I want to go back to filling this blog thing with content. Or whatever the fuck it was that I used to fill this space with. Trust me. But through a fucked-up twist of fate, the job that I thought I was being reoffered has been taken away from me because apparently I have an alter ego that smokes pot. So I have been slamming ass trying to get shit done so that I can perhaps make enough loot to tide me over until my next opportunity to hopefully pass a drug test.

So I have been biding my time with custom work. My favorite of late is a family portrait I painted as a surprise for one of my repeat customers. Her husband contacted me on the sly, sent me a few photos and gave me a list of their interests and I went from there. It was stressful, yes – custom orders always give me heart palpitations but the end result is what keeps me coming back for more.  This one ended up going real smoothly once I got started.

I got the seal of approval from the husband, so I’ve started breathing properly again since Sunday.

In other Etsy endeavors, I had started a shop a year ago with the intent to move my holiday cards there. Mainly I wanted to keep them separate from my art so as not to scare away the “normal” people who are there for the art, but even then I guess my companion stories are enough to black list me from “regular” Etsy shoppers. But really, I wanted them to be on their own so that my main shop didn’t get too variety store-esque.

In between multiple viewings of “Degrassi Goes Hollywood” (OMFG JAY HOGARTTTT!) & freaking out in a near-empty theater after midnight with one Janna Hazelbitch Hustwit to the spastic images of “Demons Among Us,” I sat in front of the computer in 90+ degree heat, redesigning my old serial killer cards. I am finally starting to feel content with them, especially the Lizzie Borden one which always fell flat with me.

I got to go for a really great power walk in my favorite cemetery on Sunday. There is something sadistic living inside me, possibly the devil, that makes me crave exercising underneath a sweltering sun and face-melting humidity. I LOVE IT. And it gave me a chance to really give the new not-yet-released Used album a good, honest listen and I fucking swear it is so near perfection that I would like to purchase it five times when it comes out at the end of August. It’s one of those albums where nearly every song makes me blush because I feel that deeply connected to it, as though Bert has written about something that I might have some experience in. It’s just one of those very relatable albums. You should go get it when it comes out. I think it’s the best material they’ve produced to date.

Listening to it, out there in that cemetery, it made me ache, yet feel really calm within myself for the first time in months. Like when you let out a deep sigh and realize that you were practically holding your breath for what seems like an entire lifetime?

And now I just feel really content.

For the longest time, I didn’t have my high school listed on Facebook because I just flat out did not want to be found. The only reason I used Facebook at all was to keep in touch with recent friends, not reunite with old ones. But eventually, people started finding me and friend requests began to stockpile. I’d stare at them, hover the cursor over “Accept,” then veer it over to “Decline.” Then back again. Over and over until I would eventually just log out altogether.

It’s like a phobia, not wanting all those people to know who I am now and what I’ve been doing and have done and am planning to do.

Because of the way I bowed out back then, I had harbored some uneasy feelings about my high school years and instead of remembering the good points, I’ve mostly just dwelled on the confused decisions I’d made.

But then I saw this one girl on there, and I thought, “Aw, she and I were close at one time.” We had a story-writing club in middle school. It was pretty lame, but thinking about it made something tug at me. And so I friended her, and she seemed genuinely happy to reconnect with me. From there, people started finding me. And while I only declined one request so far (for very good reasons and I have no idea why this broad would even WANT to feign affectations toward me), it has gotten easier each time, and I’ve been reminded that I’m not as horrible as my insecurities, issues and failed friendships have fooled me into believing. It’s helped me see that maybe I didn’t finish high school, maybe I didn’t finish college, maybe I don’t have a job right now (OK, this seems much worse now that I’m typing it out), but there are still things that I am doing with my life and have some cool shit that I’ve already accomplished, so maybe I’m not too much of a failure.

Coming to terms with this is a really big deal for me!

(As I’m typing this, Chooch is standing next to me, persistently chanting, “Are you done?

Are you done?” because he wants to play puzzles on jigzone.

com and let me just tell you, I rue the day I showed him that site.)

So in honor of high school memories, I’m sharing these scanned excerpts from my (9th?) 10th grade yearbook that I found in my old LiveJournal photo folder. They make me LOL.

So, judging by these, we learn that in high school I was: loud, annoying, mean and sometimes broke out into disco dance numbers. Sadly, it appears that I haven’t changed much, except in lieu of disco, my only dance moves on the current are raising the roof and sometimes a very lazy shimmy.

I want to know what you guys were like in high school. Tell me, tell me now!

Daisybones tagged me for a Random meme. I haven’t been tagged for anything in the blogworld outside of LiveJournal so it took me nearly a week just to discover that my blog is now a woman.

So I guess now here are 7 randoms about Erin Rachelle Kelly:

1. My favorite way to bond with someone is through music, and I often tend to be much closer with those people in the end.
2. I rarely “get over” things, people-wise, but I go through material obsessions like a bumblegum-popper fanning herself with BOP magazine.
3. I’m most content in fall, especially when sated with horror movies.
4. I once pole-vaulted with a hockey stick over a French kid.
5. I wear the same perfume I wore in high school.
6. No one makes me laugh harder than my kid.
7. Right now I am literally FEENIN’ for the Westmoreland County Fair.

OMG now I get to tag people.

• Andrea
• Ally
• Jessa

Tonight is Henry’s last night at his second job, and we are both very happy about that. Slightly scared for our financial future, but I know we’ll be a lot happier. We were starting to implode under the stress – Henry from never being home and getting very little sleep, and me from being around Problem Child all day, every day. Plus, I think maybe we might have missed each other a little, too.

I have been a little frazzled lately.

I spoke with my mom on Monday for the first time since last November. Basically, the conversation was dominated by her nonsensical spewing of political conspiracy theories, and begging me not to take a vaccination if someone tries to inject me, because this happened in the ’70s too and it’s called depopulation and OMG OMG OMG she’s moving to Canada. I was in tears, she had me so frustrated. Anytime I would try and tell her how I’ve been doing, she’d interrupt me, once to tell me about a fox that has been digging up her yard. She not once asked about Riley. I can’t say I’m surprised, as she did blatantly miss Christmas and his birthday, and didn’t bother to call when he had to go to the ER a few weeks ago (yes, she knew about it).

