I’m a Jinius

Today I googled:

Yo momma jokes

Prison Rape Not Funny

Keith Gessen

Yo momma so fat jokes

Okay, we’ve all heard the generalizations about men and women and how they are different when it comes to dating and relationships. Women are crazy. Women are emotional. Women are stubborn. But when it comes to dating, no one is more stubborn than men. And by stubborn I mean cray-cray. Man’s perseverance to score may have worked in their favor back in the pre-historic days when they were trying to get your number and fight a mammoth at the same time, but it does not translate well in today’s urban world.

Example: (more…)

I stopped by Michael Ian Black’s book reading at Bryant Park today. I think this fulfills my reading quota of the day. (Hey it counts when someone does the reading for you.) (more…)

My friends and I did a summer share at Fire Island over the weekend. Summer shares are always interesting because you are taken out of your tiny Manhattan apartment and placed in a house with about twenty people. Some of them strangers. It’s like MTV’s Real World. Only we pay money for it.

Rachel and Meredith did the same share last year and warned me about a certain house guest named CapTan Dan, a moniker bequeathed to this figure for his tan skin. It is insane.

CapTan Dan is kinda like Owen Wilson’s character in You, Me, and Dupree only without the looks, sense of humor, and slim figure. I suppose the only thing he shares with Dupree’s character is his infallible ability to remain home all day. Did I mention that he rented this house to us? I thought renters were just supposed to rent their share to guests. I didn’t realize that they were also a guest. But Dan is harmless. (Unless you’re threatened by men who wear shirts without sleeves and have a shark fin tattoo on their leg.) And Dan was also a good topic of conversation for people in the house. He unified the group in that we all knew nothing about him or why he was there.

I guess there was just something about Dan that rubbed me the wrong way. Maybe it’s because he looks like the kinda guy that would literally rub you the wrong the way. In the middle of the night. While you’re asleep.

Or maybe it was his blatant display of ripping us off. There were 14 guests in a 4 bedroom house. The other four guests were renters that he booked for the same weekend. Each room had about two twin beds and a bunk bed. It was kinda like being at camp…a refugee camp. I’m pretty sure that the sheets and blanket on my bed came from the Astrodome. Yes, I had bedding that was used by residents displaced by Hurricane Katrina. There was still sand in it. And pieces of human hair. I’m convincing myself that it was hair from their head and not a vagrant pube.

I also made the mistake of not bringing my own towel. I managed to not take a shower for three days. Oh, except on the last day my friend Balint was nice enough to lend me the towel he had been using all weekend. The same towel he used at the beach and showered with. So when I took a shower and patted myself dry with his towel, I came out dirtier

Okay, so I’m setting this story up like it’s the beginning of a bad reality show but I ended up having one of the best weekends of my summer. Because when you’re vacationing, it’s not about the house but the people you are with. Unfortunately, one of those people happened to be a big, burly man with tan skin. Insanely tan skin.

Day 1

I’m pretty easygoing when it comes to vacations but there is a certain PEMDAS that I must follow in order to have a good time. First, eat breakfast by the water. Second, go in the water. Third, pass out on the beach. Fourth, drink by the water. And finally, eat barbecue.

Will I complete my summer order of operations? Or will CapTan Dan foil my plans? FOIL!!! Get it?! Algebra joke? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

I need new writers.

On our first night, we have margaritas at the Inn Between and then go back home and play a Jew Off. It’s like Jeopardy only we ask questions about Jew-ish trivia.

Question:What is the name of the circumcision ceremony?
Answer: Ummm, Jerry Seinfeld?

To be fair to our blonde haired, blue eyed, madras short wearing brethren (obvs these were the other 4 renters in the house who were not part of our group), we also have a Wasp Off.

Question: What is in a Dark and Stormy?
Answer: Ummm, Tommy Hilfigger?

After our trivia games, everyone goes out drinking but V and I stay in because we are old and tired.

At about 3 Am, I am stirred from sleep. CapTan Dan is in the living room and screaming for this girl to come out of her room and have a drink with him. For the next thirty minutes all I hear is, “C’mooooon have a drink with me. Pleeeeeaaaaase come out and drink with me.”

For the love of god, will someone just please go out there and have a drink with him?!?! Fuck, I’ll even go out and drink with him. Anything to put him out of his misery.

Between CapTan Dan’s plaintive pleading and me trying to avoid direct contact with the sheets, I have trouble sleeping. It is pretty hard to levitate and fall asleep at the same time. Also, I am itching like crazy. I am praying that my flesh is not being consumed by Fire Island scabies.


