Honestly....?

Bridget Kyle's Here, Go Get the Drill

2011-01-26T13:45:00.000-08:00

There comes a point in everyone's life when they realize that they are going to be brutally murdered. This situation happens to me quite often because of all my gang activity, but it had never been so drawn out as it was last week.

It had been a year and a half since my last dentist appointment. Back when I lived at home with my parents, the reminder cards with a cartoon-tooth-smiley-face on it would just magically show up in the mail or the appointments would already be written on the calendar. I went to the same dentist since I was 6 and would walk away with free floss and a new tooth brush. Something they don't tell you when you receive your diploma and head out west to start your own life is that those reminder cards don't show up automatically. You have to seek them out.

When I was first employed and eligible for dental insurance, they gave me a list of dentists in my area that I can go to. And I chose my dentist how I choose all my care providers, I picked the one whose name I could pronounce. Most of the names on the list looked like they made the name from the left over scrabble pieces in the bottom of the box, so I chose the most normal sounding one. I went on Yelp and searched for reviews and they all seemed positive. Their office was 10 minutes away from my work, so all seemed to fit perfectly in place. My only reservation about the place was that it was one block south of a street called Pico.

It is widely known in Los Angeles that, excuse my racial slur, "white people" don't really go south of Pico. But I figured that one block wouldn't make a difference.

I don't know if it was out of laziness or if I really thought one of those smiley tooth cards would just appear at my home, I went a while without making an appointment. It wasn't until a coworker came back from her dentist with the news of cavities that my teeth instantly started throbbing.

I couldn't sleep or concentrate. All I felt was the nerves in my teeth writhing with pain. I called and made an appointment with the dentist.

I've never had a problem with the dentist. I actually enjoyed going since I was a little kid. Before my first visit when I was 6, my sisters tried to scare me by saying in a deep monster voice "Bridget Kyle's here, go get the drill". But as soon as I went in and sat down in the plastic taupe chair, I wasn't scared at all. They were always very nice and would ask me about school and my friends and my pets. It was like hanging out with your grandparents, if your grandparents wore surgical masks and flossed your teeth for you. So I had absolutely no fear when it came to going now that I was an adult.

My appointment was for Friday at 11:00am. I figured I could sneak out of work for an hour and be back before lunch. It was a simple plan that would obviously go horribly awry.

Maybe I should have known to turn around as soon as I saw that the sign for the dentist was a poster board tied to the chain link fence in front of the strip mall it was in that just read, "Dentist" with an arrow pointing inside. I continued on into the parking lot. And just like the poster board said, there was the dentist office, bars on the windows, and a sign that just said "Dentist". I was pretty sure I was at the dentist office.

I walked in to see what I can only describe as the setting for a scene in "SAW". Wires hanging from the ceiling, sharpie scribbles on the walls, maroon upholstered chairs with huge brown stains on the seat, and - my personal favorite- the EXIT sign above the door made out of red crayon and a piece of notebook paper. I could only assume they got the best elementary school student safety inspector in the business.

"What are you here for?" I turned around to see a Latina woman with rusty orange colored hair, a sweater, blue pants, and open toed wedge shoes. She had a huge hairy mole right on the tip of her chin that drew my attention like a moth to a flame.

"I have an appointment for 11:00," I said making full eye contact with the mole.

"We run behind for a lot because of the insurance we couldn't find it should be more minutes."

I really had no idea what she was saying but I agreed to sit in the brown stained chairs and wait. She went back into the other part of the office as I noticed her touching the doorknobs with the plastic gloves she is suppose to use for sanitation purposes. I really hoped she would change them but secretly knew she wouldn't. I was really looking forward to those going in my mouth, as I do most things.

About twenty minutes went by as I played "I Spy a Health Violation". I kept looking at the time and debating if I should just sneak out and go back to work but a sign on the door kept me at bay.

"A $20 fee is mandatory for anyone who cancels the day of their appointment."

I sure as hell was not going to be charged for running out, plus my psychological tooth ache was keeping me up at night.

I was lost in my thought of whether you can contract an STD from sitting on one when the first patient emerged from the other room. She was a small Asian woman, slightly hunched over, and she dragged her feet as she walked. I looked up at her. There was a small trail of blood dripping from her mouth.

I was so horrified and confused whether she was a zombie or just needed help but the dental hygienist called me in right away.

She was uglier the closer I got to her. Bright pink lipstick, blue eye liner, hair growing out of all parts of her face, and she reeked of B.O.

"Sorry for the waiting," she said as she walked me to the corner of the room.

"Oh, it's okay," I said. But it wasn't okay when she opened a closet door to reveal a chair, covered in duct tape.

"Okay, we going to take x-ray."

"Here?"

The room was obviously a wood paneled broom closet that they converted into a the x-ray room. I took a deep breath and sat down.

"So, you come from...," she trailed off as she was preparing the little pieces of plastic to go into my mouth.

"Ohio?" I offered. That was not the answer she was looking for or perhaps she's just never heard of it.

"Work! I came from work," I corrected myself.

"Oh! What is your job?"

"I work for a TV show. It's a cartoon," I said, distracted as she still fumbled with the pieces of plastic.

"Oh! You work with children!" she squealed. I paused. I didn't have the heart or the correct words in Spanish to let her know that the show I work on has a "For Mature Audiences Only" disclaimer at the beginning of the show, so I lied.

"Yes. Lots of them."

"Its blessing to work with the children," she sighed. "Open."

I got my x-rays done in the broom closet, then made my way to the other dentist chair. As I followed her to the next torture chair, she stepped on some dropped silver dentist tools. Instead of picking them up like any sane human or normal practicing doctor, she kicked them across the dirty tan tile to the edge of the room into a pile of collected dust. I guess it was better than her picking them up and trying to use them on my teeth. I take my blessings where I can get them.

She sat me down and put my x-rays in front of me. I couldn't help but notice most of the tray table and over head light connected to the chair was bound together with clear tape. Did they get these items at a discount dentist store? Do they have outlets for last season's dentist tools? Or was there an outraged patient that came in and smashed all of the equipment just hours before I came in? I couldn't blame him, the thought had crossed my mind.

As she started to work on my teeth, speaking in broken English, leaning over me with sweat stains inches away from my face, she stopped and pulled out a few pieces of paper stapled together.

"Okay..." she sighed, looking at the papers. I looked over to see what she was looking at. It was a study guide. A cheat sheet. Diagrams of the human mouth with a list of steps of what to do next.

"Now I floss teeth to see for plaque."

As she started flossing, she kept mumbling half sentences and minor insults.

"Oh, you have some beautiful teeth... and some are not."

So said the woman whose teeth were covered in coffee stains. She took out the electric scraping tool, which I usually wouldn't have a problem with, but I had a gut feeling something was going to go wrong. Of course she went straight for the gums and for the first time in my life I literally yelped. She kept on going down the gum line, my eyes welling up with tears, until I finally shouted, "No!" I would give her any information she asked for: government secrets, credit card numbers, names and dates. I just wanted her to stop this torture.

She pulled away quickly.

"Oh, there is blood," she said, handing me a napkin to wipe the blood from my gums.

She then explained that she was going to use the electric buffer to prevent tartar buildup. She grabbed the tool from the tray and pressed it's button. Nothing happened. She tried it again. Nothing. She replaced the instrument head. Still nothing happened.

"Okay, its broke. We do next time," she got up pushed the tray table back and indicated for me to get up.

"That's...that's it?"

"Yes. We'll reschedule for next time to fill your cavities."

"Wait. I have cavities?"

"You have the start of the tooth decay. Minor but we should fill"

I'm glad she waited until I was walking out the door for her to tell me this. I told her that I wasn't going to schedule an appointment now and I would call her. It felt like the end of a horrible blind date. I knew I wasn't going to call and I was just finding excuses to run out of there as fast as I could.

"Do you need any of my insurance information or do I need to sign anything?" I asked, making sure I would never have to come back.

"No...no."

I sprinted to my vehicle and almost ran over everyone in the parking lot just trying to get to a safe place. My mouth was in severe pain. My gums were still bleeding and I knew I got some sort of gum hepatitis from this experience. As I was planning on how I would have to explain to my future husband how I got gum hepatitis, my phone rang.

"Hello?"

"Hello, this is dentist."

NOOOOOOOO.

"You forgot to pay the co-pay for the deep cleaning."

Right. I forgot to pay, even though I asked her when I was leaving if I needed to do anything else and she said no.

"It's sixty dollars."

"Sixty dollars?!"

It cost sixty dollars for her to floss my teeth and give me a medieval bleeding.

"You come back and pay."

"No, I can't. I have to go to work."

"Oh...okay. You can pay today."

"No. You can bill me," I said hanging up the phone.

I walked into work not knowing how I could explain what had just happened to me. If we had a shower in the office, I would have turned on the water and sat down, shivering, gargling vodka. I still think about that small Asian woman who was bleeding from the mouth... I wonder if she was trying to warn me. I wonder if she had someone to talk to about her assault. Wherever she is, I want her to know... I understand and it's not her fault. It is not her fault.

You Look Just Like...

2010-12-07T12:46:00.000-08:00

It's the most awkward feeling when someone tells you that you "look just like so-and-so" because, deep down, you know that "so-and-so" is probably an unattractive human or someone you really don't want to look like. Then they show you a picture of "so-and-so" and you try to hold back your tears as you notice a large nose, bad teeth, and eyes that are too close together- basically someone who resembles Sloth from "Goonies"- only further inbred. No good can come from comparison. None at all...

Back in college, my friends and I stumbled upon this website. You upload your picture, it scans your face shape and features, and then finds your celebrity doppelganger. For a group of twenty year old girls, validation from a random website that you look like a celebrity that other people find attractive became the number priority of the night. What we wanted to know was that we were right when we thought we looked like Jennifer Aniston circa 2001 and not Jennifer Hudson circa 2006.

All huddled around one computer, in a sweatpants and old gym t-shirts, we scoured to find the most attractive pictures of ourselves to upload. My friend Robyn went first. Buffering... Buffering... Buffering. "Robyn your celebrity look-a-like is.... CATHERINE ZETA JONES". We all agreed and Robyn bashfully denied it. We reassured her- "The eyes definitely!"

Then our friend Gina uploaded hers. Buffering... Buffering... "Gina your celebrity look-a-like is... KRISTEN BELL" Again, there was a collective "So true!", and pointed out everything we thought look similar.

It was my turn to upload my picture to the mercy of the world wide web. I was secretly pushing for Zooey Deschanel but I would settle for a young Gwenyth. Buffering... Buffering... People have told me Gwenyth, so that's probably what it's going to be... Buffering... Buffering... I would love it if it were Zooey though... Buffering... Buffering... please be Zooey.

"Bridget your celebrity look-a-like is DENNIS QUAID".....

...What the hell?

There was a beat of stunned silence followed by an explosion of mocking laughter.

I was the only one to get a male celebrity doppelganger. I don't know why the internet thought I was a tranny that day. And I don't know why it was Dennis Quaid. But more importantly, why did I think I wouldn't be openly mocked by the internet in front of all my friends? You think a girl would learn... some girls are pretty and some girls are Dennis Quaid look-a-likes.

Robert

2010-09-26T14:09:00.000-07:00

We're all afraid of something. Growing up, I was afraid of a large still-life painting my mom had made that hung above the couch in our den. To me, a young, slightly chubby, skittish child, the chairs and lamps that posed in the painting, looked like angry bear monsters whose eyes followed you from one side of the room to the other. I also feared being in the bathroom after the toilet flushed. I didn't know what I thought would happen, but I didn't want to stay in there to find out.

As I got older my fears changed to radioactive waves from the microwave slowly riddling my body with cancer, how the endangerment of the bee population might lead to all of the earth's vegetation dying, and getting gonorrhea from public toilet seats. And while I'm still afraid of what most humans are afraid of- rapists, murderers, and unplanned pregnancies- I have a few unusual ones...

One of my biggest fears is being thrown into an impromptu spelling bee (they happen, believe me) but my main fear is fish.

Many friends tried to take advantage of this by tagging me in pictures of dead fish on Facebook, surprise trips to the aquarium, and even leaving Pet-Co beta fish on my doorstep. As you can imagine, I live in a constant state of fear and gagging.

I believe this fear stems from an unfortunate event I witnessed as a young sprightly lass in the happiest place on earth to a Midwestern human- Cedar Point: America's Roller Coast. For those of you who haven't experienced this Sandusky treasure, it's a large amusement park packed with some of the biggest roller coasters in the world, right on the coast of Lake Erie.

In between the roller coasters and winding between rides are little streams from off the lake. And in these streams dwell evil mutated amusement park carp. They probably started off as just normal humble, mild mannered, mid-western fish, but with thousands of stupid Cedar Point fanatics who throw half eaten funnel cakes and soft pretzels in the streams, the fish became overgrown and greedy. Their size exceeded any normal size fish I had seen. They became aggressive, dare I say, "ill tempered". When someone would drop the tiniest piece of food into the stream, the fish would topple over each other by the masses to grab it. There was a mountain of thrashing angry carp inches in front of me. In my opinion, the most disgusting sight that any human can witness is to see a fish flop out of water, struggling and gasping for air: It makes me vomit and want to stop living.

And so, there I was, excited in line for the Iron Dragon, my favorite roller coaster ride. Ahead of me in line were a few hoodlums who were spitting into the stream. Every time they spit, the fish went insane- piling on top of each other, jumping out of the water. Then, by mistake, a little girl who was standing in front of me, dropped her stuffed Pooh Bear into the water. In a matter of seconds, the fish over took the bear, and ripped it to shreds. I must have blacked out from the horror, because I don't exactly remember what happened next, but I do remember the screams of a little girl who lost her Pooh.

Ever since then, I had a fish phobia. Not only will they tear you apart, but they won't even remember it two seconds later because they don't have a memory. Hmmm...similar to sociopaths. They are the closest thing to looking like monsters that exist on this earth and are the only ones who eat their own species. That fact is probably not true, but it feels true- I saw "Nemo", I know how it works.

Last Christmas, my roommate Johnna had a friend, a tall surly man who hated "that's what she said" jokes named "Evan". He was leaving town for the holidays and needed someone to fish-sit. Our roommate, Beast, was going to be staying in LA . So, in some sick arrangement, a fish was brought into my home.

I protested. I refused to see it. But, to my dismay, a beta named Bob was placed on my kitchen table. Luckily, I was not going to be there the whole week- it would just be The Beast and Bob.

When I was in the Cleve, enjoying the some Christ's birth celebration, I received frantic messages from Beast. "Bob's water looks really weird!" and "Bob's not really moving, what should I do?!" and "I ate all of your Triscuts!"

I told Beast to maybe change the water and to put the special fish water drops in his tank. That's what I did when I babysat those Snorks, so it seemed like sound advice. All seemed okay.

After the holiday, Beast and Johnna picked me up at the airport.

"Uhh, we have to make a stop at PetSmart on the way home," Beast said.

"Why?"

Johnna and Beast let out a guilty laugh, "Bob died and we need to replace him before Evan picks him up tomorrow."

"Gross, did you flush him?"

"No, I'm going to buy this fish and then return the dead one to get my money back." That was my Beast. Always looking to make an extra dollar and fifty cents where she could.