The next day, she was admitted to the hospital. According to my equally-as-crazy aunt Sharon, it was for her high blood pressure and they were going to discharge her the next day. Well, now it’s Friday and she’s still in there and I have no idea what’s going on because my only source of information is Sharon, who suffers from chronic Pollyanna disorder and she coats every thing with a triple layer of sunshine and positivity.

It’s hard for me to care about someone who clearly doesn’t give a shit about me, but at the same time, I’m still concerned. I’m hoping that a stay in the hospital might wake her up a little, bring my old mom back. Not that we ever had a great relationship, but it never used to be this estranged and tumultuous. I feel like if I had had Chooch six or seven years ago, perhaps she’d actually have taken a more active role in his life, back before she lost most of her mind and reality. But as it is now, and has been since he was born, she’s very unemotional and awkward around him. In fact, no one really on that side of my family seems to really want to spend any time with him, and that’s probably for the best.

I’m just tired of letting this drag me down; they’re my ball and chain. They are the source of 99% of what plagues me emotionally and mentally, yet I keep letting them back in and all they do is knock me down and down and down.

And this subject has gone on entirely too long.

In much better news, Warped Tour was Wednesday and it was a fantastic day, all ups and no downs.

Pictures forthcoming!

What is your favorite way to de-stress on a Sunday?

I was going to write about last Sunday when I spent the day at Kennywood with Henry, Chooch, Blake and Alisha, but all I want to do today is watch the Degrassi marathon, listen to Seaweed and Jawbox, and paint. I’m coming off the tailend of a long and stressful week & my brain has exclamation marks, asterisks and ampersands ricocheting around (and there’s an umlaut doing something strange over by the temporal lobe) and I think that means it wants me to shut it off for a little while. The (very few) moments I have time alone, I catch myself zoning out and staring open-mouthed at the wall. I’m starting to think the best place for me is a cabin in an isolated forest where no one but a deranged man with a hacksaw can find me. I’d even take a beach at this point, and I am SO NOT a beach person.

Also, our neighbors are having a birthday luau for their daughter and it has been going on all the livelong day. At one point, I glanced out the kitchen window while painting (that’s my studio, you know) and spotted some haggard-looking broad sitting under the party tent that Henry helped set up because he’s always so eager to help everyone else but god forbid I should ask him to do a single thing for me and expect it to be done.

So I point out the window and go, “Who’s that lady?” and Henry goes, “That’s Renee, that’s the one whose birthday it is.” Now, I know my eyes are bad, but I always thought that Renee was much younger than me, so I’m a little confused at this point.

“How old is she?” I ask, and Henry informed me that she just turned 24.

She looks much older than me, and I’m about to be thirty in a month. I mentioned this to Henry, and added that she seems to act much older than me, as well.

“Sweetheart,” Henry started, as he braced my shoulders with his meat-paws, “everyone acts older than you.”

I’m growing bored with this blog.

Help.

Sometimes, when I stupidly have an urge to procreate again, I go back and read some of my pregnancy posts on LiveJournal, wherein I am quickly reminded to close them legs up, close ’em up tight, ya’ll.

Today, I had a fleeting desire to try and birth a creature that might actually enjoy to cuddle with its mother, unlike Chooch who might as well just start pulling a switchblade out of his underroos and rolling cigarettes in his shirt sleeve. So to LiveJournal I went, and I found this lovely memory of Ponderosa and realized that hey, I still haven’t been to a buffet since then. This grudge thing, it comes easy to me.

Originally written January 13, 2006

It was all Henry’s bright idea, really. While idling around the house, wondering what to do for dinner (I was content extending my breakfast and lunch of gummies into the evening), Henry suggested Ponderosa. I quickly thought back upon my last trip to a buffet and decided that I wasn’t living life to the fullest unless I gave it another go. Besides, my mom used to take me to Ponderosa when I was a wee chitlin’, and if memory served me right, I believe I liked it.

Things immediately got off to a rocky start when we arrived. I stood in front of the large menu hanging on the wall behind the counter, heart rate increasing from the impending pressure cast onto me from the impatient stares of Henry and the cashier. My only option, of course, was the buffet, as everything else was steak, steak, seafood with a steak smoothie, or super steak. That’s gross for a vegetarian.

We walked over to the secluded booth I chose and it was here when I became arrested by what I affectionately call Fish Out of Water Syndrome. I stood there, next to the table, with one knee on the slippery booth, looking to Papa H for guidance. Do we sit down first? Do we stand here and wait for a signal, a green light or the peal of a dinner bell? Maybe we should just leave; I really wanted to just leave.

“What do we do now?” I whispered. I could feel the anxiety branching its russet fingers across my face, panic wavering from my flesh like heat on the horizon.

“Uh, we go up and get a plate,” Henry chided in the tone he reserves for moments he feels I should be reminded of my fucking retardedness, after which he stood there and stared at me for a second longer, then shook his head and walked away. I quickly ran after him, grasping onto the elbow of his shirt with my sweaty fingers.

I hung back awkwardly, observing Henry’s professional buffet maneuvering. Following his lead, I grabbed a plate, making certain it didn’t come complete with a hair like his selection did, and then I began to tentatively prong clumps of withered lettuce into a small mound on my plate. The lack of fresh spinach among the salad spread had me so bereft that I had to mentally talk myself down from tear-shed. Hormones are a bitch, but to be fair I probably would have stamped my foot even without-child. Two steps down, an employee was coveting the green pepper slices, thereby monopolizing the container from all the paying customers such as myself who really had their hearts set on the addition of the crisp, snappy vegetable to their salad. The peppers were already overflowing! There was no need for restocking at that particular moment, but then I remembered that to me, buffets are  merely an extension of a waking nightmare, so I tried to stop having standards and began to expect typical salad fare to lie in festering clumps, marinating in general buffet splooge and skin flakes from the arms of overreaching salad fixers.

