FORSYTH #9

FORSYTH #8

FORSYTH #7

FORSYTH #6

FORSYTH #5

FORSYTH #4

FORSYTH #3

FORSYTH #2

FORSYTH #1

I'm going to be on the road for the next nine days with the family. The three of us will be driving to Forsyth, MO to visit my dear white-haired-hard-o-hearing-paternal grandparents. I will not be able to write during the next nine days as all of my physical/emotional/spiritual energy will be wrapped up in heavy, heavy drinking. What!? I mean, family merry making! So I will post pictures in lieu of words. All of them will be taken at my grandparent's bungalow with my brand new digital camera. Can you smell that? How spoiled I am?

Anyways. Happy-happy to you and yours!

THIS IS HOW WE

Fall in love.

THE FUNNY THING ABOUT ASHER

Is that people were forever forgetting his name. Friends were constantly saying, “Oh yeah and feel free to bring…that guy you’re seeing…what's his name again?” This always stuck me as a bad sign. And what's more, I never cared for his scent. He always smelled too much of laundry.

THE KOOCHIE RACKET

I don’t mean to hate on Planned Parenthood. They do a lot of good for the low income and/or the uninsured (like petit moi), but they can also be extremely unorganized and unprofessional.

Please, allow me this moment.

I had an appointment yesterday afternoon. I made it over a month ago. I just needed a regular exam and I also had a couple questions about alternative birth control methods. I didn’t need my ass exfoliated or my toenails clipped. No frills. Just the good ole in-out, if you know what I mean.

And I’m sure you do.

I sit down with the nurse and almost immediately she starts up-selling me on the IUD. It's a little piece of plastic wrapped in copper wire and it costs over $500, but apparently they have some extras just lying around in a drawer. So this woman in a lab coat leans in like a skeezy used car salesman and goes on and on about how great it is and how she can give me the ‘hook up.’ I’m talking about a real deal. She made it sound like I would be a total fool to pass this one up. But I want to do more research. And I tell her so.

Then another doctor comes in and sticks her finger in my ass.

Wait. No. I’m thinking of something else…

So then another doctor comes in and does the exam. It lasts all of 90 seconds, which is still more fondling than the average boyfriend, so I was pretty happy about that. Finally, a third doctor comes in and gives me a NuvaRing. It's a little piece of plastic I had consented to try. I go back to the lobby to pay the bill. Chicky-boo behind the counter goes clickity-click-click on her computer and then kindly informs me that I owe $580 for the visit. I laugh. When I ask to see the itemized receipt, I find they charged me for two NuvaRings I never got and two STD tests I never asked for. This was a $260 mistake. After many questions, I find out the STD tests are required if you are going to get the IUD. Thing is, I never said I was planning on getting IUD, so that was a $180 assumption on the doctor’s part.

The really irksome thing was how bubble-gum girl kept trying to strong-arm me into just paying. "Sooo like, just stop asking so many questions and just give us the fucking money already!" She wanted me to go away so she could get back to her People Magazine, obviously.

MORE PROOF THAT I WORK IN A PRISON

As though I needed more proof. I like to put in little silly questions at the end of all my math exams. I suppose it's meant to lighten things up and give the students some kind of creative outlet after a rigorous left brain workout. Yesterday I gave my morning class their first exam.

Q: What is your favorite number and why? (Please show your work).

A: 17 because my pre-ban glock .40 carries that many rounds.

A: 666. I can't show you my work. I'm retired.

HERE'S WHERE THE STORY ENDS

Did I ever tell you about my official break up with Asher? It happened about a week after thanksgiving. It went a little something like this:

*Ahem*

Wren: I don't want to be your girlfriend anymore.

Asher: ...OK.

Thoughts:

#1: I knew you didn't care, but I didn't think you didn't care so much!
#2: That was probably the easiest, least complicated break up, ever!

The End.

For real this time.

No foxing.

PET PEEVE #2

I hate it when my mother calls me, seeking a very specific affirmation and when she doesn’t get it, sulks.

DISCARDED SCENES FROM A NOVEL

Imagine a man sanding naked in his bedroom. His left arm is curled around a small teddy bear with yellow fur. He is holding it so sincerely, it’s mocking. There's a dark haired girl in his bed, watching him. She’s pretending not to watch too carefully. He asks, “Can you see me as a father?” She bows her head, but keeps glancing up and laughing. He rocks the bear gently, tenderly. (Stop watching so carefully!) And then. Like a period at the end of a sentence, he pretends to poke its eyes out with two fingers. Ninja style. The juxtaposition is hilarious.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN 'YOU SMELL LIKE SEX?'

Prada walks over to my work station this morning to find me staring into inner space. I look up at him as he nears my desk. I'm grinning like the fucking Cheshire Cat. "What?" He asks in his British accent. "Why have you got that impish look on your face?"

Me: "What impish look?"

...
...
...

Me: "Oh thaaaaaaaat..."

I SUCK

I am going to see the 2006 British TV Advertising Awards tonight. I don't own a television, so it's a bit strange that I'm paying seven dollars to see advertisements. But whatever, they should be worth it.

I'm going with a boy. I suppose you could call it a date, although I'm not going to call it a date. Too risky. I'm going to be good. I'm going to smile and quip and keep my hands in my pockets and do my very best to deny the inevitable urge to suck his handsome face.