Day 2

I wake up early and go wash my face. I let my face air dry because I’m afraid if I use the towel in the bathroom, my face will get gonorrhea.

Vidya and I grab egg sandwiches from Flynns and go to the beach.

I don’t know if you guys have been to Fire Island but it has the most beautiful beach in all of New York. And I’m a Miami girl so you know I’m snobby about my beaches. This is what we’re really paying for. When you see crystal blue water lapping the pristine sand, you can feel all your worries subside. Like insanely tan men who scream for girls to come out of their room in the middle of the night.

Can you believe we were just about six houses away from this?

In the afternoon, me, Vid, and Balint decide to walk to Ocean Beach and drink on the pier. We do this for about six hours. Balint says this will go in his memory as being the best part of the weekend. I can understand why. We philosophize on life, work, current events, and The Real World Season Five

As we all know, after drinking for six hours, it is invariable that I will become ravenous. I’m like those zombies in 28 Days Later. Fortunately, we return to the house and there is a full on barbecue feast. I eat about twenty pounds of barbecued chicken and my plate is just a monolith of chicken carcasses. (Special thanks to Elan for preparing this ode to barbecue. Uh, I hope you weren’t looking forward to leftovers.)

Then everyone starts playing beer pong. I, however, do not participate because I’m gnawing on my tenth barbecued chicken. Meredith’s eye suddenly swells up like a Bloomin’ Onion. She thinks its because I accidentally spit chicken juice in her eye.

Balint says Meredith’s eye got that way because God is punishing her for being Jewish.

Meredith still thinks it’s the chicken

I pass out

Day 3

I wake up with barbecue stains on my face, arms, and dress. I am also still wearing my bathing suit underneath. And I have bites all over my legs. It must be scabies.

At least it’s not gonorrhea.

We all go back to the beach and take in the sun and ocean before having to head back to our urban jungle. I am reluctant to head back to the city. I am enjoying the slow pace of Fire Island. I even have a conversation with CapTan Dan that is not half bad. If it weren’t for CapTan Dan, I wouldn’t know that a blackjack is a concealable club that could knock a man unconscious.

But, alas, all good weekends must come to an end.

So I came back from Fire Island all tan and relaxed, without a care in the world. Oh, and I am pretty sure that I also came back with scabies.

Drats.

I just returned from a blissful weekend on Fire Island. Will post the weekend details tomorrow. Because what happens on Fire Island gets divulged on the internet for anonymous strangers to read.

On Sunday evening, I come back into the city and go out for drinks with my funny Jew friends. Or as I like to call it : The Summit of Funny People. Liz, Prom Date, and Sarah (Prom Date’s sister).

We sip on grassy white wine at EU and then head to Yuca bar where we meet up with the Bearded guy (yes, I have uncreative nicknames). I wanted my friends to meet him and give me their opinions because I’ve had such cloudy judgments on people lately that even my gaydar is screwed up and I need a tribunal to deem if someone is worthy or not. My friend Sarah thought that at first he was just some skinny hipster boy but he’s actually pretty smart and cool. “Someone should give him a burger though,” she says.

I ask him how his week is going and he says, “Pretty shitty. My best friend died.”

You know when you’re at that point after having a couple of drinks and your synapses aren’t firing so quickly so it takes you a while to register what people are saying and then it finally hits you that someone just brought up death at the table and and now you have to actually figure out how to respond to a statement like that?

Yeah…

And all you can come up with is “I’m sorry.”

It turns out his friend died of a heart attack, most likely from a drug overdose. He was 31.

My friends leave and I ask the bearded guy for more details about his friend and it turns out that it was the friend that was with him that night we first met at The Room.

Snickles.

They held a little memorial for him at The Room on Wednesday night. That explains the late night drunk texts and calls. Or more like emotional drunk texting.

He was telling me how he remembers emailing with his friend last week, making plans to meet up for their regular happy hour, and now he has to get used to not having that exchange anymore.

It’s the mundane things.

So we chat more. Talking about family and obligations. It was actually kinda nice to hear that his family is just as fucked up as mine. In fact, our family dynamics almost mirror eachother.

And then we head out of the bar hand in hand. I tell him that I want to sleep alone tonight. I don’t know. Something about all the emotional intimacy was overwhelming for me and I just wanted to be alone. So instead we just hug on the corner for like two minutes.

Sometimes a hug can be more powerful than any other physical interaction. Sometimes all you need is just contact with another person’s skin to know that you are not alone.