"When did Bob die?"

"A few days ago," Beast replied.

"So, you're telling me that a dead fish is rotting in our kitchen?"

"Yes he is."

"Great, just wanted to check."

They dropped me off at home before they picked up Fish #2, knowing that PetCo fish section is my personal 'Nam. And there, on the kitchen table, in a bowl of cloudy dead fish water, was Bob. His little fish body was now bloated and bright red, floating at the top of the bowl. I almost felt bad for him since his body was going to be traded into PetCo for money in a few hours and not be laid to rest in toilet.

Johnna and Beast returned to the house with a small plastic Tupperware containing a tiny blue Beta fish that would be Bob's body double. Beast set the container down next to the dirty fish bowl.

I stepped back and looked at the two monsters on the table. One was red and the other was blue.

"Uhh, guys? Isn't Bob red?"

"No, he was blue. I think his body just turned red after he died," Johnna said.

"Are you sure?" I asked, studying them from a distance.

There was a long pause. No. None of us were sure. We were playing a risky game. Should we just give Evan the blue fish and hope that he either- A.) Didn't remember what color Bob was anyway... B.) That Bob was in fact blue, but since Beast had just let his body stay in a dirty bowl and start decaying, his color changed... or C.) Tell Evan what really happened and as a peace offering, give him the little blue fish... We went with C.

I would say I have faith in humans. I believe that everyone has some decency, understanding, and sympathy. But I also believe that I'm wrong about everything 98% of the time.

Johnna told Evan the whole story about Bob's sudden turn in health, his death, and the little blue fish that we had waiting for him at our home as an apology/replacement for Bob. Instead of acting like a normal homosapien with adult emotions, Evan flipped out. He claimed Beast killed his fish and refused to come and pick up his bowl and fish food, let alone take a new fish.

So there we were, one dead fish, one blue fish- like a messed up Dr. Seuss rhyme.

Beast told us that she was still intended to get her money back for the fish. The only problem was the pet store would only refund her if the fish died with in the week. She could either take Bob's body to PetCo, but we would be stuck with the little blue fish. So, Beast decided that the best idea was to leave the little blue fish in the small container until it died and take that back to PetCo.

Two days later, Bob's body is still rotting in the fish bowl and the little blue fish is still swimming around in its little plastic resort. We told Beast that she had to come up with a new plan because Bob's body was now starting to smell like raw sewage... or a decaying fish body. She said she would flush both of them down the toilet that day and just be rid of the whole situation. I didn't feel right about killing the little blue one, but I had also been hyperventilating every time the fish came into my eye line- so I was Natalie Imbruglia torn.

"Beast time" is not like human time. You tell her rent is due March first, she pays you June 2nd three years later in Canadian coins. It was another three days of decaying bodies and me having seizures every time I went into the kitchen.

So like Squints from "Sandlot" with the lifeguard, Wendy Peffercorn, I couldn't take anymore. As Beast downed her eleventh beer and opened a can of beans for a snack, I did something desperate.

I took Bob's bowl, which was now a dark brown color, and took it to our back bathroom. The smell felt like it was stabbing every part of my body and my stomach made a B-line for my throat. Not to mention, floating at the top, looking right at me with cold dead eyes, was a dead fish. I carefully poured the dead fish water into the toilet, trying not to spill any of the pebbles and fake plastic plants into the toilet so I wouldn't have to touch it with my hands.

I can't even describe to you what my screams sounded like but I can only think neighbors thought I was being skinned alive. I don't remember really what happened next because I paid a therapist to help me black out those moments. The next thing I knew, I had a clean fish bowl with the little blue fish swimming around in it.

No matter how many times I vomited looking at him, I could not let him die. And so, upon that day, I named him Robert. And I fed Robert everyday, screamed as I had to change his water, cried as he followed me as I walked by his bowl. I feared him.

"He was going to die soon," I thought. After all, he was a pet store fish. The months went by and Robert was still alive. Swimming, staring, and hiding in his plastic plant. Then fear turned to respect and soon respect turned to love.

Now Robert and I have been together for about a year and half. Everyday and every night, he sits on my desk and watches me. I care for him and feed him and he follows my finger up and down the glass. And now, reflecting back on everything, I realized... Robert is one of the longest loving relationships I have... and that makes me want to die.

Killer Lemonade

2010-07-31T15:36:00.000-07:00

I killed a man once. True story. Well, helped at least…

A few summers ago, I was sitting in my sweltering apartment with my friends Beast and Dani. It was one of those days that it felt like the walls were sweating and every time you tried to move, it was if you were walking in slow motion. And seeing how my apartment had nothing in it but dorm furniture and cockroaches, we were bored and little scared of disease.

“Well let’s do something summer-y” I said, wide-eyed and innocent.

“Let’s get one of those kiddie pools and put them in the lobby,” Beast suggested.

“No, someone next door did that last week,” I said, wanting to be original. “How about a Lemonade Stand?”

We all agreed that this was the most logical thing we could do on a beautiful summer day in the city as juniors in College…

We ran across the street to 7-11 where we bought a carton of Newman’s Lemonade, sugar, and small Dixie cups. All together it cost me $9 to invest in a project that would only give me $3 in return, a painful memory, and a slight criminal record. I went home and poured the lemonade into a large plastic pitcher, added water and sugar to give it a homemade taste.

We put on our best dresses, set up chairs outside our apartment building, made a sign that said “Lemonade 73 cents- exact change only.” And in order to attract customers, Beast brought out her ukulele. We sat there singing, “Lemonade- come get your lemonade- your fresh squeezed lemonade- Well, its hot outside- why don’t you come and buy- our fresh squeezed lemonade.” It was the best song since the invention of happiness. It was melodic, catchy, and sung as loudly as possible.

We mostly got strange looks from pedestrians or ignored all together. Once in a while we would get some takers. Since our price was 73 cents and we didn’t have any change, people would just give up and give us the whole dollar. One lady just gave us a dollar to be quiet. But our song continued on and we spiced it up a bit. We would incorporate the people we saw on the street into our song. Like a man on a Segway that passed us back and forth multiple times, waving and who was ecstatic about the fact he was on Segway.

Our friend Ann was walking home from work and was unbelievably excited about our stand. “Well Ann, lemonade doesn’t grow on trees…” …it kind of does, “it’s going to be 73 cents.” Ann, disappointedly, turned out her empty pockets. “ I’ll be right back! Don’t move,” she said as she ran into our apartment building.

Then a young Indian family passed us by. Beast started singing to them, “Hey there family, don’t you want some lemonade?”
“NO! No!” the father yelled at us. We didn’t understand why this man hated lemonade so much but looking back, maybe he could predict the horror that lemonade stands could cause.

After being scolded by the father of the pedestrians, from the corner of my eye, I spotted an old maroon Buick creeping by. The driver, a middle age man with a scruffy graying beard hung out his window, cigarette hanging on his lip, just stared at us. He wouldn’t break eye contact with us while his car cruised by at a snail’s pace. It was one of the top three most uncomfortable staring contests I had ever been involved in.

Beast finally reached her limit of awkwardness and stopped playing her ukulele, and yelled, “HI?” in a tone that shook that man’s attention.

The man snapped out of his trance and said “OH! Hi-“ SMACK! CRASH! BOOM!

Head on collision with a taxi. The car behind the taxi smashed into the taxi causing the taxi to further smash into our creeper’s car. Glass everywhere, tires screeching, smoke coming out of the hoods. It looked like a war scene. Our jaws dropped.

We all gasped at the nightmare that had just unfolded in front of our lemonade stand. Then we did the only thing we knew what to do.

Without a word, we all ran. We ran like 8 year olds in fear of being scolded by our mom. We ran into our apartment and hid. We changed our clothes when we heard the police sirens. We dumped the lemonade and ran to our friend’s apartment on the second floor to get a better look of the scene. We were all shaking.

Three police cars, two fire trucks, and an ambulance surrounded the scene.

“Shit! Shit! Shit! Look!” Dani yelled and pointed. The angry Indian father was talking to a policeman, pointing to where are lemonade stand was. “What do you think he’s saying?”

“Its not our fault! We didn’t do anything wrong!” I protested, although it might be illegal to have a lemonade stand when you’re 20 years old, but they couldn’t arrest us for that.

“Why didn’t you guys call for help?” our friend asked. That would have been the right thing to do, of course. But when you might have been the distraction that just caused three cars to collide into each other and cause thousands of dollars worth of damage, the only thing we could think to do was run.

“Oh God…” I gasped, “Ann!” Wandering through the wreckage, looking around the police, was our friend Ann with 73 cents in hand.

“Get out of there!” we tried to loud-whisper through the window. We shook with fear that Ann was going to give our cover away. “What if she talks? We got to get her out of there!” Luckily, Ann gave up on her own. As Ann was walking back into our building, we saw our creeper get taken out of his vehicle. He was immediately put onto a stretcher and put into a neck brace.

“Damnit!!! Do you think he’s going to be ok?”

As we all agreed that he probably was dying, they put him into the ambulance and rushed away.

“Beast, what did you do?” we looked at her.

“I killed a man.”

Over the next few hours the taxi driver gave a statement to the police, the cars were towed, and the corner in front of our apartment building went quiet.

Throughout the rest of that day we all received texts asking if Beast really killed a man in cold blood…we responded, “She did.”

That night we had a “Beast killed a man, let’s party” party/memorial service in which every one wore black and we took moments of silence for the fallen.

We kept a headlight that was left on the road as a souvenir of the day Beast killed a man. For the rest of the summer and into the fall, glass covered the street. We ducked into doorways whenever we saw a police car go by. Some say they can still hear the screeching tires and a ukulele playing when the wind blows or that in the middle of the night a maroon Buick cruises down the street and disappears at the corner. This of course is all myth and hearsay, but one thing is for certain, none of us ever drank lemonade again.

A Serial Sexter

2010-04-18T15:33:00.000-07:00

When it comes to dealing with anything remotely sexual, I have the maturity of a 90 year-old asexual that has been living in a convent since 1953. I cringe with shame and embarrassment when someone uses the proper names for male and female genitalia and not the abbreviated “P and the V”. When someone says the word “panties” I instantly want to throw up and run into a small-enclosed space. I still can’t say the word “condoms” out loud.

I blame most of this on learning Sex Ed. from a book that was titled “Jesus loves all his Children” in 4th grade at my Catholic grade school. I mostly learned that Jesus loves both boys and girls equally and that hugging is ok if it only lasts a couple seconds. And on the last page it told me that I have a uterus and I’m going to start bleeding until I’m 50. Traumatic for a 9 year old.

Then in 6th grade we started learning terms for the reproductive system in health class. Our entire black board was covered with the correct medical terms for the different parts of the body, written in perfect cursive with yellow chalk which we had to copy into our notebooks.

At the end of the day, I was leaning against the board talking to my friend while I waited for the bus. When my bus was called I started to leave the room until I heard my friends burst out in laughter behind me. Someone grabbed me by the arm and told me to take off my black winter coat. On the back was a perfectly rubbed off chalk copy of the term “Fallopian Tubes”. Traumatic for any preteen.

My mom was also a contributing factor in my awkwardness. My dear Midwestern mom would tell the teenage workers at Victoria Secret that the store is for “Big Boobed Hussies” when they asked us if we needed help finding anything. Or how she would still call flip-flops “thongs” as they did in the 1960’s. And then when a spider crawled into our kitchen she would yell, “Hit it with your thong! HIT IT WITH YOUR THONG!”…Thank god I had some friends over that day. Traumatic for all humans.

From these experiences, I grew extremely uncomfortable with subjects such as underwear, Fallopian Tubes, and chalk. But never in my life had I been a victim of serial sexting.

It was a Wednesday night and I had claimed my space on my couch watching Grey’s Anatomy on Lifetime while eating left over take out…hot. I was falling deeper in love with Patrick Dempsey when my phone vibrated. I got a text message from “Marc”. Excitedly, I opened the text : “What are you wearing?”

I laughed to myself. “He’s so funny”. So I replied back “An ill-fitting pant-suit I got on sale from Sear’s. You?”

He replied back, “Just an apron”.

One, what 33- year-old single man owns an apron? Two, if this was true and he was cooking, he could seriously burn himself in a weird way. And three, I wasn’t so sure this was a joke anymore.

So I replied, “Be careful if you are sautéing anything”.

He didn’t respond.

“Wow that was weird, “ I thought. But he was probably just joking, so I didn’t think anything of it.

Then the next night, I was back to my same routine of Grey’s and leftovers, when I got another text from "Marc".

“What are you wearing?”

Is this guy F’ing joking? Not only was I getting a little creeped out, but also disappointed in his unoriginality of a new way to sexually harass me via text.

“An over sized sweatshirt and gym shorts” I replied.

“I’m naked,” he said.

There is nothing attractive about a man naked alone in his home. Nothing. I didn’t know what to say, so I replied with the only thing I could think of:

“Well, it is Thursday…” I still have no idea what that was supposed to mean and I don’t think he knew either because he didn’t respond.

The weekend came and went without any word from him. Maybe he was disappointed in my inability to “sext” or maybe he was too busy hanging out around middle schools or making friends on Chatroulette.

Monday night, I was getting into bed exhausted when my phone went off again. “ 1 New Message” my phone blinked. I opened it.

“What are you wearing?”

Holy S’ing Eff. Are you kidding me? Does he think that every time I get this message I think, “Wow, this guy speaks right to my soul.” Or that I’m surprised or excited about this?

I replied, “Lots of layers,” thinking he would get the hint that this is ridiculous and weird. But he didn’t.

“I’m naked,” he said again.

“Why are you always naked?”

“I don’t know.”

“Invest in some pants.”

And thus ended that relationship.

So I would like to thank you "Marc", no matter how much I clear out my inbox on my phone, it will never be clean.

Call Me Ike Turner

2010-04-10T22:44:00.000-07:00

I'm going to start off with a warning- Mom, if you are reading this, stop. Things are going to get weird and I want to be able to look you in the eye at Christmas.

If you are anyone outside of my immediate family or cannot, in any way, bring this information up around my parents, please continue.

I wouldn't categorize myself as a hot chick. I don't use a lot of makeup, go tanning, or own underwear from anywhere other than the JCPenny semi- annual sale. I don't take pictures of myself in the mirror or call my friends "my sexy bitches". I never owned a Britney Spears CD. I'm in no way saying that doing any of these activities are wrong or stupid - I severely envy those girls who can pull it off. I am just physically incapable of making these activities seem desirable or as if a real functioning human is performing them. I know what I am, and I am not a hot chick.

As I had mentioned before, I started to see this 33 year old man named "Marc". He was witty, goofy, and successful all wrapped into a 5'10 blond-haired-blue-eyed man. And I mean "man". He had his own apartment with furniture that he bought from a store opposed to picking it off the curb. He drove an earth friendly Prius, wore button downs with suit jackets with designer jeans, and had a work Blackberry. He had his own office and his own personal assistant who is three years older than I am. This was a little intimidating when I compared it to my life.

I share a house with two of my friends from college on a street that has a 24 Hour Pawn Shop. I drive a Kia hatchback that constantly smells like Chinese food. And I share a desk with two other people in an office which used to be a storage closet. I felt like I was 5. We were in two opposite places in our lives and really had nothing in common except for the fact that we could make each other laugh.

