i Have an iLove iHate Relationship with the Apple Store. (A little Apple Store humor for frustrated customers who really kinda love that place, like me.)
Last week, I took a trip to the Apple store. Oh, the Apple store. It’s like a Dylan’s Candy Bar for adults. Like it’s namesake, in the Garden of Eden, or in the hands of Snow White’s evil stepmother, APPLE was so inviting… so enticing. There it was, in all of its overcrowded, 8 gazillion watt minimalistic splendor. Continue reading
Recently, I went to a sex party, which one of my friends was co-hosting. Upon entering, I was quickly introduced to the “Sexpert.”
“Jenny this is Julie, she is a penis expert.” No joke, that’s how she was introduced. This made me wonder: why people don’t introduce me as something cooler?
“That’s funny. I’m somewhat of a penis expert myself,” I said, buffing my nails on my shirt as if cleaning an apple. Then I blathered something about not being a pro like her, because I didn’t want to jeopardize my amateur status. You know, for the Olympics? Jenny what the hell are you talking about? Did you just mention the Olympics? The Olympics of what – hand-jobs? Just shut up, already.
Sometimes when I’m uncomfortable I use exaggerated humor to fill conversational gaps. Did I say use? I meant abuse, like in the form of an oddly misplaced stand-up routine, which can become painful to watch and often requires more than a two drink minimum.
“Oh, what do you do?” she asked, not knowing what to make of my schtick. “Are you a urologist or something?”
“No, I’m just a slut.“
Really, Jenny? Did you just say that? What’s the matter with you?
“I’m not really a slut, I’ve just… Continue reading
This time of year I amuse myself by looking back at last year’s resolutions. Ones I made with the best intentions, like learning an instrument or a foreign language. Last Hanukkah I had my husband buy me a guitar. I had all the confidence in the world that by this New Year’s, I would balk at a request to play “Stairway To Heaven,” saying something dismissive like… “Please, that’s so cliché, but why not?” or “Por favor, es muy cliché, pero porque no? Unfortunately, my guitar collects dust while my Spanish collects rust.
So for this year, I am making some resolutions that are a bit more achievable:
1. Nag More
For over a decade my husband has not picked up a wet towel, washed ketchup off of a dish, changed a light bulb, or remembered trash day without a divorce threat, I mean, friendly reminder. This year: I vow to be relentless in my nagging. I will lay immediate blame using words like always and never. As in, “I always, and you never.” I will play the martyr by saying, “Forget it. I’ll do it myself.” I will amp up the guilt with, “I do everything around here.” Or something unarguable like, “It’s obvious by your refusal to change a light bulb that you don’t love me anymore.” If all goes well, I’ll be nagging him to go to couples therapy by 2013.
2. Gain Weight
I’m going to quit all good eating habits ASAP. I vow to add carbs to my diet with reckless abandon. I’ll start each meal with a generous helping of bread and rolls onto which I will spread an obnoxious amount of butter. I’ll stuff food into my mouth with such fervor it’ll make other eaters uncomfortable to watch. I also vow to eat everything a la mode, including ice cream.
3. Workout Less
This will actually take serious effort. The only thing harder would be to shower less. If I need the proverbial cup of sugar, I will drive to my neighbor’s garage and beep until she comes out and hands it to me. I’ll take elevators in two-story buildings. Lastly, I’m going to cancel my gym membership and use the money I save to buy more ice cream.
4. Forget an Old Language
This year, not only am I not going to learn a new language, I’m going to let my brain atrophy to forget the one I already know. I’ll watch endless episodes of Adventure Time, The Regular Show and Beavis and Butthead. I’ll quit doing crosswords and speaking in complete sentences. I’ll break all grammatical rules: I will misplace modifiers, dangle participles, and end sentences in prepositions. I will express my thoughts through that African clicking language, modern dance, and a set of bongos that I intend to wear around my neck.
5. Stay Out of Touch
This time of year, I am reminded of the many friends I have let time and space interfere with. I intend to further that distance. I’m gonna start by rejecting any new Facebook or social network requests. I will also attach a note that reads, “I never liked you in the first place, Sucka!” Lastly, I will cuss out and then hang up on people who call in hopes of fulfilling their own resolution to rekindle old friendships.
6. Be Less Patient
I vow to be aggravated, exasperated, and ready to blow my stack at the slightest misstep. The next time my son wants help with his homework I’ll say, “That’s it! Clearly this whole elementary education thing is not for you. If you don’t know how to spell “Discerning” by now, you never will…Now, go get a job! Oh, and take your sister with you, she spends way too much time on the potty.”
