Today, Zack and I enjoyed some delicious food from Ruby Tuesday's in South Portland that later made us sickly.

Our waiter was a delightful, ostensibly homosexual gentleman named Craig. After we had paid him and we were leaving, he told us "Good job on eating all that food."

Curious.

On with it.

Holy malfunctioning Coasters, Batman!

Because I have a number of friends in New Jersey, I feel compelled to report that the "Batman and Robin: The Chiller" roller coaster at Six Flags Great Adventure has a history of problems: This weekend, a train of the roller coaster got stuck for twenty minutes, while the riders were suspended in the air upside-fucking-down. In 1998, the ride had to be closed because people were complaining of neck and head pain, but both of these incidents seem rather tame when compared to the 1997 incidents wherein people were hitting their goddamned heads on metal parts of the coaster.

Evidentally, this coaster was designed before the Riddler was fired from Wayne Enterprises. Riddle me this: What the fuck is wrong with six flags that they aren't getting the point on this?

The one real victim of this weekends incident was a little boy who had to go to the hospital to be treated for asthma once recovered from the upside-down train. Evidently, the shock leading to his attack had nothing to do a fear of heights, but was instead caused by his disillusionment when the Dark Knight did not appear within minutes to save the day. Doctors say they did everything they could to treat his asthma, but there wasn't a measure to be taken in preventing his broken heart.

Damn you, BC, damn you.

On with it.

As many of you may have noticed, I've been trying to gear this blog towards a larger audience lately, featuring posts about world events, news, bizarre happenings, and, well, things that aren't me bitching about my life. I'm trying to prepare myself before I start seriously investing in this site as, more than anything, I want my writing to be read, and that requires two things- content and exposure.

This all said, I'm going to take a bit of a break from that in this post, and post something I started last night, on my nineteenth birthday. (Props to Emily for remembering it!) A journalish entry, I think it may be the start of some growthful work dealing with my self-esteem issues...or maybe not so much growthful as...well, disturbing. Suffice to say, I wanted to go farther with it last night, but I am in Florida for the weekend, tied by the bonds of my vacation schedule and my laptop battery. I was unable, therefore, to get out all of what was in me then, and unable now to find it again, but I do hope that this will be the first of a series of posts that feature my intimate conversations with Jiminy Critic.




My Night with Jiminy

It’s 11:45, and raining outside the window beside me in the lounge area of my Kissimee Comfort Inn. I am in Florida on official duty– here to escort my unexperienced Uncle, Cousin and Aunt around Disney World, and attend another cousin’s wedding. Tommorrow, I will be spending the day in the company of Cinderella, Mickey Mouse, and Jiminy Cricket. Tonight, I am accompanied, as ever, by Jiminy Critic.

Jiminy Critic is the name I have given to that little voice in my head– you know the guy, chances are, one of his brothers or sisters lives with you. The one that taunts you and calls you bad things and tells you you’re fat, or incompetent, or otherwise inadequate everytime he gets the chance. I am reading a self-help book called “Self-Esteem”, and in the “For the Therapist” section, which I briefly skimmed, it talks about encouraging the client to give his Pathological Critic- that’s what those little voices are officially called– a name. I don’t know if it will mention that idea in any parts of the book that are actually for the patient. Of course you don’t, you lazy shit, you’re too much of a coward to get around to doing the things the books tells you to do before continuing reading. You’re too fucking scared to go on. You bullshit fucker.

That’s Jiminy. He’ll be in italics from now on in this post. I hope this doesn’t get confusing.

Anyways, as he mentioned, I haven’t gotten past this one activity that you have to do in the book– to be explained, perhaps, in more detail later– so I do not know whether it will ask me to give my little voice a name. But if they do, I will be one step ahead of them. I’m not sure that I’m supposed to be one step ahead of them, as the potential for personal growth seems to be based on following the books strict guidelines, but I couldn’t resist. The name seemed too perfect– there’s this lovable cartoon character who represents a happy, positive voice in your head, one that tells you the difference between right from wrong in a gentle, friendly way. And his name just happens to sound just like a word that refers to another voice that tells you the difference between the two...cruelly, harshly, and largely inaccurately, but he tells you none-the-less.

The book explains that that is one of the reasons we allow our evil little crickets to chirp– in some cases, we need them to function because their verbal punishment of us acts as motivation for us to stop slacking off, get something done, not do things wrong, etc. Not all the time, just some of it. Jiminy, and all his friends, work on the same principle as Slot Machines– if using them pays off once, we allow ourselves to get addicted. Every now and then, listening to that lil’ bastard accomplishes something, or gratifies us somehow, so we keep him around, in hopes that it’ll happen again. Take, for instance, the comparing one always does between themselves in everyone else. You might think that you aren’t as smart as person A or as pretty as person B a hundred times, but if every now and then you find a person C that you compare favorably too, you feel better about yourself, and therefore continue with this largely unhealthy thought pattern.

