the wrong side of the bed

i have a girl scout troop with 2 friends of mine. today was HORRIBLE. one of the girl's has a brother that sometimes shows up. i guess he is about 7 or 8. today they drove him crying from the room. i understand that they might not want boys there. i mean, it is girl scouts, but the kid is really sweet and doesn't disrupt or anything. anyway, i asked the boy if he might not rather go to boy scouts which meets downstairs at the same time. he say that he wasn't sure that the boy scout leader was there today. i took him downstairs to check out the situation. i found the leader and took him in the hall to ask if the boy could join the troop. turns out that he is in the troop. he just doesn't always show up. i guess those are the times he is with us.

i left the boy with the scout leader and turned around to go upstairs. before i even made it to the stairwell, the boy darted past me to hide behind the vending machines and cry. i asked him why. some other boy called him a scairdy-cat. i wanted to say, "well, going to cry in the arms of a GIRL SCOUT LEADER is probably not going to help your reputation..." instead i told him that if he wasn't really a scairdy-cat, then it didn't matter what some other boy said. i also told him that it was okay to be scared and that even adults get scared sometime. he told me he thought that he could go back in with the other boys. i turned around to go upstairs, by the time i had reached the top of the stairs, the kid was running after me and crying again. i ended up letting him sit in the corner coloring. i gave him posterboard and some crayons. it was sort of cute because he acted so surprised to be given crayons to use. he said, "wow! crayons!!!" liz and michelle and i decided to pretend that he is gay and to just let him come to our troop from now on. he's a quiet kid and he doesn't really take too much of our time away from the girls.

we had another problem with our troop today. one of the girls has a two year old brother who has started showing up at our meetings. since our troop is in a community center at the apartment complex where the kids live, their parents don't drop them off or anything. they just decide to come and show up of their own accord. suddenly, we have found ourselves saddled with a toddler. today, the older girls were totally manhandling the toddler. it was terrifying. one girl almost dropped him once. michelle had to take him away. at that point she realized he really needed a new diaper. of course, his sister, who is all of 8 years old, hadn't thought to bring a diaper bag. so, michelle was going to take him home. she was going to put him in his stroller, but as she was doing it, an older girl came and snatched him away. somehow, the toddler ended up crying on the floor, terrified, with three girls leaning in menacingly from above. i shouted, "everyone get away from him NOW!" and the girls stepped back. i took him home with the aid of his sister and the other boy. his mother didn't even care when the kids took him in. i started to walk away, but i went back and told her, "i brought him home because the girls were being rough." she didn't really seem to care. i left, but i really wanted to yell at her.

after the meeting was over, michelle, liz, and i were near tears. why were our girls so mean today? it was terrible! plus, more than once they asked us if we planned on coming back. it wasn't clear why. liz said she wanted to say, "we don't like you anymore. we won't come back unless you start acting better." i wanted to say the same thing. michelle wants us to take a parenting class from GHC to learn how to deal with discipling kids. i really think we should do it.

some of our girls used to be so sweet. we only see them on fridays. is this just what it is like to watch a kid be ruined by middle school through the magic of time-lapse photography?

liz, michelle, and i are planning to see "mean girls" this sunday. i think it is only fitting. our girls aren't that old, but they will be some day. we better prepare ourselves while we can.

'm watching the end of jay leno (who i really hate) waiting for conan to come on. the cure is the musical guest. note to robert smith: you should really update your look. not just because it has been YEARS, but because bright lipstick, heavy eye-liner, and mussy hair just make you look like a floozy version of boy george. yes, that's right, i said "a floozy version of boy george." and he already looks pretty skanky, so this is saying a lot.

those of you who know me know how much i love macaroni and cheese. oh man, that's some good shit! my favorite brand is kraft. whenever people say, "oh, i love my mom's mac-n-cheese the best!" i pretend to agree, but in truth my mother only ever made it from the box.

when i was a kid, if we helped my mom cook the macaroni, our "prize" was getting to eat the last few noodles that were always stuck to the glue at the bottom of the box. you probably think that is gross, but, ask my brother and sister, nothing tastes quite so good.

