Caterwauling

OK, I am going to stop writing about sex, because that invariably means my dreams will turn X-rated the very same night.

Sweet Jesus. *fanning self*

Move along, nothing to see here…

I’ve been following the Anthony Weiner scandal with mild interest. Wait that’s not the right word — disgust. Yeah, that’s it.

There’s a brilliant e-card over at SomeECards.com that says: Feel free to sext me once you have the finely toned pecs of a nerdy New York congressman. I love it.

I recently emptied my cache of such photos. Particularly among my married male friends over the years, I received a number of penis and pec pics. And while some folks were, uh, endowed and I can see why they were eager to share the wealth with women beyond their wives, I never really understood the pecs pics. I mean, we weren’t talking about hard bodies here (above the waist, anyway).

Men need to realize that women are not really all that turned on by men. Just like they don’t give a flying fuck about shoes, we really don’t care about their dicks. Honestly. I live my life just fine without having one nearby at all times.

I’ve stared, disappointed, at the ceiling hundreds of times while one was shoved into me while they somehow felt that this reverse whack-a-mole process was actually pleasurable. I’ve watched them finish, triumphant, while I was resigning myself to the fact that, well, yay it’s done but boo that I failed to enjoy it an eighth as much.

What kills me is how many guys out there don’t want to call you again because they’re afraid you will get attached. When really, we’re praying they don’t call again because we’d get closer to orgasm by going to a shoe sale. Fuck it — I’ve had more orgasms in shoe stores than in beds (or on tables, countertops, thrown up against walls, whatever).

I know we women in our (albeit late) childbearing years should be using our Law of Attraction techniques to attract men into our lives. But when that only seems to bring married ones who are just too enthralled with their own junk to keep it to themselves, or it brings others who are, again, enthralled with their own junk and feel the need to stick it in new places like they need to go on all the rides at damn Disney World, meh. Keep it. Really.

I heard a joke today that some guy once had a thought about the clitoris, but then he couldn’t find it again. That made me laugh. I think they know where it is (like you know there’s a slot machine somewhere in, oh, Vegas, sure), but it’s not as critically important as their naughty bits.

I feel bad for the wives of the men whose junk once littered my computer’s memory. I didn’t ask for any of that crap and while there were some impressively artistic shots, that’s where my appreciation ended. The only saving grace to having someone ramming their doo-hickey up your hoo-hah is that you don’t have to look at it.

But, I don’t know if I would share it, whether with their wives or the media or what. I like to think that everyone comes to their senses eventually. I mean, isn’t disappointing one woman for the rest of your life enough? Do you really have to repulse a bunch of others, too?

And don’t get me started on the ones who sent naughty pictures of their WIVES. That’s a blog entry for another day. But suffice it to say, Mrs. Oscar Meyer Weiner should be thanking her lucky stars that her dumbass husband was too impressed with his own junk to advertise anyone else’s.

Aboard the new Lady Delray

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

“Something, something about this place
Something ‘bout lonely nights and my lipstick on your face
Something, something about my cool Nebraska guy
Yeah something about
Baby you and I.”

— Lady Gaga, “You and I”

My head’s been a little stuck in the wayback machine these past couple of days. Perhaps because it’s not overly pleasant to keep my head in current times. What I need is to focus my thoughts on the immediate future because — scary or painful or not — it’s coming full-throttle.

I read a great blog story yesterday called Never Date a Writer, and I’m pretty sure I gave traffic a boost when I posted it on Facebook. Because, well, I think I have some people worried about that out there.

As well they should be. 😉

In the past few months, I’ve been re-engaging with my book characters, building up the character sketches I’ve carried around with me for years. And I’ve realized I’ve been too harsh on some … and not even CLOSE to exposing some others.

No malice intended. Well, except for the crazy-ass character whom I’m modeling after a psychopath I know just outside the D.C. line. The book character ain’t gonna know what hit him. 😉

But I am starting to take pleasure in taking what irks or otherwise troubles me about some folks and making my characters pay under the guise of “making them interesting.”

I’ve oft been told I’m “too nice” in the workplace. What they don’t know is what I do to torture my characters … even if the meanest thing I do is model them after some less-than-attractive traits from their human counterparts. Which can be downright cruel, in some instances.

I do have to confess that I’m really not too terrible to my characters. In fact, just yesterday, I was working on a sketch of the hero in the book series. I’ve always thought I would have met that character’s inspiration by now. But I haven’t yet experienced the all-consuming passion that I need the heroine to feel for him.

Or have I?

“Something, something about the chase
Six whole years
I’m a New York woman, born to run you down
So have my lipstick all over your face
Something, something about just knowing when it’s right.”

Just as I was wondering who I could model him after, the image was clear as day in my head. That one I met back in 1998. That one I swore to God I was going to marry someday. That one who eavesdrops on my life frequently and says hello every couple of years.

