Category Archives: classy

Surfing in the Winter

If you want to surf somewhere cold—like Maine in the winter, maybe—the first step is getting a thick wetsuit. If you don’t already have a thick wetsuit, visit your local surf shop and follow these steps:

AT THE SURF SHOP
Seek help from one of the friendly employees. Ideally you’ll find the owner of the shop, maybe a 60ish-year-old gentleman named John, and he’ll lead you to the wetsuit section of the store. You’ll want to be on your cell phone at this point, so John knows you’re important and not that serious about wetsuits. But you’ll also want him to sympathize with you, so knock over a skateboard display and fart a rotten one. This will show him you’re both down-to-earth and helpless, and it will endear you to him.

PICKING OUT THE SUIT
Follow John’s lead on this one. He knows how cold the waters can get, and will recommend the right ones to keep you warm. Some of them will have hoods, some will not—just make sure you tell him your sisters used to suffocate you under blankets and that you hate constrictive clothing and struggle with claustrophobia. He will not understand, but you’ll feel better having told him.

THE FITTING ROOM
John will escort you to the fitting room, likely located directly across from the main entrance of the store. Tell him you’re wearing underpants—not a bathing suit—under your clothes, and ask if that’s cool. Remember, you will have earned his pity from the skateboards and the farts, and he’ll reluctantly let it slide.

TRYING ON THE SUITS
Put on the first wetsuit. Since it’s supposed to be warm enough for cold-water surfing, it’s going to be crazy thick—six millimeters, even. Squirm your way in as best as you can. Then, once you’ve zipped yourself up, walk out from the fitting room and into the main part of the store, and ask John to check you out. He’ll tell you your crotch is sagging, and then he’ll make you tug at your junk for the next ten minutes. Finally he’ll tell you the wetsuit’s positioned correctly, and you’ll tell him you’re choking and that you “hate this so much.” Retreat to the fitting room.

TAKING OFF THE SUITS
Remember how you squirmed your way into the wetsuit? You will now realize that your shoulders are too broad and your fingers too weak to squirm your way back out. Tug helplessly for five minutes, get so sweaty the suit sticks to you even worse, and then run out of the fitting room shouting for help. Remind John about how much you hate constrictive clothing. Ask him to get you out of that GODDAMN THICK ASS FUCKING WETSUIT.

STILL TAKING OFF THE SUITS
It will require two people—John and a high school girl who works there—to get you out of the wetsuit. When they’re done, thank them by explaining, again, how your sisters used to try to suffocate you with blankets. You will notice both John and the girl are uncomfortable yet amused. Look down and realize you are in your underpants in the middle of the store (just the top half, but still definitely underpants). Hasten back to the fitting room.

NEXT STEPS
Do not buy a wetsuit. Do not surf anywhere cold.

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Should I Get a Dog in My 20s?

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Are you in your 20s and trying to decide if you’re ready to get a dog? Do you want an adorable creature to take pictures of, but not sure if you’re really up for the responsibility of caring for it? Lemme give you my version of the lowdown on dog parenthood.

What to Expect During Puppyhood
Puppies are cute. They got this stank skunk breath that smells wonderful, despite the stank skunkiness of it. They hip hop around and chase butterflies and are soft and snuggly and floppy. And yet, much like Ben Franklin, puppies are the devil.

They pee and poop on your things—usually your floor, but sometimes other things, too. Like your bed. When my dog, Dizzy, was a puppy, he peed on my brand new mattress in the middle of the night. I took him outside to finish any remaining business, he didn’t do anything except sniff, we came back inside, and then he pooped in the hallway while I was trying to clean my mattress. I texted my mom and said “I WANT TO PUNCH HIM SO BAD RIGHT NOW.” That’s a terrible thing to think and to say, but I did want to punch him. Peeing in my bed I could forgive, but pooping in the hallway! After I’d just taken him out! I didn’t punch him, but if he were a person I maybe would have.