so, this morning for my breakfast/lunch i am having mac-n-cheese. i'm eating amy's organic shells with white cheddar because i try to get organic stuff when it is an option, but it isn't as good as the artificial kraft stuff. people often make fun of me, or sometimes act concerned, because they think i eat crappy junk all the time. i suspect that i eat as well or poorly as the next person; i'm just more unabashed in my love of junkfood.

the reason for this post, though, is not to wax fondly about mac-n-cheese. it is to offer my readers a tip: think your lunch is unhealthy? throw in some frozen vegetables! i recommend peas. yum!

no, i'm not talking about emotional splinters. i'm not talking about the mutated rat, master ninja who led the teenage mutant ninja turtles. i'm talking about real splinters.

picketing gives you splinters. especially when you are using cheap, untreated wood for your signs. i didn't end up with a lot of splinters*, but one got sort of infected. i couldn't get it out with tweezers, and i couldn't find a needle. i think i messed with it a bit too much. a blister-y thing formed around it. my solution? while walking to lecture yesterday i chewed on my thumb until the blister burst, i swallowed some mystery fluid, and then sucked the splinter out. did you try that on your kid's hand, ann?

yeah, i'm hard core. i'll suck snake venom out of your leg, too. EVEN IF YOU HAVEN'T BEEN BITTEN BY A SNAKE!!!!! think about your self. all that vitriol? it's gotta be coming from somewhere.

* only two splinters in my thumb and one in my neck. anyone available to try my method on the neck splinter? i can't suck that one out on my own.

all of this work i have been doing for the union has been only partly out of my commitment to the labor movement. a good portion of it is self-preservation. i want my future contract to be good, you know? interestingly, all of this presupposes my future employment as a graduate assistant. considering that the "feeler" emails went out today for TA positions in sociology, and i didn't get one, i'm not so sure that is a safe assumption. what can i do other than teach? there aren't many options for qualitative researchers. could i beg a job from the survey center? they absolutely hate me there, but they almost kept me on despite my horrible first year.

i have been waiting a long time to finally get kicked out of this program. i'm certainly not a good grad student. the problem is, i don't know if i will leave until someone tells me that i don't belong here. they always say that one way they try to get rid of grad students they don't like is to cut off their funding. is this finally going to happen to me? why can't someone just say so? "dorotha go away."

fifth grade sucked, but i knew where i stood with those kids. they hated me. plain as day.

the consensus around here is that picketing for two days makes you feel hung over. also really old. and like you never want to stand up again.

jeremy has accuesd me of being less funny lately. well, i suppose it is true. i'm sore all over. i have bruises in the weirdest places. and i can no longer recognize humor. maybe, i should just pretend. i should listen to happy music while i walk to school. this is the opposite of my normal strategy of listening to music to reinforce my mood. actually, i really like kristin hersh's album "sunny border blue" which seems to be all about drug addiction. do you all think i should start doing hard drugs?

yeah, see, i got nothing. this is going to turn all my readers off to my blog. and i just got started!

since i couldn't use the bathroom in social sciences for the past two days, i spent a little more time in the ingraham hall women's room. ingraham, for those who don't know, houses the women's studies department. anyway, as is my usual inclination, i headed for the stall furthest from the door. on the door was pro anorexia/bulimia graffiti! what? pro-ana/mia* graffiti is not something i have ever seen before and is certainly not something that i expected right next to the women's studies offices. boggles the mind.

* this is what they call their movement. yes, there is actually a pro-anorexia/bulimia movement. they even have an official bracelet.

so, because of the strike, i have been away from my email all day. also because of the strike, i am more than a little terrified to see what people have sent me. will i have to read a hundred emails about how "great" the strike was? will my students have fired off angry missives at me because some TAA member somewhere called them a scab? what is going on with socgradchat?

this morning i had a bit of a breakdown and couldn't stop sobbing. it just seemed so ridiculous, the whole picketing thing. everyone kept saying "dorotha, you are just tired. you have been working so hard!" but other people have been working just as hard or harder and did not break down and cry just because. i mean, what did it was really having to hold in my emotions for so long. i could chant my heart out, but not be bored. i could yell and shout about the sanctity of the picket line, but not feel doubt about a strike i was against. i could sing "solidarity forever", but not hate the people on the line with me. i snapped after being on the line for just one hour. after lunch, i was better. i still have splinters that i can't seem to get out, but i am better.

