Do you need a monkey?

Sure, we all do!*

My mother found a classified ad today, that was beautifully written and punctuated - and then emailed it to me. I thought I should pass it on, in case anyone is interested in buying a monkey. Just think of the cute little outfits you could humiliate it in.

"hi, do you need a Well trained , tamed and beautiful baby c.a.p.u.c.h.i.n monkey? you are at the right place. our pet c.a.p.u.c.h.i.n monkey is blood screened and come with all her health papers, health guarantee , toys and care detectives. She is friendly, lovely and easily associate with other pets we just relocated to a new apartment which does not permit us to keep animals so we are looking for a good home to take care of our baby girl.. She like outings and she is very intelligent and respectful. She will adapt to new environment easily and to climate." 

I am apparently not familiar enough with the capuchin monkey, because I didn't even know their name was an acronym.** Maybe it stands for Cheeky And Problematic Unclean Creatures wHom Idiots owN? Just a guess.

*Do you remember those Sally Struthers commercials for the correspondence courses--"Do you want to make more money? Sure we all do!" Seriously, those were so obnoxious. 
**NOT an acronym

I prefer football.

A couple of days ago, my friend Natalie as an exercise in sharing what she is grateful for, stated that she was very grateful her husband doesn't like football. I kind of don't see the point in caring about that, but clearly Natalie does and that's great. Different strokes, for different folks etc.

Last night I was able to hang out with my wonderful friend Rachel and her totally charming ketchup* mogul boyfriend Mark, and somehow LARPing** came up. Many things had to be explained to me. Mark said, there's a documentary called 'Darkon' that goes in to the culture of this game, and the people who devote a great deal of time to it (at least every other weekend, not including all of the prep work you do beforehand.) It was on Netflix streaming, so we watched it. It is not a perfect documentary, (it should have explored Skip a little more fully, because he was where the story is,) but to its credit, it did open my eyes to a completely different way to exist in life.

Mostly, the people who participate in this game/community/way of life feel like misfits in the real world, unsatisfied with their roles at work, they relish going to middle school football fields or a forest and staging wars with foam weapons and shields because they gain a sense of importance, a sense of self. All while they are hoping to be heroic, and having supremely awkward and poorly improvised conversations that seem stolen from Lord of the Rings and some Middle Ages/Renaissance something.

I don't begrudge these people the opportunity to waste their money and time on nerdy things, in fact, I think it is great. Well, let me rephrase that. I think it is great that they are connecting with other humans, finding that niche, if you will. Just like those nerds with the salt and pepper convention.  But Mark brought up an interesting point, how is this any worse than people who are really in to football? My liberal sensibilities are really trying to say, it's not better or worse, just different, but my Judgy McJudgerson ways are overruling. Sure, football is more socially acceptable, and that's part of it, but my main concerns are actually the wasting of time and money and that they are escaping life. In being a football fan, you have a team or a few teams that you watch their games every weekend, that's an investment of like four hours, maybe a few more for a few months. You don't really have to spend money on it at all, and everything about your weekend of zoning out in football is considered real life. It might seem a great waste of time, but it is real life.  But with Darkon they are out there for full weekends at a time, leaving their loved ones, (sometimes wives and children and sometimes just parents, let's be honest here) while they run around the forest, camp, and pretend because reality isn't satisfactory enough. I think they all know that what they are doing is fake, but still, why not expend some effort on improve reality, instead of channeling it to role playing and then have the line between reality and a game blur a little more every weekend. And the money - these people have very elaborate costumes/armor, and while I kept thinking their craftsmanship was excessively poor***, they had lots of foam weapons at one point built a huge facade of a building with 2x4s and plywood, to have a three minute battle and then burn it down. (If I had executed a plan so poorly as to not consider the slope of the hill when I was installing the doors, maybe I would want to burn it down as well, but I would notice that.) What a waste of resources!

But mostly, I think that LARPing is not the best use of time, because of the consequences on the family. There was a shot of Skip's wife and daughter hanging out at a table near some refreshments that they had prepared for the gang. They are just sitting there without much to do, as the LARPers all stood around another table and plotted their next weekend's war with plastic action figures. I am positive that Skips' wife is a much more patient and understanding woman than most, but she just looked so empty and excluded in that scene that I was upset for her sake. But the worst part is the children. Look at what happens to the children.



And I am positive Natalie would embrace football if this were the alternative.

*Seriously, Sir Kensington's is great. I have the spiced in my fridge right now. One time Shara and I took it to a burger joint with us. Delicious.
**Live-action role playing. And I thought D&D was nerdy. Shoot, and I thought video games were nerdy...
***The basics of upholstery have been the same for hundreds of years, why you think fastening fabric to plywood with duct tape instead of a staple gun is a good idea, I have not a clue.

Mole want a burrito?