If you don’t want your puppy to pee and poop on your things, you’ll have to take him outside all the time. And you’ll have to follow him around the house to make sure if he does pee or poop, you can catch him in the act and tell him to quit it. Even if you work really hard at that, it still might not make a difference. Dizzy was still pooping inside after eight months. The little bandit pooped TWO TIMES during dog obedience school—in the middle of class, right in front of the dog trainer. Watching puppies all the time is exhausting, and it doesn’t even necessarily make a difference.

Other bad things puppies do: chew your things, chew other people’s things, bite you, bite other people, bark, try to eat stupid things that will kill them, take up all your time, take up some of your money.

Before getting a dog, you only ever have to worry about yourself. After you get a dog, you’ve got a real live creature whose well-being depends almost entirely on you. It’s a big adjustment. Before bringing home a puppy, make sure you got back-up. If it weren’t for my parents, I don’t know if I would have made it through Dizzy’s first couple of months. It was weirdly sad and lonely. Felt like I had postpartum depression or something (I say “or something” because I’ve never had a human baby and I don’t know what postpartum depression actually feels like). Dizzy and I are super tight now, but puppies are dicks. Know that it’s not all snuggles and selfies.

BUT STILL SOME SELFIES Y’ALL

What to Expect During Doghood
Having a dog definitely gets easier once they get a little bit older. They stop with all the indoor peeing and pooping, mostly. They can be left alone for hours at a time and trusted not to eff up too much of your stuff. Though they’re probably not as cute as they were as puppies, they’re still cute and they suck way less.

They will continue to cost you money. Dog food and dog toys and vet visits aren’t cheap. They will continue to take up your time, because they rely on you for entertainment and exercise and love. Also they get a little bit smellier. Most dogs will seek out rotten things outside just so they can roll in them. Their breath loses its puppy scent and instead smells like old hamburger and salmon. Dogs with long fur get poop stuck in the fur around their b-hole. If they’re like Dizzy and they suck at peeing, they splash pee on their legs and smell bad that way, too. Expect to do gross things, like pull rope out of their butt and cut matted fur off their wieners (if they have wieners).

Besides the gross parts, though, grown dogs are the bomb. They love doing activities and will be down for almost anything, unless it involves vacuum cleaners or fireworks. They’ll probably stare at you a lot and that’s annoying, but they’ll also be stoked when you come home from work and will keep you warm in bed if you let them sleep with you. All good things. Remember though: They are work. They need exercise and love. Be a person that’s cool with exercise and love.

For real: You ready?
In your 20s, most people are used to living young and wild and free. So what you get drunk? So what you smoke weed? You’re just having fun, you don’t care who sees. So what you go out? That’s how it’s supposed to be. But then you get a dog, and all that gets much harder. You want to drink booze and smoke marijuana? Your dog needs a walk, not a rain shower in the studio, Wiz Khalifa.

A few questions to answer before getting a dog:

1. Do I like dogs?
2. Do I like the dog I’m thinking about getting?
3. Do I have enough money to pay for food and vet visits?
4. Am I OK with spending that money or am I too cheap?
5. Am I lazy?
6. Do I mind gross things?
7. Am I all right with the outdoors?
8. Am I cool with exercise and love?

If you answered yes, yes, yes, yes—OK with it (not cheap), no, no, yes, double yes, then you’re probably ready to get a dog. Good luck!

A thing I’ve been working on

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It’s been damn near three months since I’ve posted anything new here. That’s because:

I’m lazy as hell.
My left shin is acting up and freaking me out.
I’ve been working on something else.

This something else is a longer, non-blog story that I’m planning to submit as part of an application for graduate school. I’ve included an excerpt of it below, but the whole thing is about 22 double-spaced pages. If you read the excerpt and have any interest in reading more of it, I would love to send you the full story and to have you tell me what you think of it. Tryna make it as good as I can, and your feedback would help. If you email classygallie@gmail.com, I’ll send it to you A$AP. (I’d use my real email address but I’ve seen the Google searches that bring people to this site. I got mad weirdos coming through.)

Also, a disclaimer: Some of this stuff I’ve already blogged about. Sorry if that’s boring. But! If you choose to read the whole thing, there is some freaky stuff I’ve never blogged about before, like the first time I shared a bed with someone (I was old and acted strangely. I’m not that thrilled about sharing it.)

