there’s a hole in the ozone above where i do my hair

so now that it’s may in baltimore, two things are certain:

1) i will be sweating until early to mid october. possibly til halloween, depending on weather patterns.

2) my hair is now huge, only to get huger, unless i press no less than 400-425 degrees of searing heat directly against it, taking down baltimore’s power grid in the process and creating a hole in the ozone directly above our house.

this is compounded by the fact that i’ve started to go to the gym again, to “lose weight for the summer,” (LOL) seeing how it’s may 15th and i like to plan in advance and all. 10 minutes on the damn stairmaster this morning and my DIY blowout is shot to hell. totally going to have to do it again now. totally going to get carpal tunnel, which, whatever. you know i’m going to get it anyway because i’m a writer. might as well have nice hair while i’m sitting here in my home office where no one can see me (except holly, who somehow loves me no matter what my hair looks like, even on exceptionally large hair days that make her eyes wide with alarm as she whispers babe, your hair is really big today. bless her).

in other news: holly’s semester’s almost over and OMG THANK GOODNESS I’M SO HUNGRY I’VE BEEN HUNGRY SINCE THE FALL OMG BABY PLEASE START COOKING FOR ME AGAIIIIIN. no but seriously: this year’s been an emotional roller coaster! now i see why getting your mba is such a friggin big deal. it’s hard. it’s hard on spouses, too!

it’s like holly’s school stress travels into me through osmosis or something. i’m not taking econ BUT I FEEL LIKE I’M TAKING ECON. please! i don’t want to know about econ! like all good journalists/ex-journalists/copywriters, i pride myself in becoming an expert in confusing fields completely foreign/uninteresting to me, writing an article or website about said field(s), then promptly forgetting everything like it never even happened. don’t tell me about your econ class, holly, unless i’m writing web content/email marketing copy/a script/etc. on the life of an mba grad student with a partner who’s needed a home-cooked meal since august. (trust me, you don’t want me to write that.)

no. i’ve been cooking. i cook sometimes! i’m actually a pretty decent cook. i’ve made butternut squash puree, like from an actual butternut squash. (holly had to cut it down the middle for me because i’m scared of knives and, you know, blood.) i excel at grilling chicken. oh one time i made like…a chicken piccata-type thing! you know, with capers? i also excel at roasting any and all vegetables. i’ve made some vegetarian soups featuring trendy greens like kale and chick peas (the humble chick pea: always on trend, never out of style). i made a beef stew with red wine in it. (fancy!) i made my old friend diane‘s excellent sweet & sour gummy gelatin snacks because we’re hippies now and don’t eat anything artificial and everything in our cupboards is some kind of dried thing or seed sealed in an airtight container.

i started each semester out strong saying to holly i got you, babe! i’ll do the cooking! but then quickly petered out after three days, telling her on her way out the door to please go to starbucks during your break, honey, and get a latte and some kind of egg sandwich for dinner while i ate low glycemic foods such as green apples and various tree nuts at my desk. then i’d work on my e-book for five minutes, go downstairs and binge watch gay man shows like will & grace and the golden girls, spitting out pumpkin seeds as i laughed, thinking oh i should go do the dishes now but i probably won’t! oh that karen walker! oh blanche! oh sophia! i think i need an organic cheese stick! …but there was no one to get it for me because holly was in class. and then i’d feel sad i didn’t try harder to cook for my spouse. but then millionaire matchmaker was on and…what was i talking about again?

still. i would give up the chance to binge watch my favorite reruns for some home cookin that i don’t have to actually cook.

in conclusion, i started out talking about my hair and i have no idea how i got onto this topic. anyway, here’s a picture of the hole in the ozone above our house, three hours before i shut down the power grid.

psych! it’s totally not. but wait: is that even real?? see, this is what happens when you google images. i have no idea if this is even legit. but it’s scary.

ok let’s stop talking about it now.

in conclusion (i love it when i try to “conclude” my blog posts). IN CONCLUSION: i have no conclusion. i was going to say something about hair to wrap up this post, but instead i’m going to tell you that while i was writing this (i wrote the majority of this post yesterday, about half of it alone in the house), the tv kept going on and off downstairs. it was really freaking me the hell out. i should have gone downstairs to investigate it, but there was a small part of me that thought it might be a poltergeist. (and we all know how well i handle spooky poltergeist movies.) i was trying to convince myself that some weird thing was going on with some kind of recording holly had set up but yeah, mostly i was thinking poltergeist.

i finally decided enough was enough, that i’d confront this invisible beast once and for all. i kind of expected to be sucked into the tv like that little girl in the movie (MOMMY HELP I’M STUCK IN THE TEEVEE! MOMMY MOMMY HELP! *shudder*). instead i found a box sitting on top of the on/off switch of the remote. i was flooded with the sweet nectar of relief one only feels after a close encounter with another dimension. (very few people have ever felt this.) i’m really glad this story had a happy ending or else holly would be really busy right now trying to get me out of our damn tv.

COULD HAVE BEEN ME. WASN’T. ANOTHER CLOSE CALL.

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we watched “poltergeist” the other day. that was a mistake.

