Oh brother

I think that sums it up nicely.

While the thing about President Bush winning for villain and hero is interesting and all, that's not the part of this poll that gets my goat.

Here's what does: apparently people think that Britney and Paris are worse role models than Mel, and by a sizable margin.

Come again?

That's right. Heaven forbid our children DANCE and PARTY in their twenties! We'd much rather have them turn into curmudgeonly anti-semitic misogynists with an actual drinking problem.

And of course, this couldn't have anything AT ALL to do with the sexism and misogyny perpetuated by the likes of Joe Francis (see here and here for discussion of the disgusting manner in which these creeps prey on young women in order to maintain society's virgin/whore dichotomy by which women who express themselves sexually are deemed less than human and undeserving of basic human dignity). Nope, clearly it's because Britney and Paris are just worse people.

Um. Am I the only one who thinks God might be marginally more pissed about someone who hates His Chosen People than about someone who forgets her underwear?

Maybe that Al Gore fellow was onto something?*

This is freakin' crazy.

As you know, last week gave me the joy of choosing between a 17-hour road trip and a flight that wouldn't get me home until Christmas Day (and knowing my brother and sister, the presents would already be opened by then). I opted for the miserably long and expensive drive and made it in safely on Friday afternoon, in spite of some wicked crazy snow drifts/flood-caliber puddles at the C-470/I-25 junction in south Denver.

This morning, my flight made it back to Los Angeles on time and I got to work by a respectable 9:30 a.m., after taxiing to Subaru to pick up Rudolfo, who spent the week in the shop, and driving home to drop off my luggage and pick up my secretary's (now-belated) Christmas gift.

Text messages from Mom reveal that December Blizzard #2 started picking up almost as soon as I landed safely at LAX. Visits to CNN.com confirm that my home state is being wracked with, not one, but two debilitating snowstorms in the course of a single week.

In fact, this makes Blizzard #3 for the current snow season in Colorado. My sister tells me the first one kept her locked up in the house with the roommates for a day of college-level boozing the likes of which probably would have landed me, aged as I've become in the past 16 months, in the hospital.

Oiy. When I lived there we got maybe one bad storm, every three or four years or so.

Coming soon: Christmas photos, courtesy of my awesome new camera (thanks, Dad!).

* To avoid the inevitable negative political reaction: it's a rhetorical statement, something of a joke. I'm not actually making a political statement with this post.

Well dammit.

It's supposed to be a White Christmas, not a White Winter Solstice.

It appears I will be driving home tomorrow (in a one-way rental, which is extra money out of my pocket on top of the stupid $500 piece of shit flight that is now not taking off).

"Extremely upset" does not even begin to cover it. Add to my anguish the snottiest United rep I've ever had the misfortune of speaking with, informing me that no, I cannot get a refund for only the leg of my trip they've canceled (I have to cancel my flight back here, too), and you can imagine how my "vacation" is starting off.

In conclusion, United, I hope you have a shitty shitty Christmas and that Santa gives you smelly shit in your stocking.

Those of you who are the praying type, if you'd say a little prayer that I not crash and die on my cross-country journey, I'd really appreciate it.

Ciao!

Oh noes!!

Work has blocked myspace.

DAMMIT.

It's not like I bill that time or something!!!

Urgh

A friend's recent male-related troubles have given me pause and gotten me reflecting on my own recent issues.

Boy I Was Dating Last Year has recently started IMing me again. He did this once before but it quickly became apparent he was seeking sex, so I excused myself from the conversation and made it clear I had no interest in such advances. Recently he says he'd like to be friends, and he's not looking for anything more.

For some inexplicable reason, I want to try to be friends with him if I can. I don't really know why... looking back on our "relationship" I actually think I don't like him too very much anyway. He's vaguely sexist (as most men are -- no offense guys, but you just are. Those of you who at least try to work on it get minor kudos). He's lazy. He has a weird laugh. He's a little deluded/full of himself (which, in fairness, you kind of have to be if you're a struggling "actor"). And on more than one occasion while we were dating, he disrespected my religious beliefs. Frankly, I should have dumped him long before I did. But, I guess we all do stupid things when we're dating. I imagine my desire to be friends with him stems from the fact that it's a challenge. The closest I've come to being friends with an "ex" is being vaguely friendly with a guy I went on about two or three dates with in law school. So it very well could be that I just want to prove to myself that I Can Do It. But I can't help but begin to think that this guy might be the wrong one to attempt this with.