7. Hold Grudges
This year I vow to forgive no one. I don’t care if you step on my toe, or pay me the five bucks you owe me, a day after the assigned due date. You will go on “The List” in permanent ink and I will twirl my imaginary handlebar mustache as I think about how to get revenge. I vow to hate you forever and never forget how you wronged me.
8. Stress More
I vow to lose sleep thinking about planning parties, redecorating my house, trying to budget, missing appointments, teacher conferences, and health issues caused by stress. I will laugh an evil cackle while erasing all the plans from my iPhone, and then cry over what I’ve just done. I will empty our bank account on frivolous investments and watch it dwindle away. Oh, wait…that already happened. Well good, more for me to worry about.
9. Become Addicted to Something
Smoking, alcoholism and Starbucks are so trite. No, this year I vow to pick up a unique dependency that people can really talk about like nasal spray or hand sanitizer or sniffing hot glue from class projects. Or at least something beneficial to my endurance like crack. Look, I already have a shopping addiction so that’s out and I do love me some reality TV; maybe I could offset the bills with a robust gambling problem.
10. Gossip More
I vow to talk about everything you do in the New Year. If I see you at the pediatrician for so much as a flu shot, I will tell everyone your child has hand foot mouth, so you can be verbally assaulted when you show up at a birthday party the next day. If you look too skinny, I will assume it’s a divorce or you’re a raging bulimic. If you look too hot, I’ll call it a torrid affair. If you look too young, it’s an addiction to surgical procedures because you’re getting divorced, due to a torrid affair.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
My Other Resolution: GET MORE READERS TO THE BLOG SO I CAN GET A COLUMN IN A SHE SHE MAGAZINE AND LEAVE ALL YOU READERS FLOUNDERING! MWAHAHAHA!!!
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Counseling Addiction – Those were the words in the title of an email I just received. I didn’t read on, I didn’t have to. I get the gist and I’m shocked.
It’s never dawned on me that this would be an issue, but why the f@ck not? I mean, tons of people love counseling – I’m one of them. Though I haven’t found the time to go recently, which means I’m probably not an addict, per se.
But, I do get it.
In fact, as a double major – one of them being psychology – I found that many people in my classes were taking these courses in hopes of fixing themselves.
Well, we know that never works. If it did, no one would say, “you should take your own advice,” in that snarky way that they do.
Needless to say, I spent much time in college and Grad school with people who were anxiety stricken, or OCD (like myself) or narcissists, or bipolar, or… had other fun complexes. Then they become practicing therapists and now spend a lot of time telling other people what to do and what’s wrong with them.
How rude.
If you went around dissecting my psyche and telling me how to fix it, I would not make plans with you… often. But, we pay for therapists to tell us such things. Then we respond with phrases like: “Yessss, that’s why I’m so controlling” and “oh my G-d you’re so right, I do substitute food for love,” and “sure, sure my passive aggressive behavior is obviously an outlet for my suppressed emotional responses,” and other shit we say in therapists offices in hopes of feeling less inferior.
But, now that there’s a new disorder coming from over-therapizing, I say we get off the proverbial couch and take a stand. I mean people don’t get paid to tell you things that may happen to you in the future, do they? Of course not. So, why should we pay people to label us now?
Frankly, I think we’re all doing pretty good, considering… The O-Zone is disintegrating, American’s throw away 250 million tons of trash/year, the unemployment rate is 8.6%, we’re all getting older and wrinklier and less bendy by the second, and the shoes in my closet never seem to be perfectly straight!
So, “Say Nay to Thera-pay!” I know, catchy right? I’m like the Norma Rae of head shrinking. Screw Jung and Freud and Adler, who needs ’em and their theories? The 54 million American’s who suffer from mental illness in a given year? Nah.
Addendum to this post: I just clicked the email with the Title: Counseling Addiction The subject line said this: Help fight substance abuse as a counselor.
Never mind.
I went out shopping with my mom the other day and I felt guilty, not because I was breaking my necessary self-imposed shopping ban, but because I had left my kids. I had left them not with a babysitter, but with my husband. They were not doing child labor; they were simply going to a movie.
I couldn’t pinpoint the cause of the feeling I was having. Maybe it was guilt brought on by the fear of sending them off alone with their dad. Would something happen without my guidance? Continue reading
You know the sites: Hautelook, Gilt, Zulily, Ideeli, Rue La La? There’s addiction in my family, so was no surprise that I would fall prey to the gene. For years my father feared that I would pick up some bad habit or other: pour the sauce, pop the pills, ride the cocaine train, squeeze the juice (okay I made most of that up. I’m not privy to the colloquialisms of drug users, but it sounded good right? Maybe I could get the last one to catch on with steroid users. “Brad looks so buff all of a sudden.” “Oh, didn’t you know, he totally squeezes the juice.” Okay, I digress. Continue reading
Okay, so here it is: I’m never going to that g-d forsaken place you call school. I know it’s totally anti-establishment of me to say it, but I went to visit that place with my brother and after one look, I was out.