IT’S NOT CLEAN! IT’S NOT. CLEAN!!!!

you can add this to my list of recent bad decisions, including but not limited to after-lunch hula hooping (i hiccupped every five minutes for about, oh, five hours) and other things of which i am purposely forgetting at the moment which may or may not include getting into a fight with the sushi guy at whole foods.

if you’ve read this blog even one time before, you’d probably guess that i’m not emotionally or physically hearty enough to watch horror movies. i watched jennifer’s body like three years ago for one damn kiss scene but i nearly collapsed from fright in the process. was it worth it? maybe. no.

seven years living in this city has given me some sort of post-traumatic stress disorder–except for the trauma isn’t actually over, it’s ongoing–in that blocks and blocks of boarded-up houses and you know, zombie heroin addicts don’t freak me out, but if i see a shadow in my own house i freak the f*ck out. or  a friggin firework goes off a few blocks over, i think it’s actually a gun and shout HIT THE DECK to holly, who’s sitting calmly on the couch looking at me, smiling as if to say oh baby, i love you. but could you please calm down a little bit maybe sometime? 

i was feeling particularly curious (never a good thing with me) a couple weekends ago. holly was flipping through our endless comcast cable guide and i saw poltergeist was listed.

oh poltergeist! i said, half-kidding. let’s watch that!  and you know what? she turned it on.

watching it was a mistake. i knew it would be a mistake the moment we turned it on and yet…we watched it anyway. even though the “special effects” were 80s and therefore sub-par, it still shook me to the core.

DON’T LAUGH I HAVE A VERY SENSITIVE SYSTEM. PLUS THIS WAS A VERY SCARY MOVIE BACK IN 1982.

shortly afterwards i heard a kid yelling outside (there are a ton of kids where we live) and i was like sh*t! is she stuck inside the tv? WHAT IF THAT IS ACTUALLY NOT A KID OUTSIDE BUT A KID STUCK IN OUR TELEVISION.

i managed to calm down but then i kept thinking about that weird little old lady. the ghost-fighting lady? the one they call in for help when they’re desperate to get the little girl back and rid the house of ghosts? i kept thinking of how she looked and her voice and her huge glasses and the things she said and i was like shit! that was really freaky! she was really freaky! also: why did she say the house was “clean” when it clearly wasn’t?!! if she knows everything there is to know about ghosts wouldn’t she, like, know? that the house wasn’t clean like she said it was? that freaked me out for some reason.

then when it was quiet in the house (our house) i started thinking about all those decayed old bodies, you know, the skeletons? with the hair still on their skulls? popping up in the rain…when the mom’s stuck in that huge hole with all the water in it? while her kids are upstairs, like, being attacked by that big ghost and it’s trying to suck them into the other side? and coffins keep popping up from the ground? and they swing open and bodies fall out?

and the DAMN CLOWN. that damn clown toy in the kids’ room! that is burned into my brain now. i need brain bleach! do they make that??

i also thought about the weird red jello-type stuff that was stuck to the mom and the little girl when they fell through the ceiling. what was that anyway? ew!

and THEN, then i kept hearing the dad shout at the evil boss:

YA MOVED THE HEADSTONES BUT YA DIDN’T MOVE THE BODIES! WHY? WHHHHHYYYYYY?

after it was over, i had to sun myself outside for 15 minutes, which, as you may know, is the minimum amount of sun needed for your body to produce mood-enhancing vitamin D.

i have no memory of the rest of the day because i blacked out. but i’ll tell you what helped me a couple weeks later:

watching st. elmo’s fire. which i had never seen before. it’s a pretty good movie! here are some reasons why:

1. a young rob lowe.

look at that bone structure! gorgeous!

2. a young rob lowe playing the sax!

hey now!

some good 80s sax really calms the soul. and when i say calms the soul, i  actually mean makes you stop thinking about that weird red poltergeist jello sh*t.

3. a young demi moore. again: the bone structure.
4. a young demi moore smoking at her desk. i know, right?! the 80s were crazy!

what’cha workin on there demi?! looks important!

5. the nerdy girl GETS THE GUY!

YOU GO GIRL.

6. i googled where it was filmed while i was watching and some of it was filmed at my alma mater, university of maryland, college park. HOLLA CLASS OF 2000! SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM WHAT WHAT. look at me now! i blog in lowercase! WHAT!

7. the theme song. hello. that’s some good instrumental sh*t! if that can’t make you forget about the damn red poltergeist jello, the clown, and the little girl in the tv, i don’t know what can.

thanks for the memories, guys! i’ll never forget you. if i had your yearbooks, i’d write, “never change!” in each one of them. except you, demi: you need to stop smoking. and the cocaine. thanks for that sweet sax, billy. rock on, nerdy girl. if you wanna be a social worker, you go ahead and be a social worker. your dad will get used to it.
always ‘n foreva, jessica

i’ll be eating grilled cheese for breakfast, lunch & dinner from now til october

except for breakfast it’ll have an egg in it with only one slice of cheese (see: egg & cheese sandwich). this is because holly’s away in western pee-ay mon-thurs from now til the end of september taking care of her gram, who just had hip surgery.

what i’ve come to see is that, when holly leaves and i’m left to my own devices, i promptly forget we have an oven and thusly only cook things a) on the stove b) in a frying pan with c) melted butter. and if i’m not cooking with melted butter, it means i’m making a quesadilla. before you turn up your noses please note that i add spinach which makes it healthy.

it’s not that i can’t cook, it’s that i’m spoiled and now lazy. you see: i married a fabulous cook. no no, i married a fabulous gourmet cook.

i mean, she’s so damn fancy these days she can’t even make a freakin tuna sandwich without making it a spanish tuna melt with smoked spanish pap-freakin-rika, garlic powder and who knows what else. then she goes and adds manchego cheese, made from sheep’s milk from organic sheep living in the spanish alps. (hah. just totally made that up. also there are no spanish alps but you knew that right? of course you did!)

here’s what i bought at the store today:

hot dogs
fries
american cheese
two frozen dinners
an amy’s pizza (mushroom & olive)
smoothies
english muffins
milk (yes milk)
eggs (yes eggs. see: egg & cheese sandwich)

i didn’t buy peanut butter because we already have some here. same goes for butter.

