honey, please (don't) act your age

this weekend, on the bus to alpine for the dave show. . .

preface: there were many scantilly clad drunk girls present, making spectacles of themselves and creating dramatic situations with fellow bus go-ers . . .

at a particularly dramatic moment, i turned to bill and the following conversation ensued:

kel: "who do these girls think they are? and furthmore, who taught them it was okay to dress that way and act that way?"
bill: "well, they think that's the best way to get attention. and, you have to remember, a lot of people on the bus are just out of college, you know. 21, 22. they're just not quite mature enough yet to . . . "

bill apparently had a momentary lapse regarding my recent college graduation and my 3 and a half years younger than him age.

kel: "um, bill? have you forgotten who you're talking to?"
bill: (the pr junkie in him pauses to brainstorm some damage control): "see, that just shows that i think of you as the same age"
kel: "uh huh. . . stop talking"

i am, apparently, a (nearly) 26 year old trapped in a 22 year old's body. . .

xo,

kellieannie

laziness on your own terms

last night, the great city of chicago showed "annie hall" at Butler Field in Grant Park. karen and i attended.

there's an ampitheatre directly behind the field, and the city of chicago provides white plastic chair seating for this ampitheatre. as a direct result, many movie goers were dragging these ampitheatre chairs (joined in groups of three) closer to the movie viewing area. security didn't like this idea, and went around to all the white chair sitters asking them to move the chairs back to where they found them. . . they "weren't allowed to be moved." of course, a woman sitting behind karen and i would not comply.

and here, the recreation of my re-telling the situation to josh:

kel: chair sitter: "fine. but you're going to have to help me move them"
security guy: "well ma'am, you seem to have managed to move it over here by yourself"
chair sitter: "fine. i'll move them. . . when the movie is over"
security guy: "no, ma'am, i'm sorry, you're going to have to move now. people behind you can't see."
chair sitter: well, i'm just trying to have a nice relaxing evening and watch the movie"

josh: I don't get people like that

kel: security guy: "well, you can relax on the chairs back where you got them from"
chair sitter: "but i can't move them. . . they're too heavy. you'll have to help me"

kel (again, but this time only as kel): this exchange repetitiously went on for seriously 10-12 minutes . . . karen was like. . . "is she on something?"

josh: see, that'd be a funny blog
kel: i know . . . i'm writing it now
josh: ...lol

eventually, the woman left. leaving the chairs in the middle of the grass, unattended. interestingly enough, the security guy didn't come back to move the chairs either. . . i'm assuming it would have required too much effort for him to get out of his golf-cart like mobile.

some people. . .

*sigh*

xo,

kellieannie

No John Kerry = No Flip Flops

to: the northwestern women's lacrosse team
re: white house flip-flop incident
from: a concerned, well-educated, fashionable, chicago-area woman.

ladies,

i don't even know where to begin. but really, honestly, the question must be reiterated. . . why did you wear flip-flops and sandals to the white house?! why?! seriously, how could you?

keeping in mind that you attend one of the most reputable universities in the nation (near a fairly fashionable city!) makes this even more confusing to me. you are obviously intelligent women--how could this have happened? you look like you were about ready to attend a garden party or a barbeque. would you go to a job interview on michigan avenue wearing flip-flops and no pantyhose? no. no you certainly wouldn't. and if you did, you certainly would not be hearing back from the company in question. despite my disdain for conventional formalities, i still believe certain decorum and dress are required for specific occasions. i imagine a visit to the white house ought to be a few steps up from job interviews on the formality scale, but apparently someone forgot to drop this memo into your locker room. i would even have been reluctant to get so liberal as to wear a closed toe, sling-back pump.

i can recommend two books for further reading on the topic. please consult them next time. . . before you step out of your home wearing what you deem to be "acceptable" attire:

What Not to Wear by Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine
What Not to Wear For Every Occasion by Trinny Woodall and Susannah Constantine

while some reporters have been attempting to cut you some slack by claiming that the flip-flop is becomming more acceptable in certain situations. . . i believe they are just bullshitting you. or, being paid off by northwestern trustees and contributors in order to hide this media disaster.

