I'm Pretty

My roots have started growing out, and I had one too many at our Anna Karenina cocktail club last night, which means I woke up looking like this:

Thought

I was listening to a lot of Bright Eyes last week, and came to the sad realization that for about two years I was the girl in a Conor Oberst song. In case you don't know what that means, here are some sample lyrics:

"I'll call you eventually when I have the time, til then you're invisible."

"Me I'm not a gamble, you can count on me to split."

"The love I sell you in the evening, by the morning won't exist."

"I do as I please and lie through my teeth. Someone might get hurt, but it won't be me
I should probably feel cheap but I just feel free..."

"I want a lover I don't have to love . I want a girl who's too sad to give a fuck."

Oh Conor, you charmer. No wonder I spent so long chasing after disaffected hipsters. Thankfully I've moved on to modeling my life after a Tegan and Sara video. That is to say, confusing, Canadian, and awesome.

Beach Bum

We were only at the beach for two days, but that was long enough to put me in a post-vacation slump as soon as we got back. Fun things Doug and I did that make me want to escape from the city every weekend:

1) Went to the beach. Even at the shore it was 1,000 degrees, but that didn't stop us from running around in the ocean for an hour. I wanted to go out far enough that I could jump over the waves like I used to do when I was a little kid, but I'm apparently not as brave as I was when I was ten and only made it about twenty feet from shore. I guess when you get older you're more conscious of boring grown-up things, like the fact that you never so much learned "how to swim" as you learned "how to tread water, and not drown in a pool."

2) Ate a 5lb lobster. Okay, Doug split it with me. STILL. Its claw was the size of a baseball mitt.

3) Lost $20 at a slot machine. Okay, $40, but only $20 of it was mine.

4) Read the 170 pages of Anna K. I had left before our book club meeting tomorrow. KIDDING. I actually read six trashy magazines. DID YOU KNOW that according to Star Jenniffer Lopez wore an ugly expensive dress better than Blake Lively did, but according to US Weekly Blake wore it better? I did.

To make myself feel better I just bought a dress I don't need and can't afford to wear to a wedding in three weeks. Now it's time for me to go home and read 100 pages of a giant Russian novel.

Watch Out NJ

Beach! Considering how excited I am, one would assume I was going somewhere a little more exotic than the New Jersey Shore. Whatever. The beach is the beach, and this is probably the only time I'll get to go this year not counting Coney Island, which I don't. I know people who have gone swimming there and claim it's fine, but I'm still convinced I would end up with multiple rashes and a mysterious respiratory disease.

In any case, I'm off! I have packed both a one-piece and a two-piece. While the bikini is much cuter, I tried it on last week and freaked out because the bottoms dug into my side fat a little, and I became convinced that everyone on the beach would mistake me for some sort of prehistoric sea blob. My backup is a black one-piece that features a cableknit pattern that I'm pretty sure wasn't even in style when I bought it five years ago. In either case, the forecast on the beach this weekend calls for scorching HOTNESS.

Mermaids Belong at the Beach

Monday night I did a show at a punk/metal bar in Park Slope. Seeing that all of my acts involve me trying to look adorable while wearing a big blond wig, I was a little worried about seeming totally out of place. I ended up doing a mermaid act to a surf rock song, which is the closest thing to metal I could manage. I'm not sure how well I fit in, but I had fun. Then Doug and I ended up going back to my apartment which we haven't done in months. The good thing about this: It's only one stop away from the bar, and we managed to get home before 1am. The bad thing: The apartment was sweltering.

We turned on the air conditioner in my room, but it takes a while to cool the place down. In the meantime I hadn't eaten anything since lunch, and the only food in my apartment was a can of chili. The thought of eating that in my 500 degree apartment made me want to jump out the window, so I decided to just go to sleep. Doug and I settled into my twin bed trying our best not to touch because we both felt so hot and disgusting. This was not easy as Doug is 6'3. I walked into work yesterday a cranky, hungry zombie.

