Carcinogens

THINGS THAT CAUSE CANCER

(And Whether or Not I Agree)

1.) Air Pollution
I am inclined to agree with this one.  Air pollution certainly causes respiratory problems.  And I find that a large part of cancer is the build-up of gunk in places it shouldn't be.  When you breathe in the gunk, there's not many places it can go...

2.) Global Warming
Since I am one of those people who believes in cycles (as I've said before), I don't believe that global warming or climate change is something that humans are affecting.  It seems to me that humans are alarmists, in general, and now that we're taking records of everything in the universe (literally), we're scared we're somehow negatively affecting the planet that routinely kicks our butts with natural disasters.  Ergo, I do not believe that global warming causes cancer.

3.) Pesticides
This one seems quite plausible.  I am far more likely to subscribe to a general belief in man-made cancer causes.  This one has been linked to many sicknesses, cancer only one among them, and I have to say it probably did have a hand in a few cases of cancer.  Once again, the gunk where it doesn't belong...

4.) Toothpaste
The toothpaste they mean is the kind with fluoride or bleach (the same things that make our tap water murderous).  I disagree with this one entirely.  I think a little fluoride is good for you.  A lot of it isn't, I'll grant you that.  But that's easy to avoid -- just don't swallow a whole tube of toothpaste, m'kay?

5.) Tobacco
Yes.  Cigarettes and chewing tobacco most certainly cause cancer.  That is a lot of gunk in a lot of places where it just really shouldn't ever be.  Honestly, who in their right mind thinks it's a good idea to draw smoke into your lungs?

6.) French Fries
Sorry, McDonald's.  I mean, I don't think they cause cancer.  But adding cancer to a long list of other reasons that fast food is unhealthy... well, that sucks for you.  Good thing I'll always be a loyal customer (multiple blockages, here I come)!

7.) Bottled Water
Tap water kills us, and bottled water causes cancer.  Water destroys us all.  Dr Pepper inherits the earth!

8.) Cooked Foods
We're doomed.

9.) Aspartame
That nasty sugar substitute they put in diet drinks definitely causes cancer.  I whole-heartedly agree.  I've also heard, however, that drinking anything out of an aluminum can leads to cancer.  That is patently untrue (if it were true, I would have been dead long ago).

10.) Dairy
As the milkman's (legitimate) daughter, I must take issue with this one.  Sure, lactose intolerance sucks, but dairy cause cancer?  Come on, now.  I don't think so.  Milk makes you big and strong.  I know 'cause my daddy told me so.

11.) Pet Birds
Having seen the living state of some pet birds, I am willing to believe they carry/cause diseases in humans.  So I'll agree with this one.

12.) Chewing Gum
Every cheerleader on the face of the earth would drop dead of cancer if that were true.  I highly doubt chewing gum causes cancer.

13.) Winter
Winter definitely causes cancer.  I agree fully.  Winter will kill me, one of these days.

14.) Toasters
Despite men's tendency to cover up anything important when activating toasters, microwaves, ovens, etc., I really don't think that electric heat causes cancer.  Sorry, guys.

15.) Celery
Ha!  It causes cancer!  I do not have to eat it!  Take that, veggies!

16.) Left-Handedness
You would think that in a world that has created the iPad, we would be past the archaic bias against the left hand, which is born out of customs we abolished when we invented toilet paper.  Being left-handed has absolutely no effect on your health.  Left-handers have rights too!

17.) Peanuts
Have you seen some of the bars where they have peanuts in open containers?  Yuck.  Maybe peanuts themselves don't cause cancer, but I think those places just might.

18.) Gingerbread
Maybe an ulcer.  Definitely cavities.  But cancer?  You're not gonna sell me on that one.

19.) Hair Dyes
Having been the victim of permanent hair dye myself, and having seen permanent hair dye cause hair to literally break off, I have to say this one isn't totally unfounded.  The things we do for beauty... or rebellion.

20.) Brooms
Apparently, some people believe sweeping causes nose cancer, because of the particles you kick up during the process.  Those are the same people that believe drinking from aluminum cans screws up your mouth. I'm going with a no on that one.

21.) Baby Food
As much as I would like to say Gerber isn't laying the groundwork for horrific disease, that nasty pudding-like perversion of solid food is chock full of preservatives and chemicals.  Gunk.

22.) Wallpaper
I am not sure how people think this is possible.  Maybe if you stared at it long enough you could get eye cancer... but no, not even then, I don't think.

23.) Flying
I can sort of see how one might think that changing altitudes so rapidly, repeatedly over a span of time, might cause some problems.  I am not sold on the idea that it causes cancer, but inner ear problems?  Circulation issues?  Nosebleeds?  Yeah, it causes problems sometimes..

24.) Exercise
Wait.  I thought I was supposed to exercise.  Now if I exercise, I'm risking cancer?  Sorry, but I just don't buy it.  Not when those endorphins are telling me otherwise?  Endorphins don't lie -- that's why chocolate should be its own food group.

25.) The Sun
I hate that this one is undeniably a factor in some cases of skin cancer.

The fact of the matter is, we live in a world where everything causes cancer.  I have come to believe that the main cause of cancer is The Fear of Getting Cancer.  Therefore, I choose to live it up, avoid as much gunk as possible, and believe with all my heart that I am going to be the crotchety old lady handing out candy to my favorite little kids.  I defy cancer to happen to me.  Let's see if my theory is right.

Modus Operandi: Part 2

(Director has now eaten breakfast and has been forced to change out of her pajamas.  But she is now ready to continue the story.)  Ken bursts into Barbie's house.

KEN: Kelly!  Kelly, where are you?!

He doesn't really look for Kelly, though.  He heads straight for the kitchen and the telephone.  (Director makes all appropriate noises).

POLICEMAN: (also Greg, in a lesser role) 9-1-1.  What's going on?

KEN: My girlfriend just got kidnapped.

POLICEMAN: (gasps) I'll send someone out there immediately!

KEN: Thank you!

Ken hangs up.  Now that he has called the police, he feels free to look for Kelly in earnest.

KEN: Kelly!  Kelly, where are you?!  Your sister's been kidnapped!  We have to help her!

Ken is louder than Barbie, but Kelly still can't hear him in the incredibly high attic.  She continues to play.  Ken also thinks that Kelly is too short to get into the attic, so he looks everywhere but where she actually is.

Meanwhile, two policemen arrive (played by Greg and Ariel, without her fin) and knock on the door.  Ken opens the door, harried and nervous.

KEN: Thank goodness!

POLICEMAN: What's the deal here, sir?

POLICEWOMAN: We heard someone got kidnapped?

KEN: Yes, my girlfriend, Barbie.  And I can't find her sister, either.  They might have kidnapped her too!

POLICEMAN: Did you see who did it?

KEN: Yeah, some guy dressed in black.  He grabbed her and put her in his van.

POLICEWOMAN: Where did he go?

KEN: He went that way.

(Director grunts with the effort of making Ken point.  His right arm is sticky because of that one time when she played Barbies while she ate her peanut butter and jelly sandwich).

POLICEWOMAN: Thanks, we're on it.

KEN: Wait!  Who did this?

POLICEMAN: Well, we can't be sure, but we think it was probably Larry Ferguson.

(One of Director's classmates has the last name Ferguson.  They don't get along).

KEN: But, Larry Ferguson is Barbie's stepfather!

POLICEWOMAN: Yeah, but what nobody knows is he's her evil stepfather.  We've been trying to catch him for weeks.

POLICEMAN: He's really smart and sneaky.  So if you're going to try to rescue her, be careful.

KEN: Oh, I will.  Thank you.

POLICEMAN: Keep looking for Kelly.  Tell us if you find her.

POLICEWOMAN: We'll go after Ferguson.  We'll let you know when he's in jail for good.

KEN: Thanks.

The policemen leave.  Ken sits down on the front porch and drops his head into his hands to think.

Cut to Barbie, who is now blindfolded, gagged, and tied to a chair.  (Director tried to actually do all those things, but only succeeded in getting a ribbon over Barbie's eyes and making her sit in a chair.  Unfortunately, Director doesn't have any Barbie-sized furniture, so the chair is a full-sized one, and Greg has to walk around on the chair with her to talk).

GREG: Did you think you could get away, Barbie?  You know I have spies all over the place.

BARBIE: Mmph, grash asph sjqwmff.

Greg takes off her blindfold/gag.

BARBIE: (gasps) But... you're my stepfather!  How dare you?!

GREG: I know you know where the treasure is.  Your mom told you, didn't she?

(There's ALWAYS treasure involved).

BARBIE: I don't know what you're talking about.

GREG: Well, fine!

He stomps on her foot.

BARBIE: Oooooouch!

GREG: Do you know what I'm talking about now?

BARBIE: NO!

(Director spends an inordinate amount of time making Greg pace back and forth while she decides what to do next).

GREG: How about NOW?!

Greg pushes Barbie through the slats of the chair, where she falls the the ground and hurts hurself badly. (Thankfully, Director subscribes to the George of the Jungle method: "Nobody dies in this movie.  They just get really bad boo-boos.")  Barbie gets up and tries to limp away, still tied up (Director squeezes Barbie's hands together behind her back while she hops away, ignoring how Barbie's arms weren't made to do that).

Greg jumps nimbly down from the chair and lands in front of Barbie, cutting off her escape.

BARBIE: Let me go!  I don't know where it is!  Let me go!

GREG: We'll just see about that, Barbie.  We'll just see about that.