Anywhoozle, like all situations I happen to be in, something goes array. After a date with Marc, we go back to his big kid apartment to hangout. As the night progressed, things started to happen. Nothing graphic, totally PG-13 makeout on his couch types of happening. I was laying down on my back with my legs across his lap and him leaning towards me. It was a little uncomfortable in that position so we tried to move. As he was moving out from under me, I swung my legs around to set them on the ground. Unfortunately, he did not see me doing this.

SMACK!

I kicked him in the face. "Holy S***!" he screamed. I gasped. He move his hand from over his mouth. There was blood all over his mouth. I had split his lip. "Oh my god! I'm so sorry!" I said half laughing, half mortified. "Am I bleeding?" he said as his tongue swiped across his bottom lip. "Ummm...a little bit" He got up and went to the bathroom. I just waited for his reaction.... "Oh my god!" I heard him yell in the bathroom. I was tempted to just grab my shoes, light something on fire, and run out the door before I got taken away for domestic abuse. My face was burning up with embarrassment and the after effects of Bridget Kyle on tequila. He came out of the bathroom with a wet paper towel on his swollen mouth. I didn't know if he was going to tell me to leave or hit me back. "Well thats going to make an awesome story for Monday" he said as he started laughing.

Thank God.

Serial Sexter

2010-04-09T10:17:00.000-07:00

I'm going to start off with a warning- Mom, if you are reading this, stop. Things are going to get weird and I want to be able to look you in the eye at Christmas.

If you are anyone outside of my immediate family or cannot, in any way, bring this information up around my parents, please continue.

I wouldn't categorize myself as a hot chick. I don't use a lot of makeup, go tanning, or own underwear from anywhere other than the JCPenny semi- annual sale. I don't take pictures of myself in the mirror or call my friends "my sexy bitches". I never owned a Britney Spears CD. I'm in no way saying that doing any of these activities are wrong or stupid - I severely envy those girls who can pull it off. I can't do these things because I would be mocked by the world and myself if I walked into a tanning salon. I can't take these things seriously. I know what I am, and I am not a hot chick.

As I had mentioned before, I started to see this 33 year old man named "Mark". He was witty, goofy, and successful all wrapped into a 5'10 blond-haired-blue-eyed man. And I mean "man". He had his own apartment with furniture that he bought from a store opposed to picking it off the curb. He drove an earth friendly Prius, wore button downs with suit jackets with designer jeans, and had a work Blackberry. He had his own office and his own personal assistant who is three years older than I am.

This was a little intimidating when I compared it to my life. I share a house with two of my friends from college on a street that has a 24 Hour Pawn Shop. I drive a Kia hatchback that constantly smells like chinese food. And I share a desk with two other people in an office with no windows. I felt like I was 5.

We were in two opposite places in our lives and really had nothing in common except for the fact that we could make each other laugh.

Anywhoozle, like all situations I happen to be in, something goes array.

After a date with Mark, we go back to his big kid apartment to hangout. As the night progressed, things started to happen. Nothing graphic, totally PG-13 makeout on his couch types of happening. I was laying down on my back with my legs across his lap and him leaning towards me. It was a little uncomfortable to stay in that position so we tried to move. As he was moving out from under me, I swung my legs around to set them on the ground. Unfortunately, he did not see me doing this. SMACK. I kicked him in the face.

"Holy S***!" he screamed. I gasped. He move his hand from over his mouth. There was blood all over his mouth. I had split his lip.

"Oh my god! I'm so sorry!" I said half laughing, half mortified.

"Am I bleeding?" he said as his tongue swiped across his bottom lip.

"Ummm...a little bit"

He got up and went to the bathroom. I just waited for his reaction....

"Oh my god!" I heard him yell in the bathroom. I was tempted to just grab my shoes and run out the door before I got taken away for domestic abuse. My face was burning up with embarrassment and the after effects of Bridget Kyle on tequila. He came out of the bathroom with a wet paper towel on his swollen mouth.

I didn't know if he was going to tell me to leave or hit me back.

"Well thats going to make an awesome story for Monday" he said as he started laughing. Thank God.

Let's Give Them Something to Talk About

2010-03-20T13:57:00.000-07:00

I was recently set up on a date by one of my friends at work. One day, just in passing, she, Kristen, asked if I had ever been on a blind date before.

“A date with a blind man? Or just a blind date?"

“Just a blind date,” she said.

“Oh, well, in that case, no.”

She continued to tell me that her friend, “Marc”, had recently broke up with his girlfriend and asked if she knew any “funny girls”. She checked with all the funny girls she knew, but they were all busy, so she was left with the desperate girls.
Kristen had told me she had already showed Marc my Facebook and twitter page had he had liked what he saw…naturally. In turn, she showed me pictures of him and I wasn’t horribly disturbed. In fact, he was a very nice, good-looking blond hair- blue-eyed male.

“Yea, I wouldn’t hate it,” I told her. After all, who am I to turn away a nice looking human who isn’t threatening me with a restraining order?

Then it hit me. Kristen, is in her mid-thirties and married, so I’m guessing he didn’t just graduate and is learning what words like “equity” mean.

“Ohhh…I’m I too little?” I asked, feeling like I should be holding a sippy cup and a coloring book.

“ I already told him you were 22, and he’s ok with it. Plus, you’re don’t seem immature or anything like that.”

She was quite right, I have the behavioral patterns of an 80 year-old woman with an addiction to string cheese. So the future date was in agreement for that upcoming Saturday.

On that Thursday, Kristen popped into my office, “Would you mind if we changed the date to Sunday? Marc has a hockey thing on Saturday and we do have Monday off.”

That Monday was Presidents Day, meaning that Sunday was Valentines Day. A blind double date with a married couple on Valentines Day…sounds uncomfortable, “Yes Please!”

Somehow, word spread around the office about my upcoming date and the potential for disaster. We came up with “safe words” and noises if the date turned out to be horrible, people on speed dial that would show up with an escape car, or bleeding from the face needing me to take them to the hospital, and, as always, I would bring a knife.

The night of Valentines Day came, and I drove to the restaurant to where we were all meeting. I strategically planned to be 3 minutes late, so I wouldn’t be sitting at a table by myself for a long period of time or appear to be too eager. Of course I was still the first person there and sat alone in a booth surrounded my waiters who didn’t speak English very well but kept on asking me questions.

Then, Marc walked in. I got up to say hello. I don’t really know the protocol on how to greet your blind date that you have stalked on the internet for a week, so I shook his hand.

Luckily, a minute later Kristen and Andy showed up and we ordered beers, Saki, and other alcoholic beverages. It seemed to be going well, fun conversation, jokes, discussions about Native Americans and small pox.

The dinner flew by and we decided to move to a karaoke bar to continue the night. We made our trek to Koreatown to a bar called, “The Brass Monkey” which is the go to place for people at our work to go and sing. I was still unsure on how the date was going when we started to walk into the bar. That’s when Marc kind of grabbed the back of my neck and pulled me in for a kiss. This completely took my off guard and I literally made the noise, “Heyyyooo”. It wasn’t like I didn’t want him to or that I didn’t like him, it was just that I was mostly concentrating on sucking in my food baby stomach. My next move was critical. I either should reciprocate his advances or run like hell. And in true Bridget fashion, I say something dumb.

“So, how old are you?” It was something I had wondered all week, but never found out.

“Me? I’m 33.”

“Oh I’m 22. Is that weird?”

“Uhh, no.”

A bruised male ego is a spiteful thing. It feels the need to punish or avoid. At first we were walking side by side, and now he trailed a few steps behind. As we walk into the bar, Kristen and I spot someone we know from work.: a writer and his girlfriend…who happens to be Sarah Silverman. He waves us over to his table with his other friends. I sit down, Kristen sits across from me, and then ( this is key passive aggressive behavior) Marc sits next to Kristen, leaving her husband to sit next to me. I had embarrassed him, and now I am being punished. We continue to drink and sing along to all the Meatloaf covers and the drunk Billy Joel songs people are performing.

The other couples at our table start asking me how I knew Marc. I tell them we’re on a blind date, and then they tell me that it doesn’t look like its going well. Thanks.
I felt like I had to call out the awkwardness or else it would eat me alive…or the drunk lady next to me will continue to yell out loud that she thinks Marc is gay and that’s why he isn’t sitting next to me.

Finally, it was my turn to go up in front of the bar and sing my song that I had requested.

I knew I had to break the tension somehow. Then it came to me. Kristen had said she suggested I be the date because I was a “funny girl”, so I was going to prove her right.

I got up to the mic and said, “Hey guys, my name is Bridget, and I’m here on a blind date on Valentines day with that guy right there. His name is Marc. And I’m not so sure how its going because he isn’t sitting next me. So, Marc, this one is for you…”

Then I started to sing the best rendition of “Let’s Give them Something to Talk About” by Bonnie Raitt I have ever sung in my life. Marc burst out laughing and so did the rest of the bar.

After I was done, Marc switched seats with Andy and continued to laugh. “That was really ballsy,” he told me.

“That’s how I roll.”

Creeper Series 3… Great Expectations

2010-02-10T22:17:00.001-08:00

I’ve always thought a man is supposed to compliment a woman when in the act of flirtation. Recently, I was proven wrong. A group of us went out to a bar called “Big Wangs”, a bar that serves hot wings and allows for drunken douchbagards to make sexual innuendos until they go home by themselves. I had already decided that this night was just going to be focused on Captain’s and Coke and some recreational “Buck Hunter”, but, unfortunately, the creepers had a whole other plan for the night.

About 10 minutes until last call, I was approached by a mid-level hipster. On a scale of 1 to Drunk, he was about an 8.7.

“How was your evening?” he said sliding through my circle of friends until he was standing directly in front of me.

“Probably the best I’ve ever had,” I replied looking for help to any surrounding humans.

“That’s great. Wit…I like it.”

Most of the time, when a man calls a woman “witty” he means “cleverly bitchy”- but I took the compliment and smiled.

He continued. “Would you like to hear my philosophy on life?”

Boy, did I!

“OF course I do!”

He slurred on, “When you’re surround by love, you need to give it back, because what you put out into the universe, is taken in. And what you receive can never be put back, so one must be in tune with the universe…”

I spaced out for a solid 3 minutes, but I could sense that he was still talking.

“Can you put your arms around me, so that my brother doesn’t think I’m a loser?” This is what snapped me back into reality.

“I’m sorry, what?” I said.

“Yeah, he’s over there and I just want him to know that I’m not failing at life.”

Pathetic and desperate- that’s how I like ‘em. My friends were starting to walk outside to the valet, so I gave a half-arm-embrace-with-ass-out hug to the desperate brother as he waved to his voyeuristic older brother.

I quickly shuffled outside to meet up with the rest of my friends as they waited in the line for the valet to bring up our car.

To my recollection, I was mid solo-slow-grind, explaining to my friend that I had some extremely uncomfortable dance moves, when I felt someone tap my shoulder.

“Excuse me Miss, may I ask you a question?”

I turn to see a 30 something Latino Guido wearing at least 5 chains.

“Uhhh, sure you can.”

He continued with, “Were you expecting about 2 or 3 months ago?”

…..What.

“I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“Were you expecting a little while ago?”

Yes. He actually went there.

“I’m sorry, are you asking if I’m pregnant?”

“Uhhh, yea. Oh…Sorry.”

I burst out laughing.

“Oh, I’m sorry I thought you might be another girl…I might have met…”

Either this man was looking for a girl he knocked up a couple months ago, or I looked about 5 months pregnant and should reconsider some of my wardrobe choices.

“Oh my God. This is the best thing I have ever heard.” I couldn’t stop laughing. “ Tell my friends what you said!” I proceeded to take him by the arm and make him tell each one of my friends what he said to me.

I thank God every moment that this happened to me. There is nothing like dressing up on a Friday night, going out confidently into the city with a group of friends, and then being accused of being at a hot wings bar 5 months pregnant.

Maybe this man hasn’t worked out the exact line to use yet, but he really did make a lasting impression…I haven’t eaten solid food in days.

Whoopie

2010-01-26T20:09:00.001-08:00

I could blame society for shaping an ADD generation, I could blame Facebook, Twitter, and Gchat, for being addictive distractions, I could blame Snookie and the Situation for providing hours of mindless and spray tanned entertainment- but mostly I blame myself. I am passionless.

I moved out to Los Angeles to be a writer. Yet, in these past few months, I have not yet proven myself to be one. I wake up, go to work, come home and fall asleep to re-runs of Grey’s Anatomy on Lifetime…sexy. I remember being filled with butterfly worthy excitement when I would open Final Draft and start typing “INT.” or “EXT” and all those secret codes that screenwriters know.

And for some reason “Sister Act 2; Back in the Habbit” keeps haunting my thoughts, ( like it does for most people without direction). All I can hear is Whoopie Goldberg say, “If you wake up in the morning and all you want to do is sing, then you are meant to be a singer.” Although I am an excellent karaoke performer, I can’t sing, but I used to feel that way about writing. Now, I’m not sure. But the problem isn’t that I don’t know if I want to write or not. It’s the fact that I don’t want to do anything. The only thing I think about in the morning is “My god, did a cat die outside my room last night, what the hell was that noise?”

People say, “Do what makes you happy.” But the things that make me happy are puppies and Starbucks… so that leaves me a little lost. My lack of motivation and passion leaves me disappointed in myself and horrified at my selfishness.

I have a friend who is an amazing writer. His writing is naturally funny, relatable, and charming. But more importantly, he loves doing it. Unfortunately, due to outside forces, he cannot be in LA and pursue his dream. Then there’s me- I have the perfect job to get my foot in the door, I’m in the right place at the right time with the right people- and I don’t do anything about it.

My roommate plays Ultimate Frisbee and joins tournaments all over the west coast, my eldest sister tries different exercise classes, my other sister paints and sews- and I watch “So You Think You Can Dance” clips on Youtube.

I think I might be a life sell-out at the ripe age of 22.

And although becoming a morbidly obese shut-in does have its perks, I think I’m going to take Whoopie’s advice on this one- “If you want to be somebody, and you want to go somewhere, you better wake up and pay attention.” This woman is a wise EGOT-er who was friends with my dear sweet P. Swayze, so she should be taken seriously.

Pants.

2010-01-05T21:30:00.001-08:00

I physically ran into a co-worker today- I said "ooops, sorry!"...he said "eww.".....ouch.

Creeper Series # 2... They play with my emotions...

2010-01-01T21:02:00.000-08:00

I went to the ATM last Sunday to deposit some much needed checks into my account. Since Saturdays have become my real day of rest, I hadn’t had the chance to go to the bank on a day when it is actually open. So I walked through the completely deserted bank parking lot, right next to “Midtown Lanes”, “Skate Round the World” skating rink, and where lots of homeless people play with seagulls. As I was finishing up my deposit, I heard a male voice say, “How are you doing today?”

My immediate thought: I’m going to be raped.

I turned to see a Hispanic man in his late 20’s with a zip-up hoodie on and sun glasses. I tried to pick out some features that I could later put into a police report if they ever found me after the kidnapping.

“I’m fine, I got to go.”

I rushed to my car and locked the doors. Then the guilt set in. What if that was just a nice man who wanted to know how my day was? What if he was just lonely? Or he felt the awkwardness of us being the only two people in this parking lot?