Sans peppers, I moved on to the dressings, which I was delighted to find were not labeled. I blindly added a small dribble to the center of my spinach- and pepper-less crap hill, and shuffled back to our booth with my head down. (I shuffle while pregnant.)

As I pushed the questionable bits of salad around on my plate, I took the time to scope out what nonpareils Henry had acquired. This resulted in an interrogation of how he managed to escape my side long enough to seek out an array of slightly-edible choices. Items such as a golden roll and mac n’ cheese garnished the edges of his plate; things that maybe I would have enjoyed as well.

“If you would have continued along, you would have run right into it,” he explained while tearing chicken off the bone like a caveman, as I whimpered with jealousy.

It’s true, I could have taken more time to explore the depths of the buffet, but not while some old man was breathing down my back, waiting for the right moment to swoop down under the sneeze shield. He was right up against me, tongue wagging and elbows primed and jutted, waiting for the opportunity to start jabbing. I imagined him coating me in the remnants of his impending whirling dervish, and to be honest, I wasn’t trying to stick around for that. Buffets make me feel so rushed as it is, but throw a buffet bully into the mix and watch me freak out like the amazing social abortion that we all know I can be.

After I explained this scene to Henry, while trying to be brave and stifle my tears, he promised to take me back once I picked my way through the salad. Henry’s plate of thoroughly gnashed goods had long since been whisked away by the nicotine-damaged waitress, and still the minutes ticked on. He sat hunched over the table, watching me with his glazed-over eyes as I tediously cut too-large florets of broccoli into bite-sized morsels with his knife.

(My knife was adhered to the napkin it was rolled in, courtesy of an unknown viscous substance, so I wasn’t really anticipating using it on food that would eventually wind up in my mouth.)

By the time I had devoured all parts of the salad that appeared to be health code compliant, there were too many people in line at the buffet, so I made Henry wait some more. It was during this interim that I really got a good look at my fellow diners. Interspersed with folk of Henry’s ilk, and a handful of citizens who looked like they could self-suffice for a few weeks without sustenance, sat:

• (1) man who arrived with his belt already unbuckled;
• a troika of children who had thrown their jackets onto the floor upon arrival and then proceeded to lay on them;
• a group of guys who clearly had just gotten high out in the parking lot

I also finally got to put a face on the noisy nose-blower behind me. And boy I wish I hadn’t, because for that moment in time, I feared that I had somehow wound up in Appalachia.

On my second round of facing the ominous buffet, Henry walked me through and pointed out things that maybe I would enjoy, like cottage cheese, potato salad and macaroni and cheese; it was like having my own guided tour and I felt the need to ask when we were going to see the basement. Little dollops of everything Henry recommended dotted the perimeter of my plate, which I then crowned with a hesitant spoonful of buttered noodles (they looked like worms swimming in snot, you guys) and chocolate pudding (it looked like soft serve poop with a  diarrhea skin, you guys). Henry brought me back a smaller plate featuring a diminutive lump of mashed potatoes (which I took one taste of and gagged back up for added effect), nachos and cheese, and a slice of pizza.

I’m really glad that he had the foresight to include the nachos because otherwise, I wouldn’t have been able to deduce that the cheese sauce festering away in that vat on the buffet was the same exact coagulated concoction used to coat the macaroni. It was disgusting, and it made my face crumple up like an air-filled paper bag being crushed.

I may have struck out with everything on my plates, but I still had the pizza to count on. The cheese was so thick and heavy, congealed with a luminous sheen of grease not unlike a pool of oil in a parking lot or the complexion of an amputee after performing a one-legged fornication obstacle course on the most humid day of the summer while chugging mugs of habanera chili, that I had to use a fork to pry the slice off the plate. Mistaking that I was in a real restaurant, with a real slice of pizza in my paws, I dove right in. And what a shock to the taste buds (whom I have promised to make it up to, by the way) as they drowned in a wad of artery-plugging mush. I managed to lumber through half before the thick tomato paste became too much to bear. And the crust was like no other: A strange hybrid of what one might assume was soggy Ritz crackers crumbled and rolled out with Nilla Wafers on a tray spritzed with Grandma’s Aquanet to form a sad semblance of pizza dough. I was intrigued. Nauseated, yes; but intrigued nonetheless.

Hope blossomed around the ingested sludge in my stomach when Henry suggested that maybe the desserts would be better. He brought back a smörgåsbord of pint-sized confections: A small bowl, which bore a striking resemblance to an ashtray, housed a small portion each of sugar-plated bread pudding and a crumbled mass of what I believe had “apple” in the name. Next to the bowl, he set down a plate which carried a slice of some curious variety of sweet bread and a brownie.

The crap in the bowl was decent, but the brownie was no more than a glorified piece of school cafeteria cake with an APB out on the icing. And the bread! Good Lord, the bread. Having the inferior taste buds that are programmed into your average blue-collar worker, Henry masticated his bite of bread as though it were a caviar-capped truffle, but I droned on and on about how dry it was — I even conducted an experiment using a small sample of bread, a sip of water, and an extended tongue — and oh yeah, what exactly was I eating, anyway? He insisted it was nothing more than nut bread, but halfway through the shared slice, I bit into a mushy mouthful of banana.

“It’s banana bread!” I announced as I pulled the plate away from Henry and happily ate the rest.

“So because you now know it’s banana bread, it’s suddenly good?” A veritable pylon of steam chugged from his ears as Henry wrestled with this concept. I love confusing him with my nonsensical food laws.

Unfortunately, one slice of banana bread is not enough to change my prior conception of the buffet, so from this day forward, the word will be completely obliterated from my vocabulary. Buffets no longer exist in my universe.

The lesson learned is that evidently, my boobs aren’t the only thing that have gone and changed on me since I’ve entered adulthood; my taste buds are no longer the same under-developed specks upon my tongue as I once knew them to be. Which explains why Chuck E. Cheese pizza isn’t exactly a delicacy worth writing home about these days, either.

What bothers me the most is that I still don’t know what dressing I had covering my wilted salad.