In 1993, I had a bed head of blonde hair, a bug collection, and an insane speech impediment. I spent my days at home in Maine playing with Barbies, catching frogs, eating chips, and telling anyone who would listen how much I loved “big, black, muscly men.” I was four years old.

If I ever have a daughter who, at age four, confesses to me her love for big, black, muscly men, I imagine I’d be both horrified and delightfully surprised. If that’s the reaction my own mom had when I made the same confession, then I must have only registered her delighted surprise. She, like everyone else, loved it when I said my type of man was the LL Cool J type of man. So I told it to everyone.

“I heard you lost your first tooth, Allie. Nice work!” said Clayton, my next-door neighbor.

“Nah. Michael Jordan, now that’s some nice work,” I told him. “Asked Santa to bring me that ass for Christmas. Clayton you already know I love me some big, black, muscly men.”

“All right, kiddos, it’s nap time!” said Diane, my daycare provider.

“Word!” I said. “‘Bout to have some chocolate dreams up in this bitch. You know, cause I love big, black, muscly men and I think about them in my sleep. Nighty night, y’all.”

“How would your daughter like her cheeseburger?” asked a Ground Round waitress.

“She’ll have it done medium—” said my mom.

“Make that well-done, gurl,” I interrupted. “I want it black but juicy, with extra firm buns and a spooky big pickle on the side. I call it the ‘Allie’s Manwich’ in honor of my love and appreciation for big, black, muscly men. Yo, and that comes with chips, right?”

I never actually said any of those things, but I really did use that exact phrase (“I love big, black, muscly men!”) all the time. It was true; when I was four, black men with big muscles were the only men I was into. While other girls my age were watching Snow White and Sleeping Beauty and falling in love with Prince Charming, I was busy watching rap videos and counting how many rows of abs Tupac had. My mom has always been a big hip-hop fan, and by default my three older sisters and I were, too. Since the three of them had mostly grown out of Disney movies by the time I would’ve grown into them, and since they ruled the TV remote, all we watched was MTV. Once you’ve seen Tupac rapping naked on a toilet in his video for “All About You,” there’s not much to be gained from watching a cartoon prince kiss a sleeping cartoon princess.

If Cinderella is the ultimate fairy tale for most little girls, then mine was Salt-N-Pepa’s video for their song, “Shoop.” My entire notion of love and romance comes from that video. My entire notion of life comes from that video, actually. I remember watching it and seeing those chocolate chip, honey-dipped men dancing around shirtless—the guy in the leather vest and the do-rag, and the other guy in the baggy blue suit who stripped down to his underpants. I didn’t even understand what I was seeing, but I was most definitely trying to get a scoop.

It makes me sick to say that now—to admit that I was some kind of semi-racist horndog in pre-K, but I can’t change the past. I was a semi-racist horndog through-and-through. I was a blonde-headed, light-skinnded girl whose ideal Prince Charming was big and black and built. My sole redeeming quality was though I preferred black guys, I was down with just about anyone. I just wanted to shoop, goddammit—and with few big, black, built men to chose from in southern Maine, I had to take what I could get. That’s why a year later, on my first day of kindergarten, I fell in love with a scrawny white boy named Justin. He was the first boy I made eye contact with that day.

Willing to read more? Holla at classygallie@gmail.com and I’ll send you all of it!

Making Friends

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Curtis called me an awkward tomboy the other day. Not in a mean way, just in an honest way.

It happened when we were leaving the beach. This little freckle-faced girl I’ll call Susan rode past us on her bike. She circled around us a few times, complimented my surfboard, and then told us that her parents were gone and she was home alone. Remember that Curtis and I are full-grown adult strangers to this Susan, who was probably no more than 11-years-old. If I were to grossly exaggerate what she said to us, it’d be something like:

“Hey, stranger grown-ups. Hey, did you know my parents are gone? They’re off, probably drunk. Probably won’t even come home tonight. It’s just me, a child, alone in my house.” Susan pointed to a house. “That house right over there, the yellow one. The keys are under the welcome mat. I am so weak and dumb, it would be really easy to kidnap me. You tall, powerful-looking adults ever kidnap anyone before?”

