Some events that occur showcase the nastiest little parts of our souls for us. A casual friend took the time to take me to task today. He was oh, so offended that I had dared mention his ex-girlfriend in the presence of his current one (whom he loves very much, so there). The nerve! Never mind that I was talking about the ex (dum, Dum, DUM) in a way that was unconnected to him. Never mind that Mr. and Miss Delicate Sensibilities had joined a conversation in progress. The horror of it all, sigh. How uncouth of me to blast them in the face with the knowledge that he had had -gasp- had sex, nay - relationship sex, before his current state of happy boinking-ness! Yes, just shameful.
Now, obviously I don't agree with him, but it did bring to my attention the fact that his sensibilities and experiences didn't even cross my mind. That is because I am possibly the most selfish girl on the planet. No, it's true. Oh, not because of this particular incident, it merely serves as an example. But, it did make me think back to similar situations where perhaps a little thought should have been put in to what I was saying and how it might affect other people. That is something I don't think about often enough because I am so often thinking about, you guessed it, ME! I adore being the center of attention; after all, I am certainly the star in my own life, why not cultivate more ravening, slobbering fans of ME? I have to laugh at myself; I always want everyone to love me best, I always want to be fawned over. On the other hand - if I don't like you, fuck off, and who cares what you think of me? Rawr! If you're in my circle of friends, though, you better get to worshiping. Silly, right? I don't love everyone equally (though I do love my friends to a ridiculous degree); I don't really think it's possible to unless you're a saint. Still, every time I hear of a party or phone call that I wasn't included in, a little growl of displeasure and wounded vanity wants to burst right out of my throat. Hell, I even check email lists to see what order everyone's names are placed in! Now, that's pathetic. I've made huge strides in the self esteem stakes since I first flew the nest of my parents' protection, but this one little niggle remains. Oh, I think I am naturally a little selfish, but this is the only area of my life where that proclivity takes over common sense. Perhaps because in years past I did not have enough grateful suppliants to honor me? I guess so.
Whatever the reason, the facts remain. I deserve adoration, people! Come here and give it to me. Right. Now.
A friend here on island (and one of my very small circle of readers, thanks TCWH) asked for the story of my nickname, so here it is.
Last spring two girls came into my life. They were visiting another girl whom I was friends with at the time, but it was with these two girls I ended up forming a lasting friendship (love you, my Island Magic girls). These two, we'll call them the Cock Gobbler and Sweet Boobies (CG and SB for short), are compltely off their rockers; just like me.
One fine night during their visit we decided to go to the bar. Fancy that; very unusual for us! As we imbibed our sweet, sweet libations, it came to our attention that a friend, Darth, was drinking more than his fair share. He was hammered: three sheets to the wind wasted. All night long he would find me and drag me out onto the dance floor too bump and grind with him. As the night went on this happend with increasing frequency and force. Hey, a girl's gotta rest sometimes, right? Apparently not. At the end of the night, he even followed us to The Mikes' (our favorite after after-hours spot). The dragging, bumping and grinding continued there after some chugging of the vodka. When I commmented on how much he must be enjoying this, my (at the time, we also had been drinking quite a bit) witty comment raised crys of, "You're so right. You're a genius! You're - Amber Einstein!" Followed by, "No, she's Amberstein!" Thus, Amberstein I became. And it's just so hard being a genius. ;P
Fast forward to a couple nights later. We were drinking again (no, surely not!), and once again had decided to continue with our activities after the bar closed down. This night we decided a swim at the Adult Pool was in order. So, we rounded up the usual group of malcontents and headed over to the pool a block away. CG had prudently stopped at home to change into a suit, as had SB, less prudently, into a leopard print bikini. More and more people were showing up as we splashed and drank merrily. One creepy Aussie sidled up to SB and was putting the moves on her. CG and I neglected to notice this as we were both drunk and also involved in olging some boys at the other end of the pool (mmm, boys). When I turned around, though, SB's eyes were telegraphing the "help me, you fucker" look at me very clearly. Immediately CG and I sprang into action. CG pulled her away from creepy Aussie while I hit him in the head with one of the foam pool noodles shouting, "Get off of her! GET OFF! If you don't get off of her right now I am going to hit you with this noodle until you die from it!" Whap, whap, whap. Whap. As he splashed away with his, ahem, tail bewteen his legs we burst into hysterical laughter. SB chokingly said, "We should call you Noodlestein! A genius and a rescuer." CG added, "Yeah, and when we need her help we'll just shout 'Noodlestein' three times, and she'll appear. Don't fuck with the Noodlestein." Yeaaaahh, boyyee. Don't fuck with the Noodlestein - I'll make you regret it!
