Wednesday, June 28, 2006

I HAVE A PLAN!!!!!!!!

Do you NOT want to go to college?
Are you content with going to technical school?
Do you prefer pimping over politics?
Do you desperatley need money?
Then I have the solution for you!!!

This is how it works: my future company will PAY ANYBODY standard registration fee (plus extra!) to take any standardized test of their choice! Dont want to sit there for three hours? You dont have too! just go through the test quickly, and purposefully fill out as many wrong answers as you can find. once you are done, feel free to doze off or read a book. its that simple!

Why am I doing this you ask? the truth is, im doing us all a favor! See, most standardized tests are graded on a national bell curve. by purposefully steepening the bell curve, not only will the test get easier, but higher grades will be distributed to the students that actually try because of how they compare to other students in the nation. In short- if you dont NEED a good SAT score, why have one when it could go to a better purpose? If you dont want to try, then dont! Slack Off! and now, we'll even pay you to do it! its really that simple!


Sign Up Today!

Cosmos Anyone?

I've decided the dedicate this next post to something I have much adoration for and that has taken me a considerable amount of time this summer: Sex and the City. (i also need to write my dad a poem for his 50th birthday, but ive been putting that off for weeks and another hour can't hurt)

what exactly is it that keeps me going back to the store on countless occassions, and now even splitting the bill over cash and credit card just so i can afford to have the next season as quickly as possible? Is it the theme music? The chic location? (NYC, DUH!), the "fabulous" parties and scenarios? or, much to the pride of Ms. Bradshaw herself im sure, the outfits? But this is not about my Sex and the City obsession, its about the show itself. Once you've watched as much of it as i have, (yes, i'll admit it) it does become easy to see why critics say what they do, and I have my own pet peeves, but often the more you pick the show apart, the better it gets.



1. All they ever talk about is guys!



Yes, the girls do have a tendency to obsess too much over guys, but the sad thing is, women do that, alot. In both real life and the TV show, everyone seems to think that they are out hunting for their perfect soulmate who will magically make all their problems go away. Some of the best in-jokes my friends and I share often go back to some horrible guy-based scenario gone wrong, and we can easily talk for hours analyzing the stupidest details. (Guys cannot possibly also be this obsessed, can they?) And seeing it all condensed does make you think: why do we care so much? Some critics may take this behavior as pathetic or shallow (which it sort of is) and blame poor SATC, but I think the show is smarter than that. After all, who said it better than Miranda in season two: "All we ever talk about anymore is [guys and penises] What about what WE think, WE feel, christ, does it always have to be about them!" And if one excellent thing is at work in the show, however, it is the way the four characters grow as they realize that nothing is perfect. who would have thought that Miranda, bent on gaining equal respect as a partner in her lawfirm, would spend two seasons raising a child? or that Charlotte, the innocent idealist, would almost break up her marriage soley because of sex? The irony may sound cliche, but its the irony you only find in real life. And I've even changed as a viewer. I used to dislike Miranda because she seemed boring and was less attractive, but now her intelligence and attitude (not to mention the adorable Brady!) are some things that make her my favorite of the four.



2. Carrie is stupid, and No one's life is really like that!


Thats another thing about the show: though sometimes the characters or scenarios might seem a bit silly or stylizied,(and the one-liners a little too fast) there is much real-life intelligence at work here. What exactly do people consider cheating? Do singles make up 'dating myths' to keep hope alive? Is monogamy not an expectation anymore? why do we always feel the need to classify our relationships? These are questions that almost anyone (or at least women) have asked themselves at some point or another (Even if most of them are questions that can only be answered with more questions)and that are pretty relevant to today's society. And as for the rest, what's wrong with a little romanticism on TV anyway (lord knows reality TV is overflowing with it) Who doesn't wanna be livin it up as a minor celeb in NYC? and it's interesting to see how they use the word "fabulous" sometimes. It almost seems superficial on purpose. After a bad break up, who doesn't want to go to a "fabulous" party and forget all their troubles? Yes Carrie does seem juevenille at times, and is no doubt a serious shopaholic who looses her cool from time to time, but as much as we hate to admit it, there is a Carrie in all of us.