It seemed like after Susan told us about her empty house, she realized she shouldn’t have. She mumbled something else real quick and sped off toward a gaggle of boys on bikes. When she was out of earshot, Curtis said, “Aw, she was just like little Allie. All awkward tomboy!”

And it’s true – I am. You don’t have to look any further than my relationship with my first best friend for proof.

His name was Jake, and here’s what a typical day in our friendship was like:

Jake would invite me over to the crib. I’d spent the first half hour there sitting cross-legged in the field next to his house pretending to talk to dead people. After a while I’d get up to go to the bathroom, do my business, discover the toilet paper was out, and use the cardboard TP roll to wipe. Then, since I don’t understand plumbing, I’d try to flush it and end up having to fish it out with my bare hands. Later we’d eat Nutty Bars and play hide-and-seek and we’d both pee our pants at the same time, but without having talked about it first.

Those are all real things that happened at Jake’s house. It was fine at the time because he was a 10-years-old and a boy and my ride-or-die.

That type of friendship, as wonderful as it was, was not sustainable. Like all children do, Jake grew up, shaved off his rattail, and got a girlfriend. I, on the other hand, went home and made fitness videos by myself.

Now, since I’m 25 and it’s no longer cool to hang out with elementary-school-aged boys, I try to make friends with people my own age. Here’s what a typical day trying to make friends as an awkward tomboy adult is like:

A few Saturdays ago, I had plans to meet up with a girl I studied abroad with, but whom I hadn’t seen since our program ended. We were finna get dinner together in Portland.

On my drive into town to meet her, I noticed that my breath was smelling stanky fresh. Like, straight up garlic-out-the-clove, everything-bagel-with-tha-veggie-cream-cheese, never-been-flossed type of situation. No disrespect to the man but my breath was out there smelling like T-Pain just ate a can of cat food and gurgled it down with coffee brewed with bat poop beans. Breath was kicking.

Fortunately, I make sure to keep a small tube of toothpaste in my car. When I realized the intensity of my stank breath I was stopped at a light, so I dug out the toothpaste and squeezed a line of it onto my right index finger (I did not have a toothbrush).

By the time I started scrubbing, the light had turned green. As I drove down the road rubbing toothpaste on my teeth, I remembered that fingers don’t have bristles. And without bristles, ain’t no good way to work up no kind of lather. Toothpaste was mad runny. Before I knew it, I was dribbling toothpaste juice all down my chin and onto my only good pair of jeans.

Everybody knows you can’t get toothpaste stains out with anything less than a full-blown clothes-washing. I was already running late so without having time to turn around and change, I poured water on my lap and accepted that I was going to have several white stains all over crotch for my first meeting with a potential future friend.

And in the end, I showed up looking like if not a 10-year-old, then certainly at least a 13 or 14-year-old one. You know, looking like I had…

A Christmas Miracle

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I have a great and very heartwarming Christmas tale to share.

Several years ago, my Aunt Mariah* came to town for Christmas. She came in a few days before the 25th to help with decorations and gift wrapping, because she is a nice, thoughtful lady. She is so nice and thoughtful, in fact, that she took on the burden of decorating the Christmas tree all by herself.

Aunt Mariah worked hard on that tree, so to keep her energy up she ate an English muffin with peanut butter while decorating. It was chunky peanut butter. Chunky peanut butter is the most delicious kind of peanut butter and, typically, is the kind you should always go for. The sole exception, however, is when you’re a lady named Aunt Mariah and you have gold crowns on your molar teeth. There are chunks in chunky PB and if you bite down on a chunk wrong, you’re going to eff up that molar crown in the baddest way.

And of course that’s what the crazy ho did. She was concentrating so hard on hanging tinsel that she didn’t pay any attention to the peanut butter chunks and next thing you know she bit down wrong and effed up her tooth crown. And then she swallowed it down whole! The nut!