yes, folks, i am really living the life. i am also sleeping with my diva defense (“pepper spray with style!”) next to my pillow. see below.

as i always say, if the pepper spray doesn’t blind you, the bedazzling jewel will! i have the one in green leopard print w/the lime-green gemstone, however i think it might be discontinued.

i’m also sleeping with a police baton from holly’s days with the military police in the navy next to the bed and i will bash your skull in after i blind you with my gemstone.

i’m also blasting madonna day and night because holly’s not here to say BABE MADONNA AGAIN?! (to which i always reply: YES BABE MADONNA *AGAIN*) also i’m going to do my nails with these, which my mom happily purchased for me with her $10,000 worth of “cvs bucks” while i visited my parents in philly a couple weeks ago.

not my hand or nails. some random person’s hand from the internet.

when i showed my new fabulous sally hansen salon effects nail strips in yes, houndstooth (see above), to holly at her parents’ house last week she promptly rolled her eyes and told me she “didn’t want to date a teenybopper.” to which i promptly replied that “we’re not dating, we’re married. and i don’t want to be married to someone that doesn’t like me to have fun with my nails and get over yourself, have a sense of humor and you don’t know anything about fashion or style and etc.”

then she told me to move my morroccan oil because it was blocking the tv. then i told her i was going to blog about all of this, which, true to my word, i am now.

if she says anything about my houndstooth nail strips again i will divorce her ass in multiple states. then blind her with my gemstone.

except for i won’t because dammit i miss her already and she’s only been gone since sunday! (sniff)

now i’m actually getting a little emotional, tho it might be because i’m listening to roxette’s epic ballad “it must’ve been love,” as featured in the 80s hit movie pretty woman. (oh shuddup, you know you totally got emotional when she leaves and richard gere goes after her.)

anyway, if any of you want to cook for me, please, be my guest. or if you want to do your nails with me. or take me to the store because holly has the car. otherwise you will find me here, at our house, eating grilled cheese at approximately 11:30am (lunchtime, duh) and 6-ish. sometimes alternating with quesadillas. and eggs, if it’s breakfast.

xox
jessica

part one: my big fat jersey high school reunion

i invented post-its, bee-otch!

ok so i posted a million years ago that we were about to embark on weddingpalooza 2011 (three weddings! three states! one day! click here for background) and now that we’re back in town, post-honeymoon, post-holiday, i’m ready to break it down for you, despite the fact that i’m tempted to divorce holly’s ass in multiple states for many reasons including but not limited to:

1. her inability to throw used tissues from her side of the bed into the trash when she has a cold–which she does now, which she continues to remind me of by saying, “baaaaabe. i’m sick. make me tea.”

2. the fact that she continues to butt-dial every single contact in her phone, since she refuses to carry it anywhere but her pocket, like a five-year-old. or my purse. and hello, i don’t want to carry her phone all the time, esp bc it’s always dinging with email notifications from kohl’s, bed, bath & beyond, bath & body works, every single deal-of-the-day and who the hell knows what else bc she signs up for everything while i’m grumpy and sign up for nothing and mark everything as spam.

anyway, there were many stops and much adventure on our wedding blitz. in the interest of time, space & procrastination (yours, not mine; i’ve heard from more than a few of you that lunch at 11:30 is a top workday procrastination station and you know i live to make you happy) i’ll be breaking it down into a few parts, starting with:

1. my high school reunion, i.e. we’re gonna party like it’s 1996.

saturday, november 12th, late afternoon

my high school reunion is in a few hours. while copywriting is a perfectly respectable career, i’ve decided i’m telling everyone i invented post-its.

when we get to the hotel in Livingston, NJ (hometown of my longtime fave chelsea handler WHADDUP CHELSEA! love ya! call me!), the lobby looks like a wanna-be jersey housewives convention. it’s noisy, crowded and smells like a variety of overbearing perfumes–like the mall. or a synagogue function. or perfumania. i wonder what the commotion is all about. is there a hairspray-and-mousse giveaway? eyeliner rally?

holly joins me in the check-in line and i discreetly point out a couple women in leather pants and hooker heels pushing baby carriages. i assure her that yes, this  really is where i come from. this is the land, these are the people, that nurtured my first 17 years on earth. so, really, the daily jeggings, frosty lipstick and occasional chico’s holiday sweater isn’t all that bad considering what i was up against.

a couple hours later we come back to the lobby area for the reunion. luckily the mascara convention is over, and i suddenly see a bunch of people that i think i recognize that i think recognize me. thanks to facebook, i get some names right. this one nice girl, i don’t even know how i remember her name. when i get it right, i feel an immediate sense of pride. i see her again later and get her name wrong bc it’s not actually her, it’s her identical twin. shit! twins! i think.

we walk into Ballroom B or whatever, and it’s pretty fancy. candles, centerpieces, real silver. the whole nine yards. we immediately realize we’re severely underdressed since we’re in jeans & sweaters while all the girls are pretty much in, uh, gowns.

“did we miss the memo?” holly asks me.

i told her there was no memo. just a facebook event page. someone inquired about “dress code,” and i enthusiastically wrote on the wall “jean chic!” since i suggested it, i figured that’s what we ought to go with. brilliant, i know.

“whatever,” i say, suddenly aware just how snug my jeggings really are. and that maybe my boobs look too big in my sweater. “we’re gay. everyone probably expected us to show up in bad pleated chinos, brown boat shoes–the kind with the white stitching and the two-tone laces–and unfortunate plaid flannels. tucked in. oh, and brown belts, also with white stitching. so i actually think we look great. plus i’m wearing my nine west reptile high heels. and jeggings plus high heels equals fancy. so we’re good.”