CG, I will always come for you. SB, I will never, ever let a creepy Aussie try to use your bikini as a condom. I promise.
This weekend was surpassingly awesome.
Got all gussied up (and drunked up) on Saturday for our company's Christmas party. It was a hilarious time involving many shots and jokes. The funniness of the jokes increased in direct proportion to the number of shots we had consumed. In fact, my friend E was so drunk that he didn't even hear his name called to get one of the door prizes that they were giving away! Ah, well, another opportunity lost to the demon liquor.
The next day was boat day. I never feel so lucky to live out here as I do when I'm on a boat tooling up the atoll. I will never be jaded about how beautiful the water is here, I will never be tired of shell hunting, finding turtle nests, snorkeling and swimming. Those are things that renew their value each and every time we step foot off this tiny island. I also feel blessed to have friends to do that with; who share their possesions; who will lock arms with me so that my short butt doesn't fly right out of the boat (incidentally, the water was mad rough - we would travel up one side of the wave and - KASPLOOSH - crash down on the other side; it was exuasting); who laugh with me, and only occasionally (when I deserve it) at me; who always listen to me - no matter how much I chatter-chatter chatterbox.
Anyways, that night I continued my flirtation with said demon liquor when I attended a small holiday party at my friends' house; who are otherwise known as my heros - the coolest couple/parents on the planet. I totally want to grow up to be D&D. They're smart enough to keep their own identities instead of sinking all their self worth into their kids. Pure genius. My admiration was only increased when I found out they own the sweetest game ever - "Catchphrase." It's akin to that show Pyramid, but much more hilarious in application, especially when you add Goldshlager. So, when someone yells, "Speeching!" as an answer, you don't wonder why it's so funny; you just laugh until you can't breathe.
But really? Really? The best part of the whole weekend came yesterday. That was the day that I was the happiest girl in the whole world. The Eagles beat the Giants, and almost made Jeremy Shockey cry into the bargain. Nothing could give me more pleasure than that; except the Eagles winning the Superbowl. It's pretty close, though. Unlike most Eagles fans I do not posses a burning hatred of the Cowboys, although their frequent smugness can get annoying. No, my most virulent hatred is saved solely for those who wear that ugly smurf blue uniform; the NY Giants. Solidified in college, this hatred burns in my gut like that of a Red Sox fan in Yankee Stadium. Despite the ups and downs of the game, the Eagles played well, forced turnovers, and came out convincingly on top. To say that I was tense during the game would have been an understatement; if I'd been holding a lump of coal (from Santa - 'cause I'm naughty) I could have squeezed it into a diamond by the end of the first half. That was probably why I made so much noise at the end of the game; I was shrieking and screeching like a loon so loudly that my next door neighbor actually came over to see what the comotion was. Yes, it was just me - insaniac and current happiest girl in the world. It was the best, best day, espcially when I saw Darth the Giants fan slinking away from me at the post office. I'd slink away, too, if my team had just lost ugly to their biggest division rivals. If the Eagles win out this season they clinch the division. Cowboys this Monday and then the Falcons, amen. It will be tough, but to even have a shot at this postseason is like a dose of pure adrenaline to the fans as well as the team. It must be my lucky hat working its magic. GO BIRDS!
Yeah, this whole diet thing? The thing with the eating of less calories? It totally works. Nine pounds and counting.
Here, in no particular order, are some things that I've noticed about myself and my reaction to others. Most of them are not so nice; as the Fug Girls have been accused, my "shriveled heart must be made of tar." Seriously? Mostly I'm just crazy.
I'm terrified of seventeen year-old girls who are actually self assured. Where did these freaks of nature come from? Don't they know that your teenage years are supposed to be full of anguished torment? Don't they know that your self esteem is required to be at rock bottom? Somebody should clue them in. Weirdos.
I'm a huge grammar nerd. It's so bad that I go back and correct peoples' emails to me while in the middle of our messaging. It's not to teach them a lesson (notice I said "nerd," not "nazi"). I know that they'll not even see it. No, it's simply that I cannot exist in a world where poor grammar exists without fixing it. It must be fixed, it must be fixed! Whew, sorry about that little outburst.
