Warning: If you are reading this then this warning is for you. Every word you read of this useless fine print is another second off your life. Don't you have other things to do? Is your life so empty that you honestly can't think of a better way to spend these moments? Or are you so impressed with authority that you give respect and credence to all that claim it? Do you read everything you're supposed to read? Do you think every thing you're supposed to think? Buy what you're told to want? Get out of your apartment. Meet a member of the opposite sex. Stop the excessive shopping and masturbation. Quit your job. Start a fight. Prove you're alive. If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned- Tyler.

Some Girls

Zac Posen now has a cheapie line at Target so I cruised over there early sunday morning to check it out and guess what I found?

Mean Girls.

There were three of them and they had the racks completely surrounded, doing that elbow thing to keep anyone else from getting a look at the clothes. And then they piled three sizes of each item into a cart and rolled it over to the dressing rooms where they actually took turns guarding the cart while the others tried everything on.

I didn't stick around to find out, but I'm guessing they plopped all of their leftovers back in the cart and left it outside the dressing room when they were done. Didn't seem like the types to rehang anything, much less drag them out and put them back on the racks.

Le Sigh.

On the way home I thought for a while that maybe I'd just give up on the Bay Area and move to a place where this kind of rude nonsense doesn't happen...but where is that exactly?

The real kicker was that the clothes were actually really ugly (no offense to Mr. Posen) and I felt a little better knowing that those girls were going to be out on the town in those tacky clothes thinking they were super cool amazing shoppers and that they looked really fabu in their new designer clothes.

Isaac Mizrahi was the first, and the only one to do it right.

What a world what a world.

Beast of Burden

I have this idea that if my life was really on track I would have a helper dude and he would do stuff for me. I like to think his name would be Jimmy, that's a nice guy name right? 

So Jimmy would do all those things that I don't want to do, like...

my laundry (or maybe just the folding since most guys are completely incapable of sorting by color)

get me a coffee when I start to wilt

drive me places that are far and unusual because I can't space out while I drive if I don't know where Im going and that's annoying so I'll have Jimmy drive

keep up on All My Children, it's been years since I watched it and I wonder how everyone in Pine Valley is doing these days

Also Jimmy can make me a salad when I feel like eating french fries and then ask me if I've lost weight?

So, I'm visualizing my happy life with Jimmy and I just want to take this moment to say thanks Jimmy, I couldn't do it all without you.

immune to your consultations

This is the year of less. 

For all of 2009 I kept hearing about how bad things were getting, and then how bad things were/are etc. No money no jobs no housing no food...it was the year of no.

And now that it's over I think maybe I'll spend 2010 having less on purpose rather than letting the news tell me what's what. 

First things first: less news.

Ever since September 11th 2001 I have turned on the news the minute I woke up. Just in case something bad had happened while I slept my left coast hours and missed so much of the day in the rest of the world. What if something bad happened and I was showering and dressing like normal when what I really should have been doing was freaking out and learning how to loot? But bad things happen, and maybe it's ok to be the last to know because freaking out is unhealthy and looting is not safe or sane. So now when I wake up I put on some music and when a good song comes on I dance.

Second things second: less stuff.

I think maybe it's ok to have only three black cardigan sweaters, and besides there probably isn't a perfect one out there anywhere anyway so I can stop buying them. This turns out to be true of so many things- pairs of jeans, blank notebooks, orangewood sticks, eye creams. I can just stop worrying that I have an inferior item and enjoy the one I have. Eye creams don't actually work anyway...do they?

Third things third: less people...but in a good way.

I can finally admit that I don't really care about the boyfriend troubles of that girl I worked with for 6 months ten years ago, or how many children that T.V. couple have, or what my boss really thinks of me. It just doesn't matter, and if it doesn't matter I'm going to stop pretending to be interested. I'm not going to borrow any more drama from people who have too much of it and are always looking for a place to set some down for a while. I can ignore the email, or change the subject, or just smile and get on with my own business. Probably they won't even notice.

A year of less of all the things that made me feel less happy in the past.

Happy New Year!

walk this way

Birthday Birthday Birthday. Why do we only get one per year? It's a lot of pressure, that's why. You have to have a REALLY good day or you're screwed for the year. 

I meant to clean out my closet and do all my laundry and re-evaluate my entire life and write checks to my favorite charities...but instead I got a massage and took myself out to lunch and watched a dorky rom com.

go me :-)

I don't FEEL tardy....

Two things:
ONE- when did we stop pushing our cars out of the road when they get stalled in traffic? Yesterday the light turned green and the car in front of me just didn't move, the person in it was just sitting there on her phone (probably calling someone other than AAA) and we all had to just work around her. Her hazzard lights were on, and she was just gonna wait there until Dudley Doright arrived to save her...what EVER.

TWO- I'm starting a rumor that carrying your cell phone is over. Sure, everyone will still own a cell phone, but soon you're gonna notice that all of your coolest friends will start patting their pockets and saying "gee, I guess I forgot my cell at home, can I use yours?" Once we stop carrying our cell phones we will stop having to answer them in public, and we will want to get home faster cause we're expecting a call...which will lead to carting around less stuff which will lead to my true and ultimate goal of no longer carrying around a frikin suitcase sized purse with me all over town. Our shoulders and sidewalk neighbors will thank us :-)

Also-

Lately I feel like I'm late for something but I can't figure out what...Or maybe I'm too early to see the train coming down the tracks just yet.

I've got that feeling that I'm supposed to be doing something different, that a new person/place/thing/etc is on it's way and whatever it is I am really looking forward to it because I have been doing the same dang thing for four years now and I am tired tired tired.

I love endings so much. Whenever I've left a hometown or a job or a relationship it's always felt really cool and exciting, I'm not very sentimental about situations the way I am about objects.

Whatever it is I hope that it's cute and fun and pays a lot :-)

It's been such a long time-I think I should be going-yeah

18 years ago today I packed three babies and one duffle bag onto a plane and headed home to California. Now, when I look back I can't figure out where I got the nerve to manage it, was I brave or was I naive?

I remember when the moving company guy came to give me an estimate on interstate slowboating my stuff on his truck, and he was such an upstanding gentleman, older, kind of uptight. I could tell that he had some problems with a crazy haired lady with kids crawling all over the house and toys scattered on the floor...yeah man, I had some problems with all that stuff too, that's why I was entertaining moving van estimates. Half way through the house tour my middle child got upset and barfed on the guy's wingtips...so, that helped a lot.

Anyway-I had no idea how I was going to make a life for all of us, but I was young enough that it felt more exciting than scary...those were the days.

So far so good I guess...and in celebration I try to do something independent on March 7th every year. Feel free to join me :-)