buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

This is the actual text of an e-mail I received from my mother this morning. She's talking about my 19-year-old sister, recently home for the summer after her first year of college. Let's call her "Jane":

Last night I walked into Jane's room. It was kind of late; she was talking online as usual and laughing out loud. When I walked in she turned around and said, "Oh, remember I told you that Kyle (gay Kyle) and I were out at a porn shop and he made me buy a vibrator?" oookkkaaay..."Well, he is always asking me if I used it yet"....THEN SHE SAYS, "WELL I USED IT TODAY AND I TOLD HIM AND NOW HE IS TELLING EVERYONE TO IM ME SAYING 'buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz". I put my hands over my ears at this point and walked out of her room.

Okay what is wrong with this girl. I am appalled. Geez.

Needless to say, I text-messaged her ASAP. "Buuuuuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..."

reason #734 why I am marrying my man

I told him I thought Carmen Electra was hot. I'm also trying to work out more. Yesterday he suprised me with this. What a man.

let the sun shine!

Just an update: Hair was awesome. Just amazing. I really did get a little choked up at the end, and it wasn't from the pot smoke. In the car on the way home, my fiance's cousin gave her assessment: "So, I'm not so sure what that was all about. There's the guy that wants to go to war, and then everybody gets stoned?" Let's just say she doesn't seem to be all that politically-minded.

And, since I know you're all dying to know, while members of the cast, including future brother-in-law, did indeed get naked, the way the stage was lit precluded any schlong measuring or nipple-gawking. Thank god because even though our seats were waaaay in the back, this was a smallish cabaret theater, so the waaay back really wasn't all that far back.

The other highlight of the weekend was attending the wedding of an ex-coworker of my fiance. It was a smallish, modest affair, though they did, to our great pleasure, spring for the all-night open bar. Unfortunately, they decided to cut corners on the DJ. I'm not sure if he was chosen randomly or was a friend of the family, but he was pretty much a reincarnation of that Chris Farley motivational speaker character from SNL. Seriously. He was overweight, disheveled, loud, boorish, and worst of all (or best of all, from an entertainment perspective) DRUNK. We're pretty sure he was drinking straight whiskey. And he'd yell into the microphone, causing very unpleasant reverberations. We were expecting him to follow "AND NOW, PLEASE WELCOME, FOR THE VERY FIRST TIME, THE NEW, MR. AND MRS., JOHN SMITH" with "WHO'LL BE LIVING IN A VAAAAN, DOWN BY THE RIVERrrraaaaahhhh!!!!!!!!!!" I am not exaggerating. Seriously. He also got out on the dance floor to strut his stuff to the horrible techno music he chose for the occassion (which was only slightly more tolerable than the Kenny G and Chuck Mangione numbers he played during dinner). But a good time was had by all, and also, I looked pretty hot in my new dress. Not that it was about me or anything...

I don't really want to see your junk

My future brother-in-law is an up-and-coming performer. Mostly musicals--he recently toured with Starlight Express, a very deep, emotionally-charged musical loosely based on The Little Engine That Could. On roller skates. And with costumes that were apparently designed by either the animators of "The Transformer" or the costume team from the movie Tron. He does a play here and there as well--I went to a reading of his (along with his parents, brothers, and an aunt) for a play in which he played a gay teenager in the 50's who gets involved with a local priest. The play kind of sucked, but the worst part was watching his father (my future father-in-law) watch *him* as he groped another man's package and kissed a priest onstage. Honestly I think his father would have been more comfortable with it were it not for the fact that his son is gay in real life. That said, I should mention that his parents are extremely supportive of him and his career and, while his dad probably would prefer that he wasn't gay, they accept him and have a very good relationship with him.