“well i’m not wearing jeggings. or heels,” holly says quietly.

“you’re fine,” i tell her. “you’re wearing black boots. that have small heels. plus your sweater is black. plus your jeans are dark. plus this is my high school reunion and i don’t even care.”

holly was definitely the hit of the evening, as many of my old classmates already felt like they knew her from this blog. on my way back from the ladies room, i made eye contact with this one guy and figured it’d be rude not to stop and say hello even tho i really wasn’t all too sure who he was.

“hi!” i say. “dave, right?”

“no, rob,” he says. “dave’s my brother,” and he points to the guy sitting next to him. his twin. shit! another pair of identical twins?! what class of approx 144 has two friggin sets of identical twins??

lovely gals that i wish i’d spent more time with in high school tell me stories of fun things we did or funny things i said or did and i realize holy crap, i don’t remember anything about high school. it’s kind of frightening how much of a blank i’m drawing. later on, i realize that, while other people had no idea, high school as a closeted teen was so horrifically painful for me that i think i just left and never looked back.

i tell people about our “wedding blitz” plans for that tuesday, and everyone is so excited. i get hoarse from catching up with people, answering everyone’s questions about our weddings and our life in baltimore. i love that i can finally stand proud with my partner of 10+ years by my side. i love that all my self-doubt is so far in the past. i love that i finally learned how to put a damn arch in my eyebrows b/c dang! i needed a makeover! HOLLA!

more bad decisions: i watched “the mummy” last night and now i’m totally freaked out.

"you look just like my ex-girlfriend who's been dead for 3,000 years and whom i miss terribly! kiss me!" "no! i don't! eww! get the hell away from me!"

you have your good decisions (vegetables) and your bad decisions (doughnuts/fried vegetables/french fries). i pride myself on good decision making (many vegetables, very few doughnuts, moderate-to-low fries) but last night i really tanked when i decided to watch “the mummy.”

we all know my ability to tolerate horror movies, even when they’re really faux-horror-pseudo-lesbo horror movies. (i.e. i have absolutely no tolerance and scream like a little girl). i’m sure holly would have stepped in and told me to change the channel, you’re going to scare yourself, especially at night, etc. etc. but she was on the phone. game on, i thought. i live to be unsupervised.

i kind of always wanted to see it. besides being a closet sinatra fan and “today” show Superfan (i’ll get to that later this week), i am also a lifelong ancient egypt nerd. as in: my very first book report (4th grade) was on mummification. (i wonder what my teacher thought when i explained what canopy jars are for? hint: storage for mummy guts for use in the afterlife. she never liked me. had her for 5th grade, too. i’m sure she was thrilled.)

so when it was on while i was doing dishes last night, i was like, what the hell, let’s see what this mummy movie is all about.

i missed the beginning but i think what happened was that these egyptologists found an ancient book of spells or something, read one out loud and awakened the beast, who was basically an angry-ass mummy that really missed his old girlfriend who was used as a human sacrifice at some point. i have no idea. but that’s what it seemed like.

he goes around killing everyone, awakening the ancient dead and sucking the life force out of the other egyptologists so he can get stronger. he also opens his mouth reaaaalllly wide, screams and creates sandstorms. oh and he brings these ancient cockroaches back to life that eat and kill people. nice!

i mean, it was pretty cheesy, but also pretty freaky and of course i couldn’t stop watching it. during the last 10 minutes holly got control of the remote and kept switching to “army wives” during the commercials and i was like BABE! WHAT THE HELL! I WANT TO FINISH WATCHING THE MOVIE!

she kept insisting that “she knew when the commercials would end and she would turn it back.” but i was like, “YOU HAVEN’T EVEN BEEN WATCHING THIS EPISODE OF ‘ARMY WIVES.’ WHY IN THE HELL WOULD YOU WANT TO WATCH THE LAST FIVE MINUTES OF IT?!”

to which she responded: “I DON’T KNOW! I JUST DO!”

(and yes, we have turned into the costanzas and now shout all of our conversations.)

she eventually relented and we watched, in awed silence, perhaps the worst commercial known to man (thanks, next day floors! note: this is low-budget baltimore at its finest, folks. welcome to our world), at which point holly turned to me and started complaining that you see? we didn’t have to change it yet. at which point i elbowed her in the mouth (in my mind) and told her to hush up, i needed to get ready for the final minutes of the movie.

so yeah, the end is how you’d expect: they kill the zombie mummies, save the girl, say another spell and grumpypants gets sucked into the ancient egyptian underworld. then the antiquity-filled tomb collapses, they get out in the nick of time, etc.

then i went to bed scared of my own shadow, holly said “you see? i told you you shouldn’t have watched it” and i had to sit thru a special encore of “army wives” anyway, during which i sighed heavily and kept bugging holly to turn it down. her response was, of course, that she watched my dumbbutt mummy movie and now i was going to have to deal with “army wives.”

there is no moral to this story. just that a) the lady in the mummy is really pretty b) mummies probably have really bad breath and c) i’m totally going to have to see “the mummy returns.”

who’s your ‘gimme’??

me and drew: besties. (except for that's not me on the right. but it could be. well probably not. anyway.)

every couple has their “gimmes.” you know, if you’re in a committed, exclusive relationship (yes, that includes being married; pbbbt! i know, boring right??) that person–or people–that are so understandably irresistible that your mate throws up his or her hands and pronounces that person your “gimme.”

most of the time gimmes are completely and totally out of one’s reach. movie stars, rock/pop stars and the like. straight women usually choose george clooney as their gimme. this confounds me. i know i’m gay as a day in may but c’mon ladies. what about someone like jude law or lenny kravitz? i personally think they blow him out of the water. but that’s just me and like i said, i’m a homo.

anyway, this whole famous-person-gimme thing keeps things fun and safe as your average person probably wouldn’t a) bump into any sexy famous ppl and b) have a chance w/them, most likely b/c they’d be blubbering about what a big fan they are and omg my husband/wife/partner totally says you’re my gimme.

