What a relief...
I don't know how I've made it this far without specific instructions on how to do this. Like "lather, rinse, repeat" on shampoo bottles and "do not drink" warning labels on dish detergent, this one's tailor-made for me. Now all I need is "Howtowipemyownass.com."

What, may I ask, would Erin do??
Besides the plethora and plethora-to-be of babies in my own family and social circle, I also get a kick out of celebrity baby birthdays (and baby names...Apple, anyone?). I've liked Julia since she played Daisy Arujo in Mystic Pizza. And her performance as Shelby in Steel Magnolias can still make me cry.

Yesterday Julia Roberts and her husband Danny Moder greeted their new twins - a girl and a boy - Hazel and Phinnaeus (they didn't consult me on name selection...).

If she ever gets worried about juggling kids and career...
.
...she can just channel Erin Brockovich, and new mommy will do just fine. I can even see her, at those stressful moments, thinking: "what would Erin do?"

Another year older...
Yay, me. Happy to have survived another year. Happy to have great friends. Happy that I'm fulfilled and childless and free and motivated and sane.

Confucius say:
Today is a lucky day for those who remain cheerful and optimistic.

Word.

LIST: Things I don’t know how to do
Today's list is brought to you by the letter "E" for "elitist," the letter "A" for Aleigh and the long "u" sound in Humility.

Fix cars. Despite the auto body class my asshole father made me take, I can’t fix a car.
Math. I’m really bad at it. That includes calculus, logic, and basic algebra. And balancing my checkbook.
Throw pottery. Nope, never learned how.
Save lives. I’ve never taken a CPR class.
Grow plants. While it seems like something you could do accidentally, I have what they call a “black thumb.”
Flirt. I am socially awkward and I never recognize when someone flirts with me. I’m not a giggly-eyelash-batting kind of girl, so flirting feels fake even when I try it on. And people laugh at me when I do.
Clean fish. Or shrimp.
Animal grooming. Gotta pay someone else for that one.

There are about 30 other things I don't know how to do, like navigating a boat and acting in porn movies, but for time's sake I'm only listing realistic skills.

Cats = baby substitute
On Sunday, for no reason whatsoever, I put on The Cure’s Show Me CD and danced all over the house in tank top and underwear, singing along at the top of my lungs. My only witness, the cat, was not amazed. Or amused.

This time of year, when I like the windows open when it’s cold out, she’s like a furry little Jame Gumb (Buffalo Bill) from Silence of the Lambs. I dance, I sing, I open cans, I throw little tinfoil balls across the room, and all I get for my efforts is a glare that says, “It puts the fire in the fireplace. It does this whenever it's told. Put the f*cking fire in the fireplace!" I think she’d poke me with a stick if she could.

A little Democratic revenge...
There's a great essay in Salon.com about how we (Democrats) can get back at "red America" for the election results with deviant sex, movies that threaten decency, and banned books. Go here to read it (you might have to watch an ad for a day pass if you're not a premium subscriber).

I'm off to do my part: I'll read my dog-eared copy of Slaughterhouse Five. Then I'll watch some movies that take me back to the good old days when Mel Gibson's ass didn't make me think of Jesus. And, finally, I'm adding "develop fetishes" and "act like a whore" on my To-Do List.

I love the 80s part deux...
Even though it makes me cringe to remember how high my hair once was, the smell of Aussie Sprunch Spray makes me feel nostalgic in a good way. It reminds me of a this long-haired guitar player I had a thing for when I was 15 who said my hair smelled like purple bubble gum (that sprunch spray did have a grape-y smell) right before he kissed me.

I think I still have my ripped up jeans that I used to wear with leopard spandex underneath. And the off-the-shoulder sweater. And the studded leather hip belt. I might just put it all on this weekend and roll around in the memories for a while.

Sigh.

I love the 80s...
Remember when you were in high school and you and your friends would recite the shit out of some Eddie Murphy Raw? Even though I've matured and prefer the humor of Eddie Izzard now, it still makes me laugh when I remember the dorky kid on the bus that memorized every single word and did his Eddie Murphy stand up routine every morning on the way to school.

Necessary frivolity...
Before my head explodes from all of the political drama of the past two days, I'll share my distractions:

Sex, or at least reading about it.
Shopping always helps, at least until I get the credit card bill.
A little culture never hurts.

And if you want to get really frivolous, you can read the last column I wrote for Skirt!, "Curl Interrupted," here. It's about my hair. Seriously.

Chins up, darlings.

A bitter pill...
For tens of millions of us, it is simply unconscionable that we could possibly be led for another four years by a small and spoiled little man who has very little real idea what he's doing and even less of how the hell he got there.
~Mark Morford, SFGate

My permit to bitch...
.

I was going to offer to "service" any male between 18 and 35 who voted for Kerry, but after I saw the line at the polls I decided it might be better if I just thanked them as a whole instead of doing it individually. Plus, it might make me a slut.

Let me tell you...
This movie is really freaking scary. I figured it would be fun to go see a horror flick with a friend on Halloween, and it was during the day and all, but Saw was gory enough at some parts to make me want to hurk up my popcorn. It's about a deranged, sadistic serial killer who abducts morally wayward people and forces them to play horrific games for their own survival.

You can see trailer and clips here, but be forewarned that it is icky.

Despite being scared, it was a good horror/thriller...way better than The Village, which I thought was sucktacularly predictible. Plus, MK let me dump the M&Ms into the popcorn.