i must say, there have been nights that i have looked classier in my bar attire.

xo,

kellieannie

latest outrage from the vatican: harry potter is subversive

even though i'm quite catholic, some things must be disagreed with.

we live in a day and age where children would much rather sit in front of the tv screen, watching tivo'd programs; the computer screen, chatting away for hours with their "buddies"; or the tv screen (again), playing mindless video games, than they would play outdoors like we did when we were kids (note the influx of obesity as you sit at starbucks sipping your latte). also note that when we were kids, mcdonalds was a special treat, not every night's dinner. granted, i'm not ancient, or even old by any stretch of the imagination. but the observation must still be made. even further out of this generation's reach is the desire to take on more antidiluvian pastimes: reading, collecting baseball cards, playing dress up (or g.i. joes), coloring, etc. catching a child reading an actual book, setting foot into a bookstore, or (help us) a library, have become almost obsolete occurences.

the even bigger problem lies not in the physical inactivity of today's kids, but inactivity of a less obvious arena: the brain. suffice it to say, imagination is dead. and, if it has not quite kicked the bucket yet, then it certainly is about to. though the insurgence of popular electronics, i'm sure, won't slow the obliteration of any comeback it may be planning an attempt to make. i wonder how long it will be before we can listen to books on our iPods (note that i will always prefer the bound variety. . . and do not yet [or intend to] own any macintosh associated device).

the church, while once claiming the harry potter books were marginally appropriate to help children distinguish between good and evil, now practically strikes them down as the anti-christ. please, Pope Benedict, kids today already know about the difference between good and evil. certainly if they are old enough to pick up an 800 page book, then they are old enough to have understood what happened in america in 2001 on september 11th. they are also old enough to understand that family friends and possibly older siblings are leaving to fight in a war across the world, and why. they are also probably old enough to understand, if their parents clue them in to world affairs at all (which, now that i think about it, considering the level of involvement parents have in their childrens' lives these days, this possibility is slim), that the people of London are pissed off because they, too, were attacked by, in the words of our president, faceless cowards. they have already had too harsh of a realization about what is good and what is evil in the world.

these "kids" are too old already; their minds and bodies will be defunct before they reach the age of 25. too often, we tell them how things are, leaving them no time to consider or ponder how things ought to be, or could be.

obviously, Pope Benedict is overlooking the fact that these books are getting children to read. while illiteracy rates continue to climb, while children continue to be "diagnosed" with behavioral disorders they don't have, while test scores continue to suck in the nation's largest cities, while thousands upon thousands of volunteers are looked to for help in boosting the literacy rates, isn't it slightly refreshing to know that, at midnight tonight, kids all over the country will be in line at their local borders or barnes and noble for a copy of a book? If kids are waiting for a book to be released at midnight on a non-school night, i think it's pretty obvious where they stand on the whole good vs. evil continuum. and, while these "subversive harry potter books" aren't restoring any kind of physical activity, they are restoring their imaginations, and giving them perhaps a glimmer of hope that, even though the "real" world seems to be chasing down evil to no avail, good can triumph in the end. at least it's a step in the right direction, and i can't see anything wrong with that.

xo,

kellieannie

oh amazon, you're such a tease . . .

dear amazon.com,

i've widely regarded you as my pre-in-store shopping go-to for many years, and now you slap me in the face with disappointment.

i cannot believe you placed My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands on your Breakout Books for the Summer of 2005 list.

shame on you.

make no mistake, i have no moral qualms regarding the topic of the "novel," or, shall we call it a "collection"? i have certainly been known to knock down marginally trashy chic lit novels until i'm blue in the face. this english major needs a break from salinger and fitzgerald from time to time, too. (and, i'm sure, some might argue that those authors have their trashy moments as well. hell, salinger is "verboten" in many school districts (but we'll get to censorship and book banning another day)).