Burlesque: I love you. You are so sparkly and fun! I'm glad I do not have to think about you at all for the next couple of weeks.

Countdown to the beach: 2 DAYS.

If It Ain't Broke . . .

Last night Doug and I went to a little French place in Soho and had moules frites. It was so amazing I had a new understanding of people who go out to eat and take pictures of their food. Then I started to think about what it would be like if I decided to turn this into a food blog. I quickly realized there would be two major problems with this.

1) The only meat I eat is fish. I feel like these days to be considered a serious foodie you have to be willing to eat bacon ice cream covered with whipped bacon and hot bacon sauce.

2) An attempt to keep a food diary would look something like this: Salad, banana, chili from a can, fake chicken patty, pasta, frozen macaroni and cheese, wine, Lean Cuisine, hummus, lollipop, salad, pasta, chili from a can, wine, banana, hummus.

On the one hand, this would probably make most people feel better about their diets. On the other hand it would be boring, and depress me. I think I'll just stick to my current format of blogging about whatever random bullshit pops into my head for the reading pleasure of five people.

Always Look on the Bright Side

Places I Would Like to Go This Summer:

1. Nantucket, Massachusetts

2. Cape Cod, Massachusetts

3. San Diego, California

4. Anywhere in Europe

Places I Am Actually Going This Summer:

1. Alexandria, Virginia

2. Ventnor, New Jersey

3. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

4. Stamford, Connecticut

These might seem like poor substitutes, but I'm trying to work on being more positive. The Jersey Shore might not be as picturesque as Nantucket, but there is a guy who walks down the beach selling Chipwiches out of a cooler. And while Alexandria doesn't have too many adorable outdoor cafes where I can drink red wine and chain smoke all day, I will get to sit in Doug's mom's backyard and eat crab legs from Costco (which btw are fucking amazing). Now I just have to figure out how Philadelphia is better than San Diego and I will be all set to have the second best summer ever.

Russian Novels are Hilarious

Jokes told at Anna K. meeting last night:

Q: How many librarians does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

A: Let me look that up for you.

Knock, knock

Who's there?

Feminist.

Feminist wh-

That's not funny.

A pirate walks into a bar with a large wheel attached to the front of his pants. He goes to the bar and orders a drink. The bartender looks at him and says, "Did you know there's a wheel stuck to your crotch?"

The pirate grimaces and says, "Aaaar! It's driving me nuts!"

Lily also told one that began with "Two whales walk into a bar . . ." and ended with a punchline so amazing putting it in print would never do it justice. Sorry folks. If you want more hilarious jokes like these you're just going to have to start your own Russian literature book club. Or buy some Laffy Taffy.

More Unicorns

This week I have gotten two story rejections, and a rejection from the NY Burlesque Festival. Rejections suck. They suck even more than waiting. Also, I haven't been able to run this week because it has been approximately 1,000,000 degrees here in New York. My only consolation is that a video of me being Leigh's assistant unicorn at Poets and Puppets has been posted on the Poetry Foundation blog:

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2010/07/brooklyn-ny/

I'm in the first video. If anyone out there is in the market for a unicorn that is "ineffectual at arriving on cue" please let me know. I apparently have nothing else going on right now.

We All Know How This Ends

Tomorrow is the second meeting of my Anna Karenina book club. I have never been in a book club before this one, and am discovering the things that are good and bad about them.

Good: Eating snacks, drinking wine, and having others confirm my suspicion that Vronsky is the 19th Century Russian version of every douchy hipster I have ever dated.

Bad: Having a date I need to finish different parts of the book by compels me to treat this like a school assignment, meaning I don't open the book for weeks then have to cram before our meeting and read 100 pages in two days. I thought being in a book club would encourage me to read more, but there is a good chance this will be the only thing I get through this summer.

Anna Karenina has been on my list of "books I should read" for the past five years though, so I guess I can live with that. It also helps that Anna Karenina is basically a soap opera. I'm not even halfway through and already there have been two affairs, an unplanned pregnancy, a rejected marriage proposal, and two characters predicting their own deaths. The only things keeping the novel from really kicking into high gear are the lack of evil twins and all those chapters about farming. I can only assume that those issues will work themselves out in the next 450 pages. Otherwise it wouldn't be a classic, right?