(note: if you ever run into any of your famous gimmes don’t say that. instead act cool & sexy, then discreetly text your spouse/partner/signficant other that you have, in fact, run into your gimme and fair’s fair and my phone will be off for at least 90 minutes and i’ll text you when we’re done, love you ttys!)  

but right, back to the famous gimmes. holly has a nice long list of these and they’re usually blonde. this pisses me off to no end as i am very clearly a brunette. of course we have a lot of the same gimmes and holly’s a brunette. but we’re not talking about me, we’re talking about her and plus the rules are different for me, don’t ask me why but they are.

so holly’s #1 gimme has always been, and will most likely forever be, the lovely drew barrymore. i can’t say i blame her. portia di rossi is a close second. there are more, but i think i’m purposely forgetting them right now b/c most of them are blonde. [oh wait: i just remembered another–shannon tweed (also a blonde). you know, the ex-playmate and longtime partner of gene simmons. holly’s into the strong older woman type and i get that.]

anyway, obviously we’re very open about this kind of stuff, and we recently had a very frank conversation about drew barrymore and her gimme-ness.

i proclaimed that drew is one of my gimmes, too. so what if we were to actually run into her?

“well, we’re obviously not sharing her. it’s either you or me,” i told holly. (i think we were in the car.)

“well then i would get her,” holly proclaimed, all high and mighty-like.

“why would you get her?” i said. “i’ve loved her forever!” 

“and i’m four years older than you, which means that i’ve loved her longer. so i get her.”

she had a point. dammit.

“that’s fine,” i told her. “b/c, honestly, i think drew and i would wind up becoming best friends anyway. we might hold hands or make out or something, but mostly we’d probably get lattes, do our nails, get lunch and talk about our favorite books.”

“yeah, drew barrymore and i wouldn’t be doing much talking,” she told me.  

“whatever,” i said, probably crossing my arms at this point.

“look,” i said. “if you ever meet drew barrymore, i kind of feel like you might leave me for her and you two might actually become a couple. if this happens, i want you to know i’m going to be pissed but i’ll understand. i would. but since my number is the primary on our cell phone account, i also want you to know that i will immediately drop you from our family plan. i know your family’s important to you, so i’ll call them first and tell them so they don’t worry when your phone number doesn’t work anymore. i don’t think they’ll blame me.”

“thanks, babe. you’re the best wife ever.”

“i know. but chances are you won’t meet her, and this is a moot point.”

“i might.”

“you won’t.”

“i might.”

“yeah, you won’t.”

“i might,” she whispered. at this point i decided to be the bigger person and not argue anymore and instead thought about how i really am a great wife.

ok, so who are your gimmes? mine, in no particular order, are including but not limited to:

yes, drew. yes, portia. also: rihanna, karen from will & grace, the latina girl (ok i actually think she’s iranian in real life) who was on “the l word” for a while (tho i’m not sure how long since i had to stop watching that show as i found it highly annoying), katy perry and, the newest addition, kyle from the real housewives of beverly hills (does she count? she’s a reality tv star. disclaimer: strike that from the record if she turns into a crazy and/or psychotic megabitch). discuss.  

p.s. yes, i really would drop holly from the family plan. like a hot potato.

p.p.s. drew: if you’re reading this, call me.

this is what happens when i let holly choose all the movies we watch

christina: "do you think jessica's ever going to get to see 'burlesque'?" cher: "i doubt it."

when holly and i met and started dating a million years ago (ok, more like nine, but a million sounded funnier), we would wander around the adams-morgan (now defunct) blockbuster and she would absolutely shock me w/the movies she wanted to rent.

no, they weren’t porns (you guys are really something, you know that?). but they weren’t exactly the type of movies i expected my beloved then-girlfriend to propose watching. 

they boiled down to a few major categories:
(in fact, they still boil down to these few major categories.)

cop comedies
things being blown up but with some romance thrown in
car chases with some romance thrown in
high school boy humor
college guy humor
just plain dumb
and (thankfully) romantic comedies

romantic comedies are my number one favorite. well, that and cheesy rags-to-riches stories. (a la christina aguilera’s burlesque–but we’ll get to that in a minute.) thankfully we’ve always agreed on the romantic comedy genre or else we would’ve broken up ages ago. 

anyway, eventually i stopped saying “ew” each time she suggested something from one of these categories (save for romantic comedies), and agreed to rent some. after all, i loved her and “relationships are about compromise,” so, whatever. i shut my mouth for once and actually watched them.

and you know what? lo and behold, some of the movies she wanted to see actually turned out to be pretty good. highlights include but are not limited to: “the hot chick” (that one was a doozy; highly recommended), “american pie,” “superbad,” “deuce bigalow: male gigolo,” “eurotrip” (omg that one’s so funny) “the animal,” “get him to the greek,” and “american wedding” (also a doozy).

i should also make note that there have unfortunately been some lowlights. these include but are not limited to “paul blart: mall cop” (this would go under the “just plain dumb” category). i can’t remember any others at the moment b/c i think i purposely forgot them.

