have physically been feeling like downright shit. (No pun intended)

Today's topic for 30 Songs in 30 Days is:

A song that makes you happy.

So many songs make me happy. If I am in da club and I hear a song that I love, I squeal with happiness and start dancing. If I am bummed, and I hear a morose song, it makes me feel sad yet strangely comforted. If I am in the car and stuck in traffic and I hear a good upbeat song, I get happy. And on and on.

I want to verbally vomit on happiness for a minute right now before I post my song that I am choosing for today that makes me happy.

I went to the doctor for a follow-up appointment on Friday. I had this huge thing written out for laundry list of "am I dyings" questions that I wanted to bring up. My legs and toes and hands tingle, I get panic attacks, I Hulk out into uber-bitch at the drop of a hat, I start bawling for no reason, I get headaches, I am exhausted out of nowhere, I can't eat. My damn mouth hurts! (Probably because I talk too much) The list is too big and whiny for this post.

He asked if I was depressed. I started to say yes. Because I do get depressed, and I was really depressed that day. But I am not your standard I HAVE DEPRESSION! person. I have always learned to laugh things off, make a joke out of it, or find something funny that makes me feel better.

So I changed my answer to basically this:

Last time I was sick like this, I had just gone through a terrible breakup. I had been dating around a bit as well, but I was newly and freshly single, and a lot of my friends just were either out doing their own thing or maybe they just got stick of calling me to do things and hearing me say, "I can't." It's hard to explain that you can't really leave the house much when you feel like this. Sometimes people ask if I am contagious hahahahahahaha. No. I am not. I will kiss you with tongue, ALL OF YOU to prove it.

I refer to my precious few hours that I get to leave the house every few days or so as "DOMINIQUE'S BIG DAY OUT."

I got really lonely last time. I slept a lot, read books, remained confused because doctors kept telling me to stop being all periody and womany and stressy because that's what was causing this. I probably got the most down I had ever been in my whole life. Toward the end of my illness something happened that I will probably only talk about to maybe two people, but it as so humiliating and horrifying and downright just the last straw that I told myself I was done with life and if I wasn't well soon that was that. It's weird reflecting on that, because I have never felt that way before and never have again.

Of course I talk about drowning myself in the toilet, crashing my car into the freeway wall, running into traffic, hanging myself in the bathroom, but we all know I am kidding.

Anyway, I got better that last time and came back to Earth.

This time, I started to get a bit blue, but suddenly out of nowhere, I had friends coming by to visit. My friend Andy brought me this Lil Wayne/John Wayne shirt which made my life and my t-shirt collection's life.

Victoria told a co-worker, whom I have yet to meet (IRL tee-hee) that I wasn't feeling well. He sent her over with Noni Juice and supplements for me. More than once. (thank you Randy!!!)

Conor asked if I was seeing people, and I told him I almost locked Andy and Victoria in my basement when they came over that one day. Ever since, Conor has been taking me out on little errands and popping by for visits.

Terrence is being so nice to me, even when I am being a raging whore about all this.

My dogs are driving me insane.

My mom still answers the phone when I call and she lets me ramble like a lonely crazy cat lady. Sans the cats.

Ian brought me a AN AWESOME tank top.

I keep wanting to namedrop erryone here, but anyway, I have been flooded with hugs, emails, phone calls, text messages, little pick me up gifts, and even thinking about that right now makes me tear up (AND I DON'T cry) because I feel so loved that it's overwhelming. I have so much gratitude for knowing that such sweet selfless people exist in this world and that THEY ARE MY FRIENDS.

It probably doesn't hurt that I have threatened many of them that if they aren't nice to me I will haunt them from the grave if I die.

For the record, I am pretty sure I am not going to die, it just feels that way. The speculation is Crohn's right now. To which I said, "Shit." To which I also said, "At least my disease will sound like an intelligent professor.

To which my beautiful friend Jenny Poplar said, "Sorry to hear this, Dom. It is a well documented fact that people with Crohn's disease are often of above average intelligence. Seriously, look it up. If it is Crohn's at least you have a smart person's disease.."

I am not even going to look it up, I am going to take her word for it that I am the smartiest.

So all that is not a song, but it makes me beyond happy. You know that whole bosom swelling with happiness feeling. Well, I wish my bosoms would swell, aggressive sick weight loss took those away pretty fast!

Enough about my boobs and me boobing and happiness in life.