Cut back to Ken, formulating a plan on the front porch.  Suddenly, Sabrina appears. (Sabrina is actually a pretty scary doll, having been dumped in mud multiple times, and covered in marker from a recent makeover.  But boy, does Sabrina think she's pretty).  Sabrina poses in front of Ken.

SABRINA: What's wrong, Ken?

KEN: Sabrina!  Thank goodness you're here!  Do you know where Barbie's stepfather lives?

SABRINA: Of course.  But why do you want to go there?  We should just go to the mall.

KEN: I don't want to go to the mall.  Barbie's been kidnapped, and I have to find her!

SABRINA: Why would her stepfather kidnap her?

KEN: I don't know, but I'm going to find out!  Can you take me to her stepfather's house?

SABRINA: Yeah, whatever.

Ken follows Sabrina to the general vicinity of the chair, where Barbie and Greg still fight inaudibly.  They watch until Greg leaves Barbie, forcing her to do some kind of housework (probably clean the room.  Director hates cleaning her room.  Usually when her Barbies are forced to do menial labor, they have to clean the room or mop the floor).

Seizing the opportunity, Ken starts to climb through a window to get to Barbie, but Sabrina pulls him back down.  She holds his arms behind his back and marches him into the house to see Greg.

SABRINA: He was trying to rescue her.  Do you think he knows something?

GREG: Maybe.  Put him in the basement with Barbie.  We'll make them talk.

SABRINA: Yes, sir.

Sabrina marches Ken down the longest hallway ever at a snail's pace (so they can converse).

KEN: Why are you doing this?  I thought you liked me!

SABRINA: I do like you!  But you're in love with Barbie!  Why should I help you when you won't even go to the mall with me?

(For Director, the only good thing about the mall is the Hello Kitty store).

KEN: You should help me because you know that Larry is wrong!  He's treating his own stepdaughter like a slave just to get to some stupid treasure!

SABRINA: It's a lot of treasure!  We're gonna be rich!

KEN: You won't be rich if you can't find it.

SABRINA: What's that supposed to mean?  Do you know where it is?

KEN: Why should I tell you?

SABRINA: 'Cause if you don't, we'll kill you.

KEN: Then you'll have to kill me.

Sabrina pushes Ken into the basement with Barbie.  He tumbles down (invisible) stairs and hits his head when he lands.

SABRINA: You asked for it!

Sabrina walks away, cackling.  Barbie and Ken are reunited, but scared and uncertain how to get out.  They try to escape through the window, out a back door, and even try getting back through the house to the front door, but are always thwarted by Sabrina and/or Greg.

(By this time in the game, Director is getting really tired of playing Barbies.  But not wanting to leave Ken and Barbie in such a perilous situation, she rushes through the rest of the story).

Greg and Sabrina torture Barbie and Ken by way of quicksand, trying to find out where the treasure is.  (The torture is always quicksand or water.  The quicksand is actually colored sand from a sand art kit Director got for her birthday a while back.  The water always comes from the bathroom sink).

GREG: Tell us where the treasure is and we'll pull you out.

BARBIE: Why should we believe you?

GREG: You don't have a choice!

KEN: I think you're gonna let us die either way!

SABRINA: You're dumb!  Shut up!

GREG: Tell us where the treasure is, now!  You have to!

BARBIE: No way!  We'll never tell you!

(Even though Barbie is the one always getting kidnapped, Director has a habit of making her the strongest character in the story.  Ken is usually just along for the ride.  This probably has some kind of deeper meaning to any psychologists reading out there).

GREG: Then the quicksand is gonna eat you and I'm not doing anything about it!

KELLY: (appearing out of nowhere with the policemen) Hi-ya! (kicks Greg)

GREG: WAUGH! (falls into the quicksand)

SABRINA: Hey, you can't do that!

KELLY: Yes I can!  Hi-ya! (kicks Sabrina repeatedly)

SABRINA: Quit it!  Stop!  I'll help you!

KELLY: (stops kicking) Good.  Hold me down to Ken and Barbie.

SABRINA: Okay.

Sabrina holds Kelly down over the quicksand, pulling Ken and Barbie to safety.  All watch in horror as Greg sinks beneath the surface.

KEN: Phew!  Glad that's over.

BARBIE: Kelly, where were you this morning?!  How did you know where to find us?!

KELLY: I was in the attic playing with Great-Great's dresses.  Then I got hungry and came down for lunch, and everybody was gone.  So I called the police and they told me where you were.  I came to get you.

POLICEWOMAN: And she did a great job rescuing you.

POLICEMAN: (with some colored sand still in his hair) Yep.

POLICEWOMAN: Miss, you're gonna have to come with me. (arrests Sabrina)

SABRINA: But I helped!

POLICEWOMAN: Sure you did, after you kidnapped Ken and put two innocent people in quicksand.  You're gonna be in jail for a long time.

POLICEMAN: Let's go.

The policemen take Sabrina to jail, where they also take Larry Ferguson, after they un-bury him.  Ken, Barbie, and Kelly return home, where Barbie makes a delicious lunch of sandwiches for them all.  And then of course, Barbie and Ken share a dramatic kiss (Director hates it when their noses bump together.  She wants them to kiss right -- no eskimo kisses will do!  So she squeezes some of the air out of their heads.  That makes it possible for their heads to cock, so they can get a good angle on the kiss).  Finally, Barbie and Ken are safe!

Later on, Kelly will go to the bank, where the treasure is hidden (Director kept Cheerios in one of her dresser drawers, since she thought that's what treasure was, thanks to Michael of Disney's Peter Pan).  Once she has the treasure, they live happily ever after.

THE END

Since that was one of the milder adventures, you can imagine the traumatic events my Barbies often lived through.  Sometimes they would go on adventures with me throughout the whole house!  And those adventures were nothing compared to what would sometimes happen during my bathtimes.  Those Barbies were excellent swimmers, which was a good thing, since shipwrecks were so common back then.

Later, I passed those Barbies and all their remaining effects on to another cousin, who undoubtedly was much kinder to them than I.  But I like to think that maybe those Barbies enjoyed their wild adventures with me.  They always got a happy ending, after all.  Even Sabrina and Greg sometimes ended up living happily ever after, instead of serving life sentences behind bars.

I hereby dedicate this post to Barbie -- that acrobatic, hardy doll -- who put up with all my ridiculous games.  Even though when you left me, your hair was matted and you had only a fraction of your original wardrobe, you still survived with that perfect smile on your face.

To Barbie, Ken, Kelly, Sabrina, and Greg: Thank you.  My childhood would not have been the same without you.

Modus Operandi: Part 1

To be my Barbie was no easy task.

Since I was a wildly imaginative child with a penchant for dramatic plots and dinosaurs, when I played with dolls, it didn't look quite like the typical little girl's Barbie playtime.  Whereas normal Barbies played dress-up and got their hair brushed and went to the mall, my Barbies were most often stark naked (or in the one outfit I could find for them), their hair was pulled up or braided (poorly), and they were usually in some kind of mortal peril.

As in many loving families, I had received my Barbies as hand-me-downs, from a cousin who undoubtedly used them the way most little girls did.  But after I got ahold of them, things changed drastically in their little plastic worlds.  Four of these Barbies I called by their actual brand names: Barbie, Kelly, Ken, and Ariel (from Disney's The Little Mermaid).  The other two went by various aliases over time, but I believe their most constant names were Sabrina and Greg.

In one respect, I will admit, my games were much the same as the other little girls': Ken and Barbie were always meant to be together.

My family have always been big on movies.  My father and I especially so.  Legitimately 86% of my daily conversation is either centered around movies, the people who star in movies, or quotes from those movies.  I recently tried to ban movies except on the weekends, failed miserably, and went back to watching a movie a day (since then, my overall mood has shown signficant improvement).

Since my love for movies was primarily a learned behavior, you can imagine that my father watched a lot of movies when I was a child.  And he had no qualms about watching R-rated movies right along with the Disney ones.

I specifically remember being six years old, having just finished watching Thunderheart, one of the best movies of all time.  I turned to my mother and asked her what the F-word meant.

There was also the time I was watching Conagher on TV with Mom, Dad, and Grandmother, at an age even younger than six.  There is a part in that movie where Sam Elliott (as Conagher) has reached a particularly frustrating point in the plot.  And at that heavy moment, his horse chooses to abandon him.  The cowboy expresses his frustration with a couple of choice words.

As the channel cut to commercials, I very confusedly turned to my grandmother and asked quite innocently, "Where'd Dammit go?", thinking that Conagher's words were the horse's name.  I have often thought that if I ever get horses, I might just name one of them something quite unorthodox...

But this blog post isn't about how I learned about cuss words.  It's about my poor, innocent Barbies.  We'll return to that subject by way of a brilliant transition.

I digressed to the discussion of movies so that you might understand Little Me's violent brain.  The most exciting stories had bad guys and action!  So of course those elements appeared in my rainy day entertainments for myself.

(I only ever played Barbies on rainy days.  All other days I was outside.  Mom stopped letting me take my Barbies outside after I covered Sabrina in mud and hung her by her hair from the swingset.  I tried to explain that she was training for a special top secret mission, but that didn't seem to make the process of washing her any easier for my mother).

I think I have prepared you as much as I could for the next logical step of this blog post.  Some of the following events are somewhat fictionalized, but I can assure you, my Barbies went through much worse scenarios than this.

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF BARBIE,

During the Dark Days of Her Ownership by one Rose Dallas,

Complete with Scene Notes in Italics,

And Director's Notes in (Parentheses).