while Ms. Handler was able to evoke a few chuckles from my general direction, these aforementioned chuckles were typically directed at her lack of style and command of the english language. please, Bloomsbury Publishers, what were you thinking? i could write a more creative sentence at the age of 15. okay, maybe 16. yes, these trysts are funny. but can you imagine how many more books you would have sold if these funny stories were told well?

my point is now, and always has been, this: quality. it doesn't matter how good your story is, or how interesting the idea is if you can't tell it well. i, like most readers, found the notion of a collection of one-night stands to be entertaining. in this day and age, who wouldn't? but Ms. Handler fails miserably in her re-telling of these sexual encounters; a poor attempt at super-imposing the brilliance of Candace Bushnell on her own life.

i beg all of you to take into consideration the difference between "entertaining" and "good writing." for example, i will call on The DaVinci Code since most of the western world has read it, as long as they haven't been hiding in a literary dark cave for the past two years. the story, yes, is incredibly entertaining. reading level: probably about 5th grade. writing: poor. Handler falls into the same bunch. no, i'm not asking for Joyce or Shakespeare quality, but come on people. . . where are your standards?

of even greater disappointment is Jennifer Weiner's comment on the book's cover. come on Jennifer, you're a decent author, why are you endorsing this crap? no surprise that Jay Leno likes it, though.

and the ending? oh the ending. almost as bad as ending a story with:
". . . and i woke up and it was all a dream." i think that's how i ended a project i was working on in 6th grade.

Ms. Handler, i can only hope you are a better stand-up comedian than a writer. either way, i won't be rushing to read your second book (if Bloomsbury decides to disgrace the literary scene with another), nor will i patronize a show with your name on the marquee.

*sigh*

nick hornby, i'm on to you next. but, at least i'm going into it with the knowledge that the man can craft a thoughtful sentence.

as for you, amazon.com. . . i just. . . i'm so disappointed.

xo,

kellieannie

petunias, and fireworks, and tire blowouts. . . oh my!

this weekend, i was invited to dixon, il for fourth of july festivities and the petunia festival.

incidentally, i was also meeting bill's parents and one of his sisters for the first time.

because i was invited to the cubs game earlier in the day, i got a late start on the road to dixon. bill was expecting me around 10, and told me to call when i got off at the dixon exit.

around 10:15, i was about 3 miles outside of dixon (because i am always generally at least 15 minutes late for everything), and i started to hear an odd driver side thudding. naturally, my first inclination was that my music was too loud and i was rocking out too hard. but the thudding persisted. i turned the music lower, and rolled down the window. the thudding got louder, and driving started to become not so easy.

luckily, whilst driving west down i-88 circa 10 pm, there is minimal traffic, and i easily managed to pull over to the side of the road. once i finally pulled the car to a stop, small billows of smoke came from what was left of my front driver side tire.

oops.

first i called bill: "uhh. . . well, i've got a flat tire. i'm at mile 60. i don't know if there's a spare back there. . . it might be awhile."

then i called my parents:
"mom. . . my tire blew out on my way to dixon. i don't know if there's a spare one in back."
mom is, at first, worried about my well being, but secondly she is laughing at me because she can't believe i'm convinced her one year old toyota camry is without a spare tire.
"kellie," she says, "of course there's a spare tire in the back. all new cars come with spare tires. you know how banana shirts all come with extra buttons and thread? all cars come with spare tires."
"oh. . . "

meanwhile, bill and his dad are en route to my rescue somewhere around mile 60 on i-88, and i'm completely mortified at the fact that the first time i have to meet bill's dad is on the side of the highway, even though there's nothing i could have done to keep my tire from exploding.

for the rest of the weekend i am introduced as bill's girlfriend, and everyone consistently responds with, "oh, the girl who's tire blew out on the way into town" (or variations thereof).

for some reason i had my first trip to dixon pictured differently in my head. . .

xo,


kellieannie

p.s. i'm now back home safe in suburbia, without any subsequent tire blowouts.