Riverside, Mother F....

Where I grew up, just about the worst place in the world a person could say they were from was Riverside. The only thing as bad as being from Riverside, was being from Fallbrook, and that was just San Diego's version of Riverside.

Riverside was everything us kids from near the coast thought was wrong with the world (Have you seen the SNL skits where Gov. David Patterson always talks about "New Jersey!"? It's like that): they drove lifted trucks with big, shiny rims. They went to "The River" (aka Lake Havasu) on Spring Break to get drunk. Their chicks wore thong bikinis and had long, fake nails. They hung out in the desert and dirt biked. My friends and I were more about driving whatever our parents let us, going to our local beach for Spring Break, wearing bathing suits that were at least semi-functional while we surfed, and getting a manicure or pedicure a few times a year for school dances.

Typical person you'd see walking around Riverside or Fallbrook

We hated when people from Riverside (aka the 909) decided to come to the beach. You could always tell who they were because they had a Famous Stars and Straps hat on sideways or Famous boardshorts and sometimes they wore socks and sandals. They'd also bring a surfboard or bodyboard that someone in their extended, redneck family had and try and go for a surf. I'm not in to localism or anything (surfer mentality of- this is my home break, no one else can catch a wave here unless I know them and say they can), but I am all for respecting the rules of surfing, such as not snaking (stealing) a wave from someone who is already on it. Not being a part of the culture, most of these guys didn't seem to get the rules so we mostly had this mentality (though we didn't vocalize it-well, at least not to them):

So, how come I'm talking about a group of lame people from an area I haven't lived in for 6 years (as of today, it's my moving to Australia anniversary and also the anniversary of MOTH Dude and I meeting! This time 6 years ago I was pounding shots with Bun, hoping to get up the nerve to meet him! eeeeeee!)? Well, see, this is how my train of thought has gone...Today, I had to listen to a recording of one of my calls in the call centre with my manager and we talked about what a direct person I am and that I have a certain way with words (and then she suggested, really nicely, I promise, no sarcasm) that maybe this wasn't the right line of work for me (anyway, a story for another day perhaps? and are all of these asides in parenthesis starting to make you mad? sorry!). So then I got to thinking about a certain incident that went down at one of my sister's water polo tournaments during a game against none other than the University of Riverside. So then I got to thinking about Riverside, in general, and thus, this rambling post.

So the incident at the Water Polo Tournament...

I'm sitting in the stands with my Mom at one of my sister's many tournaments; I often went to Nae's games throughout high school and then as often as I could when she became a Banana Slug for UC Santa Cruz. The game between UCSC and UCR is on in the water and the Riverside girls are playing really, really roughly. They're winning, but they are playing really dirty and you can see the Santa Cruz girls getting dunked and punched and overpowered by these beasts from (have I mentioned this yet?) Riverside. There are people behind me who are UCR supporters and they are starting to talk crap about UCSC and I'm listening and listening and listening and finally I turn to my Mom and say as loudly as possible, without actually yelling it at her, that, "At least the one thing the UCSC team has going for them is that they don't have to live in a hole of a place like Riverside. Isn't it awesome that we don't have to visit Nae in a place as crappy as Riverside? God, Riverside is shit!" And my Mom is looking at me at first like, "Why are you saying this to me right now?" and then as the Riverside supporters start commenting back she gives me the death stare that says, "Please kid, shut your mouth before we get rolled by this riff raff from Riverside" (well maybe it was more just the "Please, shut your mouth" part. My memory is a little fuzzy,but I'm sure my Mom hates Riverside, too. Right, Mom?). I ended up getting the UCR supporters so riled up that my Mom made us get up and walk to the other side of the pool during the game so that the war of words would not turn in to a full on brawl. In the end, I think UCSC ended up getting their asses handed to them by UCR but I know Nae appreciated that I had stuck up for her and the girls and that I had put those Riverside people back in their places.

And I'm assuming after reading this, you'll all hate me (unless you're from Orange County) and think of me as the entitled and spoiled brat from the OC and I guess, in a way, you'd be right. But let's bring this back full circle and I'll finish by saying that part of the reason for staying in Australia 6 years rather than the 4 months I had planned to, other than MOTH Dude, is that coming here was a reality check. I have friends here now that dirt bike and think lifted trucks are rad (though none of their chicks wear thong bikinis, thank God) and would have fun at "The River" and that doesn't make them bad or wrong or whitetrash. They're just different. So I went away a little princess from the OC and I think I've hopefully matured in to a (not so) young lady who is more accepting of others.