There are lots of other reasons- almost all of them based on the slot machine principle- that we continue to listen to these bitches. One that seems popular among my male friends, in particular, is that the punishment they inflict on themselves absolves us of guilt. Person A hurts person B, and feels guilty about it. Enter Critic. Critic calls person A a bastard, an insensitive son of a bitch, a total useless piece of garbage. This makes person A feel like he’s being punished for his sins and that makes him feel better and makes the guilt go away or, in some cases, he just believes everything the critic says– I.E. “I am a bastard, and that’s why I behaved like a bastard. There is nothing I can do about that.”– so the anxiety that comes along with wondering– wondering why he acted that way, wondering how to atone, etc.– for the situation is relieved.

Think about it.


Jiminy fucks with me. Well, nobody else can, you malfunctioning cunt. You should be thankful. He ruins my relationships– Oh, yeah, that’s me alright. –and kills off my ambition– some accomplishment there. The hotel bathroom has a large mirror, and this doesn’t help the situation a bit. As I strip myself for my shower tonight, I see my reflection.


Fat
ugly
bitch.

What are those pimply things on your ass?

You really have your mother’s body.

Look at all that goddamned cellulite– you’re only nineteen. Happy fucking birthday.

How could Zack possibly love someone who looks like you?


It’s flourescent lighting. Nobody looks good in flourescent lighting.


True, but should we do a count to find out how many people look as bad as you do in it?



My laptop is running out of batteries. I hope I can find this mindset later.

Yeah, it’s been a blast.

Go to hell.




On with it.

All right, you jittery little housewives, it's time to give props to Leo Sternbach, a 95-year-old man Jewish man who fled to America during Hitler's reign, all in order to bring you what you need most in life: Valium.

Yes, it's valium's 40th birthday this year, a time for...relatively sedate celebration. In reverence of this event, I started doing some research about the miracle drug, but I got really tired about halfway through, and life's too beautiful to waste on research anyway, right? I love you. Let's sing!

Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday dear Valium
Honk-shoo, honk-shoo.

In a related story, it's the one-year anniversary of highly controversial gay marraige of Viagra and Benzocaine, a substance featured on many new condoms that helps to delay orgasm. In celebration, they're throwing a party for themselves, but since their homosexuality alienated them from so many of their friends and family members, they report that it will probably be a long, hard night, and they don't expect anyone to come.

On with it.

So, a man walks into a bar, and the bartender asks "What's wrong, buddy? You look like shit."
The man explains himself. "I'm a locksmith, and this woman I installed a new lock for accused me of exposing myself to her after the job was done, while we were sitting down for tea. She says she saw my penis sticking out the end of my shorts."
"Well," says the bartender, "Did you do it on purpose?"
"That's just it," Says the locksmith, "I didn't do it at all. I've got a incredibly tiny penis, there's no way I could have done it. But she's taking me to court."
The bartender poors the guy a whiskey and says, "Well, I guess she's gonna be a little short on evidence, eh?"


Don't get it? That's because it's not a joke. This is fucking really happening.


This is the true, current story of a Pennsylvania locksmith, Robert M. Peters, Sr., (who evidently has thighs fatty enough to have a roll capable of being mistaken for a semi-erect penis.) and a woman who has just recently split up from her husband (despite breasts that the locksmith allegedly described as being beautiful).

One has to wonder who the real victim here is-
A- The aging woman, who's breasts probably aren't as beautiful as they used to be, who's husband has left her because she, evidently, can't tell the difference between a roll of fat and a penis,
B- The grossly overweight Peters who may be able to unlock many things, but never the secret to a woman's sexual pleasure,
Or C- the Doctor who had to examine The grossly overweight Peter's peter in order to testify that it's only an inch long when flaccid, four inches when erect.

You be the jury.

My favorite line from the article:
[The Prosecuting attorney] told the jurors he would build a road to lead them to find Peters guilty of indecent exposure, but [The defense lawyer] disagreed.

"The road that [the prosecution] is trying to build for you will be missing by five inches," [The defense lawyer] said.

Classic. On with it.