America! Fuck Yeah.

Last night Doug and I were supposed to go to a concert in Gowanus. Tuscadero was performing. They're this amazing 90s pop/punk girl band from D.C., and this was going to be the second time they've performed since they broke up eleven years ago. As you've probably guessed, we didn't make the show. Our train from Amherst didn't get in until 7, and considering that the band went on around 10, buying the tickets in the first place was stupidly ambitious of us. Instead, we went home, ate frozen macaroni, and watched The Bachelorette (yes, Doug gets rewarded for sitting through this with me.)

Tally for our weekend:
4th of July Parties Attended: 1
Drinks Consumed: Many
Grilled Things Eaten: 2
Pellet Guns Shot: 1
Targets Hit: None
Games of Badminton Played: 1
Fireworks Seen: None (Unless I count the ones we saw a family setting off when we took a walk around the neighborhood. I think they were supposed to go up in the air, but as soon as they were lit they fell over and started spewing sparks into the driveway.)
Bug Bites Gotten: 10,000,000
Bruce Springsteen Songs Heard: 100 (Estimate)

Even though I didn't see any "real" fireworks, I think I celebrated the birth of our nation in a way that would make our founding fathers proud; Guns, Booze, and Bruce.

Eye of the Something

Doug and I went running together yesterday in Prospect Park. On our way back I started singing "Eye of the Tiger," replacing all of the lyrics with his name.

Me: Doug. Doug, Doug Doug. Doug, Doug, Doouuuuuug.
Him: If you keep doing that I'm running away from you.

I stopped.

Then, because we are now officially one of those couples, we came home and made recovery smoothies using homemade almond milk and strawberries from the farmer's market. Or maybe we ordered a pizza, and drank beer . . .

Happy Summer!

It's July 2nd! That means it's almost July 4th! Which means it's almost time for Doug and I to visit our awesome and amazing recently engaged friends in Amherst! Yay! Here are some other things I have going on this month:

Not Being Poor: You know what will make you poor so fast it will make your head spin? Piecing together costumes for three new burlesque acts, getting your hair dyed blonde, and buying round trip Amtrak tickets that's what. Last month I did all these things and was moths flying out of my wallet broke by the middle of the month. I sold books to the Strand twice, took my loose change to the bank, did a low-paying side project for my boss, and "borrowed" an uncomfortably large chunk of money from my savings account just so I wouldn't be completely destitute by the end of the month i.e. unable to afford a bottle of wine to bring to my Anna Karenina book club. July is all about BUDGETING.

Waiting: I have one story out on submission, and I sent in an application for the New York Burlesque Festival a couple weeks ago. I should hear back from the NYBF in a couple weeks, and the journals I submitted to in about five years. I am bad at this. On the one hand I like having a few things out there because it leaves open the possibility for something magical to happen. Until I get a rejection letter it is theoretically possible that I could be sitting at my desk one day and suddenly get a letter from Tin House saying I am amazing and they would be honored to publish me. On the other hand, that is probably not going to happen, and I am a very impatient person

Performing: I have two shows coming up! One on July 10th at an undetermined location and one on the 19th at Lucky 13 in Park Slope. Yay! This means putting together two new acts in the next two weeks. Eep!

Running: Why did I decide that July would be the perfect time to start running again for the first time in over a year? Why is the sky blue? Why is a raven like a writing desk? Some questions have no answers.

Beaching: My aunt and uncle have a house half an hour outside of Atlantic City, and Doug and I will be staying with them for a weekend at the end of the month. It will probably be the only time I go to the beach this summer, so I'd better tan overtime. Kidding! I don't tan. My trips to the beach tend to involve slathering on half a bottle of SPF 30, eating an ice cream sandwich, and going home after an hour because I'm hot/bored. Summer!