Velvet Verbosity

There were just so many interesting blogs that came my way this week. I have a folder full of candidates, but today got a bulletin on Facebook for a blog that was just too funny not to share. A tongue-in-cheek stopping place for

Stuff That White People Like

Yes, you read that right. I was particularly tickled to read the second post, “Difficult Breakups” considering I went and “broke up” on Valentine’s Day (and no, I’m not a masochist, no matter what Woman Remodeled says). Fooking funny stuff I say! Here is an excerpt:

The majority of white person art is created after a difficult breakup; films, indie music, and poetry are all kicked into high production during the end of a relationship. This helps train white people to prepare for the pain that is coming.

Once breakup proceedings have been initiated, a white person is immediately thrust into the center of attention in their circle of friends. During this time, they are permitted to talk at great lengths about themselves, listen to The Smiths, and get free dinners from friends who think “they shouldn’t be alone right now.”

It is imperative that you do not attempt to kick them out of their misery by saying things like “get over it,” “there are other people out there,” or “I don’t want to read your poem.” Implying that there things in the world more important to you than their breakup is considered one of the rudest actions possible.

So, family and friends, take note. I am entitled to create crazy art that you will think is amazing if not downright genius. I will not be listening to The Smiths, but I will be listening to DJ Spooky’s File Under Futurism, The Cocteau Twins, Ani DiFranco, and whatever else bad *ss stuff I want to. Be warned, I might make you dance to some of it. Ok, none of the above is danceable really, but who cares?

Blogged with Flock

Hi, my name’s The Mad Sister, aka The Bear, and I’m a chocoholic. The need for chocolate has overtaken my life and affected those I love. Before I found Chocoholics Anonymous, my life had become a blur of chocolate. Late nights with Ben and Jerry, bars of melted chocolate ruining the pockets of my best blue jeans, the adrenaline rushes of stealing chocolate from my mother’s purse to get my fix…there was no end to what I would do to get my chocolate fix every day. I’ve come to rely on the Twelve Steps of Chocoholics Anonymous to restore me to sanity and to Vanilla. I no longer want to live in this chocolate prison!

I share these twelve steps with you today so that you might come back to sanity, come back to the Vanilla. Now that I am 30 SECONDS sober from chocolate, it is time for me to help others. With Valentine’s Day, that most unholy of chocolate consumption days, just around the corner, the matter of chocolate addiction is urgent!

The Twelve Steps of Chocoholics Anonymous

Step 1: We admitted that we were powerless over chocolate in all its forms, but most especially when embedded in Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, and that our lives had become unmanageable due to obsessive thoughts about chocolate and the coercion necessary to obtain it.
Step 2: We came to believe that a power higher than ourselves could restore us to Vanilla.
Step 3: We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the Vanilla as we understood Vanilla. (boooooring….er, ah, ahem.)
Step 4: We made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves and then a fearless chocolate inventory of all our cupboards, pockets, and drawers.
Step 5: We admitted to our higher Vanilla, to ourselves and to another human being the exact daily weight of our chocolate consumption.
Step 6: We became entirely ready to have a Higher Vanilla remove all our defective chocolate seeking taste buds.
Step 7: We humbly asked our Higher Vanilla to remove our shortcomings and all the chocolate at the grocery counter.
Step 8: We made a list of all persons we had harmed in our pursuit of chocolate (and there were many), and became willing to make amends over a hot fudge sundae vanilla shake.
Step 9: We made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except if they were eating a chocolate bar at the time.
Step 10: Continued to take personal inventory and promptly donated all hidden chocolate stashes to my Mom to the needy.
Step 11: Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with Vanilla as we understood it.
Step 12: Having had a Vanilla awakening as the result of these steps, we work to try to carry this message to chocoholics everywhere, and to practice Vanilla in all our affairs.

** A message from Velvet Verbosity, mother to The Mad Sister: “Please pray for The Mad Sister as she battles this insidious addiction. Her constant need for chocolate has brought our family to the brink of financial ruin and torn us asunder. May the Vanilla be with her.”

Image from www.buychocolatecandy.com

This is what happens when you tell your savvy 15 year old daughter that, NO, she cannot get her belly button pierced because it sends the wrong message and all that. And if you don’t know, this is Pink.

I told you, didn’t I? I always say how geeky is sexy and sexy is geeky, and when you put the two together, you have GEEKY-SEXY! Now the folks at TangoMag are finally catching up to what I’ve know for years. [Editor’s Note - I had previously stated The Huffington Post as the source for the following quotes. However, I was actually linking to TangoMag. When I realized my error, I thought maybe I was drinking at the time of this post, but no, it was all just a tad confusing. There was a blurb (on The Huffington Post) about the original article (on Tango Mag) and I didn’t realize I had linked out of the HP to read the full article even though ALL THAT PINK should have been my first clue (maybe I WAS drinking at the time). Seeing how I can’t yet afford a staff of source checkers, these kinds of things are going to happen from time to time.]