The song that makes me undeniably happy; the song that if I was in a coma in the hospital and it came on I would wake up and dance to it; the song that I listen to 325879 times a week, is by a little band called Orange Juice.

They're a Scottish post-punk band that came about in 1979. They never made it huge but they are huge in my heart. The song contains all my favorite elements; saxophone, clapping, campy vocals, COWBELL, and a beat sent to you from the blue clouds of heaven.

As I write this oddly enough, that song JUST started on a shuffle playlist I have going. BRB have to DANCE!!!

Whew. Back.

Favorite verse:

Nothing worth finding
Is easily found
Try as we might
That was supposed to sound
Very profound
It probably sounds dry

Now you dance!!!!

http://listen.grooveshark.com/s/I+Can+t+Help+Myself/2Ts6L5?src=5

Emphasis on the BLOW

All right! Song number two for 30 Songs in 30 Days!

This one is going to be convenient for my current state of negativity. I think my immune system ruptured a pipe a day or so ago, so now on top of impending doom, I have current doom of some sort of other sickness. Blah. Or as Dracula would say, "Blehhh!"

Day 02 – Your least favorite song

Well there are a lot of songs I loathe out there. Just turn on the radio and I can pick out probably every single one playing right now. I chose this song though because of the fact that it's one of those double-edged swords.

I will be mindlessly wandering the aisles of TJ Maxx like some sort of bargain zombie when it comes on and the song sucks so bad, the artist is atrocious, yet it brings back a treasured gawky youth memory. So that in turn makes me think, "Awesome, the one thing that brings back a treasured overly hormonal pleasant memory is this bag full of pure yuck."

Just my luck right?

When I was 15 I got a huge crush. Sound familiar? I mean I turned into a bumbling fidgety melty mouthed dolt around this person. It was the olden days before your Internets and your cellular phones and your sexting that all you kids are into these days, and it was in Iowa circa 1995 small town style. That was the grunge explosion. Try being into that when everyone else just wants a good pair of Girbauds and to see how high they can get their bangs to look so that they'll match their collared polo shirts.

I loved Radiohead. Yeah, before their Ok Computers and weird electronic bleeps and blips. It was their Pablo Honey straight out of the 90s grunge rock, honeys.

I remember I purchased a ginormous Pablo Honey shirt only to be questioned by my peers, "What's a Radiohead?" and giving them my best, "You just wouldn't get it." Gen-X face.

But then as I was walking down the hallway, this person pointed to it and said, "I like your shirt." I looked up at him and I am pretty sure made some braying donkey noises and that is where my crush began.

He of course was older than me by three years, and when you are 15, that may as well be three million years. Once you reach your late 20s we are all basically the same age.

But anyhow. He was the Jordan Catalano to my Angela Chase. A series of awkward events were surely to follow, such as not feeling well and sneaking off to smoke behind the library one day during school and him being back there.

"Do you want to hear what I wrote on my guitar?" he asked.

This was also back when hell yes I wanted to hear what you wrote on your guitar because playing guitar is the cooolest! Now Anyone Can Play Guitar, and I don't give a shit when they tell me that unless they aren't a total boner.

So he plays this really pretty song, I don't remember what it was. I was beautiful in my head so that's all that matters, and all the while, I am a bit nauseous from not feeling well earlier that day and as he winds up the song, I look him in the eyes, and I say the most romantic thing a girl could ever say to a boy she thinks she is in love with:

"I think I'm going to puke."

We got married and had 7 kids after that. No we didn't.

I was never big into dances. Or anything school related for that matter. That's not something Kurt Cobain would have done. But my friends and I decided to attend some spring dance. I don't know why. I don't even remember really any specific details on it, this seems like eons ago.

All I remember was Hootie & The Blowfish, "Hold My Hand" coming on and my CRUSH coming up to ask me if I wanted to dance to it. I am sure my heart beat out of my chest the whole time I awkwardly stood there trying to figure out how one dances.

Trust me I am still trying to figure out how one dances.

So that was the peak of my Jr. High life. And I have Hootie & The Blowfish to thank for it. A band that seriously has one of the most poorly named titles ever and their music is just as cheesy and lyrically devoid of any human life. Every time their music comes on in these stores I am shopping at I am filled with I need to punch something from how bad they suck anger, to wistful thinking of my youthful days when everything was so new and exciting and full of prospect.

Do you see how that can confuse one's mind?