A few days ago, I realized I had forgotten my lunch. So right before the period before lunch I phoned an order in to Baja Fresh, since it was just down the road. When they asked me my name I tried to enunciate as though I were speaking to a room full of ESL kindergartners. I told them I'd come pick up my order in about fifty minutes.

When I went to pick it up, I saw on the receipt that they spelled my name "M-O-L-E". This of course totally cracked me up, and made me remember when Starbucks tried to make me a cast member of the Jersey Shore.

While they might think my name is spelled like a delicious, delicious sauce, they sure did make a tasty burrito. Not Cafe Rio good, but definitely edible.

I always thought I had a relatively easy name to spell - I guess not.

Like a slushee in the face.

Or why you haven't gotten your GleeCap. 

You guys are so nice to me, asking me to write things. But I have to tell you that halfway through last week's episode of Glee I turned it off. I couldn't even begin to spend the precious few hours I had for television viewing last week on that TERRIBLE episode. So I stopped it and then watched Raising Hope which was also TERRIBLE. Then I watched New Girl, and that was delightful, so the evening ended on a high note. I haven't had time or motivation to go back and finish the episode, and I am not entirely sure I am going to watch the episode I DVR'ed tonight whilst out pub quizzing with friends, despite the fact that the Trouble Tones are doing an Adele mashup. I think I'm over Glee, we'll have to see. But truth be told, the next thing I have to watch is the Traffic DVD I've had from Netflix since October 14. (Hands down the longest elapsed time of having a DVD from Netflix, and I am including my month in Africa last spring.)

Anyone want a recap on Traffic?

Best Album of the Aughts

Last night at FHE, my friend Brian and I were talking about what we considered the the best album of the aughts (a phrase I am not terribly comfortable with considering aught means anything - maybe you're supposed to spell it like "ought" as in, I ought to have spent 2000-2009 being more productive and responsible?)

So, Brian presented what I will call "some viable options" but, I of course shot them down, for that is what I do. I declared that Ryan Adams' Gold was the best of the oughts. (I'm sticking with that spelling.) To me that really is a perfect album, but it's like my mind started at the beginning of the decade and just arbitrarily chose a first awesome album I came across. I only made it one year in to the decade for crying out loud.

Since then, albums have been compiling themselves in to a list in my brain. Including:

• Smile - Brian Wilson
• American IV - Man Comes Around - Johnny Cash
• Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robot - The Flaming Lips
• More Adventurous - Rilo Kiley
• Plans - Death Cab for Cutie
• Elephant - The White Stripes
• Back to Black - Amy Winehouse
• The Langley Schools Music Project - Innocence and Despair
• Poses - Rufus Wainwright

I just instantly went to Ryan Adams, forsaking all the rest. Which is shocking knowing me.

Just grading some math assessments

So, I couldn't help but giggle and then be a little concerned about this child's home life.

I also wouldn't be surprised if this is an accurate graph depicting the number of cop shows on tv.

The Analytics of Decapitation

Now, I have very little interest in sharing my or hearing about other peoples' dreams, unless of course they are hilarious or really insightful, and I can promise you now - what I am about to share will be neither. Also, I rarely remember my dreams, and when I do I wake up in a fury and scribble them down into my journal so I can remember them. Like the one time I was being hunted by the Russian mafia - a dream that would make an outstanding movie. Or the time I joined the SATC ladies for brunch and then mass (really?). Or the recurring dream I had about marrying a guy from Idaho whose parents didn't like me and I had to buy my wedding shoes at Fred Meyer. (Three things I'd very much like to avoid.) I digress.

This morning, when my alarm went off, it woke me from a very strange dream. I dreamt that while dressed as Speed Racer* and riding on a motorcycle I was decapitated. It was one of those out-of-body dreams, lucid in the fact that I knew I was dreaming, but not lucid because I couldn't control what was happening. As my out-of-body self watched me get into this terrible accident and the ensuing action, I kept criticizing the production value of my dream. "That's not a realistic amount of blood. That jacket is still very white." "You'd be dead by now." "Why is no one calling 911? How is that not the first step?" Very similar to what I do when I watch movies. This continued at the hospital. And at my funeral. It was kind of weird. But I kept thinking about my out-of-body self, "gee whiz, you're such a downer. Stop criticizing so much - it's just a dream. You're still alive, and very much capitated." So I am wondering if my over-analytical, hyper-critical, Negative Nancy-ness is really getting on my subconscious' nerves? In which case I would like to publicly remind my subconscious that we are much more optimistic and kind than we used to be. So maybe you can stop violently killing me in my dreams? Although, no complaints about the Speed Racer outfit.

*Have you seen the live-action movie? Very under-rated.

I've got the moves like Monson*

Is it a good or bad thing when I saw this phrase tonight on a leftover piece of paper in the Primary room at church that I immediately heard Adam Levine singing it to the tune of "Moves Like Jagger" in my head? And I may have busted a move.