My Kids Will Only Eat Food that Comes From a Children’s Menu –You Too? Here’s Help(I’m sorry, I don’t have the rights to reprint the article in full and I could use comments to the site where it’s posted. PS they called me “anonymous,” which doesn’t exactly make me happy, but they’re newly revamped and I want this job. Maybe getting readers to the site will parlay into a byline. Who knows? It happens to be a cute piece. ENJOY!) Go there now or read the intro below:
Okay, maybe you have this problem, also. My kids only eat food you’d find on a children’s menu. You know, the usual suspects: grilled cheese, hot dogs, chicken nuggets, mac n cheese, pizza, burgers, buttered noodles, etc. I could list the health content in these meals, but let’s just agree to call it nil. Where did I go wrong? Continue reading
Interrupting and finishing other people’s sentences is something that many busy people do, ahhem… like myself, and it’s certainly a bad habit worth changing.
Let’s be honest peeps. Women like multitasking and men like quick results. Neither preference is conducive to dealing with long winded conversations with grace and patience.
MORE HUMOR: 15 Random Things I Wouldn’t Know If I Weren’t a Gen Xer
I’m the typical multitasking mom. I walk into rooms with no clue why I’m there. I forget to switch laundry and have to rerun it… I can barely remember my last thought, as I have already moved on to 7 others. (Something about laundry, right? Sadly they often are. What? There’s a lot of laundry.)
When I talk to people, I find myself wanting the pace of the conversation to fit into my packed schedule. Well, that or I have something to add that is much funnier than what they’re saying and I just can’t wait to say it.
If you’re trying to explain your feelings on a subject and I already get where you’re going, I may ever so “politely” hurry you along by either responding before you’re done or telling you “I get it,” while you’re still speaking. If you’re truly lucky, I may help you get your thought across by finishing your sentence for you. I know, no thanks necessary.
MORE HUMOR: 40 Things Every Mom Should Have and Should Know by 40
So, I recently read an article that discussed the side effects of such lovely behaviors. Not only is it rude (who knew?), but it actually makes the speaker unconsciously feel rushed, nervous, and annoyed; both your pulses speed up, which can cause irritability and a defensive tone to erupt.
That would totally explain the wrestling match I got into with homeless man in the street. What? The light was about to turn, I had to help him along so I could hand him my 26 cents.
What again? I don’t keep a lot of change in my car.
Sheesh, you people are real sticklers huh?
I’m sorry, was I putting words in your mouth again. Well, I’m clearly working on it! SO, BACK OFF!
Moving on, the fix for this embarrassing habit is simple: Be Aware; Be in the conversation on your own end, and allow people to finish their thoughts before chiming in. Make a point to remind yourself of this before going to a meeting, picking up the phone, or having lunch with a friend.
*Make a real effort not to interrupt even if you’re two paragraphs into the next conversation, unless of course, they are boring the crap out of you. There’s just no excuse for that.
Technically, being incredibly boring and wasting someones time with inane mumblings should be considered rude as well, no? In some tribes it’s punishable by death. Death by boredom!
Oh, the irony.
You need special credentials to drive a car, take out a book and get a credit card, but there are no prerequisites to raise a child?
As a fairly normal adult with the means to raise a child, I admittedly had no clue what I was doing with my first child. I remember leaving the hospital thinking, He’s mine? I own him? You guys trust me to walk out that door and raise a child because I made the obligatory poop and demonstrated my ability to put him in a car seat?
Isn’t it baffling that everyday people like us are allowed to procreate without first passing a test or getting some kind of license? Think about it. You need a library card to take out a five-dollar paperback, because you can’t be trusted to return it in a period long enough to read it four times over. You’re also required to pass a test to drive a car, sell a house or be a lifeguard. You can take a class to learn how to give birth, but once that baby’s out, you’re on your own.
There wasn’t even a test at my OB’s pre-pregnancy interview. All he asked was, “Do you have insurance and are you taking folic acid?”
“Of course, I’d never think about bringing life to this Earth without the recommended 3 gagillion mgs of folic acid per day… I’m also shooting heroin, but you didn’t ask me that.”
What if I don’t feed him, bathe him or water him? I could let him swim after lunch without waiting the mandatory 30 minutes, or dress him in generic clothes from the supermarket. I could drop him off on the first day of middle school, roll down the window and scream, “Mama loves her Snuggle Buggle!”