the point here is: it’s important to open your mind and let your partner rent some movies she wants to see even tho you have no interest in watching them b/c you think they’re dumb. you may also surprise yourself by liking some of them, making your partner swear she won’t tell anyone you liked them but then blogging about it all anyway.    

ok, the story: after holly finished her final semester’s classes last month (as in: she’s done forever now! she graduated college this past sunday! congratulations, honey!), we decided we’d celebrate by seeing “burlesque.” i would not shut up about seeing that damn movie. it seemed so inspiring. we saw a preview for it in the theatre months ago and i was pretty much obsessed with seeing it from that point forward. holly also thought it looked good–tho probably b/c she wanted to examine prolonged close-ups of cher to figure out what/how much work she’s had done. no wait that’s me.  

i digress. anyway, as it were, life happened and we didn’t get to see it when it came out. weeks went by, then we had an extended “groundhog day”-esque christmas trip to holly’s hometown in western pee-ay (as in: like the movie, every day we woke up thinking we would leave but didn’t–don’t see that movie if you haven’t btw). seeing how i was so good at my in-law’s house for 10 days (10 days), holly assured me that my prize would be seeing “burlesque.”

“don’t worry, babe,” she said, gently patting my hand over the car console as we drove thru her hometown. “we’ll see it when we get home.” 

so we get home after new year’s and guess what??? friggin “burlesque” is out of the friggin theatre. we had our heart set on going to the movies so i agreed to go see “little fockers” even tho i really didn’t want to b/c of the commercial that shows ben stiller’s character cutting off his finger or something when he’s carving a turkey and blood’s spurting out everywhere. i agreed to go but only b/c we were celebrating holly’s then-upcoming graduation and it’s what she wanted to see.

we went to see it and it wasn’t great. it’s one of those movies where everything goes wrong. i’m not fond of those. i mostly want to cover my eyes or just walk out. [for the record, i looked down when ben stiller cut his damn finger. of course i looked up and there was blood everywhere. (i never look down long enough! dammit.) but at least i didn’t see it flying around the room.)

then we spent the weekend watching more movies, this time at home. i told holly it was her graduation weekend and to pick out whatever movies she wanted. i wouldn’t complain. it was totally up to her. i patted myself on the back for being a good wife.

here’s what we saw:

“dinner for schmucks”
“easy A”
“knight and day” (tom cruise & cameron diaz action thriller/romance)
“the A-team”

“dinner for schmucks,” i couldn’t even make it the whole way thru. and, despite my love for the show as a kid, “the A-team,” yeah, i lasted about 10 minutes and  went upstairs. it was so loud and everything, and i mean everything, was exploding and i couldn’t understand the damn plot. “knight and day” also confused me but cameron diaz was funny/pretty enough to make me keep watching until i started to get it. many things exploded in that one, too, but at least there wasn’t much blood. “easy A” wasn’t bad, but i wouldn’t recommend it. holly, of course, liked it. she pretty much liked all of them.  

in conclusion, i still just want to see “burlesque.” i don’t care if it sucks, i still want to see it. i want to see it in the theatre, where it’s loud and i will walk out feeling inspired and wondering if cher is, in fact, the undead.

an additional conclusion of this story is to give in and watch your loved one’s damn movies once in a while. but if it’s “paul blart: mall cop,” do yourself a favor and just walk the hell away.

p.s. sorry i’ve been gone so long! i’ll be back again soon, promise. xo.

this is why i don’t watch horror movies

don't do it! she's evil!!!

 i remember the first time i saw a horror movie. it was the late 80s. jon bon jovi’s hair was still huge and frosted (oooh how i loved him back then). my hair, too, was enormous (tho accidentally) and i didn’t care. i still wore a size 5. i had a walkman with puffy earphones. times were good. 

anyway, freddie krueger, as you may (or may not) recall, was all the rage. and, without knowing any better, when my friend suggested we watch the newest “nightmare on elm street,” during our long-awaited sleepover i was like SURE! i flipped off my white keds and settled in for the show. man, i was dumb back then. 

i sat thru the movie, petrified. then, when my friend turned out the lights in her attic bedroom (it had to be the freakin attic, didn’t it?!), suddenly everything was scary. i remember laying there on the carpeted floor in my sleeping bag, eyes wide open, convinced freddie was going come thru the window or the wall or the plumbing and slash me. i kept hearing these windchimes. oh my gosh, the windchimes. needless to say it was a rough night for me. 

so fast fwd 20-some years to last night. holly and i walked up the street to vote in the maryland primaries. on our way back, she suggested we go relax on our roofdeck. i told her i was feeling too sick. she’s had a terrible cold the past couple days. i’ve had a weird headache i feel might be a cold coming on. in fact, i made us not one but two pots of my late grandmother’s chicken soup (w/matzah balls and egg noodles). we just had a couple bowls before we left to vote. 

“how about we just watch a movie on the couch?” i suggested. 

she agreed. i don’t know if she was on the phone or  playing on her phone or what, but i was fairly unsupervised (never a good thing) as i flipped thru the on-demand movie options. i went to hbo, then movies, then comedy. i come across “jennifer’s body.” hmmm. i had heard of that. i knew it was a vampire movie. but it was under comedy. and megan fox was supposed to make out with some chick. my homosexuality got the better of me (it usually does when it comes to these sorts of things) and i clicked “ok.” i knew it was dumb but i did it anyway. 

the sound came on and holly looked up. “what did you pick?” she said. oh all the sudden she’s interested.     

“‘jennifer’s body,'” i told her, innocently. 

“WHAT?! WHY?!! that’s a VAMPIRE MOVIE. you’ll never last five minutes!” 