Oh man, did I take that full circle stuff too far? Are you throwing up in your mouth a little bit after those last few cheesy sentiments? Well, I'll just leave you with this then: I still think, 6 years on, "Thank God I don't live in a hell hole like Riverside!"

The Sound of Animals Fighting

Have you guys been watching that new show, based on the 1980s movie, Parenthood? It's been on twice now and I love it.

The episode last night had me rolling from the first 5 minutes because in it the main character, Adam, hears a noise as he is laying in bed and jumps up in his underwear to fight this possum. I swear, this has been my life for the last two weeks! I'll be laying in bed reading when all of a sudden I'll hear the trash can lids thunk. So I race upstairs in my underwear or pajamas with a jacket quickly thrown over them, grab a flashlight and some rotting lemons that we always have in our fruit bowl, and head out on to our balcony where I then begin my assault on the raccoons that are scrounging in our or our neighbor's trash cans. They aren't even phased by the light or me making hissing noises at them and they really only leave when the lemons get super close to them. I realize that I am/probably look like a crazy person doing this, but I guess that's why it's a good thing we live in a fairly remote spot-there isn't too much traffic driving by at night to see my outside in all my glory fighting the raccoons!

If you haven't checked out Parenthood, I'd recommend it. It's got the mom from the Gilmore Girls (this would be a reason Boyfriend would be hesitant to watch it so if you don't like GG, disregard the fact that she's on the show) and Peter Krause who was on Six Feet Under and a ton of other people that you have seen on other shows. It's set in Berkeley and is all about this big family's dynamics. It's like Brothers and Sisters with a lot less gushy stuff. It's a good show for guys and girls both, I think.

Have You Ever Had Trouble With Your Automobile

Hello from Oregon! Well...almost. See, we made it to Fort Bragg yesterday afternoon and had a fun afternoon running around in the rain and then a nice dinner at a Japanese food place. We got up to a beautiful view from our room- over a little river and out to the ocean. We had fun on our drive today. We saw starfish, some squirrels, some amazing rivers, and a ton of elk. We were on the home stretch in to Oregon when we decided to pull off the road to check out this beautiful river whose water was almost an emerald color (this was 20 miles from the Oregon border). We got the pictures and got back in the car and I backed the car up and we heard some terrible scraping sounds coming from under the car. We pulled out and back on the the road and I was not happy about the sound, but Boyfriend said "Squeeze my hand, we got out of that fine" It was about then that my oil light came on and started beeping at me. We immediately pulled over and sure enough, oil was steadily gushing from under the car. We were able to a flag down a girl right away who took me in to the closest little town and after an hour and a half, the tow tuck I called finally arrived. We went back out to find the car and poor Boyfriend who had been in the pitch black for over an hour. The tow truck driver dropped us at the repair shop and Mom said there were a couple hotels around that we could stay at...a Hampton Inn which was about a mile away and $99 or a place called the Front St Inn for $55. I said book us the Hampton Inn since I had heard of that one, but not the $55 a night one? It has free Wifi and is on the beach, just like the Hampton Inn. I said "Does it look clean? Do you think it's alright?" because I was wary of anything that cost $55 for the night. She said, "Oh yeah, it says it's got clean rooms and it has gotten good reviews online." So we loaded up with all the stuff from the car we could carry and had a fairly short walk down to the Inn. It looked pretty rundown as we approach, but the front desk guy seemed nice and the office area was clean and smelled good. We got to our room and it was underwhelming. Or overwhelming, but overwhelmingly bad. At least it seems fairly clean. We were less than impressed though when we came out of our room and saw a bunch of sketchy people hanging out on the balcony upstairs and when our door lock didn't work really well. We half expected we would come back from dinner to find all of our stuff in the room gone. Anyway, I guess it'll do for the night and we've got our fingers crossed that they can fix our car tomorrow. Our guess is that it is a busted oil pan (I think that's what it's called), but we may run in to a problem as we are driving a VW Beetle and they may not have one that will work with the car. The nearest VW dealership is a 2 hour drive away so we're in trouble if they have to get the part from there! Keep your fingers crossed for us. I'll update you all tomorrow with what's going on and I'll hopefully post some pictures of what we've seen so far.