He says that he’s going to Philly for work and that he’ll bring back lobster mac and cheese since I didn’t have a chance to get it last time. I tell him it’s okay, he doesn’t have to do that. But, in my head, I am thinking: That would be fucking amazing!!!!

It’s the mundane things.

I forgot to mention that including the aforementioned text I received yesterday, I also had missed calls and texts from the bearded guy.

The first two texts were around 3 in the morning:

What are you up to?

Where are you?

I don’t know about you, dear readers, but as a normal, functioning member of society, I am usually asleep in my bed at 3 am on a Wednesday.

Although there was a time in my life when I would be dancing at Hiro or Table 50 at that hour but that is neither here nor there.

And then the missed calls at 5 am??? Did I also mention that he is 33?? THIRTY THREE! The late night text from the bartender is excusable because he’s only like 23 and still a kid but men at 33 should not be sending late night texts. There are certain things that you just have to retire at that age. Like your myspace profile or Ikea furniture.

But now I feel waaaaay better about my drunk dialing behavior in the past.

Karmic redemption! At last!

On a random note, I just realized why I have been so drawn to bearded dudes lately. I’ve been doing these exercises from a self help book (shutup) or personal outreach as I like to call it and you’re asked to think about recurring archetypes and themes in your life and it hit me that I have always had this odd fascination with Paul Bunyan.

Yes, Paul Bunyan. The extremely tall lumberjack.

I remember reading tall tales in elementary school and thinking Paul Bunyan was just the epitome of the benevolent, heroic archetype with his big axe (is that a euphemism??) and blue ox (don’t tell me that’s another one!!!)

Most girls my age yearned for their prince charmings or boy band members. I wanted a lumberjack in a flannel shirt.

Anyway, that’s enough analysis. I have the day off today and I’m going to play in the city! And by play I mean I’m going to the bookstore to look for books on this and I hope that does not mean that I harbor a secret attraction to these people!!

Ed note: I edited the last part thanks to Jack’s comment. The last thing I need is more creepy google hits!

Dear readers:

Can you please help me decipher this text I received from the bartender at 2 in the morning.

Hey. You love late night calls. Get one.

Whaaaaa?! Is this even English? If he had enough sense to use punctuations then couldn’t he at least send a text that was semi-coherent??

Many of you regular readers may know that I’m an avid reader of Jezebel.com, Gawker’s feminist little sister blog.

I graduated from a women’s college and it was refreshing to read commentary on politics and pop culture that was both feministy and funny. Jezebel showed that you could care just as much about petro politics and Britney Spears and still be smart and irreverent.

But I go through periods when I have to stop reading it because of the self righteous, better than thou attitude. It’s the kind of blog that makes women feel bad for watching Sex and the City or buying Vogue magazine. Look I buy Vogue because I’m not exactly going to read The Economist while in the bathroom!

And then this happened.*

For the past couple of days, I’ve been trying to figure out why it bothered me so much. Was it the hypocrisy? The same people that made fun of the Carrie Bradshaws and Julia Alisons were making fools of themselves. Or maybe it hit too close to home. I question whether or not I would have done the same thing had I been in that situation. Afterall, what we judge in others is usually a result of what we deplore in ourselves. God knows how many blog posts I’ve devoted to my drunk, stumbling inanities. Would I have bombed like that?

I guess this also raises greater questions of what it really means to be a feminist today. Is it empowering to prove that you can drink just like (or more than) a man?** Is it empowering to tell tales of your drinking adventures of passing out and making out?** Even going beyond the blogosphere, look at how many girls post half naked pics of themselves on msypace or facebook or photos of them passed out drunk somewhere because it’s “funny.” Is that proving that we’ve come a long way?

I think my generation of women has so many conflicting messages about feminism. On the one hand, our forebearers fought for women’s sexual liberation but then on the other hand we have girls gone wild. And then we’re told that we should be equal to men in every way as if that gives us a free pass to drink to the point of oblivion and say fuck you. How do we straddle these two spheres of restriction and excess?

I wonder if the problem is that we don’t have a designated speaker or role model for our generation of women. We don’t have a Betty Friedan or Gloria Steinem that we could all look up to.

Hmmm, I nominate Tina Fey. She’s funny. She’s smart. She’s self-deprecating. And she’s never flashed her drawers to the paparazzi.

*While Thinking and Drinking is ostensibly a comedy panel that touches on serious subjects, I’m not really sure if rape is a great subject for that kind of thing. Rape is not exactly hilaahrious comedy terrain.

**Depends on who you are drinking against

*** Maybe not but it makes for good comedy

It is a wonder that I am somehow still alive.