Today's Story:

Kelly's Disappearance

Scene opens on a rainy Saturday morning.  Barbie is sleeping late, as all grown-ups do.  Kelly is up early, and decides she wants to spend the day in the attic, playing with all the dresses in her Great-Grandmother's old trunk.  (Director places Kelly on a nearby desk, where the little sister will stay for most of today's story).

At last, Barbie awakes, gets dressed, and heads into the kitchen for some breakfast.  (Director, being very thorough, actually goes through the motions of getting out pots and pans, placing them on a fake stove, and cooking something.  Probably bacon.  And oats).

BARBIE: Kelly!  Kelly, wake up, it's time for breakfast!

Kelly, playing in the attic, cannot hear Barbie's calls.  So she does not answer.  Besides, she has already had breakfast.  She had Cheerios, with milk on top.

BARBIE: Kelly, I'm not kidding!  It's time to get up!

Kelly is still playing in the attic, still can't hear Barbie, still doesn't answer, and is still full of Cheerios.

BARBIE: Kelly, if you don't get up by the time I count to three, I'm coming in to get you up myself!  (This threat always works on Director, because it is usually followed up by tickling from Dad, and that is something to avoid at all costs).  One!

Kelly plays on, blisfully unaware.

BARBIE: Two!

When Kelly still doesn't answer, Barbie puts down anything she might be (sort of) holding and starts to walk towards Kelly's bedroom.  (Director tries multiple times to get Barbie's legs to move like she's walking without having her bend over backwards.  When it doesn't work, Barbie starts to hop everywhere).

BARBIE:  Three!  I'm coming in, Kelly!

Barbie bursts into Kelly's bedroom and is shocked to find it empty!  Standing in the middle of the room, she looks about confusedly before starting to look for her baby sister.

BARBIE: Don't play hide-and-seek right now, Kelly.  It's time for breakfast.  We'll play hide-and-seek later.

Barbie searches under the bed, behind the door, and in the closet (Director's best hiding places).  But Kelly is nowhere to be found.  Barbie starts to panic.

BARBIE: Kelly, this isn't funny!  Come out right now and eat breakfast!

Barbie searches the rest of the house.  She looks in closets, cabinets, behind all the doors, and even checks all the trees out back (Director used to have a brilliant plan to pretend to run away, but actually she would just sleep in one of the trees in the backyard.  Director and Kelly have a lot in common, probably).  She doesn't check the attic, though.  Barbie doesn't think Kelly is tall enough to get to the attic (Director isn't.  She wishes she was).

Now in a full-blown panic, Barbie checks the whole house again, running around like a whirlwind.

BARBIE: Kelly!  Kelly!  Come out!  Kelly!  Come on!  You won't be in trouble, just come out and eat breakfast!

Worried and unsure what to do next, Barbie calls her boyfriend, Ken (Director makes the dial tones, dialing, and ringing noises.  I already told you she is thorough).

KEN: Hello?

BARBIE: Ken!  It's Barbie!  I can't find Kelly and I need you to come over right now.

KEN: Did you check behind the doors?

BARBIE:  Yes!   And I checked under the bed, and in the closet.  I can't find her anywhere!

KEN: Okay, I'll be there in five minutes.

Ken lives next door, so it probably won't take him very long to get over there to help.  But he just woke up and he is still in his pajamas (Director's Mom never lets her go out in her pajamas.  This is obviously a law of the universe).  Ken starts to change clothes.

BARBIE: Kelly!  Kelly!

Barbie is laying on the floor at this point, completely helpless (Director only has so many hands, and they are currently involved in putting Ken's jeans on, which are way too tight for him.  So Barbie has to be dramatic for the sake of the storyline).  Meanwhile, Kelly's still playing in the attic.  (Director makes ringing noises again).  Ken thinks it's Barbie.

KEN: Hello?  Did you find her?

SABRINA: Find who?  Hi, Ken.

KEN: Oh, hey, Sabrina.  I was just talking to Barbie.  She can't find Kelly, so I have to go help her.  Can you call me back later?

SABRINA: That's awful!  Poor Barbie!  I was just calling because I was thinking about going to the mall later.  You could come, too.

(Director always makes the girls she doesn't like go to the mall, so you know at this point that Sabrina is a bad guy).

KEN: Um...

Cut to Barbie.

BARBIE: (still lying on the floor)  Kelly!  Kelly!  Come out now!

Cut back to phone conversation.

KEN: I don't know about that, Sabrina.  I don't really like the mall.  I need to go help Barbie, now.

SABRINA: Well, I'll call back later in case you change your mind.

KEN: Okay, bye!

SABRINA: See ya!

Ken hangs up and tries to find a tee shirt (At this point, the story is paused for several minutes while Director and Ken search in vain for a shirt.  Eventually, Director puts one of Barbie's bigger, plainer dresses on him and stuffs the hem into his jeans so it looks kind of like a shirt).  Finally, Ken is ready to eat some cereal (Director's Mom never lets her go out until she's eaten breakfast either.  This is clearly another universal law).

While Ken eats, Barbie gets up off the floor and decides she should look outside again.

BARBIE: Maybe I should look outside again.

Barbie goes outside to look around.  While she looks for Kelly behind the pile of firewood, she is suddenly grabbed from behind by a bad guy!  (Director is using Greg for this purpose, but Greg hasn't actually made his character role appearance yet.  At this point, he is only a henchman.  His is a small criminal operation).

BARBIE: Hey, let me go!

HENCHMAN: Shut up, butthead!

(Director sniggers).

BARBIE: Stop it!  Let me go!

Barbie is actually awesome, so she bites the henchman's arm and he lets go.

HENCHMAN: Auuuugggrrrrhhh!

Barbie turns around and aims a high kick at the henchman's face.  Then she starts to run (well, hop) away quickly.

By now, Ken has finished his breakfast and is coming out on the front porch.  While he stands there, immobile with shock (Director only has two hands), the henchman recovers from Barbie's kick and catches her from behind again.  Although Barbie struggles, she can't get free.  The henchman drags Barbie to the getaway car (it's a Barbie Jeep, but Director is pretending it's a big, clunky, gray van.  She has the Hot Wheels version of what she wants to use, and she drives it beside the Jeep so everybody knows what the Jeep is supposed to look like).

Barbie is tied up and gagged at this point (the henchman is obviously very fast at these kinds of things), and can only kick her legs as the henchman drives away.  (Barbie ALWAYS ends up kidnapped).  Ken runs after the car, but can't catch them.  Horrified, he goes into Barbie's house to try to find Kelly and to call the police.

(By now, Director's Mom is up, and Director has to go eat breakfast).

To be continued...

Bother

By now, you have undoubtedly realized that I have a somewhat heightened preoccupation with fairies.

I tend to think that when it comes to humans, fairies are, by nature, one of two ways: mischievous or indifferent.  I used to think there were helpful ones too, like in The Shoemaker and the Elves, but I am starting to think that was just a pretty old story.  I mean, no matter how many times I fall asleep without doing my laundry, I never wake up to an empty laundry basket.

The ice fairies that visited me are an example of indifferent fairies -- they didn't frost my window for my pleasure, but rather for nature's pleasure and their own.  The fairies that leave the mushroom dancing rings behind are also indifferent fairies.  I suppose you could call them good, but I have a sneaking suspicion that if we meddled with them, they wouldn't be so indifferent or so nice anymore.

And then you have the fairies like the Tunnel Vision Fairies, or the hobgoblin I call The Signal Thief opening my apartment complex gates from the signal box, causing trouble for the mortals they are forced to share the world with.  Those are the mischievous fairies.  Any kind of fairy has the potential to be a mischievous fairy, but pixies are by far the worst of this category.

I happen to have a pixie living with me right now.

This pixie has taken lessons from the Tunnel Vision Fairies.  He knows how to create an attention vortex.  But rather than drawing my eyes to a subject of his choice, this pixie (whom I call "Ticker") draws my ears.

Ticker earned his name with the first noise he chose to amplify: the ticking of a clock.  I had just settled down to go to sleep, early for once!  But I kept tossing and turning.  I had several times been on the verge of falling asleep, only to be awakened by the ticking of my clock, across the room.

It seemed ridiculous that my clock should be so loud, tonight of all nights.  It had never kept me awake before.  And now that I was finally getting in some well-earned and much-needed extra sleep time, my clock decided it was time to get noisy?

Well, now I was annoyed on top of sleepy.  But I stayed in bed, as the lazy person I am, hoping that I would be able to get past the noise and the annoyance and still get in some good snoozing.

In the end, I removed the batteries from the clock for the rest of the night.

It was then that I knew:  I had a pixie to deal with.  That pixie's name was Ticker.  And Ticker was a worthy opponent.

He stuck to ticking clocks for quite some time, perfecting his medium, I suppose.  But since then, he has branched out.  He has amplified such noises as running water, music from next door, and rattling in my air conditioning unit.  Lately, he's even taken to hanging out with the Signal Thief down at the gates, where he amplifies a sound that was already impossibly loud: a buzzing sound brought on by some kind of malfunction in the mechanisms...

I am beginning to suspect that Ticker takes particular pleasure from messing with me.  I say this because I am pretty sure he has followed me into my car a few times, zooming my ears in on the vibrations of aluminum cans, shuffling papers in the backseat, and the squeak of windshield wipers against glass that's too dry.

And it's possible he's followed me to work a few times, too, increasing my awareness of a significant majority of the annoyances that take place on an Exasperation Day.  Ngh, ngh, ngh.

I have spent the day thinking of ways to thwart Ticker's attempts to annoy me.  His success in frustrating me has undoubtedly made him cocky.  That arrogance, combined with my newly conceived plans to ignore him, might just give me the leg up on him for once.