jeremy brought me a present to the picket. lenticular bowling coasters! i love lenticular things. i think in my new apartment, i will devote a small space to my collection of postcards and whatnot.

thanks to everyone one for being understanding today.

i've been trying not to hate so very many things reccently. i think i am doing a pretty good job. normally my speech is peppered quite liberally with "i hate this" and "i hate that." thing is, i always seem to hate things that are really not just that worthy of such strong feelings. my friend katy would say that i am a "hater of the benign."

i don't know. something that normally fills me with rage is when i see women wearing skirts and tanktops in 50 degree weather when walking to bars while their male companions have on pants, sweaters, jackets, etc. do you think that response is excessive? i also get mad when men walk three abreast and force me off the sidewalk. and when people talk on cell phones while interacting with service workers. is it okay to hate these things? i mean, really loathe them. i have yelled at people for these things before. see, a bit nuts, right?

i've been doing a pretty good job of just disliking things instead. but, today was a challenge. first of all, there are some people in the union who are just IRRITATING and pedantic. secondly, some of them are ridiculously dogmatic. and finally, some of them are assholes. the first group of people come largely from education departments. the second group are more equally represented in a wide swath of departments (excepting, of course, econ and "hard" sciences). unfortunately, the last group all seem to be sociologists. could we not harrass people tomorrow, you guys? i know it's a picket line, but some people don't actually know what that means! up until a few days ago, many of the people in the union didn't know what that means. so, don't get up in their faces in a jerky way, okay? talk to them nicely, let them make up their own mind, and then get out of the way.

more evidence that being a sociologist has nothing to do with understanding the social.

anyway, i managed to not fly into a rage, even when faced with some of my least favorite people. something that has been helping me lately has been to remind myself that there are some things that are not within my control. i'm tempted to say that being on three kinds of meds helps, too.

i'll be on the picket line tomorrow. i understand solidarity. but, someone might get a picket in their eye.

i was walking to the TA office today with a student to get him something that i had been promising him for a week, and as we walked, i apologized to him for being pretty irresponsible as a TA this semester. he said, "dorotha, let's just say that if you were a potpie, your crust would be flaky." when we got to good old 7110, i told the other TAs. one of them said, "oooooh! like from KFC? those are pretty great!" "yeah," said another, those ARE good!"

so, my question is, do i feel bad about this or not?

however, i will be tomorrow and the next day. yeah. i don't have much to say about that, but felt i should make some sort of record of it. you know, for my legions of readers. um.

people don't get me enough presents. seriously. i need a present. a sandwich would totally suffice. i'm starving right now.

and i still hate grading.

texas doesn't just suck, okay. we have a beautiful and peculiar state flower. if you are in texas in april, you may want to take a picture of yourself, your children, or your dog in a field of bluebonnets. and houston, or "the grey naseum" as my former boss called it, has the most awesome free museum. the menil collection is located downtown. if you love surrealism, and i know you do, you should make a trip next time you are in houston.

i think i should just periodically remind people why texas isn't so bad. also, i think i shouldn't have to grade.

either the whole world smells like a molding, wet washcloth today or i do.

this isn't like last summer when i was reading a bunch of evolutionary psych on the off chance it appeared on the social psych prelim (which i failed, thank you very much). when i was reading that, i couldn't help but notice that i am everything that a person wouldn't want in a mate... except i guess i don't have a withered arm or something like that.* i mean, i didn't feel really great about how i looked then, but angela was able to reassure me that there isn't some sort of objective standard for beauty. anyway, this is different.

you see, i am ugly. butt ugly. i try to hide it with cute, nerdy glasses and attitude. but, get behind my comic book facade and here is what you have: my body looks like someone randomly shoved some cotton batting into a pair of "nude" hose, scrinched it in a coupla places, and then ran away giggling. my hair is all "cousin it" style and fucking takes over my life. i have worse skin than i did when i was 15.

the biggest problem is that when i am stressed out, i pick at my face until it bleeds. i try to keep it to my scalp because then no one will know that half my head has oozing sores** but under extreme duress, i pick at my face. so, today i look like shit. i told someone recently that my "look" for the spring was going to be "haggard" and i really think that i am achieving it. blah.