At the very least, there should be some kind of “Mommy Aptitude” screening. During your interview, they could call your mom. Mine would say,
“Jenny always dreamed of being a mother and loved playing house. Her dolls were mostly naked, and she liked to cut their hair down to the hair transplant plug scalps. Sometimes she would detach their limbs and try to put them back in the wrong sockets, possibly to amuse herself, though I found it rather disturbing. Have I said too much? No, really, she would be wonderful. They would be so clean; I recall how much she liked bathing her naked Barbies.”
Doctor’s response: “Put in a 10-year IUD, give her supervised visitation with a hermit crab, and make sure someone counts the legs.”
Not only do gynecologists promote the concept of “Motherhood” to anyone donning a wedding ring with reckless abandon, they encourage us to have more. Otherwise known as repeat business. The second my daughter arrived, my OB said, “So, when am I gonna see you back in the saddle?”
Great, a stirrup joke. “Take it easy Doc, the placenta’s not even cold yet.”
Well, a month and a half later, I ran into my OB again. Actually, I had an appointment, so it wasn’t as random as I’m making it sound. He said, “At six weeks you are extremely fertile, so now is the time for another romp in the stable.” I immediately went home to tell my husband the doctor said, “Now is the time I am extremely unstable, so no romps for at least six more weeks.”
How about a probationary period to see if you’re any good at this parenting thing? When you get a new job, they evaluate you every six months. They certainly don’t give you more responsibility until you’ve proven you can handle your current load, unless you work at McDonald’s.
How does my OB know how I’m gonna solve disputes? When my children are fighting over the last lollipop, who says I won’t shove them all in the closet, lock the door and say, “Last one standing gets it”?
Well, lucky for me, I’ve turned out to be an excellent mother (ask my children), regardless of not being licensed and accredited.
(Please note: this is meant to be a mom humor piece… Though I wouldn’t be opposed to some “What Do We Do Now That We Had The Baby?” classes)
9/16/13 – I just put the share buttons on this post! If you like it … Please use ’em
XO Jenny From the Blog
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It has recently dawned on me that somewhere along the way, my sense of accomplishment became a product of my ability to be a good homemaker. The creative energies I once used to design jewelry and dress celebs are now spent trying to build intricate forts and streamline the laundry process. For instance, I’ve found that by rolling towels one can save considerable folding time, while providing the added benefit of a spa-like appearance.
When did this happen? When did I accept the job as Master of the Mundane? I remember the ad, it read: Seeking highly motivated person, who requires little sleep, to cook, clean, wipe tushies, noses, and countertops… oh, and provide occasional sex to employer. Person will be overworked and underappreciated. It is preferred that you have no prior experience or references. Always on duty. Will pay nothing. Continue reading
So, the holidays are upon us. Christmas has just passed and visitors are abundant, but their welcome is wearing thin. I know, we all look forward to this time of year, but often in the midst of it, we realize the heavy meals have expanded our waist lines and our relatives have stretched our patience.
In-laws can be the toughest during the holiday season. I’m not talking about mine; they’re amazingly wonderful and never bothersome, NEVER. Mine aren’t even in this season, but I have heard tales of other in-laws who cause stress and frustration. The way they handle a turkey, as if it is not a breeding ground for salmonella, or the way they screw with the table settings that you took a painful amount of time arranging to look haphazard and shabby chic. I know, my “friends” sound like a joy to be around over the holidays, right? I am simply relaying their stories, I am in no way referring to specific incidences that may have happened in the past, which have caused me anxiety or to count to 10 by the medicine cabinet, while searching for Zanex .
Let’s face it, it’s harder to have tolerance for those who didn’t raise us: friends and non-immediate family included. We have a certain forgivability factor for our blood relatives; they can get away with more and feel the wrath less. We also tend to offend them less as they too have a forgivablity factor, towards us. Thank goodness.
So, while you count the hours till your guests get on their merry way, I suggest heavy drinking. Use the holiday traditions to mask your quick bout with alcoholism: Manischewitz on Chanukah, egg nog on X-mas, and champagne on New Year’s.
Remind yourself that you’re probably getting on their nerves as well. This is also not a problem I have, as I am always filled with an almost addictive amount of holiday cheer, but logic says: If they’re annoying you, you’re most likely annoying them. (Or did I read that on a fortune cookie?) Well logic or Confucius says that.
Grandparents, especially in-laws, really aren’t there for you in the first place. They’re there for your children. You’re just an obstacle. You and “Your Way” are hurdles to be tip-toed around, not jumped over. They don’t agree with your techniques, your rules, and your methods of punishment — or lack thereof. Though this is a point of un-verbalized contention between you and them, look at the positive. They would love for you to get out of the house, so that they can do and say what they please without feeling like you’re critiquing and judging their every movement – which, by the way, you are.
Don’t over think this one! Go out and let them babysit!!! And while you’re out, drink heavily.
Disclaimer: No in-laws, parents, or guests were harmed in the writing of this article!