Then I felt the cold slap of vanity. Why would he want to rape me? Do I think so highly of myself to think that this man would be so violently attracted to me that he would be forced into a state of monstrous lust and mental instability? I do look great in a clean pair of slacks, but I think it’s completely vain to just assume people would want to rape me.

But then my thoughts took a turn… Well, am I rape-able? Am I borderline? Would someone risk jail time in order to be with me? Or if I were alone in a dark deserted ally at 3:00am, would they pass by and say “No, thanks”? I just don’t think I could handle that kind of rejection. I heard this comedian say one time that it is always the ugly friend who is worried about getting raped. I never thought I was the ugly friend...maybe the one who should have gotten braces or the one who is so severely pale that I look close to death, but I never considered myself the ugly one. I could very well be that girl.

So maybe I'm lucky for every whistle, cat call, and parking lot "Good Afternoon" that I get.

I’m not saying my dream man carries a knife and drives a nondescript van, but I’m just saying it might better to have a van full of foreign men yell “Hallo Honnnies” than no foreign men at all.

Creeper Series #1

2009-10-25T20:48:00.000-07:00

Creepers in the morning, creepers in the evening, creepers at suppertime…when you’re living in Los Angeles, you can get creepers anytime.

I don’t know if the constant heat or the berating sun, but there is a growing epidemic of ‘the crazy’ happening in the minds of Los Angeles' males.

Yesterday morning, my two roommates and I decided to go hiking in Runyon Canyon, which is a very popular and dusty hiking trail in the mountains in LA. Minus the fact that I didn’t have any sort of running shoes and had to borrow a pair of Keds that were a size too big which led to me slipping left and right down a large mountain- or the fact that we were run down by Queen Latifia and her dog ( true story.)- the trail was lovely. All sorts of pretty LA people with their dogs, walking on their legs, wearing short shorts- it was like a dream. After 20 minutes of intense "slick shoe" climbing, we had finally reached the top of the trail.

All three of us sat on this large wooden bench overlooking smoggy Los Angeles, resting our legs, and trying not to breathe as loud as the other- disguising our out of shape and suffering lungs. And then it just had to happen- enter creepy 43 year old man who thinks he has something original to say:

“Having fun on that bench?”….

Uhhh….yep.

“Just watching you girls on that bench, makes me feel like a kid again.”

Confusion.

He went through the list of questions that his kind asks- Where are you girls from? What do you want to do? How old are you?

Each question getting a little more like someone would ask before they’re caught on camera by “To Catch a Predator.”

Then we somehow got on the subject of how people our age these days are starting to get married earlier than in the previous generation. Creeper man then said that he wasn’t mature enough at our age to be married and have kids, then he asked if we were mature… I answered:

“Well, physically, yes. I’ve been able to bare children since the age of 9.”

Not understanding the joke, he continued…

“Wait, really? Wow.”

“Yes, I have a few kids back east. Well, I’m not sure if their mine- they claim they are but I haven’t seen any DNA test results yet. It’s my goal to have a kid in each state by the time I’m 24.”

Still not understanding that I was joking he asked, “ Did you donate your ovaries?”

“Yes. All of them.”

He then went on a rant about how humans shouldn’t be monogamous because it goes against nature and that people should only get married to have children…which I’m pretty sure contradicts his previous point…

Then he just started laughing hysterically for a little bit, and we uncomfortably laughed, adding in “Oh jeez” and “That’s for sure” here and there to break the weird silences. But then he struck back with the ultimate creep comeback:

“Do you want my dog to lay across your laps?”

“Uhh… no, that’s ok”

“Or how about my son?” he points to a 12 year old blond boy sitting behind us, obviously not trying to be seen…I can’t blame the kid.

“Hey Zack, how about sitting on these girls’ laps?”

“Uh, no, no that’s ok…” We were trapped. Surrounded by crazy and stuck on a mountain with a panting wet dog and a 12 year-old boy who might sexually harass us with his father…

After refusing many times over, they got the hint and started to trek back down the mountain looking for their next victims…

I can move from coast to coast, touch each ocean, and even climb a mountain, but I have and will always attract 43 year-old recently divorced males who harass me and their dogs.

My new boyfriend...

2009-10-03T17:36:00.000-07:00

Awkward Moose.

2009-09-29T21:35:00.000-07:00

During the summer before my Junior year at BU, I was hired to work for the Office of Orientation along with about 70 other fellow classmates. Early on in the summer, when we were all still getting to know each other, 6 of us decided to go out and get some pizza. Mind you, this was basically the first week of training, so I was barely sure of everybody’s name. Therefore, I was completely unprepared for what was about to come out at T Anthony’s pizzeria that night.

The conversation had been light exchanges and humorous stories from summers past until something changed. Someone started talking about their trouble with drug use.

It was as if the whole room went silent. I could feel my face growing red as my teeth grabbed my lower lip to stop it from smiling. From person to person, the stories seemed to try to topple each other with how dramatic their lives have been. They were openly sharing stories of rehab, physical abuse, and sexual conquests around a pepperoni pizza and people they had met only a few days earlier. I felt ridiculous in a ridiculous situation. The conversation took a pause and I felt their eyes come upon my side of the table. It was time to contribute a secret that had ruined our lives but that we could share without a second thought.

I looked up at my friend who was sitting across from me. Then, with a perfect beat, my friend confessed, “I was in band in middle school.”

I burst out laughing.

Do you ever have those moments when the best inappropriate response pops into your head but you know your future happiness and financial stability depends on you not acting like a jack-ass?

Because my life, like the United States of America, is completely out of debt and have no money issues at all….I’ve been going on a few interviews for jobs. And it seems that each interviewer is reading from the "Dummies Guide to Interviewing" list of questions. I don’t even think they really listen to your answers. I believe that they are just thinking about when they get to leave for the day- or, if they’re like me, they’ve had the Hamster Dance stuck in their head since 7th grade.

Anywhoozle, when I was in one of these interviews, I had a little bit of a John Nash-Beautiful Mind-Moment, in which I heard this voice in my head answering the questions for me.

Here are a few that came to mind:

(Them): If you could describe yourself in one word, what would it be?
(Me): Bendy.

(Them): What would you say your one weakness is?
(Me): Dairy Products

(Them): What are your strengths?
(Me): Deep- knee bends

(Them): What is your ideal job?
(Me): Hamburglar.

I just can't take serious situations seriously. It's not like I'm dead inside or anything. Believe me, I've had my fair share of locking myself in my room listening to Bonnie Raitt's "I Can't Make You Love Me" sitting in a prom dress and crying.

It's just that if I have to put on pants, comb my hair, and sit in a waiting room for 40 minutes just so I can lie and tell someone that I'm passionate about waking up at 7:30 am to go and answer phones for 10 hours a day, 5 days a week, just so I can barely afford to shop at the 99 cents store- I want to be able to tell them that dairy makes me irritable.

The Day of All Days

2009-09-13T23:23:00.000-07:00

I turned 22 years old this past August 19th. I wouldn’t say it was the most memorable birthday I’ve ever had, but it definitely had its moments.. It certainly wasn’t comparable to my 7th Jungle themed birthday, in which my older siblings insisted on only playing the “Shaft” theme song while my first grade friends tried to play spin the tail on the donkey- most appropriate. And nothing compares (Sinead O’Connor) to my 21st birthday in which my sister, Annie, and I performed the best karaoke rendition of “Don’t Stop Believin.’” We were rocking out and had the whole bar singing along to this glorious 80’s jam, when the guitar solo hit. I decided to do a fake air guitar kick. SWOOSH. My shoe flew into the arms of my friend Kasey. Then, in my drunken mind I decided that I would look ridiculous standing up on stage with one shoe on, so I decided to kick my other show off to Kasey. SWOOSH- my shoe went over Casey’s head toward the back of the bar- CRASH- hit a drink right out of a guy’s hand. SILENCE…. Then- “YEAHHHHHHHHHH!” The crowd went nuts and we continued the most passionate Journey tribute I think those souls have ever seen.

Yet this year’s party proved itself to be a contender- not from what I remember about the party, but what was discovered in the aftermath. I thought it was going to be a disappointment. After all, this was my first birthday away from my friends and family and I know about 6 people in all of Los Angeles (4 if you aren’t counting internet friends and male suitors on J-Date). But I was determined to make the best of it, and by “the best of it” I meant throw a Quinceanera. It was to be the best 15th birthday I ever had…and it was…it really was. It started off kind of small, a few friends, a few strangers, and lots of rum. Then something happened…it was as if someone hit the fast forward button and the night just went by in a swirl of sombreros, slow grinding, and unintentional slip n’ slides. It seemed that so much happened all at once that it was hard to judge whether the party was a success or not… but I think it was definitely one for the books…

I had gone to bed somewhere around 3:00am that night, but at 5:23am I awoke from my bed because of a strange noise coming from outside my bedroom door. It sounded like someone was pouring water on the ground. QUE?! I opened my door. There was one of the party go-ers with his pants down, peeing in front of my door, which happens to be right next to the bathroom…which was completely open.

“Are you kidding me right now?” I just starred at this kid who could barely stand up. His friend came running down my hallway yelling “Trent! NOOOO!” This startled Trent and he ran toward his friend down the hall…still peeing. I grabbed a bunch of paper towels, through them over Trent’s contribution, and yelled for him to clean it up. I went back to bed.

7:14am- I am sleeping until – SLAP! I’m hit in the face. I open my eyes- there’s my roommate, BEAST ( the narcoleptic vegetarian, who is family friends with Michael Bolton). “That’s for the pots in my bed!” And she walks out of my room. Although I am known for putting pots in beds when I’m angry at someone- this time I was wrongfully accused.

Cut to Beast’s room in which she awoke to a half naked Jewish man, three girls from an ultimate Frisbee team (one of which was dress like an octopus), and three frying pans in her bed, and a temporary tattoo of the Loch Ness Monster on her arm. I’m sure anyone would resort to physical violence after waking up to this.

8:42am- Beast, Johnna, and I sit and reflect on the events of the last night. 70 empty beer cans and only a $20 profit of the last night, we decide that there is only one place we want to spend our money…

10:20am- We sit outside Pizza Hut waiting for our order.

11:04am- Beast finds a barely eaten burrito and 3 barely opened bottles of vodka in our cupboard…we continue to celebrate.

5:00pm- We toast to a hell of a wedding season and all go back to bed.

8:30am Monday morning- I leave to go to work. I get into my car but I notice that the back seats are down, there is a pair of men’s sneakers, baseball cap, and melted wax inside my car…Some man had a nice relaxing alone time in the back seat of my Kia, lit some candles, then walked away the next morning without his shoes and probably feeling a little pretty.

Now, I’ve never been to another Quinceanera before, but if this is how they all end up- I’m only partying with 15 year old Mexican kids from now on.

Raul

2009-07-05T23:55:00.000-07:00

Coming into my 3rd week of being out here in Los Angeles, I have had minor success in transitioning into an adult lifestyle ( not the porn industry). I have a new pride and joy in my life, my dear sweet Kia Spectra which I named Jessica Alba- racial. Thankfully I don't have a job or any source of income to help pay for my new hatchback ( for all my camping needs) or to help pay for my eventual home ( also a reason I got the hatchback). But I'm not too worried about such things, seeing how I have way too much money and not enough ways to spend it... cats.

But despite all these set backs, I did have a slight brush with love.

A man named Raul who works at the Honda Dealership told me that since I have purchased my first car, the only thing I need is a good boyfriend- that’s funny because I was thinking maybe I needed a job in order to pay for my vehicle, or perhaps a home, or a bed that doesn’t have to be inflated every night, but then again, I just got here, so Raul probably knows best.

“Really? That’s what I need?”

“Yes miss. I would date you but I’m married.”

Damnit Raul, why do you even tease me?

“Oh, that’s too bad” I tried to laugh it off.

“But I am morman.”

Somehow I felt that Mr. Raul Sanchez was not Morman, but who am I to judge being a Mexican Jew myself ( I converted).

“It is part of my religion to marry young girls.”

“Oh really?”

“Si”

Raul did little else to convince me that he was a middle aged Mexican morman car dealer in Culver City, California who wanted to include me into his familia, but like a fool, I turned him down.

"I don't think that would be a good idea."

"Oh well," he turned to leave, but then he said something I will never forget, "You have to find a boyfriend soon so he can carry your things....I like your Kia."

Although it was brief and probably a Mexi-Morman scam, I think we had a connection. I know that life is short and that a Raul doesn't fall in your lap everyday, but I'm trying to remain positive.

Life.

2009-07-02T15:42:00.000-07:00

Things I do not regret.

2009-06-24T01:47:00.001-07:00

My friends and I used to play a game in which we would think about what super power we would have if we could get one. My dear sweet philosophy major Mister Rob’s was the ability to fly. I blame this on her concentration on existentialism and her thinking about subject matter way beyond any earthy issue or simple things that I can understand. I’m still working on photosynthesis- sounds like witchcraft to me.
Amy Burns (one of the most depressed human beings on the planet) decided that she would like to be invisible…how emo/ Clay Akin of her.

As for me, I chose the ability to turn back time, but it can only be activated when singing Cher’s number one hit, “If I Could Turn Back Time”. Some would ask why I chose this. Was it so I could witness world altering events, or to revisit favorite memories? Am I just a really big Cher fan? I would tell them no (but yes on the Cher part), it was because I live a life of regret, and I would like to tell my previous self to stop being an idiot. But reflecting back on my answer now, and on some of the things I regret, I wouldn’t end up changing a thing. I have compiled a list. This list contains some of the things that I may have regretted at a time, but now I find them completely necessary to my life.

I will do a couple of posts of my non-regrets…starting with…

1.) Running barefoot in the streets of Allston-
For those who are not fortunate to know this quaint burrow of Boston, I will try to paint the picture. Allston is where dignity goes to die. The streets are covered in beer, glass, vomit, and a thin layer of AIDS. And for four years, I would wander those streets, mostly intoxicated and an equal number of times barefoot. With my drunken self-confidence and belief that I knew what was best, I would kick off my heels and run (literally run as fast as I could) down the street to my dorm, usually caring a large stick or tree branch that I would find in somebody’s yard- after all, who would try to attack a barefoot girl running in the middle of the street with a large tree branch? Safety first.

The next morning I would wake up with sore feet that had mysteriously been stained black. For a while my black heels would be a scarlet letter for me, signifying a dirty night in Allston. Most of my roommates and friends would yell at me when I would attempt to sit on their bed, hundreds of Clorox wipes would fail when it came to cleaning my heels, and I always lived in fear of tetanus.

But now looking back, thank god I did that. I keep that memory locked in my “Things I did in College” file, along with highlighter parties and working in the dining hall. It is the true testament to “whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” These are things I would never do again in my life, but I look back and laugh- except I’m still bitter about working in the dining hall…

Abusive Men with Scissors

2009-05-31T16:40:00.000-07:00

I decided to get my hair cut the other day. My long luscious locks of love had begun to look and feel like crunchy doll hair or a piece you would find at a discount weave shop in Albuquerque. I decided to get it cut at a salon next door to where I was staying just in case it turned into a disaster, I could run home without the city of Boston seeing it. When I called the receptionist informed me that their haircuts range anywhere from $35-$65, and asked what I would prefer. Seeing how I had become so desperate to steal packets of saltines from restaurants so I could eat that week, I opted for the $35 option. I could tell the woman on the line was a little annoyed by this. She let out a little sigh and said, “Alright then, you’re going to see William then.” I said thank you, and hung up the phone…Little did I know that she signed me up for an hour of uncomfortable conversation and slight physical abuse.