I would use exclamation points for every sentence if my grammar nerdiness didn't stop me! And, when possible - I would use multiple exclamation points (and parentheses - I love parentheses)!!!!!!!
I hate my friend B's sunglasses. Don't get me wrong - he's totally fuckin' cool, but those sunglasses have got to go. They're crooked! Very crooked. Every time he puts those wretched things on his face I want to whip them off and stomp on them until they've been ground to a powder. I want to scream, "They're crooked!! How can you not notice how crooked they are?!? Doesn't it bother you that they're crooked?" Those sunglasses will break my sanity one day.
I really believe that I'm the Carrie of my Jersey/Philly girls (Tri Betas, woot). The hubris, right? Everyone wants to be the Carrie.
When I saw a piece on the news about those climbers that are missing in Oregon I thought two things. One: rescue climber dude speaking about said lost climber dudes is from Corvalis! My friend Mac's from Corvalis, cool! Two: rescue climber dude is hot! I should totally go visit her if she has men like that running around in her town. Yum. Worry for the lost climber dudes never even entered my head. Blame it on the fact that I obviously really need to get laid.
I am surrounded by really athletic people. There has never been such a high concentration of genetic freaks in such a small area in the history of the world. In just my circle of friends there are five college atheletes. Five! Irritating doesn't begin to cover it; I feel like a retarded kid at the regular Olympics by mistake. They need to stop being all perfect at sports and stuff. You're scaring the normals, people.
I believe what my Magic 8ball tells me. Seriously - that shit works.
I hate cheerful people. Not happy people (I'm rather happy myself, so...), but cheerful ones. The kind that exchange sickeningly sweet salutations with each other. For example, Cheertard #1: "How are you on this fine day? (smiling very hard and looking at other person earnestly)" Cheertard #2: "Well, if it got any better I'd be suspicious, har, har, har!" You need to be suspicious of the fact that next time you accost me with your treacle-y greeting I'm going to scream, "SHUT UP, FUCKHEAD!" at you so loudly that it will burn all the hair offa yo' face.
I cannot seem to write nicely on occasions that demand it. I always fuck it up. Seriously, did I need to misspell "happy" in my friend's wedding book? No. At anyother time I'll write you a friggin' sonnet in perfect caligraphy, but for Christmas cards? Wedding registers? Thank you notes? Chicken motherfucking scratch. Sigh.
I curse - A LOT. Blame it on being from Jersey, blame it on teenage rebellion, whatever. I have a dirty, dirty potty mouth and don't ever plan to change. Deal with it, future children.
There you have it. Me in all my glory. Bow down (pitifully small amount of) readers, bow down.
As I've established here before, we ride bikes on this island instead of driving cars. Normally that is a great thing; when every single one of your friends are hammered beyond belief you don't have to ponder how you will get home from the bar without either harming yourselves or someone else. That is only the most important reason to love riding bikes. Hmm, side note: it is truly a commentary on my life that the most important reason for anything has to do with drinking heavily. Whether it is a sad commentary or pure awesome is something that's still up in the air. Anyways, generally, riding bikes rules.
There are some times, though, like this morning, that riding bikes for transportation really, really sucks monkey balls. Whatever force in the universe controls rain, that force really has it out for the wage slaves that reside here on Kwaj. It is maniacally effective at dumping oodles of rain down from the heavens just as I need to be getting to or from work. And, people, when it rains in the tropics - IT RAINS. This contrariness is further complicated by the fact that I am the most woefully unprepared girl to live on an island ever. Raincoats, panchos, rain pants? Ha, those silly plastic items of sweat inducing plasticness! I have no time for those!
As I watched my ever so prepared roomate trundle off to work in her lovely and effective rain suit, it occured to me that it is time to get things straight with The Force That Controls The Rain. That way I won't ever have to buy plastic-y rain repellers.
Maliganant Force, why must you plaster my hair to my head with buckets of rain when I am halfway to work and have nowhere to hide? Maliganant Force, I know that you can be ever so obliging; making it rain all night and beam sunniness all humid day long. Can you do that more often? I will do anything to avoid the torture dealt out this morning, and so many mornings lately; having your capris slowly weld themselves to your thighs as you ride a four spped bike to work is a singularly unpleasasnt feeling. That unpleasntness is only surpassed by the vileness of having the 99 cent pancho that I pulled out of my ass (with shrieks of, "aha, I knew I had one of thse things left - woo hoo") this morning wrap its sticky, damp plasticness around my face as the wind changed direction. When I spit out the hood I think I mead a sound like, "Pluuh! Yuck!!!" I also might have screamed at the sky, "Why does it fucking have to rain now? Right now? Knock it off, rain!"