Are You Down with the Clown?

So I have this morbid fascination with followers of the band Insane Clown Posse (aka ICP) who call themselves Juggalos/Juggalettes. These people are, without fail, white trash and stupid, but they make for some very funny posts over at one of my favorite sites: ohnotheydidn't! Here are some pictures that will hopefully pique your interest enough that you head on over to this site to become as fascinated by these people as I am:

Images via TinyPic and Google

Here's a glimpse at what ICP fans (Juggalos and Juggalettes) look and sound like in action. These people are all talking about their love for each other at the "Gathering" they hold in the woods somewhere for a weekend each year...I especially like the part toward the end where someone in the crowd hands the guy a pipe and how the girl in the wrap totally has meth face and how clean the first chick in the purple pants looks!

And just to finish it all off, this guy in the YouTube video below makes me laugh and

he's gotten a bunch of responses from irate ICP fans.

Peter, Peter, Possum Eater

Listen, I know that's not exactly how the song/poem goes, but there aren't a lot of songs about possums out there and I try and name every post after a song...also this post is about a possum, he's a boy and I named him Peter, and I fed him good stuff to eat so it kinda makes sense to call it that.Every time we rolled our garage door up or down for the past few weeks we've been hearing lots of bumps and bangs inside of it. We had no clue what it was and were freaked out every time we walked in to the garage that a rat or snake or something was going to fall down on us.

Last night I went to sleep with the sound of the possums outside our window growling at each other and it was a scary noise, like someone coughing/a motorbike starting up, and this afternoon when Boyfriend got home from an overnight Sydney trip, this is what he came home to as he pulled the car in to the garage:

He ran inside to get me and all I could see when I came out was its long, hairy, black tail hanging out from under the garage door. I didn't know if there was a possum attached to the tail or if the possum was alive or dead. Luckily, he was alive (trust me, I got a glimpse, and it is a he) so I immediately wanted to make it my pet and decided to give it my leftover PopTart. Little guy went nuts for it!

I also put an orange up near him and I was nervous to be so close to him and while he gave the orange a good sniff and seemed interested in it, he still hasn't touched it. For some reason his nose and eyes and his sweet little face remind me of a pig...anyone else seeing that?

He really loved the banana I gave him after the orange and he tried to grab it with his gross claws, which freaked me out again. He ate nearly half of a huge banana that Boyfriend had just bought for my breakfast tomorrow. It was so neat to watch him up close and his nose kept running with excitement (/rabies?).

We just went out to see if we could put the roller door down (it's been about 2 hours since Boyfriend discovered him) and he was still sitting on top of it so we rolled it really slowly and you should've seen him go- it was like watching a lumberjack in a log-rolling competition, too cute!

Anyway, you guys just wait and see, four weeks from today is when I leave to go home to CA and I bet before then I'll have the little guy sitting on my shoulder like a parrot and eating out of my hand! (Ok, before my Mom or anyone else freaks out, I'm joking....well....mostly I'm joking)

Been Caught Stealing

On Friday, LC and I went to the shops (aka the Mall) with baby Lo to look for some dresses for me to wear to a friend's upcoming wedding. I found one dress that I kindof liked until I looked at the price....$70 for a little cotton blend summer dress and $50 for a knitted short sleeved cardigan...The outfit was cute, but not $120 cute! It looked like the whole thing might cost you $40-50 at Old Navy. And the sizes...I felt like a beast. I know I've gotten chubby, but I can fit in to "normal" people clothes back home (and don't give me some B.S. about Australians are skinnier/healthier/smaller whatever, my Australian readers, because just last year you guys were the fattest country in the world) and here, not so much. Also, the stores seem to make bigger sizes bigger everywhere but in the chests...bigger girls typically come with bigger boobs, but they just aren't understanding that concept here! So I'd have things that looked cute otherwise and then not fit over my boobs.