I showed up to my appointment right on time and walked up to the nicely decorated front desk. As I walked up, I made eye contact with a smaller framed man dressed all in black. He looked to be in his early forties with a receding hairline that he tried to cover up by buzzing his head. I gave a slight smile trying to be polite, but he just held his gaze for a second too long and then walked away without any expression. Somehow I felt guilty, as if I had mocked him in gym class in front of the dodge ball team. I had made a silent plea to the universe that this not be William and continued to check in. I put on the burgundy robe they offered me and made my way to the downstairs to wait for my hairdresser. I was sitting in the waiting chairs when the man in black came down the stairs and was quickly approaching me.

“Cats.” I thought. I stood up and smiled again. “Are you William?”

“Yea, your chair is over there, and put your things on the floor,” he said without any expression still walking past me and pointing across the room. I walked to the chair he pointed to feeling like I just got sent to my room in punishment or was being mugged by an apathetic robber. After he silently assessed my hair, he tapped me on the shoulder, “Come on,” he said and started walking away.

“Ok….” I got up and followed him.

“Sit down and put your head back into the sink.” He pulled out shampoo and a towel but still was not making eye contact. I sat down, slowly setting my head into the sink so he could wash my hair.

“Sit back” he said pushing my shoulders down in a slightly forceful manner. I thought that maybe he was punishing me because he knew I asked for the cheapest possible haircut or maybe he was acting out because he always got stuck with poor college kids and was bitter that he never got to prove his haircutting skills to the rest of his friends. Maybe he was the black sheep of the salon and hated the popular crowd of stylists that would get requested from customers, but poor William was just for those who wanted something quick and cheap.

“Are you graduating?” he broke the silence that I had been enjoying.

“Yea, this Sunday. Time to be a big kid,” I said and gave my usual ‘I’m scared and don’t want to think about it’ face.

“Yea, now is the time is your life when you have really big decisions to make.”

“Right,” I tried to encourage his normalness and not anger him so he won’t push me around anymore.

“Like, three years ago I decided not to have children.”

Uhh….what?

I didn’t really know what to say. This was one of the most uncomfortable and unexpected things to tell a stranger when you are shampooing their hair. Part of me wanted to start laughing because I partially admired him. Whenever I had to play get-to-know-each other-games and others would share “personal facts” about themselves like “My favorite food is jellybeans!” or “I’ve been to Disneyland 8 times!” I always wanted to say something like, “I have a heart-shaped uterus which decreases my chance of having kids by 30%” just to see what people would do and to put the pressure on the next kid to step up their personal fact.

This man had challenged me to step up the post-graduation conversation, but the only thing I could say was, “Yea, I hate those,” not really sure if I was talking about the decision-making or kids in general. I shifted my weight out of awkwardness.

“Relax,” he said pushing my shoulders again.

“I’m trying” I said almost sounding like I was going to cry. We soon went back to the other chair in which he started to cut my hair. The other hairdressers around us were chatting it up with their clients, laughing, and asking questions. I felt like we failed in our short term relationship. I looked up at William in the mirror. He angrily talking to himself and mouthing something every time one of the hairdressers started talking. He then looked at me looking at him. I quickly looked away, but it was too late.

“Just look down at your knees,” he said, “It’ll make it easier for me.”

“Ok…” I felt ashamed and abused and hated the fact that I would have to pay $35 to feel this way, when I usually feel like this for free.

“Where do you live?” he asked. I really didn’t know how to answer that question since I was hobo-ing it for the last two weeks.

“I live around campus. What about you?”

“I live in Allston with an activist.”

“Oh that’s good.” Again, unsure how to answer this.

“Yea, do you know those La Rouche people?”

I did know those La Rouche people. They were the ones that plagued our campus yelling at students as the walked by, saying things like, “Did you know that you helped support the killing of millions of babies?” or “Your government is enslaving thousands of Somalians and you’re not doing anything about it!” They have homemade poster boards with pictures they printed out from Google Images and articles from Wikipedia- really solid evidence.

“Yea I think I know them”

“Well, he’s part of their group. I go to a lot of their meetings, but I’m not part of them. I just think its good to be educated.”

“That’s cool”

“No, its just necessary.”

We were in silence for the rest of the time. I kept my eyes toward my knees, afraid to look up and be yelled at again. Finally when he was done, and had officially done the opposite of what I asked for to my hair, I said thank you.

“Are you on facebook?” He said in his monotone voice.

“Yea…”

“Ok, I’ll friend you,” and then he walked away.

I left the salon feeling somewhat abused and confused. I walked into the salon expecting a quick haircut with layers, I left with minor bruising and a slight emotional fear of men with scissors.

In Case I Die...

2009-05-21T21:38:00.000-07:00

I’m going through somewhat of a life crisis at the moment. I know I shouldn’t be complaining seeing how half the country is out of work, there won’t be any honey bees or penguins in 10-15 years, and P. Swayze is back in the hospital- yet, I can’t help but panic about what to do with my life.

To be honest, I never expected to live past freshman year of college, so I’m sure you can understand my shock and confusion when people are inquiring about my “ten year plan.”
“Well, my previous ten year plan failed, so I don’t think I should count on a new one.”

I didn't expect to die, it's just that I expected to stop living...But it’s not as if I live a wild, out-of-control life, experiment with illegal drugs, or listen to The Insane Clown Posse. One time I did eat a 24 pack of String Cheese and a plate of mozzarella sticks in under 10 minutes- and that’s probably the most dangerous thing I’ve ever done. But when most young girls my age are planning what their dream weddings would be like, I always thought it necessary to plan for my inevitable celebration. After all, why plan for an event that you might not happen? Some people might think this idea morbid or creepy, but I think it’s just good planning. Plus, from what I have planned so far, this might be the best funeral in western civilization.

First of all, I do not plan to have to traditional church hymns sung at my funeral. That would be too depressing. Instead, I am planning on having a Marvin Gaye/ Barry White themed funeral. I want nothing but sensual jams played at my final farewell. Some might find this inappropriate, but maybe by studying the words of Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get it On”, you might find it extremely appropriate:

“We’re all sensitive people with so much to give (Human beings giving- charity and compassion…life lessons)
Understand me sugar (Communication is key)
Since we got to be, let’s live, (So true Marvin…so true) I love you
There’s nothin’ wrong with me lovin’ you,(Not one bit)
And givin’ yourself to me can never be wrong
If the love is true. (If the love is true, I have no qualms Marvin, NO qualms)
Don’t you know how sweet and wonderful life can be (How could this not be appropriate?) “

And if possible, a Journey cover band at the after party. Or if Journey is unavailable, the Original Cast of “CATS! The musical” would be hilarious….a girl can dream, can’t she?

I literally have a playlist on my itunes labeled “Wedding/Funeral (whatever comes first)”…you just have to be prepared.

I also want my friends and family to remember the event by giving them t-shirts that read: “I went to Bridget Kyle’s funeral and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.” Humorous, yet functional.

I would like to be buried in my roller skates and short red shorts- they are two of my most valued possessions…and let’s be honest, I’d look extremely attractive.

There will be a projected screen in the background playing "West Side Story" and "Elf" on loop.

And since I would like to be a creep, I’m leaving my friend Amy Burns ( …you know how I feel about her) my Facebook password. Therefore, months after my funeral, she’ll sign into my account and start doing updates to my profile so I’ll come up on people’s newsfeed, or request a relationship with them. Then people will come up to my friends and be like, “Oh my god, Bridget requested to be in a relationship with me” and then they can reply, “But Bridget’s been dead for 20 years” in a old English accent while perhaps holding a pipe and wearing an ascot - like they do in all the really good horror movies.

Let’s be honest, funeral’s are a time when you really get to celebrate a person’s life, what they loved, and what you loved about them. And I love slow grinding. I love really short shorts, roller skates, and novelty t-shirts. I love some good MoTown and practical jokes that I force Amy Burns to be a part of.

Call me morbid, dark (that’s racist), or weird, but actually I’m just being a good girl scout by being prepared.

The Future is Bleak.

2009-05-14T08:07:00.000-07:00

This Sunday I will be graduating college and ending my glamorous life of no responsibilities. I came to Boston kicking and screaming, convinced that I would gain 130 pounds and be forced onto the Dr. Phil show as the college freshman that ate her weight in pudding snacks. But I found that college life and I would get along better than most of my family members do.

I knew how to do college. I’m great at college. I can go rounds and rounds of beer pong, drink Starbucks using convenience points on my student ID that gets billed home, crashing on different futons, writing on people with sharpie… I have learned these skills and have dedicated the last four years of my life to perfecting them. Unfortunately, in most of the job descriptions I read, none of them are looking for a drunken girl who can write on people using permanent marker. CATS!

In fact, most job descriptions ask that applicants be proficient in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint… I have actually made it through 16 years of school without ever having to do a PowerPoint, I would always opt for the poster board option of the project…So no luck there…

Some of the other job descriptions say “Spanish Speaking is a plus.” Yes, I’m sure it is a plus but the only words I remember in Spanish are Osos (bears), Pantalones (pants), and Biblioteca (library). So any subject that does not involve a bear wearing pants in a library, I cannot help them.

I don’t know what business reports entail or how they are suppose to look. I’m used to writing papers in which I try to find the biggest font and cheat the margins just to make it look like a 5 page essay instead of 4.

This past week I have just been replaying the scene in Billy Madison where the chubby kid says, "I can't wait to go to high school Billy," and Billy grabs his face and says, "Don't ever say that, stay here. Stay as long as you can." - I used to think that was just a funny scene... now i understand it to be some of the best advice ever given.

This Sunday I will receive a degree that certifies that I have gained 4 years worth of supreme knowledge- this upcoming Monday I will be an unemployed girl with a drinking problem on her way home to Cleveland, Ohio.

Oh how the mighty hath fallen.

A Bridget Jones Moment

2009-04-16T12:19:00.000-07:00

Today at my internship, one of the assistants who I have become friends with ( and facebook friends- so you know its for real), was talking about what type of girl he usually goes after. He said he has always had a thing for blondes but they have to be smart, not any dittzy biddies for this man. When he said this, one of the other assistants jokingly said, "Oh Bridge, you better watch out."

Without a second thought, the assistant, my friend, said, "No, I like them skinny."

Ohhhhhh that's a deep burn.

I just had flashbacks to Bridget Jones when she catches Daniel's mistress naked in his bathroom, then the mistress turns to Daniel and says, "I thought you said she was thin."

Everyone around us started laughing that "Oh my god that's hilariously awkward'' laugh and I thought about how I should write that on FML.com right after I throw up.

But the best part was when he tried to save himself by saying, "Oh come on, you know what I meant."

...I'm sorry, do YOU know what you meant? Because it was pretty clear that you just called me fat in front of everyone. Plus 46% of my office is compiled of my gay man mofia who gave a collective "Awww hell no" after he made his comment- when my gays are offended, I know its bad.

Males- It's not that hard to figure out what is and what is NOT ok to say to a girl. Any references to them being: Fat, Ugly, Average, Dumb, "Pregnant- Looking," Diseased, or a product of Inbreeding- NOT OK.

This past fall, my friend "Candice" had some guys who she worked with over at her apartment. It was known that one of them, "Harry" came with the intention to hook up with my friend "Paige." What he did NOT know, but quickly figured out, was that Paige wanted nothing to do with him. And when Paige does not like someone, she makes no effort to hide it. Abundance of entertainment.

The rest of us spent the night drinking and talking and we laughed and we laughed....

Anywhoozle, toward the end of the night, Harry approached me, "Hey, I just want to let you know that I think you're a really great girl"...awww Harry!

"And you know what? Some girls ( he points to Paige) are really gorgeous, but they don't have the personality.But then there are girls like you, who aren't as good-looking, but have that personality."

THANKS.

I dug his approach to flirting- make me feel like you are settling by going with me. It will make me feel lucky just to be speaking with you. And don't forget to point out my flaws. Maybe for the second date we can talk about how I have a semi snaggle tooth, or the fact that I lack human pigment. It looked like a long and promising relationship and self esteem issues. Such a shame I let that one get away....

Darwin Should Weed Me Out

2009-04-13T11:47:00.000-07:00

I think everyone has a moment in their lives when they realize just how dumb they really are and mine came this past weekend. My parents and brother came to L.A. to visit for Easter weekend and to celebrate Jesus and -let's be honest- have a nice little drunkaction (drunkaction- noun- a vacation that surrounds drinking in most to all activities) - bad ass. I was trying to think of places that would be entertaining yet PG for my family and I to visit… and there aren’t many. I didn’t know how to tell them that most of the places I know around here are karaoke bars and dog fighting dens ( everyone needs some hobbies) but I know my parents are morally against karaoke. But I did remember that my first week out here my program had a mandatory field trip to the Getty Art Museum in order to educate us about how “cultured” L.A. is. I didn’t get much out of that field trip as I thought I would because one of the only things I remember was that there was a monorail going up from the parking lot to the main building- it was like a mini Disney Land or a Simpson’s episode. Other than that I remembered a lot of bright lights and old people - I might be thinking of a nursing home or heaven.

Anywhoozle…. I thought “Perfect, Peter (my mom) is an artist and 98% of my family loves museums- let’s do it.” After the thrill of the monorail, we entered the building and I realized that the other 2% of our family who does not like museums was, in fact, me.

My mom can look at a painting for 20 minutes and comment on the technique, use of color, and compare it to the artist’s other works. Since she is an artist, when she looks at a painting, she sees something completely different than what I see. When I look at a painting I think “ Eww, there’s a dead horse,” or “I wish I lived back then, where pale and slightly chubby with small boobs was considered hot, because I would be the Angelina of the Renaissance world- minus the unfortunate marriage to Billy Bob.” But I just cannot comprehend art the way my mom does.

Same goes for music. I remember my first date with my ex-boyfriend, he took me to a concert at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. He is a musician, so he was extremely excited about hearing a two hour piece of Hayden Von Schmeegallydoo’s German expressionist interpretation of the ancient Greek tradition of slaughtering cows- I mean, who wouldn’t be? For him, those two hours were entertaining and educating because this was his passion and something that he could follow and appreciate. But for me, that was two hours of a solo game of “I Spy” … as you can imagine, nobody was the winner in that situation.

I digress…
So there I was, in one of the most renowned art institutions in the country, surrounded by Monet’s and Dega’s and just hundreds of irreplaceable art and genius and all I could think was “I think that guy over there is wearing Diesel Jeans!-Yep! Yea- I think those are boot cut- yep- those are the Zathan cut” Then it hit me…. I am the most shallow human and should be shot…am I that dumb to be so unappreciative of infamous creativity? Why am I the worst human being? Take me back to the monorail….