But tonight, we get to see him naked. Onstage. In Hair. Now, I'm really excited to see Hair. Normally I am not so fond of musicals, but this is a classic that appeals to my not-so-inner bohemian. I've seen the movie but never the live performance. I asked my fiance, "wouldn't it be funny if he got naked and all the sudden this huge Ron Jeremy-sized wang came flying out, hitting the stage with a massive 'thud'?" He replied "you wish," to which I said "yes, I wish your gay brother had a huge schlong..." Then I saw what he was getting at--the genetics and all--so I had to reassure him that his package is, indeed, more than satisfactory to meet my needs. (Men are ridiculous when it comes to this subject. As long as I can actually feel it when it's in, it's big enough, and the rest is up to you, honey).

Anyway, the moral of the story is that I was pleased to hear that our seats are in the back. Waaay in the back...

thanks for parking like an asshole

I finally did it. I left a snarky note on someone's car in the office parking garage for parking like an asshole (namely, parking smack dab on the line, thus taking up two adjacent spaces). I should mention that it is a definite pain in the ass to park in our garage--big concrete poles every which way, one of which has left an ugly scratch on my front bumper. But you don't see me trying to take double the parking space I'm allotted, do you? No sir. I don't know what it was today, maybe I was a little pissy, and maybe it was just because I happened to have some extra paper in the car. But I pulled in and saw, of all things, a Ford Focus taking up two spots, and I knew it was time to do what I've always wanted. I left this note on the windshield of that damned car:

"Thanks so much for letting us all know how important you and your car are by taking up two parking spaces. What a considerate gesture."

I really felt like writing "thanks for parking like an asshole," but I decided on the sarcasm-laden "polite" version instead. It did make me feel good, I have to say.

Next plan of action: making magnetic bumper stickers that I can put on Hummers when their owners aren't looking. They will say "I bought this car to compensate for my tiny penis".

nipples

Why is it OK for male nipples to be displayed wherever their owners please, but a crime to show female nipples in public? Um, don't they kind of look, identical, without the context of the surrounding bodies?

Imagine a shirt that covered everything BUT the nipples (meaning, the parts that are anatomically different between the genders). That'd be a sight.

(BTW, this nipple discussion was prompted by this article in the Chicago Tribune).

The perfect gift for everyone in my family

I came across the Flat-D Innovations website a while back, and I have to admit, I can't say that I actually hate their product line, but it obviously lends itself to being intensely ridiculed. The Flat-D (as in flatulence deodorizer) website promises that it's products will "eliminate your flatulence odor problem as soon as you start using it." Now that's some guarantee! I'd actually like to run my own mini-clinical trial, as I'm pretty sure I know some of the world's biggest producers of malodorous gases.

In case you were too fucking lazy to look at the website for yourself, Flat-D Innovations sell a line of activated charcoal products designed to eliminate the scent of your farts. You can buy underwear, reusable pads to put in your underwear, chair pads, and even face masks. Now, the underwear pads make a lot of sense to me--they're discreet, presumably allowing you to let 'em rip on the subway without making anyone around you pass out. I don't think, however, that the Flat-D pads are strong enough to muffle the sound of a large post-bean burrito pooter, so you may want to avoid freely passing gas, say, in the Self Help section of your local Barnes & Noble. Perhaps they should develop a charcoal pad enveloped in soundproof insulating material--now THAT would be an innovation!

From what my mother tells me about my dad's daily habits, I think he might like to invest in a Flat-D chair pad for his computer chair. Supposedly his gaseous eliminations have all but disintegrated the stylish tweed covering, and there is enough odor build-up that even the cats are repelled immediately upon jumping up there.

Another idea I'd like to pitch to the folks at Flat-D: how about a charcoal liner for the bedsheets? I can't tell you how many times my wonderful life-mate has lifted the sheets just so, blasting me directly in the nostrils with a gas so noxious they might want to consider using it at the next incarnation of Abu Ghraib.

For now, we have the charcoal underwear. It's a start, but until my entire family is outfitted in charcoal-lined jumpsuits, the world remains in great peril.