The thing about Aunt Mariah, though, is that she actually wasn’t a nut at all. She was (and still is, bless her shart) an extremely practical person. After she swallowed that gold crown, she did a quick mental calculation and figured out that a new gold tooth could cost well over one thousand dollars! “Heck if I’m going to pay that,” Aunt Mariah thought. Instead, she ran down to the local grocer and picked herself up a metal strainer and a plastic mixing spoon. She was going to go a-gold-digging.

And by that, I mean she decided to do all her pooping in a strainer and sift through it in search of her gold tooth.

Well, that’s just exactly what Aunt Mariah did. Poor woman did all her crapping in a strainer for two days straight and didn’t see a flicker of gold anywhere. She was just about ready to give up when, on Christmas morning, the impoopssible happened.

“THE CHRISTMAS POO CAME THROUGH!” Those are the words that woke me up on Christmas morning 2006 (I think it was 2006, but I can’t remember for sure). My Aunt Mariah ran up and down the hallway, banging on every bedroom door in the house, screaming “THE CHRISTMAS POO CAME THROUGH!! IT’S A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE! MR. HANKY THE CHRISTMAS POO CAME THROUGH!!! THE CHRISTMAS POO CAME THROUGH!!!!!” (I’m serious. That is what my sisters and I woke up to on Christmas, word for word.)

Despite the failures of the days prior, Aunt Mariah decided to give it one last try on Christmas morning. She took a dump in the strainer, used the spoon to go through it, and found a glint of gold amid her crap. She plucked it out, rinsed it off, threw it in a pot of boiling water, and said a prayer to the Christmas Poo. She took it to the dentist a few days later and came home with her gold poop tooth glued back down in her mouth, looking something like the ice man Paul Wall.

Call it a smile on da rocks

Need proof that this really happened? Like all good Christmas tales, there’s a Christmas carol about it!

(Sung to the melody of City High’s “What Would You Do?”)

What would you do if you swallowed your tooth?
Would you sift through the loo digging up your poo
Cause you’re frugal?
And the only way to find it is to
Paw through your crap for something kinda shiny
Cause the gold cap’s gone
Somewhere in your butt now
In and out your gut now
You ain’t got a tooth now
Cause for you this is just Christmas morning
But for my aunt this is what she calls life, mmm

*Names have been changed to protect the privacy of the tooth swallower.

The Most I Will Be

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I just spent an hour reading blogs written by people who live in houses with hard wood floors, white walls, and home offices with salvaged barn door desks. They eat old cheese and hand pies and drink Pimm’s Cups and cocktails. They decorate their homes with peonies from their garden, hand-lettered signs, and nautical paintings. They go on picnics by the ocean with their black lab and wear really cool leather shoes and have jobs as photographers and web developers. They dope.

So I read their blogs, and I think, “Hey, I could do that! I could live by the beach and have a magazine-worthy home and eat delicious foods every day. Why don’t I do that?”

Then I set my laptop down, and I get up to grab a piece of pizza from the fridge and to take into the bathroom to eat while peeing with the door open.

And I realize this is the most I will ever be.

He likes pizza, too. (Fun fact: the shorts I’m wearing in this picture are from 7th grade.)

Going Crazy

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On Saturday, Curtis and I went to the grocery store for sandwich makings.

While waiting in the deli line, the smiliest woman I’ve ever seen turned to me and shouted, “HELLO!!!!”

I didn’t know this lady – or at least I didn’t recognize her – but I turned to her and shouted hello right back.

Then, still smiling like a fool, she shouted, “How are you!!?!”

“I’m good!” I said. “How are you!?”

She told me she was good, and then kept on staring and smiling at me. I was smiling right back. It was uncomfortable but at the same time familiar and heartwarming. I really wanted to keep our conversation going and to make her like me, so I stared right in her eyes and asked the only question I could think of.

“How are you?” I asked for the second time.

She paused for a moment, said “…I’m good,” and turned away. Curtis turned away too and even took a couple steps away from me. The great rapport I had built with this random lady disappeared in an instant, and I was left alone to think about how terrible I am at harmless social interaction.