“whatever, babe,” i said. “megan fox kisses a chick. i think i can make it at least that far.” 

well as soon as the scary music started and the camera panned over a backyard in the dark i knew it was a mistake. 

“maybe this wasn’t such a good idea…” i said. but for whatever reason, we could not stop watching. i swear movies like that are such a train wreck. 

have any of you seen “jennifer’s body”? while i suppose it’s kind of tame for a horror movie, it’s pretty gross and pretty damn freaky. in a nutshell, megan fox turns into this demon vampire thing that seduces high school boys and then rips them apart and eats their insides. (silence) yeah, i know. she also scares the begeezus outta you because she keeps showing up all bloody on the side of the road!!! granted, the kiss scene was damn good. but honestly, totally not worth all the carnage to get to it. by the time it ended, i was highly traumatized. highly. cold hands, sweaty palms, the whole thing. and totally scared. as was holly. 

“you feel hot!” holly said, touching my forehead. 

“i know!” i said. “i think the movie gave me a fever!” 

despite my aching head and her bad cold, we both started laughing hysterically. then i proceeded to try to recreate the kissing scene except for i suddenly leaned back, made my hands into claws, let my bangs drop into my eyes, opened my mouth really wide, bared my teeth and hissed which scared the hell outta holly. she screamed like a little girl then i screamed like a little girl and then we both collapsed into laughter. then i did it a couple more times. which i know was mean, but damn it was so funny. i wish you coulda been there. 

“STOP DOING THAT! YOU’RE SCARING ME!” she screamed. “you have black hair!!!! like a VAMPIRE! like MEGAN FOX! I WANT MY WIFE BACK!” 

by that point i had scared myself, too, so i demanded that she go back to the kitchen with me so i could put away the soup, which had cooled by then. i was not going by myself lest megan fox jump out of the oven, trick me into making out and then eat my insides and leave me for dead. 

i took a slotted spoon and started taking out all the vegetables and whatnot so i could just put the broth away. when i was on the second pot (the one we hadn’t eaten), about my third time in i found something red in the spoon. it was kind of big and red. from a distance it looked like a dried chili pepper or something. i looked closer. it looked like a… 

“ohmygosh. OH MY GOSH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” 

“WHAT?” holly yelled from the couch jumping up (she had abandoned me in the kitchen after all–thanks, babe). 

“i…i…i think i found a GRASSHOPPER in the soup. or a CRICKET. a BRIGHT RED CRICKET IN THE SOUP.” 

a vampire cricket! 

“get. over. here.” 

as i held back gags, she took a look and screamed. then i screamed. we were both screaming when her mom and twin sister called. while she told them about the movie and how scared we were and then about the huge insect we just found in our CHICKEN SOUP, my gears turned. everyone has mice in this city. rats (and cats) out back. sure, some bugs. but never something like this. hell, crickets don’t even chirp outside, let alone land in your kosher chicken soup on a tuesday night. 

the parsley! i thought. the dill! THE DAMN PESTICIDE-FREE HERBS. (we’ve recently gone organic.) 

“dammit, honey!” i exclaimed. “it was the damn parsley or dill! i soaked them like three or four times but i never separated the leaves. i bet the bug was hiding in there.” 

by that point, heidi (holly’s twin sister; identical twin sister), was on a roll, laughing her head off about how scared we were over some teen vampire flick, and now the giant red cricket in our soup. 

“one, two, freddie’s comin for you,” she whisper-sang over the speakerphone (DAMN THE SPEAKERPHONE). “three, four, better shut the door….” 

i gasped. the freddie krueger theme song! 

“STOPPIT HEIDI!” i shouted. “YOU’RE A BAD SISTER-IN-LAW!” 

i drowned her out with the garbage disposal, which i turned on to grind up the vampire cricket. i turned my head away as i poured in the soup, but it was no use. i saw the damn thing out of the corner of my eye. 

at that point i’d had enough. i was ready for the sun to come up. i just wanted to go to sleep. it took a while to make my way into bed, however, since i flipped on every single light in the house after the movie ended. (oh please you’ve totally done that after a horror movie) 

“i’m scared,” i told holly after i got into bed. 

“you see?” she said, flipping on bravo. “i told you not to watch that movie. i told you it was a bad idea.” 

she was right. again. the moral of the story is that i need to ignore the hype and stick to the romantic comedies from now on. also that megan fox scares the sh*t outta me. and always wash leafy herbs carefully.

perfect ten

i may be “a gay,” but i’m still a girl. and us girls play games. whether we want to admit it or not, we all play games, esp. when it comes to our mates/spouses/partners/signficant others. 

and we all get burned once in a while with these games. and i suppose that, yes, i was playing a game with holly the other day and i got majorly burned. 

here’s the story: 

we’re driving in the car on the way back from breakfast at our favorite diner–or maybe we were coming home from home depot, oh who the hell knows, we’re at that goshforsakin place so much (i swear i get hit with a wave of exhaustion every time we walk thru those damn double doors that’s so severe i could fall asleep standing up, no lie) and it’s right across the street from the diner so it’s all become a big blur to me–and we had the radio on. it was one of those morning drive-time radio shows headed by a big-mouthed, obnoxious, mildly loveable dj whose job it is to stir the pot and egg ppl on. 

so the topic at the moment was…let’s see, how can i phrase this without it sounding as trashy a topic as it was/is. the topic was the “theory” of how women that are “less attractive” are often “better in the sack.” the dj apparently backed this theory 100%.  both women and men were calling in to share their thoughts, including women that rated themselves lower on 1-10 “scale,” announcing to the dc/baltimore metro areas that while perhaps they weren’t raving beauties that could stop traffic, they know how to have a good roll in the hay. 

i decided to rate myself. 