There are also about three styles of dresses right now in Australia and I am not a fan of/cannot pull off any of them: maxi dress (my legs are too stubby to look right in these), dresses that look like a wife beater on top with a stretchy belt area around the middle and short flared skirt bottom (accentuates the boobage and not dressy looking enough on me for a wedding), and strapless dresses (which my Mom has always said chubby girls and girls with big boobs should not wear strapless dresses and I agree with her, at least for on me). Even the fat girl store only offered these 3 styles of dresses. I'm all for giving chubsters some cute options and some styles do look good on people of all sizes but how about some flattering and stylish big girl dresses, too? A cute wrap dress would be great or something that had short sleeves and hit at the knee or something. The shopping excursion totally left me hating myself and was so unmotivating for the healthy eating/walking program I've been trying to stick to for the last month.

Now to the stealing referenced in the title of this posting: So we had been walking around the shops for awhile looking for dresses for me and LC needed some accessories to go with her wedding outfit. The store she wanted to hit up was tiny, like the size of a small bedroom, and was already jam packed with people and 2 shopping carts so she asked if I would stay out with Lo and the stroller while she went in. I said sure, then noticed that we were near one store where sometimes I find things I actually like/would actually buy so I told her I was going to wheel me and Lo over there to have a look and sure enough, I found something to try on (the $120 outfit I mentioned above, I just didn't look at prices before I decided to try it on). As I'm making my way toward the dressing room the shop girl goes "Oh what a cute baby, how old is she?" And I go "Uhhhh, I dunno, like 8 weeks or something?" (She's 11 weeks, oops!) And the shop girl gives me a funny look and I tell her "Oh, this isn't my baby, it's my friend's and she's in another store so she's probably going to think I stole her baby if I go try this stuff on." So the girl says, "I'll keep an eye out for her and let her know where you are" (Keep in mind this store is about the size of a master bedroom in the U.S., too. All stores are small here, no wonder I go to 20 and still walk away with nothing!) So I wheel Lo in to the dressing room and try my stuff on and wait and wait for LC to come so I can show her the one outfit that actually fits and looks kinda cute. At one point, I go to where the dressing rooms lead out in to the store because I think I hear her voice but it's not her and I figure she must be enjoying her little bit of shopping time without having to deal with a baby and a stroller. Finally, I give up and take the outfit off and gasp at the ridiculous price and go out to put it back on the shelf and to find LC. I spot her outside the store and wave to her and notice she looks a bit upset. She comes in and starts crying and says, "I thought someone stole Lo. I couldn't find you guys and thought she had been stolen!" And the shop girl is standing next to me and goes, "Oh no, she's crying" and I say "See, I told you she was going to think I had stolen her baby!" LC says, "I didn't think you stole her, but I thought when I couldn't find you in here, maybe you had turned to look at something and someone had stolen her from you and you had run away because you didn't want to tell me you had lost my baby." I say, "Thanks for the vote of confidence, friend!" And that got her laughing and feeling a bit better, but I felt pretty bad that I had made her so stressed and scared. Needless to say, I don't think LC is quite ready to leave Lo with me anytime soon!

You Oughta Know

I'm a little worried posting this...you might read it and never come back! I guess it's a risk I'm willing to take because I thought it was fun and funny to write and hey, you guys deserve to know all about the big dork I really am! So here it goes:

10 Things You Didn't Know About Little D (aka 10 Things You Didn't Want/Need to Know About Little D)

1)I hate flying. It's two months out from my trip home and I'm already thinking about the flight and dreading it. When I book flights I think to myself "Am I sealing my fate? Did I just pick the one flight that week that is going to go down? Should I rebook? But then what if that's the one that goes down?" I used to be prescribed Xanax for flying because I get that nervous. I'd still take it, but I don't have anyone to prescribe it to me anymore. Weird habit for someone who chooses to live thousands of miles away from their family, thus ensuring at least two 14 hour flights home a year, right?

2) I freak out in crowds. I hate people touching me, being too close to me, blocking my way when i've got things to do...whether it's picking out movies or grocery shopping, I panic or get really pissed off and it's a toss up on any given day which it'll be between panicked or pissy. This amuses Boyfriend to no end and he sometimes laughs about how frustrated I get and other times he's really nice and can foresee when the crowds are going to get to me and gets me out of the situation as quickly as possible.