I woke up Saturday feeling all sorts of socially anxious and testy. Nothing in particular happened, but I had a long week of potty-training and I think that combined with my usual stressors set off some sort of synaptical brush fire which desperately begged to be doused with wine. So I canceled all of my weekend plans and tried to shut off my brain.

Sunday morning, Henry suggested that I spend some time alone, since my biggest gripe is, “I NEVER GET ANY TIME ALONE, MOTHERFUCKER.” He whisked Chooch off and I did some shit on the computer, watched some embarrassing reality TV (seeing Hulk Hogan cry is even a little awkward for ME), and I modeled some clothes for the cats. Their stares were blank and peppered with undulating question marks.

I lasted three hours. No, two and a half. And then I was fidgeting and sick of being in the house and absolutely itching for something, anything, to do. Stewing in a mindless muck on the couch does not become me. Henry and Chooch were summoned home, and we went for a little Sunday drive thing.

We ended up in some country-ghetto park out near Ambridge, PA. All the roads had clumbs of weeds ripping through the cracked asphalt and I’m fairly certain it is THE PERFECT place to don a letterman jacket and rape a bitch and I kept getting little chills molesting my spine, up and down and all around.

We found an isolated pavilion that had a rusty, rainbow-painted swing set and a SEESAW which I swear to God I haven’t seen a see saw in fucking ten years. I begged Henry to ‘saw with me and as soon as he had me in the air, I mean THE VERY SECOND my feet lost their position on the earth, I was in hysterics and screamed loudly, “PUT ME DOWN PUT ME THE FUCK DOWN I’M GONNA DIE PUT ME THE FUCK DOWN I JUST PEED.”

There were several chained off, overgrown roads that were surrounded on both sides by dark woods nd practically calling out to us to uncover the murders that have happened out there. I kept voicing scenarios out loud, forcing Henry to constantly remind me that our three-year-old was with us but really it was because I was unnerving him.

I totally can’t remember the name of this sad park, but I would like to be having my birthday party there. My Simulated Murder Birthday Party. I guess that will be next year’s big fete. Oh boy.

I like the outdoors, but only for a few minutes because then wildlife things start making my nose itch and I thought I kept hearing a chainsaw firing up in the near distance. I mean, I let out a blood-curdling cry that would rival that of any Scream Queen’s because a chipmunk poked his nose out from the bottom of a collection of wildflowers we were walking next to. A CHIPMUNK, not Leatherface.

But Chooch, he would live among milkweed (Henry just taught me that!!#@!) and jagger bushes if we let him. He’s probably going to want to go camping at some point. I hate camping (I’ve never been camping, but I just know that I will hate it). So then Henry will be all, “Here son, I’ll take you camping and we can leave Mommy at home to bake bread and darn our socks” and I’ll be damned if they’re going to go someplace alone where the possibility that they’ll talk about me is VERY REAL. I will start thinking now of ways to sabotage their camping trips. Those fuckers.

Then we left and Henry bought me Gobstoppers, even though I wanted Jawbreakers but he was all, “I haven’t seen real Jawbreakers in stores in a long time” and I said, “Bitch, then you best walk your elderly ass into a movie theater, mother fucker” but he laughed because apparently he thought I was joking.

Earth-shattering updates throughout the day, brought to you by Tart-Tits. Please try to continue breathing while taking it all in.

• 15:43 June, you have barely begun and already I want to hump you. #
• 01:47 Henry whored me out. #
• 10:13 Thinking negatively has worked quite well for me thus far. Especially when I was hoping I didn’t have AIDs. #
• 13:14 Since it’s Henry’s birthday, I think he should buy me a new coffee mug at the Arts Festival. #
• 13:38 Henry tripped over a sandbag & I laughed riotously to which Alisha replied, “Really? Because you did the same thing like 3x already.” #
• 13:45 My street team, we are bumbling retards. “You do it! No you do it!” #
• 14:15 Just learned that Alisha and I would not fare well on the same relay team. #
• 14:41 twitpic.com/6rffv – Downtown Pittsburgh is severely lacking in metal surfaces. #
• 15:41 Alisha, with me under her (mean) wing: If you’re going to walk downtown, you’re going to do it right. #
• 16:31 Zany Circus guy just asked if it’s anyone’s birthday & Henry gave me a serious Don’t You Dare glare. #
• 16:42 twitpic.com/6rst8 – She’s filling in for me; had a slight case of appendicitus today. #
• 18:02 Listening to Your Best Friend after a dayful of laffs @ Arts Festival, closest I’ve felt to my beloved Summer of ’98. A+, would relive. #
• 18:04 Me, as we’re sitting here zoning out: “It’s like Quiet Time.” Alisha: “Except you ruined it by talking.” She totally missed my voice though #
• 19:00 twitpic.com/6s80h – Henry’s feeling frisky on his birthday, tackles his son. #
• 21:58 It’s like the Penguins are playing with a bunch of tempermental Erins out there. #
• 22:03 Alisha’s trying to get Henry to talk about what D-Day was like. #
• 22:07 I want to see my sinister cat Marcy out there on a line with Satan, coat the puck with some goat blood and get a few dozen goals. #
• 22:41 It’s sad when talent is overshadowed by temper. #
• 22:49 Brightside: Hossa didn’t score? Srsly, Wings deserved that win. Pens were playing like a bunch of kids w/ broken bottles in an alley. What? #
• 22:52 I don’t know why I’m laughing right now & not crying? Probably because it’s hard not to chuckle at a good folly. And I have sun poisoning. #
• 23:11 But I’ll tell you what DOES make me cry: the lack of Boggle enthusiasm in my hizzy right now. Whatever. I’d win anyway. #
  