* there is nothing unattractive about a withered arm, if you ask me. but you didn't, did you? you asked some evolutionary psychologists who told you that it was probably the sign of some terrible affliction and that people ought to stay the hell away from you lest their progeny also have withered arms.

** can anyone tell me why i told my whole philosophy seminar that i scratch my head until it bleeds? did it really have that much to do with plato?

i was just watching that documentary about the christian haunted house (in texas, of course) and actually became so distraught and offended by something that someone was saying that i turned off the television before i rememberd that i was watching a DVD, presumably for pleasure. i mean, i didn't turn the DVD off, i just turned off the TV. i quickly remembered that this was meant to be a diversion, not a punishment, so i turned it back on and continued to watch. what? am i the only one who doesn't understand why i would make myself continue to watch the film? strangely, i was most offended by a teenager who was defending the "choice" of "fucking faggots" to be gay if they wanted to be. "what would you do if i told you i was thinking of being a fucking faggot?" he asked, "what then?"

i just spoke to a friend of mine on the phone. he always has these "funny" stories that are really quite distressing. this time it was a sort of an only-in-texas, king of the hill type moment. when my friend little dougie's* mom left for bingo, his dad was drinking in the driveway with some neighbors. eventually, little dougie's dad came inside and passed out (not at all uncommon) on the loveseat (more uncommon). he woke up a little while later and half of his body was numb from sleeping funny. in his drunken state, he assumed he was having a stroke. he also couldn't remember his wife's phone number, so he called little dougie's aunt. who then called little dougie's sister. who then, finally, called little dougie's mom at bingo. allegedly, probably suspecting that it was nothing too serious, she refilled her diet coke and headed home**. by then, little dougie's dad was walking out to an ambulance to an audience of (drunken?) neighbors. little dougie's family followed the EMT to the hospital, where, shockingly, little dougie's dad was told that he was just drunk.

at this point in the telling of the story my friend laughed.

* little dougie is obviously a pseudonym. my friend isn't supposed to know that this happened. he heard about it from his little sister. little dougie is worried that somehow his family will find this if i use his real name.

** shortly after it happened, little dougie had a conversation with his mom where she asked him, "little dougie, why am i surrounded by crazy people?" playing dumb, he said, "i don't know, mom."

ugh. my friend debby just bought me lunch. we went to the sunporch (room? garden? i can never remember which is which). i'm mostly an ovo-lacto vegetarian, but i sometiems eat fish. i think it is probably okay to do it, as long as i am pretty responsible about what kind of fish i am eating. last fall, i think it was, i was eating a lot more fish, but then i stopped because it sort of grosses me out when i think about it. anyway, i ate some fish at lunch, and debby asked if my stomach would be okay. i said that it would. guess what? it ain't. blah.

later: i'm feeling better. i took a nap for about 2 and 1/2 hours. then i ate some plain pasta. from now on, i am following katy's diet.

when i was a kid, my parents (cruelly) called me "rain man" because of a film by the same name. i guess they saw some similarities between me and a severely autistic adult. i used to "have to" take a shower at exactly 9pm every night and i would only wear black shoes with black soles and black shoelaces. when they were feeling more kind, my parents would just say that i had a lot of rules. well, it seems i have a new rule: never pay a bill on time. not because i don't have the money. just... because. it's my rule. leave me alone.

i just finished doing a (much needed) load of laundry. before and after i dried my clothes, i was able to scoop handfuls from the lint trap. ah! i love lint! and i am not the only one. some seek companionship from lint, but it can be so much more.

i just found out that a bunch of people i know from the union are from texas. i love both texas and texans and often find myself defending my home state to its many detractors. what i don't normally do, however, is defend the place where i grew up. i'm from a master-planned community owned by a corporation. it is as twisted as it sounds. the woodlands is, for my money, the worst thing about texas.


here's to the lone star state! the woodlands, you are on your own.

good golly! could i have used the phrase "hang out" a few more times in that last post? i could go back and fix it, i suppose, but i really think i should be made fun of for this...