So, Maliganant Force, what do I have to do? If it will help, I will hop around my trailer on one foot, touching my nose and singing Mary Had a Little Lamb. I will do anything! Oh, except stop boozing it up on the weekends. Oh, and also I won't stop hitting the snooze button. And, too, if you could refrain from asking me to give up avacados, that would be great, too. But really, anything you want - just don't make it rain when I have to bike to flipping work!
I know one thing; I will never again complain about running to my car from my house when it's raining. Sheesh.
UPDATE 12/13: Yesterday I got rained on three times going to and from places on my bike - three times!!! I must have angered the rain gods, and lo, they are very pissed off. Oh, yes.
One of the few paltry amusements that we occupy ourselves with on-island is a bimonthly descent into utter drunkenness and frustration that we all call "bingo." I say frustration because in countless attended sessions I have yet to wrest one red cent from the sullen bingo gods - not one. That aside, it's rather a fun way to pass an evening with friends, and my other loyal companion - booze. Last night's round of bingo followed much the same pattern with the fervent shushing from the oh, so serious bingo players (everyone else), and laughter from the bingo players there to actually have a good time (us).
Only two happenings kept this from being a hum-drum night. First, my roomate managed to win round seven of the game by copious wild numbers residing on her card and a lucky first call. Brat. This is the second time I've taken the ungrateful chit and she has won money both times - both times!! How utterly annoying. To console me she bought me several drinks, so I forgave her with shameful alacrity. Hey, no annoyance shall stand between me and my vodka. Be warned.
Second, I made the somewhat collasal mistake of not going straight home from bingo. Thinking only of more drinks and convivial happenings I followed two of my friends home to their place for some wine. One of my friends, we'll call him "Chameleon," flabbergasted me totally. After a few more drinks and ciggys, he caught me alone in the kitchen and proceeded to straight up ask me if I would hook up with him. No subtle arm touches, no leaning in for a kiss - just down and dirty, blunt propositioning me. !!! My intelligent response sounded something like this: "Whu, uhh, gark, plu. Well, hmm, I, well, I..." After he (understandably) prodded me for an intelligible response I promptly made things much worse by telling him to ask me again in a few drinks! A few more drinks! How flattering for him, no? That is exactly like saying, "Well, I don't find you at all attractive, but get me shithouse hammered and you might stand a chance, loser." Gracefully handled and tactful of me, wasn't it? Poor guy - he gets up the courage to ask me to fool around and I promptly crush him under my bootheel. I'm sorry, Chameleon, I truly, really didn't mean it like that. I was just so surprised that you boldly asked the way you did that I needed to catch up with what was happening. Honestly, Chameleon, you are a fine fellow; just a little lacking in the smooth moves I apparently need to tell myself that it's okay to get buck wild.
As I stumbled homewards I knew one thing was for sure; I would never again ignore a friend when they asked, "Don't you think you should go home now?" Yes...yes, I should go home. Now.
I haven't mentioned it here yet, but I am a huge Philadelphia Eagles fan. Huge. It is impossible to explain the magnitude of my obsession, but if you've ever met another Eagles fan, you'll know what I mean. We're all nuts. That being said, I was so looking forward to Monday night football last night. Our one bar here on island shows a tape delayed version of the game (as we are eight hours ahead of Philly); it's usually a total blast. Problems do exist, however. On Kwaj there is a constant danger of finding out the score of the game (thank you Internet, grr) before you watch it. I react to this danger by acting like a lunatic on game-day. My usual conversations go like this:
Sane Friend: Are you going to watch the game tonight?
Me: (screaming in panic) Yes, but I don't know the score yet!!!!!
Sane Friend: Well, it....
Me: (fingers in ears) Shut up, shut up, I don't want to know!!! La, la, la, la, la - are you done talking yet?
Sane Friend: I was just going to say what a great game it was, that's all. Sheesh.
Me: I don't care, I don't want to know anything! We need to talk about something else. You're making me nervous!