  ---

• 02:43 It seems w/ Henry’s new age comes brand new tv-watching heavy breathing. Time for some belated birthday arsenic, I say. Or a clothes pin. #
• 14:06 Chooch just helped himself at PetCo’s pet bar, and liked it too. #
• 16:37 Luring Alisha over to the iCarly side of life. She was hooked halfway through one episode, though she tried to be covert with her smiling. #
• 19:25 Quintessential old ppl sat behind us at dinner. Topics included: those young ppl, arthritis, “hold on, I have to take my pills.” #
• 19:27 And Henry came to their defense, stating that only one was old. “The other was only about 50.” Wait, I thought—-? O.o #
• 22:46 I have resorted to enlisting ChaCha to help me remember the name of my favorite 70s (80s?) French porn with the stuffed animal vignette. #
• 23:37 Came across an old lj comment where i declared my rap name as “Prof. Lil’ Vaggie. B/C I be makin’ yo head spin w/ my philosophical jargon.” #
  

  ---

• 00:05 Reflecting over the weekend’s tweets, I’ve learned to stop tweeting while walking. Walk-tweeting. Tweet-walking, Whatever, just don’t do it. #
• 10:14 My apparent consolation for having a shitty mom is being inundated w/ food from her sister. I’m not entirely comfortable with this. #
• 12:19 I think it’s less of a desire to help out her family, more of a chronic infatuation w/ browsing cereal to soft hits from the 80s. #
• 12:39 Henry’s home, inspecting all the meat-laden products my aunt Sharon delivered, and asked “Does she not like you?” Um, duh. #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter. Now you can rest easy, knowing my (sometimes incriminating) inner-most thoughts, actions and tampon-change. Please do not call the FBI

AND NOW: A PLEA

Henry was just mentioning how he should be so thrilled that he has a girlfriend he can watch porn with, but instead he winds up annoyed and frustrated because my criteria is so specific. It has to be from the 70s. It has to be weird. It has to have some taboo elements to it (like Nightdreams, which is one of my all time faves. Hello, Satan and GOD are in it, and a Jack-in-the-Box. what’s not to love about that??). There are times when he’ll pop in a DVD and immediately I’m all “aw hell no, that girl’s voice is ruining it for me and I don’t like that she has a bruised thigh” or “I can tell immediately that I won’t like this one because that dude looks like you” or “I can tell by the music that this isn’t going to be scary enough, and right now in this moment I am desiring something scary” so then it’s back to the drawing board for him.

After he was complaining about it last night, he goes, “What do you like?? I will never understand your standards!” and I was like, “Hey remember that French porn you rented last summer? That was my favorite one ever, I think. Well, amaybe Clown Porn wins that title, but still — close second.”

Yes, last summer Henry rented this French porno from a small video shop nearby (sending Henry out to rent porn is way more rewarding to me than to see him cowardly downloading it). It was from the 70s and I enthused about it for weeks. Now I desperately would like to have it again. Except that I can’t remember what it was called, what year it was from specifically, and anyone who was in it.

OK seriously, if there are any porn afficionados out there, now’s the time to dip into your vault of XXX knowledge. Here is a small list of information, the best I can offer:

1. It was French and sub-titled, from some part of the 70s.
2. The plot had something to do with a reporter whose boss sent him out to interview several women about sex.
3. The main guy looked to be in his late thirties and I think he was balding and not very attractive, but of course all these women were like, “Oh plz mister, let us give you just one quick blow job” and then he would sigh exasperatedly and mumble, “Oh alright.”
4. He had a girlfriend/wife, but they were on the verge of breaking up
5. One of the women he interviewed was a romance novel writer or something, and she got all her ideas from her dreams. In one of her dreams, she was in a kitchen and goes, “Give me your juicy carrot” and I remember groaning because that’s like something Janna would name a weener, but really this broad was actually fucking a juicy carrot.
6. Another girl he interviewed had orgies with her stuffed animal collection.

PLEASE HELP ME LOCATE THIS CLASSY ADULT FILM.

I’m also forever on the prowl for Revolutionary War porn, so if anyone has any leads on that too, plz help this girlie-face out. And tell me to never refer to myself as ‘girlie-face’ ever again.

Hey!

Guys!

Stop!

There is a brand new website called American Indie, and it just launched last night. It’s an impressive and gorgeous joint effort filled with pop culture, music, art and features on people so rad that it’s imperative you  get to know them, and oh my god guess what for some strange reason they decided to throw me in there too and I am ever so grateful!

So please, take a few minutes to check it out and give them some comment-love too, because I know they worked so hard on it.

10 Questions about this girl.

But wait! Be forewarned — there is a rather giant photo of my dumb mug on it. Don’t go turning into stone or worse, contracting H1N1. Also, laugh heartily at the fact that I answered their “favorite city” question with a country, in true Erin form. (Aw, they fixed it! I need to hire them to walk with me through life.)

Something wonderful and terrible happened all at once: Henry got a second job. He starts today, at 3 and won’t be home until 11. This is awesome because hello, we need the money; but it’s tragic because it means I have to cook dinner for Chooch and myself EVERY NIGHT NOW.

I don’t know how to cook, remember? Not only that, but I don’t LIKE to cook.

I told Henry, “Son, you better do like all those good working mommies do and start freezing some shit.” So last night, he toiled away over a big cauldron and before I knew it, the fridge was stocked with small plastic containers of soup. “This should get you through until at least Wednesday,” he said, and I could tell by the way his voice was strained that he’s worried about this too, like he’s going to come home one night and find Chooch and I in an emaciated heap by the corner, being pissed on by cats mistaking us for rugs.

“I’ll freeze some spaghetti sauce, too,” he said on second thought, coming back from whatever faraway vision of horror he was screening.

When he came home from his first job today, he was in the kitchen stocking up the salad bowl for me. I came up behind him, gave him a desperate hug and whispered, “It’s like, the end of an era.”

“WHAT era?” he asked. The era of home-cooked meals, Henry.

The era of not having to touch the stove, ever.

Oh my shit, I’m going to miss that fucking man.

I can make cheese sandwiches (not grilled cheeses, though; that’s one step up from the three-year-old skill level I currently maintain), sometimes pasta but that’s pretty inconsistent, mac n cheese but Henry worries about the nutritional value when I get “creative” with it, and scrambled eggs but Henry worries that I will poison Chooch. I feel like there’s something else I can make but I can’t think.