Below is dramatization of the event. Dizzy plays the grocery store lady.

Dizzy studied at Juilliard.

You know when you go to the movies, the person you buy your ticket from always tells you to enjoy the show? And most of the time you just say thank you, but occasionally you’ll slip and tell them to enjoy the show too, even though you know they ain’t gon be watching the movie. Or someone will wish you a happy birthday and you’ll say, “You too!” You know when those things happen?

Those things are embarrassing, but there is something truly upsetting about asking someone the same question twice within a ten-second period. And when it’s a stranger in a deli line, there’s no explaining yourself. There’s no point in it. All that’s left to do is stand there and watch that stranger’s provolone cheese get sliced, knowing that at least one person in the world thinks you are crazy. Not jokey or funny crazy. Real, legitimate, this-girl-here-is-a-damn-kook crazy.

Airplane Tweeting

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I went to Florida last week.** On the flight home, I ordered a $7 plane drank to help me fall asleep. It did help me fall asleep (#respect), but not before getting me a little lightheaded and then inspiring me to write down the tweets I would have tweeted had I had netwerk connectivity.

I’m going to share them here. I would share them on Twitter, but there is nothing worse than when someone you follow clogs up your timeline. I used Photoshop to make them look like real tweets to keep it more fun.

Disclaimer: I feel very fortunate that my plane did not have netwerk connectivity.

**My trip to Florida was fly. My cool ass cousins and I went to the beach, went to the pool, went to the movies, saw friends, RODE ON BOATS, ate pizza/steak/shrimps/fresh fruits/other good things, drank drinks, learned the lyrics to Disney songs, and practiced rapping. (Side note: I think I could be a rapper.)

Sunscreen in the eyez/saltwater surprize

If I were Beyoncé

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If I suddenly found myself in a universe where I was the main character in Beyoncé’s “Partition” song, but had never heard the whole thing before, these are the thoughts I would think and the feelings I would feel.

Lyric:
Driver roll up the partition please
Driver roll up the partition please
I don’t need you seeing Yoncé on her knees

Thought:
OK, if I’m Beyoncé then I’m telling my chauffeur to roll up the partition because I don’t want him seeing me on my knees. Why would I be on my knees? I must have… dropped my earring on the limo floor? That’s got to be it. Yeah, the driver definitely needs to roll up that partition. If I’m on my knees, then my booty must be up in the air. Ain’t nobody need to see that harvest moon.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Took 45 minutes to get all dressed up
We ain’t even gonna make it to this club

Thought:
Wait a minute–we’re not going to go to the club just because I dropped my earring? I’m not much of a clubber but if it’s a club Jay-Z and Beyoncé go to, I’d like to check it out. Plus, if it took me 45 minutes just to get dressed up, do you know how long it must have taken to do my hair and make-up!? Upwards of two hours, fool. We going to that club.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Now my mascara runnin’, red lipstick smudged

Thought:
How did that happen!? I must be crying or something. Maybe we shouldn’t make it to the club, I guess I’m sad.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Oh he so horny, yeah he want to *F WORD*

Thought:
Oh my! I seem to have misjudged this situation in the worst way, and I don’t at all like where it’s headed. I know Jay-Z’s supposed to be my husband in this scenario, but even if I can accept that, we’re in a moving vehicle! And our driver’s like two feet away! I think we ought to hold off on this for… ever, probably.

Feelings:

Lyric:
He popped all my buttons and he ripped my blouse
He Monica Lewinski’d all on my gown

Thought:
Shout out to Jay-Z for popping my buttons and ripping my blouse and doing his freak business on my gown. Very cool of him, to wreck all my clothes en route to the club. Guess that’s why we’re crazy in love. Drunk in love. Crazy and drunk in love.

Just kidding. That’s effed, Jay-Z. Damn!

On a side note, why am I wearing a blouse and a gown at the same time? Who dressed me? Did Jay ruin all my clothes on purpose because my outfit didn’t make sense?