I considered cotton balls in my ears, but then I remembered the consistency of cotton balls and decided against that.  Then I thought maybe ear plugs would be a better solution, but I realized that Ticker could probably use the sounds of my own heartbeat or my lashes against the pillow to annoy me, if he was really dead set on being obnoxious (and as a pixie, he usually is).

So I gave up on ideas that would block him out, and began thinking of things that would drown him out.

My plan of action is as follows: When I exercise tonight, I will wear earbuds and listen to loud music.  When I get home, I will watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail (a movie pixies notoriously despise).  After I am done laughing uproariously, I will go to bed, where the dull roar of sleepiness and the imagined sounds of dreaming will be my protection.

I'm like the Princess and the Pea, except with noises instead of bruises.  Does that mean that if I succeed, I get a prince?

Well, a prince would be nice and all, but I'd settle for a full night of uninterrupted sleep.

Proclamation

This is my favorite poem.  Ever.

A man said to the universe,
"Sir, I exist!"
"However," replied the universe,
"The fact has not created in me
"A sense of obligation."
--Stephen Crane

This just in... This is my shortest blog post.  Ever.

(I kind of have the flu).

Surprise!

You know when you pick up your drink, and you think it's one thing, and then you take a sip and realize it's something entirely different?  Even if the entirely different something is a drink you like, you immediately grimace and sputter and double-check the label in shock.  It just wasn't at all what you expected.

Being an adult is like that.

We seem to spend most of our lives looking forward to the next thing.  When you're in middle school, all you want is to be in junior high.  When you're in junior high, the high schoolers are the coolest people that ever existed.  Once you get to high school, college is the only thing that matters.  And when you get to college, you simply can't wait until you turn 21.  Then you can't wait 'til you get an apartment.  Then you can't wait 'til you get married.  Then you can't wait 'til you have kids.

We spend so much time trying to get to the next step of life that we don't remember how hard it was to take the step that got us here, where we are now.  It's like that dream where you feel like you're running in glue.  Infuriating.

That first unexpected taste, high school, left me spluttering for quite some time.  I thought high school was going to be fun and awesome.  It turned out to be something quite different.  It was still a worthwhile experience, and overall a likeable one, but it definitely wasn't what I expected.  It was like reaching for Coke and realizing it was actually Pepsi.

College was another unsettling sip.  I believed college was going to be something like high school, academically, but way cooler because I was living there and my time would be my own, etc.  College is way harder than high school.  All that freedom makes it hard to concentrate.  And guess what?  Friends don't just happen to you -- you have to make an effort.  I pouted about that one for a good long while.  Reached for Dr Pepper, got a slurp of Sprite.

Now I'm in Responsible Adult Limbo.  I'm even at one of those awkward ages that doesn't mean anything, so you always forget how old you are.  I constantly tell people I'm 21, and then have to correct myself.

I have an apartment, cats, and a fish.  I cook my own food (when I cook), and make my own sandwiches (or popcorn).  If I want to, I can read on my balcony for an hour-and-a-half.  Or I can watch as many movies in a row as I want, without anyone getting bored or annoyed with me.  In that way, I very much enjoy the adult life.

Unfortunately there is also another side to adult life.  That side consists entirely of money, that awful human invention.  They don't mention this side to you when they talk about being an adult.  They don't mention the Exorbitant Money-Sucking Loans, or a monthly rent, or an electricity bill.  They don't tell you how cable packages cost an arm and a leg, how internet costs even more, or how groceries become impossibly expensive once you're buying them yourself.  They don't talk about how sometimes you have to cut out McDonald's for weeks at a time to make ends meet.

They didn't mention it, and we didn't notice.  Running in glue.

I think in this case, I definitely reached for some milk, only to realize it was orange juice.  Orange juice is harder to swallow, and just about as tart as a liquid can get.  In general, I like orange juice.  But I was expecting milk, and I guess it just... caught me off guard.

When I sat down to write a post, this was all that came through my fingers.  This posting every other day thing is not as easy as I thought it would be...  Maybe I thought that writing a blog would somehow make finishing a book the next step.  If that's true, I am definitely running in super-glue.  And I'm being chased by rabid coyotes to boot.

Ink Blots

My Superhero Mom likes to tell a story from the days when I was first learning to talk.  She always tells it with a grin and an indulgent shake of her head.  And although she wouldn't use quite this phrasing, I know she tells it as the memory of the day she knew I was going to be a weirdo.

To hear Mom tell it, I was always a very cheerful baby, unless I had an earache.  And in this particular story, my ears were fine.  So I was sitting cheerfully on the dining room floor, singing nonsense to myself as I often did, and peering out the deck doors to the world beyond.  It was a world to which my mother could not yet entrust me, since I was a wanderer even then.  I like to think Little Me had aspirations to be an explorer.

Anyway, as I was sitting there, staring out the window, singing away, I apparently startled my mother by interrupting myself with an exclamation of one word: "Duckie!"

I suppose I wanted to make sure someone acknowledged my astute observational skills, because I continued to say "duckie" multiple times, and added a pointing finger for emphasis.  My Superhero Mom obligingly came to look for the alleged "duckie."  But when she peered out into the backyard, she could see no wildlife of any kind.

Confused, Mom patted my head with a, "That's nice, dear."

Happier now, I nevertheless continued to point out the window and say, "Duckie!" every now and then. Maybe Little Me thought it would be a nice break from the usual 24/7 opera performance.

My persistence was intriguing for Mom.  She was used to me pointing out the obvious, but not for such a long period of time, and not when there was nothing actually obvious to be pointed out.  She came several times at my delighted cries of "duckie," only to be once again stymied by the complete lack of visible ducks.

---

Fast-forward to 22-year-old me, 30,000 feet in the air, 20 minutes into a 2-hour flight (that was a lot of numbers).  It's dark out, but I managed to snag a window seat, and the city lights below are astonishingly beautiful.  I start to catalogue what I see below, not just in my head, but in a notebook as well.

"A leprechaun with a bellyache," I write, grinning.  "Goblin in profile."  "Mushroom."  "Sleepy pig in flight."

These should be town names, I think with a secretive sort of smile.  If we named town based on what they looked like from above, like we do with constellations except in reverse, these would be the town names.


"Lightning strike."  "Butt-print."  "Duck foot."  "Trumpeteer."  "Stepping stones."  "Sword handle shaped like a goblin head."  "Rapier."

My personal favorite comes into view next: "Two Guys with a Trip Wire."  I actually giggle about that one, drawing a weird look from the large Latino man in the aisle seat.

"Seahorse King."  "Thunderbird."  "Electrocuted gnome."  Some of these towns lend themselves so well to the descriptions that I wonder if they were planned that way on purpose (as opposed to an accidental plan?  Shut up).

"Spider," I scribble as we pass a great cluster of lighted towns.  "Ankle boot with zipper."  "Water pump."  "Wyvern that just ate an iPod."

That one gets doodled with gleeful zeal.  Aisle Seat gives me that strange look again.

"Cartwheel gone wrong."  I spot the shape in between sentences.  "Kangaroo in moonlight."

With a sigh, I realize that not everyone will be as entertained by this little activity as I am, and that I should probably finish this blog post soon.  So, I set my pen to paper beneath my list, and pick up where I left off.

---

"Duckie!  Duckie!  Duckie!"

Just as My Superhero Mom was about to shrug the incident off and label me "The Girl who Cried Duck," she spotted something on the window.

A smudge.

Its placement on the window meant it was probably put there by a very small individual.  This greasy smudge on the window... vaguely resembled... a duck.

And at that moment, Mom knew that her daughter was going to be a weirdo.

She was right.  I rock at picking out shapes in clouds, yo.  And sometimes I tell people what my chicken fingers look like before I eat them.

Just be glad I told you that story, and not my dad's favorite story about when I was in the bathtub and the fire alarm went off.  We'll save that one for another day...

Jovial

You may think, due to yesterday's post, and due to the fact that I have never had a boyfriend on any of the 22 Valentine's Days I have celebrated, that I don't like Valentine's Day.  You'd be wrong about that, I'm afraid.

I actually love Valentine's Day.  I may be destined to be a husbandless cat lady, but I do believe in romance and love.  I genuinely enjoy celebrating the Hallmark holiday that has become all about love.  In fact, I will be eating heart-shaped pizza today.  I think that's pretty awesome.

In order to balance out yesterday's somewhat angsty post, I offer you this somewhat for-fun post.

FOURTEEN ENNUMERATED THINGS

THAT ALL

SORT OF

HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH

ST. VALENTINE'S DAY

1.) There were, apparently, three saints named Valentine.  They were all martyred in various ways, at various times in history, in various places across the globe.  These three saints were later accidentally combined into one St. Valentine (about whom the auspicious they purported a huge, fictitious, Romeo-&-Juliet-forbidden-love-type story).  So even though we call it St. Valentine's Day, it should technically be called St. Valentines' Day.  The difference in apostrophe placement is a very big deal in my tiny grammatical world.

2.) The hearts we put on everything look nothing like the actual human heart.  When I did some research about the heart symbol, I was made aware that the heart symbol may have originated as a mimickery of either plants, or early forms of herbal birth control, or simply stylized sex symbols.  That gives new meaning to that typical emoticon: <3.

3.) Although Valentine's Day itself dates back to years in the triple digits, it wasn't until the late 18th century that people began to use it as a means of courtship.  Guess how the love thing got spread around?  Fancy greeting cards.  I think we can officially call this one a Hallmark holiday.