This month, we celebrate the 20-year anniversary of Mainer Samantha Smith's goodwill mission to the Soviet Union to ease the tension of the cold war and help end the threat of nuclear bombings. Samantha, who was 11 at the time, went halfway across the world to speak to world leaders on behalf of the common man, woman and child, quite possibly saving us all from nuclear annihlation.

When I was 11 years old, my mother grounded me for a week for operating a toaster in my living room. Food for thought.

On with it.

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help?

To make the nice people happy. On with it.

This seems a day for quickie posts: In "Shallow Hal", a movie which frequents my twelve HBO's, there is a line wherein Gwenyth Paltrow's character, Rosemary, burns Jason Alexander's character, Mauricio (or something, I do not pretend to know how to spell it or to care enough to look it up) when he is rude to her upon their first meeting. She asks if he is wearing a member's only jacket, and when he affirms that he is, she says, "So, what are you, the last member?"

Hal laughs. Maurypovichio seems genuinely embarrassed. But I never understood why it was funny.

Today, this popped into my mind at work, and I decided that it was my mission for today to find out why- why is this funny?

It turns out, as far as I can ascertain from my research, is that the reason it is funny is because the coats which used to be incredibly stylish have fallen out of fashion, and are now only seen being warn by old men. I guess.

If you have any further information, please e-mail me at suedecaramel@dog.com.

On with it.

A fun fact about my work: We sell 28 different varieties of maine-themed shot glasses at the giftshop next to Burger King.

....yep. That's all I got. On with it.

"Who the hell was I when I liked who I was?"

I was bike riding today when that line, somewhere mixed into the context of my thoughts, popped into my head.

Zack had been expecting to entertain guests today, and I had spent the majority of the early afternoon with Emily, walking the beach of Reid State Park and making idle conversation. On the way home, I bought her a feast of McDonald's, then I went home and thought better of sitting the rest of my last day off of the weekend perched at the computer, so I went for a bike ride. Recently, I've been sticking to the areas around my house while bike riding, for fear that I would be more out of shape than I expected to be and be far away when I found myself exhausted. That kind of mentality, however, tends to take away from the point of bike-riding: When I was young, my mom wouldn't let me bike ride anywhere without someone being with me except for the streets that touched my house. And I did it like crazy, up and down Vining, up and down North. (It was North at the time, now called South, but, hey, things change.) When someone was riding with me, we'd almost indefinitely go to the paths behind wing street. I tend to think I was only supposed to go there when accompanied with someone's parents, or perhaps only in the day...some stipulation, anyway, but that only made it more exciting to be there. Amanda, she was my best friend at the time, she would always convince me to do things I wasn't supposed to, she was the only person in the world with whom I ever got into real trouble. In subsequent years, I would return the favor of her bad influence, and when she called me now and again from her new house in Topsham seeking advice, I'd prompt her to make the more exciting, if constantly wrong, decision.

With Amanda with me, the world was my playground. We biked in and around those paths, invigorated by the danger, the taboo, the way our bikes bucked over the sticks and mud. There was a place there-- a little bridge built for snowmobiles to get over this little ravine-- and it quickly became my favorite place to stop and talk or play Truth or Dare. I was always drawn to moving water, there seemed to be so much life in them, and I was easily pleased despite the tiny status of the stream that ran through it. And so, when I was rewarded, finally, with the allowance to ride at my will (within a reasonable distance) by myself, I spent a whole summer going there any time I wanted to sit alone, put my feet in the 8 inches of water, and lie back over the bridge, thinking and listening to the water and getting in touch with me.

As I was leaving the house, my mother reminded me to watch the heat as I was riding. My new bike has no place for a water bottle and it's easy to get dehydrated, so the warning was appropriate, but I blew it off, despite. "Sure, Mom, I'll watch the heat." When I got onto my bike, I turned up towards faith street, instead of down Vining where I normally make my commonplace rounts. I was going to the paths.

I went years without bike riding in between my pre-adolescents and now. A few rides or so a year, perhaps, but I never broke back in to the habit the way I did this year. A few years back, I remember, I one day got the urge to find my little bridge, my little stream, so I went off on a hot day like today. The paths start at a large sandpit that's visible from the road, and then the main one runs parallel to wing street and little ones branch off. That day, I started at the pit and went up the main path, unable to find the right turn-off that once was so unmistakable to me. Eventually, I took a guess and rode on in, then made a few wrong turns and ended up on something that only vaguely resembled a path. It was beginning to get dark, and even in my younger, more fearless days, I was afraid my mother's tendency to worry about me. She always gave me ample reason to, crying and getting hysterical if she didn't know exactly where I was for a half hour at a time. So, lost in the woods and years away from having any sense of where I was, I drudged out, hopelessly aiming for the road and almost hysterical myself.