3) I became a vegetarian for a few years starting at age 11 because Jonathon Taylor Thomas did an interview in Teen Beat or some magazine like that where he said he'd only ever date a fellow vegetarian. I didn't know when or where I'd meet JTT but I wanted to have at least that one thing going for me if we ever did meet and he suddenly wanted to date me!

4) I used to have OCD (self diagnosed, but whatever, minor detail) as a child, probably around the age of 10-11 and everything I had to do had to be even....if I ate a bite of food and chewed it on my left side, well then my right side and in the middle had to have a bite chewed there as well. I had to eat an even number of chips or crackers or whatever, I had to flip a switch 2 times or 4 times, but never 1 or 3 times....I wanted things to be fair and I didn't want to hurt these inanimate objects' feelings....One day I finally realized that my little ticks were taking over and decided to try and stop them. I still catch myself from time to time moving different bites of food across my mouth so that things are fair and even, but for the most part I was able to unteach myself my OCD habits. The one thing that I still do(and it's funny given my love of all things being even, I think it has something with me wanting life to be fair and my Mom telling me constantly when I was little that "Life's not fair.") is that I have to wake up on an odd numbered time...the number has to end in a 1, 3, 7, or 9....I even leave out the 5 because it's half way through 0-9. It's the one habit that I just can't shake.

5) The first big concert I ever went to was the Rolling Stones with my Mom, Dad, and Nae when we were probably around 12 years old. It was at Dodger's Stadium and we had seats on the field pretty close to the stage and I thought the whole thing was so neat, but me and Nae kept complaining about the "funny smelling smoke" all around us!

6)For my 18th birthday I asked my parents for Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young tickets and that's what we did...Me, Mom, Dad, Nae and Nae's boyfriend at the time went and rocked out and it was really special. I went through a classic rock phase (I still love it, just don't have it on repeat like I did then). I also used the song "Teach Your Children Well" as the song on my Senior page in the yearbook. (I've also seen Fleetwood Mac, Eric Clapton, Neil Young on his own, Paul McCartney, and James Taylor over the years and about 100 other bands that aren't classic rock.)

7) I was on the yearbook staff my Senior year and it was really fun and I got to meet some good people and use 6th period as a time to just hang out, though I probably should've worked harder and actually met some deadlines.

8) The only school dance I ever really had fun at was at Senior Prom and that's because I went with my whole group of friends finally and my date was a really good friend, the Captain of the High School Football Team. I was really late to our meeting spot and he was really frustrated as I was holding up the whole group, but when he saw me he said the best thing ever, that "he couldn't be mad at me anymore because I looked so good." Swoon! We had a great time: he said something silly to me as our photo was being taken so I love our picture together because I've got the biggest smile on my face, we danced a slow song together but weren't together together so I was free to mingle with everyone and take pictures with a bunch of friends and not be glued to his side the whole night or expected to dance with only him, and at the end of the night since we weren't having prom night sex he serenaded me with this reggae song that I always used to love how he sang and then we partied it up and spent the night together (but once again, not together together) at one of our friends' houses with the whole group.

9) I have the biggest mouth in the world and am awful at keeping secrets, though I really am working on it this year and so far I have 3 secrets from various people that I've managed fairly well to keep secret. Boyfriend and Nae both laugh over my big mouth and commiserate with each other about how their embarrassing moments are never kept private. Oh, and I really talk how I write; there are constant asides that I go off on (just like in these parenthesis) and I'm sure it's hard for the average listener to follow along with, but I get so excited and sidetracked and caught up in details. Though I am a fairly concise speaker when I need to be, like in front of the class because I wouldn't want to confuse the kids. I also talk a lot and it drives Boyfriend and my family crazy. They pretty much think "Do you ever draw breath?" but I can't help it. I've got a lot to say and limited time with my family so I gotta get a year's worth of talking out in 3 months and I can't help it if I get a sudden burst of energy or thing of something really awesome when Boyfriend and I get in to bed at night and just have to tell him before I can fall asleep! Sometimes I like to sit back and just listen, too, to everything that is going on around me.