4.) I think it means something that the kissing bears are fitted with magnets that force them to kiss.  Shouldn't they have a choice?  It's sick!  Sick, I tell you!

5.) PinkFriend's birthday is on Valentine's Day.  I cannot think of a more appropriate day for PinkFriend to have been born.  I have double the reasons to celebrate February 14th!

6.) I have always had this secret dream of receiving tons and tons of multi-colored roses from a guy who loves me on Valentine's Day.  I guess it isn't secret anymore.

7.) Valentine's Day could also be viewed as a day celebrating chocolate, in all of its delectable beauty and wonder.

8.) Ladies, don't ever get married on Valentine's Day.  It makes it too easy for your man to remember when your anniversary is, while it simultaneously quadruples the pressure for him to come up with some kind of uber-romantic rendezvous year after year after year...

9.) If you do happen to be single on Valentine's Day, and you realize that you're noticing more and more couples, until it seems that everyone on the planet has a match except you, don't be distressed.  Tunnel-Vision Fairies love Valentine's Day.  These fairies fly in patterns to create an attention vortex, drawing your gaze and making it impossible for you to miss the couple they used as a focal point.  They take every opportunity to make you miserable.  They follow single people around all day.  The best way to get rid of them is to pretend like it doesn't bother you.  If you concentrate hard enough on convincing the fairies of this, you might even convince yourself.

10.) Although St. Valentine's Day tries to be perfect, he definitely has his shortcomings.  A little known fact about St. Valentine's Day is that he is actually extremely jealous of his brother St. Patrick's Day.  St. Valentine's Day wishes he could be more laid back and fun, like good ol' St. Patty's Day, even though his brother is way undercelebrated.  Whenever it seems that Valentine's Day isn't going as well as you'd like, try to cut him some slack.  It might just be an off-year for the poor guy.

11.) One should only give out Valentine's Day cards if there is candy to back it up.  A card sans candy is as meaningless as The Pope sans his tall hat.

*By the way, if PinkFriend were Pope, I imagine it would look something like this:*

12.) Fellas, Valentine's Day might be a good day to make a move on that chick you've had your eye on.  My favorite pick-up line of all time is the classic, "Let's count shoulders" line, where he ends up with his arm around you.  The "Are your feet tired?" and "Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?" types of lines are acceptable, though not ideal.  Try to be more creative.  But above all, don't ever use anything written by George Lucas (I shudder to think of the sand conversation in Attack of the Clones).

13.) No matter how much you want them to, your pets do not celebrate Valentine's Day.  Please don't dress them up like they do.  You will only confuse and annoy them, provoking their uprising all the sooner.  Let's avoid that, shall we?  (Also, if you don't dress them up like that, I don't have to coo and aww over the stupid pictures you took and insisted on showing me).

14.) As the final item on this list, I shall reveal to you that I have made it my mission in life to find Cupid some pants.

Wise Maid

Happy Dote Upon Yourself Day!

You... you look confused.  (That's right.  I can see you.  Are you creeped out?)

...Big Brother is watching you...

No, just kidding.  I know you look confused because I just wished you joy for a holiday that doesn't officially exist.  But I tell you this: it is a holiday, one that actually has quite a tradition.  It occurs every year on this day: February 13, the day before the most corrupted holiday in history.  But more on that later...

Dote Upon Yourself Day was a notion born in our junior year of high school.  Before you scoff and ignorantly declare that no good ideas come out of high school students, let's remember that the Zombie Apocalypse Protection Unit might one day be the only thing saving you from total annihilation.  Are we agreed that our high school conversations were of merit?  Good.

On the day this holiday was first conceived, I was, as usual, sitting against the taupe-colored walls, blocking the hallway with my freakishly long giraffe legs, and gabbing with FoxyFriend and PurpleFriend.  That day's subject: the dreaded Valentine's Day.

PurpleFriend had, as usual, been wasting a lot of time on the internet, and had printed off for our reading enjoyment some anti-boy gems, such as, "'Can you feel the love tonight?'  Yes, and it's making me want to puke!"

As we pored over these, bursting out into random, raucous laughter, we got on the subject of how awful Valentine's Day was for us single high school girls.  The more we talked about it, the more cynical we got.  Love -- bah!  Boys -- ha!  And all that red and pink -- BLUGH!

We came to a decision.  No more would we mourn our solitary relationship status on a cheery Hallmark holiday!  No more would we swim through a sea of frilly hearts and insincere cliches!

We would create a holiday of our own, to balance the scale, as it were.  We would create a holiday in which a woman could turn the attentions and admirations usually directed at males onto a much more deserving target: herself.  We would create a guilty pleasures day, and day of indulgence, and Anti-Valentine's Day.  And most importantly: NO BOYS ALLOWED!!!

This day had enormous potential!  This holiday would be a day to worry about only one person, to toss aside the stress of everyday life and simply relax in whatever way suits you best.  Dote Upon Yourself Day is your excuse for an entire day at the spa.  For a luxurious bubble bath in low light, with scented candles all around.  For braiding hair and painting toenails, and eating as much ice cream, chocolate, and/or McDonald's as you want!

It just so happened that in our junior year of high school, Valentine's Day was on a Saturday.  That meant that, quite appropriately, the 13th of February fell on a Friday.  We could think of no better day to launch our newly-created holiday than the day before its opposite, and you can bet we took great pleasure launching it on Friday, the 13th.

That first year, we determined the first of many traditions to come.  FoxyFriend, PurpleFriend, BlueFriend and I all participated, ignoring the strange looks we received all day (we were quite used to them to begin with).  We wore all black, from head to toe, in protest of the varying shades of red and pink that would assault our eyes the next day.

To bedeck our outfits in a holiday-appropriate manner, we also wrote slogans on strips of duct tape.  These slogans were statements of our independence as females, and our complete disdain for love (until tomorrow)!  PurpleFriend's shirt read, "They say someday my prince will come.  I think my prince got lost and is too stubborn to ask for directions," which went well with my, "Love lifts us up where we belong... Yeah, until you hit your head on the ceiling."

The final tradition from that first year was actually deemed optional.  FoxyFriend and I, being hard-core and quirky as we always have been, refused to speak to anything with a Y chromosome (excluding teachers and family) for the entire day.

I happen to know that I offended some people following that tradition.  I have a very specific memory of walking down the hallway, late for Geometry, next to a boy whom I had always considered to be rather cute, and certainly nicer than most of the other 400 people in attendance at my high school.  This was not a normal occurrence.  I rarely saw this boy outside of chapel, where he usually sat in the pew directly behind me.

I had never walked alone with this boy in the hallway before, and I would never have it happen again.  But of course we did both end up late for geometry on the one day I would refuse to speak to him.

Despite my charades, and despite pointing multiple times at the duct tape wristband advertising the name of the holiday, I don't think I ever managed to communicate to him just exactly why I was dressed all in black and stubbornly silent.  I think he was under the impression I was in some kind of weird mourning.

Oh, well.

Although the holiday primarily began as a public statement, it gradually developed quieter traditions.  In the eclectic college environment, black clothes and duct tape lost some of its oomph.  And although eschewing male conversation was still a noticeable statement, I found myself losing the feeling of novelty and rebellion.

That's when Dote Upon Yourself Day became more like its name.  It became a day for me to eat as much popcorn as I could, with as much parmesean cheese as I wanted.  It became a day to drink half my stock of Dr Pepper.  To watch any movies I so desired.  It became a day of true, girly indulgence.

Oh, I still spent plenty of time being cynical about love, in the spirit of the Anti-Valentine's Day we had created it to be.  I still get fired up about the terms for people who stay single their whole lives.  A man becomes a "bachelor," which by all accounts has pretty good connotations, in general.  A woman?  Old maid.

But I learned the value of just taking a day to do whatever struck your fancy.  Of going on an adventure, if you wanted, or staying in and pigging out, or laying in bed until 3PM before going outside to lay in the sun and read.

One memorable Dote Upon Yourself Day, for instance, was spent in a bowling alley.  We laughed at each other's poor scores, and ate pizza like it was going out of style, and started calling Valentine's Day by another name: Single Awareness Day.

Another was spent in my dorm room with Roommate and BrownFriend, painting each other's nails and watching a cheesy movie, and getting into self-renewing laugh cycles that brought our disgruntled suitemates into the room wondeing what the heck we were doing.

This year, I am spending Dote Upon Yourself Day with BrownFriend again.  I intend to celebrate the holiday to its fullest.

So I'll say it again:

Happy Dote Upon Yourself Day!

Alchemy

n. the power or process of transforming something common into something special; an inexplicable or mysterious transmuting.

Every day, you take oxygen into your lungs, and expel carbon dioxide.  You do this approximately 17,280 times every day.  And you don't even realize that you're doing it.

Con-Text

I support T9 Word.

I'm not saying you have to agree, so don't get your knickers in a knot.  You should know by now that a blog post isn't generally four words long, since I am a verbose sesquipedalian.  And I intend to give that opening statement its usual attention and expansion, so that you will fully understand why I said such a thing.

I am aware that most new-fangled cell phones (including mine) now have keyboards for our thumbs.  I do not care.  I use T9 Word every day (unless I am on mobile Facebook, which hates me as much as regular Facebook does, and therefore hates T9 Word probably just because I like it).  I have been described as a "T9 fiend" by GreenFriend, who watched in amazement as my muscle memory took over one night.

As a person who hates talking on the phone with the fiery passion of one thousand suns, I have become an avid texter.  Texting makes it easy for me to avoid actual human contact by making it possible for me to communicate simple concepts sans vocal chords.  No more do I have to actually call and speak to my mother just to ask her if she wants something from WalGreen's!  Text messaging to the rescue!