Feelings:

Lyric:
Oh, there daddy, daddy didn’t bring the towel
Oh, baby, baby be better slow it down

Thought:
Wait a minute–are we going to a club with a swimming pool!? Hot diggity I don’t care if you forgot the towel, we’re going swimming! Forget slowing it down, put the pedal to the metal! I’m tryna get my Marco Polo on!

Feelings:

Lyric:
Took 45 minutes to get all dressed up
And we ain’t even gonna make it to this club

Thought:
Yeah I remember you saying that earlier but if there’s a pool involved in this outing I’d really really like to make it to that club.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Take all of me
I just wanna be the girl you like, girl you like
The kinda girl you like, girl you like
Take all of me
I just wanna be the girl you like, girl you like
The kinda girl you like
Is right here with me
Right here with me
Right here with me
Right here with me

Thought:
None of that is true.

I don’t want anyone to take all of me, for starters. I have dogs who need me, and nephews and a niece, and plus I’d like to keep at least a quarter of myself for myself. I got lots of hobbies, nah mean? Secondly, I guess it’d be cool to be the kind of girl Jay-Z likes, but it’s not like that’s my only goal in life. I want to be a lot more than just the kind of girl he likes. Just the kind of girl Patrick Stump likes? Yes, sure. But Jay-Z? Jay-Z better make like Bruno Mars and think I’m amazing just the way I am.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Driver roll up the partition fast
Driver roll up the partition fast
Over there I swear I saw them cameras flash

Thought:
Damn that driver. I already politely asked him TWO TIMES to roll up the partition. Either he never rolled it up, or he did roll it up and then rolled it down again. Neither is acceptable. I’m going to have to fire him. Eff! I’ve never fired someone before, but I bet I suck at it. Maybe Jay-Z will do it for me.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Hand prints and footprints on my glass
Hand prints and good grips all on my ass

Thought:
Not this again.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Private show with the music blastin’
He like to call me Peaches when we get this nasty

Thought:
Private show for who!? Jay-Z or the chauffeur?! Who is calling me Peaches?!? IS THIS SONG ALMOST OVER YET?

Feelings:

Lyric:
Red wine drip filth talk that trash
Chauffeur eavesdropping trying not to crash

Thought:
Is some of this gibberish or am I currently too distressed to understand anything? Motherfunker I hope we don’t crash. Imagine if I die like this: all my clothes ripped and soiled, my lipstick and mascara smudged, booty out. Please, I hope that chauffeur don’t crash. Also I wonder if he’s rolled up that partition yet.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Oh, there daddy, daddy now you ripped my fur
Oh, baby, baby be sweatin’ on my hair

Thought:
TAKE IT EASY ON MY GEAR, DAMN. Barf, there’s sweat dripping on me. I wonder what Jay-Z would think if I vomited on him, cause it’s bout to happen.

Feelings:

Lyric:
Took 45 minutes to get all dressed up
And we ain’t even gonna make it to this club

Thought/Feeling:

One baby, one dog, and one horse

4 Replies

Up until last month, I’d rescued one baby, one dog, and one horse.

The Baby

I know Steve Buscemi isn’t British, but he looks like he maybe could be.

The baby I rescued a few summers ago when I was out for a run. The baby’s British mother was pushing him in a stroller, about to descend a hill, when a large turtle crawling in the weeds next to the sidewalk caught her attention. She stopped to admire it and, when she saw me about to jog by, called me over to join in on the admiration.

“That’s one right good lookin’ turtle, in’t, luv!? Come ‘ave a look at this turtle wiv me!”

I didn’t want to stop, because I was still kinda pissed at her over all that Revolutionary War/William and Kate wedding coverage stuff, but the turtle really was big as eff and deserved a moment’s acknowledgement.

I stopped to check it out. And to keep it one hundred, it was pretty fly. But just as I was about to (reluctantly) give her props for inviting me over, she let go of the baby’s stroller and squatted down, her hand outstretched to the turtle, a blade of grass between her fingers. She was calling to the turtle, trying to entice it to come over for a belly rub or something. Missus was too wrapped up in the turtle baiting to notice that her baby’s stroller was starting to slowly roll down the top of the hill.