I’d said goodbye a long time ago. It took moving four hours away, but that worked wonders. 😉 Add another thousand miles to that and you’d think distance would erase the memory even better. But, alas, a well-timed song dedication sent me back to a time when just the thought of him invoked the dizzying feeling of my heart being squeezed by a scorching-hot hand.

He was in Tampa a couple years ago. Said he’d love to see me if I could make the trip. I couldn’t; it was a hellish time at the job. (Four months with only one lousy day off.)

I remember the last time I saw him. (Right before 9/11.) It was at a party I’d thrown for myself. (My place was always Party Central back in that era.)

I remember everyone leaving the party (and my BFFs Kristin and Steve pretending to leave but really going for a drink at the bar across the way. (God bless them!)

Anyway, let’s just say I remember everything. Nothing salacious or above a PG rating here, folks. Just, a proper goodbye. And that’s what makes it so sweet and so sad and so, so perfect in my mind.

There are many reasons why I don’t go back to that place, either on a mental visit or a real one. Mostly it’s that there’s nothing there for me anymore. It’s a foreign land, one that I don’t often admit to even setting foot in. (Except during football season!)

Maybe it’s because if I did go, I wouldn’t be able to leave alone again.

Perhaps where a story once ended, another would begin.

Or the outcome would be the same. And I can’t open up a wound I stitched shut with the strongest materials possible.

Either way, at least the fictional story will end exactly the way I want it to, with all the right words and our heroine being better for it.

Hell, our real-life heroine is better for being loved back.

“It’s been a long time since I came around
Been a long time but I’m back in town
This time I’m not leaving without you.”

Blazing orange sky and ocean

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

I am prone to panic.

I mean, it’s understandable now that I’ve become disenchanted and lazy. Who the hell wants to scramble for solutions at this age and energy level?

But since late 2004 and I was out of work for five solid months, I haven’t slept a good night’s sleep. I’ve always been terrified of … well, the worst. Whatever that may be. I don’t speak it aloud or even define it in my mind. Law of Attraction, yo.

A friend confessed the other day that she has the same fear. She’s had it for two years. And it’s all based on the same reason — how idiot employers think their superstars are simply disposable.

We should be the ones with the security, you know? With the knowledge base, the contacts and the reputation, we should be the FIRST ones these guys are fighting for. Not the ones to be carelessly cast aside under the auspices of, “Oh they will land on their feet somewhere else.”

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, THEY are the ones in over their head. They don’t know how to handle ideas that aren’t their own. So they shoot yours down and/or claim them as their own. Why is it your fault that they don’t know what they’re doing?

Speaking of “in over one’s head,” I’ve taken an uncanny interest in the Casey Anthony trial. The defense lawyer, Jose Baez, is every boss I’ve ever hated — he HAS to be the smartest guy in the room. And he will lob slights and personal insults to the people who ARE the smartest in the room.

Arpad Vass testified yesterday, bringing the nascent science of testing air to the courtroom for the first time ever. And perhaps it’s Baez’ job to attack the witnesses’ credibility, but I felt he did so even more unfairly than usual.

(Not saying he didn’t abuse Yuri Melich and, oh, Caylee’s GRANDPARENTS. He did. Seems everyone is on trial BUT the alleged murderer.)

Anyway, Vass seems to have a small speech impediment, and I felt like Baez was treating him like a special category of idiot. But if you actually listened to the guy, he was goddamn brilliant. And passionate. And confident.

Why do people have to try to bring down the Vasses of the world? My kvetch is on a bigger scale than just yesterday’s courtroom interaction. It’s the whole “Swinging Dick” theory — everyone’s gotta wield their widdle weiners and try to prove that theirs is the biggest … particularly those whose weiners you would need a microscope and a petrie dish to see.

I was always the type of supervisor who wanted smarter people on my team. I’m not ashamed to admit that I don’t know everything. Nor do I plan to become proficient at a thousand things. Nor do I want to pretend that I know more than the EXPERTS. (It always killed me how many people thought they were editorial gods and goddesses after one conversation with me. Uh, I forgot more than you will ever learn.)

Anyway, the good news is that Baez has no defense and Casey is surely soon to become the fourth woman on Florida’s Death Row.

And the better news is that Vass had jokes and zingers that he lobbed right back to Baez. I am ready to start a fan club for him. 🙂

But take that with you — it’s usually crystal-clear to others who’s the brains in the operation and who’s throwing roadblocks in their path to LOOK like the smart guy.

And when your credibility and experience gets attacked and patronized, just sit back and talk above their heads. Shouldn’t be too hard because the smartest people in the room are smart enough to know that they can stand to learn something from everyone else … and they will be laughing WITH you while the mean asshole struggles to come up with his next baseless insult because it’s the ONLY TRICK HE HAS.