This loss of verbal phone communication has been bemoaned by many-a scholarly person.  The swift onset of "txt-spk" being one of the lamentable side-effects of the spike in dependance on texting, the intelligent human beings of Earth are (accurately) projecting a directly proportional degeneration in the spoken word. 

However, as I have stated before, my texting is grammatically immaculate (betcha think that's more impressive now that you know I use T9 to do it).  So this is not a fear I apply to myself.  And I hate the phone.  So I'll text until the day my thumbs fall off.

But that's just the justification for my initial sentence.  Now I will tell you the real reason I am a fan of predictive texting:

T9 Word makes me giggle.

Seriously!  Some of the suggestions it foists on me are like little gifts from above, sent to cheer me in a world of gray winter doom.

I know that T9 has its drawbacks, specifically when it comes to small words.  If you want to type "me," T9 inevitably gives you "of" first.  If you want to type "go," T9 insists you want to say "in."  And I can't tell you how many times I have furiously backspaced after typing "I an" instead of "I am."

T9 also has a startling ability to recall every fake word you have ever typed or selected by accident.  My current phone decided that when I tried to type "its," I would always mean "Gtr."  I don't know what "Gtr" is, but it made me want to growl at the screen every time.  It also has a strange attachment to the word "sacred," over "scared," to the point that I actually spent a significant amount of time selecting "scared" from the drop-down list over and over and over and over and over to teach it the better habit.

But my old phone would not be taught.  I had a very small, very inexpensive phone when I was first venturing into the world of texting.  After I figured out how T9 worked, my phone showed its strange quirk.  Whenever I tried to type the word "think," my old phone invariably inserted this collaboration of letters: "thhok."  I am absolutely positive that I never typed that odd-looking word (perhaps it's an onomatopoeia?).  To this day, I believe that my phone was insulting my intelligence; clearly it didn't thhok I could think at all.

But despite these little time-consuming setbacks, I find T9 word to be intensely amusing.  There are several specific examples I like a lot.  To the point that I actually select the wrong thing on purpose before typing the correct word, because I don't want it to learn new habits for these particular things.

The first of these encouraged failures occurred when I tried to call my mother ancient (I was being sarcastic).  My text ended up saying, "Mother, you are so ambient."  I actually laughed out loud (no, I didn't lol.  Don't use that abominal abbreviation around me, please [also note that the word "please" has multiple vowels, and is therefore not spelled "plz"]).  I couldn't decide if calling a person "ambient" was a compliment or an insult.  But I think it is probably a compliment.

I just discovered a new enjoyable one a few minutes ago, when I was responding to Ex-BF-in-Law about PinkFriend's upcoming birthday.  I wanted to say, "Since I have zero clones or doppelgangers..."  And now I am purposefully not going to speculate what you may or may not be thinking about the kind of text conversations I have.  "Doppelgangers" is hardly a commonly used word, so T9 understandably did not know it.  My text ended up reading, "Since I have zero clones or forefingers..."  I will admit to emitting a few audible chuckles while I painstakingly taught my T9 to recognize "doppelgangers" as a word.

A golden oldie, and the one I am most careful to preserve, is one that came about after I started getting Predators Tweets to my phone.  As any good Preds fan knows, the very impressive Preds goalie is spectacularly named: Pekka Rinne.  Were you aware, however, that the same numbers it requires to type "Rinne" in T9 Word are also the numbers necessary to type "phone?"  Of course you weren't.  But guess what?  Every time I go to type "phone," I get to be reminded of one of the best hockey players living in the shadow of the Batman Building.

The last one I like is kind of... um... petty.  You see, my dramatic, whiny saga with BlueEyes sort of began with the introduction of a girlfriend.  This girlfriend was an extremely nice person, and very good for him.  But you can understand, since I am sort of a mess over him, why I didn't exactly warm to her.  Although he is no longer with this girlfriend, seeing her name still makes my heart go all achey and weird.  So when my T9 Word automatically corrects her name to "malaria"... well, it comforts me for myriad reasons.

T9 is just one of those things for me.  It's one of those things that can always make me giggle, even on days when I would rather scowl at the world and wrap up in my socially challenged cocoon.

You know what I'm talking about.  For some people, it's seeing highly amusing Engrish somewhere, like, "Unbelievable! This Is Not Butter," slapped on the top of a tub of I-Can't-Believe-It's-Not-Butter.  For others, it might be seeing that the Adult Store sits under a towering billboard that says, "Jesus is watching you!"  And sometimes it might be as simple as driving by a Feminist Bake Sale.

We have daily recommendations for how much water we should drink, how much Vitamin C we should take in, and we even have a completely unrealistic recommendation for vegetables (eight servings?  I say no, sir!).

I tend to think we should have daily recommendations for other things.  Things like how many times you should laugh until your sides hurt.  Or how many times a single girl should flirt with a handsome stranger.  Or, like the examples above, how many servings of irony you should take in.

Hey, at least I didn't focus on my overexaggerated love for puns.

Havasupai

When we were in college, BrownFriend, Roommate, and I had a discussion about which one of us was the most intimidating.  I won.

Before they argue that point, let me explain.  What we decided in the course of that conversation is that everyone is intimidating in some way.  BrownFriend, for instance, is intimidating because she was/is drop-dead gorgeous, in that Venezuelan way that can't be achieved through surgery, make-up, or tanning booths.  Roommate was intimidating in that she was/is so overwhelmingly nice.  But me?  I was just downright intimidating, in the most conventional understanding of the word.

People have tried to make this sound softer.  I have been described as a "fierce friend" on more than one occasion, and that is a title I accept gladly.  I have also been told that I have a "very strong personality," which is essentially a roundabout way of calling me a stubborn mule with loud, unswerving opinions (better a mule than a giraffe, I suppose).  This is also something I admit to.  I am who I am; there is no malleability in this personality.

But the plain and simple truth is that I am an intimidating person.

It is possible that this perception of me stems from my complete inability to interact properly with other humans, especially in a first meeting situation.  Despite the number of colored friends I mention with every post, you ought to know by now that I am actually an introvert.  I live more in my own head than outside of it, and my friends are the people that accept, and sometimes appreciate, the depth of insanity that results from that mindframe.

My tendency to retreat into my imagination is amplified upon a first encounter by the fact that I am watchful.  Besides just being a people watcher, I find it comforting to observe before venturing forth.  I am the clown fish of the social world (sorry, BrownFriend).  I would rather chill in my anemone for a little bit, if you don't mind.  Don't get too close, or my buffer will sting you.

I have been forced to recognize the fact that the combined force of these bashful tendencies probably comes off as frigid.  This is particularly likely in situations where the new person I'm introduced to has had ample opportunity to observe me with my Friends, with whom I am crazy and loud and quirky and all over the place.  The contrast must be shocking, particularly when I throw out my anemone stings in the form of scathing sarcasm.  I can understand why people might be... a little... cautious with me.

Add to that the very real possibility of me kicking your butt (be it verbally or literally) if you ever hurt someone I love, and you arrive at the summation of all these aspects of my socially challenged self: I am intimidating.

As an intimidating person, you can imagine that it is not often I meet someone who can, in turn, intimidate me.  I admit that I am a person who makes snap judgments.  I evaluate you the first time I meet you.  If we meet again, I assess my original impression for accuracy.  After the third meeting, I will interact with you as loudly as with my friends, through the lens of my fully formed opinion.

This means that after I have made a decision about you, you become just another person in my scope of acquaintance, and I will treat you thusly.  I have three interaction modes: strangers, acquaintances, and special friends.  Once you get to special friend mode, you are stuck there forever, unless you completely betray my confidence in every way possible (this has actually happened only once).  Most people get acquaintance treatment, in which I tell you whatever I think and you may respond accordingly.

Now that I have been in my office environment (a quite literal Hell for a socially challenged individual) for almost eight months, and now that Coworker is no longer working with us (three cheers for justice!  Hip, hip!), I have hit acquaintance mode with everyone.

Except Supervisor.

Supervisor intimidates me.

Supervisor is very, very nice.  She is understanding and accessible, and she has a sense of humor.  But honey, she commands respect.  I have now seen firsthand the definition of that expression.

I have downplayed this inferiority complex in the office, but I am more than aware of the complete cowardice she alone can create in me.  As such, I have strived to be invisible.  I tread lightly, I do my work, and I don't make waves.  Our working relationship is, therefore, consistently indifferent.

But last week, I got a glimpse into Supervisor's private life, and now I don't know how to act.  Apparently, her boyfriend called her as he was on the road to his job, and proceeded to inform her that he thought he might be having a child with another woman.

Understandably, Supervisor got loud.

She got loud enough that I could hear her over my headphones (which were currently blaring We The Kings), and thinking that perhaps she was trying to get someone's attention, I freed up one ear to assess the situation.

"Tell me who it is," she was saying.  Then, "What do you mean you don't know?!  Of course you know!  You're going to tell me who it is right now."

This was the "oh, crap" moment for me.  I knew now a) that she was on the phone, b) that whoever was on the phone was in serious trouble, and c) I couldn't inconspicuously stop eavesdropping.

A moment later, the boyfriend coughed up a name, and upon hearing it, Supervisor got louder.  She repeated the name he had supplied, tacking on a last name for verification.  When he responded in the affirmative, she got deadly serious and fast.

"Do you mean to tell me you're having a baby with a woman living in my house?!  While you're living in my house?!"

By now, she was so loud that people were coming down from the second floor to check on her.  She was, not surprisingly, oblivious to the audience she now had.

