July 2nd, 2002


This will come in handy in the Twenty-Teens.

When I was little, I thought being a 5th grader was the point of being old. Not in the bad sense of things are downhill from fifth grade, but in the good sense that being old meant when you were in Kindergarten: you were old enough to be cool.

After 5th grade, I thought 11th grade, Junior Year, was the point of being old.

Needless to say, I didn't anticpate the whole "I'd only be 16 Junior Year in a state where you have to be 17 to drive" thing. But I still thought it would be cool. And I guess I was kinda right. I remember my Junior Year of High School as one of my favorites.

However, when I was in 11th grade, I came up with a theory that stemmed mostly from the drudgery of waiting for my 17th birthday to roll around (which would be in September of my Senior Year): that it was going to take so long for my 17th birthday to happen that by the time it was done, I'd be 18 and have missed it. Therefore, since I will be missing an entire year of my life, how was I to know how long a year was for me? Clearly, time dimensions as we know them do not apply to a person who takes 2 years to get to their 17th birthday only to turn 18. So I figured I was as old as I wanted to be. At which point, I decided I was twelve.

A few years later, I was visiting my friends in Morristown during winter break in college. I was standing in front of the AMC in the Headquarters Plaza Mall waiting for someone to finish their shift, gazing blankly at nothing. A trio of young teenagers approch me, break my stare and ask me how old I am. Without thinking, I said "nineteen." They smiled and nodded, and suddenly the clouds clear and I realize that that was incorrect. "No!" I interrupted myself, "I am twenty-one." The children looked startled, looked at me like I was nuts, and stepped backwards away from me. Maybe it was my year progression discrepancy in effect, but I later assumed that the kids wanted me to buy R-Rated movie tickets for them, and either age I told them I was was old enough to do so. I'm not sure why they didn't want my help anymore.
  • Current Mood
    relaxed relaxed

I'm the Princess of Work.

Last week, we had a barbeque at work. The big boss had put out a bunch of party-favoresque things on the tables, noisemakers and such. One of them was a silver paper tiara with white feathers. No one else would wear it, so I did. He also got an air horn that the Plastic Sales Man got a hold of and I had to move my seat away from him because I didn't want to sit next to him while he fired it off.
  • Current Mood
    complacent complacent

My Criminal Past

I went through a petty shoplifting phase during the summers between 6th & 7th grades. Pookie and I lived about a mile from the Cumberland Farms convenience store, so that summer, we'd get up in the morning at whichever house we had slept at, walk to the Cumberland Farms, steal about $10 worth of candy and Hostess, go to the field behind the little 5-store shopping center, eat two or three items apiece, and then throw the rest at birds, squirrels, trees, and each other. Once we took a pack of Bucks cigarettes, a generic brand that wasn't worth the space in the overhead compartment, and smoked it in the same field. That was my very first cigarette. Another time we stole condoms and filled them with Coke and threw them at this guy's front door who we kind of had a crush on. One day, we had made it out of there with our usual stash, then Pookie went back in for another soda or something, and the girl behind the counter said she suspected us and that she wasn't going to turn us in but suggested we be more cautious. Yet another day, we somehow got our hands on piles and piles of 2" x 3" wallpaper samples and got the idea that we'd lick the back of them and cover up the 3 in the Speed Limit 35 sign on Ironia Road so no one would know what the speed limit was.

If one of our parents was around and willing to take us someplace, we often ended up at the strip mall in the next town over. We got up the nerve to start nabbing things other than candy, and actually started getting pretty good at it. I was the cleverest because I would go into the drug store with a pencil sideways in my Capezio purse to make it look like it was full, drop the pencil in the bottom once I got in and then fill my purse with Debbie Gibson makeup in hideous pinks and blues that I would never wear. I stunned myself pushing the envelope by stealing a $5 bottle of Sun-In hair lightening spray. It was the most valuable item I had ever taken. One night, my mom wanted to have girly time with me, so she came up to my room and we were going to give each other makeovers. She asked me how I had gotten enough makeup to fill up two Caboodles full, I just kinda shrugged, and she made me throw it all away. Later that night (or maybe the next day), I was watching the Little Mermaid in the family room pretending like nothing happened, singing along to that song about how strict her parents are, and my mom just kept giving me dirty looks. With the exception of an ashtray from the Ceasar's in Atlantic City, I haven't stolen anything since that summer. And I don't think that ashtray really counts anyway.

Food Facts.

I can make cheapo boxed Macaroni and Cheese better than anyone else in the world. The cheaper the box, the better. And I don't cheat or anything. The only ingredients I use besides the cheese powder, butter, and milk are salt and pepper.

Soda tastes better when I pour it.

I make chocolate chip cookies so well that I have photographs of two different batches in two different photo albums. They don't just taste good, they look good.

Veggie Tuna Medley (because salad usually implies mayo)
1 can tuna, pref. Solid White Albacore, drained
1/2 cup green pepper, chopped
1/2 cup carrots, chopped
1/4 cup red pepper, chopped
1/4 cup broccoli end things (if the broccoli is a tree, these are the leaves), kinda shaven off the floret

Stir well and black pepper to taste. Lemon juice optional. Check teeth for broccoli.
  • Current Mood
    calm calm

Cubicle Chit Chat

I just overheard the same girl tell the story of the parasitic worm she managed to get in her foot while recently visiting Mexico: once to the guys near my cubicle, once again to two girls in the break room (who sadly, were eating lunch at the time). Jokes were made about whether or not the worm would have to be quarantined before she was able to admit it into the country. No one joked, however, about how in the hell she managed to contract a parasite.
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    mellow mellow

I got Timbo's on my toes and this is how it goes.

When I worked at musicmaker, the utopian dot com whose demise left me unemployed and succeptable to the vultures of the real working world, we ran a promotion for this Create-your-own-Best-of-the-Beastie-Boys CD offer. Basically, you could pick from all of their songs and put the 40 you wanted on your own best of double disc.

What I kept trippin' on was how many non-American Beastie Boys fans there are out there. Do they really make universal sense? I mean, I can't imagine people from outside of the New York tri-state-area knowing what a Cookie Puss is, let alone someone in say, Belgium.
  • Current Mood
    relaxed relaxed