Basically:

1. anything that can be cooked in the microwave
2. anything that can be toasted
3. anything that is ready to serve straight from a box
4. anything that doesn’t require SLICING
5. take out, though I’ve been known to fuck that up too on occasion

So, what I’m asking is for good, nutritionous and EASY (read: Erin-proof) recipes that I can confidently prepare for Chooch and myself. I don’t eat meat so I don’t know how to cook that shit. Please help.

And if anyone local feels like showing up on my doorstep with a crock pot full of vegetables, hope, and a grandmother’s love, I might be inclined to invite you in.

A few weeks ago, we received an eviction notice in the mail. It’s not that we’re evading the landlord, choosing instead to lounge around in Steelers sweatpants while hitting the meth. We’re giving him checks, but we’re not getting caught up. Henry had been talking to him about some sort of an arrangement prior to this, so we were a little blindsided by the notice.

Henry left to go to the rental office, so he could have a conversation with the landlord face-to-face. He called me from the parking lot and goes, “Look,  the state constable is on his way to the house. Don’t answer the door.”

A simple command. Probably simple enough even for me to obey.

I decided to make it into a game for Chooch, which was, hello, a Very Stupid Move. “Chooch, some dude’s going to knock on the door, but we’re going to pretend like we’re not home, ok?”

“Huh? Where?” and he scrambled up on the chair and peered over the windowsill, his gigantic dome bobbing around like a buoy in the Atlantic. I’m on the couch, hissing for him to get down, but it was too late. The constable, unable to miss Chooch’s beach ball head, rapped on the window.

“It’s Blake!” Chooch exclaimed.

Now, here is where a normal person of average intelligence would scoff and tell the kid to STFU and get the hell away from the window. Me? I believe him. The same way I believe all the letters I get in the mail inviting me to claim my lottery winnings.

“Really?” I asked him, slightly skeptical at first. But when Chooch, face all alit with brother-love, squealed and looked back out onto the porch, I shrugged and made my way to the door. Blake has been known to sometimes show up on our doorstep, why couldn’t this particular moment be one of those impromptu visits? was what I was thinking when I pulled open the door.

And that is how I came to scream and slam my front door in the face of a state constable, who bore no resemblance to Blake AT ALL Chooch, you little asshole.

It is interesting to note that state constables do not prefer to have heavy wooden doors slammed on them. Sometimes, as in this case, it might even make them pound furiously upon said door while barking “STATE CONSTABLE” for all your neighbors to know that you are a criminal.

A criminal with no money who is only one mere paycheck ahead of drinking soup from a boot behind an abortion clinic. And then he updates his Facebook status so that all HIS neighbors will know, also.

And so, at this point, I wise up and do the rational thing: run. In circles. With my hands flapping in the air. I started to run all the way  up the stairs, planning to hide in the bathtub, but then I was worried he’d pull out a bullhorn next. So this is what I do: I stand a few feet away from the door and I shout, “I’m the babysitter and I’m not to open the door for anyone!

” I shout this, in all seriousness, at a closed wooden door. Because this is the best plan I have, aside from opening the door and groveling like a prostitute at Jesus’s feet. And my voice is fucking quaking, and my hands are fucking ice cold and sweaty all at once, because I know we’re really in some deep ass fucking corn-studded shit right about now.

But he buys it, doesn’t press me to open the door after that, and he calls out, all smoothly because now he thinks he’s talking to some young hussy babysitter, “Ok, well I’m just going to slip this paper in the door. You make sure that—” and here he pauses to read my name loud and clear off the notice, just in case there are some neighbors who haven’t heard “—gets this notice from the Magistrate.”

And then Henry comes home and is like, “What the fuck, how do you screw up ‘don’t open the door’? How was that so hard?”

This situation, this fucking little recession that maybe you heard of, this is why Henry is now coming home from his regular job and doing odd electrical jobs for the landlord’s rental properties. So that maybe we might still have a place to live because god knows my mother sure isn’t taking us in. And we thought that maybe things would work themselves out, but then, well….

It’s like this: I got laid off. Our terminal was deemed “over-staffed” by Corporate and, after dodging the first round of lay-offs in November, I was let go on Wednesday. As a courtesy, they had me finish out the week, which was awkward and a total drag.  I mean, who would want to go back after that? It’s like being dumped and then being told, “But wait! Will you still be my date to that wedding this weekend?” and you want to say no, but fuck, you already bought that shitty dress.

And so, like so many other people who are dealing with this same shit right  now, I’m not sure what’s going to happen.

But I will tell you this: if this blog goes a few weeks without being updated, assume that Henry has shipped me off as a mail order bride.

1. I tried to buy something to drink in an Australian convenience store with a Chuck E. Cheese token.

2. Henry was only supposed to be a fling.

3. I wanted to go to art school in San Francisco but my grandma threw a fit because “that’s where all the gays live.”

4. In 7th grade, I stapled my finger to the wall on purpose just to make people laugh.

5. When I was 10, I had a treasure trove of slap bracelets but my mom pitched them all when OMG PPL WERE HAVING THEIR WRISTS SLIT BY THEM.

6. I used to be REALLY into collecting rocks. There used to be a Geek Store (note: not the actual name) at the mall when I was younger, and I would make my grandma buy me deluxe rock sets there. And then later, I was dead set on striking gold by formulating au naturale eye shadow from the powder of crushed rocks. Needless to say, I feel robbed now by all that mineral shit the make up moguls are shilling. MY IDEA FIRST!

7. Another store that was in that mall many moons ago was this incredibly hip shop called Art Explosion. It was kind of like if Spencer’s wasn’t tacky.

I remember that it was always dark in there, and they had the coolest, kitschiest things. I had a revolving lamp from there, it was squat, like a siren. The shade was translucent and had a Hawaiian-beach theme. I loved how it looked it my room with the lights off. But then we moved from that house soon after (when I was in second grade) and the lamp didn’t survive the trip. Ten years later, I found a shop when I was at Cedar Point with some friends, and they sold lamps that were almost identical. I bought one that had fish on it and it never freaking worked. Tears.