Sane Friend: O-kaaaaay.
So, as you can see, I work very hard at keeping all knowledge of the game far, far away from my ears. This time, I thought that I had succeeded admirably. Right when I was merrily pulling out of my yard on the way to the bar, though, I was viciously ambushed by a jolly Hawaiian pulling out of his yard at the same time. As I innocently greeted him, he leapt across the gap between our two bikes and tackled me, squashing me into the asphalt. While bouncing my head off the pavement he roared out the score with no remorse, sucking every spark of life and excitement out of the game for me, and incidentally giving me a wicked headache in the bargain. Now, obviously that's a little exaggerated - but that's what it felt like at the time - it was that traumatic. I mean, a Hawaiian! They're so frickin' laid back, who even knew they were into bloodsports such as my beloved football? I sure didn't; I was completely gobsmacked. I know he didn't mean to ruin my night, but it's the inconsideration, the thoughtlessness of it all that gets to me. Next time, you can be sure that I will be packing a verbal bazooka to gun down any possible spoilers before they ruin my good time. Damn it!
It's been a while since I composed an entry here, in fact, my main activity on this site has been looking back at my previous entries and chortling with glee at my surpassing cleverness. Heh. Anyway, there are reasons for this absence, the main one being that I can't seem to do anything lately but whine and whine about my situation. Not only do I really hate whiny bloggers (and whiny people on general, actually), but being overweight is not as bad a hundred other things that I can think of. Last night I wandered down to the beach to absorb some moonlight, and it occurred to me how truly lucky I really am. I live in a place of surpassing gorgeousness, for one. Where else in the world, I wonder, could I have ridden less than five minutes to a beach and laid alone under palm trees and a full moon? Not many, I'd wager. I'm also lucky enough to count some really lovely, funny people among my friends, both here and in the States. Not only that, but I am, thank heavens, in possesion of a decent brain and the sense of humor that goes with it.
But, but... This whole weight thing really does consume most of my waking thoughts. The whys, temptations and logistical clothing challenges of my body shape continually force me to realize that I have a problem. The worst part of the whole thing is that I can't seem to fix it. Knowing that I shouldn't eat this or that doesn't stop me from cramming it in my mouth, my greed accompanied by disgust at myself for my weakness. I am so utterly wearied of thinking about what clothes actually look decent enough to wear in public, thinking about what meal I can eat to finally start my diet properly, thinking about it all. I'M SICK OF IT! I wish that I could either find the determination to stick to a regimen, or stop caing about my weight and live in happy corpulence. Well, I guess I don't want to be happy being fat, but I do wish that I could get it together already. I can't help feeling that I'm hurtling towards a diet crisis of epic proportions. I only hope that after the explosion I will be left with the determination required to better myself.
What a rainy, bleak, blank day it is today. I'm left feeling a little let down after the holiday weekend. My friends and I planned so carefully for our Halloween celebration, but when it happened it turned out to be just an ordinary night at the club. No, worse than ordinary - it was crowded and boring. That seems to be happening to me more and more lately. I look forward to the weekend all week, and end up feeling flat and unhappy at the end of it. I know what's troubling me, I suppose. I'm single. Funnily enough, most of the time I love being single. You're gloriously free, with nobody to consult with before you make plans, no need to check in. It also means, though, that you don't have anyone to come home to at the end of the day.
The funny thing is; I don't even know if I would take an opportunity to get someone if one presented itself suddenly. Besides loosing the whole freedom thing I would actually have to - gasp - get naked for him. Once again, ordinarily not a problem. Hey, what can I say, I'm a healthy girl - with all that entails. But, I've gained some weight, and I hate the way I look. My clothes are a little tight, and I don't feel comfortable in my own skin. I just don't think sex would be all that fun if I were wondering how my butt looked the whole time. And I would. So, I should fix it, right? Right. I've started about a billion diets in the last couple of months (or it feels that way, anyways), but I can't stick to it. I know I can loose weight, I've done it before, but I just can't seem to get a handle on why I'm having so much trouble getting it together this time. Any little breath of temptation just veers me wildly off course. I'm tired of it. I'm tired of feeling inferior to more slender girls. I'm tired of being upset half the time. I'm tired of being single. Hell, most of all, I'm tired of being fat. And I just wish that my diet fairy would come down and bless me with the werewithal to actually stick to my frickin' diet and finally become all that I am, could be, should be...