please make fun of me.

a good friend of mine is hanging out with someone i can't stand right now. it was sort of odd. we were all in the room together at the union office and suddenly everyone but me was going to hang out together. everyone was giggly and happy. i suppose i could have gone along if i had asked, but i would have had to hang out with someone who i actually consider to be quite evil.

i sometimes don't understand the world.

i guess i should be grateful that i was dissed. i'm getting some laundry done and i should be grading anyway. heavy sigh.

i really hate to shower, but i feel that i need to do it this morning. the boys in my department have a reputation for being slovenly and unwashed. i have enough problems with my gender identity without adding "smelling like a boy" to the list of things that make me disturbingly unlike a girl.

god. i just hate the commitment of a shower. once you start, you just gotta follow through.

On my walk home from the union today, I had the strangest interaction with a man asking money from me. It went something like this:

"Can I ask you a question?"
"If it's quick, sure."
"I just bought myself a forty, see."
"Yeah?"
"And I dropped it, just down that street."
"Uh huh?"
"And I only have a dollar seventy five."
"Okay." [already reaching hand into pocket. i appreciate the honesty, you know]
"I just need 75 more cents..."
"This is all I have." [handing over some small change and possibly soda tokens from the office]
"Thank you so much. I'm not a stalker. See this grey hair?" [stroking beard]
"Uh huh?"
"I'm 45. What's your name?"
"Dorotha" [what the hell? probably won't see him again.]
"Mine's Brad. Dorotha, I'm gonna look for you tomorrow. If I see you, I'm gonna buy you a drink. Thanks for helping me. A man needs his drink."
"Sure" [crossing street. beginning to worry.]

And that was it! Weird. So, I was thinking about this as I continued my walk home. Then guess what? I was walking past a tour bus parked next to the back entrance of the Orpheum. Appearantly, the sewage tank on board exploded or something, because it was leaking (somehow uphill) and I was forced to walk through a large, very unpleasant puddle.

After this, I remembered a time that a man made me eat a slice of cheese. It was when I worked at a toy store. He came in after stopping buy the nearby food co-op where he had purchased some smoked provolone. He insisted that I eat it. I resisted for a while, but finally gave in. "Mmm," I said, "Good cheese." It wasn't really good cheese. Plus, he sort of just had the cheese sitting in his hand. He said, "See? I told you you could trust me!" He actually hadn't.

Anyway, that was my walk home.

i doubt you will ever read this. still, it is important to me to tell you that i whole-heartedly support your boycott of JFW. jeremy's blog is full of lies and allows no one the chance to defend themselves.

also, mirah is mine!

my friends and i just got back from dinner. we have this favorite indian food restaurant on the east side. it's very yummy. we always go with a lot of people and make a lot of noise. the funny thing about this restaurant is that it is always almost empty. i mean, the food is fricking delicious, so it doesn't make any sense there is always only a handful of people eating there. the relative emptiness makes our obnoxiousness all the more obnoxious. and we really, really are. it is ridiculous, but true, that every time we go our conversation turns scatalogical.

years ago, my friend jenny, with whom i have entirely lost contact, watched the movie "crumb" and felt the need to advise me that my ex, sean, was just like poor, fucked-up r.crumb. see, sean is an artist and his work is a bit on the icky side. i guess she also was referring to sean being something of a neurotic mess, but nothing close to the level of crumb, if you ask me. but, instead, i am asking you. whose work is creepier: sean or robert crumb?

anyway, i'm thinking about this, of course, because i watched "adaptation" last night.

have you ever been someone's spiritual guide? i think i might be. how can i tell? well, everything that i suggest to a person as being worthwhile, said person goes out and does. it is quite odd, really.

i guess i am a little bit miffed, tho. problem is, i suggest something and the person acts like the idea just came to him from nowhere. for example, i really like a comic book and suddenly images from the comic book appear on this persons home page, or i'm fond of a particular musician and suddenly she's going to move into this person's RV!

i just want props, man. same thing you would do for deepak chopra.

give credit where credit is due or else i'm keeping mirah in a cage!