8. The worse thing anyone ever said to me was, “I’m going to gouge out your eyeballs and shove them up your vagina.” And considering it came from the mouth of the psychopath I was dating at the time, I was a LITTLE scared.

9. I was pregnant when I was 23 and the sound of bass made me so nauseated that I could only listen to soft rock channels. I have two mixed CDs from that time that I associate with morning sickness and still can’t listen to them.

10. I used to “run away” a lot in 10th grade, but I would only go two doors up to my grandparent’s house. I would sneak in through the porch, go through the garage, and hide out in their game room, where I would write suicidal stories, drink root beer schnappes from behind the bar, and make plans with my friend Jeremiah to take a bus to Hazelwood (quasi-ghetto in Pittsburgh) and join a girl gang. I did this so many times, and every time I would hear my grandparents and mom upstairs talking about me, freaking out, wondering if they should call the truancy cops, but never once did anyone bother to, I dunno, CHECK THE HOUSE.

11. My step-dad accidentally chopped off the tip of his finger on a log splitter when I was 17. We hated each other more than Jennifer Aniston hates A.Jolie (TEAM ANISTON, HOLLA) and so the first fight we had after that incident, I screamed, “I WISH YOU HAD CHOPPED OFF YOUR HEAD INSTEAD!!!” and fled to my grandparent’s house. It sucked then, but OH how we laugh about it now when it comes up at Christmastime.

12. When I was 15, I had a two-year friendship with some guy named Kevin Wilson. He was 18 and we met when he called my private number by accident. I remember he was asking for Celeste. He called back and was like, “You sound cute, wanna talk?” It was always strictly platonic. He lived nearby, but we never met, although he ended up working for my mom for awhile. I would always call him and cry when the guy I was SO IN LOVE WITH OMG would break my heart repeatedly. Kevin was like a big brother, and he ended up moving to Virginia Beach and we lost touch when I was still in high school.

13. Maniac Mansion for old school Nintendo is my all time favorite video game.

14. In junior high my old bff Christy and I once took one of those “word a day” calendars and used every word to write sexual sentences about Andre Agassi. We wrote it on my old Apple computer and saved the file as “math homework.” We never made it through all 365 words.

15. Growing up, we had a hammock in our backyard, the kind that was actually supported by trees and not a metal stand. I think of that hammock every summer, how I would lay in it whenever I wasn’t feeling well, and how my brother Ryan and I would do flips off it. There was a thin part of a tree root under it, where the grass had been worn down by our feet pushing off the ground, and Ryan would spend days pulling and tugging on that damn root. He was convinced it was Hell’s telephone wire.

16. I jump rope every day while watching my DVR’d shows. Usually shows that I won’t have to pay full attention to, like The Real World.

17. I have always been hurt more by friends than boyfriends, and to this day I have a tough time trusting girls and I open up faster to guys (EMOTIONALLY, you guys. God!).

18. There used to be a really nice restaurant in town called Tambellini’s. My grandfather was friends with the owner, Louie. When I was 4, my grandfather asked me where I wanted to eat for my birthday and my aunt Susie (his youngest daughter) was all, “Tell him you want to go to Tambellini’s!” So I did and he was all, “Yeah, OK.” So we get to this restaurant and he goes, “Here we are, Louie’s Lookout!

” and I think I’m the shit, right? Having my birthday dinner at Louie’s restaurant? So then it becomes tradition that we go there for my birthday. But once I start reading, I see that the sign says “Paulie’s Lookout.” Feeling betrayed, I’m all, “Yo, Pappap, wtf?” and that’s when everyone starts laughing and I learn that he just didn’t feel like going to Tambellini’s that one year, so he pretended Paulie’s Lookout was Tambellini’s. I still called it Louie’s Lookout after that, and I still always picked that place for my birthday dinner. It’s not open anymore, but if it was, I’d so be taking Chooch there on his birthday.

19. Once, when I was dating my last boyfriend Jeff, we went out to dinner at this place called SkyVue. As we went up to pay, we were told our check was picked up by an elderly couple in a booth. I didn’t recognize them, and when we went over to thank them, the man said, “You two look like a nice couple and we like to treat people from time to time.” It was one of the nicest things a stranger had ever done for me, and I will never forget it. Not surprisingly, it hasn’t ever happened to Henry and me, probably because we don’t look like a nice couple. And Henry looks like a molester.

20. I used to collect brochures. The kinds you find in the lobbies of hotels and truck stops? I’d take one of each. It could have been about the best place in town to get dentures, and I’d still snatch one up. I had so many that I kept stuffed in the drawers of my desk, that I often was unable to close them.

I will never forget how panicked I felt the day my mom made me throw them out.

21. When I was 16, Nick at Nite ran a marathon of Sid and Marty Kroft shows. It was billed as Puffapalooza and I watched every single show they aired. During the commercials, they’d run ads for commemorative Puffapalooza ringer tees and I begged my mom to order me one. That shirt is STILL my all time favorite t-shirt I ever owned, but I unfortunately haven’t seen it since I moved out of my mom’s house.

22. I went through a phase in ninth grade where I would shave stripes through my eyebrows. It didn’t make sense because I kept my bangs so long you could never see my eyes anyway.

23. I was always trying to fight people in high school. I had/have rage issues. There were times when the social worker would have to call my mom to pick me up because I’d be on a rampage. But I never, not once, had detention. Teachers liked me for some reason and I was usually able to schmooze my way out of situations.

24. No one ever wanted to be in my group when we’d have to make videos in English class, because I was known for my directorial histrionics when things didn’t go perfectly. And once, everyone in my group got an A and I got a B because I wasn’t “in the video enough” and I flipped my shit. “Do you not know that I WROTE THAT WHOLE THING?? I EDITED IT AND MADE THE CREDITS AND I TOLD EVERY ONE WHAT THE HELL TO DO!” Then I threatened to take it to the school board (wtf, lol) and after meeting with me alone after school, she raised my grade to an A. Personally, I think she was just pissed because there was a scene where I parodied her, but whatever.

25. I’ve picked up somewhere around 8 hitchhikers in my day and the only one that made me scared for my life was a woman.