She slapped the desk hard, saying over her boyfriend's audible protests, "You are going to turn that car around right now, get your sh*t, and get out of my house right now!"  She repeated this sentence three times, and hung up.  Then she broke her phone throwing it onto the desk.

Not long after that phone call, she took the rest of the day off.

I actually admire her for handling the situation so well.  If that had been me, I would have broken more than my phone.  And they would have heard me three buildings down.  I think, considering the information she was assaulted with, she comported herself with considerable poise and great aplomb.  The others in my office must have thought so, too, because it has not made the gossip mill runs that all office happenings must endure.  The incident died then and there.

But I have a dilemma.  I have to ask Supervisor about an approaching Monday, when I will be in Houston, Texas (I know, I know -- only BrownFriend could be enough incentive for me to brave travel to a state that means me mortal harm).  That Monday just happens to be Valentine's Day, and the following Monday just happens to be Presidents' Day.  Presidents' Day is an optional holiday for us, and I need to ask permission to take the holiday a week early, and work on Presidents' Day itself.  But I don't know how to act.

After you bear witness to such an intimate exchange in someone's life, how do you treat them with the usual professionalism and degree of separation without seeming like a heartless jerk?

I have mulled over this question for days now, and I have not come up with an answer.  Therefore, I have decided that I need to move to the Grand Canyon, where my socially challenged disasters and dilemmas will be completely irrelevant.

Hopefully the Native Americans there won't be too intimidated by the crazy, pale-faced recluse in the caves.

Achtung!

I am a Grammar Nazi.

No, don't try to sugar over it.  I can admit it.  I am a Grammar Nazi.

I am that chick who eloquently harpoons internet trolls, who have no concept of capitalizations, apostrophes, or pluralizations.  Even when I text, my grammar is immaculate -- it is physically painful for me to send a text with errors in it, even down to punctuation and appropriate abbreviations.

I am the girl that points out errors in billboards, pamphlets, and subtitles.  I'm the girl who plays Bananagrams and Scrabble and Word Twist until the wee hours of the morning.  I'm the girl who knew that a possessive "its" doesn't take an apostrophe by age eight.  I am that girl: The Grammar Nazi.

Recently, there have been several grammatical issues that have been driving me up the wall.  I need an outlet for the frustration these constantly niggling mistakes have caused in me.

Unfortunately, I can't ban people with poor grammar from using the English language until they learn to use it properly.  The "Linguistic Time-Out" would be my unequivocal first choice, if that was an option.  In lieu of a figurative Dunce Cap, I am going to have to settle for a snarky blog post, in which I detail the coping mechanisms I have developed for these issues.  Hang on tight, kiddies.

Reprehensible Grammatical Error #1: Substitution of a Preposition in a Compound Predicate

or

"Would Have" vs. "Would Of"

It is an increasingly common error to write, "He would of gone if he could of found a way," instead of the correct grammar: "He would have gone if he could have found a way."

Obviously I am aware that when a person is speaking, "would have" often sounds like "would of."  But if you wish to reflect this phonetic anomaly, you ought to do it with a contraction, like so: "would've."

You may use "would have" or "would've."  Everything else is wrong.

RGE#1 Coping Mechanism: I have taken to coping with this error by thinking of the comment as the transcription of a medieval sports announcer, written on ancient parchment, with some fragments having faded away.  That way, the error becomes an antiquated title, and you can fill in the blanks to make it all right.  Observe:

"He, Would of [the land of] Gone, [will be the winner] if he, Could of [the town of] Found, [goes] a-way."

It isn't very scientific, but it makes me feel better.

Reprehensible Grammatical Error #2: Misrespresentation of Common Figures of Speech

or

Learn Your Homonyms, People!

Too many people like to utilize frequently used colloquial expressions, without knowing how to spell them properly.  As a Grammar Nazi, this is something I have never done (in fact, there is a particular phrase that I never use in my writing, simply because I don't know which homonym is appropriate: "to say one's piece/peace").  Since I hold everyone I meet to the same grammatical standards that I myself adhere to, I do not tolerate the misuse of homonyms.

There are three simple examples of this barf-worthy mistake, listed below.  I shall show you how to cope with each (and laugh while you're doing it).

1.) Ensure vs. Insure -- The word "ensure" meaning to make certain of, and the word "insure" meaning to purchase liability equal to the value of the direct object.

2.) Bated Breath vs. Baited Breath -- The word "bated" being a derivation of the word "abated," meaning subdued, and the word "baited" meaning a dangled temptation, as on a hook or in a trap.

3.) Bear With Me vs. Bare With Me -- The word "bear" meaning to carry, as a burden, and the word "bare" meaning uncovered and without embellishment.

RGE#2 Coping Mechanisms: I find that merely taking each incorrect homonym at face-value does a lot for a sentence with this type of error.  Behold the enumerated examples below:

1.) "I am going to insure she doesn't do that." -- Picture the speaker/writer seated across the desk from an insurance agent, filling out forms to insure a She-Doesn't-Do-That for $250,000 ($35.00/month).

2.) "He waited with baited breath." -- Picture a mouth-breathing male standing on a dock, with a fishing line extending from his mouth, lure and buoy and all.

3.) "Please bare with me while I check that information." -- Picture this. You're welcome.

Reprehensible Grammatical Error #3: Redundant Repetition in Popular Melodic Songs

or

Pick One Modifier and Stick With It

If you are into hip-hop music, you have probably heard the very popular song in which this line is repeated multiple times on a catchy melody: "It was only just a dream..."

This makes the editor within me writhe uncontrollably.  When there is more than one word with the same meaning modifying a single word or phrase, you should choose the more effective of these words and use it exclusively.

RGE #3 Coping Mechanism: Think of as many synonyms as possible and list them after the original redundancy.  Like so:

It was only just merely simply exclusively singularly insignificantly a dream.

---

To all those who have committed these errors, or who will commit them in the days to come: Consider yourself warned.  Though I be but little, I am fierce.  Do not doubt that I will hunt you down and use your eyes in an ellipsis...

Ahem.  Excuse my ranting.

This is the end of the post.

Big Daddy

I sat down to write a post about grammatical faux pas, but this happened instead.  Grammar will have to wait.

Let me preface this post by pointing out the "imagination" tag I have put on it.  The things that go on in my head are often ridiculous, highly unlikely, and rather fantastical.  Nevertheless, I can't control what comes into my head, and well, my imagination is more fun than real life, anyway.

In fact, I am writing this post so you will see just how overactive my poor brain really is (in case you haven't already figured it out).  Believe me, I am well aware that the situation I am about to outline is all but implausible, so spare me any scathing comments, please.

Now, then.  I have mentioned before that I have two cats, whom I call Thing1 and Thing2 on this blog just to keep you less confused.  I got these cats as a birthday present from my across-the-way-neighbor (NumberEight), and from my apartment complex in general.  That's actually a rather boring story, so I will spare you the details.  The two things you need to know for purposes of this scenario are as follows:

1.) My two kitties are actually a mother and son, who were strays, roughin' it on Building A's back patio.

2.) When I brought them in, Thing2 was only six weeks old, and so small he could fit in the palm of your hand.  This led me to call him "Piccolo," which is Italian for "little."  Well, he's five months old now, and... let's just say he ain't so "piccolo" anymore.

I will admit to being very curious about Thing2's pedigree from day one.  I obviously know all about his mother, what with her living in my apartment and all.  But who is Thing2's daddy?

Thing1 is the sweetest cat.  She'll rub anyone's legs, if they get close enough, and especially if you venture into the kitchen.  If you feed her, or pet the sweet spot behind her right ear, you are her best friend for life.  She's a wonderful mommy, too, always loving on Thing2 and trying to keep him out of trouble (though she rarely succeeds at that).  And markings-wise, they are clones, stripe for stripe.

But, Thing1 is tiny.  She's almost two years old, and the only way she's growing is round, in the belly.  At five months of life, Thing2 is as big as she is, and topping her fast.  He's got a long tail and big paws that promise lots of growth to come.  Not to mention the vehement declarations of the vet, who vows that his rapid weight gain between check-ups indicates that he will be a "monster cat."

So where did he get his size?  From his good-for-nothing father, of course.  Naturally, I began to wonder what deadbeat feline got my Thing1 teen-pregnant, and then left them to fend for themselves.

For a while, I nursed the theory that a certain elderly neighborhood cat was responsible.  Butch hangs out in my apartment complex, enjoying the attentions of multiple cat-lovers, and the freedom to roam where he pleases (until he gets hungry).  Moreover, he looks like a darker, bigger version of Thing1, which would fulfill the genetic criteria I'd put up for Thing2's father.

That was before NumberEight debunked my theory by explaining that Butch has been fixed (which is a nice way to say "thoroughly de-sexed").

Never fear!  My mind doesn't put up with mystery for long.  I now have a new theory, which I shall unfold to you in the paragraphs below.

As usual, my theory requires a little back-tracking, in the interest of full comprehension.

This new theory of mine was born on Saturday.  If you live in The Music City, like I do, you know that Saturday was the first truly beautiful day in a long winter of gray and snow and cold (three things I do not even pretend to be friends with).  I woke at noon, and I knew immediately from the sunlight streaming through my windows that this was a day to be outside.

Too excited to follow normal wake-up routines, I popped out onto my balcony still in my PJs, and with bed-hair, too.  Thankfully, no one walked by.  It was perfect, just as I had suspected; the sun was shining, the air was a balmy sixty degrees and climbing, and I could hear the Siamangs from the Nashville Zoo just around the corner.