*Thomas Monson is the elderly, but still fairly spry, president of my church.

GleeCap: Pot of Gold

So, after three weeks off, Glee is back, (I had to watch it today after work because of super fun playtime last night. So sorry for the delay,) and it was kind of a non-event. I've decided that three non-events are going to equal a strike. So this is two in a row. Be warned Glee, because when I get bored I don't hang out.

As awesome as a note taped in a locker that says, "Lord Tubbington thinks you’re purrrrfect.":
 - Brittany is on the cover of American Cheerleader, and it is taped up in her locker. I totally buy it. +5 
 - There's some fresh-faced Irish kid thrown in and makes Finn look like a man of his own age. I'm ok with new blood coming in, but must we have this Kurt redux? Although his adoration of Brittany is so totally charming. "I really want to snog her. I'm still a virgin." +3
 - Kurt is wearing head to toe neutral tweed and a trilby. He looks like Dr. Doolittle circa Rex Harrison. Delightful. +6
 - Sue telling Burt that she "thought [she] smelled a baboon heart," absolutely reminded me of Untamed Heart, and it was a pleasant trip down memory lane with Rosie Perez, Marissa Tomei, and Christian Slater.  +2
 - "Leprechaun starring a young Jen Aniston is my favorite movie." While I don't believe it, I think it is funny. +3
 - Let's talk about the Troubletones. Is this our first foray into Xtina on the show? I like it. +12 Also, as idiotic as the idea of this second Glee club is, I am totally amenable to the fact that Santana and Mercedes will be singing more. It's like a triumvirate of awesome. +4

That is not a lot of positives. Wow.
+35

As infuriating as this Quinn-Idina Menzel story line:
 - Sue's corner calls West Side Story gay. This show is obviously very concerned with preaching to obliterate homophobia, but they seem more than content in perpetuating stereotypes and using "gay" in an inflammatory way.  Both are screamed much too loudly and are obnoxious. -5
 - The whole budget for the school's musical is $2004? The cost to produce the Umbrella/Singing in the Rain mash up with GP last season probably cost 5 times that much to produce with all that fake rain and umbrellas breaking all over the place. And high school musicals cost more than $2000 produce. Shoot, how much do you have to pay to lease the rights? -12
- A crematorium that delivers "delicious brick oven pizza" and an undertaker who loves West Side Story because there are so many deaths in it? Just because people work with dead people they are creepy? -4
 - Finn is too stupid to try to concoct schemes. He should just stop because I am bored. -2 Then he calls Brittany an idiot, well if that isn't the pot calling the kettle black. No points, I'm just saying.
 - They have an Irish exchange student pretend to be a leprechaun and then whilst wearing green sing Kermit's song? This reminds me of the other vomit-inducing literal and cheesy interpretations, like that song from Sunset Blvd. and Blackbird - both performed by Kurt. Ay yi yi. Unbearable. -15
- Quinn needs to cease and desist. The whole, I'm imperfect and will thus live vicariously through my child and put on a whole heap of issues on this child by requiring it to fill roles that are completely inappropriate. Just because you're trying to create drama doesn't mean you need to be so irresponsible with it. uft. -10
 - And speaking of Beth, why does she sleep in a playpen? Come on Idina Menzel. - 2
 - Blaine is apparently the go-to guy for Katy Perry songs. Oh, what a terrible song, and how is it appropriate for the sentiment of missing Mercedes or trying to get over the stressful week? -4
 - Puck, your hair. My friend, it is getting T E R R I B L E.  No points, I'm just trying to let you know.
 - Where are these mullets coming from? JUST STOP RIGHT NOW. -15
 - And why is everyone at this school so mean? Life will imitate "art" (Glee is far from artistic, but go with me on this) so maybe conflict could come from other places than bullying? -15
 - Now for some continuity issues...so, the Troubletones. Mercedes says that the sectionals trophy is as good as theirs. Do they not remember the trouble New Directions were about to be in when they had fewer than twelve members in their glee club? I am someone who has seen each of these episodes once, I am quite sure I've dedicated less brain space to this show than, say, the writers and producers. Put in a little effort here. -18

-102

Woah -67. It is not looking good, New Directions. Let's rally to be more entertaining next week!

Have You Heard: Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings

I've been pretty close to obsessed with Sharon Jones since my dear friend Jen sent me a copy of Dark Was The Night. Then when I went through Damages in rapid-fire succession last year and I heard "You're Gonna Get It" in a few of the episodes of Season 2, I knew that Ms. Jones and I would have a long and lasting relationship. (Not in a Me & Mrs. Jones kind of way, though.) Something about the cold weather makes me want to listen to R&B. Am I the only one who has seasonal musical preferences?