Two weeks ago, I went over a friend’s house to attempt my hand at Spades. Before any cards were dealt, I forewarned everyone that I was pretty much card-retarded, and that it would probably take me awhile to catch on. I was wrong:  it was ridiculously confusing and frustrating, and I never really did catch on. We were even showing our hands and every time it was my turn to announce how many tricks (hoes? whores?) I had, I would swallow nervously and ask my partner to do it for me because I just didn’t understand it. Suffice to say, it was not very fun. (Well, until we switched to Uno Attack, which was designed for the braindead, like me.) Still, I left that night hating cards.

The next day, I dwelled on it. I remembered how my old friend Allison (aka Cinn) used to come over and we’d play Gin. Even though I always had to be retaught as the cards were being shuffled, I always associate that game to lots of laughter and good times. And wine, I associate it with bottles of wine and purple-stained lips.

I haven’t seen Allison in three years. We speak sporadically on the phone, but my invitations to her are usually awkwardly ignored. I know she has weird feelings toward kids, and I figured she was being avoidant. But when she said she and her boyfriend would come over that following Saturday to play cards, I couldn’t help but feel excited. Henry frowned and voiced his uncertainty, but I just felt like maybe this was it, maybe this would be the invitation she would follow through on.

I emailed her during the week to see if she was still coming, but she didn’t reply. I called her twice and texted her once the day of, and still nothing. I started sulking, feeling sorry for myself, and Henry was all, “After all this time, you would think it wouldn’t bother you anymore.” And I know it seems like she’s a shitty friend, but the truth is that she was always more than a friend to me, more like the sister I never had. When I really need her, she’s there, and that includes rushing me to the hospital when the occasion calls. Our history is bizarre, abnormal, sometimes laden with distrust and resentment, but I believe that we have a fierce loyalty for each other. I can’t explain it, and I know my other friends don’t understand it. My best friend Christina, who has never met Allison, has admitted that Allison will always be a mystery to her. And really, I  guess she is to me, as well.

So last Saturday, I whined about it, I sent out bitter tweets, I cursed and spit at the entire fucked up institution of friendship. And then she called me to tell me that she and her boyfriend Bill were going to be here around 8:30. I know I lit up like a kid whose deadbeat dad had remembered her birthday for the first time in six years.

Chooch was still up when they arrive. He took to her immediately. She teased him mercilessly and he seemed to eat it up. After he went to bed, she admitted that she was nervous to meet him. I know that’s a big reason why she hasn’t been around these past few years, and I hope that will change now that she sees he’s a pretty alright kid.

When we sat down to start playing cards, it was like nothing had ever changed. Cinn started laughing for no reason while I was dealing, prompting me to yell, “What? What did I do? Meanwhile, Cinn is crying from laughing so hard, and I still don’t know why, but this is just how it is when we’re together. I do nothing and she laughs her way to a stomachache.

“Every picture you have of me, I’m either eating, or crying from laughing!” she cried.

Sitting there with her, listening to synthpop, drinking wine from spider glasses, it was like no time had passed. It was like we had just gone to the Dracula’s Ball last week, not ten years ago; it was as though she had just kicked an unwanted Canadian out of my house last month, not eight years ago. (I am not anti-Canada. This was an isolated incident.)

Henry was annoyed because I kept winning. And because I kept taking breaks during hands to play the “remember when” game, and to swivel in my chair to put a different song on, and to continuously splash wine down my gullet until I was so giddy (see also: drunk)  I couldn’t see the cards in the discard pile.

“I thought you didn’t know how to play this,” Henry scoffed at one point. My motto was: I don’t care who wins, as long as Henry loses.

And he lost, alright. In so many ways.

After they left that night, I went through that awful whirlwind of emotions that often strikes after a bittersweet encounter. I feel like, even though we let so much time lapse in card-playing and  friendship, that it all came back so easily.  It always does, every time. I’m trying not to get too excited about it, though, because I don’t want to be let down.

Seeing Cinn again made me realize how badly I miss having a good friend here in this city; someone I can call up just to talk about the day I had, meet up for coffee, or just hang out at each others houses. I haven’t had that in a very long time.

And while I was sorting through all these mixed emotions, Henry informed me that we were actually playing 500, so I got to add “deceived” to the frothy feelings cocktail.

For my friend Jessa, who appreciates Craig Owens as much as me!

In other lame areas of my life, I had the first game night of 2009 on Sunday but have been too lazy to write about it. Blogging is becoming a chore again. All I want to do is listen to music, write stories and skin missionaries. Drink some wine after that’s all done. You know, the usual.

I think my goal for 2009 is to make crepes filled with rich delicacies of the world. Then I will open a creperie and I will dress the windows with crepe draperies. I’ll have a specialty crepe called The Janna, which will have boot straps strategically folded in.  Another goal for 2009 is to learn how to make crepes in the first place.

Also for 2009, I would like to stop typing without my contacts in.

My friend Francesco had everyone ask him questions about 2008, and I’m going to ask everyone the one I asked him because I like it when you people tell me shit:

You have one day from 2008 to relive, maybe it’s because you want the chance to do it differently, or because it was just so good that you want to live it all over again. What day would you choose and why?

And I will tell you my answer, because you know I’m just screaming on the inside to talk about more about myself, tralala:

2008 wasn’t too horrible for me so I wouldn’t want to really change any of it. Even the parts that found me crying and puking out my guts in a cemetery? Those parts went on to become better days. So I would want to relive my favorite day of 2008 and there are two that are impossible for me to choose between so I guess if suddenly it were possible to make this question a reality and go back in time, I’d have to flip a fucking coin and then also I would want to go and have sex with Moses and see if that would make it in the Bible. And then after that, I would go thieve some bitches in Constantinople so next time I had to flip a fucking coin, I’d least have something cooler than a goddamn quarter.

Anyway, I’d pick either Warped Tour in July (obv.) or the Westmoreland County Fair in August which I can’t explain, but that was a fun fucking evening. For me, anyway. Henry notsomuch. Last summer was just really rad.

OK YOUR TURN DO IT NOW GO.