10) I have a blankie. It's not one that I've had since I was born; my Mom got it for me the first Christmas after I moved to Australia. It's sky blue and has snowflakes and penguins on it (I love penguins...we call them pengoos, Boyfriend and I, is that lame in general? Is it lame couple's talk? Probably on both counts but at least we don't call EACH OTHER Pengoo or Snuggle Butt or whatever, right?). It's a little throw blanket and it's down. It's the best blanket to have on the plane cause it just covers me and means I don't have to use the icky airplane blankets (I've heard stories and you really don't want to use airplane blankets). It's also warm in winter and cool in summer and a great blanket to lay on the couch with. It's a security thing because it reminds me of my Mom and home and being loved and wrapped up in a big hug, but I'm not Linus from the Peanuts...I don't take it to work with me or school with me or hide it in my purse or drag it behind me at the shopping center, but it is nice to come home and throw it over me at the end of a long day or to throw over my shoulders at night in bed for just a little bit of extra warmth.

Ummmm, ok, so are you ever coming back again now that you know the dark, dark secrets of my soul? Do you think I'm a freak? Oh well, if you're reading my stuff, you'd might as well know the real me and not just some bright and shiny version. So in summary, I, Little D, am a bad flyer, angry in crowds, a vegetarian to get boys, a reformed OCDer, a concert/classic rock nerd, as well as a yearbook geek (though actually really cool/popular girls from my class were on yearbook), a hater of all school dances in memory minus Senior Prom, a big mouth who can't keep a secret and who talks until her face turns blue, and I'm Linus lite. Stick around if you dare. If not, I understand and it's been nice knowing you! Hah!

But really, things might start to get a bit more interesting around here over the next couple of months because we've got another Ikea trip planned for next weekend(really, this is exciting/interesting to me...we don't have a lot of fun stuff on the Coast, can you tell?) plus a wedding in Terrigal with the whole group, and I've just booked my trip home for the end of October and will actually be celebrating my first Halloween in 5 years! (I told Boyfriend today that we have to raise our kids, should there be any, in America because, really, it's cruel for kids to miss out on Halloween. It's not very big here, no costumes or trick-or-treating...how depressing and that means I won't have any kids' Halloween candy to raid some day!) In the meantime, Boyfriend and I have to decide whether or not we are keeping our little house to rent for the next year or whatever and if not, where we will store all of our stuff until I come back and we find a new place together. There will probably also be a recap of another tearful goodbye between Boyfriend and I, as well as a post to all of you in case I die on my flight home (remember Confession #1?) and then a recap of the crazy people I was forced to sit next to on my flight to San Francisco. Then the process of finding a job and hopefully working lots of hours until Christmas and then Boyfriend coming to California and all of our adventures there this year. There will probably be an influx of posts about me suddenly wondering why I miss my family so much while I'm in Australia because they drive me nuts when I'm home (Mom and Dad and Nae actually had this conversation when they were out to dinner the other night..."I will love being home for a week and then I will hate everyone" haha). I'll also probably have lots of pictures and recipes to share soon because I cook a lot for my parents when I go back home (mostly because they are pretty bad cooks, sorry Mom and Dad but you know it's true, Nae would agree) and Nae is a pretty awesome chef and baker, as well, so I'll share her awesome Thanksgiving and pie and lemon bar and cookie recipes. So keep checking back in and if these posts aren't exciting enough for you guys, then remember you can email me or leave me a comment on what you would like to see me write about instead.

Comfortably Numb

I've been writing about babies, movies, recipes, and TV shows lately because there aren't a lot of adventures going on at the moment in my life so bare with me. I hope it gets exciting, in a positive way(do not want or need drama, so please karma/fate/God/whatever, don't thinkI'm asking for that at all), sometime soon because A) I'm bored out of my fucking mind at the moment and B) Then I might have something of interest to write about again.