Don’t look now, but there’s been a paradigm shift, and the very stuff that used to be geeky—gadgets, technology, interactivity—is suddenly sexy.

We’re not talking “Revenge of the Nerds” here, where the geeks wage war against the jocks. Geeks are getting a lot of proper attention suddenly. It’s not really hard to figure out why. For one thing, in the information age they are the power holders, and everyone knows how hot power is. But in addition to power, they are generally more aware, attentive, and caring than their “cooler” counterparts. Add that up with power and that’s one hot equation.

Josh Herman agrees. “Geeks are obsessive about Stars Wars, The Simpsons, comic books—and love,” he says. “And not just in the infatuation stage. The same passion I bring to anything in my life, I also bring to my relationships.”

Case in point: “This girl I was interested in in high school wanted to go to the butterfly exhibit at the zoo,” Herman says, “but she complained that you could never get close enough to them.”

One Saturday, off they went. When they arrived at the Butterfly House, his date watched with a mix of curiosity and horror as he dumped the contents of the water bottle he’d been carrying all over his head
and arms.

“It wasn’t water. It was sugar water I had mixed up that morning,” he explains. “Butterflies attacked me.” He, in turn, waved the colorful swarm toward his flabbergasted date, who, lo and behold, soon became his girlfriend.

“Would a non-geek have thought of that?” Herman challenges. “Probably not.”

No, probably not. And in that, lies the Catch-22 of dating a guy who is one: it’s not for the faint of heart, but, in the end, the stuff a geek will cook up to win yours will likely make it flutter. For the long haul.

Aw heck, see how geeky and sexy that is? Geeky because the guy wasn’t trying to be suave or cool (well maybe in Geek fashion he was). He didn’t have the script and the moves. He kind of made a fool of himself. But oh-so-sexy because he didn’t have a script. He had a brain, he had ears, he had a heart, and he combined all of them to come up with a plan that wouldn’t make him “look” all that cool, but would melt the heart of his potential mate. What women wouldn’t fall for that?

If you think I’m just loving on the geeky-sexy because it’s my personal preference, think again. Hot women are throwing themselves at geeks at comic book conventions, science fairs and anywhere else the slender think tanks geek out.

When tonight’s headliner takes the stage, a hush falls over the crowd. Harold Varmus, a Nobel Prize-winning cancer researcher, has got the geek chops, and yet he hardly acts the part of the quintessential nerd. Rather, he seems relaxed and affable, and with his first question, elicits a wave of appreciative laughter: “Who are all of these people,” he asks this evening’s host, “and why are they spending a weekday night in a science club?”

Why indeed? I ask Liz*, a willowy blonde artist in her early thirties, what brought her here. A tip from her astrophysicist friend, Ben, she says. “He’s one of the most famous astrophysicists in the world. He discovered a star when he was 22!” she gushes. But tonight Liz is here with a wingwoman—a cute brunette with a pixie cut. They came for the lecture, but, says Liz, “I have a fantasy of meeting a really hot science guy.” “Yeah,” her friend chimes in, “Geek guys are mad hot.”

Despite all the myths (mostly supported by the “cool” guys who don’t want this information getting out), geeks make good lovers and good mates too. Loyalty and a curious mind, believe it or not, can make for some pretty hot action in and out of the bedroom. “Great” as in great for both parties. Loyalty translates into proper attention, intense curiosity translates into learning about what really works, not just what the movies say works.

Christina Milano of Glee Magazine says it best:

Nerds Have a Much Bigger Hard Drive
Not only do nerds take the time to listen to their partners, but they also mentally take notes, remember and are able to retrieve the information at the most opportune moments. The best way to make your partner feel sexy, sensual, wanted and larger than life is to listen to him or her. Because most of the world rarely gives you its devoted attention, imagine how special you’ll feel when one individual does.

A hot body might get you in the door, but eventually, what meets the eye will fade. It’s important to add depth and substance to your personality. The hottest, most intense relationships are the ones with people you can really talk to, laugh with and learn from every day.

Geeks also know how to make their women feel secure, and that’s ultra geeky-sexy. As Ahmed Bilal points out in 12 Reasons Why a Geek will Steal Your Girlfriend in 2008:

Remove the source of a women’s insecurity and she becomes a much more fun person to be with - as geeks know.

It’s hardly rocket science, but leave it to the geeks of the world to figure it out. Geeky-sexy is IN, and just remember that you heard the phrase here first.

Sleep talking is uniquely entertaining. It’s like hearing one side of a conversation. A dream-scape conversation that ends up sounding slightly psychotic, or drug-induced.