Despite my proclivity to drink like a Vietnam Vet and turn into a stumbling zombie by the end of the night, I still somehow manage to find my way home. I’m like a cat. I just have an inner gps system that directs my sleepwalking self to my apartment.

But on this particular 3rd of July, my inner gps system must have exceeded its battery capacity. Pay attention because this is what they refer to as foreshadowing!

Thursday or why I need a chaperone

I go to Jack’s 3rd of July roof top party. Roof top parties are an imperative for a 4th of July weekend. Grilled meat and ice cold beer just taste better against the backdrop of the city. I didn’t take any pictures of the impressive view because my hands were occupied by food and a glass of rosaaaay at all times (more foreshadowing!) but I shall paint this lovely urban portrait for you.

Picture it: Jack’s roof. July 3, 2008.There are about a hundred hipsters squeezed onto this roof. There is Famous Fat Dave manning the grill. We ask him how he got designated as grill master and he replies, “I just love grilling. I’m doing it for the community. For the kids.” There is genuine love and content in this man’s grilling. But after a couple of hours, I think he is a bit overwhelmed because he is deluged in sweat and he eventually turns off the grill and throws off his apron.

We are near the ipod so Ursy puts on some Michael Jackson. Nothing creates party unity like some old school Michael Jackson. Hmmm, maybe Obama should consider playing Man in the Mirror at the Democratic Convention? So we all start dancing and by “we” I mean me and my group of friends, when all of a sudden one of the party guests turns off the Michael Jackson and puts on some indie song that we’ve never heard of.

From that point on, we kept referring to that man as THE MAN WHO KILLED HAPPINESS.

So I just keep drinking more rosaaaay. I start talking to one dude at the party about Carl Jung– a subject that should never be brought up at a party, especially after one is already on their second bottle of rosaaaay.

So lets fast forward to the end of the night. I get to my apartment building. I go up to the my apartment and try to open the door. Except my key will not go in. I keep jamming my key into the keyhole, thinking that will surely enable the door to open. I furiously bang on the door. I call my roommate and tell her to let me into the apartment. She says, “But you’re not at the front door.”

So after about twenty minutes of pounding on the door and CRYING–yes, I am actually so frustrated that I start crying–, I realize I am at the wrong apartment. I call my roommate again and she can’t figure out where I am and I can’t figure out where I am or even what planet I am on at this point, so she tells me to meet her at this spot near our building. We meet. Apparently I was at the building next to our apartment this entire time.

Dear Future Boyfriend:

THIS IS WHAT YOU WILL HAVE TO DEAL WITH.


Friday or how you can get a guy to kiss you after eating kimchee all night

I wake up and immediately check the contents of my purse. Wallet? Check. License? Check. My dignity? Nowhere to be found.

I call some of my friends and tell them what happened. I am swimming in embarrassment. I’ve been living in my apartment for like four years. How the hell could I get lost? But my embarrassment is allayed when my friends tell me that the same thing has happened to them. It’s nice to know that we’ve all been there. Some of just have just been there more than others.

We head to K-town for our 4th of July dinner. Because nothing says I love America like Korean bbq. We go to my favorite Korean bbq spot. This place is so nice to us even though everytime we go there we end up dancing on the tables and smoking cigarrettes. I guess this is why they always isolate us in the private room. Oh, and they hook us up with free beer! (more…)

Found some old journal entries. These three are my favorites.

Thursday, September 11, 2003

In memoriam of September 11th, I met E. for lunch at Tao.

If today was my last day on earth I would feel somewhat satisfied knowing that I had ass the night before and steak for lunch. Not that I would like to die having only completed those 2 things, but I would be happy having ass and steak for the rest of my life on a regular basis.

Saturday, September 6, 2003

Watching the Li’l John video. “Bend over to the front, touch your toes.”

I woke up at 2 pm today. Last nite went to 2 parties in Brooklyn and fell in a tub. Why do I always do that?

Tonight V. and I made shrimp paella. It was the bomb. For dessert we’re eating No Pudge Brownies. They are fat free brownies. There’s a picture of a pig on the carton. I dont know how I feel about eating something with a picture of a pig on it.

Thursday, September 4, 2003

Listening to Massive Attack’s Mezzanine

Track Number 3 reminds me of R., the Brazilian tatoo artist I met in Miami a summer ago. He had crystal blue eyes and tattoos of Japanese coy fish on his arm and leg. That is the summer I fell in love tattoos. He bartered cigarrettes and beer for kisses which I shyly denied but eventually gave in after the alcohol doused my inhibitions. I never saw him again after that nite but I hope he didnt get deported.