Anyway, until then here's another recommendation for a TV show: Nurse Jackie. Have you guys been watching it? I downloaded the first episode on Tuesday on a whim and the next night downloaded the next 7 episodes because I had liked the first one so well. To me it seems like real life in a hospital; it's not pretty, it's gritty. They've made Edie Falco look so rough and manly, it's hard for me to imagine her as Carmela Soprano like this (which is probably a good thing and probably what they are going for). It's like House in that the lead character works in a hospital and is addicted to pain pills, but there's none of the misdiagnosis then good diagnosis cycle that has become a bit tedious on House. It's people coming in and living or dying from stab wounds, falling off of skateboards, heart failure, etc. Nurse Jackie also cares about her patients way more than Dr. House ever has. If you do end up watching it, which I highly recommend that you do(This is how good it is: Boyfriend was in the other room working today and listening to me yelling at the laptop "No, no, no" and laughing so he had to pop his head in to see what was going on. I can't help it, I am so sucked in!) look out for Jackie's nurse-in-training, Zoey. Her awkwardness in new situations is me spot on. I'm cuter and can be a bitch and I'm not that way 24/7 so I'd like to think I'm not AS annoying as the other characters seem to find her at first, but just thought I should tell you all that that's what I'm really like. I'm only cool on the internet ;D I mean I even get that awkward around Boyfriend and the people in our group sometimes and I know them well...My name is Lil D and I am a social retard! So yeah, check out Nurse Jackie if you get a chance, it's way better than anything we are getting on Aussie TV at the moment!

Let's Talk About Sex, Baby

Have you guys ever watched this show? The acting is horrible, the story line is horrible, the messages it portrays are horrible...but I can't stop watching this train wreck! Basically, the story goes that the chick in the picture has sex one time (at band camp, no less) and gets knocked up. She's, also, only 15. She decides to keep the baby and along the way gets married to some dorky boy (still at age 15) from her class who she's dated for all of about 3 weeks. I guess on the season finale, she had the baby.

I was out of the loop, having only seen this show once at Nae's house with her, Boyfriend, and the Camp Counselor, and then a few more times at Mom and Dad's with Nae. I saw that the show was coming back last week and decided to start watching it again. On the first episode of the season some ultra-Christian girl decides to lose her V-card to her college boyfriend. She tells her parents of her plans and they are unhappy. She isn't on speaking terms with her Dad in the episode because of her sex plans and she doesn't speak to him before he's off on a week long business trip. She ends up having sex that night and of course her Dad's plane ends up crashing and he is killed without her speaking to him. Her Mom comes home crying and the girl says, "Don't worry Mom, I just had sex." And then her brother with Down Syndrome yells at her that she's killed their father by having sex.

Ummmmm, awesome! Hahaha, so basically the message of this whole entire tv show is anytime you have premarital sex you are going to F* up your life in a big way....you're either going to get pregnant or kill your Dad. How did her having sex bring that plane down I wonder? I had to stop watching the second episode of the season to post this because they are still going on about how she killed her Dad by having sex. And now they are also blaming her friend who is sexually active for making "sex look like fun so Grace would want to do it, too." Really, Secret Life, really?!? This show makes my blood boil because of it's stupidity and the messages it sends to teenagers and yet I still can't stop watching it. Yes, I think you should be in a committed relationship and use birth control before you start having sex, but everytime you do "it" someone's not going to die and you wouldn't get knocked up if you had proper education about birth control. As an adult, I can laugh about this dumb show and the hysteria it perpuates about teen sex, but if I was watching this as a teenager, I'd be really scared about having sex (even more scared than I already was from my Catholic religious education on sex) and I guess that's their goal?

But hey, here's an idea....more education, less hysteria!!! Abstinence Only Education is not working and has not worked. Let's empower kids with knowledge. Kids are horny, they are going to have sex for the most part anyway, so let's give them the education where they know how to do it safely and so that they know where to get help and what kind of help is available to them if they do get in to trouble along the way.

I've got my fingers crossed (but won't hold my breath) that one of the adults on the show finds some sense and tells this chick that having sex does not bring down planes. How would the mile high club exist if it did?

You Could Try and Be Way Off

Have you guys ever played this game? We went over to the Soccer Player and the Hairdresser's house last Saturday night and along with playing Pictionary (yay!) we were up til 3:30 in the morning singing along to this game.

I was shy at first and didn't want to have a try...you'd never find me in a karaoke bar to save my life unless I was smashed and I wasn't drinking on Saturday night. I hate looking like an idiot, even in good fun and even just around good friends (party pooper, I know I know) so I really, really didn't want to participate. And I didn't for awhile, especially when the disc we had on could've been called "Aussie Anthems" and I didn't know half the songs they were singing to.

