Fast Food Family

My sister and I eat out a lot. And by eat out I mean fast food. When we have Subway we're like OH! God! I'm faint. I'm like ana right now. Where my fries at?

It's something that I think we are sort of disgusted at, but at the same time don't really want to escape the lure of bbq sauce and salt. It got to the point where one of her roommates jokingly suggested she give up fast food for lent. We looked at each other like Aw. Hell. Naw. Christ gave his life.... well...Did Christ ever have a cheeseburger animal style with extra grilled onions? I don't think so. Kate Moss hath once spewed "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." Really? Clearly she hasn't had anything fried. ever. Dumb. (Wow Jesus to Kate Moss in two sentences. LOOK AT THAT TRANSITION)

Anyway, my sister recently told me an anecdote that I feel sums up our love-hate-secretly love relationship with all that is devilish for the corporal self. One evening she and her roommate decided to play racket ball at the school's gymnasium. My sister's roommate (I shall name her Christina) got there early and worked out before hand. My sister (I shall name her Sasha) drove to the gym.

Christina was kind of tired from her previous exertion and my sister just sort of watched the ball bounce and half heartedly chased it. After a while of playing glorified fetch with rackets, the girls decided they were hungry. Since they had clocked some time in sweating and such, they decided to treat themselves to Mexican food. Also known as Taco Bell. Luckily, Sasha had driven.

After Mexican Pizzas and Double Deckers (briefly, a taco named after a bus. Do we even notice this shit?) the fearless consumers ascertained that they really weren't that full.

"I'm not really thaaaat fauoll"

"Me neither"

"Wanna go to Jack in the Box?"

I am sure the conversation was more in depth than that. I am just projecting how it would be if Sash and I were talking to one another in this situation. (Y'all are like yeah effing right. YOU ARE CHRISTINA). Thus they traveled to stop number two and hastily bought curly fries and onion rings. My sister described the instance as one of sadistic consumption. "Were weren't even hungry anymore, it didn't taste good. I just didn't know what else to do but eat. Ahhheeeeh," she moans to me, in reflection. And mimes putting a french fry to her mouth, face twisted into a remorseful and terribly sad expression.

When they got home the girls started to realize that they had overdosed. My sister describes the scene as one of greasy pain and temporary horror. I say temporary because as Sasha finished retelling me the story, she added one final detail of her trauma.

"It was so bad," she whimpers as I am rolling on the bed laughing. "I couldn't eat until like" (Brief Pause) "Eleven p.m."

I love my Family.

Boys Boys Boys

Today I went to an unspeakably lovely beach in Montecito. It was impromptu, but I was feeling antsy and had two hours to kill before class. So I drove like someone on PCP to the ocean and finished (and by finished I mean started) my first massive overhaul of academic reading.

I had found a particularly nice spot in which I was laying slightly propped up by a slopping rock. This rock was also surrounded by many other stony spheres (haha), which blocked the wind a bit. It was a perfect situation. However, I was not the only one who realized this. Two adorable little boys in red and blue swim shorts were also enjoyed the bevy of boulders. I could feel them eyeing the opportune adventurous climbing situation. Unfortunately I was sitting directly in the middle of their cool time, and I am assuming their WAPSY upbringing didn't allow them to immediately trample my beached ass. It is a fitting metaphor; man has always wanted to conquer nature, but there is always one obstacle: women.

I tired to ignore them, but their precious Elmer Fudge speak started to permeate my reading (which wasn't difficult as I was sloughing my way through Ovid's Metamorphosis eeuuchh).

"Bwu-thurrr."

"We can't climb the rwocks. She will see us."

"But look at that one!"

"But we will be cwaught. She will see usssss."

Great. I was Dark Lord Sauron. Preventing innocence and beauty from having its day. I wanted to move, but then I felt the furtive glances of their mother back at where they were playing. I didn't want to seem rude, like her children were obnoxious, because they weren't and I don't even really like children. But I also wanted to move. It was a great spot. I felt bad for being in their way. Oh and I don't like children. IT WAS REALLY DIFFICULT.

I also started questioning to myself (super secret, like in my head) how can something so cute turns into such a demon being? They looked so precious and harmless, like puppies. But when I think about all the boys I have known, the past puppies that have turned into dogs (haha!), I am wary of such cuteness. It doesn't last. I know what you will become.

Then one of the little hobbit boy puppies decided enough was enough. Like the generations of men before him, he was going to survey the land and no two-bit female was going to stop him. Hobbit puppy then took a small bucket full of sand, and dumped it on my back.

Needless to say, I moved.

Image Credit: martianchronicles

The Grotesque

My southern literature professor (lord i reference that class a lot on this blog) repeatedly asks us this question: What is the most grotesque institution?

(I love it when teachers ask those broad questions where the whole class is supposed to chime in and answer. Because what comes back to our learned professor is some mumbled, murmured, scattered semblance of words so that suddenly "southern rape complex"sounds to the ears in the room like "mish rerera merragenoo". It's as if the phrase doesn't want to leave our voice boxes, so the whole time its fighting for air our larynx gives it the old one-two. Then the Professor claps her hands and rings our the answer for everyone to hastily scribble in their notebook. Next time she asks, I am just going to contribute a whispered "FISH AND CHIPS", "ring a ding ding" or "down by the bay")

Anyway, the answer to her question is slavery. Slavery is the most grotesque institution because it commodified the human soul to the point that one being owned another's. Slavery seems to me almost as the dead embodiment of grotesque, as if the word was solely created to accurately depict slavery in the English language.