"Come to the zoo!" the monkeys seemed to say.  "Come and hang with your animal neighbors on this beautiful glimpse-of-spring day!" (As always, pun intended).

I could not ignore their puffy-chinned calls.

Along with Mom and Brother, I obeyed the Siamangs' orders and frolicked through the zoo all afternoon.  I saw five baby meerkats (so tiny!), the new habitat with the flamingos (so orange!), and I learned the meaning of the word "crepuscular" (so many syllables!).

But that's beside the point.  My latest theory regarding the paternal half of Thing2's parentage occurred to me as we were leaving, when we paused at the small habitat of the Eurasian lynxes.

Do you see where this is going?

The habitat of the Eurasian lynxes -- who have lived at the zoo since their kittenhood -- is located on the back edge of the zoo.  Since the zoo is a hop, skip, and a jump away from my little apartment, I started to fantasize.

Thing1, in her small, nimble way, could probably have gotten into the zoo at some point.  That is by no means unfeasible -- there are all kinds of un-caged animals running around the zoo.  So I proceeded from that thought as though it were factual.

When a young cat is in heat, any tomcat will do, but I was beginning to suspect that Thing1 might have a weakness for Asian guys.  Since the zoo keeps all their animals well-fed, I don't think a satiated lynx's first instinct would be to kill a smaller cat.  So the instinct that's second only to eating would be?... And if she was in heat, then maybe...

Well, now the idea was in my head.  And as I watched the wildcat, I began comparative analyses.  He held his head at exactly the same angle as Thing2.  He blinked slowly as he began to fall asleep, so regally, just like Thing2, and with the same contented squint.  That very squint covered the yellow-brown of his eyes, and Thing2's eyes are just a shade darker than Thing1's...

Then I started to think about all Thing2's little quirks, which I chalked up to him being a kitten.  And it's possible they are related to his youth and spryness, and will diminish as he grows and gets older.  But I feel that Thing2 is pretty darn impressive.

He has crazy climbing abilities, for starters.  And sometimes he gets these uncontrollable bursts of energy, and goes ripping through the house with his kitten eyes on ("ripping," being used very literally here).  He recently attacked my feet with a loud growl, slicing me open in several places, and by all accounts, his claws are unusually sharp.  Add to that the longer kitten fur that only just started to disappear, his rapid growth and projected size, his monstrous purr-box, and that long yowl he lets out sometimes...

I know, I know.  Stupid, ridonkulous, improbable, silly.

But I am still gonna keep an eye out for tufts on Thing2's ears.

Tangled

Recently, GreenFriend wrote a blog post about going to see a certain animated movie (which title appears as the name of this entry).  She remarked that the title was hardly appropriate to the movie, at least in the most literal sense of the word.  While she is correct, since Rapunzel's hair was consistently shiny, brushed, and silky smooth, I saw the title in a different light.

GreenFriend made it very clear to me that she was not ruling out other possible meanings for the title.  This post is not a response to hers, so much as it is an expansion of it.  In regard to my comment to GreenFriend's post, and as a means of ammending it thereof, I would like to submit the following blog post into evidence.

I am convinced that hair controls lives.  I've been employing my Anti-Bill-Nye Science and doing some research, and I have several documented examples to support my theory (or, well... they'll be documented when I finish this post, anyway).

Take, for example, the dreaded Bad Hair Day.  The legend and folklore of the Bad Hair Day rivals that of the tales collected by The Brothers Grimm (and considering that the goats of a similar name probably had a few Bad Hair Days themselves, you might say the history of the Bad Hair Day comes out ahead).  Pun(s) definitely intended.  Let's look at it in more detail, shall we?

A Bad Hair Day has the inexplicable and inconquerable power to completely ruin what would otherwise have been an average day.  And it only takes one Bad Hair Day to make everyone forget all about your ten million good ones.

There is Science here -- hair is often the first thing people notice about you, and it tends to be a large part of how people recognize you later on.  Just get a drastic haircut or change the color to something outrageous if you don't believe me, and your acquaintances will have to do a double-take before they realize who you are.

How your hair looks can also be linked with how healthy you are.  If you have good hair hygeine, you probably have pretty good hygiene overall.  (Coincidentally, this is also true with cats.  A healthy cat will have a glossy, smooth coat that is well-groomed and soft to the touch.  An unhealthy cat will have a nasty mange that sheds every time you touch it.  My cats have excellent hair!).

But aside from the way others perceive it, the most important way hair controls lives is through your own obsession with it.  Since I am the writer of this blog, I suppose we ought to use my hair and life as an example, oughtn't we?

Let's begin with my second grade year.  I hadn't cut my hair in a few years at that point, so my hair was pretty long.  As is pretty common with me, I had a bad habit.  These bad habits interchange over the years: sucking my thumb, smacking on gum, biting my nails, etc.  The second grade version of my bad habit was chewing on my hair.

I gnawed on my hair, sucked on it, chewed it all to pieces.  As you can imagine, this was not an attractive habit.  It wasn't charming.  It wasn't cute.  It was just... gross.

My mother, realizing that this was not a habit I would willingly break, decided to cut it off at the root of the problem... literally.  She took me to the hairdresser, telling me I was just going to get a trim.  Then when they got me into the chair, they started saying the words, "Page-Boy Cut."

When I left the hairdresser that afternoon, I was traumatized.  All my hair was gone.  I looked like a boy.  People kept calling me 'young man' and 'sir.'  My mom said they simply weren't observant, but it wasn't like there was anything else for them to go by.  I hadn't exactly developed any feminine assets by that time.  And my face is not really all that feminine.  Besides, I was wearing a haircut that had the word "Boy" in the name, for heaven's sake!

After the second grade, I stubbornly refused to go back to the hairdresser.   If Mom suggested a trim, I locked myself in my room until she forgot about the idea.  She would ask if I wanted my hair cut, and I would start crying.  I started chewing on my fingernails instead of my hair, so she wouldn't have that excuse anymore.  People began to call me 'young lady' and 'miss' again.  My hair grew longer and longer and longer (though it was never as long as these chicks').  Still, I fought a return to the hairdresser for seven long years.

In my freshman year of high school, I managed to get my waist-length hair in such a snit of a tangle that my mother broke a comb trying to straighten it out.  She had reached her breaking point again.  She declared that we were going to get my hair cut, and I was forced into the car with a sense of foreboding settling over me.

When we arrived, my mother had to promise me that I could decide the length before I would get out of the car.  After she had made that promise, she marched me through the doors.  I was weak at the knees and trembling, trying not to cry.  The extremely nice hair-stylist they set me up with was very understanding, showing me several length options and talking to me soothingly while she loaded my hair with detangler spray.

Before I could call out in protest, she had detangled my hair enough to put it in a ponytail below the length I wanted.  And in one swift snip, there went half a foot of hard-earned hair.  Horrified, I watched her throw my hair callously into the trash can.

But my horror was short-lived.  The shorter hair (still past my shoulders), was easier to take care of by a factor of ten.  And after that, my haircutting days were less dramatic.  With each passing year of high school, my hair got shorter and shorter.  Right before I went to college, I snipped it too close once again, and ended up covering my short cap of hair with a Newsies hat for about a year straight (no really-- I wore it so much that when I came back sophomore year and didn't wear it, people literally did not recognize me).

That experience led me to decide I shouldn't cut my hair for a while.  That didn't stop me from dyeing my hair pink, however, when my mother learned that she had breast cancer.  It wasn't pink all over, just highlights, but it was crazy enough that I started getting hit on by rednecks and middle-aged men.  The fuschia dye eventually faded to red-orange, then to just orange, and finally to dead blonde.  My hair was so dead after the pink dye was through with it that it wouldn't even curl anymore (and believe me, my hair curls).

By the time the pink dye was out of my system, my hair was long again (and dead), so I got it cut again.  First I got a bad haircut in Houston (I should have known better than to trust a Texan with my hair).  Then I got it fixed when I came back to the good ol' Volunteer State.  I added in some red highlights for good measure.

That haircut lasted all summer, and as usual, when winter came, I wanted it cut.  I wanted it cut even though it meant that there was going to be less hair to keep my head warm when the cold blasts came with December.  I think my brain has convinced itself that I can cope better with change if I do something drastic to my hair -- exchanging something I can't control for something I can.

That last winter haircut was too short again.  It was Tonks hair, as described in the book (not like that chick in the movie), short and spiky and purple.  You read it right: purple.
Well, I was forced to live with that hair for quite a while, even though I would have liked to cut it when several huge changes assaulted me all at once.  But I survived despite the lack of haircut control, and in spite of the numerous Cracker Barrel patrons who called me 'sir' (by this time, I had developed certain, *ahem*, features that those people really should have noticed).

Recently, I am trying to recognize my hair's amazing, ominous ability to dictate my life.  I like to pretend like I am controlling it, but really my hair controls me.  I am trying to take back control from my hair by resisting the (constant) urge to cut it short again.  Not too short, mind you, but shorter than it is.  And that's without mentioning the bright blue peek-a-boo streak I want to get...  I am proud to say that I have triumphed in this battle -- my hair is longer now than it has been in almost a decade.  And there's not a speck of blue in it.

But I still went and got it layered and trimmed the other day.

~And now, ladies and gentlemen, watch and be amazed as I come full-circle!~

Because of these experiences and observations, I think that movie we discussed has a very appropriate title.  Rapunzel spends the majority of the movie defined and controlled by her hair.  She's tangled in it, if you will.  It isn't until she is freed from that over-arching vanity, and the world's preoccupation with it, that she discovers who she really is.

After all, her prince has a thing for brunettes.