I laughed as the Teacher, Croc, the Soccer Player, and the Hairdresser battled it out for glory. Then Boyfriend jumped in and surprised me with his high scores. After listening to Croc and the Soccer Player mangle "No Woman, No Cry" I knew I could do better. Just as the Teacher and Croc decided to leave, I hopped on to challenge the Soccer Player to some Bob Marley. I can't remember if I won that round or not, but I can tell you that the Soccer Player and I were both pretty awful and pretty evenly matched in our awfulness! I sang a few more songs and sucked at every one, but I ended up having a lot of fun doing it. It's good to try new things every now and again and it's good to let yourself look like an idiot, too. Now I've just got to find a disc with songs that I listen to and know all the words to so I can kill it at our next Sing Star gathering!

(Oh, P.S., I thought I should add that we looked only half as douchey as the guy in the picture while doing it)

Edit It's now 5 months later and Soccer Player is very angry about this blog (in a joking way) and wants the record set straight and the world to know that he kicked my ass and is a way better singer than I am, so there you go.

Graceful Like a Deer

Yesterday I ran in to my bathtub and heard a big pop in my toes. The two closest to my pinky toe are now killing me. How do I know if they are broken? S calls me “Graceful like a deer” or “like a pro” when I do stuff like this because one time we went on a day trip up the coast and we had to dart through traffic to cross the road, I laughed and skipped across the road and said, “Look at me, I’m graceful like a deer” The words weren’t even all out of my mouth before I ran into a low brick wall next to the road. The “like a pro” comes from when he, Bun and I were drinking in my dorm room one night and I said I could chug vodka and then take a sip from a juice bottle and mix the drinks in my mouth “like a pro.” I took too big of a gulp of vodka then was still determined to sip some juice down and ended up throwing it up on my bed and near S! Like a pro indeed…

A Long December

After my parents left, S and I just continued to get closer. Bun was in love for the first time, too. She was really missing her family though and couldn’t wait to get home. She started getting depressed and though she didn’t want to leave Gangles, she also, couldn’t see herself living in Australia for any longer. She stopped going to classes and I very rarely saw her. I think Gangles was the only one who saw her frequently as she moved in with him basically so not even her roommates saw her anymore.
S told me he loved me after we had been dating about 6 months. It happened at the end of a long night out on the town for Gangles’ 21st birthday. I was in love with S at this point, too, and so excited that he had said it.
I asked S to come to California at Christmas time. He was excited as he is a big movie buff and wanted to see all the things they show in movies for real.
I left in November and went back home to work at the surf shop I had worked at for a few years before moving. I missed S like crazy, but also enjoyed seeing some old friends and coworkers. S got in like 2 days before Christmas. I was working so Mom and Nae picked him up at LAX for me, but there was a problem. First, S didn’t have our address and you need one for the Customs forms so they can track you down if they need to while you are in the U.S. Secondly, Nae and Mom couldn’t find him so it took a couple hours to track him down in the right terminal! Off to a great start! I was so excited at work all day, but my manager wouldn’t let me go home early as it was a very busy time of year obviously. I rushed home afterwards and they weren’t home. I paced until they got there. Then he was there and I didn’t know how to act. I was so awkward. I stepped on his foot when he came in to give me a hug and a kiss. We had an amazing time together. It was S’s first Christmas ever, as his religion doesn’t celebrate Christmas, and he ripped through his presents so fast and so excitedly! We went to the San Diego Zoo with my Mom and Nae (Dad was working), we hit up Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm, saw all the people from the travel group S had met while they were in Sydney, we drove up to Yosemite just the two of us for a few nights and it was beautiful with snow on the ground and S was just amazed by the place. We then went to Santa Cruz to visit Nae and S fell in love with the area. He loved the coast line and the sea lions and Pizza My Heart and Saturn Café. He loved staying at the Hilton in a suite with my Mom and the free breakfast that came with it.
Once again, my parents proved their awesomeness when I told them I wanted to do my whole degree in Australia and they agreed to pay for it all. I even got to go on a business trip with my Mom to Singapore for a week before continuing on to Sydney.