My son talks in his sleep and this morning when I went to his room to wake him up, before I could say a word, he smacked his lips, flopped an arm around and said,

“Oh No.” (pause) “Not another jerk-face”.

What? There was more than one?

Bossy and her Beau win for most original Halloween Costume for 2008.

I’ll be the judge of that! hehe.

1. Forget to pay the utility bill and then act surprised when the computer won’t turn on in the morning. (For a double flunk, find a way to blame it on the children!)

2. Sleep through your alarm and get to work an hour and a half late. (For a double flunk, show up with Dunkin Donut crumbs on your chin and sleepy seeds still in the corners of your eyes.)

3. Check your myspace. (Double F points for doing this while eating a banana freeze-pop and neglecting dishes in the sink.)

4. Think mean things about the other moms at your daughter’s lacrosse practice. (Double flunk by actually telling Mrs. “I’m so upper-middle class and proud of it” that you like her shirt and that your mother has one just like it that you bought her for Christmas.)

5. When your teenager bites your head off because she’s “hot and grumpy” and then stomps off to her room, make a face at her retreating back. (Oh, the possibilities for double-flunking this one are endless!)

6. Chew Juicy Fruit with your juicy boyfriend at the office. (Double F for chewing two or more pieces at a time. Loudly.)

To answer the question, “How can you double flunk anything?”, this is my blog and I make the rules ’round here (as well as the lies). Understood?

I gave birth, almost fourteen years ago, to an unbelievable life force. Loud, forceful, funny, outgoing, athletic, brave-as-all-hell, thoughtful, organized, and stunningly beautiful. Everything I’m not. How does that happen?

Today, she and I were driving around looking for a parking spot, and in one of the few parking lots, there was a car just sitting, idling. The first time we drove by, we looked in and took note that the occupants of the car were a young, good-looking couple. As I drove past the car several minutes later, for the second time, I wondered aloud what they were doing just sitting there. It was annoying me for no particular reason. I thought maybe they knew something I didn’t, like that in two minutes half the stuffed parking lot would clear out, and they were just patiently waiting for some prime downtown parkage.

After I grumbled to myself, “what the heck are they doing?”, my daughter promptly replied, “They’re being hot…just give them a minute”.

Out of the mouths of babes…

This from “A Girl Named Zippy“, a wonderfully funny and touching memoir about growing up in Mooreland, Indiana. I’ve laughed right out loud at least 10 times reading this, causing my daughter to sigh over her homework, and then demand that I tell her what is soooo funny.

“I didn’t believe in God, had not ever, as far as I could remember, believed in God, and yet I was reluctant to formulate the thought too clearly, not to mention speak it aloud, for fear that poor God would hear it and get His feelings hurt.

I believed that the baby Jesus had gotten born, and that was all lovely. Christmas was my favorite time of the year, in part because of the excellent speech, “Fear not: I bring you good tidings of great joy…” and because of the song “The Little Drummer Boy.” Anything that involved such persistent percussion was undoubtedly both religious and true.

After he ceased to be a baby, Jesus held little interest for me, until he reached the age where he sat for the portrait that hung above the swinging doors in the vestibule of the Mooreland Friends Church. In the painting, which glowed from a fluorescent light bulb hung beneath it, the Big Jesus looks pensive and honey-eyed. His shoulder-length, light-brown hair is as clean and shiny as corn silk, and he has a beautiful tan. He is way better looking than either Glen Campbell or Engelbert Humperdinck.

I wanted him to be my boyfriend. My feelings about Jesus didn’t alarm me at all, because it appeared that everyone around me was flat-out in love with him, and who wouldn’t be? He was good with animals, he loved his mother, and he wasn’t afraid of blind people. I didn’t buy the bit about his terrible death and resurrection for a minute. I knew, beyond and room for doubt, that nothing in this world is both alive and dead. And this was the thing I most wanted to say in church: if you want him to be alive, you’ve got to stop hanging him on that cross. But it appeared that the cross was what the people of Mooreland valued above all else–more than his life, more than the sweet way he carried lambs on his shoulders in the pictures on the fans furnished by Main & Frame Funeral Homes–the cross, and the way he got sucked up into heaven to be with the Father who killed him. It was such and objectionable story that I decided to skip it. I decided that Jesus was alive, just as people claimed, and that he lived in the trees around my house. He had picked me out personally, and was following me around, watching my every move. Sometimes I lay out in the backyard with my blue tape recorder, just holding the microphone up to t the sky. I figured if Jesus was ever going to break his long silence, it would be on a warm, breezy day in Mooreland, with his best girl waiting patiently in the grass. The tapes I made were very peculiar and very boring. The only voice heard is that of my dad, telling me he’s waiting inside with the Campho-Phenique and the Chig-a-Rid. No one ever tried to discourage me; it is written in our very bones, as a people, that true religion requires sacrifice.”

“I Started a Blog That Nobody Read”