Like in that movie, Alien.

WRASSLIN' WITH HOPE

Wren: Oh, hello hope. I wasn't expecting to see you --

Hope: Gah!! Crazy bitch! You're! Choking! Me!

Wren: Oh, shut it hope. No one wants to hear you go on and on about how great it's going to be.

Hope: Can't breathe! Stars...I see stars!

Wren: All those things you said. That was all...talk! Grrrrr!

Hope: SldgbusofjspoKJ!

Wren: Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Hope: Douogud*;.lmd;\obfdfodm!

Hope: Gah!

Wren: To hell with you hope. To hell with you and your stupid happy endings.

TROUBLE SLEEPING

Those idiot hamsters in my brain have been keeping me up again with their incessant gnawing and scavenging for buried thoughts. Saturday night I was wide awake until about 4:00 a.m. And today I woke up at 3:00 a.m. and I have been up since. I was so desperate I almost took a frying pan to my head.

A PROBLEM

There's a guy at work who likes to say this: Naaaat a praaaaaaablem!

Dear lord. Just what am I supposed to do about that?

LET IT SHINE

If you ever want to know how to over analyze something, come talk to me. I'm super good at it. If you ever want to waste hour upon hour upon hour replaying some scenario or indulge in some tautological soliloquy, let me be your coach. I can show you how to make your own hair fall out of your head.

I AM JANE OF THE JUNGLE

And I swing from Tarzan to Tarzan.

POCKETS V. PURSE

I am not the kind of girl who can carry a purse. I don't know what it is. They just look ridiculous on my arm. Decorate your Christmas tree with tampons and crown it with a pork chop or dress your cat up in a thong bikini and you’ll know what I mean. There's simply something unnatural about it.

I carry things around in my pockets. Or if I’m in good company, I’ll carry my things around in other people’s pockets. I am sort of an incorrigible pocket renter. For a little while I was in toting keys, wallet, lip balm and other sundries in a single oversized mitten.

I GOT JUST ONE MORE THING TO SAY

How many cargo pants, how many rugby shirts and rubber thongs can a person buy with a thousand dollars? I have no idea. What I do know is, somewhere in the northern suburbs of Chicago there’s a drunken sorority girl wearing brand new clothes. Clothes that I bought for her. And frankly, I would like nothing more than to punch her in the face.

No, it's all cool.

It's just that nothing feels safe anymore. I have this impulse to withdraw all my money and hide it in my mattress. And then just sit around my apartment all day sharpening a stick while sniffing suspiciously at the front door.

IDENTITY CRISIS

So I enter my apartment building today (la-la-la, bliss, bliss). I open up my mailbox and remove two letters contained within (hmm-hmm-hmm, la-la-la-laa). As I climb the stairs to my shoebox apartment, I open the letter from Nyantu Bolo who congratulates me in ALL! CAPS! for being selected to receive a special 18 month membership to the cities’ premier fitness center (la-la-la-la, gar-bage). Then I key the lock to my room as I scan the second letter: my monthly bank statement.

*Sound of phonograph needle tearing across vinyl*

Someone made charges on my debit card. Someone spent $450 at Old Navy and $539 at Abercrombie & Fitch. In Skokie Illinois! And let me tell you. That asshole was not me.

I can’t believe somebody stole my money!

And bought really shitty clothing with it!

...

I am absolutely flabbergasted.

SMARTER THAN A DRIED APRICOT

But only slightly.

Yesterday was the first day of a new quarter. I wanted to be ebullient, inspiring, charismatic, but instead I felt more vacuous than George Dub Ya on national TV. After work I went to the neighborhood cafe where I somehow managed to dip a rather substantial lock of my hair in my coffee beverage.

So. Awesome.

DIZZY FROM IT

I had forgotten what it was like to argue with my ex boyfriend (RS), but he kindly reminded last night when he called. Of course he had to drag the entire universe into our conversation like every molecule is somehow complicit. But that whole formula is too big for my little pea brain and when it's over my head is swimming and my eyes are rolling around like socks in a dryer.

It is difficult to change the parameters of a relationship; especially with someone you shared an intense love with. It's not impossible though. It just takes a hill of work. A muthafucking HILL! I wonder if we can pull it off.

I HAVE AN IRRATIONAL FEAR OF QUICKSAND

Also, when I was a little kid I had the irrational fear that Richard Simmons would enter my home, uninvited, through the a secret porthole: the upstairs toilet.

Dead serious.

BLUE SATURDAY

Oh. Hi ennui. I didn’t see you standing there. What? Yes, I know I’m nearing the end of my two week vacation. Why are you looking at me like that? Yeah sure, you could call these are pajama pants. Yeah, I know its past noon; what are you getting at?

…

Don’t give me that face.

…

Why are you still in my kitchen? Do you need something? Like a carrot peeler or a glass of water? Nothing! It’s just making me nervous, you standing around like that. What me? Isn’t it obvious? I’m doing work! Do you think I sit in front of my computer for health reasons? What do you mean ‘what work?’ Work, work! School-work. No, I’m not 'updating that online thingy!’

Geez!


*sigh*

QUESTION

Do dreams come in genres?