So here's it is my friends. I think I'm going to puke:

30 Dongs...Er Songs in 30 Days

I have decided to do the 30 Songs in 30 Days post that I have seen floating around. Some of them seem a bit redundant, and some seem a bit subjective for the period of my life that I was in when being axed the question, so this could change on a day to day basis, what the hell. WHAT THE HELL?

Day 1. My favorite song.

I have had many favorite songs in lifetime. But I am going to pick one of my favorite songs and hand over two versions of it.

I choose you Do Ya, by ELO. ELO has been one of my all time favorite bands as far back as I can remember. Nobody, and I mean nobody has walked this earth that can compete with them in my opinion. Everything was done with such orchestrated perfection and Jeff Lynne has sweet hair.

I curse the fact that I am too young (still olde though I promise) to have never seen them play. I even set up ELO Play One More Show! On Facebook. Well, it didn't take off, but I still have hope.

Nuff said. I am usually not "that guy" but I kind of have a tendency to judge whether or not I want to be friends with someone based on how they feel about ELO.

Do Ya is probably one of the most beautiful love/lust songs I have ever heard. It doesn't say, "Do ya do ya wanna hump," or "Do ya do ya want to bone." It's Lynne listing off all of the things that he has seen and heard in his lifetime thus far in this world; things beautiful and things sad that have touched his heart in a certain way and stirred him emotionally. As he goes through his checklist, he ends it each time with, "But I've never seen/heard nothing like you.

Be still my aching loins if someone were to say that to me!

When he says, "Do ya do ya want my love...WOMAN" They way that he says woman is so pronounced, manly and forcible, like the question needs to be answered know. After that spiel, drag me by my hair into your cave buddy!

Let us not forget that the song just plain fucking rocks balls.

Without further aDoya:



For those of you who don't know this, Jeff Lynne was in a band called The Move prELO. This song was originally done by The Move, and it's kind of like the whole tomato-tomahto thing, but I am a bit more partial to the Move's version due to the fact that who the hell can resist cowbell all up in your face?? If you can then you are deaf to the siren song of rock.

Here's the OG version:



I spent years looking for the perfect vintage ELO T-Shirt. People kept either outbidding me or it just wasn't the style and fit for me. A week ago, fate and destiny collided with my body after I won an ELO shirt that knew one day it would need to meet and marry me.

I think I wore it four days in row before I came to terms with the fact that it was not going to meld itself to my body. Regardless, the fit, material, print, was the closest I will ever get to touching the hand of God.

Next Holy Grail purchase? A vintage Hall & Oates shirt.

The Heart of Plimsouls Still Beatin'

No shit. I went to bed last night at 3:30 a.m., and as I lay there drifting off, I had a very vivid dream that I got knuckle tattoos that said: |H|U|E|Y| |L|E|W|I|S| Needless to say, I was a very sad panda (or human being I guess) when I awoke to look at my knuckles only to see that they were still untouched by holy words. We will talk more about my affinity for Huey one day. That may take awhile though.

Lately since I've been on my death bed, only get to sit in front of the computer sick, I have had time to rediscover music in ways that I haven't since the olden days of horse drawn buggies and Napster.

I tapped into a genre well that I have never quite played around in before, and that would be Mod/Pop/Punk mainly from the 70s and early 80s, and music started to spray all over me. It's been an overwhelming yet delightful experience, regardless, I don't even know how to start jumping for joy. For when I find one HOLY SHIT THIS IS AMAZING BAND! all of a sudden, another one crops up. It's like I have lice, but the doctor assured me that it's just a lot of bands thank God.

Say what?? There is more out there than just The Ramones and The Sex Pistols? Don't get me wrong, those bands are great too and they were a definite staple of the punk scene, but telling people you like them is like telling people that Jay-Z is your favorite when you claim that rap music is your bag.

Generally most things that I have been drawn to have been out of the UK, Scotland, Australia, etc. But I recently came upon the Plimsouls, and Lord knows, I have listened to this song 3,000 times. I am pretty sure my house's ears are bleeding right now. But it's so solid. It's so tight. It's so rockin', It's just a little over two minutes. You know those songs. They leave you longing for more. You rinse, lather, and repeat. Over and over. It's called The Zero Hour.

The Plimsouls were formed by Peter Case who had been in the Nerves prior, another band I have been drooling all over. The Nerves by the way were the OG writers of the now infamous Blondie song, "Hanging On The Telephone." Again, more on that later. These guys ar also, bless their I love their little souls, from L.A.!

Enough! Put some socks on and prepare to have them rocked off and listen to this bitch already! I have three times thus this morning.