Ultimate Queen

2009-04-06T13:45:00.001-07:00

As some of you may have noticed, I attract, with some magnetic creep force, the crazies. They follow me like lambs to their Shepard, fat kids to an Ice Cream truck, or Lance Bass to the moon. For this, I am sometimes grateful. But I also have a large following of the gays. I attribute this to my theory that I am a gay man in a very attractive pasty girl body; girls- love me, gays- love me, straight males- scared of me…it’s so clear.

A new assistant at my work is a nice Gasian (Gay-Asian), who after 10 minutes of meeting with me grabbed my hand and said, “Oh my god, I absolutely love you.” I felt like saying, “Your kind usually does.”

My theory was also proven when this past weekend some of my friends and I went to a gay bar in LA called ‘The Abby’ (how Sound of Music). With my man candy out of town, I figured this would be a good night to go out looking a little crazy and not care about scoring some biddies..…I was wrong. I have never been hit on more in my life.

Shock and Confusion.

So, there I am, at this bar/club, sitting ( SITTING DOWN), drinking water (DRINKING WATER), under a heat lamp ( that is kind of hot…puns.) with my friend Amanda, when this man is slowly shuffling past us.

“Hi” he says in a muffled voice, barely making eye contact.

“Hi” I said, thinking he was just being polite as he was making his way to the other side of the bar. He continued to walk for about 2 steps and then backtracked to right in front of me.

“Hi” he said again…

“Hi…” …I looked up at Amanda to see if she was as confused as I was.

He continued, “I just want to tell you that you are beautiful and I’m bisexual.” I had to give him some credit- that was honestly the first time I’ve heard that line before. “Are you an actress or…?” Ohhhh, sorry sir, I HAVE heard that ONE before- should have stuck with the bisexual train.

He continued to tell us that he is in his mid-forties, originally from Pennsylvania, and he owns a theater in Santa Monica, and he would just love if we would come to see a show. He seemed so nervous and he kept saying, “I’m sorry, I hardly do this” and after about 20 minutes of small talk, he asked to give me HIS number…Ok… He said that he would like to meet up for coffee sometime and that Amanda could come so “I would be safe”…note to all males- gay, straight, or bisexual theater owners- don’t bring up the notion that there would even be a possibility that I would be or feel UNSAFE- that makes me more uncomfortable.
I put him in my phone as “Semi-Gay” and Amanda and I decided to head out to find our other friends. I was holding Amanda’s hand as she led through the techno lights and serious club dancers. I was trying to maneuver around a dance-off, when all of a sudden someone grabbed my throat.

I gasped and had a flash of all the Lifetime movies I’ve ever seen. I looked up to see a scruffy European man whose hand was still around my throat.
“Hey!… you are pretty.”

Really….? I almost threw up my heart was beating so fast. If this was a cave or a trailer park, I’m sure that would have been totally acceptable, but choking me is not the way to my heart…le sigh.

“Thank you…” I barely whispered as I pushed my way back to Amanda.

We decided to ditch the male dancers on the bar with techno music and laser lights for called “Hamburger Haven” across the street- class, class, class. But as we were leaving two more males (who I think might have been together) hollered at me ( in a more respectful gay way). I swear to God, if I would have known that I was considered Gay-Hot, I would have been going to gay bars in high school.

Why is it at straight bars guys usually only talk to me to say, “Hey, can you move, I think you’re sitting on my coat.”

Deadly Post-its...another embarrassing day at work

2009-03-30T15:44:00.001-07:00

Another reason I look crazy at work...

I don't know why, but I have a constant need to doodle and write things down. I literally have pages and pages of my signature...why? I HAVE NO IDEA.

I also have this habit of writing down "evil"... mostly because I'm used to calling Amy Burns ( one of my best friends/ the worst person I know) "evil" and signing "evil" in sign language behind her back.

I was covering an assistant's desk today, which is usually pretty boring since I can't do any special projects, so most of my day is spent on gmail or answering phones. Any who...I was in the middle of gchating Amy Burns, when I received a phone call. The executive who I was assisting was in a meeting, so I took a message. The man on the other line sounded as if he was holding his phone at arms length while standing in an active mine field surrounded by screeching cats. Therefore, it was difficult to get his name. All I got was his phone number and what sounded like the name "Greg" but in reality he probably said "Janice"...

The exec came out of his meeting and I told him "Greg" called ( I think) and I had his number if he needed it. The exec said not to worry and he knows "Greg's" number...

The post-it with the "Greg" message on it was fair game in terms of doodle-dom. I went to town on that tiny yellow square with obscure drawings of crazy eyes, squiggle lines, and the word EVIL in cursive. I mean, I covered that thing to its utmost potential. Then, in order to hide my craziness, I folded it up and threw it away.

Hours later...I'm recovering from a minor freak out about the future/ still gchating with Amy Burns, when the exec comes up to my desk. He asks if I still have "Greg's" number...apparently it wasn't the "Greg" he thought it was...it may not even be "Greg" ( my money is still on Janice)...

I looked down at the trash can...then back at him...

GOD DAMNIT.

I picked up the note...

"Here it is...let me re-write it for you-"

"Oh, no its ok, I just need it now-"

"I have weird drawings on there!" I splurted out.

"Uh, its ok" He took it from me, looked at it and walked away.

I in fact did NOT have just "weird" drawings on it...I had the word "EVIL" written on it about 15 times...I looked like a serial killer or that I really think that "Greg" is an evil human being. I won't be surprised if they search through my computer for death threats/ emo poems about "Greg" and how much I hate him.

Son of a sweet mother of pearl. I just want one day where I don't accidently make threatening post-its.

BK VS. ELEVATORS

2009-03-27T12:35:00.000-07:00

It was pointed out to me a little while ago that I have a weird tendency: I HAVE to be the first person in the elevator. I don’t know what it is but I literally cut infront of people to step into the little box first. As soon as I hear that ding, GAME ON. I elbow my way to the front. Even if there are still people trying to exit the elevator, I practically bum rush them. I’ve tried to cut back since this was brought to my attention, but I can’t help it. So now every time I step into the elevator first, I kind of do and angry flinch, as if I’m yelling at myself, but others just think I have a weird tick.

Funny Elevator story: While we’re speaking of elevators… I was going up to my friend’s apartment in the elevator, when I saw a man in the lobby running to catch it. I held it open for him as he came in out of breath. He looked like some sort of awkward middle age Russian professor who was still trying to be a hipster… hottie. Anywhoozle, as soon as he gets in, he lets out a huge sigh. I do the polite laugh and say, “Long day?” and he laughs back and says “Good thing it’s the weekend,” in a slight foreign accent. Laughter, smiles, small talk, I thought that would be it…of course it wasn’t.

He continued, “I was running from place to place, and now I just want to have fun, you know? Do you like fun?”

It’s like he could read my soul.

“Uhh yep,” I laughed.

He pulled out his business card and handed it to me …“Here, I sell cheese.”

…Why wouldn’t he?

His card was orange and had little holes in it as if it were a block of cheese. Clever.

“If you ever have any cheese needs, let me know”

A man had never told me he would take care of my cheese needs before, so of course I was flattered.

And with that, he hurried out of the elevator, and with him he took my heart.

Why do the crazies love me?

2009-03-23T13:42:00.000-07:00

I don't know if it's that I have a 'nice girl from the midwest' look about me, or that I threaten to take off my top a lot ( even when unprovoked), but all I know is that I attract the craziest of crazies that have ever walked the earth.

It was 4 am. last sunday and I was at the airport, sprawled out across two very uncomfortable chairs, trying to sleep, seeing how I had stayed up all night to catch my early flight back to LA, when I hear a voice say, "Do you mind scooting over a little?" I open my eyes to see a man with a rolling suitcase right infront of me.

Son of a bitch. Really?

"Oh yea, no problem" I said, still somewhere between sleep and polite airport etiquette. As I moved over, I looked around my boarding area to notice many other open seats. This man really wanted this particular seat...COME ON...Super.

As I started to close my eyes again, I hear, "So, what's going on? What's your story?"

Are you kidding me? It's 4 in the morning...

"Oh..not much...just waiting for a plane, " I said with an irritated smile.

"Your name doesn't happen to be Bridget does it?" At first I was creeped out, and then he laughed and pointed to my boarding pass that was in my lap that he read off of...then I was really creeped out. I gave a raised eye-brow smile, other wise known as a ' I don't know how to respond' smile, thinking maybe this would end the conversation...oh so wrong was I.

" I'm 52"

.....alright.....

"Yep, 52 and lovin' it."

"I'm 21."

"Are you an aspiring actress or something? Is that was your deal is?"

"No...I'm abroad in LA for a semester..."

"Well you are a very good looking girl, I'm sure you could do anything you want"

....creepy, but the man does have a point, I'm extremely attractive.

" You see that girl over there?" he pointed to a girl with long black hair and her backed turned toward us. I nodded.

"Yea, shes Asian."

WHAT.

"You know how I can tell?"

"Her hair?" I guessed.

"That's it!" he said in a tone that made me feel as if I had just cracked some hidden secret of Logan Airport gate C19. "And, look at her boots." He pointed to her pair of brown leather boots. "But I guess those are all the fashion now."

"Yea, I like them." I tried to contribute, I don't know why...because he came back with this remark:

"Yea, I bet they'd look good if that was all she was wearing."

................................. I'm sorry, what?....

I didn't know what to say, but he continued...

"That's me, I'll say whatever..."

I gave a high pitch laugh and an 'ok'...

"Plus I'm a little hungover, I just got back from a date. We went to the Top of the Hub, no big deal."

"That's nice."

"Yea, it was no big deal, that's just who I am."

...oh dear lord, s my d.

"But I like going to concerts you know? I love the energy. That's where we were going to go after. But instead we had sex."

Oh my god........ I don't know what noise I responded with, but I do know that the lady who was sitting on the other side of him got up and sat somewhere else. All I could think to say was...

"Yea, that's nice if you like that stuff."

"If you like that stuff?"

"Yea, I don't know" I looked around to try to find an excuse to leave this conversation. I picked up my boarding pass.

"Oh, we're not sitting near each other," He said have grabbing my boarding pass.

Thank god.

"You're 23A," and then he showed me his ticket. 33F.

"Yea, I guess you got the back of the plane"

"That's what I wanted." he said in an almost defensive tone.

"Really? It's so noisey." I said

"Yea, but if you sit in the back of the plane, you're most likely to survive." he said stone faced.

ULTIMATE CREEP.

"Well I'm going to go join the masses" I pointed to the three people who started forming a line by the gate doors. "If I don't survive, please tell my story."

I picked up my bags as he laughed at my smooth get away line,

"Haha, you're hot."

.... that is literally what he said.

I ran to the gate.

I pray that that encounter was some sort of Howie Mandel hidden camera show and that that man doesn't really exsist in the world. Human beings... I just don't understand them.

Schools Support Prostitution

2009-03-11T15:25:00.000-07:00

This past year, I bought an Icelandic man. Not for keeps, just for one night- almost like prostitution, except instead of sexual favors, there were hamburgers and steak cut fries.

My school had put on a date auction, auctioning off some of BU’s “finest”/ mostly athletes or students who work in some of the offices on campus. My friend, Mister Rob, (female), was one of the lucky few to be auctioned off. And do to true “girl friendship code,” I promised that I would be there to bid on her just in case nobody else does. So, I went to the auction with my friend “Raquel” with $10 in my pocket and a can of soup in case I got hungry. We went a little early to get front row seats and to calm Mister Rob down before she is sold at auction in front of . As we were settling down, I saw him. The Icelandic man. Let’s call him “Yon Yonsson.”

Back track: I met this Icelandic man my sophomore year of college at a soccer party. While others were playing flip cup and taking shots of tequila out of a puppet shark’s mouth, Yon was in the back doing an interpretive dance of “The Circle of Life.” …Brilliant. I believe that everyone has an Icelandic soul-mate, and I had found mine. It is also common knowledge that Icelandic humans are, what we in the business call, “attractive.” And it is also common knowledge that I can’t handle social situations involving said “attractive” people. So most of my time knowing Yon was filled with moments of complete hilarity/ embarrassment at my expense. We were the types of friends that would casually have a conversation when in the student union together or at the same party, but mostly we would make ridiculous faces at each other when passing on the street. I got that he was weird, he got that I was weird. True friendship… Anywhoozle…

So, I see Yon, strumming his guitar by the make-shift stage, looking all Icelandic and Yon-like. “Oh holy shit,” I said to Mister. “If Yon is being auctioned off, I will spent my life savings.”

“No, I think he’s just playing an opening song.” Mister said as we both watched in admiration. We waved at him, he gave us a ridiculous smile and a wave back, I turned bright red and felt like I was going to throw up.

The lights dimmed and the show was about to start. Mister ran up to were the pieces of meat were waiting to be bought and we sat in the midst of other Mister Rob supporters. After a quick introductory video, the festivities began.

Yon was the first to take the stage with his guitar and euro-V-neck t-shirt. He sang a beautiful melody about being a prostitute for charity ( honestly one of the best songs about prostitution I have ever heard, truly a talented man). The crowd went wild after he sang and you could just hear all the females in the crowd giggle and shift their weight in nervous excitement. And then the announcer said, “Alright, let’s start the bidding on Yon for $10.”

OH MY GOD.
All the comments I made in the past 2 years of “giving up the use of my legs to go on a date with Yon” came rushing through my mind. This might be the only time in my life that I could actually date BU’s Icelandic God.

Before I could actually think about what I was going to do, my horrible Cleveland accented voice over powered my rational thought, “$10!” I yelled.

I looked at Raquel who grabbed my arm.

“What am I doing!”

We laughed in a sudden panic. Another girl from across the room bid, and then another girl behind me up-ed the bid again.

“$20!” I yelled, followed by “Son of a bitch!” when my rational thought finally came through. What AM I doing? I don’t have money on me- or money at all in that matter.

A few other girls bid in- Yon’s price had gone up to $30. A sudden anger came over me.

I will be a monkey’s uncle before I let another girl take my Icelandic soul-mate to U-Burger before me! It’s not everyday that you have an opportunity to pay to go out with an attractive man and have it NOT be frowned upon.

“$35!” I yelled, before mouthing some obscenities to Raquel.
“$40” the other girl yelled. I hesistated….
“$42” I tried to slow the bidding down. A harsh reality settled over me. I physically do not have the money. I turned to Raquel as if in slow motion, “GOOoooooo get moneyyyyyy….NOOOWWW!” I pushed her out of her chair and she sprinted out of the room, debit card in hand.
“$45” the other girl yelled again. I felt the whole room turn toward me. It was then I noticed the extremely bright lights that were blinding my view of the stage, and the heat from all the people cramped in the auditorium, and how I apparently forgot to put deodorant on because I was sweating profusely.
“$48!” I shouted at the announcer. No-response…..
“Son of a bitch, $50!” I yelled since they hated my random bill-add-ons.
“Sold! To Bridget!”

Oh holy shit. Did I just buy an Icelandic man?

People started cheering around me. “Bridget, come on up and pick up your date.”

I didn’t get up at first. I just stared at the door hoping Raquel would run in. Eventually the people sitting next to me pushed me to my feet.

The next 100 steps are pretty much a blur. I remember looking at the sea of faces around me as I approached the stage. I remember saying to all of them, “I don’t have money!” Looking to them for guidance, or $50. “I don’t have any money, what am I suppose to do?!” They just shrugged back at me.