Anyway, I agreed that this weekend we could meet for coffee. He suggested watching the football game together (he remembered my favorite team... this worries me). I said no, we would stick with coffee.

I asked if he still had my number and he said he didn't. Another red flag... it means either he was hurt when we broke up (which leads to a complicated post-relationship-friendship), or he's lying (which is bad for obvious reasons).

The hattrick? As he was signing off of IM, he said "bye bye sugar pie." I quickly responded with a "???" and rather than answer, he signed off.

Ohhhh, this was not a good idea.

He called yesterday afternoon while I was in an exhausted stupor from throwing a party the night before and cleaning up afterwards, which is no simple task. I was awake enough to answer the phone, but I knew it was him and opted not to. He, quick on his feet, left a message saying he could no longer do coffee that day because he had suddenly gotten busy, but I should call him back if I wanted to meet up with him before I left for Christmas vacation.

All signs point to "don't speak to him again." I don't want to be a bitch, but... I don't want to be an idiot, either. It's obvious he doesn't want to be my friend. Frankly, I'm not sure if I want to be his, either. But I know I definitely don't want to be anything else to him.

Sigh... I really really wish girls weren't socialized to be so damn nice. If we weren't, this really would not be a difficult situation for me At All.

What are you doing New Year's Eve?

My last couple New Year's Eves have sucked.

Last year, I sat around at home and drank champagne alone. I was even dating someone at the time, but he was out of town. That's seriously about as lame as lame gets.

The year before, I went to an awesomely fantabulous party at the Drake Hotel in Chicago. I wore a fancy dress and looked like a movie star. I flirted and drank and danced and by all accounts appeared to have a great time... but I was absolutely miserable. At the time I was still hung up on McDreamy and, as I've said before, those McDreamys can Fuck You Up.

The year before that, I was in Atlanta with my then-boyfriend. I enjoyed it at the time but now it's tainted by the later-acquired knowledge that, by then, he was already considering breaking up with me.

Anyway, I want to finally have a cool New Year's Eve again. I'm leaning toward flying to San Francisco for a few days. I have a friend or two up there but I don't want to monopolize their time (you know, "hey, it's me! Drop all your plans and hang out with me!" Not cool). SO I'll open up the invitation to my blog friends: anyone interested in chilling with me in San Fran over New Year's Eve? If you're in the LA area, last I checked, Southwest had roundtrip tickets to Oakland for around $125.

Whaddya say? I'm a pretty cool person to hang out with, and I used to be a pretty good partier, back before I started working and got old...

Why...

Do I feel like I'm so very busy and so very stressed out when in fact, if anything, this week I've billed *less* hours than I usually do, and have been *way* less productive?

I bet it's because I'm working on a freaking legal memo. Legal memos are like my kryptonite. At least since my Evil Legal Writing instructor (she's somehow related to Satan) absolutely ruined any desire whatsoever that I ever may have had to do legal writing.

Seriously, this is like the first "serious" memo I've had to write since I started working here almost a year and a half ago... I've had a couple other formal memos but they've been... I dunno... less formal somehow?

I feel like I'm in legal writing class all over again. And I fucking HATED that class.

Gah

This will probably make me sound like a broken record, but this is still really bothering me.

Why won't people just take some damned responsibility for what they say? Look, Michael, if you say "it wasn't racist, I was just mad," you're making excuses. You're essentially saying, "look, what I did wasn't that bad."

It was that bad, Michael. And I hope that the men you insulted with your hate speech take you to task for it. Own the fuck up. Admit that what you did was wrong, that it means you have a problem, and for the love of God, start working on your problem.

I am so sick of people pretending that they're "apologizing" when their apology consists of saying "I wasn't really wrong, but I'm sorry you took it the wrong way." That's not an apology. That's another insult.