That memory was fresh in my mind today, as I made what may well have been the exact same turn off into the woods. I, again, had no luck in finding the path that I was sure would take me to my bridge, so I, again, took my best guess. At points, the path was so diminutive I couldn't tell at all if it were a path, and at others, the rain had soaked so far into it that the four-wheeler tracks were almost two feet deep, making crossing on a bike impossible. The determination I had aimed at finding my bridge was quickly usurped by anxiety, and I felt sick and scared and helpless. I was listening to Tabitha's Secret, and "Dear Joan"-- a terribly depressing song-- was on. And about the time I was almost totally disoriented, I was deep in rememberance of how exhilirating I might have once found a situation like that-- there, in the forest, where I always wanted to be, going down new paths and seeing new things, a real adventure. How it might have felt to be alone and unafraid or with Amanda by side, the two of us unstoppable. I started wondering what ever happened to that fearlessness in me, that wanderlust, that part of me that remains now only in the form of everpresent my hatred of boredom. And somewhere in there I started examining how I wasn't confident of my ability to guide myself out of the situation, I wasn't confident in my sense of direction or my strength or my perseverance, I wasn't confident in anything about me, and I was afraid of everything inside and out, of the trees and the paths and my body and North street becoming South and, and, and...

And who the hell was I when I liked who I was?

At first, it struck me that it sounded like a great title for a self-help book. I thought about writing one, then I thought about reading one, and then I thought that I still didn't know where I was. But somewhere it kinda clicked. Now, it didn't click loud. It didn't click strong. It didn't click in such a way that most anyone would notice it really at all. But I think it clicked, and if I was imagining it, it didn't much matter: I wanted the fearlessness back.

It wasn't easy to listen to. I still wasn't exactly sure where I was, and I hadn't the slightest idea how to get where I was going. And I was thirsty, and the sweat was tickling my face and it felt like tears in my eyes...but it wasn't. It was just sweat. It wasn't at all easy to convince myself, but the situation wasn't that bad. The song had changed by then, it was more upbeat by now, and the CD wasn't that long, so I couldn't have been gone too long, and it really was kinda exciting. And so what if I couldn't ride up that hill, I could push the bike. And so what if I was breathing pretty heavy, I could have rested if I had wanted to. And I kept picturing horrible things happening to me, but they were all pretty unlikely.

And it grew. Now, it didn't grow fast. It didn't grow much. And it might shrink back the second I let it, and probably will if I do. But the "So what?" grew. So what if I can't have sex, I will be able to some day. So what if Zack thinks other women are pretty, he loves me more. So what if I work at Burger King, I'm on my way out. Oh, it was just barely there, and it wasn't easy to hear....but so what?

So I trudged on. I rode through the four-wheeler tracks, and I walked through those deep puddles that just swallow you up, and that felt good. And the sweat all over me felt okay, and I thought that I was probably losing weight, but so what if I wasn't? And I trudged on.

And I started thinking of Amanda, and she was kinda with me in a way. And I miss her, but things like that can be fixed. So what if she doesn't live across the North Street that is now South street any longer, I carried her along up the hill and down into the place where the trees were thicker and the forest was very dark. And I started thinking that I should write to her, or for her, I should let her know I was thinking about her. And so what if she didn't respond? Your god may be in the details, mine is in the process.

And don't you think I didn't lose the click, the fearlessness, the "so what"? The hills kept coming and I kept expecting at the top of them I would recognize something, and it didn't happen for a long time. Don't you think that it got any easier to hear it at all...but so what?

Eventually, I trudged out. I found myself on Route 9, somehow, and I went down wing street. There's a great big hill on wing street, and I found myself forgetting the fearlessness riding down it. Something about the forest had strengthened me, and now I was on the street again. But I rode on home, through Huston Park a little, and I saw Amanda's car parked outside her boyfriend's house. I thought about knocking on the door, but then thought better of it. I wanted some water, and more, I wanted time to make the effort perfect. But if it wasn't exactly perfect, so what?

So I rode my back to my house. My house was located on North street once, a long time ago, and now it's on South. But, hey, things change. Along time ago, Amanda lived just across it, and her and I were crusaders, and I miss it. I don't have exactly have an Amanda anymore- not and Amanda, or a Jenn, or a Casey or anybody, really, not like that. But I do have a lifetime of memories and decades to fill with more. A long time ago, my body seemed okay to me and I was fearless in life and in love....and that's not true anymore.

But maybe...not just maybe, it will be again. And until then, I'll just trudge on with it.