I made it up on stage. Yon got down on one knee and kissed my hand. I looked at him and said the only thing I could at the moment. “I don’t have $50.”…romantic.

I don’t remember what he said to me, or what the announcer asked me on stage, all I know is that for every question, I answered with “I don’t have any money.”

They escorted me off stage. I saw Raquel running up to me off stage with $50 in hand. Then I finally looked at Yon. My stomach dropped.

“I can’t believe I just bought you.” I said in a state of shock. He said something else, but all I could hear was the voice inside me say “you idiot.” He wrote down his phone number, and I attempted to do the same. My hand was shaking so badly that I spelled my name wrong and the last two digits in my phone number had to be explained because they looked like something you would see in Wingdings font.

He hugged me and walked away. I don’t really remember anything until an hour later when I came back to consciousness and I was with Mister and Raquel. Although I was still shaking and completely embarrassed, one of my dreams had come true that night : I had bought a singing Icelandic male prostitute at a school function in order to help provide inner city school children a swing set. I love America.

2009-03-04T12:01:00.000-08:00

I usually spend my lunch break trying to catch up with my mom or harassing Amy Burns (worst human of all time) with berating phone calls and obscene gchat messages. But today I went outside and sat next to the large fountain across from my building’s lobby on a small fo-wooden bench in the sun. It was unusually windy today but all I wanted to do was just stay in the warm sun for at least 20 minutes before I had to head back to the copy room. My thoughts were scattered today and I was completely absent from the filing and collating world that is interning and I think I know why….

This morning I spoke to my friend “Shenee,” who recently had been broken up with by a man who I thought was mediocre in every sense of the word and kind of looked like the guy from the 80’s movie “Mask” starring Cher, but who she thought was god-like and “different from any guy she’s ever met.” She was telling how whenever she meets a guy who has the slightest interest in her or isn’t “100% a douchebag” she falls for him.

And although I know she wanted some sort of Buddha-like advice from me on how to stop the “penis on a pedestal syndrome” (her words, not mine…but could you imagine what that would actually look like!?), I found myself reflecting back on all my girlish stupidity.

It’s a fact that most girls deny but secretly know is true- that girl’s love guys who are assholes. Not flat out, “I’m going to beat you with an umber-ella-ella,” jerk, but one who is slightly distant and very unclear about their feelings. Guys who you can’t read or who isn’t honest about their feelings are the most attractive humans of all time. The guys who won’t fully commit end up being the ones that you spend most of your time chasing and obsessing over. Is it the chase? Or is it that you just want to be validated as a worthy partner?

I love how girls think! It’s hilarious. If a guy is falling all over us, we are totally nonchalant about it or even a little creeped out. It’s like the Woody Allen quote, “I would never want to join a club who would accept me as a member.” Someone who is totally obsessed with you must be a little weird. But then as soon as the guy starts losing interest, an alarm goes off. Why doesn’t he want to talk to me anymore? Has he found someone better? Am I not as worthy as I thought I was? And then we suddenly gain interest.

It’s madness. Dating in general is actually awkward when you think about it. Its like, “Hey opposite sex person, I want to be friends with you in a sexual way for awhile.” Uncomfortable. But then in the long run, dating is like when you are driving and flipping through the radio stations. You’re looking, pressing buttons, and then you hear a song that you kinda like, so you stop. But then you’re thinking, “Well, I like this song, but it’s not my favorite, maybe there’s another song on right now that I would like better." So you take the plunge and start searching through the stations. Maybe you find a better song so you move on to that station. Or maybe you were wrong and you try to go back to the original song and plead for forgiveness- it will either still be on and happy to have you back, or it's now a commercial and you lost your chance forever. Or right off the bat you hear the greatest song in the world and you just feel so lucky that you were listening to that station at that time- fate. Or maybe, for those of us who are not the luckiest, it's just commercials on all your programmed stations and you end up listening in a daze and feeling lonely.

I sat there next to the fountain reflecting back on my radio theory and the relationships I've had, feeling like I've gained some knowledge from my experiences. Right then someone tapped me on my shoulder. I looked up and I nice lady who works on my floor was standing there.

"Hey, I just want to let you know that your skirt keeps flying up and we can all see your underwear."

I looked behind her to the tables of people who were sitting by the lobby watching our conversation. Good. The feeling of knowledge and worldly experience quickly left me and the thought "Thank God I wore underwear today" popped into my head. Intelligence.

Suicidal Monk Fans

2009-02-26T16:04:00.001-08:00

Let’s be honest, I’ve dealt with my fair share of crazies in my lifetime. They flock to me as if I was their savior ( no offense Jesus, I love you).

When I worked at Diesel, there was a foreign girl who locked herself in the dressing room and cried for 2 hours because she didn’t know if she should return a jacket. She made me try it on, hide it from her, bring it back to her, and watch her try it on. She stayed 40 minutes after the store closed, still crying and refusing to leave the dressing room. And then when I finally convinced her that she should keep it, she asked if we were hiring and what I was doing after work.

Or when I was in high school working at an ice cream store and a man in a large white bunny costume came in and just stood in the corner of the store for 20 minutes. Creepy / sexy.

But since I’ve been out here in L.A. I haven’t had such a run in until now…

An assistant was out sick yesterday which mean that I, the little intern who’s desk is in the copy room in the back, actually got to walk out into the light and sit with the big kids. I’ve covered assistant’s desks before, and have managed to not throw up or light anything a flame, which is hard because I enjoy both a good binge and fire. So I smiled and took my place at the desk.

It is also universally known that I fear phones. I don’t like talking on the phone, answering it, listening to voicemails, or the way they taunt me with their noises. But as an assistant, most of your time is answering phones. So I’ve tried my best. I’ve been extremely uncomfortable and asked people to repeat their names so many times that they verbally accost me over the telephone, but other than that, it’s been pretty good. Well, almost…

At 1:00 pm, everyone leaves for lunch outside the office. It’s like a fire alarm goes off and people flee from the building screaming and hungry. But since I was the low man on the totem pole, ( do people under 50 use that term?) I had to stay in the office and take care of any calls that come in.

There I was, day dreaming about snacks, when a call came in. After my initial heart attack and figuring which button to press, I gave my greeting:

“Hello M***** S****’s office-“ I barely get the words out of my mouth before the crazy starts-

“Hello, I’m Caroline Lee, my number is 767-555-6758. I live outside of San Francisco, and I have OCD. It’s really bad, my life is really bad. I mean everyday I pray that God will kill me that’s how bad it is. Nobody would want to live my life, that’s how bad it is. I have OCD-“

At first I thought it was a prank call- so I looked around to see if maybe someone was watching me and laughing…Nobody was around…This lady kept on going…

“I can barely leave my house its that bad. My birthday was on December 2nd and I was stuck in the shower for 19 hours. Standing for 19 hours, that’s how bad it was. I bet you don’t know what it feels like to stand for 19 hours.”

All I could muster was a really high pitched semi-laugh, which was probably the worst response to someone who prays that God would kill her, but it didn’t matter. She kept going.

“ I heard that the is Monk’s final season and I don’t know what to do. I love Monk. He has OCD but mine is way worse. I mean, you can’t even imagine how bad mine is. It’s awful. And Monk is my best friend and if I lose him, I will lose everything. I mean there is not much in my life that I look forward to, but Monk is my favorite show. And I was wondering if it’s possible if I could be in the background, like an extra. I saw that you let Asians on the show and I’m Asian, so everything will be alright. I know where you film the episodes so I can fly there or to LA. I can be there anytime you want.”

My face was frozen in disbelief and confusion. But she continued…

“My Doctor can be a reference on how bad my life is, her number is 938-586-3933. And if you could ask Mr. Shalhoub ( the man who plays Monk), if he’s tired of doing full time maybe he and just do part time? He seems like a nice man and I’m sure you’re nice too. And if I could be an extra you have no idea how much that would mean to me. I literally was stuck in my shower for days.”

5 solid minutes of crazy went by. I heard the story of how she was stuck in the shower 3 times, how much she hated her life 17 times, I received a list of 4 different people and their numbers that can be used as references on just how bad her life was, and then it finally ended.

“Is there anyway that I can please be an extra?”

I looked around for help, but nobody was there. I know how to copy things, make labels on the label maker, file scripts, and stock the fridge. But I have never been trained in what to do if a suicidal Monk fanatic calls. I responded the only way I knew how…

“I’m sorry he’s at lunch right now, can I take a message?”

2009-02-24T14:22:00.000-08:00

Things I miss about Boston:

1. Starbucks Ladies in the GSU.
They make a mean tall non-fat no-water chai latte, and they seem so apathetic while doing it. Patti, Consuela, and Briggitte…three of the biggest bad asses in the whole joint. Totally cooler than the Jamba Juice bitches who could never pronounce my name and would always mark me down as “Barbra.” The S.Bucks Ladies might have judged me for being in their line everyday and sometimes twice a day, but, God damn, do I respect them.
1.a. Other notable GSU workers- Alison- the check out lady- I never had any idea what she was saying and always felt uncomfortable going in her line because she flailed her hands too much. Susan- the other check out lady- she would always tell me “Ok, have good day my friend”…that meant something to me. The Aesop’s Bagel workers- Lamoth especially- are probably the slowest and most unemotional human beings possible to survive. There really is no reason why toasting a bagel should take 20 minutes, but they found a way to do it, and they like it.

2. Being able to walk 2.3 miles home from a drunken night in freezing cold weather.
It was a usual routine to go to some Allston bar/house, get a little shwasted, find a friend passed out in a shopping cart on the side of the street, go to Shaw’s, and buy a 24 pack of string cheese and a box of mozzarella sticks and eat the whole thing on my walk home…which was really only 4 blocks away. (This story may or may not be true…but mostly it’s true)

3. Convincing my mom that I didn’t know where the convenience points charges were coming from.
I haven’t had a dining plan since the middle of Junior year. Since then I’ve mostly been stealing pre-made sushi in the GSU to survive.
For a while my diet consisted of:
1. Plain Croissant and a Chai Latte from Starbucks (paid for by Convenience Points)
1. Stolen pack of Avocado and Cucumber rolls (6 included) from the GSU.
1. Can of Campbell’s Tomato soup from CampCo ( also paid for by Convenience Points)
And sometimes for a snack - a half eaten box of Wheat Thins that my dear friend Beast, would have already found and denied that she ate any.

My mom, still thinking everything costs the same since 1925, would give me about $25 a month to spend on food. Yet she still believed that there was a computer glitch when random $10 charges would be sent to her.

4. Allston
I had never seen so many abandoned shopping carts and mattresses in the streets before I went to Allston. The streets smell like Natty Light and as if something was just burned to the ground in a gang related fight. Allston is the place where you go randomly to have a good time and wake up the next morning missing your shoes and a little bit of self respect. It’s a place where you see dozens of freshman walking around, going door to door as if they were children on Halloween, looking for candy or booze ( again just like children on Halloween…these kids today and their drinking problems).
You can find the most precious and exotic gifts on the street, like the one time I was walking down Ashford and came across a real severed pig’s head with a spear through it- hahaha…memories. It’s absolutely the dirtiest place I have ever been in my life, but I will continue to run through it barefoot and drunk.

5. Greenpeace.
I miss the Greenpeace people who try to stop you as you pretend to be on your cell phone or like you are 97% deaf in one ear. I miss their witty come-on’s, like “Hey do you like polar bears?” or “How much do you like living on earth?” I used to avoid talking to them or when I was cornered- flail violently until they let me go. Then I discovered lying! I then told them I was already a member- then I got high fives and hugs. Sometimes I would just find them and tell them I was a member so that I could receive some sort of affection… I get lonely sometimes…

5a. The “hug don’t hate” people in front of Marsh Plaza- forcing me to hug you makes me hate you. The Hilel House also in front of Marsh- and how they would just shake their heads “no” as soon as I started to approach them…unrequited love.

To be continued…..

what an idiot

2009-02-19T12:56:00.001-08:00

I booked a flight to go to Boston for my spring break in March. That’s right. No thank you exotic beaches, sunny weather, or a chance to make out with a man named “El Guapo” and wake up in the back of a pick up truck with a shaved head with a tattoo that says E.G. & B.K forever (because I already did that!) . I wanted mid 40’s cloudy weather and to sleep on a futon in Allston Mass. So I quickly booked my flights and was all set to go….or so I thought…

I came home from going out the other night…Snuggled in my bed…. Decided to check my email, maybe go on facebook to see if anyone left some caring message for me ( they didn’t)… My gmail pops up on the screen. There’s a message from Orbitz.com reminding me that my flight is tomorrow and to get to the airport early to avoid lines….

Uhhh what?

“There’s no way” I yelled. I ran to my underwear drawer, (not because I peed my pants but because that’s were my flight information was), and sure enough I had booked my flight for the wrong day… cats.

I called Orbitz at 3 am., listened to some smooth yazz hold music for about 45 minutes, and then begged and pleaded with Lupita at customer service for another hour. After I cried and threw up, and called back 3 hours later, I walked away with $180 charge to get the original ticket.

I tried to get some sympathy and maybe some monies from my darling mother Peter… I called her, put on my depressed voice, and told her my distressed story. I danced around the subject of her actually spotting me some money so I can eat this month, thinking maybe, just maybe she would offer something.

Not to my surprise…this is what she said…
“Oh Bridge, I’m sorry…we all do that sometimes…So…I picked out the new wood for our kitchen cabinets this weekend.”

Without her love and support I don’t know what I’d do.

Crazy Town ( not the band, but I wish)

2009-02-18T14:32:00.000-08:00

It was brought to my attention by a Mexican man, who I will call “Sean” but will pronounce it “Scene” because that’s kind of what it looks like, that I have mostly been telling stories about the past and not about what’s happening now. Thanks “Sean,” I’m glad you caught on. But he brings up a good point, I should write about LA and all of its happenings.

Before I came out here to Los Angeles, about 87% of the people I told about my move told me they “hated LA and good luck,” …. Thank you. That didn’t scare the shit out of me at all.

And once I got here, I had the exact same thought I knew I would have, “Well, it’s no Cleveland.”

Here are a few things I’ve noticed about LA that I find humorous…

There are left hand turn lanes, but no left hand turn arrows. Therefore, if you wish to make a left hand turn, you have to wait until it’s a red light and people beep and swear at you, but at least they provide you with the lane to be sworn and beeped at.

If it says the road is 35mph, people go 30. And if you try to go above that, they will burn you for witchcraft.

There is a Carl’s Jr., Carl’s Jr. Jr., or an In & Out Burger on every other block…I have yet to see a McDonalds.

The Christian Bale freak out was the lead story on the local news… the Inauguration was somewhere in the middle between Oscar Coverage and how “Fish Leather” is in this season… (score!).

Everyone is attractive or foreign. Thank god I can speak in broken English.

Little dogs and babies are so trendy right now. I figure getting pregnant is cheaper so I’ll go with that one.

They sell much more than fuel and snacks at gas stations. The Chevron station on Highland Ave. sells life size stuffed tigers and watercolors, (a stellar combo that not many people have tapped into…innovative).

Ryan Secrest is either on the radio or on the television 24/7…and people respect him.