Cotton candy colored clouds and ocean

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

Because I’d like to write something more intelligent than “argh,” “ack,” “pfft,” “bleargh” or “waaa-waaaaaah!” (i.e., Debbie Downer music), here’s life in a nutshell.

Note that I stole quite a few of these lines from somewhere else. Because, hey, if they said it better, who the hell am I to change perfection?

Aimed at no one in particular, since most of them won’t see this anyway.

1. I listen to every song you post on your wall. And download the very few I don’t already own.

2. “Every time you walk in the room
I could never be sure of a smile
You were never the same way twice
I’m falling in love, night after night
And it’s crazy.” — Blue Rodeo, “Try”

3.a. “Tomorrow you’ll realize what I’m worth. And I’ll be with the guy who realized it yesterday.” My favorite Twitterfeed, The Notebook

3.b. Same source: “Don’t wait for the right person to come into your life. Be the right person to come into someone else’s life.”

3.c. And again: “The only 3 things a guy should wanna change about his girl is her last name, her address and her viewpoint on men.”

3.d. One more time, with feeling: “I’m currently making some changes in my life. If you don’t hear from me anymore, you’re probably one of them.”

4. “If God meant the day to be perfect, then he wouldn’t have invented tomorrow.” — Girlfriend Facts feed

5. “If you see me out on the town
And it looks like I’m burning it down
You won’t ask and I won’t say
But in my heart I’m always somewhere with you.” – Kenny Chesney, “Somewhere With You”

6. Do people really believe their own B.S.? I promise, if you say something enough times, it still doesn’t make it true.

7. I’m changing all my passwords to “incorrect” — so that I when I can’t remember, my computer tells me “your password is incorrect.” (Can’t take credit for this but can’t remember where I got it!)

8. “Imagine a cool mountain stream. The air is crisp and the water is so clean you can clearly see the face of the person who is annoying you below the surface.” — The illustrious, incredible Silver Blue

9. My soul’s value ain’t on clearance, and my heart ain’t gonna be waiting at the store for you when you come back. Pay up or step off.

10. Hey Prince Charming, I know Google Maps sucks, you’re lost and you’re too proud to ask for directions. Just tell me where you are and I’ll come rescue YOU.

Any other words to live by to offer a girl?

CityWalk at Universal

Originally uploaded by dcwriterdawn

I keep dropping in on the Casey Anthony trial in Orlando (via the TV, not by driving north for three hours!), and I’m feeling sort of nostalgic for Universal Studios, where she claims she worked but no one can prove it.

Anyway, in comparison to her fucked-up existence, mine seems like a damn dream!

I have the mother of all blog posts brewing in my head. But alas, you’ll hear about it another day, Grasshopper.

Let’s just say that I officially have no proof that anyone has a soul.

It’s like when princes and princesses get divorced. Like, wait a minute — we HAD the fairy-tale ending. What’s THIS shit?

I take back everything I said about the Twunt. God, at least that person emblazons their character on their sleeve. I’d rather be screwed by someone who is CLEARLY INTENT on screwing me than being fucked by a longtime friend. Gimme a chance to lube up, at the very least — no need to make me bleed, too.

Anyway, long story. One in which I am complicit to a degree but I don’t want that to be the long-term situation. I prefer to be “in the know” — and my eyes are WIDE open.

But everyone has a good side — at least, I hope so. And I have a network that’s really going above and beyond to rescue me. It’s basically my opportunity to lose.

And while I’ll still be OK if I do lose it, or if it turns out to be not “just right,” I would like that to be MY decision … not anyone else’s.

The one thing I can leave you with is this: Be careful what you wish for. Because when you’re down to nothing, God is definitely up to something. And I think He likes to give us what we want, just to fuck with us. 🙂

There’s a phrase I hear from time to time in my industry, “swings and roundabouts.”

Basically it’s a way of saying something is a Catch-22, although it’s more balanced. In other words, to get something, you gotta give something.

Like, you have to exchange “having time to do fun things” for “getting the money to do fun things.” They’re kind of mutually exclusive, like if you have to give up “staying in your jammies all day” to “get a job.”

You see where this is going, yes?

Anyway, I’m swinging today. (That sounds a bit more interesting than it really is!) Rather, I’m enjoying the free time and the living in mah jammies because I think my soul has grown back enough to start roundabouting. Perks of working from home aside, little things like life’s little luxuries — and the big things, too — have been a little challenging to maintain and I’d like to think about reintegrating the ones that have fallen off the “necessities” list.

Everyone, if you’re so inclined, please light a money candle (green) for me if you get a chance, mmkay? I’ll take you to dinner when it can be on me again, I promise!