But it also got me thinking about the.. mini-grotesque? I mean those everyday situations where we are bombarded by something disgusting, vile, or wrong but we take a strange and often masochistic liking to it. For instance: my weird obsession with making Linda Blair references, watching Cat House with my roommates while eating prunes, consuming obscene amounts of ice cream right before I go to bed while watching reality television on line and feeling the aftereffects at 3 am when I dream about Patty Stanger shooting me in the shin with a gun made of leather and spoons...(?) LESS SPECIFICALLY reality TV, horror films, infidelity, S&M, all the nasty shit.

Or perhaps most commonly, when you do something you know is wrong. And for a while you can't help yourself because of it's magnetic pull; it's wrong, but it's so intoxicating and exhilarating that you can't stop. Like a junkie, you start to justify your action so you can keep going. Until one day you look in the mirror and realize you are grotesque.

I think a healthy fascination with all that is bad is what keeps us human. But it seems to me finding the balance between the grotesque and your own goodness is the most important thing. Because while I think we are hedonistic beings, I am also in love with one. And that is enough to keep the grotesque at bay.

Attack of the Ego Rapists

Last night I lost my phone at a club, I have an interview for an internship tomorrow, and I am in a BAD MOOD. The memories of $3 dollar Jager shots and lipsynching Britney to a faux-hawked gay across the bar are losing their charm as my hangover gains momentum and I get grumpier. MMmm whiney. Feels SO GOOD.

So in my current state of headache, communication-less, and irregular bowel movement, naturally I begin to ruminate on all the things that have pissed me off in the past week. I don't know what it is about being hungover that makes me just start to steeeamm. Like FUNK! WHY IS MY PILLOWCASE NOT ALIGNED WITH MY PILLOW or SHITBALLS I HATE UNCUT GRASS or MY TOMATOES ARE MUSHY GODDAMMIT However, this week something actually did happened in the basement of my campus's university center that merits more pissyness than mushy vegetables (although that is supremely annoying.) And yes, I am going to rehash it now, on my widely circulated blog.

Tuesday afternoon I was traipsing around where all our overpriced books are sold in mass quantity, hungover, and starting to sweat a bit because there isn't very good circulation down there. The books are stacked in neat but tiny isles in the basement of the the bookstore, and I always got apprehensive descending the stairs to that place (hell, ha get it). I guess it's because know you're about to drop hundreds of dollars, fighting your way through equally annoyed students to pick up a big ass book, only to probably crack that $107 excuse for an educational tool open twice during the quarter. Then when you attempt to sell it back, some bouffant blond with heavy eyeliner looks at you and says wickedly "We no longer use this edition." GROWL.

Anyway I was strolling the ENGLISH isle, and I ran into a classmate of mine whom I know vaguely because we have had quite a few classes together over the years. He is very...verbose. In class he...talks a lot. He is...annoying. He is the kind of manchild who comes up to you after a discussion section and mentions your lack of participation, and then recites what percentage "actively participating" is out of your total grade. Saying, "Damn girl, you were quiet today." IM QUIET EVERYDAY. ITS BECAUSE I USUALLY DON'T KNOW WHAT'S GOING ON.

As I walked past him to find my books, we made eye contact. I said hi weakly, and he looks at me with a mixture of recognition and disgust. Then homeboy crinkles his nose as if some foul odor had just drifted up from the graying carpet and says "I was wondering what that smell was."

And I say "what?"

And homeboy says "Are you wearing perfume?"

I sniff my shirt, confusedly.

He reiterates: "Your wearing perfume, are you not?"

I say "uhhh ye, uhh may uhh this morn-ummm"

Then he monologues. "I was wondering what that like powerdy smell was. I mean I'm walking past you and I was like Whoeew (waves hands in front of face as if he is batting away killer bees. My stench is like a killer bee) I mean how much of that stuff do you put on Wheeeeewwwee. You need to tone it down. I mean seriously, take it eassyyy."

I say "..."

What I SHOULD have said is Hey! Buddy! I am sorry my stench is an affront to your nostrils. But that was a rude thing to say, and as the old adage goes, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't spray it. Your hair bugs me. It looks like Jon Goesslin. Or an aged member of the tool academy. Do you know why i said ag-ed? BECAUSE YOUR HAIR IS THINNING.

But I didn't say that. My face just awkwardly crumpled into a pissed expression and I walked away mumbling to myself in the Geology isle pretending to look at Rocks and Mountains! (or whatever it is that they read, I am sure there are more sophisticated titles). Because I still needed my books, I wait fuming, until I heard his spiel on modernism (some innocent asian girl got sucked into conversation) drift up the stairs.

Then I went to the food court and furiously ate Panda Express sushi (don't, by the way) while thinking of all the snappy comebacks I could have retorted with. I have been in quite a few situations where people I don't or barely know confront me on something negative about myself that they think I should be privy to. Which is weird, but my reactions have progressed nicely. I used to cry, then I used to get mad and cry, now I just get mad, laugh, and then excited that have a funny story to tell people I love.

And after this last time, I am going to start writing a list of general yet hilarious comebacks and memorize them. It's my proverbial pepper spray; these potential ego-rapists won't know what hit them. Next time an old lady tells me I look like a slut, I'm going to say "Takes one to know one!"

...Maybe not that one.