There is a mural on the side of a huge building in West Hollywood of Cher, John Ridder, Judy Garland, Carol King, Don Knotts, and Elvis….really? …Out of all the stars…Out of everyone…this? This is who you…?...No, good I was just checking…

The Jim Henson muppet building is across from a strip club called Crazy Girls, who’s neon sign reads “Live CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY.” There’s just a whole bunch of crazy going on.

There’s a hot dog stand called “Pink’s” that always has a line around the block whether its 2 in the afternoon or 2 in the morning…I’m determined to find out why.

Instead of hot dog vendors or pretzel carts on the street, there are mango vendors, but never anyone actually there to sell them….curious…

We are told that “diverse areas can cause riots” and to avoid Scientologists.

Billy Ray Cyrus blew me a peace sign kiss like a young Sammy Sosa.

I like LA so far. It’s great when its 58 degrees and people have winter coats and scarves on, and I run around topless laughing and laughing… The weather is beautiful, the beaches are beautiful, avocados are 2 for $1, and I love my internship.

Just a little something something

2009-02-17T12:22:00.000-08:00

"Great" things don't happen to me. I'm not complaining in anyway because I think it's pretty funny. And in no way am I saying that I lead a boring or average life, vacant of any entertainment. What I'm saying is, life just wasn't meant for me.

For example, while most American teenagers got cars, cell phones, or parties for their 16th birthdays, my mom bought me a cartoon dog calendar that was on sale at Borders because my birthday is in August and the calendar was only good for 4 more months. She ended up just keeping it because she liked it so much. Can you blame her?

AIDS is everywhere.

2009-02-16T14:42:00.000-08:00

It was Sophomore year of college, I woke up in my lofted Hojo bed. I hopped down onto my desk and then the chair, seeing how BU decided not to provide us with ladders to use to get up and down from our beds, no that would be too easy...I really had to work in order to go to sleep at night or get up in the morning...why not? I love life.

Anywhoozle, I carefully got up, hoping not to wake up my roommates, Officer Rob and Amy Burns (worst person I ever met), and went into our tiny bathroom. I pulled back my wild bed hair with one fluid motion and tied it up with my stack of hair ties I always keep on my right wrist. Got my toothbrush out and started brushing. I was just thinking my morning thoughts, like, "I hope the next time I wake up, I won't wake up to Amy Burns..." I spit the toothpaste out in the sink. And to my surprise, I spit brown.

Shwaaaaaaa?

I opened my mouth and stuck out my tongue. Brown. My tongue was brown. Now for those you who don't usually look at their own tongues, that is not the typical color.

I did't know what to do. I went over to a sleeping Rob.

"Rob?" I whispered...."Rob?"

"Hmmm?" she mummbled...

"My tongue is brown...."

She slightly lifter her head..."What?"

After she rose into conciousness and finally understood that my tongue was indeed brown, we did the only thing that made complete sense and could for sure help me.

WEB MD.

I typed in my symptoms....mostly just "Brown Tongue" and waited to see what my brown disease was. ....

The answer came up on my computer. My heart stopped.
"The discoloration of the tongue is a symptom of HIV/AIDS."

Oh my god. I have AIDS.

I didn't even know what to do... My main source of all knowledge, the interweb, had just told me I have AIDS.

Between gasps of shock and thoughts of suicide, I call my mom.

"Mom, I have AIDS."

"WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT!? WHY WOULD YOU HAVE AIDS?"

"I have a brown tongue and the internet said I have AIDS."

" BRIDGET! HOW COULD YOU HAVE AIDS!"

I really didn't want to have to sex talk with my mom for the first time right after I just found out I have AIDS.

"Well, I woke up with a brown tongue and the internet said-"

"Wait! Did you take Pepto Bismol last night?"

I stopped to think. Flash backs of an intense sitting of pineapple eating and severe stomach cramps. Pepto was brought out.

WARNING: If you have Pepto before you go to bed and some of it is left in your mouth- it will turn your mouth brown.

I was relieved that I didn't have AIDS, but now I had to deal with my mom asking me why I thought there was the slightest possibility that I could, maybe have AIDS.

Bridget meets Booze- the long love affair.

2009-02-12T10:15:00.000-08:00

I was what you could call a “late bloomer” in many ways. Not physically though, I was a very attractive 2nd grader and the only one with a “Badonk a Donk” in nursery school. But let’s just say I would dominate in “Never I have I ever.” All the normal childhood milestones that any human being would achieve were completely foreign to me. Like how I didn’t even go into the ocean until I was 19 years old-- My mom had told us that we would get swept up in the waves and probably die—reasonable thinking.

Or that I’ve never been to Disney World or Disney Land. My family went the year before I was born and – according to my mom-- because I was “unexpectedly” born, we no longer have money to do fun things. No guilt there.

And the first time I ever drank was my junior year in high school. The rest of my friends had had crazy middle school experiences, or went wild freshman year, but not I. I was watching movies and going through that awkward phase when I still parted my hair down the middle.

So, one night Junior year, my friends “Flocks” and “Tall One” and I were just kind of hanging out and one of them said, “God, I wish we had some booze” ( or something like that). Then- I remembered something….

I have a brother…it’s true. Some people have tried to deny it, including myself, but he does exist. And for my 13th birthday, he hid a bottle of vodka in my pillow case, moved to Prague, and disappeared for a couple years. Well, I had kept that gift hidden away and forgotten about it until that night.

“I have a bottle of vodka” I said like Smalls did in Sandlot when he said that he had a ball to play with and everyone pushed him to go get it.

And there it was. There was the night I started one of my longest and healthiest relationships…da’ booze. I started drinking the vodka and Tropicana No Pulp orange juice with no idea what was going to happen next. Nothing happened at first, but then after awhile my face started feeling warm and numb. I poked my cheeks a few times to see if they still existed. My other friends were laughing as I continued to dive into a land of drunken behavior.

“Bridget, tell us something funny” they said, trying to egg me on. I knew what they were doing. They were trying to make me look or say something dumb. So in my brilliant mind, I decided to talk about the least funny thing I could possibly think of…

“I’m going to talk to you about Quantum Physics…” I slurred…that was my way of sticking it to them. They just laughed even harder.

Needless to say I puked the next morning. But it did give me a “sick day” that following Monday.

I had drunk a few more times in high school, but nothing really intense. I saved that for college and boy, did I.

Early freshman year, I thought I could hold my own when it came to drinking; after all I did it like 10 times already. DUMB. So one party, my friend “Alex” called me over to take some shots with him. After each shot he made a tally mark on his hand and did the same for me… We were going to go shot for shot…Did I mention that “Alex” was a Senior frat boy and weighed over 200 pounds? Yea… I remember sitting on a chair making a rap about a man named Roberto and then throwing up in the bathroom and having Amy Burns ( worst person I know/love) find me in there asking who called her to come to the party….ooops. I woke up the next morning in the Holiday Inn with 11 tally marks on my hand.

Ouch. I looked in the mirror. I looked sick but not deadly. But I did notice that I had a little pink dot on my left eye… “That’s weird”… well that dot got bigger…soon half my eye was blood red. I had popped a whole bunch of blood vessels from puking that I looked like a monster. I tried to play it off by wearing sunglasses Monday morning to class, but as soon as I took them off my friends yelled, “Oh my god! What is wrong with your eye! Oh god! Put those back on!”…and that was the day I cut my bangs to cover my left eye.

I skipped class and went to Student Health to try to get a note. There they looked at my and just said that I probably just broke the blood vessels but it looked horrible ( thanks … I know.). They didn’t know if it was going to get worse, so the only thing they could do is give me an eye patch….

Uhhhh….what?

It was 3 weeks into freshman year and there was no way I was going to be known as “Pirate Girl” for the rest of my life. I had a choice…scary bloody eye or eye patch?....I declined the patch and hid in my room for a few days vowing never to do shots again.

Now that I am older and wiser, and scared of the number 11, I can hold my own… I hardly puke, I just get naked.

Jew Addict.

2009-02-11T12:46:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: The names of the parties involved in this story are slightly changed but still pretty obvious who they are about.

I have a problem. This problem has, on many occasions, driven me to insane embarrassment and rejection, which I love. I am a Christian girl. I’ve loved Jesus and apparently he loves me too, but that leads me to why this is a problem… I have and always will…want a Jewish man. Jesus was a great Jewish man who would probably make some wine and bread appear on my table and save me from damnation but his mother would never accept me.

Going to an all girls catholic school did not exactly help my search for such a “Mensch” (Mensch (Yiddish: מענטש mentsh, German: Mensch, for human being) means "a person of integrity and honor"). BUT, freshman year at BU, I made out with my first Jewish man. He was everything I imagined him to be: hilarious, strange, scruffy, and a musician. I will call him “Dwayne.”

After a night of hilarious story telling and trying to make the weirdest faces we possibly could, “Dwayne” and I madeout in the ally behind the McDonalds in West Campus, like every little girl dreams. To this day, that was probably the most fun makeout that I have ever had behind that McDonalds. Problem was, “Dwayne” didn’t go to BU. He was a friend of a friend, and was only visiting. So, le sigh, he was gone.

But for the next year or so, “Dwayne” came about two or three more times to visit our mutual friend, but nothing happened. I was either unable to make it to their party, or we just didn’t have any time to ourselves.

Sophomore year, “Dwayne” moved to Boston. I know this because we randomly saw eachother on the street. At first we locked eyes…mixed with shock and excitement, we walked toward each other…closer and closer. And then we both passed each other. Unable to hide our laughter, we both turned back and ran to embrace each other right there in the street.. ironically infront of the West Campus McDonalds.

We parted ways and promised to meet up sometime. Well months went by and failed attempts to hangout started stacking up. I had almost given up the dream half way through the year until our mutual friend’s birthday party. Our mutual friend promised me that “Dwayne” was going to be there and that he wanted to see me.

Therefore, like the crazy biddy I am, I dressed in the cutest thing I possibly could, curled my hair, had my friend do my make up, because this was the night. THIS was the night of all nights. So my group of friends and I go over to the apartment where the party was. We were a little early, so not a lot of people were there yet…We waited… We waited… About 2 hours go by and no “Dwayne”. Some of my friends wanted to go to another party, but I begged them to stay a little longer.

Just then, I heard someone answer the door downstairs, “Dwayne! Great to see you man.”
I almost threw up from excitement. I could hear him coming up the stairs. Then he walked in, ( and of course, like a creep I was “casually” right by the front door). We locked eyes again. Laughter and excitement.

“Bridget!? No way!” he hugged me and picked me up and swung me around like they would do when some one actually cares… “God, it’s great to see you,” he said, “Hey, meet my girlfriend, ‘Becca.’”…………………………..

I’m sorry, what?.....No, no, no….what?

There was a general silent “OH SHIT” from all my friends who were gathered around us.

And there she was, “Becca.” A tall, brown hair, brown eyed, olive skinned lady and the killer of all Christian girl’s dreams.

I don’t really remember what happened after that. I’m pretty sure I blacked out or shaved a cat but thank god it was in public so everyone saw.

We left the party right after the encounter.

I’ve had one other Jewish man obsession since, and of course it ended in another heart break. I’ve been Jewish Man clean now for about 2 years. I’m not going to sit here and tell you there hasn’t been temptations. I sometimes loiter around Synagogues or Shool. But deep down I know, I will never be the choosen one.

Because Jesus Doesn't Love Me....

2009-02-10T15:32:00.000-08:00

It is universally known that I can’t take “attractive” pictures. Every school picture has been unbelievably awkward with at least 3 double chins and a lazy eye. Most of my facebook pictures are of me making the weirdest faces possible to hide the fact that I actually can’t smile in pictures… BUT! I have had luck with my school ID.’s. I looked like a normal female who was not suffering from any sort of physical disability in my first two ID.’s. Unfortunately, at the beginning of Senior year, my ID stopped swiping. So I had to go to the Terrier Card office and get a new one.

I admit it. I was cocky. My first two ID.’s were pretty impressive, why should this one be different.

O son of a sweet mother of pearl.

I was wrong. I got it back and I was in shock. Has anybody looked this bad ever in the history of life? I looked like a 90 year old woman with a red wig, sucking of something really sour. Unbelievable. Little kids on the street were running away from it in fear.

So I hid it. I never would let anyone look at it (except when I was drunk and we all needed a good laugh)….

I moved to Los Angeles, leaving my dear sweet BU behind and all reasons to use my ID. I had escaped the ugliness… or so I thought.

First day of classes here, all the Film & TV students gather in the classroom. We all settle down, I sit in the back ( because I am one bad ass mother- WHAT YOU SAY!?) and the professor begins…

“I just want to let you guys know, that it’s going to take me a while to get your names right. There’s about 60 of you and all I have are the pictures from your ID.’s that BU sent over.” He said as he help up a couple sheets of paper.

“Good God,” I thought, “I hope he doesn’t look at mine because it is uuuhhhgggg-ly”

“And I have to say,” he continued, “Some of these pictures are pretty bad.”

He wouldn’t… he wouldn’t actually name anybody….

He started flipping through the papers…

Ohhhh...he’s doing it. It’s going to be-

“Who’s Bridget?” he said with a slight chuckle in front of everyone…

First day of class. FAIL.

I raised my hand, “Yea, that would be me.”

“This picture is awful!” He continued..Everyone starts laughing.

"Yea I know."

"I mean, it's really bad"

"Yes, thank you, I would like to talk about it some more..."

So the lesson for today is: everybody judges you.

2009-02-10T14:15:00.000-08:00

story:

i'm not what you would call "lucky"... things don't go smoothly for me. i know this and i have come to accept my inevitable failure at life. but when these things happen, i laugh and i laugh and i cry.

At my internship, it was an executive's birthday and he brought huge cupcakes. Now I had turned them down at first, one- because I promised myself I wouldn't eat this month, two- I still feel like an awkward 5 year old who peed their pants in a room full of TV executives ( half of that statement is acutally real...probably the pants part), and three- I didn't want hold them up from their big conference call. Well... 20 minutes go by and the fact that I have only been surviving on Special K 90 calorie bars finally caught up with me...

I quietly snuck out of the copy room where I have been stationed...I sneak up to the assistant's desk where the cupcakes where and start to cut one in half and walk away... BOOM. I knock everything off the assistant's desk right in the middle of the office, right in the middle of the big conference call.

There I stood, cup-cake in hand, and colored paperclips and other office supplies at my feet. Boy was my face red.

I was the clumsy fat intern who couldn't make it 20 minutes without stealing someone's birthday cupcakes... Do I smell a job opportunity opening up? Hmmmm?!

I walked away, mumbling "this is my life"....

I was not invited to the conference call meeting.

FML.

2009-02-10T13:55:00.000-08:00

I think the word "blog" is one of the funniest words that humans created. I like to try to slip it into as many conversations I possibly can...for example..

"Can you believe that he hooked up with her?"- "Oh, I know, I'm totally going to blog about it." ...

"Bridget, what are you doing tonight?"- "Oh, I think I'm just going to relax, watch a movie, blog, no big deal."

"Oh, sorry I missed your call, I was blogging."

The list is infinite. Since I use the word every chance I get, I thought I should write one...along with a 4 other reasons...

1.) To keep my friends updated on my life in LA.

2.) I have little to no memory.

3.) To stop the war in Iraq.

4.) To Amy Burns off the streets and away from children.