“i’d say i’m about…a six,” i said to holly as she drove. i could already hear her response. 

“no way, babe! you’re a total 10. an 11. off the charts.” and she would seal her declaration with a kiss. 

instead she paused and said, “you are not a six, babe! you are totally an eight.” 

silence. 

(you just stopped breathing for a second, didn’t you?) 

shock. 

anger. 

and then the sadness only women and very vain gay men are able to feel. 

and then RAGE. 

“WHAT?!” i shrieked. “I’M AN EIGHT?!! YOU THINK I’M AN EIGHT??! I…I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU JUST TOLD YOUR WIFE SHE’S AN EIGHT! DON’T YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT WOMEN! GEEZUS I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU! YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO SAY I’M A TEN! A PERFECT TEN!” 

first she was stunned into silence. and then she went into all-out protection mode. 

almost no one’s a perfect ten she said. practically no one. not even celebrities. 

i had goosebumps. i was that upset. i told her this. and yet–she didn’t budge. 

on looks alone, she surmised, she could only think of two women that she’d rate as tens. the girl (latika) from “slumdog millionaire.” and drew barrymore. (even in my rage, i had to admit to myself that my partner really does have impeccable taste.) 

then she proceeded to say that her personal “rating” system takes into account not only looks but personality. oh and this was supposed to make me feel better? if you add in my sparkling personality, that alone should make up the two points and give me a ten! 

oh we had a jolly old fight about the whole thing. it was really classic. really, you should have been there. (really, you shouldn’t have. i just said that to say it.) 

in conclusion, ladies, watch the game playing. i know you’re all sitting there shaking your heads like perfect angels, oh no, i don’t blame games! i would never!

oh but you do. you do and you don’t realize it. or maybe you do and you’re just scared to admit it. regardless, do yourself a favor. don’t put a “score” over your head and expect love of your life to do what s/he is supposed to do and rate you as a ten or, you know, an 11+. while we’re at it, don’t ask if your butt looks big either. b/c if you’re asking, it just might look big and you know you don’t want to hear it.

frieda pinto (latika from "slumdog millionaire"). one of holly's two "perfect tens." yeah yeah yeah. fine. she's ok. all right she's *gorgeous*. let's change the subject.

drew barrymore: even children and small animals love her. plus she can rollerskate.

 

“how does it feel to be a married woman?”

that’s what my 88-year-old great uncle ben asked me–with a bright, wide smile, his blue eyes shining–early thursday morning as i padded into the kitchen to pour myself a cup of coffee. it suddenly occurred to me it was the very first time, after nearly nine years with holly and huge jewish wedding a year and a half ago, that i woke up fully married–under the law. vindicated. respected. protected.

i smiled back at him and held back tears.

“it feels good,” i said. “it feels really, really good.”

it still does. the glow of our simple, st. patty’s day ceremony in dc’s dupont circle–just feet from the very bench we sat on during our very first date in early may 2001–has not left me. despite my mind-altering pms. and the stress of our day-to-day. and the fact that we’re really not sure about how our dc marriage will be recognized by the state of maryland (health insurance, for example), the glorious sunshine (the whole city seemed aglow, like it’d be under a dirty window wiped clean with windex for the first time in years) that seemed to fill my entire body, warm all of my skin at once and reenergize my winter-weary mind hasn’t left me.

i am still so happy. i am still pinching myself to check if this is real. am i really married to my partner? did i dream this all up? but then i see the big white envelope that holds our marriage license, the one with both of our names on it, and our joint address. and a big silver seal stamped (tuesday afternoon) by a grumpy dc marriage license worker (the same one that did our oath while “hey soul siter” was playing on the radio) with a piece of ancient manual machinery just before he handed it to us and said in his island-accented monotone, “congratulations.” i see that envelope and i know what’s in it and i know i’m not dreaming and this is all real.

i thought i saw a smile–not a half-smile, even, maybe a quarter-smile–creeping on his very unsmiley face, if only for the fact that it was the third time we’d been there in a week (once just to ask a question about officiants–yes, we drove all the way from baltimore simply to ask who, exactly, could marry us–b/c the office has been so busy no one’s been answering the phone).

yes we want to be married that badly, that visit said. we want to be married so badly that we drove the 45+ miles here and got stuck in who knows how much traffic just to ask you guys a question.

we held up our signed marriage license for photo after photo wednesday afternoon, a few close friends and uncle ben in the wheelchair we rented for him surrounding us. yes this is ours, i kept thinking. no, i can’t believe it. man this was so much better and more fun and less stressful than our first wedding. 

we brought that license with us where we are now, holly’s hometown in western pee-ay, to show her family. and yes, uncle ben’s with us! he is a road warrior. we’ve been taking him everywhere. in fact, he’s sitting on the guest daybed right next to the computer i’m sitting at right now. he just asked what i was doing, and i told him writing a blog entry on the wedding ceremony.

“oh,” he said. “well, why don’t i see you writing anything?” then i showed him how the screen scrolls down and he totally got it. we’re both still up and the rest of the house is asleep. we both eat constantly. we both share his mother’s, my great-grandmother’s, blue eyes. it’s really really nice to have him around.

we watched “slumdog millionaire” tonight (i had never seen it) and i’m just feeling so inspired. i feel like my life–our lives–are off to a brand new start. it’s like this big, gaping hole has been finally filled with this legal marriage and we can move on now. like all the hurt of our last wedding is over and the slate’s been wiped clean. i feel like everything and anything is possible. i never thought marriage could feel like this. i never thought a piece of paper with a stamp and a signature could change my life so much.