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the latest waddle:

good morning, wordpress - 10:36 a.m. , 2009-07-03

elaborate murder attempt - 2:56 p.m. , 2009-07-01

building a tractor in the basement - 10:42 a.m. , 2009-06-19

ask no questions tell just a few lies - 3:17 p.m. , 2009-06-09

my long lasting flavor really lasts long - 1:10 p.m. , 2009-06-04


2002-12-10 ... 4:08 p.m.

A RECENT TERRIFYING EXPERIENCE THAT ACTUALLY TURNED OUT OKAY

I have some difficulties in the area of Being A Girl. The equipment is fine, it is the trappings of gender that I sometimes have trouble with. Like showing up at your bridal shower and being enthusiastic about towels. Or shopping. Or, especially, wearing makeup.

Did you think that at some point in your life you would be a Grown-Up Lady and you would just sort of magically understand all that makeup crap that women's magazines throw at you? Because I know I did. Needless to say, it never happened: After I grew out of painting on the theatrical I Am An Undead Teenager eyeliner and black lipstick, I was kind of stuck without any guidelines. My sister-in-law, a devotee of all things girly, has kind of been after me to visit a department-store makeup counter with her, and do the whole makeup thing, which I have never done. Finally I gave in. We went to MAC, and I was vaguely okay with that until:

(1) This very scary girl with those blonde/brown tie-dye highlights and lots of visible lipliner sat me down in a chair and started talking about (let me see if I can convey her very special speech patterns): Color! Like, Lots Of Color! Totally! You Need Color! You Little Pale Greenish Thing! Let's Get Some Color On You! This made me kind of wig out. Also, she kind of reminded me of a squirrel, if squirrels wore lipliner, and she spoke glowingly of the Adam Sandler vehicle "Eight Crazy Nights." I continued the wigging-out process.

(2) Halfway through the making up process I remembered that RuPaul was once a spokesbeing for MAC. "Please don't make me look like a drag queen," I begged the Makeup Squirrel. She said, "What?"

Of course I cannot see much of anything without my glasses, so I was totally helpless during this procedure until the end, when she handed me a mirror, and I must admit I feared the worst. Surprisingly, my fears were not entirely realized. There was way too much eye goop going on, especially for someone who rubs her eyes (in a sleepy or allergic way) as much as I do. It was all green and black and sparkly, and with the glasses and my generally subdued clothing it made me look a bit like a librarian-by-day-stripper-by-night who was experiencing some temporal disorientation. But the foundation stuff blended well, I must admit, and could come in handy on hungover days. The thing I was totally suckered into buying, though, was this moisturizer. Oh man. A deal at twice the price. You could put a miniature baby to sleep on my face, that is how soft and smooth this stuff makes me. It feels magical and I practically want to eat it, in order to be all soft and smooth and moistened on the inside as well.

Okay. So we have learned that department-store makeup counters, although not entirely pleasurable, are not necessarily the worst thing ever. It still is not anything I would ever choose to do again, though. And that got me thinking.* Have you ever planned your Perfect Day? Like maybe when you were a kid on your birthday and you got to do whatever you wanted, and you were probably a cool kid and planned some outing to an amusement park or a pool party with your friends, whereas I always wanted to go to the Field Museum, have Shirley Temples at the 95th Floor, and pick out any book I wanted from a bookstore. Come to think of it, that is not so far from my Perfect Day now. Add a whole lot of alcohol, rock-and-roll, and a plate of sushi and we are good to go.

*I could feel the digression coming on, so I left that asterisk up there so we wouldn't forget what we were talking about.

Still thinking in binaries: what would the Horrible Day be like? (Let us leave work out of the equation and pretend Horrible Day is some kind of holiday.) What leisure activities could we plan that would be wholly repellent, that would be nothing at all like you, that, in fact, would make your soul implode? Here is my Horrible Day:

7 am: Wake up to really loud, beeping alarm. Scrape myself off ceiling.

7:30 am: Step aerobics class.

9 am: Breakfast at Soul Kitchen or other unjustifiably-snooty Bucktown restaurant with whiny irritating people (possibly one of my relatives or my old college roommate) who complain the entire time about the temperature, the music, the wait, the service, the food, and yet will not consider going anywhere else.

11 am: Off to the Craft Fair! Hours of looking at hideous crap, especially the scary "country d�cor" trend, where everything is made out of twigs or rusted metal. Or WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS, these "decorative" abused children hiding their shame in the corner.

2 pm - 3 pm: Rollerblade along the lake in denim cutoffs and a bikini top.

3 pm: Attend lecture on finding out the color of your co-dependent guardian angel's parachute, or something of that nature.

5 pm: Shop for brassieres and have a pedicure.

7 pm - 10 pm: Drive out to the south suburbs to one of the sad singles bars there. Watch divorced systems administrators and respiratory therapists shake their groove things to the stylings of a truly incoherent DJ. Bon Jovi, bad techno, Mariah Carey, and the Beach Boys are all present and accounted for in the mix.

10 pm - 4 am: Back to the city to this bar. I just stumbled upon this link, and OH MY GOD. It is almost impressive how these people have managed to alienate just about everybody. Who is this place for? I have never been fond of the whole hippie drum circle thing, so I would hate it anyway. However, if you ARE fond of the whole hippie drum circle thing, you certainly are not going to want to practice it in the west Loop, with valet parking and $5 cosmopolitans and trophy girlfriends everywhere. And do spontaneous, hippie-esque drumming, alcohol, public space, and total strangers go together? No they do not. What a fucking nightmare, I really can't talk about it anymore, I just can't, it is making me break out in hives. No further questions, your Honor, please.

JUST TWO MORE MORSELS AND THEN I WILL GO

1. Oh Axl, you dumb-ass, you crack me up.

2. On the way home yesterday I saw a Christmas tree lot, and all its signage said "HOLIDAY TREES." Get Your Holiday Tree, Trees For The Season, and other slogans like that. I thought it was curious to go so overboard not to mention Christmas, because no one really gets a tree for Hanukkah or Kwanzaa or even, really, the Winter Solstice (although we all know that is where the tradition comes from). It is okay to call a Christmas tree a Christmas tree. Go ahead!

---mimi smartypants brings you tidings of comfort, joy, and deep ambivalence.

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