I put my hand out and grabbed the stroller… that was it. I didn’t have to chase it or anything. Still, I rescued a baby. A British baby! I let go of old grudges and rescued a British baby.

The Dog

Chico the mini schnauzer

The dog I rescued was a young brindle pit bull that attacked me when I was out walking Dizzy one morning. She didn’t really attack—she just ran up to us and started freaking out, jumping on me and trying to get Dizzy to play. I love Dizzy, but he’s a scaredy cat bitchass, and so he started yelping and crying and I had to pick him up, even though the pit bull wasn’t being mean at all. She was just playful and wild as shit.

We were on a super busy street, I was carrying Dizzy in my arms, and the pit bull was jumping on me, sprinting out into the road, and coming back to jump on me again. She chased us for maybe an eighth of a mile until we got back to my house. As soon as I opened the front door, she sneaked through and started running wild in the house. Our other dog, a mini schnauzer with a Napoleon complex and a stankin attitude toward spayed females, immediately started lunging and snapping at her. The pit bull’s snapping back, Dizzy’s running around yelping, my dad’s screaming to get the pit bull outside, and my mom’s trying to find an old collar that’ll fit the pit bull’s neck. Everyone’s in an uproar and the entire house reeks of buttstink and adrenaline.

Finally my mom found a collar big enough, and I leashed stranger dog up and took her outside. I walked her down to the house on the corner, where I thought I’d seen her tied up outside before. That was her home, and apparently she had slipped her collar.

The Horse

Just a pretty horse (via digdang.com)

The horse I rescued my junior year of high school. My friend Lacey and I were driving around in her car to kill time before basketball practice, when a big brown muscly stallion shot out of the woods and in front of the car. Lacey, without a second’s thought, gave chase.

We followed him for a few miles and eventually herded him back to his own barn. There, the horse’s toothless owner garbled something completely unintelligible, but what I imagine was something like, “Thank you, heavenly angel ladygirls, for returning my little pony boy.”

Last Month

I have a decent rescue track record. Remember the baby, the dog, and the horse? So, a few weeks ago when my friend Sarah and I drove past a border collie running loose in the streets, I was down for a rescue mission. At first we saw an old scraggled mofo with a leash looking like he was walking with the dog. But when we drove past a second time and the dog nearly ran straight out and under Sarah’s car, we decided we better stop and try to help.

I got out while Sarah went to park. The second I stepped out of the car, Old Scraggly Ass handed me the leash and said, “Her name’s Riley. Will you catch her? She doesn’t have rabies or Bordetella or nothing. She don’t bite.”

I ran over to an empty parking lot and starting calling Riley’s name. While standing there, holding a leash and calling for a dog I didn’t know, I began to ask myself a few questions.

Why dafuq did Scraggle Ass Snaggle Tooth need to mention that Riley is disease-free? Is this his dog? Why is he not catching his dog? Why does a stranger need me to catch his dog?

I decided these were pretty good questions that deserved an audience bigger than just me.

Me: Excuse me, stranger/monster man. Is this your dog?

Scraggle: …Yes.

Me: Why ain’t you catching your own dog?

Scraggle: She’s… a border collie! (He holds up his hands). Border collies are… (He waves his hands around.) You know!

Within a minute or two Riley ran over to me, Scraggle yelled out for me to grab her, and I did. Then he came over to take the leash from me and the dog cowered away from him, clearly not wanting to return.

Scraggle: Thank you! She just wants to play, that all. Hey, do you… do you live in town? You down to chill?

Me: Hell no, on both accounts.

Scraggle: Oh. Oh okay. Hey, about that down-to-chill part–can I… Can I buy you lunch?

Me: Hell no, again. You’re scaring me, mister. Plus it’s 3pm and I already had lunch. Shit. You got cookies or something?

He didn’t, so I got back into Sarah’s car and we left.

Now, I can say I’ve saved one baby, two dogs, a horse, and myself because that dude was definitely a serial killer.

Lesson of this story: I AM THE GREATEST SAMARITAN OF ALL TIME SCREW ALL YALLS

Author’s note: I wasn’t sure how to end this post.