more practice

my friend carole thought that this was fucking hilarious. i do, too.

how am i like charlie kaufman? a professor i know told me that throughout his watching of "adaptation" he was reminded of me. i find this creepy. not just because charlie kaufman spends much of the movie jerking off, but also because his character bears a disturbing resemblance to my ex-boyfriend. even sean found it creepy how much nicholas cage LOOKED like him in the film. my brother-in-law remarked, after seeing the film, that he felt like he had actually watched sean masturbating. do you think i am like charlie kaufman? does it creep you out?

i'm just practicing with color. don't let it distract you from the question.

i just ate a handful of potato chips as i entered membership cards into a database. yuck. i feel like i need a shower on the INSIDE.

i am supposed to be walking down the hill right now to go to my philosophy class. i'm really (REALLY) not looking forward to it. school is pretty uninspiring these days. classes in particular leave me wanting, and i am not working on anything of my own right now. i wish someone would just tell me to drop out of school. or at least tell me that i don't need to go to this particular class.

for some reason, i am "in charge" of our departmental karaoke outings. tonight we are supposed to sing and drink until we forget the boundaries between qualitative and quantitative, between student and faculty, and between dull as rock and charmingly insane. i really don't want to do this. one reason is that i feel really intent on maintaining some of these boundaries. another reason is the pile of grading that i have to do. the final reason is probably my extreme desire to put on pajamas and never leave the house again.

please, if you are out there, don't make me go...

i'm playing hide and seek with a friend right now. it's sort of funny, but really not so much. anyway.

it's funny cuz i feel like i haven't talked to my friends in a long time - you know, my out of town friends - and yet, instead of making connections with people i already know, i have decided it might be a better idea to write some crap that no one will read because it is so fucking boring. i had a similar idea last week that is laughable in both its stupidity and in my own hypocrisy. i used to write a sex column for the student paper, but i got fed up because my friends and i would get hate mail for our columns (we were too feminist for the general student populace). when i gave up the column, my last piece of advice to the masses was really a rant about everything i hated about doing the column. it was a not-so-fond farewell, and it was meant to last. last week, i thought it might be a good idea to write a column called "ask a TA" in which students could write in questions that i would answer. of course i would end up hating the whole thing. why do i think i should do it? must be sort of like my instinct to eat pancakes when i am sad. i really hate pancakes. they just sit like lumps in my gut and for the rest of the day everything reeks of maple syrup. sometimes when i am depressed and full of self-loathing, i eat pancakes anyway, just to make myself feel worse.

i kind of hate weblogs, too. but, here i am.

today is not a day that i am looking forward to. i have to spend 6 hours collecting and tallying votes for my union. i also have to obsessively check each name against a slew of not-so-good data to make sure that each voter is legit. seems a teensy bit ludicrous to me.

i also have piles upon piles of papers to grade for the class that i teach. i may never do my own work again.

i wish someone would just come sit with me for the entire day. just sit and chat while i do boring drone shit. maybe you could even offer to run to the corner store and buy me a soda when i start to look drained. i like soda. and whatchamacalits. get me one of those, too.

xoxoxo
dorotha

george wendt is staring in the local performance of "camelot." i find that sort of creepy. i saw "camelot" when i was a kid. my mom was in to robert goulet, i guess. i don't remember much about the performance. it definitely didn't inspire me to know anymore about king arthur or even kennedy. if i see george wendt perform in the lead, what might happen? am i expecting to much from a musical?

so, everyone i know is getting married. seems to me that the people that i most want to stay single are the ones that are most likely to get married. people i date, secret crushes, my kid brother.... everyone is doin it.

marriage has always seemed so unnecessary to me and also sort of sinister. i must be alone in this belief. or else everyone i know is a big, fucking sell-out. i'm going with the latter.

my last post didn't show up all the way, so this one is just practice.

i am actually sort of anti-blog and i really don't know how this will go. the thing is, i have recently decided to give up a particular (embarrassing and unmentionable) pastime of mine and i hope this might fill that void. i don't know what would compel you to read this. i understand that motivation even less than my own for writing this. i am worried that i will turn into some kind of whiny teenager by blogging, despite being well past my teen years. i suppose that we shall see.