3. What's with some of those outfits? and all those puns?



...yup, got me there.




PS: Yes, I too have just realized i watch waaaayyyyy too much SATC, but what can I say, it's fabulous!

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Missing: My Romantic Readiness?

When I was in seventh grade I was one of the happiest, most enthusiastic, perkiest people I knew. I had almost everything I wanted, and I had an unshakable faith that the rest would all be taken care of. I wasn’t afraid to "dream big" and was sure that a perfect, happy future was looming somewhere beyond the horizon, and I could go in no other direction than towards the rising sun.

When life got a little grimmer the next year, I started to see the darker side of things. I would scold myself for allowing myself to be so naive and alienated from reality. I tried to shut out my inner dreamer, which so often had become associated with stupidity and superficiality. I would cringe at the thought of my former, smiling idiot self who was happy, I then thought, only because she had alienated herself to the bitter truths of life.

It’s ironic then, that three years later I find myself idolizing her. I have since realized that my great, inner happiness was not necessarily caused by self deception, but by my solid belief in all the exciting possibilities the present and future held. My “romantic readiness” so to speak. I now wish that the current me could be so willing to put all her hopes and aspirations into a complexly fabricated daydream, without trying to downplay these mental excursions as stupid and impossible fantasies to be seen in the mind’s eye, but never believed. I wish I could still believe, so wholly, in a happy future that was just around the corner. To smell the sense of possibility in every hot summer day and humid summer night, and just be really excited about the promises of my life, instead of being stuck in the dullness of one lifeless moment after another.

It’s very easy to lose your inner dreamer, and at first I reveled in my new wizened and skeptical self. It was like a misery-laced party for one- spending time moping, glaring, and bitter, believing only in a profound loss of all hope. But the truth is, the more you try to believe something, the more it becomes true. And eventually, at least with something like that, it gets old. The quest I face now is possibly far more challenging- trying to get my inner dreamer back, not only for the sake of my sanity, but for the great source of creative energy that comes with her. Is it a coincidence that around the time I started scolding my dreaming, creative part, I stopped playing dress up games and doodling pictures with all sorts of fantastic stories attached to them? I recently realized that we spend our entire lives trying to re learn what we learned in kindergarten- but I never realized to what degree I was correct.

And I know I’m not alone. It’s a quest as old as time. In genesis, Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge, realized they were vulnerable fools, and were forever expelled from paradise. Now, I am mimicking the same quest as the rest of their offspring: the search to my own mental state of Eden. I know it’s impossible to once again enjoy a perfectly conscious free bliss, (unless maybe I try drugs) but I also know that having seen the darker side of things, I might just find even truer happiness. I will not have just been born and raised in the garden, but I will have had the joy of knowing I worked to get there. And I can get there-I just need to believe it exists.

It is that outlook that allows me to accept the negative influences in my life, (after all, I often later thank them for what they have taught me) but I can’t let them live my life for me, or force me into a self-imposed prison of skepticism and lack of faith. I don’t need to force myself to be entirely content with the reality I have, i just need to appreciate it more. And , most importantly, for the things I don’t have I need to give myself full license to really believe in the possibilities of my existence, and all the great tings my future can hold if I let it. I need re-learn how to lose myself just enough in a dream to remember how good life can-and someday will- be. And after all, reality is only the way you choose to interpret it, and keeping a foot hold in reality is like anchoring a ship in water- sure, the general area stays the same, and that’s important, but the exact location is ever shifting with the tides. You’ll never know where it was, and you’ll never know where it will end up.

So Here Goes...

I beleive in the Green Light.
I beleive in the orgastic future which is not receeding, but approaching with my
every step.
and I beleive I can Go.



This entry is dedicated to Eliza, who never fails to astound me with her unlimited supply of joy and creativity.

Monday, June 19, 2006

Got Bored? Get A Blog!

...Which is exactly what I did. So sink your teeth in, and enjoy what the Juicy One has to offer...